The Pilgrims of Rayne (31 page)

IBARA

“C
ome on,” I said to Siry, gently grabbing his arm.

Siry let me lead him, but he felt like a coiled spring. I figured that might be helpful, but not just then. I pulled him out of the workstation and walked along the glass corridor toward the center of the pyramid. Saint Dane's images watched us from thousands of monitors, softly chuckling. It was like being in a surreal fun house where the clown from hell was having a lot more fun than we were.

“We're going into the center of the pyramid,” I told Siry. “Where all the jump tubes are. Whatever is inside, it's something Saint Dane wants us to see.”

“Why should we do anything he wants?”

“To find out what his plans are. Stay alert. At some point we're going to have to get away. Do as I say and don't hesitate.”

Siry nodded. I pushed open the door at the end of the core, and the two of us stepped into the immense center of Lifelight. I'm amazed to say that the space didn't look much different from when I had been there before. Three centuries before. The interior was a huge, cavernous space with multiple
balconies built along the sloping walls. The floor had to be the size of two football fields next to one another. The sides were built at a steep angle that eventually came to a point high in the sky—the point of the pyramid. Access to the hundreds of balconies was from a central tube with an elevator that went from the floor all the way to the top of the pyramid. There were hundreds of catwalks that spanned the distance from the tube out to the various levels. I had walked along one of those narrow sky bridges. The memory made my palms sweat. It was the closest I ever came to walking a tightrope.

Each balcony had thousands of rooms that contained the Lifelight jump tubes. From the floor I could look up and see many of the closed doors, just as I remembered. Only this time, no lights were lit outside the doors to indicate a jump was taking place. This was no longer Lifelight. It was a mausoleum. After so many years the jumpers would be nothing more than skeletons. Or dust. The idea that we were looking up at the graves of multiple thousands of people sent a chill up my spine.

I glanced at Siry. He was in awe, though I didn't think he really got the idea of Lifelight or that this had become a place of the dead. It didn't matter. That was ancient history. Looking across the floor, I realized it wasn't the sheer size of the place that stunned Siry. There was something else. Something far more disturbing. Standing maybe twenty yards from us, with his arms folded, was Saint Dane. In the flesh. Or whatever it is he's made out of. Seeing him there, alone, unmoving, made my skin crawl. He was in his normal form, standing well over six feet tall with his all-black suit. The dark suit made his bald head stand out even more starkly. As far away as he was, I could see that he was smiling and staring at us with his cold eyes.

“Welcome back, Pendragon,” he called with a sinister
sneer, his voice echoing through the pyramid.

“Where is Twig?” Siry bellowed as he took a threatening step toward him. I quickly held him back.

“Whoa,” I cautioned. “That won't help.”

“What exactly is a twig?” Saint Dane asked innocently.

“She better not be hurt,” Siry shouted, straining against me. I gripped his arm to keep him under control.

Saint Dane shook his head in disappointment. “Haven't you explained to him that there is much more at stake than the life of one of his playmates?”

“Who are you!” Siry screamed in anger.

I gripped him tighter, holding him back.

“Don't you know?” Saint Dane said with glee. “I'm the boogeyman.”

“Calm down,” I whispered to Siry. “Yelling at him won't help.”

Siry backed off. He didn't relax, but he backed off.

“What do you want to show us?” I barked.

Saint Dane strolled casually, glancing up at the balconies. “It's been about Veelox from the beginning, you know,” he began. “This is where I've been preparing to stage my conquest of Halla. I guess you could say it's been three hundred years in the making. Once Ibara has been snuffed, the Convergence will begin.”

“You haven't told me what the Convergence is,” I said casually.

Saint Dane stopped, looked at me, and smiled. “I haven't, have I?”

He didn't then, either. So much for trying to trick him into answering me.

He continued, “To be quite honest, Ibara isn't important. I consider it more of a training exercise.”

“Training who?” I asked. “For what?”

“Why, Pendragon!” he exclaimed with mock surprise. “I thought you had so brilliantly put it together.”

As if on cue, I sensed movement. Siry tensed. Creeping out of the shadows like rats came the Flighters. Dozens of them. No, more like hundreds. Behind us, several more appeared, forcing us to step closer to Saint Dane. They formed a giant ring around us. Their tattered, rotten clothing now made sense. They were living examples of what had happened to the city itself. Their clothes were falling apart because no new clothing had been manufactured in centuries. They were like rodents, living in squalor. It was no big surprise that Saint Dane was able to organize them into assaulting Ibara. Whatever he promised them would be better than what they had.

“This is beneath you,” I said to Saint Dane. “These people are desperate. They'll do whatever you ask. Where's the challenge?”

“It's true,” Saint Dane replied. “It wasn't difficult.”

“Then what's the point? “I asked. “You always have some grand philosophical reason for targeting a territory and proving how greedy people can be. Or arrogant. Or power hungry. What's the big lesson here? What are you trying to prove? That you can organize a bunch of desperate losers into attacking Ibara? This whole thing seems kind of…pathetic.”

I was hoping to tick him off. I didn't. He laughed. Again. I've mentioned how much I hate that, right? Only about a hundred times.

“Pendragon, my boy, I had hoped you would one day realize how misguided your efforts have been. I tried, time and again, to demonstrate how the people of the territories are their own worst enemies, but my lessons were never learned.
I will reluctantly admit defeat on that front. You are beyond help. You could have been by my side while the new Halla was created, but I'm afraid that offer is no longer available. All that is left now is to complete what I started.”

The ring of Flighters got smaller. They stared at us with dead eyes. Their soulless gazes didn't bother me as much as Saint Dane's words. Something about him had changed. He was as self-assured as ever, but this felt different. It was like he didn't care about me anymore. I've always felt as if he needed to defeat me in order to conquer Halla. His new attitude made me feel as if that didn't matter anymore. Or worse. It felt as if I had already been defeated. I needed to claw myself back into the game.

“You're kidding, right?” I said, scoffing. “This is the future of Halla? You really think this grunge can conquer anything? Sure, they can beat up on a bunch of kids, but you don't seriously think they're going to threaten Ibara? And then what do you plan to do? Take these smelly creeps and march on Second Earth? On Third Earth? Is that your big Convergence?” I laughed. “Go for it! But do me a favor. Make sure I'm around to watch the fun.”

Saint Dane continued to smile. I tried to hold mine. It wasn't easy. I knew there had to be more.

“To be sure,” he said with a sinister smile. “I most definitely want you there to watch the fun.”

The pyramid was suddenly filled with sound. I couldn't tell what it was at first, but it sounded like high-pitched squeaking. It came from everywhere, reverberating off the pyramid walls and bouncing around the cavernous space.

“What is that?” Siry whispered nervously.

My eye caught movement up above. All around us, on every level, the doors leading to the jump tubes opened up.
Every last one of them. I had the fleeting thought that the ghosts of the dead were rising up from their graves. That wasn't the case, unfortunately. I would have liked that a lot better than the truth. People were slowly stepping out of the jump rooms. If every jump room held only one person, there could easily be ten thousand people about to make an appearance.

“Flighters,” Siry gasped.

I watched as the people walked slowly and stiffly out the doors, toward the balcony railing that looked down over the center of the pyramid.

Siry was near panic. “We can never fight off that many,” he said.

I stared up at the thousands of faces as they walked to the railing and looked down on us. My throat clutched. I knew what I was seeing, but my brain didn't want to accept it. In that one instant Saint Dane's plan became horrifyingly clear. I had underestimated him, again. From what I was seeing, he was absolutely capable of overrunning Ibara. No, worse. I understood why he considered Ibara a training exercise. The tiny island wouldn't stand a chance against this army. My mind was reeling. The possibilities were too horrible to comprehend. This
might
only be the beginning.

Saint Dane chuckled. “Still want to be around to watch, Pendragon?”

His plan for Ibara was becoming clear. His plan for Veelox was becoming clear. His plan to make Veelox his stepping-off point for the destruction of Halla was becoming clear. The truth was all around us, staring down from above.

“Pendragon,” Siry said, his voice cracking. “Those aren't Flighters.”

They wore the same rotten rags as Flighters, but that's where the similarity ended. They were much bigger than the
Flighters. I could say they looked well fed, but I knew the real reason. I knew these guys. I had fought these guys. On First Earth. At the gate. I had grabbed a handful of clothing and it had disintegrated. Now I realized why. It was all coming together in one, terrifying bundle. On First Earth there were only a few. Here, there were thousands, with no way to know how many more might be right behind.

“They aren't Flighters,” I said to Siry. “They're called dados, and Ibara doesn't stand a chance.”

IBARA

T
he ring of Flighters slowly grew tighter around us, while thousands of dados watched from above. As the reality of what we now faced became clear, I was hit with a wave of emotion I'm not sure how to describe, other than to say I felt beaten. Not just on Veelox. Everywhere.

“You're right about the Flighters, Pendragon,” Saint Dane said. “They aren't capable of mounting anywhere near the kind of force I need. Though they have been quite helpful. We've been testing the defenses of Ibara for a while now. Their hard work will insure the minimum amount of loss when the fun begins.”

Fun. He was about to overrun Halla with a mechanized army. Talk about mixing the territories! Everything else had been prelude. With an army like this, he could wreak havoc on Ibara. And Second Earth. And Third Earth. And every other territory that wouldn't know how to deal with such an invincible foe.

“As I said, it's too late, Pendragon,” he chuckled.

“For what?” I asked, not really caring to know.

“For you to join me,” he said with mock sympathy. “It wouldn't be the same, now that you know you've been beaten. I wanted you when you thought you still had a chance. Now, well, it would be embarrassing for you to beg. So don't. Unless you feel the need.”

“What do we do?” Siry whispered.

“Nothing. It's over.”

“It's not,” he hissed in anger.

All I wanted was to crawl into one of the Lifelight tubes and make it my home for eternity. Siry grabbed me roughly by the arm.

“Ahhh!” Saint Dane exclaimed with a laugh. “This delusional young Traveler has some fight left. Perhaps you should explain to him how completely hopeless your situation is.”

I was in a daze. Instead of trying to come up with our next move, all I could do was imagine an army of dados marching on Washington. Or New York. Or Xhaxhu. I grew more depressed with every passing second…while the Flighters closed in.

Siry pulled my arm, forcing me to look at him. His eyes were on fire. He got right in my face and angrily whispered, “We can't give up.”

“They're robots, Siry. Mechanical men. They can't die. Even if one did, there'd be a dozen more to take its place.”

“We have to warn Ibara,” he said, still whispering. “They need to know what's coming. They have the right to try and defend themselves.”

“This is way bigger than Ibara.”

“Not right now it isn't,” Siry shot back. “We can't give up.”

I focused on him. Siry had grown up in the last few days. Dealing with death and Armageddon will tend to do that.
Where I had tuned out, he was now thinking clearly. I glanced over his shoulder to see the ring of Flighters tightening up. We were at the center of a large circle that had reached Saint Dane.

“Whispering secrets?” Saint Dane taunted. “Do you actually think you can do anything to stop an army of dados?”

I looked to Siry and saw determination. I looked to Saint Dane and saw arrogance. It was the jolt I needed. The hatred I felt for that guy surged back. We might have been on the verge of defeat, but we were going down swinging.

“Stay close to me,” I whispered to Siry.

Before I could talk myself out of it, I bolted toward the center of the pyramid. Siry was right with me. My best hope was that we would catch the Flighters by surprise before they braced themselves to stop us. I blasted toward the smallest one and barreled right through him, shoulder first. With a loud grunt I knocked the vagrant on his butt. We were out of the circle.

Saint Dane's laugh echoed through the pyramid. He was still having fun. Good for him. We'd gotten over the first hurdle. There were plenty more to come. I actually had a plan. It was a desperate one, but that pretty much described our situation. I jammed for the elevator in the center of the pyramid. If we could get inside and close the door, we might be able to get up to another level and lose ourselves. There were all sorts of things wrong with that plan. Dados were everywhere. The elevator might not even be working. Or it might not have been on the ground floor. It was a desperate plan, but at least it was a plan.

The Flighters finally figured they should be doing something and ran after us. They weren't the brightest bunch. We reached the central tube way ahead of them.

“Where are we going?” Siry asked.

“Up!”

The elevator door was open. The car was on the ground. Our luck was holding. We jumped inside and I started hitting buttons. I didn't know how to work this thing, so I figured if I hit them all, the door was bound to close. That was assuming the elevator had power in the first place.

The Flighters were now sprinting for the door.

“We're trapped,” Siry said, just as the doors closed in front of us. I heard several loud thuds outside as the Flighters bashed into it. They hammered with their fists, as if that would make it open. It didn't. I saw a lever that I hoped would get us off the ground. I couldn't remember how Aja had run this thing. I feared that if I hit the wrong button, the door would open up again and, “Surprise, you Flighters! Just kidding!” I grabbed the lever and pushed it forward. The elevator lurched. We had power!

“Are we moving?” Siry asked, frightened. He'd never seen an elevator.

“We're going up the central tube,” I answered.

“To where?”

“I don't know. I'm thinking we take this thing up as high as it will go, and see what we find.”

“Thank you, Pendragon,” he said sincerely. “I'm not giving up.”

“No, you were right. It would be wrong not to try and warn Ibara. People have the right to choose their own destiny, right?”

Siry gave me a smile and nodded sadly. “There's no hope, is there?”

Things were about as bleak as they'd ever been. At least we were alive and moving. We had to keep trying. It was our job.

“There's always hope,” I said. “It's the one thing Saint Dane can't destroy.”

“So it's all true,” Siry muttered. “Everything my father told me.”

I nodded and shrugged.

“Then why was he on the tribunal? If he was concerned about the turning point of Veelox, what did that have to do with the tribunal?”

It was like a ray of light had suddenly cut through the dusty dark. With one simple observation, Siry sparked a thought that made me realize we might not be so done after all.

“Saint Dane wasn't telling us everything,” I declared. “This isn't a training exercise. He wants to sway the turning point. That's what he does.”

“You say that like it's good news,” Siry said, confused.

“It is. It's never about a battle. It's about a decision. A choice. That's what turns the territories. If it were just about winning a war or enemies fighting, Saint Dane would have won every territory. Saint Dane pushes people into making bad decisions, because he's out to prove something.”

“Prove what? To who?”

“To who I don't know. If I knew that, I'd unravel this whole thing. But I know what he's trying to prove. He wants to show that the people of Halla are selfish and flawed. He told me that everything he's ever done would never have happened if the people didn't want it to happen.”

“Is it true?” Siry asked.

“No!” I replied. “He twists things. He makes people believe they're doing the right thing, when in reality he's pushing them toward destruction. The turning points are critical times in a territory's history. If Remudi was on the tribunal, the turning point must have something to do with Ibara.
That's why Saint Dane wants to attack. It's not about conquering the island. It's about forcing the people into making a bad decision. Then he can say it was all their fault in the first place.”

“So what do we do?”

“We have to get back to the tribunal and warn them about the dados. But we've also got to figure out what the turning point is. If we can figure that out, the battle might not even matter.”

Siry frowned. “I'm totally confused.”

The elevator slowed to a stop. I braced myself, ready to pounce. Or be pounced on. The elevator stopped. A very long moment passed. The doors slid open. I was ready to get hit by a dado. Instead I was hit with blinding light and a fierce wind. The force was so strong it pushed us both back to the rear of the elevator. I fell to my knees, I think by instinct. Siry crept forward and grabbed the edge of the open door. I crawled forward, still squinting against the light, trying to get my eyes to adjust.

“We're on top of the clouds,” Siry gasped.

He wasn't far from wrong. The elevator had opened at the uppermost point of the pyramid. Centuries of erosion had eaten huge holes into the steeply slanted walls, which meant we were looking over Rubic City from the highest point possible. To say it was breathtaking is a huge understatement. Laid out before us was the entire city. Beyond that was the ocean. The skyscrapers that seemed so immense from ground level now looked like Lego toys beneath us. I was both awed and saddened. Not many people get the chance to see something like this. Cities are staggeringly huge and complicated creations. Seeing it from so high up gave us that perspective. That sense of awe made it all the more painful to know it was a city of the dead.

There might have been ten feet of floor between the elevator doors and the outside wall. Or what was left of it. The floor itself wasn't in much better shape than the rotten walls. I looked down to see big chunks of floor missing.

“Careful where you step,” I cautioned.

I worried that it wouldn't matter how careful we were. The whole floor looked as solid as a piece of dry paper. Neither of us was too quick to leave the elevator, until the doors started closing.

“Get out!” I shouted.

We both hopped out. I held my breath, fearing the floor would collapse under our weight. The elevator doors closed. We heard the sound of the car descending. I had no doubt that it would soon return, loaded with Flighters. Or dados.

“Now what?” Siry asked.

It was looking as if I had led us into a dead end. My escape plan had only delayed the inevitable. We were still prisoners, only with a better view. I walked cautiously across the floor toward the destroyed, slanted wall. The wind blew through the holes, making whistling sounds. I cautiously peeked out of the hole and down the side of the pyramid. The sight made me nearly lose my balance. It was like my inner ear suddenly went all wacky. I pulled myself back in and closed my eyes to fight the vertigo.

“What did you see?” Siry asked.

“It's a long way down,” I said, with my eyes still closed. “I think the angle of the wall threw me off a little.”

That's when the idea hit me. I took a breath, opened my eyes, and peered back outside. This time I knew what to expect, so I wasn't as rocked. There was no way to judge how high up we were. The wall wasn't straight down, because it was a pyramid. It angled out. Centuries ago the surface was
slick and black. Now it was a mess of holes. Some big, some not. Chunks of framework stuck out everywhere. It looked more like a chopped-up field of garbage than the wall of a pyramid.

To me it looked like an escape route.

“We're climbing down the outside,” I announced.

“What?” Siry shot back with horror.

“The angle of the wall isn't that steep. There's plenty to grab on to. Unless you've got a better idea, I say we go for it.”

Siry joined me at the hole and peered out. He took a long hard look at the surface, then a long hard look at me.

“You're crazy, you know that?”

“Yeah, but in a couple of minutes that elevator is going to hit bottom and Saint Dane is going to get on and bring up some of his pals to take us back. Which way do you want to go down?”

Siry looked sick. I probably did too. I wasn't as confident in this insane plan as I was making it sound. Without waiting for Siry to make a decision, I stuck my foot out of the hole, turned back toward Siry…and stepped out onto the face of the pyramid. At first the biggest problem was the wind. I was able to get a foothold on a piece of frame and felt pretty secure. But I was afraid the wind would blow me off. I flattened my belly against the steep wall, trying to create as much friction as possible.

“Don't look down,” I called.

“Don't worry.”

I carefully started to climb down. It was all about finding secure foot-and handholds. The surface of the pyramid was chewed up, creating several of each. I didn't stop to think about how insane this was. I was hanging against the outside
of a building a hundred stories in the air. I wasn't afraid of falling. I was afraid of sliding. One false step and I knew I'd start a slide that would be impossible to stop. It would be just as bad as a fall.

Siry was right behind me. Or right above me. Or…something. You get the idea. If he lost his footing, he'd come sliding right down onto me and bye-bye both of us.

“You okay?” I called up.

“I'm still here” was his answer. Good enough.

I always had four choices of where to go next. Between my two hands and two feet, one of them kept finding a lower perch. It was working. We were moving down. I was beginning to think our biggest worry was going to be Saint Dane discovering us creeping down the outside of the building, totally defenseless.

It wasn't. I heard a wrenching
crack
sound.

“Ahhh!” screamed Siry. He lost his grip and started to slide. A moment later he shot right past me. I reached out to grab him. Bad move. The moment I let go with my left hand, I felt myself sliding too. I had to quickly pull my hand back and grab on, or I would have gone down right after him. I watched in horror as Siry picked up speed. Looking down, I realized the idiocy of our plan. Seeing him slide away, and looking beyond him to the ground so far away, brought the vertigo back. The only way I could keep from losing my grip was by closing my eyes and pressing my cheek against the skin of the pyramid. I wanted to pound my fist against it in anger.