Spires of Infinity (53 page)

Letting the crystal drop back to his chest, Gabriel flashed them a roguish grin that made Kari’s heart beat just a little bit faster, despite the jealous glare his little wolf cub was shooting her.

“This is a little hard to explain to people that don’t get it. With time travel you can go to any instant in time that you want. So even though I was in the past for hours, I was only gone a few minutes here because I came back to the same time that I left. I know that the Apostle will somehow Gate Jump back to the past, and that means she’s going to get over the wall.”

“Wait, so, if she was
already
in the past,” Michael scratched behind one of his ears.

“How can she be over there,” Jonathan finished, scratching behind the opposite ear.

“It hasn’t happened yet, and you’re talking like it has,” Kari added.

Gabriel sighed. “It
will
. Just wait for it, and don’t get in her way, because she
needs
to get back to the past.
Trust me
, it’s for the best.”

“Too confusing for our blood,” the twins said. “We fold.”

“So, something in our future has already happened in your past,” Kari tried hard to wrap her mind around the concept. “But it’s going to happen in your future now too?

I don’t get it.”

“It’s not that hard,” Sam shot Kari a smug grin.

“The life of a time traveler doesn’t always happen in the right order,” Gabriel said.

“Oh yes,” Michael replied. “That makes
everything
make sense now. Thank you for that nugget of wisdom.”

“Gabriel,” Allie said, appearing beside him and completely solid now. “The

shield can hold for decades. Unless something drastic happens, you could die of old age before she comes one step closer.”

“Hey,” Jonathan said. “Wait, if you’re back and everything’s still the same,

doesn’t that mean you failed?”

Unable to help herself, Kari reached out and poked at Allie’s arm. It felt like flesh. Allie glared at her hand until she pulled it back.

“The paradox happened,” Allie explained, “but there are still events that happen in this part of the timeline that must happen to make
that
part of the timeline possible.”

“That makes even
less
sense,” Michael cried.

“Stop it,” Jonathan moaned. “My head is hurting just thinking about it.”

“Amen to that,” Michael agreed.

“Did the Apostle do that to you,” Kari asked, pointing to the cuts in Gabriel’s clothes, and the large bloodstains.

He nodded.

“You fought her and
won
,” Jonathan cried. “You have got to be the most amazing human ever!”

Gabriel hesitated before answering. “She wasted me, but I got her with my Jedi mind tricks in the end.”

“Jedi what,” Michael asked.

The ground beneath their feet trembled with the activation of some sort of internal machinery within the wall. Allie’s head suddenly snapped up and she turned to look at the computer console near the entrance of the Control Tower. There was a soldier standing at the keyboard punching in commands, catlike tail swishing lazily.

“Captain Alain Maxen,” Allie’s voice echoed over the loudspeaker. “Stop what

you are doing at once!”

“What’s going on,” Gabriel asked, squinting to look down at the soldier. “What’s he doing?”

“I think he’s using the data from the last Gate Jump performed to open another Gate,” Allie explained. “If he succeeds it will bring down the shield.”

“So that’s what happened,” Gabriel mused. “A traitor.”

“He’s locked me out of the console,” Allie cried. “I can’t stop him.”

“All soldiers and robotic guards,” Allie shouted over the loudspeaker. “Captain Maxen is a traitor, and trying to lower the shield. Kill him immediately!”

At the announcement the soldiers below and those not manning cannons on the

wall began to turn toward their leader. Hesitating not a second, Kari drew the arrow she had knocked and let it fly. Shrieking through the air, it struck Alain in the shoulder, knocking him off of his feet. Getting up, he barely seemed to notice it. Kari could just barely make out his face at the distance. His expression was one of fevered worship, without a trace of the pain he should be feeling.

Men on the walls began aiming their weapons, and those on the ground ran

toward him.

A near gunshot caused Kari to wince. Her ears were very sensitive and such a

loud noise was painful.

“Hey,” Sam said excitedly, looking at the massive pistol in her small hands.

“Look Gabriel! I actually hit him. I’m getting better with this thing already.”

“No,” Gabriel said, grabbing the barrel of the pistol and jerking it upward. “Stop.

It has to happen!”

Ignoring Gabriel’s protests, Kari knocked a second arrow, drew and aimed. Sam had indeed hit Alain. Blood poured from a gaping hole in his belly.

Loosing her arrow, Kari followed its flight with her eyes, knowing that it flew true. Time seemed to almost stand still as the long, thick shaft screamed through the air.

Alain raised his hand and jabbed down at the keyboard one last time with an air of finality before the arrow hit him in the temple. Blood splattered into the air, creating a momentary red nimbus around his head as the arrow exploded through the other side of his skull, imbedding in the wall beside him.

Alain’s arms went limp, dropping to his sides, and he stood motionless for a few seconds before falling. The arrow had killed him just a second too late. A ten-foot high bolt of lightning crackled into being and split apart, making a doorway.

“Energy Shield fatal error,” Allie’s voice sounded over the intercom. “Shutting down.”

The bluish energy shield above began to fade away, at first in patches here and there, then in large sections until it was completely gone. Turning to look out into the wasteland, Kari saw the Apostle’s army surge forward with incredible speed. A cheer reached her ears after a few seconds.

“Wonderful,” Allie growled, stomping on the ground in frustration.

“Turn it off and raise the shield again,” Kari suggested.

“I
can’t
,” Allie hissed. “He locked me out of all Gate Jump functions. I don’t even know where to start breaking down his encryption. It’s the same one that the Apostle used in the past! He’s locked the main gate open too!”

“But why,” Sam cried. “Alain seemed so
nice
!”

“The Apostle has some sort of mind control powers,” Kari explained. “If she

came into contact with him before, she might have planted the command in his mind.”

Shooting another look at the dead man below, Kari saw that his fellow soldiers were beginning to congregate around him. Several of them were looking up at the sky where the shield had been, and others were staring in horror at the open front gate.

Leaning over the edge of the wall, Kari yelled down to them. “Get ready to fight for your lives! We’ve got an army incoming, but only a few can get through the gate at a time. We can hold them off long enough for the computer to break down the locks that the traitor placed on it. We can win. There is nothing to be afraid of.”

“Do you think they believed that,” Jonathan asked, looking at Michael.

“They still look like kittens facing down a lion,” Michael answered. “Call me skeptical, but I don’t think so.”

Turning back to the wasteland, Kari knocked another arrow. “Soldiers to your

stations! Get ready to fire!”

The Apostle’s army covered the ground to the wall with amazing speed. The

cannons kept firing into the masses, but they were unable to fire sharply downward at the head of the pack. Allowing her army to do the dirty work for her, the Apostle held back out of range, watching everything from the back of her animal.

“Well,” Kari said as she took aim and loosed down into the milling mass of

mutants. “This is bad.”

Chapter 45: The Battle of the Spires

Swarming across the red sands, the Apostle’s army had nothing but the barest hint of humanity in it. No two creatures looked alike. Many bore misshapen bulges in every imaginable place on their bodies, and bony deformities. Some even had spikes or horns, while others had thick scales that looked like stone. Coming in all sizes, some were covered with fur, or coarse, curly hair, while others were bare and pasty-skinned. Some ran on all fours, like beasts out of hell, tails lashing as their paws, feet, or hooves thumped the ground, others ran on two legs. Most wore nothing in the way of clothing and carried no weapons but their own hideous bodies.

Growling and snarling like an enormous pack of wild beasts, the mutant hoard

threw itself at the walls with enough force to make Kari stumble. Many in the front were crushed by their fellow mutants. Some began climbing with huge claws driven into the metal. Others climbed with hands that seemed to stick to the surface.

Drawing her bow again and again, Kari fired a steady stream of arrows straight downward at them. Shuddering, she tried not to see the hideous monstrosity with eight segmented legs attached to a human torso and head that was crawling up the wall like a spider. When she shot it, it went limp and it’s legs seemed to lose their stickiness, slipping off the wall one by one until it dangled by a single leg that broke off under the weight.

Standing to Kari’s right, Gabriel and Sam leaned over the rail, firing their

weapons at anything close enough to hit. The huge pistols had a lot of power at close range, but were not as effective as the rifles that the soldiers carried at any great distance.

“This is hopeless,” Michael said as Kari let another arrow fly. “We’re never

going to hold out against this!”

Glancing over her shoulder, Kari saw that the soldiers below were in an all out melee against the creatures pouring through the open gate. “You two get down there and help. You’re useless up here.”

Jonathan and Michael gave identical nods as they drew their weapons and stepped to the railing on the courtyard side of the wall.

“After you my good man,” Michael bowed politely, gesturing with one of his

swords.

“No, no,” Jonathan replied with a slightly deeper bow. “I insist.”

“Age before beauty.”

“Oh, I couldn’t.”

With a growl of annoyance, Kari fired the arrow she had drawn and gave each of the twins a hefty kick in the behind, sending them both over the edge. Watching long enough for them to right themselves in the air, Kari turned back to her work, firing arrow after arrow down into the Apostle’s army. The twins hit the ground fighting, anything that got near them died as their blades flashed in the light of the dying sun.

“I’m out of bullets,” Sam growled.

Gabriel pulled a box from an inside pocket of his coat and set it atop the railing between them. “Take as many as you need. Don’t hold back. We need to hold them off until the Apostle gets here.”

“And then I get to go back to the past,” Sam asked hopefully.

“That’s right,” Gabriel answered warmly.

Not sparing any of her concentration to continue eavesdropping, Kari turned her full attention back to the task at hand. Things seemed hopeless. Every time she killed one, seven more seemed to appear in its place. They were getting closer and closer to the top, despite her best efforts. It would not be long before they were fighting atop the wall.

Though Kari was not a coward, she knew when she could not win. The thought

of jumping to the safety of another world briefly crossed her mind. Pushing the thought away, Kari kept her eye out for the Apostle. She was not leaving this world without making her pay for her crimes.

As the overwhelming tide of deformed creatures began reaching the top of the

wall in some places, Kari jabbed her thumb on one of her fangs and quickly drew a symbol for lightning on the railing in front of her. When she was done she slammed her hand down on it, willing the lightning that it described into existence. Bolts struck down from a clear sky, frying anything they touched to char. She could feel some of her strength leech away into it, weakening her, but she saw no other way to deal with so many. As she began drawing another symbol, she was interrupted when several mutants leapt over onto the wall and rushed her.

Reaching for another arrow, Kari found her quiver empty. Drawing her heavy-

bladed knife, she cut the bowstring with a high pitched snap. Jamming the handle of the knife into the carefully crafted metal socket at one end, she twisted sharply, locking it into place. Twirling her heavy-bladed spear over her head, she slashed at the nearest mutant.

Seconds later, she was surrounded and fighting off foe after foe with barely

enough time to breathe between them. Only those directly in her path bothered to attack her. Barely appearing to notice her at all, those that she could not reach began climbing down the other side of the wall.

Hopelessness weighed down on Kari once more. Despite the fact that any mutant that came within her reach died, many more were flowing past and down into the courtyard. Those she killed seemed less intent on fighting, and more intent on getting through. They only cared about getting over the wall.

Though Kari could hear Gabriel and Sam shouting to each other over the howls of the mutant hoard, the soldiers seemed to have all been killed, trampled, or thrown from the wall.

Wondering if killing the Apostle would break whatever control she held over

these things, Kari began searching for her between kills. With mutants pressing in on all sides, her world was very small, and she was unable to spare the attention to looking for things outside of the reach of her spear. The Apostle could have already walked past ten steps away and Kari would have never known it.

Taking a deep breath, she cleared her mind, reaching out with crippled senses.

Though creatures of darkness were supposed to have an affinity toward one another, she’d been born with that sense as good as blinded. Every now and then she could catch glimmers of the things her brothers could feel so easily, but she really had to concentrate, and the middle of a battle was a poor place for concentration. Still, she had to try.