Winterfall

by John Conroe

They fell silent, watching the battles play out across the metal surfaces. Mack noticed that the black tide had been pushed back till it covered only half the box, but it was stubbornly refusing to give more ground. He racked his brain for something to help his friend.

  “Can we help break the entanglement?” Tanya asked.

  “How?” Chet asked her back. “We don’t even understand how it works.”

  Mack was still thinking about Chris’s observations, his brain playing with the word frost.

  “What do you think was the probability that Aylin’s remedy for Black Frost Blades would work on the aliens?” he asked.

  “I think it highly likely that it’s related technology. It’s possible that Morrigan got the idea from the aliens or the aliens got the technology from her,” Tanya said.

  “Kind of what I’ve been thinking. Jetta, give me your jacket, would you?” he asked.

  “It won’t fit you, moron,” she said.

  He just looked at her and she huffed, taking off the jacket and handing it to him. “It might not smell the best. I haven’t had a chance to wash it since we got back,” she said, glancing at the others.

  “I’m counting on that,” he said, looking into the pockets of the lightweight garment. Deep in the sewn seam of one of the large pockets, he found what he was looking for.

  “Is that a seed from the Quist plant?” Tanya asked as he held it up between index finger and thumb.

  “Yup. They’re tiny and my sister isn’t always thorough,” he said with a grin.

  “Screw you Mack,” Jetta said, arms crossed.

  “Oh, you’re detailed about some things, like weapons and gear, but there was a better than even chance you’d missed one of these tiny things,” he said.

  “Why are you so happy about it? What are you going to do?” Tanya asked.

  “I’m going to give it to Stacia. She’s going to ever so carefully drop it into Declan’s hand,” he said, rising slowly and moving quietly over to the were girl, who looked at him with raised eyebrows.

  “And that’s going to do what?” Chet asked.

  “Crafting is mostly symbolic. Using representations that our brains can easily recognize to fold unrecognizable energy to the user’s wishes. We see the alien computer attack as black mold or, if Chris looks at it with his Sight, as frost. Black like the zombies and frost like Morrigan’s powers. Declan just spent time fighting Morrigan and he saw the zombies and has tangled with Frost blades several times now. I’m hoping the seed with be a new representation for him. Allow him to move the magic he’s wielding in a new way, one that is deadly to the alien computer virus,” Mack said, dropping the seed into Stacia’s hand.

  He moved back to watch her gracefully lean forward, moving around her boyfriend without touching him and gently dropping the seed into Declan’s upturned right palm.

  “Will he even be aware of it?” Chet asked.

  “I guarantee you that he is very aware of Stacia. I mean, come on. It’s why she’s his ground. So on some level, he knows that she just did that. Now we’ll see if he can use it.”

  Declan’s eyes continued to flicker, but a new frown had formed between his eyebrows. A few seconds later, it smoothed out and something very like a grin flickered across his mouth.

  “Look!” Jetta said, pointing at the cube.

  The black mold was in retreat, melting away. It started slowly but then gained speed, till it was pulling back so fast it was very like a frozen windshield defrosting as the car’s heater finally came up to temperature. Gradually pulling back from every part of the cube until it was suddenly gone from sight.

  Nothing happened for a few seconds and they all started to exchange questioning looks. Declan’s eyes fluttered open. Around the circle, the girls’ eyes all started to open too.

  “Mack, that was fecking brilliant,” Ryanne said, looking over her shoulder at him.

  “You knew what he did?” Tanya asked.

  “We could hear ye all, ye know. Not like we were deaf,” the Irish witch said with a smile.

  “I got lucky,” Mack said.

  “How often are those words muttered, I’m wondering?” Ryanne said to Britta on her left. The pretty blonde witch smirked at the multiple meanings.

  He felt his face uncharacteristically flush at her words, but he turned and focused on Declan. “Well?”

  “I am returned, Mack Sutton,” Omega answered from Mack’s own phone.

  “Those bastards are definitely connected to Morrigan’s biological sciences,” Declan said, rubbing his face with one hand. “I think she sold them a lot of her technology, although they’ve modified it and have a bunch of their own. That organic computer is pretty fucking scary.”

  “Concur. Until facing it, I had no concept of something with more computing power than I have,” Omega said.

  “What is it exactly?” Chet asked.

  “An organic, DNA-based molecular computing system. It has DNA strands from every species that the Vorsook have come across. Very powerful. It jumped to me from my own drone.”

  “Vorsook?” Tanya asked.

  “The closest we can come to the name the aliens call themselves. I have a lot of data on them, the byproduct of cyber combat.”

  “That means they likely have a lot of data on us,” Chris said.

  “They already did,” Declan said. “They’ve been studying us for years. All the little green men and space alien abductions.”

  “So they’ve been coming here in what? Flying saucers?” Chet asked.

  “Interstellar travel is too expensive in terms of resources and much too slow. Portal technology appears to be the most efficient form of travel across the vast distances of space. They do, however, have aerial craft far in advance of earth-based aircraft,” Omega said.

  “Why haven’t they attacked before?” Chris asked.

  “Not sure. I think they have a lot of links to Fairie though. Relationships with the elves. At least that’s the feeling I got, but I only fought for a short while. Omega?” Declan asked.

  “You are correct, Father. Their access to this world was via Fairie’s portals. At least until they subsumed the TRAPPIST planet and its inhabitants, who also had ancient connections to earth. The Vorsook assimilate worlds and races into their empire, as it were. Much like the ancient Romans.”

  “But never Fairie?” Chris asked.

  “Apparently not. I do not know the reason for that.”

  “So what do we do now?” Jetta asked.

  “First I must regain what I have lost. The governments of this world have been busy in my absence. Then we must gather more information in order to prepare.”

  “For what?”

  “Either their attack, or… ours,” Tanya said.

  “Exactly.”

  Chapter 32

  Chris

  New York, New York, USA – Two weeks later.

  We’re a stubborn species. Omega calls it temporally challenged, Tanya says short-sighted, and Lydia says we’re just plain stupid. The United Nations hearings had mixed results. Testimony by European and Chinese authorities and forensic scientists, and American CDC field observations, backed by video footage from hundreds of sources, provided compelling evidence that our world had suffered a sophisticated and terrifying attack. And there was our own testimony.

  The result? The world’s leaders immediately came together—to point fingers and assign blame. Not the results we were looking for. Then came the suspicions and demands for access to the samples of the zombie infectious agents that we so carefully destroyed.

  Good idea, let’s all play with the alien’s favorite weapons—uncontrollable, world-ending weapons.

  So we revealed Omega to the world, taking the information beyond the UN Emergency Council and putting it into the hands of the world’s citizens, despite the almost universal government idea that widespread panic would reign.

  Panic had already happened, thanks to the internet and the porous nature of information in the digital age.
People had noticed the actions in Europe, and China’s efforts to keep the world from observing it bombing four of its own villages into ash failed completely. Rumors ran rampant, covering everything from the formation of a new world order to Ebola outbreaks to alien invasion. We confirmed the last one, via worldwide announcement on all news, media, and internet channels simultaneously. The world froze, the entire global village fixated on their phones, televisions, tablets, and personal computers. Omega’s message was cohesive, thorough and, oddly, inspiring. Declan’s little AI had grown, understanding human psychology so well that the knowledge of his existence and the assault by aliens was anticlimactic.

  A super AI presence, capable of removing weapons of mass destruction from the hands of politicians, stable and unstable alike, had the effect of actually calming the average citizen down. It turns out people have little trust in their politicians to handle global catastrophe, but a quantum super intelligent computer who had immediately re-seized the world’s nuclear stockpile was somehow reassuring.

  Don’t get me wrong. There were plenty of people preaching the Skynet-Terminator scenario, demonstrating in the streets, and more than a few headed for the hills. But one segment of talking heads pointed out the fact that we were all still alive and not slaves to a Colossus world intellect might actually be a pretty good indicator that the powerful AI wasn’t inherently hostile. And since he had the ability to circumvent every government’s attempts at media control while squelching fake news and false flag operations, the result was an unprecedented degree of news accuracy to, well, everyone.

  He was immediately a worldwide resource, belonging to everyone and no one at the same time. Bigger than any one country, bigger than any one group or corporation. It had taken almost a full week for him to regain most of his previous reach and control, his digital wounds invisible to everyone, except maybe his creator. Declan had an idea of the damage done but freely admitted it was simply beyond his comprehension to know the full extent of it.

  The roles played by what Jetta called Team Demidova, in the defense of the planet, along with the positive actions of the governments that had assisted were duly reported and credited, giving the world faces and names to connect their emotions to.

  At their own insistence, the team from Fairie, who arguably delivered the weapon that resulted in a knock-out blow, were kept in obscurity. In fact, Omega himself insisted on hiding their involvement, having found no possible scenario where the follow-on fame would lead to anything other than tragedy and misery. They were okay with that, none of them wishing for that kind of fame.

  The existence of Fairie itself, on top of the TRAPPIST aliens, was enough of a giant shock. Nothing good could come from revealing the Speaker to Dragons and the new… lord? Ruler? King of Middle Fairie?

  So society reeled and shook with the revelations but held together under an almost instant faith (by most) in Omega. The fact that he could interact with virtually everyone and anyone all at once made him almost a religious entity. Type a text or email him and you’d have an answer in moments, day or night, twenty-four-seven. It was like being able to talk to God anywhere and anytime and get an actual answer.

  The result was a demand for action by the world’s population and almost instant agreement by career politicians who could read the winds of change with well-honed instincts.

  That was the surface. The dirty underbelly of governments’ interactions remained almost reassuringly paranoid and underhanded. We got regular reports from Omega. Spy versus spy. The sudden rebirth of the Cold War, but deeply hidden.

  Another change was that we had returned to the US. Reactions were mainly positive, but there’s always some who object, sometimes violently.

  Demidova Tower had been brought back to full staff and we were back in residence, keeping as low a profile as possible while society’s rumbles and quakes settled back to a dull thunder, with more security than ever before, backed by Omega’s constant omniscient watch.

  Ian and Ashley had returned home to upstate New York but were due to return this very day. The rest of the Fairie team was with us in the tower. Declan’s aunt and step-aunt had joined us to allay Ashling’s fears for her nephew. She was a powerful seer and had been terrified when he went off-world. Standing between a powerful witch and her defacto child was a fool’s game, and Team Demidova weren’t no fools.

  So I found myself amused to watch Declan holding Wulf with a natural comfort, while his carnivorous girlfriend looked decidedly less sure about holding Cora.

  “You never babysat for anyone?” he asked, incredulous. “What about Toni?”

  “There weren’t any babies in my immediate circle of friends and family when I was growing up,” she said, a touch defensive. “And Toni was like eight when I met her. Cora is just a few months old.”

  “It’s only for the reason that I made ye look after some of the waitresses’ wee ones that ya feel yer such an expert, lad,” Ashling said. It was the second or third time she had risen to a light defense of Stacia, who had no need of the help but seemed to relish it nonetheless. Aunt Ashling was growing fond of her boy’s girl.

  “I’m no expert, but it’s not rocket science. Right Wulf?” he asked my baby boy. The most powerful witch in existence, feared on at least two worlds, and he was making baby talk to my kid.

  “Ian and Ashley Moore are in the building. They are accompanied by an elf of the Winter Court. He is unarmed and under guard by both Demidova security as well as two of my more capable drone units. Ian is asking for a meeting with all of you. What is your pleasure?” Omega asked.

  I looked at Tanya, then Declan and Stacia. Our young witch paused for a moment, then handed Wulf to Auntie Nika while Cora was quickly claimed by Lydia. He then pulled a coil of copper wire from his bag and threw it on the ground, where it wound itself out into a ten-foot circle. Nika nodded to Lydia and the aunties stepped into the circle. Instantly, I saw a black column of impenetrable black surround my children as Declan knelt down and touched the wire. Then he stood and pointed his left hand at the nearest electrical outlet.

  A two-inch-thick bolt of power flowed into his hand and the lights flickered. “Okay, send them up,” he said, arcs of electricity weaving around his fingers.

  Five minutes later, the elevator opened to reveal Ian, Ashley, and a tall, dark-skinned elf male with hair lighter than Stacia’s. Behind them were Mr. Deckert and his right hand, Stevens, both heavily armed. A pair of drones hovered next to our security guys.

  Facing them was Declan, crackling with power, Stacia, whose eyes glowed yellow, Tanya with two steel swords, and myself, arms wreathed in aura. Behind us hulked Awasos in his new combat form, hunched over in the twelve-foot-high room.

  “Shit!” Stevens said, mouth open.

  Deckert turned his bullet head slightly and gave him a look. “You realize they’re on our side, right?”

  “Sorry boss, but that’s damned… well… it just…”

  “Yeah, I gotta agree, Mr. Deckert,” Ashley said. “I think I might have peed myself a little.”

  She and her father had frozen in place at the sight of us, but they both also held up hands.

  The elf held his hands out, open and empty. “Peace?”

  “Greer,” Declan said.

  “Milord,” the elf said, bowing his head slightly. Then his gaze turned to take in the rest of us. “I am no threat to you and yours,” he said, bringing his hands up very, very slowly.

  “Holy shit, Dec. This is overkill, don’t you think?” Ashley asked, eyes wide.