"Not exactly. If you haven't noticed by now, we're not really a well-groomed fighting machine. Yeah, sure, there are professional soldiers in the ranks, mainly leftovers from the civil wars back home. A lot of the people who came over were mercenaries or criminals given a chance at a new life, people Trevor convinced to gamble on some new world paradise."
Trevor let that sink in. Mercenaries. Criminals. Very few professional soldiers. If that held true for the other invaders, it would explain why they often fought two-dimensionally. His ruse of the arrogant Red Coats at Wilkes-Barre, the wholesale slaughter of Red Hands during Five Armies, or the rout of the Chaktaw with a surprise charge during the last days of that battle. At one time, he wondered if man might be the best warriors in the universe. Perhaps a lack of quality among the invading armies gave his people an advantage.
She said, "If Jakob had taken The Committee out on his own, we might not see another supply shipment, and the gateways are one-way, Trevor. There's no going home and even if we did, half of the people in Thebes would be going home to jails or emptiness. At least here they have a chance to build a life."
"They don't belong here," he showed not one ounce of sympathy. "I don't care who they were, they don't belong and if they don't go back willingly, then they deserve to be slaughtered."
She ignored his words and said, "With you back and you killing The Committee, Snowe can step up and be the hero who salvages everything."
A whole slew of questions avalanched into Trevor’s mind. He tried his best to slow his thought processes and deal with them in some kind of order.
"Wait, now, you had your gateway. It’s one way? But you can—"
"Yes. One way. To Earth. Once you come over, there’s no going back. But we can communicate with home through the gate; tell them what supplies we need, when we need reinforcements if they can convince anyone to come, that is. That type of thing, you know?"
"But you weren’t convincing anyone to come, were you?"
"A few criminals here and there, no one we really wanted, not after Trevor's death. He was the glue holding it together. He could convince ordinary people to take up arms and follow him on this grand adventure, you know?"
He remembered his speech before the final showdown at Five Armies, how he had reached into the hearts of ordinary people—yesterday's accountants and shop clerks—and infected them with a blood lust, turned them into killers.
Imagine what I could do with a whole world listening. My gift to humanity, turning people into warriors.
The clouds that had rolled in earlier completed their job in blocking the sun from the afternoon sky. The temperature dropped and the wind carried hints of cold rain.
"So you figure, bring this successful Trevor Stone over and maybe he can energize things, huh? Maybe you can still win this."
"Survive this, you mean."
He nodded, "Yeah, I suppose so. Survive."
"But this was personal for you, wasn’t it?"
She did not answer for a long while. He decided not to push…not yet. They walked together in silence for a minute while their boots crunched in the surface of the soft road top and as drizzle turned to an honest rain.
"So you bring me over, hope I can turn the military tide of things, and have enough people in on it so you can hide the truth for a while. All the time the best you’re hoping for is, what, I off the Committee and take over. At that point you had to figure I’d find out that this wasn’t your planet; that you are the bad guys here."
Trevor felt a tremble in his arms, his hands flexed, and an angry shout grew in his throat…then faded as he calmed himself with a deep breath.
When he felt he could control his voice, he said, "So you’ve been playing mind games with me all the time. Using…playing games to distract me. To—what?—get me hooked on you? Get me hooked on all the crazy things you and the old Trevor used to do."
She jumped in, maybe to try and head off nastier words.
"Yes, that’s right. If my Trevor…if he wanted those things then I figured you would, too. And you know what? You did. No one forced you. I just gave you want you wanted. All the fantasies. Everything he craved, everything he made me do."
Her tone was not confrontational. No, it sounded more dejected.
He stopped walking. She sensed it and stopped, too. He stared at her through the curtain of cold rain and saw fear in her eyes. Her posture slumped, as if ready to cower on command.
His head tilted and he stared off toward the leafless trees surrounding the road.
"You're right. That’s scary, you know. It’s scary that it almost worked."
Trevor saw himself slamming a junior officer against a wall and shooting Chaktaw prisoners and leading a bloody coup d'état. He recalled the feeling of invincibility that had come with the daring-if-foolish victory over the Geryon Reich. He remembered the sex with the Major, especially the first time. Angry. Mean. Love had been a world away.
Almost worked. Oh no, Trevor. It worked. It was all on display right there for everyone to see. No where to hide, Trev. You did the killing and you enjoyed it.
"And was that what your Trevor was like? Quick to kill? No mercy. Vicious?"
"Trevor and I…we…I loved him. After he was gone, maybe I wanted to have him back. Maybe I did this, you know, for personal reasons, too."
Nina avoided looking at his eyes and instead gazed at the road ahead.
"One more thing. You said you had help in getting me. Who?"
She fidgeted and her lips pressed tight together like a bank vault shutting. He saw her cheeks blush. At first he thought she might be getting sick, but then he realized that the girl was terrified of answering his question.
"Tell me, Nina. You didn't find and know how to use The Nyx's nest on your own."
After taking a deep breath, she turned, looked at him, and answered, "I told you that Trevor knew stuff. He knew about what was going on, a lot more than he ever told me. Snowe knew some things too, partly from people back home, partly from things Trevor filled him in on over here. Going to get you wasn't an idea original to Snowe or me."
"Go on."
A chilly wind whipped the rain along the road.
"When you first got here, you told me that there was, like, one big bad guy on your world that you thought was behind—"
He grabbed her shoulders. She cringed and her voice morphed into a frightened cry, "Something called Voggoth!"
"Voggoth? Of course. I should have guessed! I should have guessed!"
"But Trevor, listen," she confessed. "It wasn't just getting you here. Jakob cut a deal. As long as you were over here helping us, well…"
"Tell me!" He nearly spat in her face.
"As long as you were here they'd help us with the Chaktaw. Remember their outpost? Voggoth hit them first, knocked them down so our attack was easy."
"But not the Duass? He wouldn't help us against the Duass! That's why Snowe wanted me to leave them alone. Voggoth doesn't want you fighting each other, only the Chaktaw!"
He released her and stepped away. His head cocked to one side and a big, sardonic smile that did not have an ounce of good feelings in it grew from ear to ear.
"Oh, sure, kill two worlds with one Stone."
"What? Trevor, I don’t understand."
"Don’t you see? Don’t you see?"
"What?"
"On my Earth, we’re doing pretty good. We survived the first years of the invasion. We haven’t been beaten down. Just like the Chaktaw here, they’re holding on pretty good, right?"
She nodded.
"Voggoth convinces you to get me, probably hoping that everything would fall apart for man on my Earth. He brings me here thinking maybe I can help wipe out the Chaktaw!"
Trevor pinched his nose and shut his eyes. The scope of his failure caused a pounding ache in his temples. He had left behind his world, putting everything gained there in jeopardy, and come here to aid Voggoth unwittingly as well as whomever else choreographed Armageddon.
His eyes opened. "That you're supposed to kill me if I find a way back, right? So what of it, Nina? I might have a way home. Are you going to try and stop me?"
The question nearly sounded funny. Despite her combat skills and despite the rifle and pistols she carried, Major Nina Forest was fully defeated. She existed now only in his shadow. She could no more shoot him than grow wings and fly away. He saw this clearly and despite his anger for what she had done, the idea of such a strong person being so completely beaten down did conjure a pang of pity in his heart.
He said, "Voggoth behind it all. Pulling the strings. Manipulating the whole thing. So tell me, your army of misfits and mercenaries marched through your gateway and came here, right?"
"For the most part everyone stayed together and in formation, but there were reports that the gateway sort of misfired, sending some troops and equipment to completely different places on the planet. We found out the tech didn't work as perfectly as advertised. Still, most of us hit the ground here, marching through the gate or appearing near to it."
"Okay, but you also brought animals through. I’ve seen them. I figured they were indigenous here, but I was wrong. I saw wolves and deer and pigeons. They came with you."
She answered, "There’s another gateway from our home world that sends over animals. All part of terra-forming this planet into something like we knew. I never could figure out exactly why, it doesn't make a lot of sense. Seems like the idea of the invasion is more than just grabbing land, kind of like erasing the Chaktaw's entire civilization. I don’t know where that other gate is, if that’s what you’re asking."
"All the higher life forms plus an army. So tell me, Nina, how many civilizations are involved in this? Do you know? Tell you what; I’m going to guess that there are seven others. Seven others including the Chaktaw plus mankind, that equals eight."
Trevor felt satisfaction at figuring out something the Old Man would never have admitted, but Nina contradicted, "I want to say nine. I mean, when you count Voggoth."
"That wouldn’t add up," he protested because he really wanted to be right; he wanted to understand. "If there are eight universes, there should be eight different civilizations. Each universe with a different race on Earth, defending against an invasion by all the others. That would add up. Nice and neat."
"Look, I’ll tell you whatever I know," she said in an almost pleading voice. "But I don’t like being caught in the open like this."
"Yes," he agreed. "Caught in an alien environment."
She cast her eyes down again. Yet he did agree. It was time to move on.
---
Trevor and Nina followed the road that, in turn, followed a river through a tight valley with massive walls made of unforgiving, un-climbable rock.
Afternoon moved toward evening. The rain stopped but the blanket of intimidating clouds remained, fitting like a lid atop the foreboding mountain peaks to either side.
They came to the largest Chaktaw city they had yet encountered, protected by a high, iron wall stretching from one end of the valley to the other like a dam. Unfortunately, it had not succeeded in its task. A large segment of the protective barrier had been smashed. Piles of twisted beams and other debris lay to either side. Through a gap in the failed wall, Trevor glimpsed buildings, some tall, some wide, all grouped together in a metropolis, the Chaktaw’s version of New York City or Los Angeles or Houston for that matter.
The road approaching the city told the story. Trevor and Nina first circumvented craters where bombs had impacted, then carefully stepped through a field of rotted Chaktaw defenders, their flesh picked clean from years of scavenging.
Next came something he first thought to be a pile of bones heaped together. However, he soon realized that he looked not at a collection but at one massive skeleton, one that offered a clue as to the force that had battered the protective wall.
In the remains, he saw huge legs with cloven hoofs that had once made the ground shake with each step. At the top of the body, a skull devoid of skin yet still sporting two ram-like horns.
The two stared at the horrendous corpse outside the broken walls of the city. In it, they saw a conspiracy crossing universes.
Eventually, they started again, moving around the huge skeleton and toward the city where many truths waited to be spoken.
27. City of Truth
After circumventing the giant's bones as well as piles of collapsed wall, the two travelers entered the city proper. The setting sun cast shadows across the ruins of stores, office buildings, and supermarkets, as well as the disintegrating remains of the Chaktaw residents who once called this place home.
Inside the wall, the road sprouted branches weaving through the metropolis.
Here, the Chaktaw favored more traditional buildings including a few tall ones, although they appeared less obsessed with skyscrapers than humanity; the tallest structure Trevor saw reached ten floors.
Building materials resembled what he knew from home. The preferred color pattern appeared to be white stone or metal with a coat of glossy enamel and blue glass for windows. Some buildings stood on stilts allowing for sidewalks and parking areas underneath.
The valley surrounded the city providing a sense of cover and security, like all of the Chaktaw places he encountered to date. He suspected that these people evolved in a harsher environment, either fighting each other like mankind did on Trevor's pre-Armageddon Earth, or perhaps confronted with more dangerous predators.
"We need to find somewhere to hold up for the night," he said.
"Looks like we’ve got a lot to choose from, you know?"
Trevor stopped walking, looked to her, and then glanced around at the 'empty' buildings. As if in response, they heard a soft crack of glass, a scraping noise like a sharp edge drawn across metal, and then what sounded like a moan.
"I think we need to find somewhere. Real quick like."
Ahead of Trevor and Nina the main road split at a ‘Y’ intersection. To the right and left stood buildings of various sizes in various states of decay as well as side streets and alleyways. Facing them from the middle of that 'Y' was a pillar-like building lined with triangular windows, topped with bent transmission towers, and at its base a gaping black hole framed by the remains of smashed front doors.
From that hole came a gang of ghastly-white creatures with sunken eyes and skull-like faces shambling forward like primates, the creatures Trevor had long ago nicknamed "Ghouls."
Major Forest raised her assault rifle but Trevor pushed the barrel down.
"If you shoot it'll wake up everything else in this city. Run!"
He directed their escape along a small path between two round buildings featuring gigantic but smashed video boards.
With heavy packs and bulky bedrolls on their backs, it only took a few seconds for their sprint to deteriorate into a jog. Their half-empty canteens sloshed, utility belts jingled, and their heavy boots thumped with each step making it difficult to hide their movement. Behind them—closing fast--the pursuing Ghouls hooted and grunted.
The road ended at a tall stone wall but Trevor spotted an open door in one of the surrounding buildings. He could not guess what denizen nested inside, but with the Ghouls nearly upon them, they had no choice but to take a chance.
With bayonets fixed, Trevor and Nina charged into the darkness. Based on the echo of their footsteps, it felt like a very big but pitch black room with a low ceiling and filled with both a chill and a musty stink.
Nina lit a flare and tossed it ahead while Trevor searched for and found the exterior door. He swung it shut and, in the red glare of the flare, spotted a forked steel rod—perhaps a tool of some kind—and propped it against the door, jamming it shut at least temporarily. Claws and teeth gnashed the other side, attempting to scrape and bite through.
"We need to keep moving," Trevor spoke the obvious but the sparkling glow of the flare lit only more darkness, giving no clue to their surroundings.
Nina answered with a second flare, this time holding it aloft, creating an umbrella of light. He moved to her side and together they advanced, hoping to find another exit while the door held. When Trevor kicked something, he saw the floor littered with debris including scraps of paper, metal shards, and bone fragments.
Behind them across the black void, the Ghouls pushed against the door. Their thumps, thuds, and scratches reverberated all around yet…yet Trevor heard another sound, one with them in the dark. Something like…the sound of…breathing?
The sparkling red flare lit a bundle of junk in their path; a mound of branches, planks, piping, and shrubs. Mixed in with the junk, a carcass of some small animal.
Trevor barely had time to mutter, "Oh shit," before the master of the den roared out of the darkness into the intruders' balloon of light, stumbling toward them on two big legs standing seven feet. In a flash, a big furry paw sent Nina sprawling to the floor. Her flare rolled across the ground sending strobes of red light through the chamber.
The monster turned to Trevor, dropping to all fours yet still of intimidating size. It rammed him with a snapping snout, teeth tearing away his thigh rig, knocking him down, and sending his assault rifle to the floor beside him.
As the creature paused to roar, the rolling flare shined perfectly on the beast, illuminating white-tipped brown fur, a muscular body nearly a thousand pounds in weight, and massive paws.
Trevor yelled, "It’s a damn Grizzly Bear!"
At that same instant across the black chamber came the sound of the door crashing open, the metal tool clanging on the hard floor, and the shuffle of Ghouls' feet.
He had no time to consider the irony. As the animal lunged at him again, Trevor stretched for his bullpup rifle and wielded the gun like a club, momentarily warding off his attacker as the edge of the bayonet cut across its snout.
Trevor thought, an invading monster from Nina’s home world. A world where the animals are like what I know on my Earth. Yet here, they’re the monsters.
Beyond Armageddon: Book 03 - Parallels Page 39