Pantheocide

Chapter Seventy Seven

The Himilheothon Gate, The Eternal City, Heaven

Thirty eight thousand tons. The number echoed through Corporal William Bodie’s mind as he shuffled up to the smaller doors set in the massive Himilheothon Gate. That estimated weight excluded the pearls that studded the wooden structure. Set in the road surface were dozens of curved strips of bronze that provided a path for the wheels at the foot of the Gate. What the ground pressure under the wheels amounted to, Bodie didn’t know and didn’t care. In any case he seriously doubted whether the main gate could be opened. It looked frozen in place from uncounted millennia of static disuse. Only the smaller doors were regularly opened and closed. Through them, a constant stream of second-life humans were entering the city.

The great wall of Heaven loomed over him. A hundred meters high and at least fifty thick. There was no way the track-head and the rest of the armies closing in on The Eternal City were going to get through that. It rather amused Bodie that he and the rest of the team had simply walked through the gate and thus became the first living humans inside The Eternal City. It helped matters, of course, that the Angels had such an appalling idea of security. The Ishim guarding the gate simply gave a wooden marker to each human as he went in and it was collected again as the human left. The whole system was designed to ensure that no human had the temerity to stay inside The Eternal City a moment longer than was necessary for them to pursue their duties. Faced with its first serious challenge, it had failed completely. But then, it had failed when faced by people who were unequalled experts at making security systems fail.

Bodie joined the stream of people passing through the doors, sliding unobtrusively past the Ishim on duty there. This was the point where amateurs always got it wrong. They either overplayed the nonchalant bit or were too obviously trying to avoid detection. The great art was simply to behave the way everybody else did. Anyway, Bodie already had his marker. It was a forgery of course, but that really didn’t matter. Once he was through the gate any challenge would be answered by his forged token and the Ishim would assume that it had been issued normally. All humans looked the same to them anyway.

Once through the gate, Bodie set off for the street edge on the south. He paused slightly to adjust the robe he was wearing and tighten the rope belt that held it in place. That same belt also held his pistol although what use a 9mm Sig-Sauer would be here was arguable at best. Pistol calibers had been ‘redefined’ since the Salvation War had started. Still, the P226 had a nice, comforting bulk to it. He glanced up; the sky still had streaks of dark gray across it. The original sight of heavenly blue skies with just enough small fluffy clouds to provide contrast had gone. When the Yanks popped that nuke, they had changed a lot of things.

The city block he approached was crowded by the standards of The Eternal City. It was mostly the abode of Ishim and they didn’t live in the stately palaces occupied by the higher ranks of angels. The homes here reminded Bodie of the council houses he had grown up in. He took a closer look at the buildings in front of him. Studded with semi-precious stones just as those council houses long ago had pebble-dashed walls. The difference was the level of repair, these so-called palaces had plaster that was scabbing away and paint that was faded and peeling. In places, the wooden lathes that reinforced the plaster were visible. The Eternal City was very old, that much was obvious. The trouble was that in this case, old just meant ‘so much more second-hand.’

Old it might be, and more than slightly run-down, but The Eternal City was still huge. It more than a twenty kilometer walk to the side road Bodie was looking for. Even in the temperate climate of Heaven that was still not something to be taken lightly, especially given the load he was carrying. Eventually, he recognized his turning and took it, heading down an alleyway barely fifty meters across. Here, the stones that embellished the walls were less glittering in their profusion and the signs of neglect and decay were stronger. Occasionally, there were even small areas of rubble on the stone of the streets. Bodie had noticed that, all the legends had said that the streets of the Eternal City were paved with gold but instead, they were a garish bronze-colored marble. Once in a while, the great slabs were cracked. Bodie ignored them; he was too busy counting buildings to worry about the state of the paving. At least that was what he thought until he tripped over one of the cracked slabs and nearly fell flat on his face.

Finally he reached the building the team had chosen. It was a disused temple, one that appeared to have been abandoned after its structural deterioration had reached dangerous proportions. Bodie climbed up the steps, cursing the fact that even the Ishim were a bit larger than humans and that made their steps uncomfortable to climb. Once in the main hall, he caught his breath and made for the rooms at the rear.

“No problems getting in and out then Bodie?” Sergeant Doyle was lazing between two fallen columns, a position that allowed him to watch the only entrance to the hall from a concealed yet comfortable position.

“Like babes in the nursery they are.” Bodie dropped his load with relief. “They’ve got no idea.”

“That’s not surprising lads. They’ve never had any real infiltration efforts to worry about. Not as far as we know anyway.” Captain Greg Crowleigh was also waiting in a concealed overwatch position. Unlike the guards at the City gates, his team never let their guard down. Although, the SAS team was beginning to wonder if the Angels at the Himilheothon Gate guards had ever had their guard up.

“They might have a lot more to worry about now.” Bodie had picked up all the intelligence from the Outside Team on his visit. “There’s Chinese armored recon in the woods outside and a Russian Spetsnaz group. They might be in here as well by now.”

That caused a sudden silence. Crowleigh’s team had never been one of the front-rank SAS sections, not until they had killed the gorgon Lakheenahuknaasi. By an odd quirk of fate that had resulted in them being the first living humans to take up residence in The Eternal City. Killing the gorgon hadn’t lifted them to the top tier of teams but it had put them at the head of the second rank. Only, all the top-tier teams were tied down in Hell trying to get the problems there sorted. So, when this job had come up, Crowleigh and his men had got it. Sometimes things worked in strange ways.

“We’d better be damned careful then. We don’t want to get our wires crossed. Especially since the HEA don’t know we’re here.” That caused another outbreak of silence. This mission was just about as unofficial as it got. One thing that concerned everybody was whether they would get the word in time if it was decided to nuke the city into oblivion.

“Any word on how the HEA plans to get into the city?”

Bodie shook his head. “Rumor mill is working overtime but that wall seems to be chilling everybody. This city is fortified with a capital F. The current story is that the Russians will use gas again.” That remark caused a series of whistles. Everybody remembered what the Russian sarin attack had done at the Phlegethon River.

“Boss, you’d better hear this.” Private James Dempsey had a recording disk in his hand.

Crowleigh turned around, frowning at the interruption. “What is it man?”

“The temple we bugged? Well, there’s just been a meeting in it. The local Ishim were assembled and addressed by an Elohim. The gist of it is that Yahweh is out. Michael-Lan has taken over.”

“What?” Crowleigh was stunned. “A coup?”

“It hasn’t been phrased like that. According to the announcement, Yahweh has been so distressed by the death of his son that he has blamed himself and gone into retreat. Apparently he is meditating on his actions and contemplating the future.”

“Ah, he’s dead then.” Ray Doyle sounded positively chirpy.

“Undoubtedly. But Jesus has been killed as well?” Crowleigh thought for a second then realized there was more message to come. “What else?”

“Anyway, the message is that Yahweh has asked Michael-Lan to take over running Heaven until Yahweh considers himself fit to resume absolute rule. Until then, Michael-Lan has appointed a council of angels to help him rule. The first priority is to bring the war with the humans to an end and restore the ‘natural order of things.”

“We need to get word of this out immediately.” Crowleigh decided that news of this importance had to go directly to Sir Michael Jackson. His orders were to have no contact with HEA headquarters but those orders had never envisaged a situation like this. He shouldered the responsibility for his decision and started the process of getting through to the HEA. In doing so, he and his team finally made it to the top tier of SAS units.

Over The Human Expeditionary Army, Heaven

Raphael-Lan-Michael, now offically in charge of communications as part of the provisional government of Heaven, hoped desperately that he was communicating well enough. While his wings drove him through the air towards the heart of the human army on the ground, his arms were desperately waving the largest white flag he had been able to find. In addition, he was frantically transmitting mental messages of surrender even though he guessed that the metal hats humans now wore would prevent those from being received and understood. Still, better to try it and fail than not try at all. Especially with humans around. Their tendancy to shoot first and shoot with lethal effect had been made all too clear.

Down below, he could see the long snaking columns that were making their way towards The Eternal City. There was no end of them, literally no end as far as he could see. He had adjusted his vision for its longest range but the lines of trucks and armored vehicles seemed to go on forever. The information coming in from the countryside suggested that this was just one of three great armies converging on The Eternal City. The frantic itching in his skin told him that the forces below had seen him and were already locking their weapons on him. Please don’t fire humans, I’m trying to bring peace.

For a moment he thought his pleas had been ignored. Four great bangs had surrounded him and he cringed expecting to feel the lash of iron fragments from the missiles lacerating his body. But, he had been spared that. It was just the crash the human aircraft made when they flew anywhere fast. This group formed up around him, one on each side, one behind, one in front. Then, with him nice and tightly boxed in, they started to change course. Raphael got the feeling he was being herded as if he was a helpless target. Then, he understood, that too the humans that was precisely what he was.

Headquarters, Human Expeditionary Army, Heaven.

“Anyway, we had no women in the army until the late 1960s. There had been, right up to the First World War but when the Germans reorganized us in the 1930s, that was a change they made. Then, the Army found they needed us and started recruiting. I was one of the first few intakes. Of course, they had made no preparations for us at all. None of the things we needed were there and the stores were reluctant to issue the things they had. After all, as the quartermaster said, they are called stores, not issues.”

Petraeus, Jackson and Gillespie all laughed while they refreshed their glasses. Asanee eyed Petraeus carefully, he seemed to be recovering from the depression that had affected him after the nuclear destruction of the previous Angelic army. She topped up her own glass of whisky and resumed.

“They didn’t even have any underwear for us. We had to supply our own and civilian standard stuff didn’t last very long. Eventually, the Army got around to issuing the women soldiers with underwear. Guess what. It was camouflaged, the old tiger stripe pattern. What did they expect us to do? Run around a battlefield in our underwear?” There was another eruption of laughter and she eyed the other generals severely. “First person to say yes will be killed.”

Petraeus wiped the tears of laughter from his eyes. “You think you had problems. One of my men actually shot me on a field exercise. Tripped over and his rifle discharged. I always said there were problems with the lethality of the old 5.56mm.”

“I wouldn’t recommend trying it again now.” Australian General Ken Gillespie sounded concerned. “The. 50 Beowulf SLAP is a lot nastier. My boys prefer the Winchester. 458 though. The Beowulf is a bit short-ranged for them.”

“My general experience,” Petraeus was interrupted by a general groan at the pun. “Is that it is better not to get shot by any kind of bullet.”

“Sirs, Ma’am, apologies for interrupting but we have an urgent message from the 366th Tactical Fighter Wing. Their F-15s just intercepted an angel flying over our front lines. They’re escorting it in to a forward air defense field now.”

“Escorting it in?” Jackson sounded surprised. “Didn’t shoot it out of the sky?”

“It was waving a very large white flag, Sir. The pilots thought it was better to try and bring him in. Sir Michael, there’s a message for you in the British comms center. They’re asking you to go down there to see it.”

Sir Michael Jackson frowned mightily at that. Senior generals did not go running around collecting their own messages. Unless they were very important or very sensitive indeed. “If you’ll excuse me David, Ken, Asanee.” He left hurriedly.

“So, another angel is defecting.” Asanee looked at her glass. “Is it me or is the situation in The Eternal City falling apart?”

“It’s not looking good for them.” Petraeus suddenly looked a lot brighter. The fear of having to blast his way into The Eternal City was beginning to lift.

“General Gillespie Sir,” the communications officer was back. “A message in the Australian section for you. Very sensitive they say.”

“Thank you Captain. If you’ll excuse me David?”

Petraeus nodded. When he had gone, he looked quizzically at the contents of his glass. “Don’t you just hate to be the last person to know what’s going on in your own army?”

“Pretty familiar feeling in ours David. We had a coup once, somebody forgot to tell the commander of a tank battalion what was going on. He arrived for work one day just in time to see the last M41 in his battalion leaving their laager. He ended up chasing them through the streets in a taxi. With Army this big from so many nations, things bound to be screwed up.”

“David,” Sir Michael Jackson was back. “I’ve just had word from our team inside the Eternal City. There’s been a coup in Heaven or so it seems. The message is a little confused but it seems that Yahweh has been deposed and Michael-Lan has replaced him. According to the message, Yahweh has gone into seclusion for a long period of meditation and contemplation.”

“Ah, so Michael killed him.” Asanee nodded wisely. Like all Thai officers, she understood the subtle nuances in the announcements that followed a coup. She’d written more than one of them.

“That’s what our team leader says as well. Anyway, according to the official version, Yahweh asked Michael-Lan to take over in his absence. He’s formed a council of state or something to rule Heaven and he wants to end the war.”

“Do we have any confirmation of this?” Petraeus snapped the words out.

“We do, David.” Gillespie had returned, a big grin dominating his face. “Our team has reported the same thing. More or less. Apparently, there was one hell of a fight in the Ultimate Temple, virtually wrecked the place according to my people. One followed by a very big splash in that lake we’ve all been looking at.”

“Just where are your people?” Jackson sounded envious. The Australian message sounded as if their insert team was close to the city center while his were in the outskirts. “On second thoughts, don’t answer that.”

“And we have an Angel surrendering. This isn’t a coincidence people.” Petraeus turned to his communications panel. “call General Dorokov and General Ti Jen-chieh. Then get through to General James Conway. Tell him to get his Marine Corps task group ready. Major staff meeting coming up as soon as I’ve heard from that angel.”