No matter how she tried, Gazelle could not hold her anger in the presence of such love and understanding. ‘You’re right,’ she conceded, willing the pulse laser back to stun mode.
The large Leonine male smiled triumphantly, having never let go of his girl’s hand.
Gazelle fired at point-blank range and he fell like a stone to join the other males Tareena had led from the bar, who were also sprawled on the floor.
‘What have you done with Viper, bitch!’ Tareena kicked out in Gazelle’s direction.
‘The Chosen have sent a team to rescue him from the clutches of that witch,’ Gazelle informed her, as the young girl rushed to the only familiar face among the strangers and Gazelle hugged the child at her side.
‘What witch?’ Tareena scoffed. ‘Liar! You’re a fuc—’ Bast conjured up a gag, which she clamped over the mouth of her captive and the strap self-attached around Tareena’s head.
‘Mahaud is a he now. Remember?’ Sparrowhawk explained to Gazelle, who nodded vaguely in recognition as she crouched to talk to the young girl and reassure her. ‘Now what?’ Sparrowhawk looked at Doc, who’d been placed in charge.
Doc mulled this over, and looking at Bast, who was sporting a huge smile, he suspected they were having the same idea.
When Tareena returned to the bar with three of the males she’d left with, only a couple of her kindred were curious about the absent one.
‘Where’s Miki?’ A large Leonine-Nefilim male stepped into Tareena’s path.
‘I’m not his mother,’ she said smartly, spreading her fingers over his face and shoving him out of her path. ‘I have more important matters to attend to.’ She raised her voice over the din, and the noise halved.
When one of the males in Tareena’s company whistled loudly, the room silenced to a few garbled comments.
‘I have heard from Viper,’ she announced and there was a mixed response to the news. Some present sounded pleased, some doubtful, but most were perturbed. ‘By the sounds of it, our leader was right to remind me that many of you here require prompting to his cause and it is at Viper’s request that I ask all of the unfaithful to line up for a shot of the bad stuff.’
There were many moans and groans of protest.
‘And may I remind you all that if you do not comply,’ Tareena added in a sinister strain, ‘we, Viper’s darker adepts, will be forced to offer you and your family as a living sacrifice to the elemental force our lord has been entertaining.’
As the three men with Tareena began rounding up the unfaithful, who moved to one side of the room as per Tareena’s further instruction, the diehard supporters stayed where they were. They laughed at the plight of their weak kindred, those who kept being drawn towards the path of light!
It was the handful of diehards who were fired upon first.
As this was unexpected, the larger mass of people remaining looked at Tareena fearfully, wondering if she was seizing leadership from Viper.
‘What about the rest of them?’ questioned one of Tareena’s supporters.
‘No.’ Gazelle lost her male disguise and exposed herself to the masses. ‘I will not allow my people to be tricked into anything any more. They deserve to be told what is happening and given the chance to decide their own fate.’
A perfect silence fell as her companions revealed themselves and holstered their weapons.
‘Listen to me.’ Gazelle climbed up onto the bar. ‘The potential to be one of the Chosen lies buried within the heart of every one of you. I have spoken to Lahmu, who has agreed to instruct those who are willing in the ways of the Chosen. The righteous will join the ranks of the Chosen just as I have.’
There was a gasp from the audience and garbled mutterings as they quietly debated whether to believe her.
Bast was stunned that Gazelle’s tactic was working so beautifully and looking at Sparrowhawk — who was very proud of Gazelle — Bast served him a wink for all the good he’d done the rebel and he gave a shy smile in return.
‘We’ll never give up Viper’s cause,’ yelled one of the diehard minority, pulling the dart from his person and heading towards Gazelle to stab her with it.
Sparrowhawk intercepted the Falcon-Nefilim male, who attempted to fly around him. ‘Be at peace, my brother,’ Sparrowhawk suggested, relieving him of the dart. He squeezed a pressure point in the troublemaker’s shoulder, and quiet was restored as the culprit passed out. The other diehard supporters refrained from protest when Sparrowhawk looked their way. ‘It’s not polite to interrupt when a lady is speaking.’ He let their comrade drop to the floor and then landed himself.
‘So, I suppose killing her would be out of the question then?’ jested the gamest of the men.
Sparrowhawk nodded to assure him he presumed right. ‘But killing you is not.’
22
MERGER OF WORLDS
Avery went ahead of his brothers to South America. He followed the ley-grid through the Otherworld, from the Shamballa centre in the Gobi Desert around the world to the opposing polar point where all the ley lines came back together.
The more sparsely populated areas did a better job of empowering the flow of energy to the grid, as the humans who inhabited such places had more space to stabilise their own energy without the interference of other people’s emotions and so found it easier to maintain a positive view. In the densely populated areas the lustre was sucked from the grid. As people were so drained of energy themselves, and unable to draw on the abundance of vibrant energies to be found in nature to stabilise themselves, they were forced to suck the energy from the ley-grid and each other. Thus the inspiration of the natural power grid of the planet was depleted as it neared the opposing point on the other side of the world, and the negativity collected en route represented the Dark Lodge’s contribution to the grid. Sadly it appeared that there was more shadow than light in the energy stream that managed to flow to this side of the etheric matrix. Avery was aware of the Inner Earth tribes on this planet, and that they contributed much light and love to the etheric grid and to their brothers and sisters living on the surface. Avery knew this was Gaia’s saving grace.
At last, the Otherworldly lord arrived at a great cavern, located on the edge of a mountainous region. Around the mouth of the cave, the energy of the grid, good and bad, just dissolved into the ground and disappeared.
Avery lowered his vibratory rate to attune with the physical realm and then telepathically summoned his brothers to join him as he moved into the chasm and lit a flare.
Rhun arrived to find his little brother illuminated in green light and staring up at a large Mayan-style column that was protruding from the earthen wall. Despite the awesome size of the column, the first thing Rhun noticed was the forbidding presence of the place Avery had led them to. ‘Dammed is right,’ he commented.
Suddenly, Avery swung around to warn Rhun, ‘Don’t step back!’ The panic in Avery’s voice startled Rhun, who began teetering off balance, as he looked aside to see the great gaping crevice that ran straight through the centre of the dark cavern.
Zabeel grabbed hold of Rhun’s weapon’s belt and set him back on his feet. ‘Forward is this way,’ he chuckled, moving off towards Avery.
‘I can’t believe Gwyn ap Nudd allowed this to happen.’ Avery sounded completely devastated.
‘Hey, earthquakes flatten temples all the time,’ Zabeel appealed, ‘that’s nature’s way.’
‘What is going on here is not nature’s way, I can assure you.’ Avery’s tone was aggrieved indeed. He even sounded a little fearful. ‘Don’t you feel it?’
‘Feel what?’ Zabeel appealed.
‘Exactly!’ Avery confirmed. ‘This place is dead! It is literally damming Gaia’s energy.’
‘Explain,’ Rhun urged, motioning towards himself with both hands to indicate urgency.
‘Instead of the planetary energy flowing back into the cosmos as it should, it is being dammed here for some dark purpose.’
‘How do you know it is a da
rk purpose?’ Zabeel wondered if Avery was just making an assumption, or had good reason to think this.
‘A loving centre of energy once existed here,’ Avery told him. ‘If this was still the case, Gaia’s energy would be being cleansed and returned to the cosmos, from whence it originally came, with love and knowledge that the Cosmic Logos could benefit from. But we feel a dreadful nothing.’
‘So, in a sense, our planetary Logos has been cut off from the chain of command,’ Rhun mused. ‘There’s information coming in but no line out.’
‘Yes.’ Avery nodded and conjured up a smile, pleased to be understood. ‘But that could also have been part of the great plan,’ he realised as he spoke. ‘The White Brotherhood knew that the planet was going to go to the dogs for an eon after Atlantis, and maybe by allowing the Dark Lodge to seize control of this place, they were protecting the higher realms from infection.’
‘If you haven’t got something positive to say, then don’t say anything at all.’ Zabeel quoted some parental advice that seemed fitting in this instance and both his brothers nodded, relating to his sentiment.
‘The big question is,’ Avery hesitated to pose it, ‘is it time to pull the plug?’
All three brothers took a deep breath and looked at each other, wondering who was game enough to take responsibility for the answer.
‘We are here to rescue Viper and the Wizard, so let’s just follow the chasm and see where it leads us?’ Rhun suggested finally and it was agreed.
The cavern led underground, deep underground, and Avery flew on ahead most of the way to check the path was clear for his brothers.
Zabeel couldn’t help but think it was too clear. ‘Is it just me, or does this look like a road to you?’
‘Watch out … vehicle!’ Avery cried out in warning as he spotted it.
Rhun and Zabeel both dived aside, but the hovering vehicle stopped short of hitting them, and two men in black suits climbed out with guns blazing.
Unfortunately for Zabeel, he’d been forced to dive off the crevice side of the road and was now hanging from the ledge by his fingertips.
Rhun had pulled his weapons, but in the heat of the moment blasted his attacker with an Orme dart instead of a pulse laser bullet.
The dark agent pulled the dart from his chest and looked at Rhun, somewhat bewildered.
The second man in black approached the ledge from which Zabeel now hung and, taking aim, fired at Zabeel’s hand.
‘Youch!’ Zabeel found himself hanging by one arm as his shattered bones repaired.
The black agent took aim at Zabeel’s good hand, and with a smile fell to the ground unconscious. Avery came to land beside the fallen man and reached down to hoist his brother out of his fix.
‘Cheers, Pan man. How is Rhun?’ Zabeel asked, as he got a foothold.
They moved around the vehicle to find Rhun having a little chat with the other agent, who was crying like a baby.
‘I didn’t wanna do it,’ the man in black sobbed. ‘I didn’t wanna be left behind. Just cause I’m a bit thick … I still have stuff to contribute.’ He gripped hold of Rhun’s shirt, desperate for a solution. ‘I don’t wanna die!’
‘And you won’t … what’s your name?’ Rhun sidetracked a second.
‘Zero,’ he replied and Rhun tried not to laugh as he found the name rather unfortunate.
‘Well, Zero, if you help us do our job, then no one will die.’ Rhun hoped he wasn’t making promises he couldn’t keep.
‘What did you mean “you didn’t want to be left behind”?’ Zabeel couldn’t contain his curiosity.
‘All my people have been evacuated into space,’ Zero told them. ‘They just left me and One,’ he motioned to the unconscious agent, ‘to ensure the reversal comes off without a hitch.’
‘The reversal!’ all three brothers gasped at once.
Rhun shoved Zero into the driver’s seat of the hovering vehicle and his brothers dived into the back. ‘Let’s go, pronto,’ he instructed their new friend, ‘to the base.’
Zero complied with gusto, throwing everyone back in their seat as the hovercraft spun quickly round, skidded along the side of the crevice, and took off down the road.
Avery peeled himself off the back seat to lean forward and question Zero. ‘You haven’t seen a guy that looks like me hanging around your facility here, have you?’
‘There’s only one guy left in the place,’ the agent informed. ‘He’s got somethin’ to do with this reversal, but I dunno what he looks like.’
‘Take us straight to him,’ Avery instructed, and was again thrown back in his seat as their vehicle picked up speed.
Zero sped through the empty base until the tighter inner doorways would no longer grant their vehicle admittance. The agent then led them straight to the complex that housed the Polarifier, and the huge gun head with which the Orions planned to reverse the energy flow of the etheric matrix. The Polarifier was not active today. The huge laser gun head that Viper had seen was aimed down into a massive funnel. The funnel was lodged in a pit of seething black energy which was being whipped into a frenzy around the exterior of the funnel.
‘Holy smoke,’ mumbled Rhun as he saw the extent of the technology here. ‘I was hoping these Orions were having visions of grandeur.’
‘So where’s Viper?’ Avery prompted their dark friend to explain.
‘He’s inside the funnel, I think.’ Zero pointed to the towering structure into which the weapon head was aimed.
The whirlwind of shadows around the funnel began to reach out towards the conductive metal rod that shot up from the top of the gun head. The black lightning-like tentacles startled the brothers.
‘I’ve never seen a black electric charge before,’ Zabeel gulped. ‘What the hell is that stuff?’
‘It’s pure destruction, pure negativity, pure darkness,’ Avery explained. ‘A black hole in every particle.’
‘Then how the hell did the Orions contain this energy?’ Rhun had to wonder.
‘Use your etheric sight,’ Avery advised, for he could see a light matrix reinforcing the metal walls that housed the seething pit of vaporous blackness. ‘The Orions must have figured out how to manipulate etheric world energies. We’ve never come across this kind of technology before.’
‘Oh, goodie.’ Zabeel forced a smile. ‘A new challenge. Just what we need.’
‘This stuff usually just lies about doing nothin’, beyond making ya feel bad.’ Zero referred to the thick dark mist and scratched his head. ‘Somethin’s got it all worked up today.’
Avery gripped his head. ‘They’re using Viper as a superconductor to mobilise the dark mass! Can the funnel be blocked off?’ Avery asked Zero, as they didn’t seem to have too much time.
‘Probably … but I’m not very technical. I don’t know how the controls work.’ He backed away, fearful of Avery as he took to the air.
‘Never mind.’ Avery closed his eyes and willed himself to the huge weapon head.
‘Avery, no!’ Rhun was not fast enough to stop him and closed his eyes to go after his brother.
‘No, Rhun.’ Zabeel gripped his older brother’s arm to keep him present. ‘We both know this is Avery’s gig.’
Rhun looked to the core of the dark whirlwind to see Avery narrowly escape a dark bolt of lightning that fell short of the metal rod it was reaching for. ‘Where does the funnel lead?’ He looked back to Zero for a response.
‘Everywhere,’ Zero shrugged. ‘To the ley-grid of the inner and the outer world.’
‘Oh no.’ Rhun ran for the controls. ‘We’ve got to close that funnel.’ He pressed several buttons, but nothing was responding. ‘They’ve locked the system off. Shit!’
Avery flew down the funnel to find Viper spreadeagled across the passage in a horizontal position. His hands and feet were bound to the wall and a dark abyss descended behind him. Metal cuffs were about his ankles and wrists, fastening him in place via beams of light; this form of restraint was new technology to Avery.
‘Viper?’ Avery hovered over his twin, whose head hung backwards as if he were unconscious.
The Falcon-Nefilim outlaw looked up and laughed out loud when he saw Avery. ‘Come to gloat? Well, go ahead, have a go! There ain’t nothing you could do to me that hasn’t been done.’
Avery smiled, as Viper was wrong. ‘I’m here to rescue you.’
‘So I can go face Lahmu’s wrath, no thanks.’ Viper hung his head back once more to await his demise.
‘All Lahmu will ask is that you forgive yourself, Viper,’ Avery explained and received a grunt of disbelief in response. ‘You’re me, you know,’ he commented, wondering how he could sway his darker self. ‘What happens to you, happens to me.’
‘Bullshit!’ Viper snarled. ‘You have everything, I have nothing!’
‘Because that is what we chose for us this time round. You have learned lessons we needed to learn!’ Avery emphasised.
‘I didn’t choose this —’
‘Yes, you did. And why?’ Avery gripped hold of Viper’s jacket to get his full attention. ‘So you could know that the hell you’ve known to date is not what you want for us for all eternity!’
‘All that creating your own reality stuff is crap!’
‘But you’ve been creating your own reality all along,’ Avery pointed out. ‘You’ve just been doing it for the wrong cause.’
‘Well, you had the monopoly on sweetness and love,’ Viper jeered.
‘I know.’ Avery could see his point of view and how unfair it must seem. ‘And that is why I can be so determined about saving you. If you are damned, I am damned! And when all that shit that is brewing out there hits you, we’re both going straight to hell.’
‘Then piss off!’ Viper recommended.
‘It won’t make any difference, you’ll still damn us! I have to get you out of here —’ Avery looked up, distracted by the sound of an electric current. The dark matter now had a firm hold on the magnetic support legs for the gun head and was inching its way towards the rod. Avery flew to the wall and by covering the porthole from which the beamed chain extended to the prisoner’s wrist, Viper’s left arm was freed.