Chapter 11: Eyewitness

Staff-Sergeant Joseph Friday (Yes, he’s heard ALL the jokes before) paused before the roadblock and wondered for the hundredth time…’What the hell was going on?’ His National Guard unit was mobilized to active duty and shipped upstate to almost the New York/Pennsylvania line and put in charge of the road block on Rt. 6. “Let anyone out, help whomever you can… But If you see something unusual… Report ASAP!” Those were his orders. He helped all the people fleeing the… Whatever… It was worse that when he got called up for Hurricane Ajax three years ago. Then, it was people heading for shelter, just until the storm blew over… This was people leaving! And leaving for good! Some of them told stories when they stopped… UFO’s had landed… A demon was eating people… A suicide cult was killing everyone… Whatever was happening, the bigwigs were pretty concerned about it.

“If this was the only thing going on, I could almost understand it”, he said out loud to himself. “But, there’s that thing on Mars… And the Sphinx… and those bigfoots… Bigfeet?… Sasquatches… Running in this direction… And all the weird weather patterns… The weather control satellites haven’t worked right in days…A drizzle? In the middle of the day? Who would have thought of that happening?” The sound of heavy vehicles approaching drew Staff-Sergeant Friday out of his reverie… Missile Transports? And Tanks? What the HELL were they doing here?” Checking his uniform for neatness and trying to remember all the correct protocols for dealing with the ‘real’ army, Friday wished that he was back in front of his terminal entering payroll records for his ‘real’ job.

A full-blown Colonel got out of the lead Hum-vee and started shouting orders like an old-school drill sergeant. Staff Sergeant Friday continued patrolling the barricade, watching the Colonel out of the corner of his eye and hoping that Flanigan wasn’t sleeping in the command tent again. After the Colonel gave orders to his men, he walked over to Staff Sergeant Friday and returned his salute. “Mr. Friday, you and your unit are hereby ordered to return to Lock Haven Command and await further orders. The refugees that we met on the way talked about this exit-point and the courtesy that they received here. I pass on their ‘thank-you’s' and add my own. If you can have your men out of my way in 30 minutes, I will have another ‘thank-you’ for you. Anything still here after said 30 minutes have passed will acquire numerous tread marks. Have I made myself clear, Staff Sergeant?”

“Yes, Sir!” Staff Sergeant Friday saluted again and spun 180 degrees and sprinted over to his command tent. “Get the hell up, Flanigan! The real army’s here and we got to get the hell out of here. C’mon, get up! Get the truck over here and get everything packed, ASAP!” Friday ran up to the pre-lim barricade/lookout post and ordered the three privates there to start packing. The he got on the radio to Kleig up in the point position and ordered him to fall back and move out as well. Kleig responded that there were three more vehicles coming down the road and that he’d catch a ride with one of them as soon as they got to his position. Friday ran back to his command tent and started helping Flanigan pack their gear. They had everything on the truck when gunfire sounded down the road.  Friday ran up to the barricade and got his binoculars out and started scanning the road. The Colonel was there as well, also scanning the road.

“Sir, It’s probably looters again. It’s the third time today that we’ve had to ‘remind’ people that martial law is in effect.”

“Staff sergeant, you have nine minutes to get your men out of here.”

“But, sir; it’s only looters! And we’ll be out in plenty of time. I just have to wait for my point man and he should be along with… Where are the vehicles? My point mentioned that there were three vehicles coming along the road… Where did they go?”

“Bring the Hazard missiles on line… Have the Abrams II’s deploy along the road… Set up snipers on the right flank… Have my radio patched directly into Lock Haven Command… They want to know EVERYTHING that happens…”

“Sir? Sir? My equipment? Sir?” The Staff Sergeant’s protests went unheard as an Abrams II ground his ‘command tent’ into the ground.

“Colonel! I have positive location on the hostile, sir.”

“Good! Feed the co-ordinates to the targeters. Give the signal for ear-protection.“

“Sirrrrrr.”

“Yes, Mr. Phillips?”

“Sir, the reports are right, sir. It does look like a large wolf or dog, sir. But it’s kinda hazy; even under the satellite enhancement’s, we can’t get a definite picture.”

“What? A dog? What the hell is going on here? You destroyed my equipment to kill a dog?”

Staff Sergeant, I’m only going to say this once… If you aren’t out of my sight in 30 seconds, I will have you shot for disobeying a direct order!”

“You’re kidding me! A dog? You’ll have me shot over a dog?”

“Mr. Phillips, have the MP’s sent up here.” The siren to signal that ear-protection would be needed went off. Everyone, even the Staff Sargent, put headsets on. The first Hazard missiles were launched. The Abrams II’s elevated their barrels for maximum range and fired shortly after. Even through the headsets, the roar was deafening. After all ten Abrams II’s have fired a round and 30 Hazard missiles had been launched, everyone paused for the Colonels next order. The Staff Sergeant tried to fade into the background, watching as the reports came in.

“Sir! First salvo has… Well, I think it’s been destroyed, sir.”

“Think, Mr. Phillips?”

“Sir, I can’t read it by satellite anymore… And AWACS doesn’t show anything… Forward scouts are waiting for the dust to clear… That’s odd… Gomez and Riker’s tracking beacons just went dead… And now Brant’s is dead… Sir, Brant was in visual range…” Everyone lifted their binoculars up and looked down the deserted highway toward the dust cloud left by the first salvo. They saw nothing but rolling dust for a second, then the Elder God walked out of the cloud. Directly toward them.

“Fi…Fii… Fire! Fire Again! Fire!”, the Colonel stuttered. Missiles launched and Abrams II’s barked and another cloud was created. But the Elder God stayed in front of the cloud. The crack of sniper’s bullets could be heard. A LAW anti-tank rocket was launched. Nothing seemed to have any effect on the Elder God. Either it wasn’t affected or it just wasn’t there when the ordinance landed.  The cloud rolled closer and with it the Elder God. Staff Sergeant Friday had long since dropped his binoculars and was running in the other direction. Colonel Jameson crossed himself and thought about his grandchildren. Spotter Phillips looked up from his screens, saw what was coming for them, and fainted. The snipers behind the National Guardsmen’s barricade turned and ran. Just as the Elder God reached the barricade the Sphinx dropped out of the sky unto it’s back!

“We was just about to die.” The Private put his head down and shook it; as if trying to block out the bad memories. He lifted his head up and stared off into the distance, then slid further back into the seat of the hum-vee. The newswriter waited for him to continue. “We was just about to die. That damn beast had torn up the road block and killed five good men. It shrugged off M-1 rounds like they was nothin’. Nothin’! I’d never see anything like it. Back in boot they put on a demonstration for us. One of those new M-1 rounds went clean through a 12 inch think piece of steel. STEEL! And that damn thing acted like the rounds were just rain drops. It did start raining, too! Real rain, like I’d NEVER seen before. The weather sat’s weren’t working… Or that guy messed ‘em up. That Thor guy.”

The reporter interrupts “Thor? When did he show up?”

“I’d better just start at the beginning… We was on routine guard duty; well as routine as it could be under the circumstances… It was just like after Hurricane Ajax a couple years ago… Help the survivors… Prevent looters… Stay on your toes in case the ‘real’ army showed up! They showed up here, too… Fat lotta good it did ‘em… Most of ‘em are dead…”

“Thor? And at the beginning?”, the reporter prods, handing the trooper a cold Pepcokesi.

The Private shook his head again and continued. “I’d went to the back of the staging area to help stow the tents and the rest of our gear ‘cause the real Army was there, actin’ all important. The had missiles and tanks and all sorts of high-tech weapons… Anyway, I heard the siren for ear-protection so I knew something big was gonna happen. I grabbed my ‘muffs and ran back up the front… Then I wished I hadn’t. I saw the thing… The beast… There ain’t no better word for it… It was just a goddamn beast! Anyway, they pumped round after round into it… More like, into the cloud around it, as it kept moving inside the cloud, I guess… Didn’t make a bit of difference, the damn thing tore through the three road block we’d set up like they wasn’t even there! Lumber the size of railroad ties was flying everywhere! It had…, it had just got to the command post that the Army Colonel had set up and it was gonna shoot out those tentacle thingies…”

“Tentacles?”

“Yeah, it had tentacles all over it’s body! It would shoot them out, WITHOUT LOOKING, and skewer some poor guy. Flanigan died that way… Sucked the life right out of him… Them Gods, too… They didn’t all die from the tentacles, but they all died, anyway… Never seen so much blood…”

“The Gods died?”, the reporter asked incredulous.

“Yep, they all died. National Guard. Army. Civilians. Even the Gods. I’ve never seen such a fight, though. The beast was almost upon us, so close we could smell the stench of death on it and see it’s evil, red eyes. Then just as it got ready to start skewering us, the GODDAMN SPHINX fell out of the sky and landed on top of it! The Goddamn Sphinx! I was never so happy to see a cat in my life! It landed on the thing and drove it down into the ground about twenty feet. DIRT FLEW EVERYWHERE! It musta fell from outta orbit to hit like that. That damn thing didn’t like it one bit, neither, just let me tell you that; it was all ready to have some more dinner; namely US; and now the Sphinx was here and had him by the balls!

“Why didn’t it like this ‘Sphinx’?”

“Oh, it was the Sphinx, all right. I’d went to Egypt when I was in school and took the five-dollar tour… It was the Sphinx… I just don’t remember him having wings before… never mind ‘bout that. The Sphinx landed on the beast and drove it deep into the ground. Then the Sphinx flapped his golden wings and flew back up over us, never taking his eyes off the beast. The beast came up out of the ground and made this… noise… Kinda like a roar, but we heard it inside out heads, too. Most everyone still alive threw up when they heard it, donno why… The Sphinx just roared back, louder than hell; we could still hear it even through the sounds muffs. Then these two red BEAMS came out of the Sphinx’s eyes. They was red, but they still seemed brighter than the sun. The damn thing screamed then… in pain… the Sphinx had hurt it… hurt it bad! The Sphinx then landed on the ground next to the hole and turned the eye-beams on again… the thing screamed again but it was different this time… Like it was getting quieter, somehow… Musta been digging even deeper, to get away from the Sphinx… That musta been it! Because the Sphinx kept rooting around at the top of the pit, kinda looking confused… It was digging with those claws… As long as a hum-vee, they were, and throwing dirt everywhere… It was like the beast had disappeared… Then, Oh, my God, then…”

“What happened then?”

“Then the Sphinx died…”

“Died?”

“Yes. It… Died. The damn thing had tunneled underneath him. It erupted out of the ground and started wrapping those tentacles all over the Sphinx. The Sphinx screamed in pain… I’ll hear that scream for the rest of my life whenever I close my eyes. It covered the Sphinx up… The tentacles just kept coming, kept coming out of the ground and wrapping around him. He tried to take off, but the beast had too good a hold by then. He drilled into the ground with his eye beams and hurt it again, but the thing held him tight. Then he shot flames out of his mouth, the Sphinx did… That’s what melted that tank over there… Just melted it ‘ta scrap metal… And I’m pretty sure there were still people in there, too. There were probably already dead before, but they’re certainly dead now. The Sphinx kept trying to dig and pull his way away from the beast but it was all almost covered in tentacles… If only that Thor guy or one of the other Gods had showed up then, they might have had a chance, but none did, not one at a time like that.

“Then what happened to the Sphinx?”

“Then it screamed again... Oh, god…, it screamed again. The beast had come up out of the ground and was right next to the Sphinx, squeezing him hard with those tentacles. I think it cut off the rays of the sun from shining on the Sphinx, that’s what I think. The it started to smoke. The Sphinx, I mean. Started smoking. I don’t know what the beast was doing but, but that what killed the Sphinx. After a while, the tentacles dropped off and the Sphinx just stood there, all burnt up. His wings were almost gone and he was black from the top of his head to the tip of what was left of his tail. The beast nudged him and he toppled over on his side… And just lay there, not moving. Saddest goddamn thing I ever saw.” The Private paused to wipe away a tear that had leaked out and ran down his cheek.

“What do you mean, it would have been better if they had all showed up at once?”

“I don’t know how or why they were coming here, but they all got here one at a time. And they all died one at a time. Thor was next. The Thunder God, ever heard of him? Had the goddamn hammer and everything. It was just like out of my college Mythologies class. He showed up right as the Sphinx landed on it’s side. His chariot was pulled by two goats, Tooth-grinder and Tooth-bender if I remember right… Anyway, his chariot landed and he stepped out and looked at the beast. You could tell he was pissed, too! Never have I seen someone like that. Kinda dressed like a Viking, but he was EIGHT FEET TALL! And not one of those giant guys from pro wrestling, either. You could tell he was ALL MUSCLE! He took two steps toward the beast, before it noticed him. I think the damn thing was going to try and eat the Sphinx or something. Thor started twirling his hammer. Faster. Faster and faster. The damn hammer was going so fast you couldn’t even see it. Smoke was starting to come off it, it was going so fast! The Thor gave a roar, some sort of battle cry or something and he threw the hammer. The beast had looked up at his roar and it took the hammer RIGHT BETWEEN THE EYES! It knocked the beast back almost a mile! Made a sound so loud I thought the earth had split in two.

Then Thor started running after his hammer. We all did, too. The ones left alive, that is. He was running faster than all of us and in mid stride, just like my professor said it would, his hammer snapped back into his hand. He didn’t even look or lose a step, he just kept on running to where the beast was. When we got there, the beast was still shaking its head and walking around stumbling into things. Thor stood and watched it for a second and must be, his pride got the better of him. He should have finished it off then, but he waited a second too long. The damn thing wasn’t hurt as bad as it let on. It knocked over a tree that almost landed on Thor. He jumped back out of the way and dropped to one knee. He had this determined look on his face as he tapped the hammer on the ground. Two taps, I saw it. I remember what the prof had said, so I pulled my jacket up over my head. I was right. It started pouring. There hadn’t been a cloud in the sky before he tapped the first time. After the second one, it was so dark out and raining so hard, you couldn’t see you hand in front of your face.”

“How do you know what happened, if you couldn’t see?”

“The lightning. There was a ton of it. Thor was directing it. He wasn’t letting up this time, either. Every few seconds another bolt would land. They didn’t all hit the beast, but enough did to hurt him some more. The beast kept trying to run away, but the lightning kept landing either on it or right in front of it. I don’t know how he was doing it, the damn thing was moving so fast, but he kept it cornered for almost a minute… Then…”

“Then…?”

“Then the damn thing wised up. It waited for the next paused in the lightning… Thor paused for a second too long and the beast jumped on him… Or right next to him… Damn lightning bolt hit both of them. I don’t think it hurt Thor at all, but it sure startled him… He lost his concentration for a second and the beast was on him. I saw him swing the hammer and break one of the beast’s legs but the tentacles were wrapping him up as he did it. He started screaming as his legs started smoking… It musta been a last ditch effort because he threw the hammer away, then.”

“Threw it away?”

“Yep. Threw it away and then he jammed his arm in the beast mouth. Bravest damn thing I’ve ever seen. Of course, the thing bit off his arm. Blood shot everywhere and Thor screamed again. The beast thought he had won.”

“ I imagine so, if Thor didn’t have his hammer or even his arm!”

“The hammer cam back. Mjollnir, I think it was called. Thor’s father put some magic on it to make it always return to his hand.”

“Did it…?”

“Yep. It hit the beast in the side. Made a sound like watermelon thrown off a bridge. The beast screamed again and started clawing at the hammer. The hammer musta been pinching the hell out of it’s side, but the hammer wouldn’t come off, until…”

“Until?”

“Until… Thor died. We’d kinda forgot about him, what with watching the beast roll around, but when he died, the hammer just fell to the ground.”

“Oh, God…”

“That’s what we thought. We all realized we should have been trying to get the hell out of there instead of just watching. We didn’t know more were going to show up.”

“More? More Gods?”

“Yep. Like I said, if they’d worked together, they still be here but the beast tore them up, one at a time. Mars got here next. He had a quiver slung on his back and it was full of… I donno… they look like spears, but they looked like they were made out of lightning; like he’d somehow made the lightning solid or something. He landed in a chariot, too. After Thor had died, the storm had just died out. Mars jumped a puddle, did I tell you he was eight to nine feet tall, too, and he got in position to attack the beast. The beast musta been feeling pretty good now; it had won two hard battles, but it was hurt, too.

It tried charging Mars, but it couldn’t run on its broken leg. Mars must have noticed because he launched the first spear right at the leg. It flew just like the lightning it resembled and drove clean through the beast’s leg. The beast screamed again and rolled over on its side, pawing at the spear. Mars didn’t get any closer, he just waited for the beast to give him a good target. He put another spear in almost the same wound as the first one. The beast’s tentacles were trying to pull the spears out but they couldn’t get a grip on ‘em. Mars aimed another and put one in the beast’s eye. The thing flipped over on it’s back and screamed in pain. Someone, a civilian, I think, let out a cheer. Mars smiled but never took his eyes off the beast. He stuck another spear in the same socket, then…”

“Every time you say ‘then’ it means something bad is gonna happen.”

“That’s right. He musta got cocky or something. The beast waved its paw up over it’s face, the one with the spears in it, and Mars tried to pin the paw to the eye socket with another spear.”

“I take it that didn’t work.”

“Nope. It hit one of the spears already stuck in the thing’s leg. The spear fell to the ground in front of the beast. In a flash the beast picked it up with it’s good leg and threw it back at Mars. I think it threw the spear even faster than Mars had been throwin’ ‘em. Caught him completely off guard. Stuck him right through the chest. He was probably dead before he hit the ground. He fell real slowly with a look of shock on his face. One of the surviving medics ran over to try and help him but we all knew it was too late.” When he died, the spears turned to metal poles and the beast pulled them out easily.”

“ I bet you got out of there then.”

“Actually that’s when the Government tried again. Good ol’ U S of A! I never saw them hiding in the woods. They had to be crack special ops troops, too. All in full battle armor that had some sort of optic scramblers on ‘em. Your eye wanted to slide off of ‘em every time you saw one of them. They had some sort of plan worked out. Four or five started hitting it with heavy weapons, some further back opened up with a mounted laser, but that was all a diversion for the troops in back. Two guys tried to run up behind the thing and put some sort of device on it.”

“What sort of device?”

“Probably a nuclear bomb or something. The beast didn’t even pause. It had just destroyed three mystical beings… What were mere humans going to do? The weapons didn’t hurt it at all and anyone that got too close, got tentacled. It would stick one of them right through the armor and drag ‘em in close. It could see ‘em, somehow. Each time it got one in close, it would lift the body up to it’s mouth and… I guess feed is the best word for it.”

“Gross.”

“You got it. But not as gross as what happened next.”

“I don’t think that thing could do anything worse.”

“It didn’t.”

“Huh?”

“All the specials ops guys were, was just a diversion. Whoever came up with the plan, had them all set up to be killed. He had them in way too close. Damn government!”

“A diversion?”

“Yep. All they did by dying for their country was lure the beast back into the open. As soon as it got clear of the trees, the laser from space shot down. I’m still blinking away the sight of that. Damn thing probably blinded me in part of my eyes.”

“A laser? From space?”

“I guess that’s what it was. Musta been one of those hush-hush secret projects that everyone know the government has, but they refuse to admit anything about.”

“Did it have any affect on the beast?”

“Yes, actually it did. He kinda froze in his tracks and seemed to be shrinking, like the beam was boiling him away or something. Maybe, because it was highly concentrated light and the creature was something from somewhere dark and evil, they were canceling each other out.”

“So they killed it?”

“Nope.”

“Nope? You mean it’s still alive? Where? We should get the hell out of here!”

“Hold your horses. It’s hurt. Hurt bad. It’s gone to wherever it goes during the day to heal up. The laser almost killed it, but then Shiva showed up and put the real whammy on it!”

“Why didn’t the laser kill it? It sounded like it was working pretty good.”

“It was. It just kinda… stopped. I bet some five cent part wore out or…”

“Or?”

“Or someone in the government decided the beast would be a better weapon than anything they had… and they turned the laser off and are going to try and capture it.”

“Damn fools!”

“I’ll say! No one in their right mind would want to be on the same planet with that thing. I mean, even the gods were getting killed by it.”

“You said ‘Shiva’?”

“Yep. The wind started blowing while the laser was blastin’. The wind kept getting stronger and stronger. Then a tornado appeared on the horizon. The new kid on the squad was from Kansas. He started screaming and crawled under a tank. He knew what a tornado could do… The rest of us were dumbfounded. I mean, after all we’d seen today already’ a tornado didn’t have any effect at all.”

“What did the tornado do?”

“It came directly toward us. When it got close, everyone was holding on to something to keep from being blown away. Sounded like a goddamn train. Then it touched ground right in front of the beast.”

“It’s too bad it didn’t suck it up and drop it in the ocean or something.”

“No. It wasn’t an ordinary tornado. It’s how Shiva got here. When the tornado touched down the winds started lessening. Soon, they stopped altogether. Where the tornado had landed, Shiva stood there. Now that guy was almost a monster himself, let me tell ya! He musta been twelve feet tall and his skin was a dark blue color. And he looked… Mean, I guess is the best word. He just stood there staring at the beast. The wind from the tornado had blown away all the burnt skin and the beast was all pink and ugly looking. The burnt skin had turned to maggots and was crawling back to the beast. Shiva started doing this… Dance is the best word for it… Waving the swords all around…”

“Swords?”

“Yes, he had eight swords.”

“Eight?”

“Yep. One in each hand. He had eight o’ those too! I told ya he looked kinda like a monster. Anyway, he started waving the swords all around… It was almost hypnotic in a way. The beast seemed to be going to sleep. Shiva was chanting, too. As he was waving the swords around, every so often he would take a step. Towards the beast. Closer and closer he got. Waving them swords so fast you couldn’t even see ‘em. And chanting load enough to wake the dead. We could hear it through the ‘muffs; he was yelling so loud. Musta been magic in his voice. And in the way he was dancing. It all looked hypnotic. I don’t remember a lot of the dance… It’s all kinda blurry in my mind…”

“But, you do remember that he was dancing?”

“Oh, yeah! It was beautiful in a way. I’d seen lots of weird things today and that was really something to see.”

“What happened?”

“Shiva danced right up to where the beast was standing; his arms were moving so fast they looked like hummingbird’s wings. Then he changed the pattern of his dance and the swords started slicing into the demon. Sounded like a circular saw that was stuck on a knot, just a real ugly sound. We all thought the demon was just gonna stand there an take it, but no. It was dancing, too. As Shiva cut into it, we could see the thing’s legs pumping up and down. It musta been doing it’s own magic dance right back at Shiva. He was cutting and cutting and the blood was flying everywhere. The beast had all four legs up off the ground, it was being held up by it’s tentacles. The feet were pounding the ground and pounding the ground. Then… That’s right, there’s another one of those ‘bad’ then’s…”

“I figured as much.”

“Then the Earth caved in. Shiva and the beast both fell into the hole. Neither one of ‘em came out. We heard a scream and one of Shiva’s sword flew up out of the ground and is stuck in that tree over there.”

“Kinda looks like Excalibur, the way everyone lined up to try and pull it out.”

“Yeah, but Excalibur was magic and that’s just a regular sword. C’mere and look at this…”

The Private gets out of the Hum-vee and walks around to the back. A tarp is laying on the ground. The private looks around quickly to see if anyone else is watching, then slides the tarp aside with his foot. “Is that what I think it is?” asks the reporter.

“Yep. That’s Mjollnir. Wanna try and pick it up?”

“I thought only a ‘worthy’ person could pick it up?”

“You DO know some mythology, don’t you! Well, I tried to pick it up. Go ahead, give it a try.” The reporter gets down on one knee and gingerly wraps his hand around the handle. With a show of nonchalance, he tries to stand back up and almost throws his back out because the hammer never budges. “Yep, same thing happened to me when I tried.”

“How come we can’t lift it? I thought Thor was dead.”

“He is. And I think the reason we can’t lift it is because Odin is still alive. And I bet he’s majorly pissed, now.

Continued in War of the Blood Gods #11

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