The Seven Princess and The Gates of Hell

by Steve Wharton

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  The Tango arrived in Casey a day early and the skeleton crew at the Australian outpost assisted in off loading the crates that belonged to Ryan and Maria and then load them into an ice cat, the ice cat would carry them to the south pole and provide shelter if the weather should turn bad. But this time of year the temperature would stay just below freezing and no bad weather was expected.

  Ryan and Maria climbed into the ice cat after all the crates were loaded and they were checked out on the operation of the ice cat. Ryan pulled out of Casey station and headed for the south pole, the trip should only take two days. The ice cat had been there before as had many of the other stations so to see them there was not unusual.

  Late the afternoon on the second day Ryan spotted a demon flying towards them, “Looks like we have company.”

  “What is it?”

  “That spot in the sky is a demon, must be coming over to check us out. Make like you don’t know he is there.”

  The demon circled over the ice cat and seeing that there was no response he headed back in the direction of the south pole. Ryan said, “looks like we are headed in the right direction.”

  “It sure looks like it.”

  “Babe how much farther to the pole?” Ryan asked.

  “Based on GPS we still have about forty miles to go.”

  “Sun will be down shortly, let’s stop for the night and grab a bite to eat.”

  Ryan stopped the ice cat and Maria went to the back and grabbed two MRE’s (ready to eat meals). She grabbed the portable cook top and set it up outside and prepared the MRE’s , when they were hot she carried them inside and they ate the meals. “Not the best food in the world but it will keep us going.” Ryan said.

  “There really not all that bad, I’ve ate much worse.”

  “Based on the GPS we should get there around an hour after we roll in the morning.”

  “I’m just wondering how I’m going to find the gate, I doubt that the demons and hellhounds will be standing out in the cold.”

  “Never know they just might be. Remember you can see them most us of can’t”

  “That’s true, I didn’t think of that.”

  Early the next morning Ryan had the ice cat rolling across the snow packed ice. He was hoping to make the south pole by eight. There are two south poles one is the Geographic South Pole and the other is the Magnetic South Pole. They were headed for the Magnetic South Pole. It would take another two days to reach the Geographic South Pole if the Gate was not at the Magnetic South Pole. The ice at either one was thick almost two miles thick based on the information that Casey station gave them. Ryan was hoping that the gate would be located at the Magnetic South Pole because the United States had a station that was always manned at the Geographic South Pole.

  Maria finally woke and came to the front of the ice cat and joined Ryan, rubbing sleep from her eyes she asked, “how much farther?”

  “I guess about half an hour, and I think we picked the right pole as there has been a lot more activity by the demons.”

  “Do you think they may try to stop us before we get to the pole?”

  “I doubt it they should be pretty use to seeing one of these things all the time as the scientists are always out here. I did take the opportunity to be ready, the MAC-10’s are all loaded and ready to go, I stored them right beside our chairs.”

  Ryan was coming up on the south pole and topped out over an ice hill when he spotted the hellhounds and what looked like a boat load of demons.

  The closer they got to the pole five demons started flying towards them, Ryan stopped about a half a mile from the pole and he could see all seven of the hellhounds and these made the ones back in Iraq look like puppies.

  “Babe, you should see the size of these hellhounds.”

  “Are they big?”

  “Big isn’t the word for them, more like gigantic. They have to stand ten feet tall.”

  “How are we going to deal with them? You had a hard time with ones back in the temple in Iraq.”

  “Once we get out I want to set up some of the scientific gear that’s on this thing and I will set out the missile launcher and a few missiles, we can see how they react them.”

  “Why set out the scientific gear?”

  “I figure that the demons are use to see certain things when the real scientists come here so we can make like we know what we are doing with this stuff. When the demons go back to the pole I should be able to get off a couple of missiles before all hell breaks out.”

  “If you say so.”

  “I do and I want you back in the cat after I fire, I don’t want one of those beasts getting a hold of you.”

  “But I can provide backup support if the demons start to come. I can see them then you know.”

  “Ok but if I tell you to get inside you do it.”

  “I will.”

  “Ok let’s get some of this gear out there.”

  They started to off load the steel box’s with the scientific equipment. Ryan would hand it to Maria and she would set it out, open the box and start to twist the knobs and make like she knew what she was doing. Ryan kept an eye on the demons and it finally seemed like they were satisfied with what was going on that they left and headed back to the others at the pole.

  Ryan handed her the launcher and then seven missiles. He jumped out of the cat and opened the case for the launcher and loaded a missile into it. He grabbed his spotter scope and got range and wind speed and direction. He sighted on the closest hellhound and fired, he reloaded and fired on another hellhound before the first one hit. He moved the he picked up his scope and followed the first missile right into the hellhound. To his surprise the hellhound exploded into a million pieces.

  He grabbed another missile and loaded it into the launcher and fired it again at a different beast, The second missile hit its target and the third hit seconds later and destroyed a third hound before they were moving at them. Ryan loaded a forth missile into the launcher and fired again. He missed the hellhounds but hit the group of demons that were trying to keep up with the hellhounds.

  Ryan felt the launcher shift and the tap on his head and he instantly pulled the trigger on the launcher. Maria had decided to load the launcher, she had seem it done in the movies so she reached up and touched Ryan on the head and the missile fired. Maria almost didn’t get out of the way fast enough as the flame from the missile almost got her. She stood off to the side and loaded the launcher again and tapped Ryan on the head and a fifth missile was away. Maria loaded the sixth missile and tapped Ryan again and the missile was away headed toward a hellhound. The fifth missile killed another hound but the sixth missile maimed the next hound blowing off one of its arms. Maria loaded the seventh missile and tapped Ryan and the seventh missile was on its way. Ryan dropped the launcher and grabbed one of the MAC-10’s, a handful of spare magazines and he told Maria to get back inside the cat. Without turning to see if Maria obeyed Ryan left the cat and was sprinting as far as he could get. The remaining hellhound was less than two hundred yards from him and the one he blew the shoulder off of was just a little farther back.

  Ryan called the Angel Sword to him and it appeared in his hand. Just as the sword appeared Ryan went into a slide avoiding the hellhounds claws. As the hellhound kept running past the sliding Ryan he brought the sword across the hounds leg cutting off the leg. Now Ryan had a one legged and one armed set of hell hounds trying to kill him. Ryan figured that this evened the odds a little. Ryan spotted the one armed hound getting ready to stomp a massive leg down on him and he rolled away and sliced a deep gash in the leg of the hound.

  The one legged hound had made it up on its one good leg and was limping toward Ryan, Ryan ran toward the one legged hound and slid to the left of the beast and sliced the other leg off of the hound. The beast fell to the ground howling in pain, Ryan scrambled to his feet slipping on the ice a couple of time before gaining steady footing. He moved in on the badly injured hellhound and he drove the An
gel Sword deep into the beast’s head thru hi eye. Ryan twisted the sword and the hound died. Ryan had forgot about the other hound and it grabbed Ryan with its good arm and tossed Ryan like a ragdoll.

  When Ryan quit sliding he regained his footing and stood ready for the beast. The beast charged and Ryan side stepped to his right and saw the beast move to cover Ryan. Ryan stood his ground and just as the hound grabbed for Ryan he brought the sword and cut off the beasts arm. The beast slipped on the ice and fell to the ground and Ryan was on top of it. He was slicing and jabbing the beast everywhere he could see before finally landing a blow to the eye of the hound and the blade pushed into its brain. Ryan pulled the sword out and the hell hound died.

  Ryan turned back to the ice cat and saw that the demons were surrounding it and Maria was firing at them the best she could, Ryan headed back as fast as he could run. Ryan started firing at the demons as he got to within one yards of the ice cat. A few of the demons turned their attention to Ryan and Ryan hit them with a spray of bullets from his MAC-10. The closer Ryan got to the ice cat the more demons would fall from his gun fire. Enough of the demons had been killed by Ryan that Maria was able to take a more careful aim and more demons started to die.

  Ryan was within fifty feet of the ice cat when the last demon fell, Maria opened the door and ran to Ryan and leaped into his arms crying. “Babe it’s ok you were holding your own and doing a good job.”

  “I’m so sorry I let them get too close.”

  “No babe it’s ok your ok.”

  “I wasn’t paying attention, I was trying to figure out a way I could help you when the demons started pounding on the windows and doors.”

  “Babe, it’s ok. Really.”

  ”I won’t be so careless in the future.”

  “Babe, stop it’s ok. You did a good job.”

  Maria just hugged Ryan tighter, Ryan told her that they needed to load up everything and move closer to the pole and see if they could locate the gat it’s self. Maria finally let go of Ryan’s neck and helped him load all the gear back into the ice cat. Once they had it all inside Ryan started the ice cat and they started to move closer to the pole at a snail’s pace.

  The closer they got to the pole Maria said “I don’t see anything except ice and snow.”

  “There it is, about two hundred yards in front of us.”

  “I don’t see it.”

  “It must be like the demons you can’t see them until they are a threat to you.”

  “As long as you can see it.”

  “It looks like all the hellhounds and demons that we killed were the guards. Ryan pulled the ice cat to a stop just twenty feet from the gate. He got out of the cat and walked to the gate. The closer he got to the gate the more defined it got, right over the gate Ryan looked down into the bowls of hell it’s self. Flame and molten rock were all over the place and Ryan could hear people screaming for relief from the fire. Ryan knew that the one screaming down there were the souls that Lucifer had claimed.

  Ryan returned to the ice cat and got out a case of C-4 and placed the bricks around the gate. He placed wireless detonators in each brick. The remainder of the case about twenty bricks he placed wireless detonators in each brick and covered the case back up, he tied a rope to the crate and lowered the crate about twenty feet into the gate. Ryan returned to the ice cat and backed it off a quarter of a mile away. He picked up the wireless transmitter and pressed the button. The C-4 detonated and Ryan could see that the hole that had been there was being covered by the water that had been melted by the blast. The water was freezing almost as fast as it got to the gate. In less than fifteen minutes the gate was gone.

  Ryan and Maria inspected the site of the gate and Ryan confirmed that it was gone. Ryan looked at Maria and said “Time to go home.” They got back into the ice cat and returned to Casey station. They made it back with 2 days to spare, Ryan had left word with Captain Rocco that if they were not back in nine days that he was to leave their without them.

  The crew loaded Ryan and Maria’s crates back on board and made ready to leave port. By six that nigh they had gotten underway and were well out to sea. Ryan and Maria spent the next nine days in their cabin. Upon their arrival back in Lima they made arrangement to have the crates shipped back to San Diego and they went to the airport and caught the next flight back home. As the made the turn on the street to their house Ryan spotted twenty to thirty demons were watching the house waiting for their return.

  Ryan was tired and in no mood to mess with any demons, he drove right past the house and stopped just around the corner of his street, He looked at Maria and said, “Wait here, I won’t be long.”

  Ryan only had the Angel Sword but he would make quick work of the demons. He snuck up behind a van that he had seen at least five demons and he opened the rear door and dispatched of the eight demons that were in the van. He next moved to the four demons that were standing next to his RV and he quickly killed them. He moved around the back of the house and had a little tougher time killing the ten demons that were there. He opened the back door to his house and went to his bedroom and got a nine millimeter pistol and put on a silencer and he walked out the front door. The last eight demons started toward him and he quickly shot each of them. He walked back to his car and got in and drove back to the house and the two of them went in without a word. Once inside Ryan said “Wake me in a week and he climbed on the couch and took a nap.