The Apocalypse Script (46 page)

He spoke.

Moros swayed dizzily but did not
fall. Blinking rapidly, he saw that Lilitu was no longer in front
of him. There was, instead, a man - or rather a
giant. A Titan!
Even sitting in the
chair - and how was it that the chair had increased in size to
accommodate him? - the creature in the yellow robe towered ten feet
above him. No face was visible beneath the monster’s hood. There
was only blackness and two orbs that shown like stars.

The sharply drawn breaths around
him told the Peth lord that he was not the only one to see the
monstrosity. His heart racing, Moros realized that he still held
his belt in the air, as if he planned to strike the creature before
him. He dropped it and stepped back, raising a hand to protect his
eyes from the glare of the giant’s gaze.

“
Nisirtu,” the creature said in a
thundering voice that made the walls and floors vibrate. “The
Sillum sits before you!”

Everyone present cowered at the
force of the words.

“
Moros,” boomed
the horrible voice, “tell me what has happened here.
Everything.
”

The Peth lord complied without
hesitation, his fear mounting as a black fog began to rise up from
the floor. When he was done, the Sillum growled and surveyed the
room.

“
Who among you,” it boomed in its
horrible voice, “have this night pledged yourselves to Lord
Moros?”

The guests on the floor of the
Great Hall shouted “Me!” or “I have!” for it was not a question
that could be answered with a lie or go unanswered.

The giant glared at them. “Rise,
leave this place, and descend the mountain on foot until you have
reached the great city below. If you survive the descent and the
cataclysm to come, you may return and beg the queen’s
mercy.”

Each of the kneeling guests rose
without hesitation. As a group they filed silently out of the doors
and into the reinvigorated storm, many without shoes and none with
coats or umbrellas. One of the guests was Lady Del. Ben guessed the
attractive woman next to her was the one known as
Persipia.

When they were gone, the giant
roared, “You in your rooms who did not abandon Lilian -
well done.
You shall be
rewarded for your loyalty and courage. Remember this…” and here the
giant spoke a word, before saying, “Now, go to your beds, and
sleep.”

The Sillum commanded the Maqtu on
the balconies to return to the floor of the Great Hall. When they
had gathered there, the monster stood and towered over them. The
glowing orbs that were its eyes grew brighter, and brighter, and
brighter still, until they were like twin suns. The Great Hall was
bleached yellow by their brilliance. The room began to shake
violently.

“
You….
”
growled the Sillum, pointing at Moros and the Maqtu around
him. “
Listen closely…
”

The Sillum spoke, and the fires that would not end
sparked to life.

Disparthian’s second platoon,
tasked to clear the hills, had been surprised to see Maqtu
approaching them. But the rebels were supposed to be their allies
and so were allowed to approach the ridgeline unchecked until one
of Disparthian’s sergeants, a man who fought the Maqtu for years
and who still didn’t trust them, challenged them. He reminded them
gruffly that clearing the ridge was the responsibility of “real
Peth” and not “Maqtu mercenaries.”

This was not well received by the
Maqtu. Already tasked to kill the remaining Peth, they opted to
immediately open fire, thus forfeiting the element of surprise that
might have ensured their victory over the unsuspecting
platoon.

It was a huge tactical blunder.
Disparthian’s Peth, now knowing the Maqtu’s intentions, and being
at the top of the ridge, had a decisive advantage as they shot down
at them from behind the cover of trees and concealed by darkness.
The rebels found themselves lying prone in the mud with no
available cover, illuminated by the courtyard lights and trying to
fire up and into the rain at Disparthian’s nearly invisible
troops.

Lord Disparthian had been
searching for Fiela some fifty yards away when the first shots were
fired. Hearing the gunfire, he moved quickly to assess the
situation. Seeing the Maqtu firing up at his platoon, he moved in
behind the rebels and began to pick them off one at a time even as
his Peth engaged them from above.

The skirmish was brief and
decisive. The larger Maqtu force was decimated in quick order. The
Peth lord, understanding the implications of the rebel attack, ran
back toward the Great Hall while yelling for his guards to follow
him. His worst fears seemed confirmed when he heard hellish screams
emanating from inside.

The scene before Disparthian when
he entered Steepleguard was surreal. His lieutenants lay lifeless
on the floor, Lilitu was gone, and the Maqtu stood in clusters
around the room screaming their heads off. It was a hellish chorus.
At the far end of the hall, on the stage, was a man fitting the
description of Ben Mitchell sitting in a chair in a grimy pair of
jeans and a bloody shirt.

Only when the Peth lord approached
the stage did he see that Moros was among the people screaming. The
scene made no sense. Nothing was being done to the Maqtu or to
Moros, yet to hear them he would have sworn that they were being
tortured.

“
Benzira…” began
Disparthian, but he reconsidered, and said,
“
Anax?
”

The man in the chair suddenly
raised his head and the lord stumbled backwards, terrified. The
thing in front of him had large glowing orbs of yellow light where
its eyes should have been. It was
not
Ben Mitchell.

“
Who are you?” it said in a
gravelly, evil voice.

“
I…” said the Peth, continuing to
walk backwards, a terror gripping his heart like none he had ever
experienced, “I am Disparthian.”

Immediately, the yellow orbs
burned out, and the eyes of a man, a very tired man, appeared in
their place.

“
Disparthian…”
the thing that was again a man said. “Lilian told me about you.
I’m...
Ben.
” The man said his own name as if it was foreign to
him.

“
Anax Sargon,” said Disparthian,
daring to step forward. “What is happening here?”

The other man evaluated his
surroundings and appeared as surprised as Disparthian. After a
moment of thought, he said, “Punishment.”

“
Punishment for what,
Anax?”

Ben spoke a word that conveyed
everything he knew to the lord.

“
I understand you anger,” said
Disparthian. “But how long must this go on?”

The man on the stage asked, “How long do you think
is sufficient for what they have done to my family?”

Disparthian said, “I think they
have suffered enough. The proper punishment, the merciful
punishment, is execution. Torture is against your nature, Anax. I
can see it in your countenance.”

Ben mulled that over as he watched
Disparthian’s Peth arrive through the main doors. Like their
commander, each of them stopped abruptly, baffled by the scene
before them.

Ben nodded and rose. “Can you and
your Peth see to that, then? The executions?”

“
Yes, Anax.”

The king shuffled to the edge of
the stage and almost fell off. Disparthian caught him just before
he did and helped him to the floor.

“
You must rest,” the lord
said.

Ben spoke and the screaming
stopped. He said to Disparthian, “They will do whatever you tell
them.” He looked beyond the man, toward his troops, and yelled,
“When the executions are complete, you will remember that it
was
you
who
corralled Moros’s troops and the rebels, that you fought bravely
and overcame tremendous odds. You will not remember this
conversation or seeing our enemies in this state.”

The Empyrean seeds began to
germinate in their minds.

As Disparthian and his troops
moved back towards the doors, their captives in tow, Ben yelled
after them. “Wait! You know what? You’ll
also
remember me kicking the living
shit out of Moros and him crying like a baby.”

As the last of the enemy forces followed the Peth
from the hotel, Ben slowly trudged back to the entrance to the
cave.

“
I am the king, after all,” he
mumbled to himself.

The physicians told Ben that
Lilian was in good health but sedated and that Fiela was stable. He
had asked if the Peth should be transferred to a hospital and they
told him that the facility in the cave was surprisingly advanced
and that they had everything they needed to treat her there. In any
event, hospital helicopters were almost certainly not flying in the
storm and an ambulance would take too long to reach
Steepleguard.

Even if transporting the girl had
been less problematic, they didn’t want her in a hospital. It would
be a bad place, tomorrow. Tomorrow the lights were going to go
out.

Ten of the guests were, not
accidentally, nurses, and Fiela was being constantly monitored. Ben
directed that another bed be moved next to hers and, undeterred by
the disapproving expressions of those around him, he lay down next
to the girl, placing a hand on her cheek.

“
Lord Disparthian is in charge,”
he told one of the attendants over a shoulder. “If he or anyone
else needs me, I will be here. Tend to the wounded.”

The attendant nodded and made a swift exit.

Fiela stirred. Looking at the
clock on the wall, Ben saw it was just after three o’clock in the
morning.

“
Mutu,” she said, blinking at him.
She placed her hand on his. It had an IV tube attached to it, the
needle held in place with white tape.

“
I’m here,” he said.

She managed a weak smile and said in a voice that
was a whisper, “Duh.”

Ben laughed. “You see, your
English is improving already.”

The girl looked confused. “But I
am not speaking English.”

The man realized the girl was
right. She’d spoken in Agati, and so had he.

“
You don’t even have an accent,”
Fiela said, marveling at his words.

“
I’ve got a gift for languages,”
he replied lamely.

The girl seemed to drift back to sleep, but then
said, her eyes still closed, “Where were you?”

He assumed she was asking where he
was during the reception. “In the tablet vault. I fell
asleep.”

“
Really? I thought you left.
Because of me.”

He didn’t understand. “Because
of
you?
”

She whispered, “I wasn’t scared of you, Mutu. You
didn’t do anything wrong.”

“
Don’t worry about that, Fiela. It
was a misunderstanding.”

She shook her head slowly and her
eyes became wet. “I thought you were dead because of
me.”

“
Like I said, it was a
misunderstanding. It’s my fault for disappearing like that. Get
some rest.”

Fiela nodded but kept speaking. “I
didn’t abandon you, Mutu. I kept looking.”

“
The vault door was locked. There
was no way you could find me.”

She shook her head weakly. “I
heard your voice and you were saying the most beautiful things. It
was like a poem. That’s how I knew you weren’t…
there.
”

“
Where?”

But she was asleep.

Part 7
- September 26
^th
and
27
^th

Barbarism is the natural state of mankind.
Civilization is unnatural. It is a whim of circumstance. And
barbarism must always ultimately triumph.

Robert E. Howard,
Beyond the Black River

Steepleguard had several turrets
that climbed six stories into the air, each of which housed what
Ben dubbed ‘Vegas Suites.’ He, Lilian and Fiela occupied one of
these turrets and negotiations were underway as to who would occupy
the others, though there was little doubt it would be the
highest-ranking nobility present, as well as Disparthian. Ruffling
a few feathers, he used his authority as
Anax
, which still felt pretty damn
silly, to appropriate one of the turrets for use as a temporary
command center. This particular turret offered excellent views of
the surrounding country and elevations suitable for the placement
of HF, VHF, UHF, and satellite antennas.

As a result of Ridley’s
forethought, there were a number of electrical engineers and
communication specialists among the Nisirtu present at
Steepleguard. To Ben’s surprise, Lord Disparthian had a PhD in
Telecommunications Engineering, so he put the Peth lord in charge
of assembling the command center, telling him that he wanted at
least twenty large high-definition monitors removed from the guest
quarters and placed on the walls of the appropriated suite. Ten of
the monitors were to be tuned to television news broadcasts while
the other ten would display the home pages of what he considered
the most reliable internet news sites. Ben further required that
police scanners and military-grade receivers be brought to the
turret and that Peth be assigned to monitoring local and HAM radio
traffic.