Mercury Shrugs

by Robert Kroese

  “You can’t leave!” cried Drekavac. “What am I supposed to do with all these people?”

  But Azrael just kept walking, leaving Drekavac, alone and unarmed, with the captives.

  Drekavac smiled weakly at the group of hostages. “All right,” he said, in a quavering voice. “Lucifer and Tiamat will be back shortly. No funny business!”

  But Mercury was already on his feet. Ankles still tied together, he began hopping toward Drekavac.

  “This looks a lot like funny business,” said Drekavac disapprovingly.

  Mercury stopped a few feet in front of Drekavac. “Move,” he said.

  Drekavac stepped aside and Mercury took another hop toward the steel shelving unit behind him. He turned around and leaned down, and Suzy realized he was picking up the box cutter from where Tiamat had left it.

  “I’m not sure I should let you have that,” said Drekavac. “You could… see, this is exactly what I was concerned about.”

  Mercury had gotten his hands free and was working on his feet. Drekavac seemed to be trying to get the courage up to intervene. “Don’t even think about it,” said Mercury, brandishing the box cutter at Drekavac. It wasn’t a very intimidating weapon, but it was enough to cow Drekavac.

  Drekavac frowned a Mercury. “Let the record show that I’m completely opposed to this current course of action on your part,” he said.

  “Noted,” Mercury replied. He went to Suzy and cut her hands free, then handed her the box cutter. “Start working on the others,” he said. “And do it fast. Lucifer could be back any second.” While Suzy freed Eddie and Balderhaz, Mercury looked through the shelves for another knife. He didn’t find one, but he pocketed the Balderhaz cube and Tiamat’s “miracle detector.”

  Suzy cut the zip-tie on Special Agent Burton’s wrist and then handed him the box cutter. “Good luck!” She said, and turned back to the others. “Let’s go.”

  They set off toward the exit.

  “Wait!” cried Drekavac. “Come back!”

  But Mercury and the others were already gone.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Mercury led the way through the maze of equipment, with Suzy, Eddie and Balderhaz right behind him.

  Mercury stopped and held up his hand as they approached the perimeter of the building. “Careful,” he whispered. “Lucifer’s minions are—”

  His words were interrupted by the sound of an explosion from somewhere behind them. The fluorescent lights overhead flickered out, and the building was suddenly dark except for minimal battery-powered emergency lighting—Suzy had skimped on lighting requirements to save time. Another explosion sounded just ahead, followed by shouts and the clattering of debris on the floor.

  “Another diversion?” asked Suzy.

  “Lucifer’s already inside,” said Mercury. “I think the feds got sick of waiting.” He glanced back the way they’d come.

  “What’s the problem, Mercury?” asked Eddie. “Keep going!”

  Mercury handed the Balderhaz cube to Suzy. “You go, Eddie,” said Mercury. “Keep Suzy safe. Balderhaz!”

  Balderhaz, who seemed to have gotten lost down an adjoining alley, turned to look at Mercury.

  “Stay with the group, please,” said Mercury.

  Balderhaz shrugged and shuffled back toward them.

  “Where are you going, Mercury?” Suzy asked.

  Somewhere in the distance, another explosion sounded.

  “I have to destroy that portal generator before Lucifer causes any more trouble,” said Mercury.

  “I think the FBI is going to take care of that for you,” said Eddie.

  “Can’t count on it,” said Mercury. “It won’t take long. Get the Balderhaz cube away from here and I can melt the thing to slag in a second.”

  “But all our work…” Balderhaz protested.

  “I know,” said Mercury. “It sucks. Maybe we can build another one someday.”

  Balderhaz grumbled something indecipherable.

  “I’ll catch up to you guys shortly,” said Mercury, slipping past them in the direction they had come. “Just go.”

  “Wait!” cried Suzy. “Mercury!”

  But Mercury, intent on finding his way through the maze of equipment in the dark, paid no attention. Were he not inside the Balderhaz field, he would convert a small amount of interplanar energy into light, but for now he had to stumble through the dimly lit building, cursing each time he banged a knee or elbow into a piece of errant machinery.

  As Mercury approached the open area, he saw the familiar bluish-white glow of the open portal on the floor. Next to it, visible only because of the reflected light from the portal itself, was the portal generator, still intact. Drekavac still stood in front of it, regarding the screen. He turned as Mercury approached.

  “Good, you’re back,” Drekavac said. “The shard is fully charged. I managed to set the portal generator a few hours farther into the past, but…” His face fell as he turned and saw that it was Mercury approaching. “You again! Why don’t you leave me alone?”

  Not sure what to make of this odd greeting, Mercury ignored it. “Step aside, Drekavac,” he said. “I need to disintegrate that thing.”

  Drekavac sighed and shuffled away from the portal generator. “I just wish you would make up your mind.”

  Mercury took a step toward the portal generator, hoping that Suzy was far enough away with the Balderhaz cube for him to use interplanar energy to perform a miracle. He would only need to weaken the molecular bonds of the portal generator’s components momentarily and the thing would collapse into a pile of dust.

  As he approached, two more explosions sounded nearby. So far, whatever explosives the feds were using didn’t seem to be doing much damage, but Mercury suspected that was because the demons were using interplanar energy to minimize the effects. Even with the Balderhaz cube inside, it would be easy enough to create a dome-shaped barrier that would cause any bombs to detonate prematurely. Of course, that would only work until the feds decided to use something really powerful, like a nuke. And since they’d evidently already decided to sacrifice three of their own agents, Mercury suspected the nuke was on its way. The feds were starting to get an idea what they were up against, and they were going to use every weapon in their arsenal.

  Mercury raised his hand, attempting to harness enough interplanar energy to destroy the portal generator. At first the energy seemed to be flowing freely, but then he felt some resistance. Was Suzy returning with the Balderhaz cube?

  No. The resistance was too sudden. Someone was actively interfering with his attempt to perform a miracle. But Drekavac showed no interest in stopping him. Mercury turned to see a tall, thin figure approaching, barely visible in the dim bluish light. Lucifer.

  “You know,” said Lucifer, “if you had any sense, you’d be miles away from here by now.”

  “I got to thinking about that,” said Mercury. “It occurred to me that it doesn’t do me any good to be sipping piña coladas in the Azores if I’ve never existed.”

  “You won’t feel a thing,” said Lucifer. “One moment you’ll exist, and the next you won’t.”

  “Is that what you told Tiamat?”

  Lucifer chuckled. “Tiamat’s fine.”

  “Of course she is. But she’s not going back in time with you, is she?”

  “No,” said Lucifer. “Tiamat’s not very good at playing second fiddle. I hit her over the head with a pipe and tied her up.”

  “I figured. Azrael has abandoned you, you know.”

  Lucifer shrugged. “Don’t need him. Where I’m going, there will be plenty of potential converts.”

  Another explosion sounded overhead.

  “Can’t let you do that, Lucifer,” said Mercury. “You had your chance at world domination. You lost. No do-overs.”

  “I’ve changed the rules,” said Lucifer. “Try to keep up.” He launched himself toward the portal, but Mercury, anticipating the move, tackled him around the waist. The two crashed into the
steel shelving unit behind the portal generator, knocking tools and other equipment to the ground. Seizing the advantage, Mercury took a swing at Lucifer’s face, but he misjudged the distance in the dim light and merely grazed the demon’s jaw with his knuckles. Lucifer backed away and then altered his trajectory, heading back toward the portal.

  But when Lucifer was only a few feet away, another blast sounded, shaking the ground so hard he was thrown to floor. Mercury, gripping one of the steel shelf supports, barely remained on his feet. As Lucifer crawled toward the portal, Mercury dived at him, grappling him around the waist and rolling away from the portal. Mercury landed hard on his back, with Lucifer on top of him, and barely moved his head in time to avoid being punched in the face. Lucifer’s knuckles hit the concrete with a crack and he yelped in pain. He rolled off Mercury, holding his right hand in his left and groaning, while Mercury tried to catch his breath. For a moment, the two lay there, side by side, looking straight up at the ceiling. Except the ceiling was missing: one of the bombs had apparently torn a gaping hole in the roof and they were now staring at the dark canopy of the desert sky, dotted with the pinpricks of thousands of stars.

  “Wow,” said Mercury after a moment.

  “Yeah,” said Lucifer. “Makes you feel pretty insignificant.”

  “Sure does,” said Mercury. “Like, we’re just two people out of billions on one little planet orbiting one star out of billions and billions.”

  “Makes our differences seem kind of petty,” said Lucifer.

  “Right?” said Mercury. “Like, what are we even fighting about?”

  “Well,” said Lucifer, “I wanted to go back in time and erase history and you’re trying to stop me.”

  “I know that,” said Mercury. “I meant, like, in the grand scheme of things, what does it really matter?”

  “Oh,” said Lucifer. “Yeah, I see what you mean. But that’s just the human condition writ large, isn’t it? I mean, what’s the point of doing anything? You can’t think that way.”

  “I suppose not,” said Mercury. “Still, I think it helps to stop and get some perspective once in a while. Hey, can I ask you a question?”

  “Shoot,” said Lucifer.

  “Well, I don’t want to give you any ideas,” said Mercury. “But I’m curious. If the shard is so valuable, why don’t you take it back in time with you?”

  “Trust me, I would if I could,” said Lucifer. “But you can’t take charged ubiquium through a portal. It’s too unstable. It’ll blow up and probably tear a hole in the spacetime continuum, obliterating me and everything else for miles around. I could drain the shard of energy, but it has to be charged to power the portal.”

  “Catch-22,” said Mercury.

  “My favorite kind,” said Lucifer. “So, my hand is feeling a little better if you want to get back to it.”

  “Okay,” said Mercury. “I’m never going to let you get away with it, you know.”

  “We’ll see about that,” said Lucifer, sitting up.

  Mercury pulled himself into a crouch, ready to launch himself at Lucifer as soon as he made his move. Lucifer got to his feet and took a step toward the portal. Mercury launched himself at Lucifer again, spreading his long arms to tackle him. But Lucifer twisted away at the last moment, and at the same time another explosion rocked the building. Lucifer caught himself against the shelving unit but Mercury, badly off balance, stumbled forward, trying not to trip over his own feet. Just as he regained his footing, another explosion went off behind him, there was a roaring in his ears and then everything went black.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Somewhere in North Africa; c. 5,000 B.C.

  Mercury awoke face-down with the smell of dirt and decaying leaves in his nostrils. He pulled himself into a sitting position and looked around.

  At first he wasn’t sure where he was. Then he wasn’t sure when he was. And then he was sure neither where nor when he was.

  He had gone through the portal and ended up somewhere—and somewhen—else. The portal was nowhere to be found. Sometime after he had gone through, the portal had been shut down. Had Lucifer come through as well? Mercury was fairly certain he had not. Mercury didn’t think he’d been out for more than a minute; if Lucifer were anywhere nearby in this desolate landscape, he’d see him. Also, he doubted Lucifer would have left him alone if he’d come across him lying face down in the sand. The jerk would have pantsed him at the very least.

  Mercury stood up and surveyed the area. A jungle, he thought. A canopy of trees hung overhead, broken only by occasional cracks of daylight. The rustling and squawking of birds and other animals could be heard. But something was wrong: the animal sounds were sparse and lethargic, and the smell of decaying leaves and sight of wilted vegetation around him attested that it had been some time since this rain forest had seen any rain. But there was something else: the cracks of daylight overhead were too big and well-defined. These weren’t gaps in the foliage; they were actual cracks. He was looking at a ceiling. But there were no walls, just an endless ceiling that extended to the horizon. A dome.

  No, he thought. It couldn’t be.

  Mercury had heard Balderhaz’s theories about what had happened to Horace Finch’s insane vanity project in the North African desert, but as with nearly everything Balderhaz said, he hadn’t taken it seriously. Balderhaz thought the entire facility—along with Christine Temetri and her friend, what’s-his-name, the explosion guy—had been transported several thousand years back in time. It was a cheery thought, that Christine had lived out the rest of her life in some other time, but Mercury had never really allowed himself to believe it. But as he strolled under the massive dome, his feet crunching on dead leaves that had fallen from the dying trees, he realized it was true. He had gone back in time through the portal and somehow ended up in the precise location where Eden II had been transported.[8] How was that possible? And where was he, exactly? Still in Nevada, or at the remote North African site of Eden II? Or somewhere else entirely?

  He strolled outside through a door that had been left open and stood blinking for a moment in the bright desert sun. The landscape superficially resembled the Nevada desert he had just left, but it was clearly a different place. It wasn’t just that the building was missing; the vegetation was different, and the sand was a different shade of brown. The real clincher, though, was the mountain range in the distance that hadn’t been there before he came through the portal, 7,000 years later in the world’s history. He couldn’t be in Nevada; seventy centuries of erosion wouldn’t erase those mountains. The vista matched his memories of the North African plain where Horace Finch had constructed Eden II.

  He puzzled on this for some time. Why had the portal transported him ten thousand miles across the planet’s surface, rather than just causing him to materialize in the same spot he had just left? The answer came to him when he remembered that the portal would be using the geometry of the interplanar energy channels rather than an ordinary reckoning of geography. The Nevada site was the location of a nexus of energy channels, so it made a perfect spot for a portal location. But the interplanar energy channels had undergone a realignment in 2012,[9] which meant that the Elko nexus likely hadn’t existed before that. Drekavac probably hadn’t taken the realignment into account, which meant the channel he’d opened up simply followed the path of least resistance between the present and the past. Thus the destination portal would appear at the location of another nexus, possibly hundreds or even thousands of miles away. So here he was, in North Africa.

  That was where sorted. The bigger question, though, was how long had Eden II been here? Judging from the sorry condition of the jungle, it had been several weeks at least since the life-support systems of Eden II had shut down. Had the systems worked for a while and then shut down, or had they stopped working the moment the place was ripped out of Africa? As Mercury understood it, most of the infrastructure for Eden II was underground; it was hard to see how the machinery required to keep this place go
ing could have been transported back as well without displacing a whole lot of ground. Most likely only the above-ground part of the facility had been sent back in time, which meant that the jungle would have started dying almost immediately. Assuming that it had been at most a year since Eden II appeared, Christine and what’s-his-name might still be alive.

  He needed to find her. After all, there had to be a reason he was transported to this particular place and time, didn’t there?

  He frowned as it occurred to him that the reason might be to foil Lucifer’s plot to rewrite history. And that train of thought prompted another question: why hadn’t Lucifer followed him? The obvious answer was that the portal generator had been damaged in the FBI’s attack. A wave of despair washed over Mercury as he realized this might very well mean he was trapped in the past forever. Well, for the next seven thousand years anyway. The good news was that Lucifer’s plan had been thwarted—at least for now. Mercury just hoped Suzy and the others had gotten free.

  Of course, there was always the possibility that Lucifer would repair the portal—or eventually even build another one—and try again. But Drekavac had set the portal generator for as far back as he could, and time was still moving forward… which meant that he couldn’t possibly travel farther back than Mercury had. Mercury smiled as the realization dawned on him: he was uniquely situated to prevent Lucifer’s plan from ever coming to fruition. All he had to do was wait for Lucifer to show up. But that could be hours… or years. Mercury didn’t relish the prospect of camping out here for the next God-knows-how-many years waiting for the devil to show up. It would be like that time he tried sitting through that horrible French play with the two guys bickering for three hours. There had to be a better way.

  If only he had some way of knowing when the portal had reopened, then he could go look for Christine and not have to worry about missing Lucifer. Also, it might be a good idea to try to find some other angels to alert them of Lucifer’s plan. But if it really was the Epoch, then angels might not even be around yet. It was odd to think about: somewhere on Earth, another Mercury had recently materialized, or was about to. A Mercury who had no idea what sorts of adventures were in store for him on this strange plane. Poor bastard, he thought.