Ragnarok

EPILOGUE

Endgame Headquarters, White Mountains, NH

14 December, 1430 Hrs

Snow fell heavily outside the immense open hangar door of the Endgame base, hidden under the large rocky face of Mount Tecumseh, in the White Mountains. King drove a black Humvee into the large hangar and parked it next to a Black Hawk helicopter that sat dormant, its rotor blades strapped down lengthwise along the vehicle with nylon webbing to metal rings sunk into the gray concrete floor.

He climbed out of the driver’s seat, and Asya stepped out on the other side of the vehicle. Before they had fully emerged, the massive metal door that retracted into the ceiling of rock above the doorway began to lower. Soldiers in white battle gear operated a newly installed guard shack that had a door leading from a shack on the inside of the hangar to an identical shack on the outside, adjacent to the massive door.

Some of Deep Blue’s new White security team. King knew they were top-notch soldiers from Fort Drum, just like their predecessors had been. He just hadn’t taken the time to get to know any of them. If they lived long enough, he knew he would. The only thing he knew about them was that Deep Blue had foregone the Chess-themed numbering and hired ten men to be security members, where previously they had numbered only five.

There was a lot to think about and process in the wake of the assault, which had hit the team hard, but the world even harder. Millions were dead or missing. Cities were destroyed or simply gone. The world economy was in turmoil. The silver lining was that most governments recognized that the threat was not of this Earth and threatened every nation. The damage was extensive, but governments were entering a new phase of cooperation as they lent aid, rebuilt and prepared to fight global threats as a unified force rather than as separate nations. King wasn’t naive, though. There would be some who deviated from the plan. Over time, alliances would fade. Greed would divide nations. Eventually, without a second attack, the world’s governments would be back to fighting each other.

Despite all of that, King had only one focus right now: finding his parents. He and Asya had been hard at it for weeks, tracking down every lead. Asya had been temporarily given the callsign: Hammer for the mission, which began as a joke with Queen referencing how well Asya had fought in Norway, and also referring to the symbol from the old Soviet flag. Asya liked it.

They were a natural team and bonded quickly. Asya reminded King of his mother and he of her father. They swapped childhood stories, marveling at how their parents had led double lives, in two countries. And for the first time in his life, King knew where his father had really been during the ten years he’d been missing. Asya had also become fast friends with Sara and enjoyed being called “Auntie Asya” by Fiona, who also enjoyed rubbing in the fact that the women in King’s life now outnumbered him three to one.

As King and Asya headed down the hallway toward the main computer lab to check in with Deep Blue, they came across Rook and Queen, heading the other way. Rook was dressed in shorts and tennis shoes, with a rock t-shirt that read Primal Puppy Dogs on the front and showed a silhouette of a medium-sized dog, lifting its leg and urinating on a guitar leaning against an amplifier. As a native of New Hampshire, things like winter didn’t faze him. Even when they would go outdoors to local restaurants as a group, Rook wore shorts year-round. Over his t-shirt, he wore his arm in a blue medical sling. His shoulder would still need a few more weeks to recover from the surgery he had undergone to repair his rotator cuff.

Queen wore tight-fitting jeans and a loose navy sweater that accentuated her lithe physique. She also wore a black pneumatic medical fracture boot on her ankle that allowed her to walk short distances while her ankle healed. Her right hand was in a blue cast from the fingers to just beyond her wrist.

King noticed that she held Rook’s hand with her left hand as they approached, and they were not shy about it. He smiled at them. “How’s it going?”

“Pretty good,” Rook said. “Together we make one function- ing human body.” Queen elbowed him in the rib, and he smiled broadly at King and Asya.

“I never did ask you, Rook,” King said, a grin forming, “That plan we discussed on the Crescent, while we were on the other side.”

Rook’s eyes widened with a look of Shut-up, King!

“How’d that work out for you?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know,” Rook said.

“What’s he talking about?” Queen asked.

“Nevermind him, Zel.” Rook tried to lead her away.

“Oh, ma puce,” Queen said, “Are you afraid I’ll learn about your plan to save the world and get in my pants?”

Rook laughed and shouted, “You told her! You son-of-a-”

Just then, Deep Blue came rushing around the corner of the corridor from the direction of the computer lab. “Been waiting for you to get back,” he said looking at King, then he turned to Rook and Queen. “You two should hear this as well.”

He was holding a piece of old-looking, yellowed parchment in his hand. He gave it to King, and King read aloud:

You handled Fenrir well.

I needed the laptop, so I helped myself.

Don’t pursue the issue. Peter and Lynn have enjoyed my hospitality so far but if you push, King…

The note was signed with a symbol King had seen before: a circle with two vertical lines through it, making a stylized letter H.

It was the symbol for the mysterious Herculean Society, a group that controlled and altered the historical record to hide the truth of past events. But it was also used as the signature for the group’s leader, Alexander Diotrophes.

Hercules.

Previously the man had assisted Chess Team during the Hydra affair-after all, he was the one that had dealt with the Hydra in ancient times. He had rescued Fiona from the massacre at her reservation in Oregon and delivered her to King for safekeeping. Then the man had even been an active ally in the fight against Richard Ridley and his Machiavellian schemes.

“The laptop?” King asked. "What laptop?"

Deep Blue looked to the floor, lost in thought for a moment. “Before we bugged out of Fenris Kystby, Lew was able to access the servers wirelessly. He download three terabytes of data covering nearly seventy years of failed experiments: the dire wolf hybrids, as well as personnel files, notes, photos, security logs- everything — including the schematics and very detailed plans on how to build the portal device.”

"Why haven't I heard of this until now?" King asked, doing nothing to hide his ruffled feathers.

"Lew hadn't decrypted the files until this morning," Deep Blue answered. "You were going to be briefed later today."

"But now we've lost everything?"

Deep Blue shook his head, no. "Lew transferred the files to our servers, but the information was never deleted from the laptop. How Alexander could have known about the laptop or that it contained anything worthwhile is beyond me. But now he has it. And I have no idea how he could have gotten past our security. It’s been significantly beefed up since the GenY incursion. And…” Deep Blue paused for a second, shaking his head as if he couldn’t imagine how it was done. “I was looking at the laptop two days ago, before I put it back in the safe. The base has been fully populated since then. Everyone was here. He walked right past all of us and got out again unnoticed.”

King scowled. He had known that Alexander was a tenuous ally from the start, but now the man had stepped over the line. Immortal or not, demigod or not, he had infiltrated their headquarters, stolen hard-earned intel and abducted King’s parents.

He had just declared himself an enemy of Endgame and the Machtcenko family.

Asya snatched the paper from King’s hand and read it. “Who is this man?”

“His name is Alexander-you might have heard of him being called Hercules-and I think I’m going to have to kill him.”