by Yronwode
His title and name was Archonex Ordinator Meek, and until yesterday, he had been considered the frontrunner to be the next Pontifex. His head was bald, his face was soft and puffy, and his eyes were guarded by wire-rimmed spectacles. He and his acolyte, a quiet and, truth be told, rather effete young man, were giving Eddie Roebuck a crash-course in Starcross Theology.
“How much as her Serenity Pontifex Solace told you so far?” Meek asked.
“She said if I decided to eat my lunch off the naked breasts of teenaged girls I could do that,” Eddie informed him. This brought a titter from the quartet of young women he had requested, and been granted, as servants to his personal needs.
“Well, of course you could,” said Meek, with his soft, reassuring voice. “But if it isn’t what you knew the Allbeing to want you to do, then you would forfeit your power and authority as Pontifex.”
“I should have known there would be a catch,” Eddie Roebuck sighed and sipped his wine. It was pretty good as wine went. Not much kick, but pleasantly fruity, without the dirty-sock aftertaste of the vintage he had previously been acquainted with back in Halifax.?
“Technically,” Meek continued. “Your title will be ‘Emissary Pontifex,’ the Supreme Pontifex of the Starcross Holy Empire resides in his palace of gold and moon-crystals on Beta Ceres.”
“Palace of Gold and Moon Crystals?” Eddie asked, because it sounded more and more to him like this Starcross thing was a pretty lucrative racket. .
“Gold is formed in the heart of supernovas, so it is precious,” Meek explained.
“And the Palace of the Pontifex is constructed of polished crystal transported to the surface of Beta Ceres. In his throne room, he has as many orbs as there are worlds in the empire, each a perfect sphere of polished stone from that planet… even Yronwode.”
Meek seemed a bit wistful at the memory, and he quickly returned to the matter at hand. “I have sent for the Sacred Texts to be brought here so that I can instruct you on at least the basic tenets of our faith.”
Eddie crossed his arms. “Just cut to the chase. What are we doing when this is over?”
Meek seemed a little confused. “When this is over?”
“When we’re dead,” Eddie clarified. “I mean, that’s what religion is, isn’t it? It tells you what happens when we’re dead.”
“I don’t agree with that definition,” Meek began, then gasped and corrected himself. “According to the teachings of the Pontifex, the Everlasting is a place where we spend eternity with those who are like ourselves. To put it another way, the good gather together and make heavens, the evil gather together and make hell.” Eddie gave this some thought, and smiled. “We spend eternity with people just like us?”
“In severely reduced terms… yes,” Meek answered him.
Eddie pushed the point. “So, when I die, I spend eternity with a bunch of guys who like to drink and chase women?”
“If that is what you value, if there is no more to your existence than that, then that is what you shall have,” Meek answered.
“I start to like this religion,” Eddie told him.
Meek, somewhat flustered, went back to his primary task. “The Fifth Testament is divided into three parts. The first part is History, which describes the colonization of the planet Taramayara in what would have been in the Earth year 2000 BC.” Eddie raised an eyebrow. Something about that did not seem right. “You’re saying that there was a human colony in outer space 2000 years before the First Messiah, Jesus H. Christ, walked on Earth.”
Meek protested. “I am not saying it; the Prophet Brian Kingman said it. The civilization perished roughly a thousand years after the appearance of the Holy Twins on that world, or, what would have been the Solar Year 1954.”
“Ignoring the fact that Solar Year 1954 was like, what, a thousand years before humans had starflight, did he see why they perished?”
“That is not in the Fifth Testament,” Meek explained. “It is in the First Compendium. Each world in the empire has its own compendium, which records the revelations of the Allbeing to the Pontifexes. In the first compendium, it was revealed to Brian Kingman in a vision that the Taramayaran civilization was destroyed by an invasion of giant mutant space broccoli.”
Eddie stared at him, hoping the meaning of the stare would become clear.
When Meek failed to respond, Eddie continued, “You’ve got to realize that’s nucking futs.”
Meek was undeterred. “The Second Part of the Fifth Testament are the Chronicles, which follow the history of the Taramayarans. The third part is the Prophecy, which foretold events that transpired after their civilization was destroyed, but which came to pass in our era… the colonization of space, the Crusades, the coming of Vesta…”
“So, basically, stuff Brian Kingman already knew about when he ‘discovered’
Taramayara, plus a bunch of stuff he could have made up,” Eddie interrupted. “Tell me, did anyone go back to check out this Taramayara planet, or did you just take his word for it.”
“The coordinates of Taramayara were lost on his return,” Meek said.
“Of course they were,” Eddie sighed. He finished his wine in a single gulp and gestured to the serving girls for more.
“Let me continue with how the Prophecies of the Fifth Testament described the rise of the Starcross Holy Empire,” Meek continued.
Eddie cut him short. “So, what powers do I get as Pontifex.” Meek tried, and failed, to suppress a little sigh. “You’ll be able to heal the sick, you’ll bless crops and ensure a good harvest, you’ll be able to bless children…”
“Do I get any good powers?” Eddie asked.
“Control over the elements,” Meek answered.
“Really, the Pontifex can do that?”
“The Chosen One can do that,” Meek answered. “Compendium of Yronwode, 22:23. ‘All the elements at his command, the chosen one turns the horde aside.’”
“I have to turn the what aside?” Eddie asked?
“The Horde,” Meek explained. “The Prophecy states that the Chosen One will descend to spare God’s people from an onslaught by a Horde of godless barbarians.
We believe the barbarians are the Xirong, and you are the Chosen One.”
“And the Horde is fixing to over-run the place?” Eddie asked.
“The other prophecies have already been fulfilled,” Meek explained. “Our retreat to Midian, the coming of the Kariad, the falling away of the Redeemers from the path of the Allbeing.”
“That was in the Fifth Testament?” Eddie asked.
“Those prophecies were in the Yronwode Compendium,” Meek told him. “It was prophesied hundreds of years ago. Solace is a strong believer in prophecy, and she long felt she would live to see the arrival of the Chosen One.”
“But I can’t turn back any hordes,” Eddie insisted.
“You must,” Meek told him. “Many doubt the Xirong could ever rally a combined force capable of over-running Midian and Xiyyon. But they are wrong. The Xirong will attack soon. The Midians think their shield and their weapons will save them, but they will not. Only you can turn back the Horde.”
“How?” Eddie demanded, an insinuation of terror breaking into him.
“Your powers will magnify after you become Holy Pontifex,” Meek assured him.
Eddie sneered and drank more wine. “Yeah, right, and when is that supposed to happen?”
“Upon the death of the current Pontifex,” Meek explained. “Provided, of course, that you successfully complete the Stunt of Ascension, and in consultation with the Levitating Matriarchs…”
“The Stunt of Ascension? What is it?” Eddie Roebuck asked.
Ordinator Meek snapped his fingers. “First Compendium of Ceres Beta, Chapter 10, verses 22-28.” The acolyte opened his technoscroll as the Ordinator recited. “So shall it be, that when the Pontifex, sensing the call of eternity (subnote, imminent death), shall name his or her successor, the successor shall prove him or herself worthy to guide the Eternal Church by d
emonstrating courage and skill. So, to this end shalt thou construct a deep pool no less than forty meters across. And so shalt thou put into this pool one (or more) large sharks, such that this shark might eateth a man. And lo, shalt thou endeavor to fever the appetite of the beast by whatsoever means thou chooseth, like maybe throwing some bloody fish or something into the pool. And, behold, the successor shalt jump over the pool (or tank) on a motorcycle.
And if he surviveth, lo, he shalt be called Pontifex.”
“Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!” Eddie put out his hands in a Stop! What the Hell!
Gesture. “I have to jump over a shark on a motorcycle.”
“No, of course not,” said Meek. “Yronwode’s eco-system won’t support sharks.”
“Good.
“You’ll have to jump over a man-eating sea-kraken.”
I should have recognized that set up, thought Eddie Roebuck.
Midian Security Base One
David Alkema had been airlifted from Security Base Four to Security Base One in a kind of military aircraft lifted by four powerful jet-thrusters. Security Base One was the largest of the Midian Security Bases, located on the northern border of the Midian Penisula. It wrapped around the foothills of a flat-toped, anvil-like mountain range, and guarded a long flat expanse known geographically as the Plain of Salvation, but more commonly by its military designation, the Demilitarized Zone. On the far side was Xirong territory, a sprawling city ran along the horizon at the far side.
When his aircraft set down, Lt. Cmdr. Alkema was met by a strong, handsome, middle-aged woman who introduced herself as Colonel Brave. She was not part of the Security Forces, but instead with Midian Intelligence, which meant her uniform has a lot more black on it and Alkema trusted her even less.
Alkema cut right to the point.
“Did we get enough telemetry on the crash site to launch a rescue mission?” “Affirmative,” Brave answered.
“And have we secured the necessary permissions to launch a rescue mission.” “Affirmative that also,” she told him. “The teams are preparing for embarkation.
Come this way,” she led him down the tarmac for several hundred meters before coming to a hangar… lean-to type structure with an open front. Four large aircraft were parked inside, metal craft with odd articulations of legs underneath, twin sets of wings, and a kind of rotating blade assembly on the top. Brave called them ‘Ornithopters.’
Midian personnel were loading packs of weapons and medical supplies into the rear hatch. Brave introduced Alkema to the man in charge, a short, powerfully built man with close-cropped black hair. A perimeter of immaculately trimmed black facial hair surrounded his mouth.
“This is General Parka,” Brave announced. “He is the commander of our Search and Rescue unit.” He did the ‘move-hand-up-and-down’ thing with Alkema, as he explained, “I have led 119 rescue missions into The Wilderness of Howling Zeal,” he said, his voice was low and serious. “I have successfully retrieved 44 prisoners from the Xirong.” “Only 44 out of 119?” Alkema said.
“Only 44 out of 232,” he told him. “Some missions involved multiple captives.
The Xirong are adept at kidnapping, and they rarely release prisoners alive… or in one piece. We can hope your captain has not yet been captured, but is has been almost a full day since his ship was lost.” “May I bring my own warfighters with me on the rescue mission,” Alkema asked.
“You may bring them,” said Parka gruffly. “But they will be under my command, and they will stay out of my way. Is that understood?” Alkema agreed that it was understood. “Good,” Parka said. “We depart in 20
Microns. Have your men assemble here.”
Prudence
A little more than an hour after finding the wreckage, Trajan Lear detected the arrival of a squadron of air vehicles vectoring in from the southeast. He went on the COM link, “Prudence here, I believe I have the Search and Rescue team in sight.
Awaiting instructions.”
Alkema came back on the link. “Trajan, this is Tactical Lieutenant Commander Alkema. I’m aboard one of the rescue ships. Is the area of the wreckage still clear?”
“Affirmative,” Lear answered. “Shall I set down now.”
“Negative, I need you to do one other thing for me, before you come back,” Alkema paused and then added. “It’s very important.”
“Okay,” Lear said. “Standing by to receive instructions.”
“I’m transmitting a mission log to your ship, are you receiving it?” Trajan checked his multi-functional display. “Affirmative. 80-90-100% received.”
“Download it into the memory core of the Hammerhead missiles carried your Accipiters.”
This was simple. Drag the mission log from its space in Prudence’s neural net and transfer it into the memory hole of the Hammerheads carried by his Accipiters.
Trajan did it in his head, and the ship carried out the operation. It took four seconds.
“Complete,” he reported.
“What’s your current altitude Prudence? ” Alkema asked.
“9,700 meters,” Prudence reported.
Alkema took a breath. “Increase to 9,900.”
“Okay, 9,900,” Trajan Lear acknowledged. He pressed his stick forward, but Prudence was already nosing up on his neural command.
“Prudence is at 9,900,” Trajan Lear reported a few moments later.
“Intiate a full sensor sweep. Look for energy fields or any change in your physical environment.” Alkema ordered.
Trajan used the full-range of Prudence’s on-board sensors, scanning the complete electromagnetic spectrum, sweeping for neutrino waves and quantum field emissions.
“Do you detect anything?” Alkema asked.
“Only the same intense scattering field we detected from Pegasus. It begins approximately 12,000 meters above the surface and reaches up beyond 22,000
meters.”
“What do you detect at 10,000 meters?” Alkema asked.
“Nothing but air,” Trajan Lear reported.
Alkema took a deep breath. “Take Prudence past 10,000 meters and initiate the plan as we discussed.”
“OK, going to 10,000 meters.”
Seconds passed. “Do you detect anything now?”
“Affirmative,” Trajan replied. Then, his voice disappeared beneath shrieks of feedback that cut through the COM link.
“Repeat that, Flight Lieutenant Lear,” Alkema demanded, his voice fading away in the distance. “We can’t…”
Then, there was silence.
“I’ve detected a large airborne reptilian creature,” Trajan Lear reported, he was fairly certain communications between Prudence and the Midian Search and Rescue Force had been cut off, but procedure was procedure.
A second after that, a blast of energy hit the back of his ship. Trajan instinctively ordered his ship to maximum thrust and peeled away at maximum velocity.
The reptilian only registered visually and in the quantum field. The ship detected no mass, but the scans of the electromagnetic spectra were oscillating wildly.
Prudence concluded that the creature behind them was created of pure energy.
Normally, Trajan Lear didn’t believe in pure energy creatures, not in this universe anyway. But, he would deal with his lack of belief later.
The reptilian cut loose with another blast of fire. Trajan dodged it deftly, like a leaf on the wind… with ion afterburners. He checked his altitude: Prudence was keeping exactly 10,000 meters. He told the ship to increase speed and go higher.
As soon as he crossed 11,000 meters, two additional reptilians appeared in front of him, blasting what appeared to fire, but was massively more energetic.
He flipped Prudence into a dive and avoided the blast. He wanted to fire back, but there was nothing for his weapons to lock onto.
The only thing left was Alkema’s suicide mission. He dodged one of the dragons again and directed Prudence straight upward, engaging the Gravity Engine for maximum ascent velocity.<
br />
Prudence shot upward through 11,000 meters, then 12,000, then 13,000.
Beneath him, three dragons became nine, then twenty-seven. Also, some force began dragging on his ship, pulling him down. Prudence couldn’t identify it. At 13,400, he concluded “This is as high as I get.” He decoupled the Accipiters from his wingtips.
The Accipiters flew upward through 20,000 meters before Prudence lost telemetry. Somewhere above that altitude, they opened their weapon bays and launched all of their Hammerheads at max velocity into space. Their target: Pegasus.
“Midian Command Center,” Trajan spoke into his radio link. “I don’t know if you can hear me, but I’ve fired off my Accipiters with the message in their Hammerheads. I am still being pursued by… something bigger and more powerful than my ship. I’m going to try something.”
Trajan flipped backwards and dove hard, thrusters blazing, with eighty-one blazing dragons hard on his tail.
CHAPTER: 07
The Wilderness of Howling Zeal – Headhunter Territory Alkema and the rest of his team were deposited via military, heavy-lift ornithopter on the sands near where Zilla had come to rest. Then, they were not cleared to leave their rides until a perimeter of razor-wire fencing and security forces had been put in place. Caliph got very bored and annoying as she waited with Max Jordan and Johnny Rook, in full battle gear, inside the hot, dry-sauna-like interior of the ornithopter’s hold.
“Why do they call it Headhunter Territory?” Rook asked Alkema at one point.
Colonel Brave answered. “The Headhunters are the most … savage … of the Xirong. They hate both the Phalanges and us. They live as nomads and scavengers among the desert wastes.” Her finger flew to her lips. “Ah, you should only use the term
‘headhunter’ in military company. Many civilians find it offensive and degrading to refer to them that way.”
“So, why do you call them Headhunters?” Rook persisted.
“Because their preferred form of execution is decapitation,” Colonel Brave answered.
“Is it some kind of ritual?” Alkema asked.
“No, they just find it entertaining,” Brave answered.