by James Axler
He recalled when the last of the pure Tuatha de Danaan on Earth, the mad god Maccan, came for the interphaser. Maccan’s assault on Cerberus had left several dead and scores injured, including Domi, who had been tortured in Lakesh’s presence to make him give up the interphaser.
The device was something he’d needed to return to his home dimension, thanks to a linkage in the great Martian pyramid. Grant, Kane and Brigid had rushed to Mars, dealing with little, mutated trans-adapts, pint-size humanoids designed for surviving in less atmosphere-rich environments, as well as being proportionately denser and stronger than a normal human.
With an army of such mutants in the Mars base, and Maccan himself setting up the interphaser to head home and then bring back an army of his followers, the trio had found themselves in a truly dangerous situation. Only by forcing Maccan’s ancient glove weapon—the Silver Hand of Naudha—to unleash its power inside the pyramid had they managed to stop the scheme. The ancient building collapsed as the Silver Hand’s power bolts tore through the roof, all while the Cerberus adventurers raced to the mat-trans to take them back home to Earth.
If one god was a threat with the interphaser, then letting Vanth and Charun have access to it would be even worse; at least that’s what Kane assumed. Then again, Brigid was rarely a woman who did anything without purpose and plan. The tiny pyramid was an interphaser housing, but there was little guarantee that it had any of the proper components within. This could be a damaged prototype or something worse.
Kane swung the Manta over the center of the temple’s remains, landing it among the Doric columns that were all that remained of the ancient structure. The ruins were large enough to land the compact scram jet, even with Brigid present.
He popped the cockpit for her. “So, you’re bringing that along?”
“Yeah. Try not to fly too recklessly. The interphaser is used to just transporting itself and recalling immediately. Being jostled isn’t in its best interests,” Brigid admonished, climbing up and handing him the device.
Kane looked at the casing. It felt heavier than normal, but then Brigid caught his eye.
“Don’t think of it,” she told him.
And almost immediately Kane’s thoughts became a little fuzzier, clearing a moment later as the interphaser was cradled in his arms like a baby. “You sure this can take entering and exiting orbit?”
“If not, I can tinker with it,” Brigid stated. “It’s just a backup plan that might help our godling friends.”
Kane nodded. He still knew enough to feel distrust of the Stygian aliens, those doubts forward in his mind…but something had slithered back into his subconscious.
Brigid squeezed herself in behind the pilot’s couch, grumbling and complaining all the way. She was a tall, well-built woman, so slithering into such a tight spot was nothing fun for her. He turned and handed her the interphaser, wondering why his arms felt so achy and weak as he lifted it.
Kane dismissed it as tension and uncertainty. They were facing off with two alien humanoids that seemed to be capable of stealing a person’s soul and breaching the barriers between universes. He wanted to talk to Brigid about this, but something in him whispered that she didn’t want to know about his doubts and worries.
He ground his molars, feeling completely off balance, even as he went over the checklist for takeoff. It may have been overly redundant, as he’d just done it a few minutes ago before takeoff to the trip here, but he was a pilot. Not as good as Grant was, which was why he wanted to go over every variable, every condition, of the aircraft before risking his and Brigid’s lives on takeoff.
The more he concentrated on the every day, the mundane, the better his mind and stomach felt. He wanted to ask Brigid if she had anything to do with this, but once again, a fog of obfuscation had him forgetting what he was going to ask a few moments later. It was a mental roller coaster, and one he wanted to get off of, but even wishing he could talk with someone else about it was making him feel worse.
“Kane?”
He turned and looked back to her. “Is Vanth attacking my brain?”
He managed to squeeze the words out, but it was as if his throat was a thin slit of cloth and as he pushed each syllable through, the canvas tore, threads popping, his larynx growing more and more raw with the effort.
“No. No,” she said. She touched the side of his face, squirming to look him squarely in the eyes.
“What’s wrong with me? My memory is going all crazy and I can’t concentrate,” Kane asked. “It feels like I’m not alone inside my head.”
“Concentrate on me,” Brigid told him. “I should have known that your will was too strong, that you were too aware of yourself to be able to ignore my posthypnotic suggestions.”
With that statement he began to calm. “Posthypnotic suggestions. You’ve been helping me keep my thoughts aligned.”
“But you are too smart. Too in touch with your own thought patterns that you were feeding into a loop of recognizing the dissonance, and then aggravating yourself more as your subconscious went to work burying it,” Brigid said. “Your point man’s instinct comes from your ability to see through the filter of your subconscious and pick up on actual details, not the usual tricks of consciousness that inform our daily perceptions.”
Kane blinked, but kept his focus on her. Parts of him were upset with her, rooting around in his head, but then, he’d actually been one of the people for the act of altering his thoughts, protecting the Cerberus expedition from the intrusive powers of Vanth. It was merely his ego rebelling at the thought of his mind being manipulated by another.
“I’ve broken your conditioning by merely mentioning posthypnotic,” Brigid offered. “Should we try this again?”
“I don’t think so. If anything, it might make things worse for me, even if you managed to find a way to get me out of my loop of confusion,” Kane said. “Who knows, she might not scan me casually…”
“Except you’re returning with new stuff, new information,” Brigid countered.
“Like the interphaser housing…being heavier,” Kane agreed. He narrowed his eyes. “If we spend too much time here discussing this, she’ll wonder where we disappeared to.”
He finished his checklist and, satisfied that the Manta was ready to go, he glanced back. “All right, we’re off. Make sure I don’t bang the interphaser around too much, okay?”
Brigid took a relieved-sounding breath. “I’ve never been so happy to hear you play dumb.”
Kane tilted his head. “What’re you talking about, Baptiste?”
“Never mind,” she concluded, sighing with exasperation.
Kane’s lips pulled into a tight, self-satisfied smile.
Chapter 14
The four people in the CAT Beta squad had seen the departure of Kane’s Manta from the mountainside and realized that something was up. From the direction that it flew in, Domi was certain Kane and Grant had ingratiated themselves into the house of the Etruscan godlings. That was always a good thing in Domi’s mind; she didn’t have to worry about putting on a false front to engage in the tiresome games of intrigue and false politeness with the alien entities. She was here, in the wilderness, where she was comfortable.
She was glad for the launch. Now she could start looking for a sign to track from where the robots had brought the captured Manta. With grim determination, she followed the back trail of the two Gear Skeletons as they trundled from the improvised launch pad on the side of the hill. Shadowing them was an exercise in the basics, as neither of the gigantic mechanisms was the quietest of devices, nor did their ponderous tread land lightly on the ground.
Even so, she didn’t want to be lulled into a false sense of security, so she acted as if they were possessed of the sharpest hearing and the keenest of eyes. She stayed to the foliage and shadows, crawling along to pace them, but always keeping aware of where her next hand- or foothold should be, so as not to crunch a leaf or snap a branch.
The others were behind, keeping a d
istant watch, just in case someone, somehow, picked up the feral huntress’s trail. Edwards and Sinclair both had long-range rifles to provide her with overwatch, and they had night-vision and infrared capabilities that would pick up such a creature in pursuit of her.
So far, things were quiet. Of course, they were on radio silence, but Domi knew that if she did develop a tail, the others would fire. No matter what kind of silencer technology was developed, there was no way to make a rifle report quiet. She’d hear it.
Of course, if she heard it, then so would the gods within the mountain temple.
Domi focused on the mission at hand, living in the moment, as was her nature. All of that was how she managed to stay alive for her two decades of life so far, even in the face of inhuman opponents. Keep the basics, always move with absolute certainty and keep your eyes and ears peeled.
No technology, no tricks, were substitutes for the hard-won skills she’d developed.
The pair of giants reached a set of crags and an outcropping along the bottom of the hill. From a distance, it seemed like a natural formation and a casual glance would have mistaken it for a normally formed cave. As the robots continued on, Domi could tell that it was an entrance, with stones and slabs of solid rock positioned to conceal a metal-walled frame. The size of the “cave entrance” was also an indicator of the unnatural status of the opening, as the fifteen-foot-tall giants strolled through the doors as if it were nothing. Domi set her shadow suit to duplicate the rocky terrain, because it would be hard to hide herself among the barren hillside without a little bit of technological assistance.
With a few quick strides, she was out from the edge of the tall grasses and up beside the hand-built entrance to the mountain of Charun and Vanth. She peered around the edge and saw that the Spartans had gone down a hundred feet of corridor, thanks to their long strides, and were approaching a gate. She switched on the shadow suit hood’s optics and gave a verbal order to search for cameras or electric eyes, things that even her finely tuned instincts couldn’t discern in the shadows of the unlit hallway.
Domi didn’t merely skim or glance; rather, she looked along as much of the wall detail as the telescopic zoom and light amplification would allow her to, which meant everything that wasn’t obscured by the massive shoulders of the New Olympian war suits. There was no way she was going to endanger the other members of her team without a thorough examination of the artificial corridor. Fortunately, it seemed the only man-made objects were the ribs that upheld the rock walls, and the flat plates of steel that formed the roof and walls at the exposed entrance. No electrical wires were in evidence, and the metal looked as if it had been present for centuries, thanks to rust.
No wiring, no bulbs were in evidence, and there were no small mammals in the crags and holes along the walls of the deeper tunnel. She observed as the gate rose and heard the clank of chains and a pulley system lifting the iron bars. Domi remained still, so that if someone looked at her, she’d simply appear to be just another rock. Even her breathing was shallow, so that her shoulders and ribs didn’t shift too much.
It was waiting, and those who knew Domi would have never thought she’d have this kind of patience, but this was not simply idling. She was observing, and staying low profile. She blended into her surroundings, eyes and ears peeled. She was not only watching for any holes in the Etruscan gods’ security, but also if someone was coming up on her from behind.
So far, she was safe in her periphery, and hadn’t missed that the gate was large, heavy and dwarfed the pair of Spartans. There were also gaps between the bars, which the hood’s optics immediately measured, displaying the dimensions of each gap. Getting through would be a task of phenomenal contortion even for the slim, tiny Domi, let alone any of the rest of her teammates and Smaragda. The only means of getting through would be to rely on technology that was left behind at Cerberus, or crudely spending time digging a channel beneath the gate, and hoping the surrounding dirt didn’t cave in on the ditch.
The second option would also leave them vulnerable during the length of time it took to dig that hole, especially if it was to be large enough for Edwards to slither through. Domi’s lips pulled tight as she realized their quarry had a good piece of security here.
She glanced back, scanning the mountainside with the telescopic optics for her friends.
Edwards and Sinclair appeared in stark contrast to the countryside as she picked up their passive IFF signature. She was out in the open and visible to them, but like her, their suits were configured to blend in with their surroundings.
Domi lifted her hand and waved for the rest of the team to come down. Sure, the idea of digging under the heavy iron gate was a bit foolish, but it was also so audacious that no one would consider someone try it. If there were any contraindications on the opposite side of the gate for making their entrance through there, then they could retreat.
Domi hoped it wouldn’t come to that. She wanted to get inside before their friends ended up in deep trouble.
Something bothered Domi as she waited for the others.
There were only two Spartans lifting and maneuvering the Manta; the same suits she recognized from Edwards’s vid footage. She wondered at the lack of the third of the suits. She recalled the heavy tread of a solo entity approaching their landing at the parallax point with Kane and Grant, but the two men had reported that it wasn’t a Gear Skeleton that approached them. It had been some form of inhuman giant akin to the massive Balor they had battled in the Appalachian Mountains months ago.
That kind of a creature was an abomination crafted of human flesh, of a living, willing host, and often the dead and dying victims of the mutant. The Fomori, as they had called themselves, were on average about three to four hundred pounds, their bodies bulked up almost like cannibals, robbing the very parts of other people, stealing muscle, bone and skin to make them larger and stronger. This form of hideous transformation was part and parcel of a deadly being known as Bres, who was an inheritor of Enlil’s, a half-breed who had molded himself into an object of perfection.
Stolen flesh, Domi continued to muse, looking down the tunnel. She began to wonder what a Gear Skeleton would resemble if it were given a coating of living humans, and the thoughts were uncomfortable. It only made sense…skeletons need muscle and meat.
And a hammer-wielding god such as Charun would need an opponent.
One whose bones could never break, being forged from an alloy version of orichalcum, and whose flesh could be healed and rebuilt, using the mindless and enslaved thralls Domi and her group had been avoiding for the past day and a half.
She wondered if the others would pick up on that. She had to remain in radio silence and avoid broadcasting the presence of CAT Beta to Vanth. She had to trust in the intelligence of her three friends that this threat could quite easily have been a replay of Helena Garthwaite’s manufactured threat, that Vanth built something for Charun to slug it out with, finally having scored enough to make a true giant.
Of course, this could mean that some of Smaragda’s own people could not be recovered, not if they were dissected and rebuilt to make new monsters.
Domi ground her teeth. She’d have to inform Smaragda of the fates she suspected, but hoped she wouldn’t have to.
Domi prayed silently that she’d never have to tell the brave Olympian soldier that the comrades she had lost had been torn apart and reassembled as the muscle and skin of a robotic giant.
* * *
THE DULL RUMBLE of thunder in the sky alerted Grant that the Manta had returned. His instincts were buzzing, almost as if the tension he was feeling was emanating from him like electricity. Grant was glad to have Kane and Brigid both back at his side, but he couldn’t help to think this was an elaborate trap, one that was intended to pull the three of them off balance.
Grant fought the urge to jump up and head to the ladder to see Kane bringing in the Manta from the peak of the hill. The hatch at the top was open, which was how he was able to hear the s
onic boom of the Manta’s deceleration as it reentered the atmosphere. Charun smiled at the sound.
“Your friends have returned,” the eight-foot humanoid confirmed. His face was bright and happy at the sound; his eye lit with genuine pleasure at the prospect of meeting Brigid Baptiste. Grant felt bad for being so suspicious of Charun, but he’d encountered enough sociopaths, human and otherwise, who could put on a good mask of false emotion. If he turned out to be a noble and just being, then Grant would beg forgiveness of the Stygian.
He hoped he would be able to beg such forgiveness. The fact that the giant let him keep his side arms, even the bag of various weapons, was disarming enough an action, but it also could have been a sign of superiority. After all, Charun had faced the heaviest of small arms on the Manta and was unharmed. What mere man-portable equipment could injure such a being?
The truth was that Grant realized Charun’s invulnerability had, in part, been due to the ancient hammer, an artifact of alien technology that was so powerful, it might as well have been magical. Sure, the others had seen the damage the hammer had wrought upon his Manta, but Grant was the only one to have been on the receiving end of the weapon in the hands of Charun. The aircraft had shaken violently. Even the inertial nature of the pilot’s couch had conveyed the force of the hammer strike.
Charun was not an opponent to underestimate, and for all his cheer and amicability, showed signs of great intellect behind his attempts to seem simple and straightforward.
“I didn’t want to seem too rude by hopping to my feet when I heard it,” Grant told Charun as he rose from his seat.
“It is understandable, Grant,” Charun said. “I have spent many a quiet hour in the company as an uncertain guest.”
“In between your tasks as a chooser of the slain?” Grant questioned.
“My duties as a so-called psychopomp, as you mentioned before,” Charun said. “The stories, as we’ve explained, have permutated over the many centuries.”