Invading hell the oculus.., p.17
Invading Hell (The Oculus Gate Book 2), page 17
When he added weight to her shoulder, she smiled. “Let’s take a step together.”
As they walked slowly toward the path, he chuckled. “You kind of like that name, don’t you?”
She turned her head, trying to squelch her smile as she guided him down the path. “Nope. I mean, seriously, what girl wants to be called a gorilla?”
“Whatever you say, Princess Prevaricator. I’ll avoid any further simian references.”
“Good. And I’ll resist the temptation to throw you into the chasm.”
“Fair trade.”
Thunder clapped again, drawing closer. Iona strained to keep her back stiff, battling Leo’s weight. His pain had to be worse than he was letting on. She couldn’t give in to her own pain. Too much was at stake.
With her back bent, she glanced at her chest where her cross usually dangled, but it wasn’t there—left behind on the floor, a prayer for help. As she imagined it around her neck, Chantal’s sacrifice returned to mind, her determination, her grit, her courage, qualities that reflected the symbol of the cross she had bestowed to a rookie spy. And now that raw recruit had to live them out for herself, for Leo, for everyone.
She gritted her teeth and pressed on. God, help me. That’s all I ask. Just … help me.
Ben and Caligar sprinted along the lake’s shore and back into the forest. Shouts erupted behind them. After about half a minute, Caligar slowed to a jog. Ben ran abreast. “Why are we slowing down? Are you hurt?”
Caligar gave Ben a quick glance. “I am well. I want them to follow.”
“What? Why?” Ben slid his rifle strap off and chambered a round. “Do you want to try to shoot our way out after all?”
“No. I have another solution. You will see.”
The shouts grew louder. An arrow thumped into a nearby tree. Another zinged by Ben’s ear. “They’re getting closer.”
“Do you think”—a baseball-sized stone struck Caligar, inciting a grunt —“I am unaware of that?”
“Never mind. I just hope you know what you’re doing.”
“Trust me.” Caligar halted at a stream and pulled Ben to a stop. He raised a hand as if ready to wave at someone ahead. The air shimmered for a moment, like a curtain of wrinkled light. “We wait here.”
“Wait?” Ben set the rifle at his hip, ready to sling it up to his shoulder. “Why?”
“As I said before, trust me. You won’t need your weapon. If you fire, the sound might draw many more attackers.”
The giants appeared about fifty yards away, one with an arrow nocked to his bowstring and the others each carrying a stone. As they approached, they slowed to a jog, their eyes wary.
“Get behind me,” Caligar said. “Then take three steps and halt. Do not delay. Your life depends on it.”
Ben stepped around the huge man, blocking himself from the other giants’ view, then took the three steps. Something in the air tickled, and the scene changed. He stood at a precipice to a deep gorge. The stream spilled parallel to a rope ladder that allowed a climb down to a ledge about fifty feet below.
Ben turned toward the forest. Caligar, still facing the other giants, spoke with a series of whistles and grunts. The giants shouted back, shaking their fists. Caligar responded with a laugh and a short burst of whistles as he wagged his head in a mocking fashion.
The other giants charged. When they drew close, Caligar stepped back, grabbed Ben, and lunged to the side. The giants burst out of the forest. When they saw the precipice, they tried to halt at the cliff’s edge, waving their arms to regain their balance.
Caligar rushed to them and pushed them off the cliff one by one. As they plunged, they screamed with fading voices. After a few seconds, several muffled thuds rose from the chasm floor.
Ben looked back. A pair of trees with head-high knots emitted light from holes within the knots, most likely projectors of some kind. “You set a trap for them?”
“For any foot-bound or hoof-bound creature. If they are stupid enough to hurtle into this chasm, they are witless animals.”
“Witless? If you hadn’t told me to stop, I might’ve fallen in myself.”
“Perhaps.” Caligar looked into the depths. “If you are as stupid as they are, but I doubt it.”
“How can you be so callous? Don’t you have a heart?”
Caligar shook a finger at Ben, glaring down from his greater height. “Now you’re in my world, Benjamin Garrison, a world you know nothing about. Do not let your ignorance and prejudice lead you into foolishness.”
“Okay, ignorance I get. I’ve never been here before. But prejudice?” Ben slid the rifle strap over his shoulder. “I’m not judging anyone.”
Caligar pointed into the chasm. “You are judging them from a position of ignorance. You think they might not fully deserve their demise, but you are ignorant of their corruption, though you are well aware that they tried to kill us moments ago. I, on the other hand, know exactly how vile they are. My judgment is based on experience. They deserved to die.”
“I’m not talking about what they deserve. I’m talking about grief over lost souls.”
“They have no souls.” Caligar stared at Ben, his brow deeply furrowed. Then, with a sigh, his expression loosened, and he began climbing down the ladder, his rifle strapped in place. “Follow, if you wish. I am angered by your presumptuous mindset, but that will not stop me from trying to help you.”
As dark clouds drew close, announcing their presence with peals of thunder, Ben edged to the precipice and watched Caligar’s progress. About thirty rungs below, he dismounted at a narrow ledge and walked into an alcove that appeared to be a cave. Of course, not following was out of the question, but the tongue lashings were hard to deal with. It would be better to stay quiet for a while and avoid the giant’s wrath.
After climbing down the ladder, Ben stood on the lower ledge and faced the deep valley. Caligar returned from the cave and stood next to him, looking through binoculars toward the downstream horizon. “A storm will be upon us in mere seconds.” He lowered the glasses. “Rainwater here is more acidic than in your world. It will cause abrasions on your skin.”
“And not yours?”
Caligar shook his head. “Our skin is tougher. We drink the rainwater and bathe in it without harm.” He entered the cave, calling, “This way. That is, if you still want this callous Viridian to be your guide.”
Ben hurried to follow, feeling like a kid toddling after a scolding dad. The feeling was maddening, but he didn’t have much choice.
As they strode deeper, Caligar bent under the low ceiling, and light from outside dimmed. Soon, he halted and frowned at an empty lantern bracket protruding from the wall. “Our lanterns are missing.”
“Is that unusual?”
“Somewhat. I have told my son many times that if he takes the last lantern, he is to wedge a pebble between the bracket and the wall, a signal that he will return soon with another lantern. But I see no pebble. He has forgotten to do so in the past, but he had been doing well of late before I departed from Viridi.” Caligar drew a long knife from a belt sheath. “We might have an intruder.”
Ben touched a flashlight on his belt. “Should we stay dark?”
Caligar nodded. “Follow me. I know the way without a light. And I stowed some glow stones farther in for just such an occasion. They are dim enough to avoid raising an alarm.”
Ben kept his voice low as well. “How many of you are in your clan?”
“Do you mean my family or in my species?”
“Let’s start with species.”
“At one time we were a thousand strong.” Barely visible now, Caligar stooped and began pulling loose stones from the wall and setting them to the side. “By the time Winella and I left this world, we were only three—myself, Winella, and our son, Bazrah. We had a daughter at one time. Lacinda. But tragedy struck, and she is no longer with us.”
Ben’s throat narrowed. Hearing about a lost daughter struck home. Their own preborn baby might have been a girl, a daughter he never had a chance to hold. His arms ached at the thought, but this was no time to relive the tragedy.
“Our home,” Caligar continued, “also housed Bazrah’s caretaker, Melinda, an android. We count her in our family clan, but, of course, not as one of our species.”
“An android? That’s sophisticated technology.”
“You seem surprised.” Caligar withdrew a fist-sized stone from the hole he had created and began rubbing it between his hands. “Your world learned how to make androids only two decades ago. And now you have none.”
“Because the angels banned and destroyed them. I’m saying that your world seems too primitive to produce androids.”
Caligar kept his focus on his hands. “What makes you think this world is primitive?”
“Well, I haven’t seen any modern buildings or transportation.”
Caligar displayed the stone in his palm. A dim white aura surrounded it, maybe from a friction-activated chemical on the surface. He began walking again, now at a quicker pace. “You are being presumptuous again, Benjamin. You consider a lack of your own images of modernity to be a sign of a primitive society. You are in a new environment. You need to identify and remove your presumptions.”
Ben hustled to keep up with the huge man’s long-legged gait. “All right. I’ll accept that. But if your species has only three members, what happened to the others, besides Lacinda, I mean? And who are the giants who attacked us? Aren’t they the same species, or are they devolved like the ones on Earth?”
“They are devolved, as you guessed. We were born the same species, but they are no longer the same. As I said the last time this topic arose, that is all I will say about it.”
At the end of the tunnel, a hole in the ceiling illuminated the floor with a white glow from above. When Caligar arrived, he stopped and pinched a ragged rope dangling from above with short rope sections attached to it at intervals. “This is an evil sign. It was a ladder. One of the vertical ropes is gone.”
“Broken or cut?”
Caligar lifted the end of one of the shorter sections, then another above it. “Cut cleanly along with every rung above it. The intruder is armed with a knife.”
Ben stepped closer and eyed the rope. “To prevent entry, escape, or both?”
“I intend to find out.” Caligar set the glow stone down, grasped the broken ladder, and began climbing hand over hand. “If you are able to follow,” he said, grunting as he rose, “I suggest you do so. Otherwise you will have to wait until I can repair the ladder.”
When Caligar had climbed through the ceiling hole, Ben grabbed the ladder and ascended past the lower hole and through a rocky cylinder. After a few moments, Caligar hoisted himself into an upper chamber and walked out of sight.
As Ben drew close to the chamber, he quieted himself and listened. Above, Caligar called for Bazrah and Melinda, but no one answered.
Ben scrambled the rest of the way up, grasped the edge of the hole, and hoisted himself out. He rose to his feet on the wooden floor and looked around at what appeared to be a circular observatory room twenty feet in diameter with a telescope aimed at a glass dome about fifteen feet above.
An open exit door to one side appeared to lead to another chamber. Loud footsteps tromped from somewhere beyond, drawing closer. Caligar ran through the doorway and into the observatory, out of breath. “No one is here. Melinda would have left some kind of message. Her programming won’t allow a deviation from that behavior.”
“Did you see any clues at all? Signs of a struggle?”
Caligar nodded. “A circular burn mark in a wall. I found no cause for it.”
Ben scanned the room. Something odd protruded from a hole at the base of the telescope. He stepped over and snatched it up—a wooden cross attached to a cord. Iona’s cross. He laid it on his palm and showed it to Caligar. “My friend from Earth was here. This was precious to her.”
Caligar touched the cross. “She dropped it accidentally?”
“She would’ve noticed. Maybe she left it as a message to me.”
“She wouldn’t leave a message for you unless she knew you were coming, which is impossible.” Caligar looked at the telescope. “Unless …” He took two long steps and sat on the stool. He closed one eye and set the other at the scope’s viewing lens. After a few seconds of silence, he used a finger and thumb to turn a dial near the lens. “Clouds are obscuring my view, but the scope is positioned on the Oculus Gate, which is not unusual, but I am certain that I left it focused on the Maxial Nebula.” He drew back and looked at Ben. “Only Bazrah and Melinda know how to alter it … except …” He rose from the seat and stepped back. “Could he have been here?”
Ben slid the cross into his pocket. “Who?”
“Allow me to check something before I answer.” Caligar reached up and touched the ceiling. The glass darkened, and stars appeared along with two yellowish moons, one at each side of the room. The Oculus Gate shone directly overhead, its elliptical eye looking slightly askew as it covered about a quarter of the ceiling.
“This is a light energy view that penetrates the clouds.” Caligar set a finger on one of the perimeter’s lights and, his fingertip acting like a phosphorescent marker, drew a glowing line across to another light, a bright ribbon connecting the points. Symbols appeared within the ribbon, constantly changing. Caligar squinted at the symbols for a moment, then looked at Ben. “A new conduit is forming at the Oculus Gate.”
Ben focused on the symbols, though they were meaningless to him. “Winella fired up the towers again?”
Caligar shook his head. “It’s forming from my world, not yours, which means someone stole my technology.”
“Someone? You mean the person you mentioned a minute ago? The one you suspected of being here?”
“Correct.” Caligar’s lips twitched, an unusual tic for him, maybe a hint of fear. “I am now certain he was in this room.”
“What makes you certain?”
Caligar waved a hand across the ceiling, clearing the screen and bringing cloud-obscured daylight into the room again. He knelt at a floor cabinet and flung its door open. “No one else on this world has enough intelligence to use the technology.” He pushed his head into the cabinet and began rummaging, his voice muffled. “The thief took Bazrah for leverage, and Melinda would follow. Her programming requires it. My guess is if your friend is valiant, then she, too, would follow to try to stop this madman.”
“Iona is valiant, but I think she was forced to go. If she followed after the fact, she would’ve left the cross in a more obvious place. For some reason, she didn’t want it to be seen. And the cutting of the rope doesn’t add up.”
“We are merely speculating. The answers lie at a nearby site where we must go as soon as I learn if the fiend located …” Caligar emerged from the cabinet with a small box in the palm of his hand. He opened it and looked inside. “It’s empty. He probably forced Bazrah to locate the device he needed to power the conduit.”
Ben cocked his head, unable to read the alien-language label on the box. “What is it?”
“A catalyst of sorts.” He set the box back in the cabinet. “It is too complex to explain now.”
“Does that mean the intruder had a weapon? I assume Bazrah wouldn’t give him the device willingly.”
“Correct. Without a weapon, Melinda would have been able to overpower him. She has defensive capabilities that can protect Bazrah from all but the strongest of my species … I mean, the other hominid species of my world.”
Ben let Caligar’s slip of the tongue pass. “And Melinda had help from Bazrah and Iona, and maybe from Leo, if he was able to come with her. He is a formidable man.”
Caligar’s huge eyes seemed to brighten. “Would Leo have left something to signal his presence?”
“Like Iona’s cross? Good question.” Ben knelt at the base of the telescope and pushed a finger into the hole where he had found the cross. Something smooth and round lay inside, like a small marble. He coaxed it out, pinched it, and brought it close to his eyes. “It’s a miniature smoke bomb. Definitely Leo’s. That’s great news.”
“I am pleased for your sake and Iona’s. I hope his presence is also helpful for Bazrah.” Caligar closed the cabinet door. “Come. We must go to the site where the thief is likely employing the technology. If we fail to arrive in time, all of our efforts could be for naught.”
Chapter Seventeen
With the path steepening as it twisted in sharp switchbacks that led in the downstream direction toward a distant mesa, Iona quieted herself, watching each step she made and listening to Leo’s labored breathing. Although her head still pounded, it wasn’t as bad as before, and concentrating on the task helped her ignore the pain, at least part of the time.
Raindrops fell. Most hit her clothes, but when the water passed through the scarf and seeped into her head wound, it stung, nearly as painful as a wasp sting. She used the scarf to dab at the wound and looked at the material. Fresh blood. The acidic rainwater had already done some damage.
The path narrowed, with a sheer wall on one side and a sharp drop-off on the other. The rain strengthened. Drops pelted her face and hands. Both stung sharply. Iona touched Leo’s hand on her shoulder. “Hold on tight. The rainwater’s acidic, like Melinda said. We have to go faster.”
“A problem for us but a benefit for Bazrah. It won’t bother him, but it’ll be like nettles to the sensitive scientist.”
“Good point. And maybe Bazrah will figure out a way to use it.”
As they continued walking as fast as the hazards would allow, the clouds boiled. Rain and wind strengthened to a raging tempest. Sheets of acidic water assaulted them, burning their skin and slickening the path.
Iona trudged on, though more slowly. Leo’s weight on her shoulders made a foot slip from time to time, forcing her to slow further.
Leo shouted to overcome the din. “I see a cleft.” He pointed toward the rock face a few steps ahead.
They hurried to the narrow opening, big enough for one person but probably not for two. “You go,” Iona said as she slid the rope off her shoulder and set it next to the cleft. “I’ll find another one.”
