The Warrior's Beckoning

said.

  “Ah, you were spaced out,” Joel said with a chuckle.

  “I was just shown memories of a survivor. He’s linked up with Daniel and the others,” I

  “You were shown memories?” Frank said, looking puzzled.

  “Yeah. I don’t understand it either,” I said, shrugging. “I just…well, I have faith in them

  somehow.”

  Frank stared at me for a moment, then smiled grimly. “Yeah, nothing’s normal about today, so if you say you saw someone else’s memories, that’s good enough for me,” he said. “Now, how do we get back to Daniel’s group?”

  We heard footsteps behind us, and we all spun around, weapons drawn, ready to shoot.

  Those approaching shone their flashlights on each other. It was the other team. “Daniel! You almost got shot!” Joel yelled out.

  “What were you thinking, running up on us like that?” Frank asked.

  “Well, how would you react if you heard one of us scream?” David said as they approached.

  “Point taken,” said Frank.

  I looked at the Survivor. He wore a black dress shirt and dress pants. His laser rifle glowed faintly, making it appear to hover in the darkness.

  “God has almost assembled his team,” he said to us. “Now we must enter the facility and find the last piece…”

  “The facility? That must be the place the dead guy’s diary mentioned. Where do we find this place?” I asked.

  “The entrance to the tunnel system is sealed. We’ll have to exit and access the facility from the surface,” he said.

  “Through the woods…?” Rick said softly.

  The Survivor nodded. “Yes, the Forest of Anguish, it’s called.” “No kidding. Have you been up there lately?”

  “The organization’s activity has been monitoring a dark entity there, I know,” said the Survivor.

  “Yeah, but…have you been out there?” Rick asked again. “There are monsters everywhere!”

  Daniel spoke. “What choice do we have? If we stay here, we’ll be stalked by the entities.

  If we can get to the facility, maybe we can figure out what’s going on and how to stop it.” “That’s a big if,” Frank said.

  “God called us here, and no one else is going to do it,” said David sternly. “Remember this poem.” He began to recite it:

  The battle rages within.

  A dark influence whispers,

  Demanding your separation from the moment. The memories you recall…are they a dream? A subtle suggestion ends in a broken life.

  The sorrow is not just with you. Visions of terror awaken at night. A shadow looms over you.

  With logic we discard the battle within. With fear we cower.

  There are too few warriors to fight this battle. Standing on the Word, they face the enemy.

  So many doubt them.

  So many ridicule them.

  Will you stand for the weak and the wounded?

  He stopped reciting. “We are the warriors chosen by God, and we are here to stand against the darkness.” His words instilled hope in us all. We knew that they were God’s words, words from the Holy Spirit. We moved with guns raised, the same way we had come in. The shadows receded, watching, perhaps wondering, perhaps planning.

  Soon we arrived at the bunker and slammed the hatch shut behind us. “Well, then,” Jason said.

  Daniel walked to the double door and motioned for us all to follow. “Be ready,” he ordered. David flipped over a table and crouched behind it at the right of the room. I stood beside Daniel. The others took up positions of cover around the room. Joel and Frank crouched behind heavy crates at the left of the room. Rick and Jason crouched in the center, and the Survivor stood behind them.

  “On three,” Daniel whispered. He held his hand up, one finger raised. Two fingers.

  Three. We opened the door quickly, then raised our weapons. All was quiet.

  Then, behind us, the hatch opened slowly. None of us had touched it. Were they about to hit us from both sides?

  “Rick, Jason, focus on the hatch,” David barked. He pointed to the Survivor. “You! Support them.” He turned to Joel and Frank. “The two of you, lay down suppressing fire as needed. Ghost hunter, you’re with me. Daniel, since you have a melee weapon, you stay in the center and slice anything that gets close.” He raised his own weapon. “We have them at two choke points, front and rear. I want overlapping fields of fire!”

  What could we say to his orders? He was a soldier. Combat was his life. We trusted him. The walls were riddled with bullet holes from our last battle in this room. I had the feeling it was going to get worse. A Spirit of Decay rushed from the ceiling at the center and another from the wall to the left. The Survivor fired a beam into the one in the center, and Joel fired the laser pistol at the other, and the spirits receded into the shadows. Thump, thump,

  scrape. The sounds were followed by a sickening moaning echoed from the tunnels.

  We heard snarling from the woods outside. The shadows in the room danced around us. The dark entities were moving. A corpse lurched forward from the hatch and was immediately put down by Rick. A snarling shadow dog hurtled in from the woods, and another lurching corpse, a Spirit of Decay, reached out from the floor in the center of the room. We opened fire. Daniel raised his sword to block a second Spirit of Decay as it came forth. He drove his sword into it as the Survivor fired a beam, and the entity dissipated. The other swiped at Daniel with its scythe. It lunged into one of the corpses at the doorway and then leaped to the ceiling. Several more shadow dogs rushed in. Joel raised his shotgun, and he and Frank fired into the beasts. Daniel and the Survivor pulled themselves up off the floor and rejoined the battle.

  The possessed corpse sent a wave of energy at Joel and Jason, knocking them against the wall. A group of the smaller shadow creatures crawled over the crates and began to attack the two men. Daniel charged, swinging his sword in a wide arc, and the creatures’ heads were severed from their bodies, splattering black blood in a wide radius. The legs twitched as the upper bodies crawled toward Daniel. Joel and Jason sat up, firing into the torsos. A bullet whizzed just past me, ricocheting off the walls. The sound of gunfire was painful, and my eardrums felt bruised and bloody. We were being attacked from every direction, but we stood together.

  I fired on full auto on a group of hounds at the doorway. David fired a burst into the possessed corpse on the ceiling, and it sprung away, latching on to the wall beside him. He ducked as it swiped at him. Daniel pulled a small vial of holy water from his robe and tossed it at the corpse, catching it in midair. It shook and shrieked before falling, lifeless. Daniel turned,

  swinging his sword high and slicing another corpse’s head off. It rolled on the ground as the body fell. By now we were covered with black blood and rotting flesh.

  The number of attacking entities began to decrease. Their bodies piled up in the doorways. Finally, it was quiet.

  Then a voice whispered over my shoulder. “Do you truly believe you pathetic mortals stand a chance against me?” The voice was cold and distant. It sounded like the creature that had attacked in the beginning. I looked over my shoulder but saw nothing. The voice seemed to loom over each of us, taunting us.

  The Survivor’s thoughts entered my mind. Don’t listen to it. His voice was gentle. It wishes to instill fear in you so it can gain power over you.

  A force knocked us all to the floor, although the Survivor was able to remain standing.

  Trembling, I could not move. My breathing became heavy, and my heart beat fast.

  “FOOLISH MORTALS!” the entity yelled out as it appeared. The assimilating fog extended outward, covering each of us. It was so cold…

  “I don’t fear you!” the Survivor said defiantly, still standing. The entity moved closer. “Only because you have not seen all of my power,” taunted the entity.

  “I know your power, dark one, and it has no effect over me.” The Survivor raised his hand
. “I do not fear you.”

  The entity laughed menacingly. “You will.” It vanished. The cold fog remained briefly. I stood slowly and walked to the Survivor. The others followed.

  “That took some guts,” David said.

  “No, it took faith,” Daniel said. “Perhaps you are the one we were looking for.”

  “Yes, I think I might be,” the Survivor said. “God sent for me in a dream, just as he sent for each of you in a dream. We are all pieces of the same puzzle. At first, you wanted to deny its meaning, but it nagged at you, that vision of a place shrouded in darkness, sorrow, and pain. You were shown an address, and each of you looked it up, and each of you came here…”

  “And how do you know that?” Rick asked.

  “You’re all thinking about it right now. Your thoughts are open to me.” The Survivor smiled. “Don’t worry. I won’t tell them.”

  Rick shook his head wonderingly, saying nothing. Jason laughed softly. “Reload your clips,” David ordered. “We’re heading out ASAP.” What could we say? We did as we were ordered.

  The BAR was a heavy rifle. I set it back in the gun rack and took out all of the clips for it. I caught Joel watching me as I picked up a heavy pistol and replaced the rifle clips with pistol clips. I pulled out the EMF meter. “I need two hands so I can use this, too. Maybe he can read minds, but I can’t. Don’t want those bastards sneaking up on us out there,” I said. Joel nodded approvingly.

  We were covered in black decay, dirty and rancid, but we weren’t ready to slow down. Daniel recited a poem to us:

  Looking to who I was,

  I see no hope.

  An existence lacking purpose,

  I was fallen, drenched in despair. Distant I stood.

  Vague I remained.

  Mocking bellows surrounded me, Kicked and spat on,

  So close to oblivion, So far from light.

  Looking to who I am, I see my potential.

  Clad in the Word, Wielding its potent power, I am risen,

  Clothed in love. Anew I stand.

  Steadfast I remain. Cries surround me, Unheard and unseen, So close to salvation,

  So far from righteousness.

  Looking to who I am to be, I see a warrior,

  An existence fulfilled. I am to rise higher, Armored with his love.

  Shock and awe will surround me, Persecuted and questioned,

  So close to him,

  So far from darkness. Unleash me.

  “We are his warriors,” said Daniel. “We will be questioned. We will be doubted. But we will make the difference here, unleashed for his glory. Remember this: our actions will not be recorded; they will not be praised. We will slip into the unknown, but we will have our God. We will have each other.”

  Daniel was inspiring, both through his words and his actions. I felt safe with him.

  I took point, and Daniel walked close behind me. Frank and Rick took the flanks, with the Survivor and Joel in the center. David and Jason took up the rear.

  As we approached the double doors, I saw faint EMF readings, but nothing significant. It was quiet. I slipped through the doors cautiously, waving the EMF meter and the pistol about slowly. Daniel stayed at my side. “Looks all clear,” I said.

  The others followed cautiously. The trees seemed to whisper to us, as if they were alive. A shadow danced from tree to tree in the distance but did not draw near. Were they stalking us? As I turned to Daniel, he gave me a nod and moved into the clearing. Our flashlights were our only source of light.

  “This way,” the Survivor said quietly, pointing north. I started off in that direction, the others following. Suddenly, the Survivor stopped us and motioned for us to head west. We were all quiet. What could we say? Most wouldn’t believe what we were doing at all, what we faced. We were there at the whim of our Lord, and none of us knew if we would make it out.

  The Survivor paused again, and we all stopped in place. “There’s something near,” he said. Instinctively, we turned off our lights.

  “Paranormal?” I asked, glancing at the EMF meter. It showed nothing. “Humans. A group of them, looking for us. Take cover.”

  We dispersed, and each took cover behind a tree. Shortly after that, we heard a faint

  rustling. “They know we’re out here somewhere, and they know where we’re heading,” the Survivor whispered.

  I saw nothing in the darkness. The near silence was torn by a roar, followed by shouted orders and gunfire as something big attacked the men ahead of us. One stranger’s body was hurled toward us and landed by me, mangled and bloody, nearly broken in half. I signaled my intentions to David and Daniel, then stood and ran into the clearing. The others followed.

  Five sets of gunfire…then four…three. They were dropping fast. Would we be any different? I watched as a creature, twenty feet tall, swept a massive claw toward a soldier. He narrowly dodged it, and so there were two left.

  The creature had two arms, two legs—the thing was humanoid. However, its skin looked harder than saddle leather. Its entire form was black and muscular. I couldn’t make out its mouth—did it even have one?—but it had evil, glowing eyes. The creature did not have claws; it merely crushed its enemies. We circled the creature and opened fire. Bullets seemed to have little effect.

  David lobbed a grenade at the creature’s chest, causing it to stumble with a roar. A small gap opened up in its chest, and my EMF meter lit up. Energy must have been exposed from within the creature! Reading my thoughts, the Survivor fired a laser beam into the opening. The creature roared and thrashed, and the gash closed. The creature barreled toward David, and Daniel ran behind it, slashing at its legs with his sword. The creature roared and turned. Daniel rolled to his side just as the creature took a swipe at him. Someone lobbed a grenade at the creature’s back, and Joel fired a laser beam into the wound. That blow slowed the creature. David and the other soldier each lobbed a grenade, hitting the creature front and back, and Joel and the Survivor fired laser beams into the wounds, and the creature fell. The creature shriveled and melted into the ground. I walked to the two unknown soldiers. The others followed.

  “Thank you,” one of them said. “Hey, no problem,” said Rick.

  Joel looked at me questioningly. “So, how exactly did we kill it?”

  “I think the bullets didn’t have enough kinetic energy to rupture its shield,” I said. “But the grenades were able to pierce it electromagnetic carapace.”

  “Its what?” Frank asked.

  “It’s corporeal shell. The grenades briefly broke through the shell, drawing some of its ethereal form to the surface. The lasers we fired into the openings dissipated that energy, rendering the creature lifeless.”

  “Good enough for me,” Jason said. He turned to the soldiers. “Who are you?” “We’re what remains of a containment squad,” one of the two soldiers replied. “What were you sent to contain?” David asked.

  “All of you,” the other soldier said. “We were ambushed on the way to the tunnel’s auxiliary entrance. You saved us.”

  The first soldier spoke. “I have no intention of carrying out my orders. Whatever our employer has unleashed has to be contained. You need to get to the facility. We’ll take you.”

  Daniel and I looked at the Survivor. He nodded. They were telling the truth.

  “Lead the way,” I said. The soldiers turned and entered the tree line. We followed. We seemed to have little choice. We had come into contact with creatures that defied all understanding, and we needed to stop them.

  The forest was still except for tiny movements from tree to tree. More shadows. We were being stalked. However, whatever was stalking us would not come near; it merely observed us. My thoughts wandered. If these demons could appear, would angels appear as well? I looked at my companions and realized I had my answer. They were humans, mortals sent by God, who had come to my rescue just in time. I had been fighting alongside them, and yet I did not know

  them. I knew their names, a
nd their occupations, but nothing more. Who were they? They were a mystery to me—as I was to them, I supposed.

  When we passed by the house where my team had been slaughtered, the Survivor placed his hand on my shoulder. He knew what I was feeling. Daniel knew, too, from the look on my face. He took my hand, gently, and looked into my eyes. His eyes were filled with wisdom and compassion, something few possess.

  Don’t worry. There was nothing you could have done. He said nothing aloud, but I read his words in his look. Their souls were not lost. I had been thinking about that as well.

  What did he mean? Could they be recovered? I didn’t know, and there was no time to ask. The soldiers had stopped walking. They pointed off in the distance at the facility. It didn’t look like much. I had expected it to be larger. It was surrounded by barbed-wire fencing, with towers at the front corners.

  The first soldier spoke. “To gain access, we’ll need a retinal scan from each sentry. The chances of getting close enough to them without being detected are slim.” He looked at me. “Our uniforms are the same—black BDU with no markings. Put on my mask, and they won’t know who you are.”

  I looked at the Survivor. “Go ahead,” said the Survivor. “He’s right.” I took the black mask and slid it on.

  “The sentries will escort us down the elevator,” said the first soldier. “There will be three of them. The fourth stays on the surface.”

  “We can take them out with our combat knives, then send the elevator back up. When the sentry goes to check it out, one of you can take him out quietly,” said the second soldier. The three of us walked to the facility.

  I had just met those two men less than an hour earlier, and yet I was trusting them with my life. We approached the first sentry at the front gate. He gave a salute, which we returned.

  “Sir, what happened to your squad?” asked the sentry.

  “We were ambushed by a massive entity. Only three of us survived,” said the squad leader. The sentry gave a nod and waved to the sentries in the towers. They assembled at a panel alongside the building. The seemingly low-tech brick wall opened up into four screens, each with a retinal scanner. My companions and I lined up in front of a door wide enough for five people to stand shoulder to shoulder and ten feet fall.

  The three sentries followed us into the elevator, after the doors opened, and turned. We three were lined up at the back of the car, each with a sentry in front of us. Everyone was silent. The squad leader silently counted to three with his fingers, and on three, we jabbed our combat knives into each sentry’s spine. We held our hands over their mouths to silence them as they bled out. After a moment, they fell lifeless.

  One of the soldiers pressed a button on the panel by the door, and the elevator stopped.

  He pressed another button to return it to the surface.

  “Let’s hope they can take out that fourth sentry,” said the squad leader. As the doors opened, Rick grabbed the sentry by the chin and snapped his neck. The rest of the team quickly moved into the elevator.

  “Are they going to know something is wrong?” Frank asked. “I mean, now there are no sentries.”

  “Yup,” said the squad leader. “Be ready for anything.” The doors closed, and the car headed back down.

  “Open fire as soon as the doors open,” the squad leader ordered. Frank, Joel, and I crouched, guns ready. Daniel and the Survivor stood behind us. When the doors opened, we opened fire at the guards filling the hallway and rushing toward us, dispatching them quickly. The two soldiers and I moved out of the elevator and took up firing positions. They positioned themselves in a janitor’s closet next to the elevator, one crouching, one standing, and I went

  prone behind a trash barrel just outside a restroom door. Daniel, the Survivor, and Jason moved into the bathroom just behind me, while the others moved into the closet. The hallway was tight, and there was not much cover. When one of us had to reload, another would lean out and cover. The surviving guards took cover and returned fire. Despite the gunfire we unleashed on them, the barrage did not slow down. We were pinned down, and we had just entered the facility. Soon we would run out of ammo. What hope was there?

  A voice echoed through the corridor. “Cease fire!”

  The order came through a speaker system. The gunfire ceased, and the hallway grew quiet. I looked at David, who shrugged.

  “The guards are standing down. You may pass,” said the voice on the speaker. I exchanged glances with Daniel and the Survivor then stepped out into the hallway. At the other end, three guards were pulling their dead out of the way. Three dead, four wounded. Ten guards in all.

  “This way,” said one of the guards, motioning to us to follow. He led us through the facility, which seemed like a normal office building, although one with several small clinics, as it contained many smaller rooms and cubicles, as well as labs and exam rooms. We stopped at an air lock, where a man in a suit approached us.

  “You’ve done quite a lot,” he said. “Who are you?” David asked.

  “My name is unimportant; only my title matters to you. I am the administrator of this facility. I must say, you are a motley crew. However, you have proven to be quite effective.” He looked us over. “We are merely attempting to avert a massive catastrophe.”

  “At what cost?” Daniel asked.

  “Do you mean the volunteers who died in the tunnels? They didn’t trust their abilities. We need someone who can stand up against the entities.” He looked at the Survivor. “You have much potential.” He shifted his gaze to each of us, pausing for a moment on each face. “All of you may have something to offer. In any case, you’re here now, and there’s much to be done. Come with me.” He turned and opened the air lock. The doors slid open, and we followed him.

  “Everyone has something to offer,” said Daniel.

  The man shrugged and offered no comment. “We have traced a powerful entity’s origins to an event that occurred thousands of years ago. I believe you met him.”

  “The fog entity?” I asked.

  “Yes. We tore open a temporal rift and found the precise moment”—he pointed to Daniel’s robe—“that book was inscribed with a piece of that energy. The entity is far too powerful for us to destroy.”

  “Then how do we stop it?” Joel asked. By now, we had cleared the air lock and entered a large lab. Strange crystalline statues were hooked up to something out of a sci-fi flick, three cylindrical structures on crystalline pads. If I believed such things were possible, I would have guessed it was a teleportation device of some sort.

  “There are three events from the past that must be changed—the three listed in the logbook.”

  “You’re nuts! It’s not possible to travel in time…not yet, anyway,” said Joel.

  “Actually, it is,” said the man, pointing to the three cylinders. “Once we learned how to detect and open the rifts, the rest was just math. Traveling in time to change the events requires separating the ethereal form from the corporeal form. Then we can throw you through the temporal rift.”

  Joel nodded. “Nice theory.”

  “So this facility…all this…its purpose has been to find the right people to send back in time to alter these events?” asked Daniel.

  “An oversimplification, but…yes.”

  “I’ll go,” said Daniel.

  The man looked him up and down intently, as if trying to guess his weight. Then he reached out and shook Daniel’s hand. “You do seem well suited,” said the man. “But you have to understand. This is a one-way trip. You can’t come back.”

  Daniel stepped forward and stood in the first pad. “I understand. Send me to the Scribe.” David stepped onto the second pad. “Send me to the Warrior.”

  Frank stepped forward, entering the third pad. “Send me to the Grieving Father.”

  The administrator looked at Frank. “No, it’s the Drifter you must revive.” When Frank nodded in assent, the administrator looked from one man to another. “It will take s
everal minutes to generate the power required to—” He was interrupted by a panicked voice on the speaker system.

  “Code red! Entities closing in on the facility from all directions! So, so…cold…” The voice faded, followed by a sinister laugh then silence. The fog was coming.

  The administrator turned to the Survivor. “I’ll need you stationed here in case it gets this far. You’ll be our last-ditch effort to hold it at bay.” He stood a few feet in front of the three pads.

  “It seems to have taken a keen interest in me,” I said. I looked at Daniel.

  “Maybe it’s tracking the book.” Daniel removed the logbook from his robe and tossed it to me.

  “I’ll return to the tunnel system and distract it,” I said.

  “Good idea.” The administrator turned to the others. “There will be another entity converging on us. It is very powerful.”

  “The big monster that wiped out my team? We took it down,” said the squad leader.

  “No, you merely slowed it down. It reforms, drawing its energy from the darkness of the forest. It is the spawn of hatred,” said the administrator.

  “I’ll keep it busy,” the squad leader said. “I’m with you,” said the other soldier.

  “No.” The squad leader placed his hand on the other man’s shoulder. “Stay here and aid in the defense.” He headed for the elevator.

  Joel and Rick also stayed behind to defend the compound. Time was short. I joined the squad leader in the elevator. We were both silent as the elevator ascended to the surface. What could we say? The two of us were going to play decoy in situations that seemed impossible. We would be up against two entities of vast power and knew we had little chance of overcoming them. We would face them nonetheless.

  Daniel’s Sacrifice