Something about it made me nervous.
Before I could say anything, Marshall ordered a couple of his men to try the doors. They'd found nothing of consequence so far, just a variety of empty corridors and abandoned buildings; no furnishings, no artwork, nothing to indicate just who or what had made these structures. With three hours of exploration already behind them, this seemed like their best opportunity.
I kept my mouth shut, not wanting to appear scared to the rest of the troops.
The door swung open easily, almost as if it were on gimbals, and Marshall ordered his squad inside.
As soon as the last man had entered the structure, the door closed smoothly behind them.
I waited for one of them to reappear.
No one did.
To make matters worse, once they passed inside the strange monolith, I lost contact with them. All communication was suddenly cut off. The radio frequency was filled with static. Their individual vital sign monitors went dark on the board in front of me. Even the emergency channel didn't work. I know; I tried.
Figuring it had something to do with the material from which the city had been erected, I settled down to wait.
A half hour passed without contact.
An hour.
Then two.
I was getting a bit nervous by then.
Still I waited.
No one came out.
I tried contacting them by radio.
No luck.
My instruments suddenly picked up a new signal. It was another ELF wave, mingling and merging with the first one to create an entirely sound.
It made the hair on the back of my arms and neck stand on end.
Four hours had passed and I was now officially worried.
No, it was worse than that. I was freaked out.
I tried reporting in to Icebreaker, only to discover that all of my radio and network connections back to base had been severed. Regardless of the channel I tried, all I got was static.
The strange new signal had begun to pulse with greater frequency. I shut off my connection to the audio sensors through the ship's hull, but even this had little effect. I could still feel the pressure of the wave pressing against my flesh and bones, could feel its insistent whisper inside my heard. I wondered, not for the first time, why I had a higher resistance to the sound than my brethren.
I paced around the cockpit for another fifteen or twenty minutes, trying to decide on a course of action. In the end, I simply couldn't leave them out there. There was an extra HADS in back, as well as several supplemental canisters of 02. The lighter gravity would allow me to carry at least two additional canisters strapped to the back of my suit. If I got trapped inside, I'd be good for at least twenty-four hours, maybe more. If I wasn't back by then, chances were I wasn't coming back anyway.
*** ***
"So you went out after them?"
I stubbed out my cigarette, rose from the table and began to pace. Just thinking about what I'd seen caused me to break out into a cold sweat and I knew there was no way I could calmly sit there and go through it all again.
"Yeah, I went out after them."
*** ***
I spent hours wandering around that strange city. Streets shifted. Buildings changed. It was as if the city itself understood what I was doing and actively worked against me. I spent hours wandering that place, knowing with every step that time was running out for the rest of the squad.
Finally, I was forced to switch over to one of the reserve oxygen tanks and knew as I did so that I'd failed. The squad had long since run out of air their own air, which meant the mission had now changed from a rescue to a retrieval.
It took another hour after that to find the temple. The doors opened easily at my touch. I used the empty air canister as a door stop, assuring my exit would not be cut off as had the others, then advanced into the interior.
I wandered around inside, following a twisted series of hallways, until at last I emerged into a giant amphitheater.
That's where I found the rest of the squad.
They stood at the base of a huge dias, the throne on top filled with some imperfectly glimpsed thing. To this day I can't picture it clearly, though my dreams are haunted by quick images of something large and tentacled, with a pale glistening eye that seemed to watch over everything at once.
Their positions did not suggest the agony of suffocation, so for an instant I felt a small surge of hope. I bounded over to where Marshall stood at the head of the group and put his faceplate close to mine, so that we could see each other's expression.
He stared at me with the flat, empty face of the dead, his eyes barren and bereft of hope.
Yet he was not dead, that much was clear. He stood there, his arms raised in silent supplication toward the slumbering thing on the throne before him, somehow caught between this world and the next.
He was not breathing, but he was aware.
I stumbled over to Grearson.
And then James.
Sullivan.
Masamori.
Little.
All of them, every single one. The same blank stare. The same listless expression. The same unlife that wrapped them up in its passionate embrace.
There was nothing I could do.
I think it was the fear of it all that saved me. I could feel the waves of pressure pushing against my mind as the horror on the throne above attempted to snare me in its grasp just like my comrades. But the sheer horror and loathsome nature of what had been done to them helped me to keep my focus, helped me drown out the rising wail in my head.
I turned and stumbled away.
I don't remember much about my retreat from the temple nor of my passage through the city. I don't remember returning to the Manta One, nor my frantic drive back through the ocean's depths.
I do remember returning to the interior of the Icebreaker, only to find it deserted. Manta Two's cradle was empty.
I stumbled through the deserted ship until I reached command and control. It was as empty as the rest of the ship, but the vidcams showed me what I was afraid to see. The crew of the Manta Two was just entering the city, the lights from their HADS illuminating the enormous structures ahead of them. I tried to reach them over the comm, but failed. All I could do was sit back and watch it happen all over again.
I guess I lost consciousness after that. It was several hours later that I stirred and stared at the screens once more. The figures were gone now; all that remained was the edge of Manta Two's wing and the open gate of that giant city, beckoning.
Radio calls to the Vengeance went unanswered as well.
The launch sequence took much longer with only one person carrying out the various tasks, but I managed. Just before dawn I jacked into the controls of the Icebreaker and took her up away from the ice, back out of the atmosphere to the Vengeance.
*** ***
"So you abandoned your comrades?"
I felt anger for the first time since the interview started. "I didn't abandon anybody! They were dead!"
The "doctor" cocked his head. "How do you explain your own survival?
I sighed, the anger gone as swiftly as it had come. I'd heard all the accusations; there wasn't any sense in getting upset anymore. "I don't know. I think it had something to do with the induction ports in my skull. Somehow they disrupted the effect of the thing's commands, allowed me to continue to think and act rationally when everyone else fell under their control."
"And the skeleton crew left behind on the Vengeance?"
I knew where he was going, knew the tapes of the "discussion" would be used at my trial, but still I felt a need to answer it all fully, to get my story on the record, if only to help those who would be left behind to deal with His arrival.
"They were all dead when I docked the Icebreaker. I'm not a trained investigator, but it looked like the ELF waves from the Beacon had caused them all to become violent. I found their bodies all over the ship, each one the victim of violence."
He stared at me for a long moment and then said, "So that's your story?"
I didn't bother to answer.
He got up from the table, left the room for a moment, and then returned with something in his hands. As he got closer, I could see it was a book. He tossed it onto the tabletop.
I looked down at the book, already knowing what I would see. It was an ancient, battered copy of a lurid tale that had been popular almost a century ago. I'd pulled the electronic text from the Vengeance's library during my long trip back, had scoured it for any clue regarding what to do now that the sleeper had been awakened. In the end it had proved useless. Mr. Lovecraft, whoever he had been, hadn't known any more than I.
The investigator grinned. It wasn't a nice grin, but rather more the kind of savage expression a hunter gets when finding his prey trapped and unable to escape. "The records onboard the Vengeance show that you accessed this story forty-seven times while en-route from Europa. If one were a suspicious man, which I am, one could almost imagine that you were trying to memorize the details, to use them to flush out your own ridiculous story, so that you'd have some kind of defense when you returned without the other thirty-nine members of your crew." He paused and looked at me with disdain. "Well? What do you think about that?"
I shrugged and reached out for another cigarette. I took my time lighting it and then got around to answering his question. "What do I think? I think Mr Lovecraft had it all right. I think he knew exactly what was sleeping out there beneath the ice, in the depths of the sea. He just got the location wrong, that's all."
The investigator laughed in my face. For the first time since entering the room he let his true feelings show. "You're a nutcase, Daniels. No doubt about it. And I'm going to enjoy watching you hang."
He moved to the door, opened it, and turned back to say one last, final comment.
That was when the second, stronger ELF wave struck the station. The one that had been propagating across space ever since I'd taken Vengeance out of orbit around Europa.
I felt it pulse against my mind and watched as he stopped in mid-sentence, his face going slack and his eyes glazing over.
Behind him, the open door beckoned.
I sat down at the table and reached for another cigarette.
There was no sense in running.
There was nowhere to go.
About the Editor
Joseph Nassise is the author of more than a dozen novels, including the internationally bestselling Templar Chronicles, and several installments in the Rogue Angel action-adventure series from Harlequin/Gold Eagle.
He’s a former president of the Horror Writers Association, the world’s largest organization of professional horror writers, and a two time Bram Stoker Award and International Horror Guild Award nominee.
Connect with him online at:
www.josephnassise.com
www.thetemplarchronicles.com
Books by Joseph Nassise
THE HERETIC
Book one of the Templar Chronicles
A former SWAT officer turns modern Templar Knight in this exciting new urban fantasy series for fans of Jim Butcher, Rob Thurman, and Patricia Briggs!
A chance encounter with one of the Hellspawn left Cade Williams with certain unique traits, including the ability to walk between the lands of the living and those of the dead. Now, as commander of the Echo Team, the special operations unit within the Templar hierarchy, he has devoted his life to using his "gifts" to protect mankind from the things that lurk in the darkness.
When a Templar commandery is invaded and its occupants mercilessly slaughtered, Knight Commander Williams is called in to hunt down those responsible. His investigation quickly leads him to a cabal of necromancers known as the Council of Nine.
There's only one problem.
The necromancers are allied with the same supernatural creature that left Cade for dead five years before. A creature so powerful that the Templars know it only as the Adversary.
In order to stop the killing, Cade will be forced to face his own personal demons. Not just those deep inside his heart, but also the one that left him scarred, body and soul.
The same demon that has already beaten him once before...
Learn more at Shades of Reality or view it at Amazon US or Amazon UK
A SCREAM OF ANGELS
Book two of the Templar Chronicles
The men of the Echo Team are back for another action-packed Templar adventure!
Three years ago an archaeological expedition led by Vatican scholar Juan Vargas discovered something unusual on the shores of the Dead Sea. Early the next morning, Father Vargas, and the artifact he uncovered, disappeared without a trace.
Until now.
An injured and badly dehydrated Father Vargas wanders out of the New Mexican desert, telling a wild story about a secret research installation and bloodthirsty demons hunting men through its halls. When word of his survival reaches the Vatican and those in charge of the Templar Order, the Echo Team is called in to deal with the situation. Their orders - investigate the facility, determine exactly what happened there, and deal with any infernal presence that might exist.
But the being they encounter there beneath the desert sands has found a way to break the bonds of Hell itself and doesn't plan on going back easily. This time, their foe might prove to be too much for even Cade and the men of Echo Team.
Learn more at Shades of Reality or view it at Amazon US or Amazon UK
A TEAR IN THE SKY
Book three of the Templar Chronicles
When Knight Commander Cade Williams discovers that his wife, Gabrielle, is not truly dead, but held in some kind of arcane stasis between the lands of the living and the lands of the dead, he vows that nothing will stop him from freeing her soul from the prison surrounding her.
But his vow is tested right from the start when an old friend calls on him to help protect the city of Boston from the ancient scourge that threatens to destroy it, leaving Cade with a heart-breaking choice: Do his duty and save the innocent lives he has sworn to protect or forsake them all in order to rescue the one for whom he would brave the walls of hell itself?
Learn more at Shades of Reality or view it at Amazon US or Amazon UK
THE SPIRIT BANNER
A Rogue Angel Adventure
Genghis Khan carved out a legacy of bloodshed and conquered kingdoms that has lasted almost eight hundred years. But while his name and deeds live on in the annals of history, his tomb has never been located… until now.
Not everyone is convinced that the diary and the map, said to lead to the great warrior's final resting place, are authentic. Archaeologist Annja Creed is among these doubters. The reality is that the body was lost to history. But despite her skepticism, Annja suddenly finds herself pulled along an increasingly complex trail of clues, each more remote than the last.
And as she and her companions race to their final destination, one thing is clear--the only tomb she may find is her own…
Learn more at Shades of Reality or view it at Amazon US
THE DRAGON'S MARK
A Rogue Angel Adventure
Archaeologist Annja Creed and her sword have never been outmatched--until now. When a surprise party for her mentor Roux includes some uninvited guests, Annja finds herself fighting desperately for her life. The intruders escape but leave a sinister message behind.
A legend has resurfaced about a sword that should be feared. A sword that seeks a master as bloodthirsty as itself. It is wielded by an assassin known as the Dragon who initiates a terrible game of cat and mouse. Eventually, the two swords—light and dark—must meet...and only one shall triumph.
Learn more at Shades of Reality or view it at Amazon US
TEAR OF THE GODS
A Rogue Angel Adventure
The legacy of a pagan king could unleash terror on the world
It started as a dream —a redheaded warrior king fought and died for his men centuries ago. The dream would lead a
rchaeologist Annja Creed to the king's undisturbed corpse…and one of England's greatest mythical artifacts.
Deep in an archaeological dig in England's Midlands, Annja locates a braided necklace around a mummified king's neck. Made of an unusual material—not quite obsidian, but gleaming with multihued color—the torc is an astonishing find. But someone knows exactly what the torc means. And he will do anything to get his hands on the Tear of the Gods. When the dig is compromised and innocent archaeologists are slain, even Annja herself is left for dead. Now she is fleeing for her life, not knowing the terrifying truth about the relic she risks everything to protect—or the devastating consequences should it fall into the wrong hands....
Learn more at Shades of Reality or view it at Amazon US
Table of Contents
The Defenseless
When Gods Die
The Last Resort
Rock, Rock, Never Stop
Ticketyboo
A Peaceable Mind
One With the Music
Traffic School
The Night is an Ally
Siren Call
About the Editor
Books by Joseph Nassise
Brimstone Dreams: A Horror Anthology Page 14