by Toby Tate
One thing Lateef always looked forward to at the market was the entertainment, which was usually within view no matter where he set up—magicians, glass eaters, fire swallowers, musicians—and for a young man of only seventeen, the occasional beautiful girl was always a welcome sight. Unfortunately, it was also known as Souq al-Harameya, or thieves market, because of all the pick pockets that seemed to be targeting Cairo in recent years.
Lateef sighed—another hour until he reached the city. If only this truck had a radio, he could at least listen to some music.
Suddenly, a shimmering wall of purple and green light appeared in front of his truck and he slammed on the brakes, screeching to a halt and leaving a trail of burnt rubber on the dirt road. He peered through the windshield and saw that there was not just one wall, but many walls. Except they were actually more like curtains than walls, moving and shifting as if they were being blown by the wind. What were they? He knew there had to be some rational scientific explanation, but he had never heard of such a thing in his life.
Lateef decided to get a closer look and slowly opened the rusted door of his truck as it creaked in protest. He stepped out and slammed it behind him. There were no street lights or any light other than the stars and the moon, but these shimmering curtains seemed to give off light of their own. He tried to reach out and touch one, but it was like a mirage—you could see it, but it really wasn’t there.
As he stood contemplating the strange phenomenon, a light from above suddenly cast his shadow across the ground and he turned to look behind him. There, about ninety meters back and some sixty meters from the ground, was a ray of blue light no more than forty centimeters in circumference. Lateef held up a hand to shield his eyes from its intensity. He gazed from one end of the beam to the other, and as far as he could tell, it had no beginning and no end, like some kind of light from God. It even looked as though it was bending with the curve of the earth. He was no scientist, but he had never, ever seen light bend.
What is going on?
* * *
Orbiting two-hundred and thirty miles above the Earth, Science Officer Commander Jackson Flynn opened the shutters protecting the seven windows on the Cupola, an observatory inside the International Space Station that somewhat resembled the gun turret of Star Wars’ Millennium Falcon. He would be taking photos of the effects of the geomagnetic storm caused by one of the most powerful solar flares in recent history. He and all of his crewmembers aboard the space station would absorb their yearly limit of radiation in a few hours, but since they were at the end of their tour, they would be leaving soon. This was a once-in-a-lifetime event, and he wasn’t going to miss it for anything.
Strapped in to the observation chair to prevent floating around while in free fall, he checked his digital camera to make sure there was plenty of memory and then glanced out at the giant blue orb set against a backdrop of velvet black. It was a sight he and his crew never got used to, no matter how many times he witnessed it. He could see the outline of the Earth’s atmosphere on the horizon and the clouds of several different weather systems covering the surface. His main focus would be the eastern hemisphere, where the auroras were likely to be strongest.
Dimitri Yurovsky, the station’s resident flight engineer, suddenly appeared in the doorway holding his own camera, his red hair standing straight up on his head from the zero gravity. He grinned at the commander.
“Is there room for one more?” he asked, his Russian accent causing him to roll the “r” in “more” one too many times.
Flynn slapped the chair beside him. “Sure. Come on in. Best seats in the house.”
Yurovsky floated inside, grabbed a seat belt and pulled himself down, then turned until he was firmly seated, and strapped himself in.
“Looks like Mother Nature isn’t wasting any time,” Flynn said, as green and purple ribbons of light began to run like a trail of fire across the globe as far as the eye could see. He raised his camera to start shooting, and then stopped as something caught his attention. He lowered the camera and stared out the center window at the Mediterranean. Thin blue beams as bright as lasers had suddenly lit up, crisscrossing and connecting with one another, stretching from northern Africa all the way to Europe and Asia.
“Are you seeing what I’m seeing?” Yurovsky asked, his camera now forgotten and floating free below his chin.
“I’m seeing it, but I don’t believe it. I hope the video cameras are getting this.” Flynn raised his own camera and began snapping pictures as fast as he could.
“What do you think it means?”
Flynn continued shooting as he spoke. “I don’t know, but somebody must be using a hell of a lot of energy to create it, especially since we’re seeing it this far out. It could be powered by the storm itself. In fact, I…”
Flynn was cut off as he heard Yurovsky gasp, and lowered his camera again. There, at the center of the pentagram, around where the island of Crete was located, was an incredibly concentrated beam of blue light going straight up into the atmosphere, past the ISS and continuing on into space.
“Dimitri,” he said, “we’d better call mission control.”
Then the power died and the module went dark.
Eighty-two
All around them were shimmering curtains of purple, green, red, and yellow, when the most intense light Gabe could ever imagine shot up into space from the top of the obelisk, on its way to another planet or another solar system.
She glanced down at the backpack lying on the ground, and then made a dash for it, gambling that the timers hadn’t been reset. Behind her, Jason and Matthias were yelling at her to stop, but she paid no attention. She had to get the C4 into the obelisk, at least put it near the base, to insure that the structure would be taken down. She took off in a sprint as pain from the bullet wound shot through her shoulder like a red-hot poker and she gasped for breath. She kept running until she reached the pack, then scooped it up with one hand and continued toward the door of the obelisk.
Once inside, she found where Hunter had placed the other charges and planted it in between.
That should be enough to take this damn thing out.
She heard a noise and glanced up to see Hunter quickly climbing down the spiral stairway. But he was alone.
“Where’s Mac?” she yelled up at him.
Hunter peeked over the rail at her. “I’ll explain when I get down there. You need to get out of here. There’s only about three minutes left on those timers.”
That was no answer. Gabe knew something had to be wrong. She ran to the stairs and began to climb. When she was about to pass Hunter, he grabbed her and held on.
“No, let me go! We still have time!”
“Gabe, you can’t save him. He’s changed. The meteorite caused him to mutate. Besides, if you go up there, the radiation will kill you before you can go two feet.”
Gabe knew Hunter was right. She stopped struggling and looked him in the eyes. “Is he still alive?”
“Yeah, but I brought him another block of C4, and when it goes, he and Hendricks are both going with it. There’s nothing we can do for him now.”
They stood there for a few moments as Gabe stared up at the top of the obelisk and said a silent goodbye, and then they both turned and climbed down the stairway.
* * *
Mac knew there was no way to make the C4 explode without setting off the blasting caps, and there was no way to set off the blasting caps without the timer, which was now worthless.
Hendricks suddenly leapt at him, smashing into him with his great weight. But Mac was ready, and caught the beast in his arms, throwing him across the room in one motion, using Hendricks’s momentum against him. But the creature was as fast as a jungle cat, and righted himself immediately, glaring at his opponent.
Mac could feel the power surging through his body. It was exhilarating, intoxicating. He looked down at the floor and suddenly saw the stairway below it. He glanced back up at the other beast and saw the bones and
sinew inside his body. He shook his enormous head, trying to regain control over his vision, focusing on solid objects. Although it probably came in handy in certain situations, he didn’t need x-ray vision right now.
There was only one thing to do—he had to keep Hendricks busy until the charges at the base of the tower crumbled its foundation and sent the structure toppling over.
Eighty-three
Hunter and Gabe exited the obelisk and made their way across the parking lot. Gabe seemed to be having a hard time walking and she placed a hand over her wounded shoulder. Hunter offered her an arm to lean on and she took it. All around the area, colorful Aurorae Borealis hung like curtains undulating in the wind, fading in and out. When they reached Jason and Matthias, Hunter saw them gazing at the sky and turned his eyes upward. The beam that was radiating from the top of the obelisk seemed to be splitting the sky apart. The stars around it had completely disappeared, as if they had been sucked into a black hole.
But there was something else inside that hole, something shadowy and alive. All around its edges, static electrical charges appeared like lightning, shooting out in huge arcs. Hunter couldn’t tell if the phenomenon was inside or outside the atmosphere, and it probably didn’t matter. When it reached its maximum size, they would all be dead. The Earth, which began in darkness, would also end there.
“The energy being created by those stones must be astronomical,” he said.
“Just pray that whatever is waiting inside there is stopped when the C4 goes off,” Gabe said. “It should be only a couple of minutes.”
Even as she said the words, she couldn’t help but hang on to hope that Mac would somehow make it out alive.
“Do you think the explosives will work?” Matthias asked.
“If not, I’ll have to call in an airstrike, diplomacy be damned,” Jason said.
* * *
The two beasts eyed each other, circling, looking for weakness. Even as his reasoning brain was slowly being overtaken by animal impulse, Mac knew he had to win this battle. The entire human race, of which he considered himself a part, depended on it.
As he fought to retain his humanity, instinct kicked in when the Hendricks creature launched itself in another attack, landing directly on top of Mac and slamming him to the floor. Its weight was crushing, but Mac managed to throw it off with a flip of his massive body. So far, it seemed as if Hendricks was merely toying with him, biding his time. But for what? Maybe he thought that once the earth had been taken to the other universe, he would gladly submit himself to his new masters and become a willing accomplice to the New World Order. If that was the case, Hendricks and his puppet masters had another think coming.
Mac released an eardrum-splitting bellow and leapt through the air at the other creature. He slammed into it with the force of a mortar shell and they rolled across the granite floor, entangled in a mass of fur, teeth and claws, rending and tearing, blood spraying. When they finally separated, Mac crawled along the floor with big grunting breaths, leaving a slick trail of blood behind him. He plopped down on the floor, not really caring about Hendricks’s next move. But even as he lay there, he could already feel the wounds on his body healing.
So, this is immortality?
As he had that thought, a huge explosion shook the monolith like a great earthquake and Mac could feel the structure begin to sway. He stood and used his newfound eyesight to gaze down through the granite floor. Far below, at the bottom of the obelisk, was an erupting fireball shooting a hundred feet up the stairwell, melting and bending the aluminium steps and rails.
The C4 had ignited.
Eighty-four
There was a bright flash and a deafening bang followed by a huge ball of flames as the blocks of C4 blew the obelisk door completely off. It flew through the air and landed with a metallic clang fifty feet in front of them. Smoke poured from the opening, filling the night air with toxic fumes.
As Hunter, Gabe, Matthias, Jason, and the rest stood around the perimeter of the parking lot, they waited for the huge structure to begin toppling over. But nothing happened.
Gabe ran to the other side of the building, with the others trailing behind, to where they could see the damage from the explosion. They stopped and were greeted by a gaping hole at least twenty feet wide and twenty feet tall. The C4 had done its job and blown apart the granite wall right at its base, but the structure still stood.
“Do we have any more C4?” Gabe asked.
Jason shook his head. “We gave our only block to Mac. We don’t have time to go back and get any more.”
Gabe glanced up at the sky. It was pitch black, with a massive swirling vortex that must have been miles wide. Electrical charges shot out and circled back again. There were no stars that she could see, and even the moon had disappeared. The beam from the top of the obelisk stopped dead in the exact center of the hole, and lit up the entire area around them like daytime. But even more disturbing, was that inside the ever-widening, circular mass, she could see something moving, an enormous shadow flitting at the speed of light from one side to the other, as if gauging the progress of the beam. Was that Tartarus? Or Satan himself? Whatever it was, they would soon be at its mercy, and she doubted very much that it had any.
* * *
Mac turned to gaze at Hendricks, who stood across the room glaring at him with silver-red beast-eyes, a malevolent grin showing rows of dagger-like teeth. His muscles bulged, as hard as steel cables. All of his bloody wounds had healed, and he looked like he was ready for another round. But Mac didn’t want to fight. He wasn’t a killer, and not even Satan himself could change that.
He had to think; there must have been something else he was overlooking, something else that could be done. As far gone as humanity was, he believed there was still hope for them. It couldn’t end like this—he wouldn’t let it.
Then, he had an idea. Mac knew the meteorite was cool to the touch, even though it produced an enormous amount of energy. But it was also producing light—an extremely intense light, like a laser, and lasers were very, very hot. Hot enough to set off blasting caps.
He looked Hendricks in the eye, furrowed his brow and released a low, rumbling growl from deep inside, showing that he was ready to tangle. He began to charge toward the monster as it did the same, and then veered off at the last second, allowing Hendricks to sail past him and skid across the smooth granite. Mac snatched the block of C4 off the floor as he continued ahead, skidded to a stop and held the explosive directly over the beam.
God forgive me.
Then, searing heat and excruciating pain, followed by darkness.
Eighty-five
Hunter noticed the walls of shimmering aurorae were intensifying and he glanced back up at the sky, where Hell itself awaited. The hole looked more and more to him like some gigantic eye, or the entrance to Dante’s Inferno. It covered the entire sky, all the way to the horizon, and was completely silent, which seemed to add to its terrifying appearance. Hunter wondered if they would be sucked into it by the vacuum of space, or pulled into it by some unseen force. The wind on the ground had picked up speed, as dirt and pebbles began stinging his face. He thought of Lisa and Jade and how petrified they must be. He wanted to call them, but what good would it do? He doubted if any of the cell towers were working, anyway.
As if in response, Gabe said, “The power’s probably out for miles around, maybe across the globe.”
Hunter slowly shook his head, marveling in awe at the spectacle far above. “How many other people are seeing what we’re seeing right now, quivering with fear, no clue about what’s happening or what awaits them?”
“They’re probably better off not knowing.”
As they stared at the nightmarish vision in the sky, enormous shadows began to slide out of the swirling mass, like phantom hands ready to grab hold of their planet to pull it into oblivion. Everyone stood silent, watching the living shadows as they reached out farther and farther, spreading as far as the eye could see from one hori
zon to the other, darker than the blackness of space.
Hunter closed his eyes.
“God help us.”
He was jolted out of his somber prayer when the top of the obelisk suddenly blew apart and shards of granite rained down on the parking lot as everyone moved away from the structure to avoid being hit. The light that had been shining from it split into several beams and disappeared altogether. The sound of a thousand shrieking demons filled the night air and Hunter clapped his hands over his ears, watching the monstrous shadow hands pull back as the doorway to oblivion shrank down and down, smaller and smaller, until it finally became nothing.
Left in its place were the moon and stars, shining like they had never been gone, as the shimmering lights of the Aurorae Borealis were slowly disappearing and the winds died down to a light breeze.
“What the hell just happened?” he asked.
“I think Mac just saved us all,” Gabe said.
There was a loud cracking sound, like a boulder breaking in half, and the huge monolith suddenly caved in on one side and began falling toward them.
“Everyone, get out of the way! Run to the other side of the obelisk!” Jason yelled.
The group fled around the edge of the parking lot as fast as they could move, back to the opposite side, as the gigantic structure fell toward the ground with a groan of twisting metal and crumbling granite. The tower hit with a bone-rattling crash, shaking the entire area with its incredible weight. Clouds of dirt and dust roiled up into the darkness.
Then, everything was still.
“Everybody okay?” Jason asked. A dozen voices replied, many coughing from the settling dust.