Original Fiction The Salvation War - Pantheocide

[LTR]

West of Hacienda Heights, Los Angeles, California

The location had been chosen with great care. Uriel's wings were still not fully healed and that had left his ability to fly impaired. In any case, he had come to the opinion that flying over his target, as has been his tradition, for millennia was no longer practical. Human aircraft and missiles made it far too dangerous. He had tried that tactic twice and both times it had come close to killing him.

This time, he was trying a different approach. The hills west of Hacienda Heights gave an excellent view over the city of Los Angeles. He would have line-of-sight access to some of the most populated areas of the mega-city beneath him and a huge number of people would where Uriel could bring his peace to them. He had thought long and hard about that. At El Paso he had tried to annihilate everybody and everything within his reach, only to fail and bring peace only to a small proportion of them. Based on that lesson, he had tried to concentrate his power on a small community at Eucalyptus Hills. There, he had come achingly close to bringing his peace to the entire community. If it had not been for the aircraft and the missiles. . . .

Uriel felt unfamiliar feelings running through his mind. He hated the humans and their machines for what they had done to him and mixed in with the hatred was rage that his divinely-ordered purpose should be denied. He fought the emotions, aware that they represented mortal sins, and tried to squash them. This time it would be different, this time he would stay on the ground where the missiles could not strike at him. It had taken days for the humans to corner him after Eucalyptus Hills, he would need only a fraction of that time to bring his peace to the community that would lay helpless at his feet.

To take them all or just concentrate on a few? That was the decision that Uriel faced. He had tried for all at El Paso and failed. He had tried for a few at Eucalyptus Hills – and failed. But the size of his target at El Paso meant that even failure meant that a large number of souls had found their way to perfect peace. Uriel made his decision, he would try for all. Even a small percentage of a large number was better than a large percentage of a few.

Uriel made his decision. He had locked in on his target, he had selected his strategy. He knew what to do and where. Now, he would place his faith in the All-Knowing Father of All and honor His Immaculate Name by bringing more of these recalcitrant humans to their final peace.

al Za'im, West Bank

The air-raid sirens woke a very resentful Husni al-Sohl from well-deserved and much-needed sleep. The last year and a half had been a very strange time for him. Once a dedicated member of Hamas and a key member in one of its undercover cells, now he worked in an Israeli munitions plant, helping to churn out the sub-munitions that the world needed to fight off the satans who had declared war upon it. The Israelis he worked alongside were equally confused; once these same submunitions would have gone to arm missiles and artillery rounds. Ammunition that was intended to defend Eretz Israel against the hordes of terrorists and assassins that besieged it. Only, The Message had changed everything. Mankind had a common enemy that counted for more than petty local squabbles.

At least that was what Husni al-Sohl believed and the Israelis who worked beside him had said the same. They had all noted something rather peculiar. When the command to lay down and die had come from in high, the religious fanatics, the idealogues and extremists who had shouted longest and loudest about the purity of their faith had been conspicuous by their absence from the dead. Those who had sent others out to die in suicide bombings, who had incited others to die for their beliefs, who had fired people's hearts but seemed curiously reluctant to do any other sort of firing had found many excuses for not obeying the command that formed a key part of The Message.

Oh, there had been those who had laid down and died, but they had been the quiet ones, the ones who had kept their religions in their hearts, not their mouths and their fists. The others, the ones who had made ostentatious public displays of their faiths, they'd used their alleged religion as a path to power. With The Message, some had slunk away and tried to hide, others attempted to carry on their foolishness. They hadn't lasted, their previous supporters had seen them for what they were and killed them. Now, they had all gone from both sides and things had settled down to an uneasy truce. There was too much history, too much spilled blood, for the truce to be anything but uneasy but al-Sohl and his Israeli co-workers both agreed that with the self-serving fanatics out of way, they could at least agree to differ quietly. And everybody needed the sub-munitions that the factory made.

The sirens that had blasted him awake made him think, for one brief moment, that the bad days had returned and he was back in Gaza with the Israeli helicopters closing in. So many had died, blown apart as the missiles had plowed into their targets. Was al Za'im to be a target now? There was an Israeli border guard post only a few yards away. Had one of the idiotic morons who had brought so much death down tried to attack it? The fact that he hadn't heard any explosions suggested otherwise. Then his brain woke up fully and he realized they weren't air raid sirens. They were warnings that a portal was opening and that an attack would be coming through it soon.

"What is happening?" His wife had woken as well and was staring around with frightened eyes

"It is an attack. Perhaps it is Uriel, deciding to leave the Americans alone. Or some other devil." He grabbed her arm and hustled her to their shelter room, the one whose walls were lined with extra-think layers of aluminum foil. As they went, he glanced out of the window and saw a black ellipse forming to the east of the township.

417th Flight Test Squadron, Edwards Air Force Base, California

The wailing sirens made the base look as if it had been a giant ant's nest and somebody had kicked it over. A stream of pick-up trucks was spreading out from the base buildings and heading for the aircraft that were already being prepped for flight by their ground crews. Some headed for the row of F-15Es, a few in the original lizard green camouflage paint but most in the red/gray mottled camouflage of Hell. The paint job wasn't an affection, the paint itself was designed to protect the aircraft from the abrasion caused by flying through the dust of Hell's atmosphere. Others headed for the two B-1Cs that were parked in the test area. Their paint job was white as befitted prototypes that were under test. A very accelerated test program, the B-1s were desperately needed and the Air Force couldn't wait for a leisurely pre-war test and evaluation.

Two other pick-up trucks headed for strange-looking aircraft that were parked by themselves. Boeing 747s they had been, once, but now they had the firing turret of a chemical oxygen-iodine laser in their noses. They were YAL-1s and they had first priority for the runway. Technically at least, although they had to get there before the others would make way for them. Getting the new and complex laser platforms started up was a battle in its own right. The YAL-1 was unlike anything else in the Air Force and procedures for it's operation simply didn’t exist. An accelerated test program wasn't an option for the YAL-1, there was just too much that was new. Eventually, the systems were up and running, but by that time bomb- and missile-laden F-15Es were streaking off the runways, heading south-west. Los Angeles thought Colonel Samuel Allansen grimly. Uriel is hitting Los Angeles.

"Scalpel-One ready to roll." Mickey Jennings was already on the radio to the tower.

"Scalpel-Two ready to roll." The voice on the comms system followed a bare second later.

"Scalpel aircraft, form up behind the two B-1Cs. You are sixth and seventh in line for take-off."

"Sorry about that Scalpel-One." A British voice sounded over the channel. "We're past the last taxiway turnoff, we can't turn off and let you through."

"No problem. . . ." Allansen hesitated, not certain who he was talking to.

"Winters, Group Captain Martin Winters, RAF Heavy Bomber Development Unit. I just arrived here yesterday, on exchange to get ready for our B-1s."

"Welcome to California. Tower, what the blazes is going on?" The YAL-1 edged forward as two F-15s went down the runway side-by-side. Behind them two more turned into position and started powering up, ready for their take-off runs. From the load hanging under their wings, Allansen guessed they were pushing the maximum weight limit as far as it would go and maybe just a little bit further.

"Small portal started to open over Los Angeles, Hacienda Heights area. It's Uriel, we're sure of it. Nobody's going to let him get away this time. There's aircraft converging on Los Angeles from all over. Including Navy and Marine birds so watch it. And there's two AEGIS ships running in at 30 plus knots."

The tower voice was interrupted by the scream as the next pair of F-15s streaked down the runway and staggered into the air, the aircraft obviously straining to stay flying. Yup, well over maximum take-off weight Allansen thought. The lead B-1C was turning on to the runway. "Good hunting Wing Commander."

"Thank you Scalpel-One. And good luck with that magic ray-gun of yours."

4th Street, Santa Monica, Los Angeles, California

In the street cars were swerving to a halt as the sirens blasted out their warnings. From them, people were running to the buildings where doors were being held open so they could get to cover. The lessons of Eucalyptus Hills had spread quickly, people should get together, in the largest possible groups so they could share their strength against the onslaught from Uriel. Just in case anybody failed to hear the wailing sirens, the street lights were flashing a visual warning.

"Come on, hurry up. Inside, quickly." The bouncers on the doors of Harvelles Blues Club were adapting well to their changed role. Normally their job was to prevent undesirables from getting in and throwing the unruly out. Now, it was to get as many people as possible in. They were manhandling people inside, pushing them through the doors as fast as they could. Outside, the street was blocking up rapidly with abandoned cars. The earliest refugees had put their cars between the trees lining the road, or in one case the bouncers could see, into a tree. Well, the insurance people could sort that out when the attack was over. It would have been much worse before gas rationing had taken so many vehicles off the street. "Wait, let these people through."

'These people' were a small group of teenagers probably high school students and all loaded down with cages. They were staggering under their loads and two of the bouncers moved out to help them carry their loads. They knew the teenagers by sight, they were working summer jobs at the pet store across the street and it looked like they'd brought as many of the animals with them as they could carry.

"Many more left in the store?" The bouncer barked out the question.

One of the girls was almost in tears. "Too many, we brought as many as we could carry, but the rest, and the bigger dogs, they were just too many and too heavy."

"Doors locked?" The girl shook her head. "Right, get inside. You men, yes you over there, come with me. We'll pick up the other animals and bring them over." The group of men who'd just been drafted looked at the bouncer and decided that weight and bulk gave authority to his orders. The group ran across the street and vanished into the pet store to emerge a few second later with more cages and a variety of dogs on improvised leashes.

By the time they got back to Harvelles, the street was clearing as people got under cover. They herded their livestock through the doors, then the remaining staff slammed them shut. They had a well-rehearsed drill, the doors themselves were lined with aluminum foil but they reinforced it with additional layers mounted on wooden frames. Another lesson from Eucalyptus Hills, defending against Uriel meant using multiple layers of foil. The sirens had switched from their pitched wailing to a long, steady note. The attack was imminent.

In the main body of the club, the host was already up on stage, tapping his microphone. "Good evening, ladies, gentlemen and other species." There was a quick burst of laughter as the crowded audience looked at the stacks of cages around the walls. "Welcome to Harvelles. You are all doubtless aware that Uriel is coming to visit us and I can say with confidence that the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines have prepared a welcome for him that is in the best American tradition." Another roar of laughter and a series of war whoops. "All we have to do is stay under cover and wait out the attack."

He paused slightly to take a breath. "Now, we all heard how the Diegans rode out the attack down there and is anybody here going to tell me that Angelenos can't do better than they did?" There was a roar of 'No' and the host made a 'winding up' gesture with his hands. "That's right, so the management will take it as a personal affront if any of our guests passes on. To encourage you all, the management have announced that all drinks will be on the house until either the attack is over or the first person dies, whichever comes first. So, if you all want the free drinks to keep flowing, don’t die. And make sure your neighbors don't die either."

His address was interrupted by howls overhead that easily penetrated the building. The host looked up. "There we are, the Air Force is overhead already. Uriel is going to get a truly warm welcome and to add our contribution to the festivities, I ask you to put your hands together and give a true Harvelles welcome to The Key Frances Band."

The Palatine Palace, New Rome, Hell

"Ave Caesar. Ave Kim."

"Ave Paschal." The exchange of Roman salutes interrupted breakfast. Caesar's response was almost automatic, he was deeply engaged in reading a file. Jade Kim grinned at Colonel Paschal and tilted his head in Caesar's direction. "Gaius never stops, literally. Even in the middle of the night, he'll get up, slip away and do a couple of hours more work. Titus tells me he was like that even when he was alive. Did you have a good sleep?"

"I did, thank you. It's a relief to find you have filtered air here."

"Even us Second Lifers prefer clean air if we can get it. Breakfast is fruit, bread and wine. I hope that's all right? We're working on getting honey down here."

Paschal chuckled. "That'll be fine. I'm more curious about how you get the power to run the air cleaners and so on."

"Geothermal energy." Gaius Julius Caesar looked up from his file. "We've struck a deal with a company called Calpine. They've built a pilot plant to try and exploit geothermal energy here. If it works out, they'll build a lot more. We have a pilot grid here as well, it's servicing New Rome. Apparently Hell is a lot better for geothermal than Earth. Much lower investment costs. We could end up supplying California with energy." He took a bite of wine-soaked bread and looked again at his file. "Jade, I think we'll approve this."

"The Insula? I think so." Jade Kim looked at Paschal. "An Insula is like an apartment block, the occupants own the land in common and their own unit. Pretty much like a condo. Not everybody can afford their own villa although that's the way we want people to go. The Insula make a good first step. People who live there will satisfy the conditions for becoming Citizens and get them started."

Overhead, there was a whupping noise that almost caused Kim to drop her breakfast. Paschal grinned at her reaction. "I put the request through last night. These are a gift from the U.S. Government."

Kim had recognized the sound instantly. "MH-6s? You got me an MH-6?"

"MH-6T. Three of them. They're new production, they've got all the Hell modifications built into them, not slapped on as an emergency refit. So the filters are a lot more efficient and they affect performance less. You've got all your old unit here?"

"I have. With the addition of Titus and Lucius, they're the Consular Guard now."

"Well, you'll need to be checked out on the T version, there's new kit on it you'll not have seen before. But, welcome back to the Little Bird community. Roman Chapter. Caesar, you're getting some M1117 armored cars as well. They're not new or first-line, they were ones in the factories at Detroit when the city got smeared. They were rescued from the lava but they got beat up in the process. Rather than fix them, we're passing them through to you."

"Very generous of you." Caesar's voice was suspicious.

"The feeling is that you have a well-organized state here that's keeping the peace and setting a good example. There's others around that aren't. More like warlords leading gangs of brigands and terrorists. So, we're giving you some quiet backing. There'll be more kit coming through as soon as General Petraeus can get his staff to organize it."

"Let me guess." Caesar dipped another piece of bread in the wine. "Enough to defend ourselves, not enough to go around conquering people."

Paschal smiled. "Exactly."

 

[LTR]

New York Air Defense Interception Zone Secondary Command Center, La Guardia Airport, New York, United States

"Manhattan is taking a real pounding." Mayor Bloomberg looked across at the blacked-out island, scarred by the fireballs rising from the multiple impact points. The power over there had failed under the repeated ground shocks and that was adding to the chaos that was developing as people tried to flee the ruthless bombardment. "When can we do something about it?"

"We're trying to get the system online now. The original control was by way of the World Trade Center complex but that's gone. We're trying to reroute around the holes knocked in the net." Colonel Mark Gridley was trying to re-assemble the communications net while he spoke. The problem was that the original flurry of rocks had taken down many of the nodes the system depended on and there was no reliable way of finding out which were up other than by 'pinging' them. The good news was that each time he found a functional node, it opened up new prospects for routing signals. Also, a side issue now but one that would become important when the attack was over, the destroyed nodes formed a map of the wrecked areas of the city. Who knew how many people were trapped in the wreckage.

Over on the horizon another series of fireballs rose over Roosevelt Island. The fall of the rocks was intermittent, there would be a flurry of hits and then a pause while there were only a few scattered hits. Almost as if work gangs were rolling the 100-ton rocks through. Which, Gridley thought. was probably exactly what was happening. "Mayor, the damage I'm plotting suggests the portal is drifting up the west side of Manhattan. If it continues on its present course, it'll cross over the Hudson between Hoboken and Union City. We'd better get warnings out to New Jersey."

"I think they're probably better informed than we are at this point." Bloomberg spoke drily, disguising the fact he was horrified by how quickly the city's defense systems had become unglued. It had been well over a year since Sheffield and Detroit had been attacked and, during that time, New York had installed a system that was supposed to stop such attacks in their tracks. Yet, faced with its first assault, the new system had collapsed almost completely.

"Sir, radio message from the Intrepid." Bloomberg knew that the ship was acting as a forward observation point. During the Mobilization she had been considered for restoration to the active fleet but the old lady was too far gone. Still, she had her radios and with the data communications net shot full of holes, she was performing admirably. "She reports a new group of rocks falling just south of her, working their way north west. She says. . . . I'm sorry sir, she's gone off the air. Very suddenly."

Bloomberg's lips twisted. That almost certainly meant the museum ship had taken at least one rock. She might survive it but if she did, she would be a dreadful sight afterwards.

"Sir, I'm through to the portal intercept missiles at Secaucus. They have a firing solution on the portal." Gridley listened for a few seconds. "They can fire as soon as the current rock flurry tapers off. They warn us though, if there's a problem, the missiles will come down in Harlem."

Bloomberg didn’t hesitate. "They may fire when ready, Mister Gridley."

USS Intrepid. New York

If the 'Evil Eye' hadn't already been firmly aground, she would have been sinking fast. The rock had hit two thirds down the length of her hull, ripping straight through he flight and hangar decks before expending its energy blowing a hole in her bottom and excavating a crater in the soft mud underneath. Looking at her, Norman Orwell thought the ship was putting up a hell of a fight but losing anyway. It was the crater more than anything else, it had stripped the support out from under her. By the way her bow and stern were rising, her back was already broken. She was burning as well, the fires from her hangar deck blazing uncontrolled. The city fire brigades had as much as they could do coping with the damage in the main part of Manhattan. The fires there also out of control and people had to be rescued. The Intrepid could cope on her own.

"Everybody ready?" Orwell looked around at his emergency rescue team. They weren't professional firefighters or emergency medical personnel. They were museum researchers, restorers, administrators, few of them less than fifty and none of them with anything more than rudimentary rescue training. Most of their equipment dated from the Second World War and much of it had seen service when Intrepid had been hit by Kamikaze aircraft off Japan. How well it would work now was an open question. Yet, the people around him nodded and gave thumb's up signs. "Team One, forward, try and get the people there to safety. Team two, with me, we'll go amidships and get the people out of the radio room."

"How many Norman?"

"There should be twelve up front and ten in the radio room." The fact that forty people were about to run onto a burning, wrecked aircraft carrier to rescue twenty two didn’t register with anybody. Rescuing those in danger almost regardless of cost was an ingrained human reaction. The same reaction that would cause half a dozen men to risk – and sometimes lose – their lives to rescue one person from a sinking car in a flooded river or trapped on the ice in a frozen winter. In the final analysis, it was why humans were winning The Salvation War.

Orwell led his group up the gangway that led to the hangar deck abreast of the island. The blast of heat from the fires further aft seemed to engulf him as he entered the hangar and he saw the displays that he had been so proud of were already shattered and broken. That hurt him more than the damage to the ship. As a naval historian, seeing all that history literally going up in smoke was something that cut deep into his heart. "Follow me, we have to get into the island. The radio room is on the second deck. Birkenhead Drill."

He stumbled across the deck, feeling his way through the increasingly-dense smoke. For all its age, his protective gear seemed to be working, he could breath at least. Behind him, members of his team were unreeling safety lines so that they could find their way out of the ship once they had the survivors secured. In front of him was the hatch that led to the island over their heads. The dogs unfastened smoothly, one piece of luck in a night where New York's had run out. He and his team had to get one deck up before they would join the route through the ship that had been cleared for tourists. That would lead them straight up to the radio room. If it was still there.

Under his feet, he could feel the deck still angling as the broken ship settled further into the mud. That mud had almost spelled her doom once, it had been a hell of a job to get her clear of it when she had been towed away for renovation. Orwell scrambled upwards, his feet turning on bits of wreckage that had fallen when the ship had first been hit. Another hatch this one hard to open. The dogs took repeated blows from sledgehammers before they finally sprung open and the hatch was cleared. The good news was, they were level with the flight deck and the way up was easy.

The radio room was a disaster. Parts of the overhead had caved in and the men and women working on the equipment were down, trapped under the beams and debris. Orwell led the way in and started to check the people. One woman, her blonde hair caked and matted with blood groaned as he touched her. She was a priority, the Birkenhead Drill applied here, women and children first. Two of the rescue team came to his aid and they lifted a fallen equipment locker off her. Once they had her free, she was passed down the line to the people waiting to get her off the ship. It wasn't the way the emergency drills said things should be done but this was a special case. At the rate the fires were spreading, the island would be engulfed soon.

The casualties were being passed out, the three remaining women first, then the men as they were freed from the entangling wreckage that had tried to kill them. By the time the last one was on his way out, the smoke in the radio room was so thick Orwell could hardly breathe even with the aid of his mask and oxygen bottle. He grabbed the line and started to follow it out, feeling the heat of the fires on him as he did so. Down the steps, through the hatches, back on to the hangar deck. The way they had come in was impassible, the fire had already spread to block it, so he, his team and the people from the radio room made their way forward until the way down the forward gangplank was clear.

At least there were some doctors down there now, first aiders anyway. Orwell stood on the top of the gangplank, calling out the names of his team and checking their names off the list as they answered. All twenty accounted for. To his amazement they had been in the ship for less than ten minutes. It had seemed much, much longer. Then, he made his own progress down the brow to the relative safety of the dockside. The men and women from the ship were laid out on the concrete, some sitting up and looking for their rescuers, others laying on the concrete while the first-aiders worked on them. Three were already covered by cloths, for them the rescue had come too late. Orwell looked at the survivors and saw that the blonde woman he had first pulled out of the wrecked radio room was one of those who was able to sit up. She saw him as well, and grabbed his hand. "Thank you. Just, thank you."

It was all she needed to say. Orwell walked down the quay to where his people were reassembling. Even as he did so, he felt the ground trembling under his feet as more rocks slammed into Manhattan. He stopped suddenly, feeling desperately short of breath, his chest hurt and his left arm was alternately numb and cramping. Then his vision blacked out and he crumpled to the ground.

Central Park, New York

The park was filling up as people from the lower half of Manhattan found refuge from the hail of rocks that were slowly battering the city into submission. The police were trying to shepherd people into the park and then keep order while they were there but both tasks would have been beyond their ability individually. Together, they were impossible. Inside the park, it was the mounted police who were most successful at preventing panic from causing an even greater disaster. From the backs of their horses, they had a viewpoint that allowed them to spot trouble-makers and get to the scene before they got out of hand. One man who'd tried to start a fight had been picked up by two officers, turned upside down and had his head pounded on the ground. "Testing the road surface," they'd explained to appreciative onlookers.

Officer Sharon Grimble urged her horse forward and used its weight to push into a knot of people gathered around a woman laying on the grass. "Everything all right here?"

"Fine officer, she just fainted."

"And you are?"

"Her husband, we were in The Sheep Meadow when the rocks started falling. " The man handed up two driving licenses and Grimble used her Maglite to check them against the people she was speaking to. They checked out, husband and wife.

"Do you need a doctor? I can put a call out but it's likely to be a long time before anybody comes."

"It's fine Officer, We'll be fine."

"Officer, its it true the Empire State has been hit?" The voice had a German accent, a tourist? There were such things even with the war on.

"No. All the damage is on the west side of the Island. The last four or five hits went into the Hudson so I think we've seen the worst of things here. Just stay calm and everything will be all right."

She urged her horse forward and moved along the path, watching out for any signs of trouble. Some people faded away into the shadows when they saw her approach but she had neither the time nor the ability to chase after them. Overhead, there was another streak across the sky as a rock hurtled over their heads. A few seconds later, there was the orange glow of a hit on land. It looked like New Jersey was about to get its baptism of fire.

Or was it? The orange streak of the falling rock was immediately answered by two brilliant white streaks from the ground. They screamed overhead, the supersonic bang from their passing causing another wave of panic to start forming in the crowds of refugees. The white flashes ended as quickly as they had formed, vanishing through the portal high over New York.

Plain of Mapheloistamitos, Hell

Azrael knew that the attack was running into its final stages. His work teams were having to bring the great rounded 100-ton rocks in from further away and that meant an ever-increasing delay between the strikes. Soon, he would have to close down this site and evacuate the area. Still, it had been a highly successful attack, almost a hundred rocks had been dumped on the city the other side of the portal. The seventh Bowl of Wrath had been well and truly poured on the humans below. Now, all that was left was to invade them with the Angelic Host and all would be well. Normality would be restored and the divine order of things returned to its rightful place. What, therefore, happened next was the cause of a very brief episode of cognitive dissonance on his part.

The Ares missile was a kludge. Basically it took the airframe and engine of the GMD interceptor and armed it with an EBU-6 warhead. This was simply a larger and more powerful version of the weapon used to close down Belial's Sky Volcanos Everything non-essential had been stripped out of the system to get the greatest possible payload and that included the guidance system. It was, therefore, good shooting that put both missiles through the portal over Manhattan island.

The fuzing system was also lightweight, a simple timer that had been pre-set to explode the warhead a few seconds after launch. The ground computers had known to a millisecond how long it would take for the missiles to reach the portal. They'd added a few milliseconds on top of that to let the missile get some height above the portal and that had been that. Both EBU-6 warheads had exploded in the same millisecond. It was as near to simultaneous as could be managed.

The explosions shut down the portal instantly. They also devastated the arrays of copper rods that had made the portal system possible. The explosions also tore apart the pre-notched steel coil that surrounded the warhead and turned it into a hail of deadly spinning steel fragments that scythed through the work teams that were still gathered around the portal site. Finally, as the metal fragments tore into him, Azrael realized that Michael had been right, it was extremely unwise to underestimate humans. It was a lesson he would need to remember.

News Studio, KOCO Television, Oklahoma City

"And the latest news is that missiles fired by the New York Defense System have closed the portal. A total of 98 rocks each weighing an estimated 100 tons have landed on Manhattan and New Jersey, inflicting catastrophic damage on the west side of Manhattan Island. Known casualties are already in the thousands and we will be getting more accurate figures as the dead start arriving in Hell. Already questions are being asked, why did it take so long to fire the missiles that ended the attack? What went wrong with the system that kept the portal from being closed until after this catastrophic damage had been suffered? This is Brandon Breyer reporting from the Bronx in stricken New York City."

"Thank you Brandon. Well, there is no doubt that this is the long-awaited Seventh Bowl of Wrath, supposedly Heaven's knock-out blow against us. Well, we're still standing Yahweh. The hero of the attack was Norman Orwell, Curator of the Intrepid Sea-Air-Space museum in New York. After the carrier was hit by one of the rocks, he led an emergency team of museum staff into the wreckage to pull out the survivors from the destroyed ship. Thanks to his efforts, and those of his colleagues of course, nineteen of the twenty two people known to be on board the Intrepid were rescued alive. Sadly, just after completing this daring rescue, Doctor Orwell suffered a heart attack and died from his exertions. We will be broadcasting an interview with him shortly.

"The surviving senior managerial staff of the Goldman-Sachs bank have just released a press statement. It states that their headquarters building was totally destroyed by a direct hit from a rock with heavy casualties to the partners and senior staff. Due to the resulting reduction in their pension commitments for the next thirty years, the profitability of the bank will be significantly improved this year. As a result, the surviving partners have awarded themselves a special bonus to reflect the improved financial standing of Goldman-Sachs."

Anita Blanton brushed her hair out of her eyes. "Well, nothing to be surprised at there I suppose." She looked away for a moment and her eyes widened. With a level of relish in her voice, she then resumed. "A late breaking piece of news. The deceased partners and senior staff of Goldmans-Sachs Bank have applied for a restraining order against the living partners and senior staff, requesting that they be restrained from awarding themselves a bonus using the assets of the bank pension fund. The deceased members of staff claim that the terms of their contracts do not stipulate that they will lose rights to their pensions by dying and that they are entitled to continuance of their normal pension payments. They also claim that they are being discriminated against simply because they are dead and that they are fully entitled to any bonus payments that are made to living bank members. They are requesting the ACLU take up this case on their behalf.

"Attorneys for the deceased members of Goldmans-Sachs, the law firm of Bleedum, Grabbit and Runne, have also filed suit before the Federal Court asking for an injunction against the Securities Exchange Commission prohibiting the SEC from cancelling the trading licenses of the deceased Goldman-Sachs employees. Filing the action, attorney William Crook said 'Being dead is no reason why somebody should not be a good banker.' The case is expected to go to the Supreme Court before any resolution is reached."

"Yes, Anita, but whose Supreme Court? There's a lot of dead Justices in Hell. They could end up claiming jurisdiction."

"Don't ask me Brandon. I just read the news. On to our next item. With the first oil supplies arriving from Hell, the civilian oil price dropped below three hundred dollars a barrel today for the first time in almost two years. . . . . "

 

[LTR]

Human Expeditionary Army Forward Headquarters, The Eternal City, Heaven

"There are three journalists and a gentleman from the Times seeking interviews with you Dave. General Michael Jackson sounded saddened and deeply sympathetic at the news. After what had happened to General McChrystal, the press were being kept at arm's length.

"They can keep seeking." General Petraeus nodded, then hesitated. "Only four?"

"There were five but one of the journalists stuck a microphone into Asanee's face and asked some impolite questions. She told him he had big brass balls and then asked if he had planned on keeping them. He left very quickly. Michael-Lan is here as well."

"Good. Mike, Yamantau want to know if there is an equivalent of the Minos Gate here in Heaven and, if so, where it is. Also, do bodies still come through it. My guess is that the division of Second Life humans between Heaven and Hell is beginning to become a real issue. Who goes where? And who makes the decisions."

"I've got a feeling it won’t be us David."

"I know what you mean Mike, civilian control of the military and all that. Do you want to try that line on Asanee?"

Jackson shuddered slightly at the thought. One of the subtler effects of the Human Expeditionary Army was that it had brought together armies that had never considered working with each other before. Many of those armies came from social backgrounds that were radically different from anything the others had contemplated. Concepts that some took for granted were unknown or even derided by others. Chief amongst these areas was the relationships between military and political authorities. Slowly, the various national contingents were beginning to have a genuine understanding of what made the others tick. Idly, Jackson remembered the fable about the Tower of Babel and how Yahweh had split humanity up by language to stop them building another such marvel. Was the H.E.A. now reversing that action as well?

Across the desk, Petraeus pressed a button on his intercom and asked the Duty Officer to bring Michael in. As he did, he and Jackson exchanged smiles. They made a point of meeting Michael here; although the rooms were oversized, they were still uncomfortably small for the big Archangel. It was quite impossible for him to either enter the room decorously or strike poses once inside. "Mike, do you get the feeling Michael isn't quite what he was?"

"You mean, has he had the stuffing knocked out of him? I got that feel as well. About time too, he was too full of himself when we got here. Tossing him out on his ear was a good move Dave."

"There's more to it than that. We need to keep a close eye on him. But, I meant that it may not be humanity's choice who goes where. We may find we have to play the cards we get dealt. We've still no idea on what lies the other side of that gate." There was a photograph on the wall behind his desk that showed the hazards of the Minos Gate. As an experiment, DIMO(N) had driven a HEMTT up to the gate and then backed the rear half in. The vehicle was now half-size, the part that had been pushed through the gate boundary had vanished. Nothing that crossed that boundary ever came back.

The door opened and Michael-Lan inserted himself into the office by way of a door that was intended for beings half his size. Petraeus looked at him carefully and was convinced his initial impressions had been right. Something had been knocked out of this Archangel, the cocksure, daring self-confidence wasn't gone but it had been dented and tarnished. And there was a calculating air about him, one that indicated he had been given a mighty problem to chew over.

"Michael-Lan. We want to clarify some points with you. It appears that humans haven't entered Heaven directly for many years. Is that correct."

"It is General. Yahweh closed the gates of Heaven to humans centuries ago. About the fifteenth century by your calendar."

"We thought it was earlier than that. Never mind. The humans who arrived here after that, how did they get here?"

"I went down to the Plateau of Minos and collected them. I had a deal with the Fallen Ones who worked there. I took the humans I wanted in exchange for opium. It worked out quite well, I had no intention of telling anybody about my pipeline and the Fallen Ones knew if they gave me up there would be no more clouds of bliss for them," Michael struck a penitent and regretful note that fooled nobody. "I only wish I could have saved more."

"I'm sure," Petraeus was sarcastic. "So, there was a time when humans arrived here directly. How?"

"There was a gate here, like the one on the Plateau of Minos. It still is there in fact, but no humans have arrived through it for many centuries. Poor Peter is really bored down there. I used to slide him a few shots of cocaine now and then, help him pass the time."

Petraeus shuddered quietly. "So, it's possible that Yahweh 'closed' the Gates because no more humans were coming through? That his 'order' was just a recognition of what was already established?"

"The order came first. Once Yahweh had given it, the number of humans coming through slowed down and stopped. At the same time, the number turning up at Minos increased."

"I see. Michael, I'm going to assign a military unit to take over guarding the site of that gate. You will take them there." Petraeus paused and thumbed his intercom box again. "Duty Officer, get me the commander of Third Armored. I'm going to be borrowing one of his tank battalions again."

Spearhead Battalion, Heaven

Her command had grown again. She now had an engineering company attached to what was still laughingly called a battalion. That meant the Spearhead 'battalion' now had eight full companies plus an assortment of platoon-sized attachments. Colonel Keisha Stevenson had the uneasy feeling that the only reason why it wasn't reclassified as a larger unit was that doing so would mean she got a General's star.

"This is it." Michael-Lan stood in front of the black ellipse, one that was guarded by a pair of pearl-encrusted metal gates. "Until Yahweh closed everything down, this used to be quite busy. It's only got a caretaker now, Peter. Nice old boy."

"That would be Saint Peter, I suppose." Stevenson wondered what her old church preacher would have said about this situation. He'd often waxed eloquent about what Saint Peter would do when faced with various members of his congregation but 'obeyed orders delivered at gunpoint' hadn't been one of the options considered.

"That's what you call him, sure." Michael's voice was slightly distant again. In the long drive up here, Stevenson had noted that. It was as if Michael's mind was elsewhere. Given what she had learned about him, that probably didn't bode well for somebody.

"Take me to him." Her voice was blunt. Her orders were to secure this entire area. She had the force needed to do it and those orders included clearance to do whatever that task required. Behind her, the tank transporters were lining up and unloading her vehicles. Getting here had been a ten-hour drive and if she'd brought her armor up on its tracks, half the vehicles would be left by the roadside as mechanical casualties by now. The tank transporters had been an optimal solution and Stevenson understood that being General Petraeus's go-to commander meant that her 'optimal solutions' had a very high priority.

Michael led her over to a hut built beside the gates. It was a small, ramshackle affair, one that would have been condemned as a slum in New Jersey but Stevenson's expectations had been changed by her time in Heaven. For here, and in the eyes of most of the human inhabitants of Heaven, this was as good as it got, better than anything they'd known in their earthbound lives. The door creaked open and a figure with a flowing white beard emerged.

"Michael-Lan, Great General, welcome to the Gates of Pearl."

The voice was obsequious and that made Stevenson's hackles rise. Humans didn’t have to tip their caps to Angels any more. There was a more-than-necessary snap to her voice when she spoke. "You are Peter, the guardian of this gate?"

He looked at her, initially almost with belittlement. Then he saw the uniform and the guns, and he took in the sight of the vehicles unloading. "You are a soldier, a woman soldier."

"I am Colonel Stevenson, commander of this position. From now on, you report to me, not him." She gestured at Michael and saw him nod. "Now, you are?"

"I am Shimeon Kepha Ha-Tzadik. Also known as Simon Peter and follower of Jeshua." He smiled sadly. "I am also caretaker here."

He looked hopefully at Michael who responded by producing a small packet of white powder. Peter whinnied with delight and produced a mirror, knife and a plastic drinking straw from a pocket in his robes. Slightly disgusted, Stevenson watched him cut a line and snort it up through the straw. Peter caught her expression and offered her a line.

"No." Her voice was even sharper and the dislike in it more obvious.

Peter looked at her, then his face brightened. "I have some liquor here if you prefer that. Built the still myself."

"Hokay, when did you learn to do that?"

"Back in the old days, when we were roaming around Galilaea with Jeshua. He used to do his preaching and the rest of us would brew up and sell the moonshine. Only, Jeshua would never stop in one place long enough for us to set up a decent business. As soon as we got the still set up and established ourselves, he'd move on and we'd have to do the same. That's what finished us in the end you know."

"Do tell." Despite herself, Stevenson was beginning to like him.

"We kept moving on and we never paid the tax duty on the moonshine we were selling. That really upset the Romans. They didn’t care about the preaching but tax evasion was something quite else. Then it turned out that Judas had been skimming. He was responsible for giving the local administration their share of the take but he was short-changing them and pocketing the difference. He'd made thirty pieces of silver on the deal before they wised up and sent some Maccabee killers out to whack him. Anyway, Judas decided the only way to get away was to sell the rest of us out to the Romans for tax evasion. Didn't help him much, the Maccabees got him and strung him up anyway. Anyway, the Romans were about to crucify us all but Jeshua talked them out of it and took the blame himself. He took the fall, we all got to walk so we carried on preaching his message for him."

Stevenson laughed delightedly and the old man seemed pleased. "You have got to tell that story to everybody down on Earth. I suppose Jesus – Jeshua is up here in heaven somewhere?"

Michael shook his head. "He never turned up; I suppose he's down in Hell somewhere. He was only a tool you know, he was possessed by an angel called Elhmas. Once he'd finished with Jeshua, he just abandoned him."

Stevenson's head snapped around at that, so she was looking at Michael. "And what happened to Elhmas?"

"Most everybody thinks you killed him. Oh, not you personally, you humans. He was in command of the Incomparable Legion of Light when it was nuked. The Host is certain that he died there."

Stevenson nodded and tried a sip of the moonshine. It was surprisingly good. "Peter, got any more stories about the days in Galilaea?"

"Watch him Colonel." Michael sounded amused. "Peter loves a good story. He'll have you here for hours if you let him."

Stevenson was about to say it didn't matter and that she had plenty of time. Then, suddenly it did matter and she hadn't. Because an unconscious body had emerged through Heaven's Minos Gate and was on the ground.

USS Turner Joy. Seattle, Washington.

The band was playing "Anchors Aweigh" as the crew on the old destroyer made fast. Captain Reynolds gave the order "Finished with main engines" and the adventure was over. A new USS Turner Joy was commissioning soon and she would take over the reputation as well as the name. The DDG-120 Turner Joy was a Flight III Arleigh Burke class AEGIS destroyer with her own portal generation equipment built into her. Yet, she would be a cold, impersonal ship until her crew breathed life into her DD-951 Turner Joy already had her life, a phenomena that only sailors fully understood, but it was already ebbing away as her crew made ready to leave her.

"She'll be back in the museum soon." Sophia Metaxas looked sadly at the ship that had been her home for almost three years. In that time, Turner Joy had fought her battles on Earth, in Hell and in Heaven and had brought her crew safely back from every one of them. "It seems a shame somehow."

"She's steam-powered Sophia, the Navy is all gas turbine and nuclear now. When the war was on, she had her role to play. Especially since the Navy never expected to get her. That's all finished now. Now, she can return to honorable retirement again. She has a tale to tell after all, and it's one generations in the future will want to hear. Reynolds looked suddenly very sad. "I never did get Yahweh under my guns though."

"I expect she'll do a lot better than some of the museum ships have though." Sophia was trying to look on the bright side. The Museum ship fleet had not done well from the war. Mostly, they were too old and too far gone to bring back into commission the way Turner Joy had been brought back. Some had been stripped for spare parts, others of useful equipment. All had been neglected in the driving urgency to concentrate every effort on the ships that could help win the war. Olympia had sunk at her moorings as a result and it was rumored that Texas was in a bad way and unlikely to survive.

"You can count on that. Anyway, my new ship is officially adopting her. We'll be making sure our older sister gets proper care. We won't be leaving you in the lurch." Reynolds would be commanding DDG-120.

"Thanks, Captain. We'll be keeping her ready though, Just in case." Sophia nodded and turned to walk down the gangplank and back into civilian life. As she did so, another small increment of Turner Joy's life ebbed away.

DIMO(N) Headquarters, The Pentagon, Washington

It was over. General Schatten looked around at the rapidly-emptying offices. Within a few hours DIMO(N) would cease to exist. Its military research and development activities would be taken over by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, its civilian activities transferred to other government departments. He recognized it was inevitable, the Salvation War was over, there was no need for an organization like DIMO(N) any more. Others could take over the charge it had led, others could build upon the foundations it had laid. Just as James Randi's Institute of Pneumatology had closed down and dispersed when its work was done, so too would DIMO(N). In his imagination, Schatten heard the sounds of a trumpet playing Taps.

"What will you be doing now General?" Schatten heard the voice cut through his reverie

"Dr. Surlethe. Come to say goodbye to us all."

"And to thank you for a job well done. Considering you started off from a bunch of old texts and grimoires and made a start on turning the legends and myths there into the foundations of real science, you people pulled off a spectacular achievement. We've got a long, long way to go but it all started here. You achieved something else as well. You took legends and myths and replaced them with logic and understanding. We really have got a long way to go but it will be facts and experiments that guide us all the way. Anyway, you didn’t answer my question. What will you be doing now?"

"I've been appointed the new Director of Celestial Intelligence. It won’t be announced until tomorrow and the Senate has to approve of course."

"That won’t be a problem. So you're the new DCI. So we will be working together after all. How do you fancy working with Homo Caelis?"

"Homo Caelis?"

"The genus that contains the Angels and Daemons. They really are closely related, you know. We had to call them something and that was the best bet.

"It'll be hard to think of them as anything but the enemy."

"We can't be sure they aren't. Not yet. And there is who knows what out there. We know there are at least three other groups up there. The Aesir, the Baals and the Olympians. Then there's the devils, we're not sure who or what they are. But, if Homo Caelis is the enemy, they are a defeated enemy. It'll be up to us to keep them that way."

Schatten nodded. "Still, there's Yamantau and what it represents. And we still have the H.E.A."

Surlethe grimaced. "I know, but it's spread pretty thin. We're straining every economy on Earth and a lot of the smaller countries don't like it at all. With the United Nations sidelined and virtually moribund, they feel they've been cut out of the decision loop. Which they have of course. How that will work out is still to be seen. Still, there's one thing we have to be thankful for. Humans don’t have to fear death any more. Not on Earth, anyway."

"No, we don’t have to fear death here any more. I just wonder what else is out there, that's all. And what lies beyond the Minos Gates."

Surlethe grinned. "Well, don’t tell The President that you're wondering. Even the thought of adding another few billions to the defense budget is giving him conniptions. Come on, let's get ourselves a drink. I think we've earned it."