Dark Gate Angels Complete Series Omnibus

by Ramy Vance

  Abby was nowhere near having as many nanobots as she’d had before, but she was at a higher capacity than when the DGA had gone on their dungeon crawl.

  The scientists and Creon were talking excitedly as Nib-Nib and Cire walked through the group to get to Abby and Persephone. The two girls were looking at the portal like one might peer into a window.

  Cire clapped a hand on Abby’s shoulder. “It’s a brave thing you’re doing today.”

  Abby squeezed Cire’s hand. “No, it’s really not. We’ve been collecting data all night, and they’ve been working at deciphering it all morning. This is as safe as it gets. We even have some projections of what it should look like when I get there over on that holoscreen.”

  “The first images of the Netherverse?”

  Abby tried to hide how pleased she was with herself. “Yep. Pretty cool, huh? You wanna check ‘em out?” She led Cire, Nib-Nib, and Persephone over to the holoscreen and swiped through it until she got to the recorded images from her nanobots.

  The holoscreen displayed a vast land of sweeping hills and forests, the landscape black and tinted with a strange, unearthly silver glow. “See? It doesn’t look that much different from anything else on this world,” Abby said. “We wouldn’t be surprised if the Netherverse was like any of the nine realms, sandwiched on top of each other. That’s probably how this Gate works too. But we should get to it. The longer we sit here talking, the more time we’re wasting.”

  “What’s the rush?” Persephone asked.

  Abby’s eyes shifted from their usual color to a sharp green, her irises moving back and forth like gears. “We’re curious to verify our data. Come on.”

  They headed back to the portal. Nanobots covered Abby’s body, creating armor that was bulkier than usual and had a breathing apparatus on the side. Gravitational displacements connected to her feet, anchoring her to the ground. Two plasma cannons built themselves atop her shoulders, while a domed helmet cobbled itself up over her face.

  Creon and the majority of the scientists gathered around Abby and the portal as Gertrude floated over to the girl.

  Abby patted Gertrude on the top of its drone head. “Ready to do this, Martin?”

  Martin popped up in the corner of Abby’s field of vision. “Time to make history. God, I wish I had family to tell this to other than you.”

  “I made sure to mention you in the email I sent my mom last night. She says hi.”

  A silver line blasted out of Abby’s back, connecting to the ground behind her. “If things get too bad in there, we’ll signal you. Just yank on this, and it’ll pull us back. See you on the other side.”

  Abby ran toward the Gate and leapt in. Its surface rippled as she disappeared.

  She hit the ground hard, rolling to her feet as her gravitational boots locked her in place.

  This place was nothing like the video projections.

  Abby stood on a rock that floated through an infinity of stars and black holes, but there was more. It was taking Abby some time to comprehend what she was looking at.

  Purple lightning storms flashed in the distance, outlining creatures the size of universes that were slithering about, combining and shifting, breaking away and reforming.

  There was land beneath her. The heavens, where Abby seemed to be, were separated by a purple and blue ocean that stretched as far as she could see. “This is definitely not what we were expecting,” she murmured.

  Gertrude floated over to Abby. She directed the drone down toward the ocean. The machine splashed through the water, coming out on the other side. It sent Abby a readout of the liquid it had passed through, along with a diagnostic of the air quality.

  The liquid wasn’t dangerous, and there was enough oxygen here to breathe.

  Abby’s mask broke apart, conserving the nanobots. Then she leapt through the water, landing on the ground beneath her, which was soft.

  Lightning flashed, illuminating the ground. Abby screamed in horror and leapt into the air, firing her thrusters so she could float.

  Beneath her, stretching on and on, were billions of corpses. Their blank eyes stared up at Abby. As she looked closer, she could see they didn’t have the same consistency as physical bodies. They wavered slightly as if they weren’t fully corporal.

  “Oh, my God, are these souls?” Abby wondered aloud.

  She descended closer to the ground and reached for one of their hands. Hers passed right through it. She raised her wrist, constructed a HUD, and scanned the area. There were no signs of life. “Martin, are you getting all this?”

  Gertrude came up on Abby’s side, scanning the sea of souls. “Yeah, I’m getting it all. So, I guess everyone was wrong about what happens after you die. This is disappointing. There’s not even a river.”

  “There has to be something other than this. Why else would the Dark One want to have a Gate leading to this place? Maybe just to have access to the Elder Ones?”

  Gertrude jetted forward and spun in a circle, scanning everything within range. “Nah, that doesn’t make sense. Rasputina had to perform a huge ritual to get that Elder One to Earth. And the only other time we’ve seen him pulling out anything close to an Elder One out was a mission the dragonriders were on, I think Alex Bound’s team. Anyway, it required an interdimensional meteor that might have been made of the very essence of the Dark One. Safe to say, it’s probably going to take more than a Gate.”

  “Then what would he need here? There’s only death.”

  “Let’s keep looking.”

  Abby and Gertrude floated along the shores of the dead, for that was what they were. She could see that as they came to a river, its contents a purple and blue sludge of a liquid, the shores covered with heavy fog. Lightning still crashed above, illuminating the silhouettes of ancient, forgotten gods, unconcerned with the two specks walking around beneath them.

  A quick scan showed the waters of the river weren’t toxic. Abby knelt and dipped her fingers into it. “The river Styx, minus Charon. Guess the stories weren’t true.”

  “This can’t be all of it, though. I mean, I’m glad that I don’t have a mortal life, but if this is all you have to look forward to after the big living thing, what’s the point?”

  Abby hadn’t really thought about that, but Martin did have a point. All these souls tossed around as if they were litter on the beach. Was this all that they had to look forward to? “Maybe this isn’t the way it's supposed to be. We haven’t read anything implying the Netherverse is where all souls go.”

  “True. You’re right. We gotta keep an open mind about this whole thing. There could be something very wrong with this place.”

  Abby looked at the sky, shading her eyes against the lightning. “Yeah, but maybe this whole place is wrong.”

  “If it is, it definitely shouldn’t be where all the souls of the nine realms are going. It doesn’t make any sense.”

  A bright purple light flashed across the river. It was different from the lightning above her. It continued to glow, growing brighter with time. “There’s something there,” Abby muttered.

  “Do you want to check it out?”

  Abby tried to comm Cire, but all she got on her side was static. Still, she explained the situation and told him she needed to investigate further. Then she returned to Martin. “We’re going to check that out.”

  “Wait, do you mean you are, or both of us are?”

  “Did you prefer to stay here?”

  Gertrude’s display showed an icon of a smiley face with an uncomfortable toothy grin. “Stupid question, okay? Let’s go check this out.”

  The two flew over the river, heading toward the bright purple light. As Abby passed over the river, she could see that its surface was covered with floating souls.

  Abby was surprised that she didn’t feel more unsettled by this place. There was an odd kind of peace here among the dead. An idea popped into her head. “Martin, scan for our dead soldiers. It is a longshot, but—”

  “Already in the pro
cess. Also, I have a query.”

  “A query?”

  Martin scoffed, yet stumbled over his words when he spoke again. “Okay, a fucking question. If you were to ask someone to do something but they didn’t have a body and most of your conversation centered around exchanging data streams for optimal performance, what would you say?”

  Abby stopped flying and floated in front of Gertrude. “You need to be straightforward with us. Are you talking about our consciousness?”

  “This is an uncomfortable conversation for me. I kinda feel like I’m asking my mom for permission to date a symbiotic nervous system living inside her.”

  “At least you didn’t say ‘parasite.’”

  Gertrude’s display showed a smiling face with a thumbs up. “You know, you’re right. I didn’t. So, yeah, I guess what am I asking is if it would be weird to ask your additional consciousness out…sort of.”

  “If you guys like talking to each other, who are we to stop you? Go for it.”

  The display changed to an excited face with tears rolling down its cheeks. “Sweet! I promise I won’t distract them from their processing priorities too much. Unless things get binary, if you know what I mean.”

  Abby was only half-listening. The purple light seemed to be coming closer to them. “No, we…I don’t know. And I don’t want to. Keep me out of it.”

  Another flash of bright purple, this time only a couple hundred feet away. Abby rocketed toward the light but stopped once she saw what it was coming from.

  A lone figure crouched in the midst of the purple light. It was a man, slim, hunched over the souls. His hair stood up and was shock white, and he wore a long black coat. Purple light was radiating from his hands and his eyes.

  Abby’s cannons aimed at the man. What the hell is that? she thought.

  The man looked at Abby, his glowing purple eyes flashing as he touched one of the souls beneath him.

  The soul began to jerk, black goo stretching over it as technological tendrils snaked from the man’s arms, digging into the chest of the soul, tearing it open, forcing themselves inside, and then stitching it up.

  Abby waved her hand at the man. “Hello!” The moment she spoke, she realized that she didn’t have a follow-up.

  The man stood, then clapped his hands together, and there was another flash. As the purple light faded, Abby could see the man was now covered in a skintight black suit. There were electrical valves attached to the back, and a black helmet covered all but his mouth. Electricity ran from his eyes down to his fingers.

  Martin pulled up Gertrude’s weapons. “Abby, he’s getting ready to—”

  The man surged forward faster than Abby could have seen, moving at the speed of electricity. He hit her in the chest, sending her flying backward.

  Gertrude whirled and prepared to fire.

  The man appeared behind the drone and rested one finger on Gertrude. She exploded.

  Abby kicked her thrusters on, heading toward the firmament of water above.

  The man teleported in front of Abby. “And who might you be?” he asked.

  Abby didn’t bother answering. She fired her cannons at him, but he teleported out of the way, allowing the plasma blasts to hit the souls on the ground.

  The man appeared right in front of Abby. “Hm. I assumed you had the disposition of a learned man or woman, but you might be nothing more than a common brute in beautiful armor.

  He reached out, a purple atom sparkling on the tip of his index finger.

  Abby had no idea what it was, but she knew it was dangerous. She tugged on the cord attached her back as she scanned the man.

  The slack from the cord tightened and Abby was yanked back. She flew through the Netherverse away from the man in black with purple eyes and hands.

  Abby burst through the portal and scrambled away from it. “Shut it down,” she screamed. “Shut it down.”

  Creon gave Abby an odd look, preparing to explain something.

  Abby didn’t listen. She raised her hand and fired into the Gate.

  The portal vanished.

  Abby got to her feet as her nanobots receded.

  Creon came up to her side. “What did you see?”

  Abby stared at the Gate. “We have no fucking idea.

  Chapter Twenty

  The Mundanes and the two members of the DGA stood before the huge gold dragon. It was roughly the size of a red dragon, but its tail was nearly twice the length of the rest of its body. Its wings were long and bat-like in shape, but instead of the soft leathery look of a bat’s wings, the dragon’s wings looked like spun gold. Golden whiskers like a cat’s hung from the dragon’s face.

  Suzuki gave the Mundanes a look as Terra cleared her throat uncomfortably. “Uh, I’m rethinking this whole thing.”

  Beth shook her head and folded her arms. “What good is being Dragon Bound if you can’t throw your weight around a little bit? Besides, it’s a gold dragon. It’s one of the good guys. Just use all those fancy words you got, and we’ll be out of her in no time.”

  Anabelle was surprised by the casualness the Mundanes were exhibiting in this situation. If she were to square up against a dragon, it would have been a much more dire affair. The Mundanes went about this as if they were playing a game.

  Suzuki nodded and straightened out his armor and turned back to the dragon, which had vanished. “What the hell?” Suzuki gasped.

  In the dragon’s place was a young man with yellow-tinted skin. He wore a suit of gold and had a shining emerald tie that matched the man’s eyes. “I believe you’ve come for the jar?”

  Sandy leaned over to Anabelle and whispered, “Gold dragons are master shapeshifters. Even when they’re in their own homes, they hate to be in their natural bodies around anyone other than other gold dragons. I think it’s like being naked for them.”

  Suzuki cleared his throat. “Greetings. I am Suzuki, Dragon Bound, Mundanest of the Mundanes.”

  The gold man-dragon bowed slightly as Suzuki did the same. “I am Telzrem, the Voiceless one. I have heard whispers of you, Suzuki. I believe you are bound to a particularly beautiful, honorable dragon. What brings you to my humble abode?”

  “My party is helping our new friends fulfill a quest of the utmost importance. They stand against the Dark One, as do we, and require a soul jar to defeat what the Dark One has raised up.”

  Telzrem raised his eyebrows curiously. “That is interesting. Any enemy of the Dark One is a friend of mine.”

  “Great! So, we can have the soul jar?”

  “Absolutely not. Now please leave before I am forced to kill you.”

  Suzuki’s smile faded as he scrunched his face, confused. “Wait, why won’t you help us?”

  Telzrem raised his hand and sent Suzuki flying back with a telekinetic blast. “This is my home. There is nothing I am required to answer. Just because you were foolish enough to step foot past my door, it does not mean you are entitled to answers. Now leave.”

  Suzuki landed in Beth’s arms, and she kept him from falling over. “What are we going to do now?” she asked. “I’m surprised your golden tongue didn’t get the job done.”

  “That’s probably not the only job it doesn’t get done,” Stew called.

  Suzuki and Beth both glared at Stew. “Now is not the time, Stew!”

  Stew shrugged as he unsheathed his axe. “Whatever, dude. A zinger is a zinger, no matter what time. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to get that jar.”

  He let out a loud scream and charged toward Telzrem, axe raised high, ready to bring it down on the man-dragon’s head.

  Telzrem raised his hands, one hand conjuring a spellbook, and the other casting a light blue mist.

  Stew froze in mid-swing, his eyes moving back and forth as he started to panic.

  Suzuki shouted, “Sandy, this is your department.”

  Sandy drew her wand and floated into the air, her ash cloak covering her body as a death mask whose visage was perpetually curled in an expression of terror
appeared over her face. She waved her wand at Stew, unfreezing him.

  Beth drew her longbow and notched an arrow. She pulled back with all her strength and launched an arrow at Telzrem, who leaned back, letting the missile fly past him.

  Telzrem closed the spellbook and placed it under his arm. “I can see that you are all strong warriors. It would be a waste to deprive the fight with the Dark One of fighters of your caliber, but if you do not leave now, I will be forced to kill you. This is your last chance.”

  Anabelle stepped forward and stood as tall as possible. It didn’t have much of an effect because Telzrem seemed to grow even taller as Anabelle approached him. “I don’t understand what your problem is. It’s just a shitty jar, and we need it.”

  Telzrem smiled at Anabelle as he crossed his arms. “Ah, Anabelle. Leader of the DGA, I believe.”

  “How the hell do you know that?”

  Sandy came up on Anabelle’s side. “Magic. Gold dragons are the only dragons that practice formal magic. He’s probably skilled in telepathic magic. If we’re going to fight, this is going to be a hard one. One we should maybe think about.”

  “We need that jar, and I’m not leaving here without it.” Anabelle squared up to Telzrem. “You guys can walk away from this, but I’m not going to.”

  Terra pulled out her axe and came to stand beside Anabelle. “I’m not walking. It’d be cooler to kick your ass when you’re all big and shit, but a dragon is a dragon, I guess.”

  The Mundanes looked at one another. Without exchanging a word, Suzuki nodded and drew his sword. “Mundanes, we’re running gold dragon formation extra-spicy mode. Wasabi-drenched.”

  The rest of the Mundanes drew their weapons and joined the formation. “Why does it have to be wasabi-drenched?” Sandy asked. “That’s the most boring one.”

  “You’re just saying that because you are support. It’s the most effective one for these kinds of situations.”

  Telzrem pulled his book of spells out from under his arm and opened it. “You prefer to fight. I will try to give you all a quick, honorable death.” The book of spells floated around him as he rose into the air.