The Forsaken - The Apocalypse Trilogy: Book Two (41 page)

He was a great support after Updike’s call to
Mayor Barnstable. The preacher had pressed the mayor for
compliance. He was committed to razing the City, but he was still a
man of God and feared the death his army would cause if the City
ignored the Divine edict.

Barnstable had said, “Captain Updike. A
warrant has been issued for your arrest. The City of Light does not
negotiate with terrorists. I am authorized to tell you that any
action by your followers, overt or otherwise would be considered an
act of war. The Westprime Defense Forces are on high alert and
await orders. You have twenty-four hours to turn yourself in to
Central Authority.”

Updike had reached out to his first recovery
for support. Updike loved Oliver Purdue deeply, and had come to
respect him like no other. Like many of the dead, Oliver had looked
into his former life and found the doors closed. But instead of
sinking into despair, Purdue had determined to make his death a new
beginning. He didn’t speak about his past and Updike didn’t press
him. The result was that Oliver was a mystery. Updike had often
mused that were he not crazy, he would find the dead man’s dark
eyes a terrifying thing to look upon. Instead, Oliver’s charity and
compassion buoyed him up.

Updike remembered passing through a small
town late that morning. It was deserted as most were. The preacher
gave the order to call a halt a mile past the town in a small
forest of dead maples. Stoneworthy had approached him with obvious
reluctance in his thin-legged stride, and asked why they wouldn’t
stop in the town. It had started raining, and many buildings there
were sound enough to provide protection from the elements.

“My friend,” Updike had said. “Did you see
the arena as we passed? It is a structure of steel and aluminum.
The type of building designed by the soulless architects at the end
of the Millennium before the Change.”

“Yes,” Stoneworthy had said. “Between that,
and others I saw, we could easily take shelter as we rest. There
are the living troops to think about, and some of our people need
to apply oils and treatments to their bodies.”

“I know,” Updike had sighed. “But there is a
greater erosion that I fear those buildings will bring, far worse
than any rain. It is an erosion that our cause cannot afford.

“Passing through the town was bad enough.
Just passing through I’m sure has taken a toll. I would have
avoided it all together, except that the farmland around it has
turned to swamp in the decades of rain. What do you think we will
find if we make our camp in the arena, or in the city hall?”
Stoneworthy had shrugged, his face a mask of perplexity. “We will
find remains. Not of the town’s inhabitants, not bodies no. Those
would have risen and walked away or been dragged off by animals.
No. We would have found the remains of a world that is gone.

“Imagine the foyer of the arena. Would there
not be pictures of hockey players and of figure skaters? And would
they not be the fresh sweet faces of children? There would be
trophies, and plaques and awards—with names engraved, names of
teams and of children, and long ago dates: Fastest Sprinter, 1988.”
Updike watched Stoneworthy’s face smooth over with understanding.
“I would not wish this army to see that. I would not want their
purpose darkened with loss or revenge. We must have an army of
righteousness to serve our God—to serve His Apocalypse. We cannot
have an army of despair.”

The jeep took a sudden lunge and jerk to the
left, jarring Updike out of his reverie by banging his head against
the roll bar. Pain lit fire in his mind, but the painkillers must
have been working for it quickly dulled. He hoped he had been
entirely truthful with the minister. Updike had given him the
logical, tactical argument, but he wondered if he truly doubted the
faith of his troops so much. These people had handled more than
that. They had died and returned to an existence of numbness. And
still they had faith.

The gray noon sky lit up on the southern
horizon like a sunrise.

“Jumping Jesus!” Bolton shrieked, moving
stiffly forward in his seat. “Driver, get Lorenzo on the radio. Try
to raise Carstairs.” General Lorenzo was leading the southernmost
contingent of the army of dead. Carstairs led the southwestern arm.
The driver fumbled with the jeep’s handset. He shouted a few things
into it, turned the knobs—twisted dials—static and electric
noise.

“Sorry, General! Interference.”

Updike knew that things had just taken a
drastic turn but the pain in his head kept him from realizing its
full impact. He retreated from the ache by thinking back to the
town they had passed. He remembered seeing something in the coarse
tangle of grasses by the faded remnants of a picket fence. Lying on
its back—bleached corpse white by eternal rain and time, a chubby
little arm and shoulder, beside it the round and pitted head of a
plastic doll.

57 – New Deal

The Prime was a creature in the grips of
dynamic opposition. The forces that worked upon him tugged at his
mind, threatening to tear it apart. One moment, he was ecstatic.
When the mood took him he moved his bulky body along the hall to
his office as though he were about to take flight. Triumph!
Triumph! Fucking Triumph! The tactical nuclear strike had reduced
some eighty thousand corpses to burning dust—those farther from
ground zero caught fire and spread the flames through the
ranks—turned it into a holocaust.

During the moment of ecstasy the Prime
allowed himself to imagine the hobbled army of renegades, tramping
north through the wilderness, holing up in abandoned towns, doing
whatever it was dead people did, and the next minute, a rocket
whistling toward them, then a bright light turns them to vapor.

The Prime giggled. He nickered like a newborn
mare. It was just a pity that the process was so quick!
Drop and
roll
.
Drop and roll
. He would have enjoyed drawing out
their molecular unbinding. Nonetheless, the Prime was caught up in
the desire to do it again immediately. And thus the oscillation
began.

The moment he thought of doing it again, he
was gripped with killing anger. When that mood took him his
movements condensed to the weight of a black hole, and his features
darkened, as though the concentrated hatred that boiled in his
veins would cause him to implode and drag the rest of the Tower to
Limbo with him. That bastard Updike had forced him to show his
hand. He was willing to use nuclear weapons.

It was a good and bad thing.

In the grips of a mood swing to dark, he
stormed past his secretary’s pleading look without so much as a
snarl. The Prime crashed through the door to his office. He plowed
across the room, rage making clubs of his hands, and spun his large
chair to sit in it.

A man sat there.

The Prime leapt away. “What the…”

The intruder stood. Smiled. The Prime was
astounded by the man’s height. He was almost seven feet tall.

“Forgive my unannounced arrival,” he said,
the Prime now noticed the lack of pigment in his skin. This gave
his black eyes the appearance of holes. He was dressed in white
cotton; he wore a wide-brimmed Panama hat. “But I couldn’t risk the
regular channels.”

“Get the FUCK out of my office!” The Prime
was already moving away. All of his weapons were in the desk. The
leader of Westprime was dumbfounded. How the Hell?

“Before you consider calling your security, I
wish to inform you that the people I work for have full knowledge
of the
Union
.” Long yellow teeth leaned out of a smile.

The Union? The Prime’s mind raced with the
idea of being burned at the stake while an ignorant mob howled like
apes. No one knew about the Union.

“Who are you?” Knowledge of the Union could
undo all of his work. Then he realized using of the nuke was
already flushing competitors out of the woodwork.
Fucking
Updike
!

“I am Passport, assistant to the Demon.” The
white man bent at the waste like a wet bread stick.

“Demon?” The Prime’s thoughts raced. His Ally
had never mentioned having servants?

“Oh, I see where your thoughts are running,”
Passport said matter-of-factly. “The Demon for whom I work is
invested with a magnitude of Powers far above that of your
Ally’s.”

More powerful than my Ally? The Prime knew
that there were other Demons. He suspected there’d be a
confrontation like this one day. But he wasn’t ready—or was he?

“And, who is this Demon?” The Prime needed
information. He took a step toward his desk.

“I work for Baron Balg. He resides in the
Sunken City.” Passport moved his hands on many jointed arms. They
bent every which way. “He offers you something.”

“Offer?” The Prime’s insulted ego growled,
“I’m the leader of Westprime. I don’t need gifts.”

Mischief played at Passport’s strange, thin
lips. “Of course, Prime. You have no need of gifts. Neither do you
need suggestions. This is simply an offering.” He smiled. “You’re
acquainted with offerings?”

“Offerings?” The Prime glared into the
interloper’s eyes. As he remembered the Sending Room: the pentangle
of blood, the weeping sacrifice.
Dark father hear me
!

“Great leaders achieve their prowess with two
things chiefly: wisdom and strength. Your strength, like my
master’s, is great. And yet, it may now be time to apply wisdom to
its use.” Passport pursed his lips. He moved across the room toward
the window. The sunlight burned on his white skin.

“What are you talking about?” The Prime had
moved closer to the desk and the guns in its drawers.

Passport turned to him. “I am speaking of
those who will lead.” He took a couple of steps. “
You
are
the leader of the New Age.”

The Prime was ready for that. He had even
fantasized about such an offer. His Ally had informed him of a vast
hierarchy in the Pit that consisted of thousands of Dukes, and
Barons and Princes. In reality, the Prime had always expected a
visit from Lucifer himself.

“There are hundreds of Barons!” the Prime
said finally. “Is Balg the best you can do?”

The intruder smiled. He tilted his head as
though thinking or listening. “It is the Baron’s assurance that he
will be King of Demons on Earth. He has need of an ally among the
humans.”

So that was it. The Apocalypse was here. The
Demons were going to war.
Let’s do it
!

“And I’d be his puppet?” The Prime knew the
Demons had been banished to the Pit with the coming of the One
God—they wanted out.

“Balg is too practical to think that either
of you could share power outright.” Passport wrung his
long-fingered hands together. “And yet, the world is changing.” The
stranger smoothed his pants leg with the back of a hand. “And as
the world changes, it moves farther from what you know.” He paused.
“The Baron wishes to rule his Demons on earth, and you rule your
humans.”

“Rule.” The Prime’s Demon organ slid between
his legs, writhing like a snake.

“There are forces converging on the City of
Light that will plunge it into darkness.” Passport sauntered toward
the desk, dragged fingertips along its edge. “These forces must be
stopped.”

“You think I’m afraid of a pack of corpses?”
the Prime growled. “I just cremated a bunch of them.”

“Indeed you have. And yet, is this a style of
warfare that is safe for the people that you hope to govern?” False
concern colored his voice. “Your power would be decreased with too
reckless an application of these devices of yours, would it not?”
Passport reached up, removed his hat. “Power is meaningless without
adoration.”

The Prime didn’t speak; he was thinking
feverishly. That was a good point. He’d always imagined some
survivors. He’d need slaves. And it was more exciting to control
the unwilling. Maybe he’d just take out the other Primes. Then he
shook off the line of thought. That was his plan. His Final
Solution was in place just in case the worst happened.

“It is Baron Balg’s wish to assist you in the
repulsion of this band of rabble. He offers troops. It is my
master’s belief that your City would be better defended with such
aid.” Again the assistant to the Demon showed teeth. “It has been
foreseen that your ground forces will be no match for the dead and
their allies. The dead bear the memories of the old world with
them, and they wear the faces of those who are gone. It will
terrify the living forces under your command. And the dead are
hardy, for they need nothing, nor do they fear death. Your forces
will fail without the help of Balg.” He smiled. “And the dead have
allies—those who would come to whom both Demons and humans pay
homage.”

Angels
?
Fallen
? If the Divine
and Infernal ranks were coming, humanity and Demonkind both had
everything to lose. And if he didn’t accept the Demon’s help, then
he’d have another army attacking his flank. Perhaps his captive
could shed some light.

“What does Baron Balg want in return?” The
Prime had to know his options.

“He wants to share the earth when the battle
is over. You will rule yours, and he will rule his. Together you
can repel the One God’s forces.” Passport straightened his
shoulders. “Demons and humans evolved on this planet together
before the coming of the one.”

“I need to think,” the Prime started but
Passport cut him off.

“You don’t have time,” the Demon’s servant
said. “Your show of strength has forced all hands. Powers greater
than the Army of the Dead are on the move.”

The Prime knew his Final Solution could still
rule the day. Topp had the coordinates and the weaponry to burn it
all if there was a double cross. “If I accept this premise in
theory I have a question. My forces are unlikely to see the
inclusion of a Demonic horde as a good thing.” The Prime thought
this over. “Is it possible for the Baron’s soldiers to approach in
some other form or fashion, either separate from mine, or in an
appearance that would not provoke a negative reaction in my
people.” The Prime enjoyed the phrase
my
people
. He
was too realistic to believe the line, but it had a ring to it that
appealed to his messianic egotism. What if the Prime could lead
humanity to a better place? So long as they obeyed him, what did he
care? And, what about the other Primes? With a Demon army behind
him, he could bomb them all back to the Stone Age, or better,
relocate the Demons to lands now occupied by his enemies.