Firestorm

by David Klass

  He’s lying! Gisco assures me. Don’t think! Just do it!

  You’re the one who told me my fate would be worse than Oedipus’s, I remind Gisco. So killing my parents sounds just about right. What he’s saying makes a lot of sense. If I change something important now, I will be altering the whole future. How can I not be?

  Because time doesn’t work that way. It’s not a river, where if you move a stone upstream, you change the entire flow downstream.

  “That’s true, Jack,” Eko agrees. “This man is a clever and desperate liar. He’s using a simplistic and outdated model of space-time to fool you. We can’t explain it all to you now. Your father is wise and good, and he sent you here to save and preserve, not to destroy. Now you must rise to your moment and assume your destiny!”

  I’m dizzy. Punch-drunk with their arguments. They play into my greatest fear and insecurity. I don’t know who I am. Who sent me back. What their real motives were.

  They continue to argue. Their words and thoughts swirl around me.

  I search my soul. What is right? What is wrong? Eko and Gisco seem good. Dargon embodies evil. My father in visions seems wise. Dargon’s father haunts my nightmares.

  I remember the reef I dived down to. An undersea garden of Eden. The oddly shaped sponges. The magnificent corals. The weird and wonderful creatures of the deep.

  Dargon was ready to destroy it all.

  Somehow I figure out what I have to do.

  74

  I step forward and in an instant clear my mind. The throbbing silvery light seems to pulse right through me. I reach down for it, as if reaching for a part of myself. This time my hand doesn’t stop on the top of the dais. That incredibly hard surface that repelled Dargon’s laser puts up as much resistance as a pool of water in a mountain spring. I reach into the pool. Touch the warmth that is Firestorm. My right palm just covers the glowing orb.

  I withdraw my hand from the dais, and Firestorm comes out with it. It’s free. I did it! Don’t ask me how.

  I hold Firestorm above my head.

  Suddenly my hand is burning! I scream. YAAAAAAAA!

  Try to hurl it away. No response. I’m paralyzed. It’s not just my hand that’s on fire. My arm, my shoulder, my whole body is suddenly searing, charring, roasting! Enveloped in orange-red flames.

  Is Firestorm burning me, or am I somehow doing this?

  Neither. It’s a connection. A coming together. Something inside of me is unlocking it. I have some link with this primordial force, a spiritual connection far deeper than cells or even my DNA. This has nothing to do with science. It’s magic, or beyond magic.

  The moment I was born for! The Mysterious Kidah divined it, my father learned of it and sacrificed my whole childhood to bring this about, the couple who pretended to be my parents spent years loving me and lying to me because of it, and now the fateful moment is here!

  This pain has to be worse than being born, worse than dying. But those are the images I’m seeing. Birth and death. Creation and destruction. As if I’m inside Firestorm.

  Lightning lashing lifeless molten seas. A one-celled animal dividing and feebly propelling itself. The first and smallest worm in the long history of worms uncurling. A tiny proto-fish emerging from an egg. A snake with winglike appendages rising above an ocean for a few seconds, as if no other creature has ever made it aloft before. A dinosaur chasing a squealing rodent-like mammal across a swamp, catching it, and devouring it. Neanderthals throwing spears at a great woolly mammoth. What looks much more recognizably like a man, grinding two rocks together, kindling a spark. Fire.

  Yes, FIRE! Fields ablaze! Coal furnaces glowing! A mushroom cloud rising above the city-incinerating heat of an atomic bomb! Airborne gaseous chemical flames sweeping through a marsh, driving frightened wildlife before it. The eyes of the terrified creatures as they realize there will be no escape. Mothers herding their children desperately forward. Planes dropping napalm on virgin jungle. Oil geysering from a crack in the hull of a tanker, befouling a pristine sea, and then igniting, so that that water itself is on fire, and the birds and the fish flee before it like the terrified animals of the land.

  Firestorm! The wound was undoubtedly inflicted by the hand of man. Firestorm! Is it the earth itself trying somehow to fight back? To reverse centuries of man’s befoulment and abomination? Yes, that’s it!

  Worshipping the earth is mankind’s oldest form of devotion. Earth gods pictured in cave paintings or on ancient rock carvings are always bestial and terrifying, the stuff of childhood nightmares.

  Now those images sweep around me, and I hear frightening names, whispered from afar, “Gaea, Anath, Huemac, Aruru, Chantico.” Horned gods, lion bodies with serpent heads, goat-faced deities with burning eyes, an Aztec god of earth and fire, with cactus spikes and a red serpent. “Dagda, Jord, Phan Ku, Geb.” A green-skinned Egyptian god with an enormous upright phallus looks back at me and opens his mouth, spewing out a red vapor that makes the crystal throne room tremble. “Pele, Tekkeit-sertok, Kali.” The dark Indian earth mother moves her four arms, and her necklace of skulls rattles.

  Firestorm is fully alive now. Its spirit free. To create or to destroy. I feel its rage sink down, deep beneath this volcanic island, to the molten bedrock—

  A galvanic sound rings out, ten times louder than the thunderclap we heard earlier. Not a roar or a bang. More like a cosmic string that has been stretched tighter and tighter is suddenly snapping, and nothing will ever be quite the way it was again.

  The cave rocks violently side to side. Boulders shift and rub and grate. I’m tossed away, head over heels, still holding on to Firestorm.

  Flying through the air. Hurled sideways, high off the ground. I smash into something unyielding.

  The walls are coming down around me. Dust. Rocks. The smell and heat of magma seeps up from gaping fissures.

  “Come,” a voice says. “Can you make it on your own?”

  I look up. My vision clears. Eko.

  “The whole island’s going to blow apart. Can you walk? We’ve got to get out of here.”

  Based on what I know of vulcan speleology, she’s absolutely right. This is going to make Krakatoa look like Jiffy Pop, old bean. Gisco stands next to her, bracing himself on his four sturdy legs as the cave shakes. There’s one other thing about the chimera of Greek legends worth mentioning—it was a portent of great natural disasters, particularly of the volcanic variety. We’ve only got a few minutes to get off this rock.

  I struggle to get to my feet. Gisco and Eko help me as best they can.

  The ground is shaking so much that we have to lean on each other to walk.

  They lead me away, out a side tunnel. I stop for a second. Half turn. Look back.

  One last peek at Dargon, pinned to the cave floor by an enormous chunk of fallen stone. His parrot flits around him, trying to help but clearly useless and panicked.

  Dargon’s eyes meet mine. A burning stare of unmitigated hatred. If looks could kill, this one would finish me off.

  But they can’t kill. I’m heading out a side tunnel. And he’s about to find out what it’s like to be inside a lava cave when the molten magma comes bubbling back up.

  I raise one arm. Mouth four Latin words back at him: “Frater, Ave atque Vale.” Brother, hail and farewell.

  And then I head up the tunnel and away, as fast as I can go.

  75

  Dargon’s island doing the twist. Shaking, rattling, and especially rolling. Probably not fun if you’re standing near his hilltop compound, or riding in a boat on the usually tranquil bay. But definitely a drag if you’re in the upset stomach of this volcano when it’s preparing to blow chow on the scale of Armageddon.

  Best thing to do in such a situation? Flee!

  We’re running for our lives. Or, to be more accurate, climbing, sometimes on all fours. Don’t ask me where we are, but I do know that we’re heading almost straight up. Through steep, dark cave tunnels with treacherous footing.

  Firestorm l
ights our way. It’s barely flashing now, its energy released, its anger spent. I hold it tightly.

  Eko is in the lead. I’m chugging along in second place. Gisco brings up the rear, huffing and puffing.

  I don’t mean to complain, but climbing steep caves is not what large dogs are best known for. Swimming, yes. Jumping, sure. Any of the field events, except pole vaulting, I might well medal in on a good day …

  Less communication, more speed, High Dog of Dann, Eko admonishes him telepathically.

  That’s what I’m trying to tell you. Anatomically superior though the canine is in more ways than I can list right now, I’m incapable of climbing any faster. In fact, I need to slow down. I would suggest leaving me behind, but I know you’d never do that, so we might all pause for a brief subterranean siesta …

  I know this four-legged fur pile well enough to suspect the prospect of being abandoned will make him run faster. Yes, he’s right, we’ll have to leave him behind, I suggest to Eko telepathically. There’s no choice.

  No choice at all, Eko agrees, instantly catching my telepathic drift. He was a great dog once. You should have seen him in his glory. But he’s too old now. Too slow. Poor fellow, it will be lonely lying here by his lonesome, waiting for the walls to cave in.

  You two are kidding, aren’t you? You wouldn’t abandon dear old Gisco? Trustworthy, gentle Gisco who knows more about how to find the exit from dark lava caves than a beacon of hope who’s been chopped up and bloodied like a piece of hamburger, or a High Priestess of Dann who’s been consorting with the enemy.

  Consorting with the enemy? Eko sounds truly insulted. How dare you, High Mutt! You know very well that was the only way I could position myself to assist Jack—

  Sensitive, aren’t we? I’m sure you positioned yourself in some very interesting ways—

  What the hell’s that supposed to mean?

  I try to mediate. Easy, you two. Gisco, if in fact you do have any idea how to get out of this cave, this would be a good time to—

  The dark tunnel rumbles and shakes so violently we are all hurled to the ground. I cover my head with my arms as rocks rain down like hailstones. Somehow we survive. But that was close. We won’t live through the next one.

  Gisco appears unfazed. You, who were about to abandon me, were saying?

  I respond quickly, brushing pebbles and grit out of my hair and eyes: That if you do know a way out of this lava cave, which I doubt but am willing to admit is possible, since cowardly dogs know more about hiding in holes than most higher animals, this would be a very good moment to let us in on the secret.

  Gisco draws himself up in a huff. Well. That’s not really a very polite way of asking me to share centuries of secret canine lore. Is it now?

  More cave rumblings and tremors. We’ll be entombed in a few seconds.

  Please, High Dog of Dann, Eko pleads.

  Oh, so it’s High Dog now? What happened to High Mutt?

  That was a term of endearment, she explains. And then adds a telepathic but heartfelt: Please, Gisco.

  Yes, you sweet-faced bighearted pooch, I also beg. Save us if you can. We both love you.

  Well, when you put it that way, I suppose I’ll help out. Did you two happen to notice that the dust is moving?

  Eko and I look at each other. The cave tunnel we’re in is indeed suffused with rock dust from the recent near cave-in. The gritty miasma does seem to be moving slowly.

  No. Not moving. Circulating.

  No, not just circulating. Flowing.

  Eko sees it, too. We look at each other, and then back to the dog. What does it mean, Gisco?

  Caves breathe. He delivers this informational nugget as if he’s imparting great wisdom.

  We don’t have much time, I remind him. Less mystery, more doggone clarity. Exactly why do caves breathe?

  Changes in barometric pressure. But it’s not a why so much as a where that you need to know about. The air flow accelerates near vents. So if the dust is moving this quickly, we must be near—

  An exit! Eko finishes the thought.

  But I’m way ahead of her, already following the flow of dust …

  Through a winding corkscrew shaft that narrows and then veers around several tight corners. Suddenly there’s light ahead, literally at the end of the tunnel, as it widens so that the three of us are running, sprinting side by side, and we pop out into …

  Dazzling sunlight. We’re on a cliff. Far below us on one side is the glittering blue Atlantic. On the other is the crater of the volcano. I look down into that pit and see, far below, molten red lava bubbling, foaming, and clearly getting ready to blow skyward.

  Toward us.

  “There’s no escape,” I say to Eko. “We’ll never get off this island. It’s a death trap, and all we’ve done by climbing up here is find three ringside seats. When the volcano erupts, it’s going to fry us alive.”

  76

  Eko reaches inside a small pouch. Comes out with three shirts that look familiar.

  No, not shirts. Thick, like life jackets. But form-fitted, like padded wet suits. They glow slightly, as if made from phosphorescent material. “Put these on,” she says. “I assume I don’t have to tell you to hurry.”

  The antigravity jackets we used to fly in the Outer Banks! I have mine on in a heartbeat.

  I bend and help Gisco get his paws through his own jacket. As I straighten up, a voice from behind me calls, “All flights off this island have just been canceled.”

  Dargon. Less than ten feet away. Sweating. Drenched in his own blood. A deep gash down one side of his face. But standing strong and steady.

  He’s holding the large laser gun in his right hand. Aims it at me. “I should have killed you on the trawler, when I first had the chance. But I’ll do it here and now.”

  I see it unfold in slow motion. Dargon’s trigger finger moves. A deadly beam shoots out of the gun. There’s no possible escape. It will vaporize me. No time to dodge. It’s over.

  Something dives in front of me. Takes my bullet, or my laser beam, or whatever. There’s a scream.

  Eko! She saved my life. But at what cost?

  A throaty growl. Gisco sinks his teeth deep into Dargon’s right wrist.

  The gun falls away, over the edge of the embankment, into the crater of the volcano.

  I kneel down next to Eko. She looks up at me. Winces, but manages a slight smile. Not in great shape. I’m pretty sure she’s dying. “I think I would rather have been eaten by a bull shark,” she gasps.

  Dargon has pried Gisco off.

  His parrot and Gisco begin fighting tooth and beak.

  Dargon steps toward me. “I don’t need a gun for the likes of you. I’d rather do this with my bare hands.”

  I stand up to face him. He’s just mortally wounded the most beautiful and interesting woman I ever met, who sacrificed herself for me. That’s pretty strong motivation. For a minute I forget all about Dargon’s mastery of the martial arts. All about the volcano that’s about to erupt. I just want to put my fist through his face.

  He beats me to it. Uncanny speed. One of his right-hand hay-makers. I get my left arm up to block it, but the force of the punch sends me spinning to the ground.

  Stuns me. Rocks my world. Everything twirling.

  No, it’s not that my mind’s spinning from his punch. The island’s doing somersaults! Ground shaking. Lava exploding up from the crater. I get to my knees.

  And here Dargon comes again. He jumps so well in a fight it seems as if he’s flying. Reminds me of Eko in that barn, gliding down toward me in the ninja outfit.

  Dargon lands on his right leg and uses his left foot to kick me in the chin. Faster, more precise kick than anything I’ve ever seen before. Knocks out a few of my teeth. I fly backward.

  Grab a boulder at the edge of the crater. Look down into bubbling lava lake far below.

  Here Dargon comes to finish me off. Leaping toward me, almost flying. His next blow will end this one-sided battle.

&nbs
p; I’ve got to strike first. But he’s too fast. Too skilled. Anticipates my every kick. Beats me to every punch.

  I flash to Eko in the barn. The way I finally got the drop on her. When she was in the air, gliding down, I anticipated her landing.

  Dargon’s flying through the air now, heading for a rock outcropping near me. He’ll land and instantly launch his final assault.

  I ignore him. Roll over and do something very simple, yet at the same time unexpected. Kick away the rock outcropping.

  He’s still in the air, on his way down. Sees what I’m up to. Gives a guttural shout. Fear in his eyes …

  His landing pad suddenly gone. He doesn’t come down gracefully, like a gazelle. He spins down like a helicopter on the side of a glacier. His legs splay at incredible angles, searching for purchase …

  He slips and skitters along the lip of the gravelly precipice. Somehow manages to slow himself. His toes must be as strong and limber as fingers! They dig into the gravel. He stops himself, and starts to turn back …

  I’m right there, waiting on his blind left side. He doesn’t see me right away because of the glass eye, but he senses me and starts to raise his hand.

  Too late. All it takes is a single light push, administered to the center of his chest with my right hand, holding Firestorm.

  The orb flashes brightly as it touches Dargon’s chest.

  He looks back at me incredulously. Circles his arms. Slips over the edge.

  Starts to fall. A cowardly death scream. WWW AAAAAAA!

  I should check on Eko and Gisco, but instead I stand there and watch Dargon all the way down, till he disappears into the bubbling, molten lake.

  Goodbye, cuz. You really had that coming to you.