Life-After (30 page)

Kyle let go of me and ran to Kim’s aid. I turned around to see her lying on the ground, a gaping wound in her chest. Kyle fell to his knees and lifted Kim from the ground. He held Kim in his arms rocking back and forth, shaking. In the distance I could see two more suits approaching them.

“
Kyle, come on!” I screamed. “We can fix this!”

I ran toward Kyle. He picked up his weapon and pointed it at me. I stopped and stared at him. There was a look in his eyes I had not seen since the alien attack. He took his arm from around Kim’s waist and reached for his chest. I knew exactly what he was doing. He pulled the master pin connected to his remaining grenades. His look was the same as mine when I knew everything I loved was lost. Kyle turned the gun on the suits and began firing. They returned fire this time with deadly precision. The blasts tore through Kyle’s body. I could do nothing, not even scream. His body fell backwards to the ground. The pin fell from his fingers.

“
David…” Flag called to me. “There’s nothing you can do. We have to go.”

I turned and ran toward the elevator; the explosion pushed me forward knocking me to the floor. Clara reached out pulling me into the elevator. I turned around to see the hallway had collapsed. Kyle did not want to leave the love of his life behind. He sacrificed himself to allow us to escape. As the elevator doors closed I realized Flag was wrong. There was something I could do. I closed my eyes and thanked him.

The elevator sped downwards. I sat on the floor of the elevator with my back against Clara’s knees. There was silence for a moment and I thought about the second anomaly that appeared. I was beginning to doubt everything we were doing.

“
What was that back there?” I asked Flag returning to my feet. “Tell me!”

“
I…” Flag stuttered. “I don’t know. I believe it was another opening, another gateway, but…”

I turned away from Flag toward the elevator door looking at my reflection. I closed my eyes and could see Kim and Kyle lying on the ground dead. The rage was returning, building up inside me. I had only known them for a few moments, but their death still affected me. I slammed my fist against the elevator door. Clara reached out to touch me, but I turned motioning to her to stop.

“
That’s not good enough, Flag.” I said. “What we are about to do. You said you have been planning since you arrived. Everyone is dead and now we discover Richard can open a gateway to us?”

“
We don’t know that.” Flag exclaimed. “I felt it to, David. There was something inside the anomaly, but we don’t know if it was Richard. As I said, I believe we are within the Life stream, the central point for all converging realities. It is possible, as I stated before, that we are not the only ones fighting against Richard.”

I had not had time to think much about what Flag had theorized. He was correct that if I was somehow accessing different dimensions and that there were others working on similar plans against Richard. Then it was possible another version of me or Flag was responsible for opening the tear. The energy that came through, however, caused pain when it hit me. I believed that perhaps it was incompatible which would have explained the static-like feeling.

Flag held on tightly to the crystal. I knew we were at the point of no return. Either Flag would be correct and we succeed or we were all misled and all realities would come to an end.

“
Their deaths won’t be in vain.” Clara said. “I know we will end this.”

“
Yes.” I said taking Clara’s hand. “We will.”

The elevator came to a stop. As the doors opened I could feel the energy pouring out from behind them. A long dark hallway stretched out before us. At the end of the hallway I could see a bright flashing light. Clara, Flag and I walked forward toward the light. The imagery was not lost on me. It reminded me of the beginning. The dark void and then the bright light leading me to Clara or who I thought was Clara.

The room was spherical in shape. A dome-like ceiling was reinforced with a metal I had never seen before. It was an onyx color, but reflected the light from the room. The anomaly sat in the center of the room on a raised platform. A single narrow catwalk led to the platform. A railed walkway surrounded it. Two metal arches crisscrossed around the anomaly. As series of cameras and sensory devices were placed around the room on the adjacent walls, but there were no computer stations or other equipment anywhere to be found.

The anomaly was about ten feet high and three feet wide. The light pulsating from within was bright and yet soft on the eyes. I could feel the energy flowing from it, but it did not cause any pain or discomfort. In fact, if felt as if it were healing me. Not just my physical injuries, but the mental and emotion ones as well. A peaceful calm came over me the closer we came to the light. I wanted nothing more than to step into it.

“
This was to be my life’s work.” Flag began. “Though I was fascinated with the theory of life energy it was the discovery of this gateway that I felt held untold potential. To be able to travel to alternate worlds and see the differences in history, science and technology…”

Flag went silent. When he spoke about the anomaly his eyes brightened like a proud parent talking about their child. I realized what brought out the emotion, the passion in Flag. I also realized by him going silent and his face returning to the cold scientist I had known, that he knew that if we succeeded in our mission any hope of continuing his research would be forever lost.

“
We have to stop Richard.” I said to Flag. “Nothing else matters.”

“
Of course...” Flag whispered. “You are right. Once we detonate the device it will not only close the gateway Richard has opened, but all gateways to and from the Life Stream. The combined energy will destabilize the entire area. No one will ever be able to open a gateway to here again. This means once we return, we will be trapped here, forever.”

Flag slowly approached the platform holding the crystal. He climbed the first stair and placed the crystal on the second step just below the anomaly. The crystal began to glow as tiny streams of energy flowed from the tear into it. He turned back toward Clara and I with a saddened look on his face.

“
There is something you should know before we proceed.” Flag began. “My knowledge on the anomaly did not just come from my own experiments and my father’s research. When I arrived here and found this place I came down here. I wanted to see if the anomaly was here and when I found it I believed it was a way out. I stepped into it and could feel the follow of energy and the power it contained. I felt more than one presence within and realized I could not go any further alone. I exited the anomaly, but I brought something back with me.

My understanding of the anomaly was different. It was as if it spoke to me. It was a transfer of information. Data can be transmitted through energy and since we are merely vessels of energy I understood that data could be transmitted and received by my body. I took into account that this information could be misleading. However, it was not raw knowledge I received, but awareness. It opened my mind and allowed me to create this device we are about to use. With that said, I did take a precaution.”

I had worried that perhaps everything that had happened no matter how elaborate was nothing more than steps to lead us exactly where Richard wanted. The fake Clara told me she could stabilize my life energy by giving some of her own to me. I realized that could be a form of control. Like placing a computer chip in a machine Richard could have imprinted himself into each and every one of us. In the end I realized it did not matter. One way or another, the nightmare had to end.

“
What precaution?” Clara asked.

“
The crystal will detonate, no matter what happens.” Flag answered. “While it would be much more powerful with David’s life energy it will have absorbed enough of the gateways energy to be viable. If this is a trap set by Richard I will throw the crystal back into the gateway. There it will quickly overload and explode. This will not only destroy the gateway, but the Life Stream itself.”

Flag knew much more about the gateway and the Life Stream than he had told us. He was well aware that from the start it was a great possibility that we were all being manipulated. There was no need to ask him the how or why. I just knew he already had the answer and I had no problem with it.

“
Destroy the Life steam?” Clara gasped. “But, if the Life Stream is the afterlife for all existence than that is what you will be destroying? What effect will that have on the universe? How do you know you will not destroy everything?”

“
I apologize. I was not clear.” Flag continued. “Energy cannot be destroyed. What will occur is all the energy within the Life stream will change. Life energy is the force behind all creation. However, sentient life energy is not needed to continue feeding the universe. Richard requires sentient life energy. When the crystal detonates within the Life stream it will erase the consciousness of the life energy. Our individuality will be destroyed and the life energy within will return to its most basic state. With this done Richard will become powerless.”

Clara looked at me expecting a response, but I understood Flag’s reasoning. We were prepared to erase countless souls to prevent them from falling into the hands of evil. To Clara, it was like murdering a child to prevent it from ever knowing the pain that life could cause. To me, it was putting a fatally wounded soldier out of their misery. There was no telling what Richard could do if he was able to absorb the energy from the Life Stream. Both Flag and I were not prepared to that find out.

I took Clara’s hand and approached Flag. The crystal was glowing brightly. I bent over picking it up with my free hand. I could feel the energy within it. There was a warm glow from it that resonated through my body.

“
We know the outcome we want.” I began. “But I know too well that you have to plan for and sometimes expect the worse. I understand now why you pulled me from that other dimension, Clara. I believe happiness and truth go hand in hand. Living a lie is not living at all. If we can’t kill Richard then the least we can do is free everyone within from his nightmare.”

Flag nodded slowly in silent agreement. Clara wrapped her arms around me. I closed my eyes to savor the moment. When I opened them I could see Clara was crying. Her tears shimmered in the light. I lifted my hand to her right cheek and brushed a tear away.

“
I don’t care what dimension or reality I am from.” Clara said. “I love you, David, the ‘you’ who is standing before me right now. I know this, here, is real and this is what matters to me. If this is our end then so be it, but I wanted you to know how I feel.”

With a kiss she said goodbye. I looked in her eyes one last time.

“
I love you too.” I said. “I always have.”

Clara held my hand tightly as we stepped into the light. As I was bathed in it I felt more powerful than I ever had before. For a moment I could feel the souls of everyone within the Life stream and had access to eons of knowledge. My physical body melted away and I became pure energy streaking across time and space. All feeling faded from me as I became one with the Life stream and prepared to meet the being behind my torment.

I began to feel the others pull away from me. Then I realized it was I who was being pulled away. The feeling of having a physical body slowly began to return to me. The soft white light became cold, thick and heavy. I came to a stop and hovered helplessly in space. I could see nothing but a dark void all around me. I could not move or speak.

In the distance I could see a deep red light. It was traveling towards me. I could feel the power coming from it, but I could not tell if it was a friend or foe. I was helpless as it drew closer to me. Soon I could make out it was a single sphere of light, perfectly circular with a solid consistency and steady glow. It hovered in space just a few feet in front of me. Then I could feel something else. It was reaching out to me, to my mind trying to communicate with me.

“
The others have failed.”

The voice was unfamiliar, male, deep, commanding. The sound echoed around me vibrating though my body and into my mind. While its voice sounded perfectly human I knew the sound did not come from human vocal cords. What it spoke was only a small part of its communication to me. I could feel its energy seeping into me. It was feeding me information.

“
What others.” I asked. “Who are you?”

“
I have no name.” The entity replied. “You are the last of those tasked to free me. If you fail your worlds will be lost.”

I did not understand what it meant. My first thought was that it was Richard. There was no one else that I would need to free. It said there were others tasked with freeing it. This made me believe that everything was set in motion as if we were all called upon, but that did not make sense. I did not know if stating that my worlds would be lost meant my planet or all realities and somehow I felt I would not have time to have all my questions answered.

“
I am not here to free anyone.” I said. “I am here to kill Richard.”

“
Your path was corrupted.” The entity began. “Your instructions were not fully received. The one you call Richard cannot be destroyed by your kind. You must free me. As this is your task, mine is to destroy the one you call Richard.”

I had believed that I was special, if not in life then in death. I was lead to believe that my abilities, my power was meant to kill Richard. I always had a doubt that we would be able to defeat someone who was as powerful as we believed Richard was. Now, an unknown presence was telling me that not only had others who tried failed, but that what I thought my mission was, was wrong.