Rise of the Beast (76 page)

A winged demonic lieutenant dropped down in front of Molock. He made his report. “My lord, I have seen the extent of the damage to building one and the ring with my own eyes. We did extensive damage. I truly believe that these invaders are now trapped here.”

“But you are not certain,” deduced Molock.

“Well, no, not certain,” was the reply.

“If it were my decision, we would withdraw,” said Molock. “There is nothing more to be gained here. In all likelihood, the ring is inoperable and Serena is dead. But it is not my decision.” He paused. “We now have about 150 troops on the ground, do we not?”

“One hundred and seventy four, including me,” said the lieutenant.

And how many reserves do we have standing by in Paris?”

“An additional 110,” replied the lieutenant.

“And how many dark angels are there?” continued Molock.

“We are not sure,” admitted the lieutenant, “surely fewer than 15.”

“Then this is what we shall do,” said Molock. “Bring all of them through the ring and assemble them here in 15 minutes. We are going to stage an all-out attack on the defenders of that building. I want it leveled to the ground. Then we will go through and search this entire island inch by inch, even the caves. Only then will I consider this operation complete.”

“My lord,” objected the lieutenant, “we only have eight hours to escape the devastation that the comets shall surely bring.”

“All the more reason to begin now, wouldn’t you think?”

The lieutenant bowed before his master and departed. Molock looked toward the building in question. Even from here he could just make out a dark angel pirouetting on the trade winds above it. It was time to end this thing and get out of here while they still could.

Fifteen minutes found the assault underway. The winged demons, over a hundred in number, took to the sky to resume their fireball barrage. Those who possessed a human by union or by the more conventional method began their advance upon this makeshift fortress on foot. Their orders were simple—to secure that hill within three hours and bring back the bodies they recovered.

“It’s no good,” lamented Tom, turning from the power supply. “I’m sorry, Abaddon. I can’t make it work. There must be more damage to the system than I’d originally thought.”

“So what do we do now?” asked Abaddon.

Tom seemed deep in thought. There had to be a solution. Then he happened upon it. “No, no, wait a minute. There was another ring set up on a barren atoll some 20 or so miles to the south of here. Aaron told me about it in a briefing several days ago. I’m sure I could find it. It is almost certainly unguarded at this point. They removed its power supply, but this power supply I brought with me still works. We could hot wire it. It would probably be good for one transport, maybe two, assuming they didn’t take any of the other guts out of the unit. It could work.”

“We have a massive force approaching, by air and ground,” came the warning over Abaddon’s radio.

Abaddon turned from his radio and looked toward Tom. “How long would it take you to be ready to leave?”

“Three minutes,” replied Tom.

“Very well, keep working,” said Abaddon, running toward the control room.

What he saw pierced him to the heart. Serena lay beside her mother, weeping. Both Bedillia and Leland Senior were dead.

“She gave her life to save me,” wept Serena. “I wish we’d have had more time.”

“They’re coming; we’ve got to go,” said Abaddon.

He gently picked up Serena and headed for the door. Leland and Chris followed. Both wore pairs of lab overalls and steel toed shoes they had managed to pick up from a nearby storeroom.

Returning to the main room, they found Tom still busy. He’d opened an access port at the rear of the platform upon which the ring stood.

“We’ve got to go,” warned Abaddon.

“I need a few more minutes,” said Tom, working furiously. He looked up but momentarily. “Where’s Bedillia; where’s Leland?” The silence led him to only one conclusion. “Oh God,” he murmured. Tears came to his eyes. “Now I know I need to do this.”

“Do what?” asked Abaddon.

“I’m going to leave those demons a little gift to remember us by,” said Tom, working all the faster, “though I suspect that memory will be measured in the microseconds.”

“A bomb?” asked Chris.

“Oh no,” said Tom, anger in his voice, “not just a bomb. I’m going to break some eggs on this one, eggs of the atomic variety.”

“A nuclear bomb?” deduced Chris.

“Something like that,” said Tom. “I’ve wrapped eight power cells around the still live field coil of the ring. If they knock out the reserve power to the ring with one of their fireballs, the coil will discharge and this little gem will blow this whole island to Hell, where it belongs. Otherwise, I’ll set it to detonate in two hours.”

Tom was already zippering up the access plate. Abaddon would give him the time he needed.

“OK, all set,” said Tom. He glanced back at the ring. “This one is for you, Bedillia.”

The group met with their small force of dark angels and ACs at the front door to the facility. “I have asked much of you during this mission. I will need to ask still more,” said Abaddon. “I’ll carry Serena. Four of you will accompany me, carrying the humans, to an atoll some 20 miles south of here. The rest of you and all but 20 ACs will engage the enemy. Don’t take unnecessary risks. You’ll need to engage the demon forces for about ten minutes while we get the humans to safety. Then split up. Just get away from the island any way you can. Once you are sure that you are not being followed, turn due south. Meet us at the atoll; we’ll wait for you. From there we’ll gate back to Refuge.”

It took but two minutes for them to get organized. Seven dark angels vaulted straight into the sky, while the others, with their human cargo, flew off to the north. They flew barely above the spray of the ocean at the highest speed they could muster. Then they slowly turned to the west, then the south. They were not detected.

Three miles off to the left, Abaddon witnesses the distant glow of an angelic battle. They placed the battle ever further behind them. He prayed that his fellows and his children would have time to escape before the device that Tom had set out detonated.

It was the better part of an hour before Abaddon and the others set foot on the deserted atoll. The ring was still here, but was it functional?

Tom immediately went to work on it. It was several minutes before the verdict was in.

“It’s all here,” he announced. “I’ll have it powered up inside of an hour. You folks are going home.”

It was about 45 minutes later that the first of the other group of dark angels began to arrive along with the ACs. The last two were in sight, coming in from the northeast when a flash of light erupted along the northern horizon. The classical luminous mushroom cloud quickly followed.

“Now that’s a pretty sight,” said Tom, gazing upon the work of his own hand. “That one is for you, Bedillia.”

It was a comment that gave Abaddon some measure of concern. He was
certain that vengeance was a part of Tom’s motives in orchestrating this display of power. He decided not to say anything about it.

It was over a minute later that the low rumble reached them. By then the ring was powered up. The blue starry mists appeared within it, obscuring what lie beyond.

“Are you sure you won’t come with us?” asked Abaddon, turning to Tom.

“No,” said Tom. “My work is here. Anyway, I have to see that the others are teleported to safety.”

Abaddon turned to Serena, who lay in her husband’s arms. She looked back at him with her eyes about half open. “It was good to see you again,” he said. He kissed her hand. “Until we meet again.”

Serena managed a slight smile. “Until we meet again.”

“I owe you more than I can ever say,” said Chris, shaking the hand of the dark angel.

“Just take good care of her,” said Abaddon. “That will be thanks enough.” Chris nodded, “I will.”

“We have a solid lock on the ring in Refuge,” announced Tom, “stable wormhole established, but I don’t know for how long. Come on folks, let’s move it.”

The dark angels and ACs rushed into the wormhole. They weren’t particularly fond of remaining here. It was then that Serena noticed that Goliath wasn’t moving.

“Go, you’ve got to go,” she whispered. “I’ll be just fine, but there are others who need you. Please, go.”

Goliath nodded, rubbed his fur against her chin, and flew into the mists. Serena was positive she heard a voice in her head, a goodbye. Was it from Goliath? Yes, she was sure of it.

The mists dissipated. Tom was making some quick entries into the small keyboard within the housing to the one side.

“This thing sure is primitive,” he grumbled. “We have 34 percent power left, more than enough. OK, I’ve been thinking. You said that you entered the wormhole through a barn in Illinois. Well that link is still available according
to this. I can’t think of a safer destination on Earth. We might need to take care of some bad guys on the other side, then again, maybe not. At least we’ll be in the good old U.S.A.”

Krissie smiled, “That sounds good to me.”

“Go for it,” said Leland.

“Here we go,” said Tom, punching in the coordinates. Yet when he hit the enter key the whole display went dark. “What now?” he grumbled. He rebooted the system, it came up all right, but it wouldn’t accept the coordinates when he reentered them. Tom stood there for a moment then entered a new set of coordinates. “OK, we’ll go to New Zealand first, then form the wormhole to the U.S. from there.” Yet, when he hit the enter key, the screen went blank again.

“I take it that we have a problem,” said Leland, walking over to Tom.

“Yeah,” confirmed Tom. “I’ll figure it out. It has to be a small problem. I’ll solve it. Everyone just relax.”

And so they did. During the next three hours, Tom had just about every access panel on the instrument off and on, but success eluded him. It was just past one in the afternoon when he found the problem. He gingerly wiggled then pulled the circuit board from its slot in the instrument. He scanned it carefully, confirmed what he’d seen from the access port. “This is at least part of it,” he announced. “It’s a burned power trace. This is why the relays aren’t firing.” He shook his head. “This thing is just so primitive.” He looked still further. “No, it’s worse than that we’ve got some component damage. Forming a wormhole to Hell was just a bit much for this ring.”

“Can you fix it?” asked Chris.

Tom sat down, leaning against the ring. “I don’t know. Let me think.”

“Don’t think too long,” said Leland. “We’ve got about, what, three hours?”

“Not that long,” said Tom, looking at the board. “Just give me some time.”

And they did. Leland and Krissie sat together under the sheet metal pavilion arm in arm. If they were going to meet their end out here, at least they would be together.

Chris sat there, leaning against one of the concrete pillars, with Serena in
his arms. How she had survived this long he couldn’t even begin to guess. She seemed so peaceful right now.

The others had barely noticed that Tom was on the move again, literally rewiring the circuit board. The two couples had managed to fade away into a light sleep even as Tom worked furiously. He had an idea. He only hoped that he had time to make it work.

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