by Alten-Steve
“Mick, what are you doing?”
“I need to see that black hole. I’m going to fly her into space.”
“Her?”
“It. Does artificial intelligence have a gender?”
“What about Beck and Kurtz? Break free of this mountain and you’ll bury them in rubble.”
“Yeah, you’re right. Stay here, I’ll get them, just don’t touch anything while I’m gone. Don’t even think. Think about baseball.”
“I hate baseball.”
“Then think about the fertilized egg growing inside your womb.”
“Michael, shut up and go!”
Majestic-12 (S-66) Subterranean Facility
15 miles south of Groom Lake Air Force Base (Area 51)
North Las Vegas, Nevada
Lying on his back on the coarse desert sand, Immanuel Gabriel gazes up at the turbulent brown sky, the seemingly endless heavens of volcanic ash racing north at more than five times the velocity of a commercial jet. Exceeding supersonic speed, the generated forces cause the atmosphere to crackle and growl, the earth to rumble.
Turning to his left, he sees the simmering remains of the extraterrestrial vessel. The electricity generated from the fast-moving debris clouds has short-circuited his unknown “hosts’” transport ship. He has no idea whether the craft had been remotely piloted or if there are life forms inside.
Turning to his right, he sees the heavily armed MPs. Emerging from the bunker, they duck low, wary of tornadoes spontaneously blossoming across the open terrain. Grabbing him by his arms and legs, they carry him roughly inside the bunker.
Aboard the Balam
Nazca, Peru
The earth trembles. The trident marking the mountain’s western face slides into the sea as the fractures deepen, rending the dispersing geology into an avalanche of rock and soil that collapses upon the Paracas shoreline—revealing the starship Balam.
The 722-foot dagger-shaped star cruiser rises into the heavens. Inside the command center, Michael Gabriel grins like a teen given the keys to a new sports car. Thought control has revealed a 360-degree viewport, offering the four passengers a view of the diminishing Peruvian coast.
Dominique squeezes Mick’s hand as they pass through the churning volcanic ash, the atmospheric tsunami polishing the Balam’s soiled hull to its original golden luster as it rocks the ship.
And then they are through, the sky darkening into space. A billion stars greet them, along with the aurora borealis. Below, the planet’s Western Hemisphere is visible, its lower latitudes, from the South Pole to the line of soot just north of the equator, now clear of volcanic ash. The rest of the Earth’s clogged heavens continues to drain into space like the sand from an inverted hourglass. The charged atoms of this cosmic rainbow bleed away from the North Pole into a twisting particle stream that rises ten thousand miles above the Earth—where it swirls into the gushing mouth of the strangelet’s event horizon.
Kurtz stares at the ominous aperture, the eye of the galactic storm as large as the diameter of the moon. “What the hell is that thing?”
Michael Gabriel is no longer smiling. “It’s called a strangelet. Believe it or not, it’s a man-made black hole.”
“Man created that?” Beck rasps. “Why?”
“Forget the why,” Kurtz snaps. “Will it harm the Earth?”
Mick points to the trail of debris being inhaled into the black hole’s event horizon. “All that ash is feeding the monster positively charged atomic particles. The particles have given the strangelet size and mass—enough to stabilize it inside the physical universe. When the remains of the volcanic ash are swept into space, the strangelet will be drawn to the planet in order to continue to feed. This time, when it passes through the core, it will consume the entire Earth.”
“How do we stop it?”
“I have absolutely no idea.”
Majestic-12 (S-66) Subterranean Facility
The elevator plunges down the subterranean shaft, stopping at LEVEL 29. Secured in shackles, Immanuel Gabriel is dragged down a bright empty corridor and through a security checkpoint.
The prisoner offers no resistance. Manny’s mind’s eye is absorbed in a bizarre slide show of subliminal images—Chilam Balam’s journey through the sacred cenote’s wormhole … his capture by Seven Macaw … Blood Woman’s execution … Lilith’s decapitated body … his journey through the 2047 wormhole—the images repeating over and over, accompanied by the double pulsating beat of two synchronized hearts.
The pain is sudden—a thousand nails hammered into his flesh, driven deep through his bones. He cries out, instinctively knowing the source. The heartbeats … Jake and I have been conceived. The same soul cannot exist in the same dimension within two separate vessels. I’m being torn apart by the presence of my own fetus!
Squeezing his eyes shut, he slips inside the Nexus.
Relief is immediate, the gravitational forces easing. He looks around, realizing the corridor of existence bridging the physical universe and the upper realms has changed. Below the soothing ether is a dark hole, its mass latching onto him, attempting to drag him into its swirling orifice.
The strangelet … it’s crossed through the Nexus.
Rising from the eleventh dimension’s portal is Seven Macaw.
The blue-fanged abomination circles Manny, its icy presence terrifying.
Chilam Balam … I’ve waited all eternity for this moment. Enter the dark road and I shall serve as your personal escort into Xibalba.
The surgical suite has three operating tables. Laura Agler is strapped to the first, her twenty-year-old daughter, Sophia, to the second. Pierre Borgia stands next to the gorgeous younger woman, his right hand smoothing her hair back as if she were a pet, his left holding the scalpel.
Leaning on his cane, Joseph Randolph instructs the MPs to handcuff their barely conscious prisoner to the third table. Then he dismisses them.
The white-haired director leans over Manny. “Wake up, Mr. Agler.” He slaps his face. No response. “What’s wrong with him, Pierre?”
“He’s taken refuge in the Nexus.”
“Draw him out.”
“How?”
Randolph motions to Sophia. “Cut her.”
Laura closes her eyes, slipping inside the Nexus. She finds the light of her husband’s soul caught in a tug-of-war with the gravitational forces of a black hole, his being circled by a malevolent force of nature, the presence of which curdles her blood cold.
Seven Macaw’s red eyes appear from within the vapor, paralyzing Laura in fear. Blood Woman! How I’ve missed the taste of your soul. I have the sun, and now I have the moon. And soon I shall possess the souls of every spark of the shattered vessel of creation. And the serpent in the garden shall be the Creator!
Serpent in the garden …
Serpent in the garden.
A surge of adrenaline jolts Manny’s being as the words, encoded into his subconscious by his father during their last encounter, reveal their true meaning.
Jacob cleaved to the tree of life that you see before you, which is why his soul remained pure. You were bound to the tree of knowledge, a dark side that cleaves to the human ego … As powerful as Jacob was, he could not succeed in the eleventh dimension of Hell without your ability to adapt to the dark side …
What you fail to see, Immanuel, is that you are the serpent.
Manny flees the Nexus and opens his eyes, his thoughts focused despite the wave of agony that greets him, his soul’s divided presence in the physical universe threatening to unleash every cell in his body like a miniature Big Bang.
The pain is necessary; to free Laura’s consciousness from Seven Macaw he must draw the devil out of the Nexus.
Raising his head from the surgical table, he stares at Pierre Borgia. “I can smell you, Seven Macaw. I can smell the sulphurous rubbish of your soul. Face me like a true deity; stop hiding within the flesh of this pathetic human. You call yourself the sun and the moon; you consider yourself a
creator? Ha! You are nothing. Show yourself, coward, and I’ll descend through Xibalba Be into the eleventh dimension. Continue to hide, and all shall know of your weakness.”
Pierre Borgia freezes, his head cocked to one side. After a long moment he turns to speak, his one bloodshot eye blazing red, his voice a throaty rasp. “Chilam Balam?”
Laura’s inert form reanimates as she expels a deep gasp, freeing herself from the Nexus.
Laura, can you hear me?
Yes, Sam.
Whatever happens, do not follow me into the Nexus.
Joseph Randolph turns to his nephew. “What’s going on? Explain!”
“Answer your master, Seven Macaw. Prostrate yourself like the dog you’ve become. Lick his hand in obedience.”
“Pierre, enough games. Question the Nordic. If he doesn’t answer, begin working on his daughter.”
“You heard your human master. He gave the sun a direct order; he demanded the moon do his dirty work. Obey, you pathetic bag of bones. Obey your master!”
Tightening his grip on the scalpel, Pierre Borgia whips the blade through the air—slicing open Joseph Randolph’s throat. Immanuel Gabriel leaps back inside the Nexus, beckoning his unborn twin, Jacob, from within his mother’s shared womb …
Dominique’s face goes blank, her body rigid, her turquoise eyes widening as her Hunahpu mind receives instructions from her unborn son. Pushing Mick’s consciousness aside, she takes command of the Balam.
Through the void of space, the starship locates the island of antimatter orbiting Mars.
The Balam’s artificial intelligence communicates with the post-humans’ vessel, activating its propulsion system as Dominique has commanded.
The seed of thought had been planted in Immanuel by his father, nourished by a single troubling thought: after 127 million years, why were his parents still alive?
Michael and Dominique’s fused consciousness was controlling the transport ship. Had they truly desired to release their trapped souls through their own physical deaths, they could have simply allowed the vessel’s orbit to decay eons ago, sending Phobos hurtling into the surface of Mars.
Only they hadn’t. They had maintained control.
Why?
The answer was as simple as it was selfless—they knew Manny would need the vessel on the last day of the fifth cycle.
Now, as Phobos races at light speed toward Earth, Manny releases himself from the Nexus, his consciousness falling into the black depths below—
—his soul entering Hell.
38
Hell is a place, a time, a consciousness … in which there is no love.
—RICHARD BACH,
THE BRIDGE ACROSS FOREVER
Xibalba Eleventh Dimension—Hell
The sky is a molten vermillion red, obscured by choking charcoal-gray clouds, like smoke from a petroleum inferno. As his watering eyes adjust to the tremendous heat, Chilam Balam realizes it is not a true sky he is observing, but a simmering subterranean ceiling, located high over a mountainous terrain.
The Jaguar Prophet gazes at what was once a fertile Nazca valley. The landscape is covered in lead-gray volcanic ash, the mountain streams degenerated into swampy cesspools of silvery-brown ooze, stagnant with feces, bones, and the smoldering remains of ashen flesh. Twenty-inch scarab beetles feast upon the offering by the tens of thousands, their sharp mandibles creating a nerve-racking crunching sound as they feed.
The Mayan city that had been alive with greenery, farmlands, and irrigation canals is a dead zone—a shantytown of soot-covered abodes and ash-laden streets. The fallen temple of Chilam Balam has been replaced by a ten-level pyramid, topped by a summit structure adorned in jade.
The Jaguar Prophet stands between the temple’s two main pillars, his arms stretched high and wide, strapped to each support. The stone beneath his bare feet is stained black from the ash, save for a crimson creek of dried blood that originates from the massive chacmool situated before him, running down the narrow southern steps to the base below.
The woman is laid out on the chacmool’s back, her naked form secured by her four limbs to the stone idol. Blood Woman turns her head to face him, her turquoise eyes filled with terror. “Balam? How is it we are alive?”
“We are not alive, my love. I have entered Xibalba, and because you are my soul mate, you have been cast into Hell with me. Fear not—”
His response is cut off by the thundering metal reverberations of a gong, its sound summoning the people to the base of the temple. A procession of grunting, moaning, mutilated transhumans exit their shanties, making their way through the streets. Some of the beings lack legs, others arms. They are dressed in heavy soot-covered robes, their elongated skulls tucked inside hoods. Exposed flesh has long disappeared beneath adhering layers of mouse-gray silicon, giving their faces a heavily pruned appearance. Neanderthal-like brows protect dark, deeply set eyes. Noses and surrounding cartilage are missing, leaving behind only open nasal passages from which they expel a fine ebony mist with each excruciating exhalation. Lipless mouths remain slack-jawed, exposing teeth caked with atmospheric dust and film.
Like cattle, these tortured souls push and prod each other, inching their way closer to the pyramid to receive a morsel of sustaining light from their oppressor.
Seven Macaw exits the jade temple to greet his followers, raising his tattooed arms triumphantly to the gathered flock. “I am great. My place is now higher than that of the human work, the human design. I am the sun and the moon, I am the light, and I am also the months. I am the walkway and I am the foothold of the people. And now I am the vanquisher of man, my power as great as that of the Creator.”
Seven Macaw faces his prisoner, his red upturned eyes dancing from the glow of a dozen torches, his fanged grin stained blue. “Chilam Balam … at last. I have chased your soul since the vessel Adam rejected the Creator’s light. Our fates have remained connected throughout existence, every new rebirth of your physicality spawning my own, each reincarnation ending in your death by my hand, along with that of your soul mate. The souls of your deceased followers have kept me nourished these last six hundred years; now, with the end of the fifth cycle I shall finally drink from your light. Welcome to Xibalba, Chilam Balam. Your soul is mine for all eternity.”
Balam smiles at the Mayan death god. “No, Seven Macaw, it is you who are mine.”
The subterranean ceiling fractures and crumbles, exposing the transdimensional portal to the underworld—an emerald-green vortex. The strangelet’s eye opens to the stars, revealing a brilliant orange speck streaking across the dark cosmos. Guided by the hero twin’s consciousness, it soars toward the funneled opening, growing larger with each passing second.
A suddenly panic-stricken Seven Macaw grabs Chilam Balam by his long dark hair, his fanged mouth pressed against the prophet’s right ear. “How are you doing this? As a spark of the Creator you have no power in the eleventh dimension!”
“I share a soul with my twin. His half was nourished by the tree of life, mine by the tree of knowledge. I was conceived for this very moment. I am Chilam Balam—the dark prophet. I am the serpent in your garden!”
The celestial object fills the entire eye of the strangelet’s event horizon, its light cleansing the lost souls of Xibalba. Gray silicon melts away, yielding to revitalized flesh and limbs. Chilam Balam’s followers ascend the pyramid steps, drawn to the light of the Jaguar Prophet.
Seven Macaw’s face morphs into the angelic appearance of Devlin Mabus. The Seraph sprouts a pair of massive wings, keeping the people at bay. “You cannot win, Uncle.”
“It’s not about winning. The end of the fifth cycle is about man transforming his negative behavior, recognizing—finally—that we are all sparks of the collective soul. Love, Devlin, can transform the darkest depths of Hell into the brightest heaven.”
Born from energy dispersed during the near-light-speed collision of matter, the monster had nursed in a parallel dimension. Feeding from the Earth’s core,
it had outgrown its womb, its coalescing gravitational forces crushing a path into the physical universe. Inhaling a mass-stabilizing meal of volcanic ash, it had breached adolescence into adulthood to become a fully formed black hole, its infinite orifice consuming everything venturing near its event horizon, from gaseous debris to stellar light.
The monster registers the Earth’s gravitational forces. Unable to move the massive planet, the strangelet latches onto the watery world like a magnet drawn to steel. Though smaller than the Earth, the black hole’s mass equals that of a dozen suns. In the physical universe the rules are simple: size yields to density, atomic structure to gravity.
The monster will consume the planet and nest in its cosmic vacancy. Over time it will continue to grow, until it replaces the sun as the gravitational center of the solar system. Eventually it will consume every planet and asteroid and moon caught within its vortex until it inhales the sun itself—extinguishing the light.
The monster never detects the moon-size object until the ship plunges unannounced through its gullet and detonates. Like acid on flesh, the particle wave of escaping antimatter from the transport ship’s engines burns through the strangelet’s atomic structure, disrupting the sweeping tide of its gravitational vortex.
The event horizon ceases spinning. The eye of the beast flutters and closes.
Birthed in an instant, the strangelet dies in an instant, choking on a belch of antimatter.
Mick squeezes Dominique’s hand as a streaking bolt of orange light soars past the Balam and disappears into the black hole as if guided by the hand of God.
For a split second nothing happens. Then a soft white ethereal light bursts silently in space and is gone—sealing the black hole with it.
The four passengers exhale. Then they smile and cry and hug one another, their bodies trembling with adrenaline and fatigue.
Embracing his soul mate, Michael Gabriel gazes through the Balam’s massive portal at the Earth. The planet’s atmosphere appears blue and clear, their preserved home world offering humanity a second chance.