Home at Last

by Alex Sapegin

  “Mistress!” said a woman in a deep voice behind the elf. Lubayel turned and stared at the mighty tall orc (how did she manage to approach so softly?). Behind her stood several more gray orc women and three fair-haired Norsemen. The women were holding knives in their hands. “Mistress,” the orc repeated, “it will be an honor for me to serve you and your family!” she said, sank to her right knee and slashed the knife into the wrist of her left hand. Bright red blood spurted out onto the roadway. “Please accept our oaths!” The women behind the powerful orc repeated the bloody action.

  A blood oath! If she refused, they would kill themselves. The main orc and the others looked at her directly and openly, showing that the decision was deliberate and under no circumstances would be changed. Lubayel could not imagine an orc deciding to pronounce such an oath to an elf.

  Lubayel, her motionless face resembling a stone golem, took out a dagger from the sheath attached to her belt and held the sharp blade to her arm.

  “I accept!” The magic completed the bloody ritual. She was the first Rauu ever to accept gray orcs into her family.

  Earth. Russia. Secret scientific research center. The night shift…

  There was a cheerful atmosphere in the control room of the third facility. Despite the fact that the third group was switched to round-the-clock duty after dividing the team into three subgroups and diluting it with new people—after all, the positions laid by the regulations should not be empty—everyone was in high spirits on the team. Maybe it was because most of the staff were young people. Sixty-five percent of the team were young people aged twenty-five to thirty. No wonder they were the ones who set the general tone.

  The management of the complex diluted every shift with old guys, whose function was to pull the young people away from risky and reckless experiments while opening windows to other worlds. The “wise elders” could give advice on all occasions. A couple of inconspicuous observers from the secret services (“consultants”) with typical, non-memorable faces played the role of anchors holding the “vessel” in a given area of sea. There were also inconspicuous “knights of cloak and dagger” whose function was to monitor any electrical installation, such as the important fuses and voltage surge protectors. Each silent consultant was given the authority to stop the apparatus without explaining the reasons, or, conversely, to prohibit the folding of the spatial window. However, this had happened only twice, and it was at the time when the group was just forming.

  Now, the observers sat quietly in the corner of the hall behind their monitors and did not interfere in anything. How could they interfere when the apparatus schedule was down to the minute and had to be approved by the highest authorities? Soon, the young scientists got used to the consultants. They were perceived by young scientists as just another part of the surroundings at the site.

  In general, the curators were pleased. They managed to maintain a balance between the carrot[S10] and the whip, balancing the oppression of punishment with a whole bouquet of motivators for good work. They were betting on the promising young people and the old guys from the Soviet era, who were hardened by that culture. They had high salaries by any measure and were able to do top-secret work. They realized their work was of real benefit. Hollywood screenwriters only made things up, but they actually worked with a real secret. What could be more exciting?

  Based on the advice of psychologists, the management of the center installed a board in the operating room on which people posted information about any scientific breakthroughs in Russia. It was secretly promoted by the “alien chasers” of the third group and consisted of scientific discoveries or technologies stolen by them from the developed worlds. The copies of the decree by the Prime Minister on the allocation of a round sum from the stabilization fund in a freely convertible currency especially warmed the soul. The money was spent on financing the construction of two full-cycle microelectronics factories. The new electronics were expected to make a real sensation in the market since the prefix “nano” could be added to the name, while only one mini-port and a small box, a third the size of a matchbox, with a hundred terabytes of interesting information, contributed to the breakthrough. A special team later spent a week adapting the foreign gadget to Earth electronics, and a group of linguists led by an Indian genius spent more than a month getting the information, instructions, and drawings that would come with it up to the required standards.

  But that’s another story. Now, the night shift was preparing for duty. Recently, the observation of the magical world had been dumped on the “nightlights.” The leadership was very much interested in the disgraceful things happening there. The magical war was a rich catch that gave abundant food for thought, and that “food” was comparable to the flow of information from the technological worlds. The spatial screens and fighting golems alone made it worth it.

  Some hotheads considered the option of buying a couple for a certain amount of gold, or offered to just conduct an expropriation, but what about the sources of magic, and how would the items behave in Earth’s conditions? There were a lot of questions. Dozens of brainy guys and girls (the staff of the secret scientific center grew many times) worked on the riddles of magical gadgets, stolen with the best of intentions. A mini-window, an impulse to open the portal—and no fraud. Except that the word “theft” was replaced by “mining sample” or “expropriation.”

  “Vitya, why do you open your mouth wider than a gate when you yawn?” Nicholas Odintsov said to his colleague, who was correcting the temporal flow, covering his mouth with his palm. “You should yawn like this, without making it noticeable. It’s contagious, you know. Didn’t you get enough sleep during the day?”

  “Whatever, Nick,” Vitya answered, shaking himself. “I can’t sleep during the day. Just a habit.”

  “Habit,” growled Nick. “Just don’t fall asleep during the launch of the window. Who’ll synchronize it if you press onto the mass too hard?”

  “Don’t be afraid, it’s not the first time I’m doing this. I’ll ask Paulina. Paulina!” Victor quietly called the sketchy blond lab assistant, dressed in a white lab coat. “Will you take over for me?”

  “Can I?” Paulina immediately joined the game and smiled charmingly. She and Vitya proceeded to exchange flirtatious banter.

  “That will do! The bazaar is over!” The head of the night shift entered the operator’s room. “To your spots, people. I’ll be commanding this parade!”

  “Where’s the boss? Where did Chuiko go?” someone asked.

  “Took time off for family reasons. At least, that’s what the curator said.”

  “I get it. More intrigue and scheming in the high echelons of power,” the same person commented, offended.

  The head of the night shift looked sternly at the scientists and team of consultants and barked, “To your spots, colleagues!”

  “What’s the schedule for the windows, Petrovich?” Nicholas asked the shift manager.

  “Ilanta, Orten. After three hours, Terium, a scientific complex. We’re studying the approaches, determining the exit points and portal arrangement. Let’s get going, Nick. Start the pre-launch preparations.”

  Nicholas, jokingly putting his hand to his head, launched the test program. Fifteen minutes later, a picture of the besieged city from a bird’s eye view appeared on the main screen. It was early morning on Ilanta; the sky in the east had just turned pink. Obeying the shift supervisor’s command, the portal operator cracked his knuckles, carefully touched the joysticks, and led the portal down.

  “What sort of demonstrations are these?” Paulina asked in surprise, examining two lines of people walking along parallel streets in the direction of one of the bridges linking the different urban areas. It seemed the whole city had gathered on the sidewalks. The residents were throwing grain and breadcrumbs on the road in complete silence. Even the children didn’t shout but gazed silently at the strange procession. “I see to have a bad feeling about this, guys.”

  “You’re right,
Paulina. It doesn’t seem like an Independence Day parade. Let’s see what happens,” Petrovich said quietly.

  People walked to the bridge. Numerous outfits of guards and army patrols parted before them in reverence and bowed low as they passed. The march seemed very unusual because most of the “demonstrators” were people with disabilities. The awe and respect that hung in the air created an incredible atmosphere.

  The Earthly audience heard the sound of crutches on the pavement, shuffling of feet and intermittent breathing coming from the lines. Nobody said a word.

  “Guys,” Paulina broke the silence. “Maybe I’m wrong, but the white shirts on the humans and orcs really bother me. I have a foreboding feeling like from the jackets the magicians at the front of the lines are wearing.”

  “You’re not mistaken,” answered Petrovich. “I bet we’re about to see something incredible. Why do I say that? Our ancestors wore white clothes at funerals and dressed the deceased in white. In the old days that color was associated with mourning and the afterlife. I don’t know why we now dress in black. In the East, in China, for example, white is still considered the color of death. Another thing I don’t understand is why birches are considered an originally Russian tree.”

  “They’re not?” asked Vitya.

  “Somewhere I read that the Slavs didn’t like birch trees because they grew fastest on waste grounds and conflagrations, the charred remains after a fire. Our ancestors preferred pine forests and broad oak forests, but in no way birch forests.”

  “Come on,” Paulina interjected into the conversation. “Looks like they’ve arrived. Look, the magician in the black robes separated from the first column. And the one in black and white, from the second.”

  “Yeah,” Vitya bit his pencil. “Mike, zoom in. Miiiike,” he spit out the pencil, “did you fall asleep, or what? Zoom in on the wizards.” The image jumped forward. “That’s good! Stop right there.”

  The mages in black and white whispered to themselves, drew their blades and began to delineate a complex pentagram directly on the pavement. The lines drawn by the swords immediately flashed a strange black and white color. When they finished the drawing, they froze. It seemed that the show was over, but it wasn’t. Strange runes or other magic symbols unknown to the scientists began to light up in the air, from which red luminous flagellas stretched to the pentagram.

  “Mike, go back,” Petrovich commanded. “Uh-huh, a 3-D drawing. Oh, Mike, turn the window to behind the fortification wall for a second. It seems to me that the guys in black and white want something to hit the orcs with. Look, they’ve already led the zombies out into the field and are building attack ranks of the living. It seems their commanders intend to take the Lower city. Mike,” he gave another command to the god of joysticks and windows. “go back. Who’s that couple there?”

  The couple completed work on building a 3-D multifaceted pentagram and a magician in black, although he was a blonde, stepped beyond the border of the magical drawing and put a dozen knives with long narrow blades on the ground.

  “Wow!” Victor expressed the common opinion and guess. “I swear by my mother, the black and white boys are preparing a sacrifice!”

  “Knock it off!” Petrovich snapped. “Our business is to observe.”

  The magician in black, stepping over the border of the pentagram, took his colleague by the hand and began to sing something. The partner echoed him. The lines of the pentagram shone brighter. Continuing to hum and hold hands, the mages walked in a circle. As soon as they passed by some rune, it flashed with a bright flame. Having finished the walking in a circle, the mages, continuing to sing, unclasped hands and parted in opposite directions. The blades lying on the ground glowed blue. Apparently, that was a signal for the orcs and humans standing at the bridge.

  The scientists and observers from the secret services in the hall had seen many deaths in the foreign, on-screen war, but they still got sick when the first demonstrators went to the knives and began to stick them into themselves in cold blood. Paulina gasped and turned away.

  “Craaaap,” whispered Nicholas.

  Instead of crashing to the ground, the suicides turned into powerful flames. The red flagella separated from the pentagram and sucked the fire in. The knives were hanging in the air, then, in a few moments, they were in the hands of the next victims of the crazy ritual. More and more tongues of fire appeared. In five minutes or so, a fiery tornado covered the pentagram and the magicians hidden inside. A ripple ran across the screen.

  “Static, chief,” Mike came to life. “I’ll go back. God forbid the window collapses.”

  “My God, my God,” Paulina repeated, pressing her hands to her cheeks, wet with tears.

  The tornado grew before their eyes. The ritual knives became red-hot. The victims no longer pierced them in their hearts; as soon as the person touched the blade with his hand, he instantly turned into a flame and added another petal to the fiery whirlwind, under which red puddles of the molten pavement stones flowed. Although, however strangely, the unbearable heat did not touch the humans and orcs extending their hands to knives.

  A few minutes later, the last man joined the fiery dance. Mike zoomed the window out even further; the impact on it got stronger. The tornado sharply transformed into a spiral and sucked into the pentagram. Suddenly, a human figure, embraced by flame, flew out of it, backward. On the spot of the magic drawing, a sparkling fireball formed. The fiery man waved his hand. The ball flew at great speed from the spot, hurling towards the camp of the besiegers. In the huge red-hot puddle that was once the pavement, a totally naked man lay. He was not at all disturbed by the unbearable heat of the melted stone.

  “How about that!” Nicholas was not alone in his exclamation. Many in the room chose much more powerful words. A bright flash made everyone squint for a moment. When the light faded, the observers froze from the unreal picture. The site of the green orcs’ camp was adorned with a giant mushroom of fire, as if from an atomic bomb. The shock wave that struck the city tore off roof tiles and weather vanes, threw people on the ground, and broke windows. Behind the shock wave, a fiery shaft rolled over the earth, burning siege machines, orcs, and zombies. The living flame touched the outer walls of the city, licked the ancient masonry and opal as if it knew that it was impossible to go any further, and stopped. Of the huge army of green orcs, there remained only ashes…

  “How about that,” one of the consultants repeated, wiping the sweat off his neck and forehead with a handkerchief. “How much would that be in the TNT equivalent?”

  Ilanta. Orten. Timur…

  The fire was everywhere. It seemed the goddesses themselves were dancing in the tongues of hellfire; they called him to join them, and only magic kept him from joining the souls which turned into the bright red tongues of the huge vortex. Timur held out with his very last strength. Every soul flew through him, leaving some part of himself behind. Bitterness, fear, hope, pride, regret, rejoicing—the whole range of feelings experienced by the humans and orcs that touched the knives lashed through the auras of Timur and the necromancer. The mages were poles holding the whirlwind or axis of the “kiss” from destroying everything around it. Timur no longer understood where the magic of life was, and where the magic of the death of grall Necros was. Everything was intertwined, like the inherent elements; only will and intellect, which distinguish humans from animals, remained anchors in the raging hurricane.

  “That’s it, give it direction,” he heard in his head. Timur saw before him the fiery face of his teacher. It seemed as if they were looking into each other’s eyes forever. Two tongues of flame with human figures and dark coals instead of eyeballs.

  “Give it direction,” the necromancer repeated and made a motion of pushing something away from himself. Timur was torn from the ground and thrown out of the native, peaceful, and at the same time, fierce flame.

  When he was outside the now native element, he glanced at the distant tents of the orc camp and mentally joined the center
of the pentagram and the object of retribution, waving for some reason. Driven by grall Necros’s will, the ball flew from its place.

  “LIVE!” The image of the necromancer with a sad smile on his lips appeared in his mind.

  Why? thought Timur. His consciousness escaped, a real storm of voices, demanding something from him, calling him to join them, begging to return to the burning element, came upon him. Without the fire around, it was so cold and empty. Timur tried to resist the boundless load, but the voices broke all barriers. At last, his mind could not stand it and plunged into darkness.

  Ilanta. Orten. Timur. Three days later…

  Shadows, a kaleidoscope of faces and voices, flashes of light and dark stripes. Darkness. Emptiness. Fire—he needed fire; he beckoned and asked to plunge into the living flame, to give a piece of himself and take on scraps of souls. They were calling, demanding, pleading, and threatening him with terrible punishments. He had to accept them, merge with them, break ties with the world under heaven.

  “Stop it! Leave me. Leave! Me!”

  The souls didn’t care. The pale shadows continued to dance and extinguish the flame that was picking up his particles. Fire. Need more fire! So cold…

  What was this? Where was the wind coming from? Strong gusts united with the tongues of flame and burnt the ghosts that tore at him. The former fragments of souls turned to ashes. The fresh wind took away the garbage and brought peace…

  “It’s all over,” a strange, comforting voice whispered from nowhere. “Go to the light... go to the light.”

  The delicate velvet of the wonderful voice called him to itself. The echo swept from the direction of a small glowing dot hanging high above the tongues of the flame. Timur with all his essence reached out to the light and the voice. The burnt snatches of souls no longer hung on his feet like heavy weights. The voice called and pulled; the source of the bright light got closer…