Trevor guided the 'Eagle' northward with, thanks to Omar, better-fitting pilot goggles.
Outside the ship, thick flurries rode the air: not quite yet a storm.
Nina sat in the co-pilot’s seat but Trevor remained the only one who knew how to fly the alien craft. That meant three perfectly good flying machines sat unused in Wilkes-Barre.
Danny Washburn, Dante Jones and ten ‘volunteers’-including a few from Major Prescott's troop-filled the passenger compartment. Eight K9s rounded out the advanced team.
A ground convoy led by Stonewall transported more vehicles, people, and armaments to the battle but they would not arrive until morning.
In the meantime, Trevor's group would scout the area, assess the gateway, and formulate a plan to destroy it. That's why Trevor picked Danny Washburn to come along; his career with ATF meant he had experience with things that went BANG.
The ship pushed through a veil of white. Below, the deep woods and hills of the Endless Mountains rolled north turning whiter and whiter the further they travelled.
The Eagle crossed the New York border on December 15 ^ th en route to the campus of SUNY Binghamton situated off the Vestal Parkway south of that city.
During the first part of the flight, Trevor followed Interstate 81. After crossing the state line, he relied on a compass Omar super-glued to the control panel, one of several modifications to the alien craft including sport bucket seats pulled from a BMW.
Most important, Omar had rigged two energy weapons derived from the Redcoats’ rifles on a swivel beneath the front landing pods giving the Eagles talons.
Around noon, they caught sight of their destination.
The snow-loaded clouds could not hide the atmospheric disturbance on the horizon: flashing lights, some similar to the flicker of lightning, others more balls of energy catapulted away from the gate into the distance.
Trevor landed on a field surrounded by a running track on the northeast side of campus.
The buildings of the State University of New York at Binghamton stood in clusters separated by parking lots, access roads, and strips of trees made bare by winter. Fire, explosions or general ransacking had damaged many of those buildings.
They entered Hunter Hall on the south side of campus and established a temporary command post. Trevor and Danny went to a dorm room on the top floor and pointed binoculars at the ten-story tall abomination sitting in a vacant parking lot six hundred yards away.
"Jesus," Danny muttered without his usual good humor. "Just the sight of that thing makes my skin crawl."
The Grenadiers in the room seemed to agree; they fidgeted nervously and did something Trevor's dogs rarely did: whimpered.
Nina, wearing a leather jacket over black BDUs, strode in. Behind her came the other three members of her recon team including Dante who wore a hodgepodge of winter gear.
She said, "I don’t get it. There’s some pretty nasty stuff up by the gateway, but between here and there not much. I’m just saying, the scariest thing we saw in any of these buildings were some rats and a raccoon."
Trevor lowered the binoculars but kept his eyes focused on the distant sphere. A ball of energy shot away and disappeared into the steady drizzle of white puffs.
Dante suggested, "Man, it’s like it’s just throwing monsters into our world."
One of Nina’s other team members-a short but strong fellow with a scavenged parka over green army BDUs-added his thoughts: "Maybe the area around here is under its range. Sort of like an artillery piece has a minimum distance based on the firing arc."
Trevor tried to remember the man’s name.
Rhodes. Yes. That’s it. Rhodes.
He looked over the second soldier who had accompanied Nina: A big guy-so big he could have been a professional wrestler instead of a professional soldier-named Casey.
Nina continued, "Whatever the case, it's sitting over there on parking lot X."
Trevor saw something on Nina's face, an expression akin to puzzlement; or maybe she was getting sick. In fact, her entire recon team shared the same look: brows crinkled, noses twitching and vacant eyes.
"What? What is it?"
Nina answered, "It makes a noise. A thumping."
"No, no," Rhodes presented a different take. "Like a whining. But really low."
Dante said, "It wasn’t like you hear it with your ears, but like it's inside your head. Gave me the creeps, Trev."
Washburn chided, "Take off the skirt, Nancy."
Dante responded with his middle finger.
Trevor raised binoculars and faced the 10-story tall gateway again.
A strange texture covered the sphere, one mimicking frosted glass. A brownish bark-like material that appeared to have sprouted from the ground framed the orb and held it in place. That globe rippled every so often, as if it had a liquid surface yet the skin appeared solid.
Inside that sphere, movement. A ball of something like worms the size of oil pipes, spinning lines and shapes at the core. Still, all the time, flashes of lightning and bolts of energy flying away toward unseen destinations: a new horror airmailed to Earth.
Nina’s voice grabbed his attention: "That’s not all. Look at this."
Rhodes handed Trevor a digital camera.
"There are things guarding it," Nina explained as Trevor cycled through images.
"Two of them," Dante said. "Probably the ugliest damn things I’ve ever seen."
They were big and round; the size and shape of wrecking balls. Fibers sprouted from their bodies and waved madly like Medusa’s hair. They were covered with oval eyes and gaping mouths seemingly placed randomly around their bodies.
Rhodes hacked to hold back nausea as he told Trevor, "They leave, sort of, a pus behind. Like snail tracks when they roll around."
Trevor crinkled his nose and asked, "Danny, what do you think?"
"I think we stick to the original idea. There’s plenty of farm country around here. We can find what we need. I’m sure there’s an abandoned 18-wheeler around here somewhere, too."
"Okay then," Trevor agreed. "We go with the whole big boom idea."
"Super-genius," Casey-the big soldier-imitated the Coyote from Roadrunner fame. "Wile E. Coyote, Suupppeerr Genius. I think I like the sound of that."
– The advanced team spent the night in Hunter and Cascade residence halls overlooking the campus’ main access road. They expected the ground convoy in the morning.
Trevor, Danny Washburn, and Nina shared an upstairs corner room with Odin and Tyr. The two men kept watch while Nina curled under a blanket and fell asleep.
The constant flashes from the gateway sparked flickers behind the steady stream of falling snow flurries; the only light on an otherwise black night. As hypnotizing as those flashes were, Trevor's eyes drifted to the sleeping Nina.
In the old world, he often wondered why Ashley Trump cared for him. She felt like a gift for which he was not worthy.
As he watched Nina sleep, he appreciated the fortune in meeting her but he did not feel unworthy. To him, she served as an anchor to his humanity. In her arms, he found parts of his old self; parts he thought buried under the weight of responsibility. With her, he gained a purpose beyond the great cause: something precious to Trevor Stone the man.
Yet despite his love for her, he knew he could not limit Nina's risk in the battles ahead. Not only because she was one of mankind's best warriors, but because he had to let her be who she was. He owed that to her no matter how much the fear of losing her scared him.
Danny Washburn, sitting on the floor against the outside wall, broke Trevor’s thoughts.
"You really love this girl, don’t you?"
It did not embarrass Trevor to admit his feelings. "Yeah. I do."
"That’s great. You deserve it. Before, the two of you were all doom and gloom and ‘oh-my-god it’s the end of the world.’ Now you’re not nearly as much an asshole."
"Danny, it kind of is the end of the world."
"It’s the end of the world when we give up. Look at how we did against everything we’ve faced so far. Could of packed it in, instead we fought and what happened? We won."
Trevor asked, "So what do you think all of this is about?"
Danny considered his words for a moment-a rarity for him-and then shared, "At first I figured this was all just, you know, a big invasion like Independence Day. After all I've seen I'm starting to figure we don’t know why it's happening. Maybe we’re stuck in the middle, like ants on the canvass of a boxing ring. Or maybe we haven’t seen all the pieces."
A tease of a memory danced across Trevor’s mind. A memory from his dark nightmare in the clutches of The Order.
Something…
Danny went on, "Maybe if we survive long enough we'll we find out. But damn, I look at this gate thing and I know there are some higher pay grades running this show."
Trevor thought about the Old Man.
What is his pay grade?
Danny said to Trevor, "Hey, curl up next to your honey and forget about this for a bit. Don’t worry, ole’ Danny’s here. I’ll keep a sharp eye out."
Trevor hesitated.
"Go on, I gotchya covered."
Stone followed his friend’s advice. He rested his carbine on a tabletop, grabbed another blanket, and rolled next to Nina. He slipped his arm over her shoulder and even though she slept, she wiggled closer.
Trevor listened to the gentle rhythm of her breathing. The sound calmed his nerves, put his heart at ease, and led him off into a quiet slumber.
– The convoy arrived mid morning. Stonewall brought a heap of firepower in the fifty-caliber machine guns atop Humvees as well as fifteen armed fighters: a mixture of professional soldiers and post-apocalyptic draftees outfitted in an eclectic collection of uniforms but all with sturdy boots and gloves.
First, they created hard points on the fringe of campus to control access to the area. After, Trevor flew Washburn to the countryside in search of farm supply centers. Ames (the older brunette with fiery eyes) and the young man named ‘Bird’ went off to find an 18-wheeler. Bird assured he knew how to get one started without a key. No one asked.
Trevor and Danny prepared a simple plan: blast the gateway to smithereens with an ammonium nitrate bomb delivered in a truck. To get that close they would need to distract the gateway’s guardians, a job for which Nina seemed well suited. Stonewall would command a reserve force while Trevor and Dante coordinated from a rooftop.
By nightfall, they gathered all the supplies and prepared for an assault in the morning. However, night brought a heavy snowstorm. After much consideration and consultation, Trevor decided to go ahead with the attack.
Before dawn-while the snow raged-Trevor parted ways with Nina and the other five members of "Alpha" team. They drove south in Humvees off campus, then west, then back onto campus on the far side of the target area. There they waited in Palisades dormitory, practically in the shadow of the gateway separated only by a patch of brush and woodland.
Dawn shined on a cold day. Nearly a foot of fresh, powdery snow had fallen and more continued to drift to Earth.
Danny Washburn and Bird piled into the cab of a ROADWAY rig while a support team followed their truck in a Cadillac Escalade. Trevor moved to a good observation point on the roof of Cleveland Hall with Dante and Tyr at his side. The remaining K9s provided security on the flanks of the assault. Stonewall and his relief force of eight men with snowmobiles waited in reserve underneath Trevor’s observation point, using the Winnebago as their command post.
At 10 a.m. on December 17 ^ th, the first known human counter attack on a dimensional gateway began.
– "Alpha team, go," Trevor radioed.
Nina, Ames, and Casey moved, on foot, through the wooded area to Parking Lot X.
Despite the falling snow, the gateway continued to dispatch bright pulses into the low gray clouds, delivering more miseries to a planet already besieged by chaos.
The air around the abomination felt charged with unearthly electricity. The gateway’s sound added to its eerie ambiance; a constant hum, as if a child pounded a cord on an out-of-tune piano. The creatures inside the sphere wiggled and squirmed behind the opaque ball that hid their true features but conjured an image of maggot-infested meat.
Nina struggled with the sight and sounds of the gateway as some natural instinct urged her to retreat. She shook her head fast in an effort to subdue that instinct. A flutter of snow tumbled from her knit cap.
With new determination, she waved her arm forward. Alpha team engaged the two bloated, massive balls of vileness standing guard outside the hideous monument…
…Trevor watched as muzzle flashes announced the commencement of stage one. He worked the transmitter on his radio.
"Bravo team…punch it!"…
…Bird grinned as he drove the tractor-trailer. Washburn shared the cab and wore a headset radio. He spoke into the microphone, "Roger that. We’re a go."
The rig started its attack run, passing Hunter Hall. The piled snow grabbed at its 18-wheels causing starts, stops, and slips but they moved forward nonetheless.
"Yeah baby!" Bird hollered. "Here comes the friggin’ mailman with a special god damn delivery for all you mothers!"
Washburn howled, "Wooohooo!"
The truck gained speed as it entered Lot X. The massive gateway stood at the far end.
Washburn gazed at the hideous structure, the sight of which sapped his enthusiasm for the mission. He radioed, "This is bravo. We’re making our run…"
…The two big balls of puss guarding the gateway rolled toward Nina’s assault team as fire from M4 carbines hit against their thick hides, causing no harm. The creatures wobbled over the powdery snow with their eyes searching and mouths working mindlessly as they fell for the ruse and pursued. Ames lobbed a hand grenade that exploded in a splash of dirty snow but barely slowed the creatures.
"C’mon, fall back," Nina ordered according to plan.
The monstrosities followed the humans into the wooded area…
…Trevor watched from his position as the demon balls chased Nina, the sight of which filled his belly with unease despite being a part of the plan.
"Here comes the truck," Dante pointed.
With its chase car following behind, the 18-wheeler rumbled toward its goal with a hearty pull on the horn that carried across campus…
… Nina, Ames, and Casey led the rolling balls of puss to the open ground between the wooded area and Pallisades Hall and straight at two 50 caliber machine guns atop idling Humvees, one of which operated by Rhodes.
As the monsters rolled into the kill zone, the heavy caliber weapons spat rounds at a furious pace. The fiends hissed. Vapors shot from holes punched through their sick bodies as the creatures disintegrated into chunks creating a horrid smell of rot.
The machine gun fire ceased, leaving both monsters broken into smaller pieces. More specifically, each ball had been broken into four equal pieces.
Nina stopped wiping snow from her pants and said aloud, "How is that possible?"
Those eight balls of puss vibrated and stirred. Their edges smoothed; eyes and tendrils poked forth, grinning mouths worked open. Eight rolling balls of disgusting monstrosity bore down on Alpha team.
"Open fire!" Nina bolted for the flamethrower as the machine guns blazed again.
Ames pulled another grenade. Before she could throw it, two of the creatures grasped her with tentacles and greedily pulled in opposite directions. Her mouth strained to scream but could not find any voice. Casey charged in with his M16 blasting. At close range, the bullets did damage but not enough to stop them from…from pulling her in two.
Each monster-ball enveloped a half of her body and gulped it down with multiple mouths. Casey bid a hasty retreat…
…The gateway-its guards distracted-loomed above the ROADWAY trailer as Bird hit the brakes. The truck jackknifed and skidded to a stop. As it did, the gate shuttered and vibrated. A howling noise-an alarm-erupted from its core. The flashes of lightning it so often sent into the air flashed at its base.
Something began to come through…something very big…
…Trevor and Dante watched in horror. A massive image formed in front of the Gateway next to the explosive-laden truck. A vague disturbance in the air grew into a more distinct outline as falling snow swirled and fled from the burgeoning form.
It became a shadow. A building-sized shadow…
…Washburn and Bird jumped from the cab of the truck and gaped in awe at the massive hulk fading into existence.
Washburn heard Trevor over the headset: "Get out of there, Danny!"
The former ATF agent grabbed Bird by the collar and hauled him to the waiting Escalade. In moments, a massive explosion would engulf the area.
Glowing red eyes materialized ten stories in the air behind a veil of blustery, falling snow; glowing red eyes conjured from some hellish inferno of the universe…
…The rollers approached the Humvees; the fifty-caliber shots served merely as an annoyance.
Nina lunged forward with the flamethrower, sending a stream of fire into two of the creatures. That fire turned snow into water almost instantaneously but the monsters did not stop.
Casey brandished one of the Redcoats’ energy rifles. He let it charge as long as he dared and fired. The blast broke off a chunk of flesh from one of the round beasts and sent it tumbling across the snow like a billiards ball smacked by the cue. That blasted chunk smoothed its edges, grew tendrils and eyes and a mouth, then spun forward.
Alpha team could not stop the rolling things, but they did stop.
The alarm from the gateway echoed across the snow-filled air. The rolling monsters reversed direction and raced back to their guard posts. The humans of Alpha team watched them go with great relief. Everything they had thrown at the creatures had been ineffective. Nina realized in a huff of despair that they still had much to learn about their enemies.
More lessons were forthcoming…
…Its skin came into the world…a scaly, tinny skin that could have been organic or could have been built in some horrid workshop. Its legs-two of them-like towers. Its body, clothed or natural skin was unclear but it did not matter for its scales appeared as solid as a Titan’s armor. Goat-like horns wrapped its head on either side of raging red eyes. Its arms; it stood upright but instead of hands it sported cloven hooves.
Certainly, this monster served as the root of all satanic visions. Had the ancient Greeks seen this beast? Or the Romans? The Minoans? Truly a horror to inspire poets to sing verses of Hell and damnation.
It roared as it came into this reality and the ground trembled.
Trevor watched as the Cadillac swerved to flee. The creature that inspired dreams of Lucifer kicked the puny vehicle, flipping it across the snow.
Trevor heard Washburn’s grunts and exhales via the open radio as the car cascaded end over end before resting against an abandoned minivan.
Trevor pleaded as a knot of fear grew his stomach, "Danny! Get the hell out of there!"
"Argh…workin’ on it, Trev."
Stone realized Danny and his escape team had probably rolled out of the blast radius, but that might be the least of their worries. The giant demon stepped forward. The heavy step shook the world.
Washburn, Bird, and two others scrambled from the battered SUV.
Bird did not make it another step. The demon-thing’s cloven arms slammed down and pulverized the insect.
The other three stumbled off through snow nearly knee-deep.
"Christ, run, Danny, run."
The 18-wheeler erupted in a rolling burst of fire and concussion, blowing a wall of white in all directions. The explosion forced Trevor and Dante to cover behind the rim of the roof. The shock wave blew as if a hurricane. The building beneath wobbled and threatened collapse. Waves of snow and dirt and debris carried overhead in a gale of destruction filling the air with a burning smell, a blast of heat, and a cry of destruction.
Trevor's ears crackled then rang; he felt oxygen sucked from his lungs.
The sound of the blast echoed into the distance, the tremble and shake slowed then stopped, but the burning smell lingered and a terrible wail grew from soft to loud.
Dante and Trevor stood.
The gateway had evaporated. In its place spun a screeching, screaming vortex. The squirming nest of worm-things-fat and white and covered in fibers-floated above that whirlpool of reality.
At the eye of that vortex bubbled a ball of red, maybe fire. One by one those vulgar worms dropped into that ball of red and disappeared through the portal.
The vortex expanded, growing larger and louder as it widened across the parking lot. Trevor and Dante clamped hands over ears to chase away the forlorn wail. The snow-covered concrete, the cars, the light posts; all warped then stretched then disappeared down that well to whatever place had sent the nightmares.
The vortex enveloped the rolling puss creatures. The vortex sucked down the towering demon. The creature bellowed and raged as its glowing eyes sunk from view.
The blast had knocked Washburn and his team to the ground. They slowly staggered to their feet but were even slower to recognize the encroaching danger.
Trevor gathered his senses and screamed as loud as he could into his radio.
"Danny! Danny, run!"
Too late.
The expanding vortex enveloped Washburn and his team. Trevor heard Danny’s confused voice over the radio, barely audible beneath the moaning, crying maelstrom.
"Wh-what? What is this?"
Stone watched his friend warp and stretch…
"What is this? Oh God, Trevor! Help us!"
…and disappear into Hell…
"What is this place? It hurts! TREVOR! HELP US FOR CHRIST’S SAKE! YOU CAN’T LEAVE US! TREVOR! HELP ME! HELP ME! WHAT ARE THESE THINGS? GET OFF OF ME! GET OFF! OH GOD OHGODOHGOD…"
The vortex collapsed and disappeared, its shriek silenced. The radio frequency cut.
The cold snow of a December afternoon fell fast so as to fill the wide round crater where a part of the Earth had once been.
– Trevor sat alone in the dark on the top floor of Hunter hall.
Outside, the storm had stopped shortly after dusk leaving behind a tranquil, snow-covered campus with drifts pushed high against walls. A first-quarter moon glowed above and white grains of snowy powder gusted in and out of the moonbeams while the wind whispered amongst the dead buildings. The temperature had dropped dramatically with the setting sun. A cold, dry air hovered overhead.
Several hours past since Danny Washburn and his men were dragged off into some other dimension. Yet despite the demolition team’s grisly fate, Stone’s surviving soldiers considered the mission a success.
Of course, they were right. Certainly the Old Man would agree. A small price to pay for walking the path.
Trevor closed his eyes.
Help us for Christ’s sake! You can’t leave us!
He pounded a fist into his forehead, leaned against the corner of the room, and slumped to the floor. He purposely ignored the blanket there, shunning the warmth it offered as if he did not deserve such comforts.
He heard her footsteps in the hallway. He did not want to see her. He did not want to be seen by her.
Nina entered the room with a flashlight in hand. She spotted him huddled in the corner exhaling short puffs of frosty breath.
"Trevor? You okay?"
He did not respond.
She walked to him.
They had not spoken since the end of the attack. She had been busy organizing everyone for the night. They would start the return trip in the morning.
Nina knelt next to him. She saw him shiver.
"You getting sick?"
She placed a hand to his forehead. He felt cold.
Nina realized she had seen him like this once before: the time he had cried next to the body of Sheila Evans.
She turned off the flashlight, sat on the floor next to him, and whispered in the dark: "It’s not your fault."
"Yes it is," he insisted in a monotone voice. "I should have known better. I should have known that it wouldn’t be that easy. I should have spent more time watching and waiting. Or maybe…maybe I should have sent Stonewall’s men to get Danny. Why didn’t I do that? I wasn’t thinking!"
"Listen, the longer we would have waited the more chance it would have spotted us or that other hostiles would have stumbled on us. As for Stonewall, from what I heard his men couldn’t have done anything. They would have been killed, too. It was a tough call. That’s what leaders do. They make the tough calls."
His voice wavered, "Leader? The same leader that had us raid the airport and pull all of our manpower off the estate. That went great, too. This leader just sent a bunch of people he knew to something worse than dying."
He clenched his teeth. "I…could…hear him…on the radio…crying for help… begging for me to do something… anything!"
Nina searched for words.
"You have to make those decisions. You can’t possibly know everything that’s going to happen. I’m just saying that you can’t be angry at yourself because of this."
"Angry? You think I’m angry? Where’s your flashlight? Shine it on me! Look at the great leader! See who I am, Nina. See the fraud! See the man behind the curtain! See him curled up in a ball crying like a two year old and wishing he could go crawl under his pillow and wake up from this damn nightmare."
He shivered again. She grabbed the blanket and tried to place it around his shoulders. He pushed it away.
"I…am tired of this game! I don’t want to be the leader anymore. I don’t want to have peoples' lives depending on what I say. I don’t want to fight anymore. I want to go hide and cry myself to sleep. I don’t want to be strong and sure and none of that shit ANY-MORE!"
Nina said nothing. What could she say?
"There’s your great leader, Nina. I’m not the man you think I am. I’m Richard Stone. I sell Chevrolets. I live at home with my parents. I don’t know who this Trevor guy is. I don’t think I like him very much."
Nina forced an arm around him. He tried to pull free but she would not let go. She tugged him close. He started to push free again but instead began to sob.
"Let it out…you can…you can let it all out with me. You can try and chase me away but I’m not going away."
He buried his face in her lap.
Nina stroked his head and told her lover, "I know Trevor Stone. He’s got a tough job but he does the best he can; better than any one else could do. I know it used to be a lonely job but that’s not true anymore. Trevor Stone is never alone as long as I’m here. As for this Richard Stone guy, I’ve seen him from time to time. And you know what? I love him, too. So I don’t care who is here next to me, Trevor or Richard. You don’t have to hide from me. But when you need me to, I’ll hide with you…in the dark."
Without thought, without planning, Nina found that, yes, she could give comfort to another human being. She could do more than kill; she could deliver mercy, too.
She felt complete.
Richard Stone cried for the loss of his life. He cried for the horrors he had seen over the months. He cried for the soul of Danny Washburn.
And he cried most of all because he knew when sunrise came, Trevor would be back.
Outside the windows, lazy flakes of snow rode the cold December wind.