by S. T. Boston
Over the long years, since his first appearance on Earth, history had remembered him by many names. The people of Nazca had called him Viracocha; the Greeks had called him Mammon. Others had called him by his birth name, Asmodeous, but history had most famously remembered him by a name that still struck fear into the hearts of foolish Earth-Humans.
Satan.
Chapter 10
The small and agile RX7 cut its way through the night. The lack of traffic on the road had allowed them to set a reasonable pace; traffic jams and rush hours were a blight of the old world. Many vehicles still sat in driveways and by the roadside, lifeless and rusting, their owners unable to source or afford the parts to fix them. The other more macabre option was that their owners were dead. Adam kept a tense eye on the speedometer, cringing at the way Maya seemed unable to drive in any other way than having her foot mashing the accelerator into the foot well. At the breakneck pace she was setting, he could see them covering the one-hundred and twenty mile journey in just over an hour and a half. Maya was certainly not one to hang around. Although his car had been relatively cheap to buy and fix, it wasn't the most economical of vehicles on the road. Certainly, not ideal in these times of ludicrous oil prices, but he rarely used it normally. With the boy-racer style of driving Maya had, they'd be lucky to reach Wiltshire on a tank. He could understand her wanting to put some distance between them and the major towns and cities on their route, negating the possibility of being stopped by the police or military, or running into the various ne'er-do-wells who roamed the roads at night, robbing and thieving what they could.
From Brighton, they had sped west, cutting past Portsmouth and Southampton. Just past Southampton they had swung north, through Salisbury and out into the open countryside. Around ten miles outside of Salisbury the ancient monument, Stonehenge, had loomed out of the night, silhouetted against the bright moonlit sky. The ancient stones seemed like giants, all meeting in the field where they'd stood for thousands of years. His face pressed against the glass, Adam watched as they slipped past. He wondered what their true purpose was, sure they must have some link to the Arkkadian people who'd had such a huge influence over history, and yet had mysteriously managed to slip into obscurity, leaving very little evidence of their existence apart from a wealth of misinterpreted religions.
The journey had been mainly silent since passing Portsmouth. For every minute that ticked by, Adam found himself trusting Maya more. The longer he spent in her company without her making some attempt on his life, the better he felt. Still, he didn't allow himself to relax fully – knowledge of who and what she was had firmly cemented itself in his mind. When they'd left Brighton in the rear-view mirror, Maya had told him how she and her accomplices had planned to capture him at his aunt and uncle's house following his book talk. He shuddered as she recounted the events which had unfolded in the modest bungalow with its serene sea view. To prove the story, Maya had shown him photographs on her phone, showing two men he didn't recognise, laying in pools of blood, sprawled out on his aunt's kitchen floor. He did know the room they were in, only too well. One guy – Maya had said his name was Chris, still had an expression of surprise on his face which gave him an almost life-like look, but the gaping hole in the side of his neck told a different story. It surprised Adam how easily he could consume such images; death, unfortunately, had become a regular event in this damaged world.
Maya had told Adam about how once taken, he was to be flown to Peru, to him. Adam had listened in mute horror, not quite able to believe he was being thrown headlong into this ancient battle once again. He knew only too well that it was nothing short of a miracle to have survived the first ordeal, and he was sure he was fast running out of lives, even with the Gift coursing through his veins. There was one topic he felt reluctant to press Maya for information on; the exact details of what evil was now planned for Earth. The need to ask her burned at him, grew with an unstoppable anxiousness until he could bear it no longer. As the small car twisted through the Wiltshire countryside, fast approaching their destination, he turned his face away from the window and looked at Maya, her delicate face masked with concentration as she navigated through the dark and twisty country lanes that snaked across the rural countryside. On more than one occasion, she'd had to jam the brakes on to avoid hitting the various wildlife which dashed in front of the speeding car, as if they were suicidal. It appeared the Reaper had been exclusively a human virus; there were no cases of the native animal species getting sick in any country. The developers on Sheol who had engineered the killer had been very good at their work.
“What are we facing here?” he finally asked. “You said he plans to leave this planet as dead as Mars. Just what kind of weapon does he have?”
“No weapon,” replied Maya, not taking her clear blue eyes off the road, “The ship he is in was once an Arkkadian exploration vessel, it's very ancient, not a craft built for war.” Maya guided them through the small town of Pewsey, Adam pointing out the left turn she needed. Hardly slowing down, she threw the Mazda into the corner, making Adam grab what Sam always called the Fuck Me Handle above the door, and the tyres squeal in protest against the tarmac. She powered the Mazda down a very narrow road, hitting a railway bridge faster than Adam would have liked and making his stomach lurch as if he was on a roller coaster.
“Just how is he planning to do it then?” Adam watched a small housing estate fly past; a few houses had lights on, but many remained in darkness.
“If he was in possession of such a weapon, do you really think he'd be sitting out in that desert, waiting? No, he would have struck out at Earth as soon as his craft came into orbit, six months ago. He's relying on you Earth-Humans to be the architects of your own downfall.” The small housing estate vanished into the night, giving way to a tree-lined road, the old ragged oaks creating their own natural tunnel over the thin strip of unkempt tarmac. “Over the last few months,” she continued, as they hit a pothole which shook the car and had her wrestling the steering wheel, “all of the world's superpowers have been locked in a race to repair and bring back online their nuclear launch capabilities.” She shook her head sadly. “The race has been on since Russia started to get a little choosy about who, and at what price, they sell their precious Siberian oil to.”
“Another mess we're in, thanks to your kind,” jeered Adam. “I'm sure you know that one of the Watchers – Euri Peterson, as he was known on Earth – had pioneered hydro-run engines.”
“I know.”
“Yeah, well after his death, and during the week of the Reaper, Zeon Developments suffered a massive fire, burning the place to the ground. So much of the research and patented information was lost, it set the development of the technology back by years. The members of his development team who are still alive, are back-engineering a few of the jets they had in service, but the set-back from his death and fire has been disastrous.”
“You follow the news, then?” Maya asked.
“Of course, every day. You might say I'm a little paranoid now.”
“You know then, that there's a naval stand-off about to take place in the Pacific between the USA and Russia over the Siberian oil supplies?” Adam nodded. “Those subs are nuclear ready, and not only that, but the old nuclear launch bunkers and silos are also nuclear ready. You see, the EMP never rendered the payloads useless; the weapons just needed fixing, and new launch and defence programs had to be written. They're just waiting for the launch systems to go live and make every nuke viable once again. It's been a race which will see all the former nuclear powers reach the finish line within a few hours of each other. Or so my sources say.”
“So what? He's hoping someone will push the button? I know they're fully expecting another Cold War, but even during the first one, no one had the balls to do it. They used to say nuclear weapons made the world a safer place. Bullshit, if you ask me.”
“No, he has a program, one that can assume control of any country's defence systems. Once those nuclear launch s
ystems are back online, they'll be fair game to him,” Maya answered gravely.
The tree-like tunnel ended abruptly and the road opened out into fields. Large, rolling hills rose to their right, watching over the fields like a massive, natural amphitheatre.
“We're nearly there,” said Adam, it's a left in about a mile.” His mind was spinning, it seemed almost impossible that the insecurity and mistrust between the world's leaders was going to give Asmodeous a second chance. The one positive to come out of the EMP was how it had put everyone on a level playing field, weapons wise. It should have been a fresh start, a more peaceful existence without warships and missiles, fighter planes and tanks. If he hadn't seen such a life on Arkkadia, he never would have thought it possible, but it was a fresh start that Earth-Humans seemed incapable of taking. Maybe it was better for everyone if Asmodeous just ended the whole thing – hell right, at that moment, he felt like going directly out to that desert and pushing the button for him. Then he remembered the way local communities had pulled together in the early days, the days when at night all you had was a candle to see by and you kept a knife or a cricket bat by your side when you slept, in case looters decided tonight was your lucky night. He remembered how in his street, they'd pooled their food supply and rationed it out, an informal agreement until the government set things back in motion. Human nature was essentially good, and that deserved preserving, didn't it?
“I've seen how this program will work, Adam.” She eyed him with wide eyes. The car reached the junction, the wheels skidding to a stop on a small layer of gravel that had built up on the road. Spinning the wheels, she went left. “The program has a name. Enola. And Enola is very clever. Once those systems are live, it will assess Earth's weather patterns and run predictions for wind and rain patterns over the coming weeks, then target each weapon according to how best the radiation will spread, factored in with initial casualty numbers by the blast of each payload.”
“And you think that I, or we, can stop this from happening?”
“I don't know,” she said bleakly. “I had to do something.”
“Just the other side of the bridge,” Adam instructed as they approached the cottage. He felt nauseous, both from Maya's driving and the thought that in less than two days, those systems would be making the planet Asmodeous' own private shooting gallery. “It's a small, thatched cottage on your left.”
Maya took this bridge a little slower, and Adam glanced out of the window and got a look at the canal where he and Lucie had swum and kayaked as children. It was hard to tell, but was sure there was a half-sunken narrowboat sticking out at his side of the stone arch.
“Just here,” he indicated with his hand. Maya jammed the brakes on, testing the inertia mechanism on Adam's belt. With one final over-exaggerated turn, she fired the car into the driveway and cut the engine. Adam unclipped his belt, eager to escape the stuffy cab. Stretching out he enjoyed the chilled air on his skin. “There should be a key under the large pot in the greenhouse,” he called back, heading up the narrow drive, his shoes crunching on the pea-shingle.
Here and there, weeds sprung from the small stones, fighting for their own bit of space. Swinging the back gate open, he activated the torch function on his phone. The garden looked like a miniature rainforest, nature had taken control over the modest sized plot of land. The grass, although slightly the worse for wear from the recent early cold spell reached up to his waist, and he pushed it aside with his free hand. “Wait there,” he called, glancing over his shoulder and pointing the light toward Maya, who shielded her eyes from the glare. He was about to tell her he didn't want her falling over when his foot found a divot of grass, or one of his grandfather's gnomes, which had once taken pride of place on the immaculate lawn. Before he had time to speak he went down hard, his phone spilling from his hand. When pain flared in his ankle he cursed his stupidity, got to his feet and shook the wounded joint, knowing full well that in a few seconds the sharp pain would subside and no evidence would remain that he'd ever taken a tumble. Sure enough, in under a minute he was on the move, phone in hand and sliding the greenhouse door open. Cobwebs hung from the whitewashed glass roof, swirling and stirring gently as the open door let fresh air in to flood the small outbuilding. The large terracotta planter was exactly where Adam expected it to be, and briefly, he tried to recall the last time he'd been at the cottage. It was before the world changed, meaning the place had been standing empty for the best part of three years. Lifting the heavy tub he located the key, where he'd placed it after a weekend's heavy drinking with Sam – it seemed like a lifetime ago. The brass was dull but the metal felt reassuringly cool to the touch. Leaving the greenhouse he followed the path he'd created back to the gate, where Maya was waiting. He stopped briefly at the spot where he'd fallen, crouched down and fished around, rummaging in the overgrown greenery. Finding what he was after Adam tugged it free – just as he'd suspected, the culprit was one of the gnomes. He looked a little worse for wear after being lost in the jungle-like garden, his jolly red hat faded and the paint flaking. Taking the ornament with him, Adam reached the gate and set the sorry-looking gnome on the gravel, facing away from the gate like a tiny watchman standing on post. It was a completely inane attempt to restore some order to the property, but it made him feel a little better.
Reaching the front door, he slid the key into the lock. It offered some resistance, but with a little more pressure the lock slid back. Glancing over his shoulder, Adam swung the creaking door open and went inside. Musty air assaulted his nostrils, dust motes dancing chaotically in the small yet powerful beam of light the phone emitted. Swinging it around the lounge, the furniture cast hectic shadows against the cold walls. Adam flinched when the hat and coat stand briefly took on the appearance of a shadowy man, skulking in the corner. He was on edge, certain a thousand eyes were on him, studying his every move. He wanted to be ready, in case someone was hiding in that empty darkness. He half-expected someone to be sitting on the blackened, musty-smelling lounge, awaiting their arrival, but of course, no one was. The place was empty, and as silent as a crypt.
Chapter 11
“Seatbelt!” Lucie prompted urgently as Oriyanna slammed the Mini's passenger door shut behind her. Before she could grab the buckle, Lucie had the Mini in reverse, gunning the engine the small car jolted backward, and Oriyanna planted her palms against the glove-box to avoid being thrown through the windscreen. When Lucie selected first gear and planted her foot hard on the accelerator, Oriyanna was thrown back into the seat, and with the belt gripped in her hand she finally managed to click it into the receiver. With her spare hand, Lucie tore her apron over her head and threw it into the backseat as they sped away.
Lucie slammed the Mini Cooper down the small concrete ramp leading out of the car park. The front of the car hit the tarmac with a loud scrape which made her grit her teeth. She was a little precious about her beloved car, lovingly named Mavis the Mini. Sam always ripped her about that one but she didn't care; the car was one of the few new vehicles on the road. It had cost a small fortune, but the cash packages which arrived with the seemingly never-ending list of targets for Sam were more than generous and had seen them through some rough times a lot more comfortably than the average person. Now, with a stranglehold on oil supplies and the increasingly regular sight of petrol pumps out of service, Lucie wasn't sure how much longer she'd be able to drive her most prized possession. Although it was a hybrid, it still needed a certain amount of fuel to work. Despite her love for little luxuries, it was a luxury she'd gladly give up to have her husband out of harm's way. Tough as it was, she'd accepted being married to a guy like Sam would mean the odd sleepless night filled with worry; he was who he was, and she loved him for it.
Glancing in the rear-view mirror, Lucie's stomach plunged when she discovered a pair of headlights bearing down on them. Ramming the gearshift from second to third, she flicked her attention between the mirror and the tachometer, and when it redlined she knocked it into fourth. �
��We're being followed,” she said urgently.
Oriyanna spun around and watched anxiously as the lights continued to draw closer. “I feared there would be more than one of them,” she said, placing a hand on Lucie's shoulder. An instant wave of relief wash over Lucie. Sam and Adam had both told her how Oriyanna could influence people, but she'd found it hard to believe – hell, the whole story was hard to believe – but here she was living it. There was no doubt Oriyanna could ease a worried mind, faster and better than any bottle of wine.
Lucie powered the bright red Mini down Eltham Hill, and in her panic, instead of keeping left and taking the A20 out of town she went right, toward London. There was no time to turn around, the car on her tail was getting closer. Her little Mini wasn't slow by any means, but there were plenty of faster vehicles out there.
They flew past the burnt-out shell of Blackheath Sports Club, which had gone up in flames one night, shortly after Adam and Sam returned home. Although a good few miles from the house, they'd seen the black plume of smoke rising into the night sky with an eerie orange glow at its base. Speeding toward the Thames, London's financial district rose from the opposite bank, the looming structures dark, silent and broody. The days of leaving lavish lighting on to highlight a building's beauty were long gone, only red aircraft warning lights blinked solemnly to themselves at each building's peak, and even these would be turned off soon, as no aircraft were permitted to arrive or depart any UK airport after one AM.
As the pursuing car drew closer, the driver turned the full beams on, highlighting the fact he was closing in on his prey. The blinding light made Oriyanna and Lucie shield their eyes from the glare which bounced off the vehicle's mirrors. Lucie took one hand off the wheel and pushed the rear-view mirror up toward the roof; it helped, but not by much. Before she could grasp the steering wheel again, the car behind slammed into their rear bumper, and only the seatbelt saved her from reeling face first into the steering wheel. With a shriek of terror Lucie wrestled with the car, as it mounted the kerb and the passenger side hit the railings of a pelican crossing, sending a hail of sparks into the air. Heart hammering she finally got the vehicle under control, “Do something!” she yelled at Oriyanna, “Can't you make them stop?” Lucie knew it was a silly thing to say, as soon as the words left her mouth.