CHAPTER FIFTY THREE
Time passed, days turned to weeks, weeks to months. The battle of Armageddon had lasted but sixty hours, showing mankind how close it was to decimation. Without the failure of the Six-Sided Circle to take full control, the earth would have been laid to waste in twenty-four hours. Dark dust clouds would have shrouded the earth’s atmosphere from the nuclear holocaust; the sun would not shine, plunging the fragile land into another ice age. Not only had ADAM had prevented this, but the efforts of all good people. With evil well and truly on the run, the chain of deceit was crushed by governments world wide, civil wars ceased and the earth becalmed.
Armageddon had not passed without cost to humanity. The destruction of all Inter Ballistic Missiles at launch by ADAM had suffered some detonations. Three in China, four in Russia, one in France and five in the deserts of the US. The powerful warhead detonated on the sea surface from Seadragon on the US west coast sent a tidal wave more than fifty kilometres inland and left much of the coastline contaminated. Over twenty nuclear submarines limped homeward on the surface of the sea. Damaged by their encounters with ADAM and carrying many dead crew. Three thousand strike aircraft had been lost from the world’s air forces; over a thousand pilots and crew were still unaccounted for. Civilian casualties were over five million.
Friday, December the twenty-fourth, nineteen ninety-nine, ten am. A world summit convened by Quinn Packard and attended by world governments gathered aboard the USS Wisconsin, beneath the Statue of Liberty. All nations with nuclear power signed an agreement to disarm by December two thousand and decommission nuclear power plants within five years of that date. Non nuclear powers agreed never to use nuclear power. The crew of the Wisconsin were decorated for their courage in the engagement that stopped the battle of Armageddon, most were no older than nineteen. Admiral Rice was buried the same day in a sea burial from the deck of the Wisconsin, he had died of a heart attack jogging in Central Park one week before the summit. His body was laid to rest on the sea bed below the Statue of Liberty, a plaque placed at the base of the Statue bearing his name and the reason his remains are therein.
All nations had been given their own “Wisconsin”, somebody had fought hard in the face of Armageddon giving them someone to look up to as the planet battled to regain its track, and martyr’s plaques adorned the earth worldwide.
It was Monday evening of the twenty seventh when Jason’s plane touched down at Adelaide airport returning from the Wisconsin summit. Of all the people in the world Jason still carried a heavy burden on his shoulders. The four bodies recovered from the Six-Sided Circle in the Triangle had all been identified. Steel was not among them. They all had the same position in their respective governments as Steel and Mortimer and their birthdays were the sixth of the sixth sixty-six. They also had a mark on their scalp, five sides of equal dimension joined by a longer side, a perfect circle could be drawn around the tip of the apexes; Ridge Mortimer had had the same mark. Although Steel’s birthday didn’t match, he knew he was still out there somewhere; his instinct to finish his task drove him on. The entire world was looking for Steel, but had come up with nothing. As he answered questions for the army of media at the airport he felt an ever growing presence of evil near him. He asked to be excused and rang home. Tammy answered the phone to Jason’s relief, but her response confirmed his instinct.
“The old man is with me daddy; he says the evil man is coming.”
“Stay there love, I will be home shortly.” Jason hung up and, dodging the army of media, was escorted home. Anita became worried; Jason and Tammy said nothing, and they just sat together on the balcony overlooking the valley. Anita didn’t realise they were deep in mental conversation, feeling the ever growing presence of evil. Jason never left home and cancelled all engagements to remain with Tammy and Anita. It was eleven thirty pm, Friday the thirty first of December, nineteen ninety-nine, New Year’s Eve. The old millennium and the new would be changing hands in the year following midnight; the doorbell rang. Jason rushed to answer it, Tammy stood behind him; Jason opened the door. To his surprise it was Victor Drummond, still alive but the dark rings around his eyes had become black circles.
Drummond swallowed hard before he spoke, “I was spared after you last consulted me, now I know why. The supreme demon summoned me not half and hour ago, I have a message for you.”
Jason barked at him with a fading patience, “And the message is?”
“You must go immediately to the Convent of Saint Marie, for it is time, he is there.”
Anita had come to see their visitor; she overheard Drummond and burst into tears behind Tammy. Jason asked Drummond in; Tammy and Jason held Anita as she cried into her hands.
“It’s all right mummy,” said Tammy. “Daddy has everyone with him, he will be back soon.” Anita fell to her knees; Jason walked to the door, turned and spoke to Drummond.
“Stay here with them, bring Tammy to the convent in ten minutes; it’s not with ease that I ask that. If there is to be a confrontation we have been told what we must do. I feel no fear and have always been able to trust my instinct. Steel could have struck any time without notice to defeat me; there must be a reason why he waits till the last minute. We have been told we have a few minutes before he calls the dark side. I think he wants to know something, I’m damn sure there are some things I want to know. If we go to him together he will be forced to fight and I will never know. He’s already lost, let’s see if he realises that,” said Jason as he closed the door. The Ferrari left the garage in haste.
In only a few minutes he stood in front of the convent, standing in all its glory. The full moon lit the stone steps to the entrance; the mammoth wooden doors were open. The air was perfectly still and silent, it was ten to midnight. Jason’s boots broke the silence as he walked down the long corridor to the main hall; he felt the presence of evil bite at his heart. He saw a tall wide dark figure standing in the shadow of the stone walls at the end of the hall, as he entered not thirty metres away. Jason stood in the moonlight beaming through the arched windows of the great hall. Steel stepped into the light, his voice bouncing off the stone surfaces of the great hall.
“We have little time my friend. So you are the chosen one who would dare the power of evil?”
“Yes and you are the one who has caused so much suffering since the dawn of time.” Jason walked to the light of the closest window to Steel and looked into his face not five metres away; he looked at the spray of coloured bars on Steel’s uniform, the indication of a highly decorated military man. Steel’s hat bore the symbol of the Soviet army and an array of gold embroidery on its peak.
“Take off your hat and jacket,” said Jason. “You are not a fit person to wear such a thing.”
“Armageddon is over Brinkly; it is the future of evil we fight here and now,” barked Steel, “For the first time since the dawn of good and evil, you have made me feel fear. This I know to be due to having a human form, not created of the dark side. My given form perished due to human incompetence when I was born; I entered the body of a visiting child to the hospital I was in at that very moment of death. That is why I bear an incorrect birth date. I have had to endure a life of human feeling for the first time in the fight for my quest. This however has been to my eventual gain, I have learnt much from you, the first mortal to oppose evil who is non righteous, yet you still bear the sword of the cross. The dark side does not understand this; they now need my knowledge to return. I will be spared and when I understand this defeat at your hands I will return, your future generations will feel the terror of my defeat this hour. Why have you opposed me? You have no resemblance to any of your predecessors, you have no affiliation to any faith, yet you have inflicted a crushing defeat as to the sword of the cross.”
“I have faith in everyone who wants to try, I like helping people. I have been told I need not be of the cloth to bear the sword of the cross. I have come for all the good people of all the lands on earth. I think they are just plain fed up with you. Should yo
u return, if indeed you are leaving at all, me or my future generations will kick your arse, no matter what dark side or dirty hole you climb out of.”
“You disappoint me Brinkly, but leave I must. Your daughter approaches; the dark side tells me I may perish in your combined presence; I am in no position to find out if that is true. I ask you to come with me Brinkly, for I can show you worlds you didn’t know existed, the wonders of the universe, the cosmos and beyond. Together we can be invincible.”
Jason walked to the light of the same window as Steel; he looked up into the big man’s eyes. “Still you taunt me; it’s one minute to midnight, the end and start of the millenniums in the same year. Go on, confront me or leave Steel!”
A cold wind began to circle the great hall bending the tallest trees in the convent gardens, the moonlight became broken by black storm clouds as they gathered above the great hall. Deep thunder broke the air’s silence.
“We will all wear the scars of Armageddon Brinkly; I now know the weakness inside the human soul. Sharp died by your hand Brinkly, a strategic move on your behalf, for if he had joined Mortimer, Sharp would have led us to ADAM. You bear the blame of another soul’s departure; inside you will suffer the consequences till you die. I take what I have learnt of human weakness in the soul to the dark side and will return to use it against your kind when I understand it. You have taught me fear Brinkly, a valuable asset to know in war.”
Jason screamed into the darkness now filling the great hall. “You leave me no choice Steel; I choose to confront you when my daughter is in the grounds. You have summoned the dark side, show yourself!”
Cold wind billowed into the great hall; Jason felt evil bite his skin as Steel’s voice boomed from the darkness. “Calm yourself Brinkly; the dark side comes for me, not for you.”
The storm died as quickly as it had come; Jason could hear the city clock tower striking the hour of midnight in the now quiet and calm moonlight. He looked down in the light of the window at the floor where Steel had stood; he saw a hat and jacket of a high ranking Russian military commander on the floor. It was all that remained of the supreme demon’s presence, Steels uniform. He picked the hat and jacket up, sat in the moonlight of the window at a long wooden table and bench in the centre of the great hall. The city clock struck its twelfth chime; Jason’s shoulders felt light as Tammy ran into the hall and embraced her father.
“Daddy we’re free we’re free, I feel so free!”
“Yes love,” whispered Jason as he held her tight. “It’s over, we are free.”
Drummond entered the great hall; he carried the book under his arm. The dark rings around his eyes had gone. “Your good wife and daughter helped me find the book when I asked, I hope you don’t mind?”
“No,” said Jason. “If it’s that important to you, keep it.”
Drummond sat in the light of the moon opposite Jason and Tammy at the table. “You don’t understand Jason, the pages we couldn’t part are open; they are blank. We must fill them in with your story, for those who come after you. You have dealt a massive blow to evil, but it will be long forgotten when it returns, it may not be in our time or this millennium.” In the centre of the table was a quill pen in a bottle of ink, Drummond dragged them to his side. “Now tell me slowly, I must write in Latin, it will take some time."
Tammy listened as Jason related all he knew to Drummond, his visions, his rise to a position of command from humble beginnings, the presence of unknown friends, the powers given to him and his daughter. The location of ADAM and its capabilities, the awesome weapon of Armageddon that had served him so well. The defeat of the Six-Sided Circle and his confrontation with evil in the shape of the supreme demon. Finally he explained the weight that had lifted from his shoulders that very morning and the feeling of freedom. The morning light of the first day of the year two thousand replaced the moonlight as Drummond closed the book; the pages immediately clung together refusing to open again. Drummond placed the book in the centre of the table and they walked into the new morning light, as their feet touched the ground, the convent returned to ruins. Jason turned to look at the crumbled moss-covered buildings as the sun’s first rays splashed across the top of the tallest trees. He noticed something beside the old chapel, headstones in a small cemetery; nothing had been there prior to this day. Drummond and Tammy followed Jason to the rusty wrought iron fence around the weathered headstones; they bore the inscription of some familiar names. Sister Parker, Sister Staples, Sister Bickford and several more whom had not been called to him, they all wore the same year, eighteen eighty-five, all had the same epitaph. Died by fire but resting peacefully.