The Undertakers: End of the World (34 page)

“Yes.”

“Jeez,” I heard Sharyn mutter.

Tom said, “So, you’re here to … what? Bust us out?”

“Unfortunately, no. I don’t have that capability. But when my people learned that you had crossed the Void, apparently intent on somehow destroying the Eternity Stone, I was sent here to mingle with the other builders and offer what help I could.”

Sharyn remarked dryly, “Awesome. So what help
can
you offer?”

“Information,”
Little Bob replied.

“Never a bad thing,” said Tom.

“Okay, then let’s start with the big question,” Helene suggested. “How can we destroy the crystal?”

“You can’t.”

We all looked at him. Then we all looked at each other. Then we all looked back at him again.

He said,
“If it was possible, don’t you think the Fifth Column would have done it by now? The Eternity Stone can be damaged, yes. In fact, the royal caste does so deliberately, carefully chipping at the great crystal when the situation calls for it. This is where Anchor Shards come from. But doing any damage to it
…
any at all
…
requires tremendous energy, energy that the Royals collect by killing members of our lowest castes. Builders like me especially. Often by the thousands or tens of thousands.”

“That’s horrible!” Helene exclaimed.

“That’s life as a
Malum
,”
Little Bob replied.
“For most of us, existence is short and difficult. Only the royal and leader castes live for millennia.”

“Have your people always been here?” Helene asked. “Is this Ether really your home?”

“It is. We’re creatures of the Ether. We have never had a world such as yours. Our bodies, strong as they are, cannot survive in any material dimension. We are made for here, for the spaces between universes.”

“That’s why you couldn’t invade Earth physically,” Tom guessed.

“Yes. Only our Selves can visit material dimensions, and even then we must hide inside native matter.”

“Like corpses,” I said.

“Quite so. In one respect, your bodies are stronger than ours. Here you stand, whole and alive, in our Void. We envy you that ability. It’s one of the reasons why, when life like yours was first discovered, our foremothers declared it evil and worthy of destruction.”

“For your 411,” Sharyn pointed out, “one of our dudes
did
find a way to waste the Eternity Stone!”

“Yes,”
the creature replied.
“Word of this has reached me. But your freezing liquid, while effective against our warrior caste, wouldn’t have harmed the Eternity Stone one bit. A useless and, ultimately, suicidal effort.”

Hearing that slammed me harder than you’d think, given that we hadn’t even managed to hit the crystal with the Binelli. Steadying myself, I said, “No. Not
that
weapon. We’re talking about something else.” Then I described Fore, the electric javelin, and how it could set up a harmonic resonance that would cause the crystal to vibrate faster and faster until it shattered.

Little Bob listened with fascination—and even, I thought, a tiny bit of hope. Then again, how do you read the expression of something that doesn’t have a face?

“Such a weapon has been considered,”
he said.
“But we have no means to make it here in the Ether. Someone in a material world would be required. In fact, we have often considered the possibility of reaching out to such an individual, should the opportunity ever present itself.”

“What kind of opportunity?” Tom asked.

“A Rift,”
Little Bob replied.
“The Fifth Column have no means of opening one, as we have no access to Anchor Shards. Our only hope is an enterprising individual in the material world doing so, either accidentally or deliberately.”

I suddenly thought of Professor Moscova, and his early experiments with the sliver—years in the future.

And then I thought of Enigma.

I wonder
…

Little Bob asked,
“But tell me, where is this
…
Fore?”

I shifted uncomfortably and looked at the girls, who shifted uncomfortably, too. Only Tom stood, as ever, calm and stoic. “We don’t have it with us,” he admitted.

“Then failure is certain,”
the creature pronounced.

“First things first,” the chief said. “Tell us about
bavarak.
You said I was right that, if we win, the Queen will have to let us go.”

“She is not the Queen,”
Little Bob repeated.
“But merely the most despised of the late Queen’s daughters. She is also but one of at least twenty pretenders to the throne, now that our previous ruler has been destroyed. Some of her rivals are among the late Queen’s other children, of which she had many, and the rest are all members of royal clans of similar rank
…
distant relatives.”

“Where are all these other Royals?” Helene asked. “And why is that one out there in charge of the … crowd.”

“She is the only Royal who happened to be on hand when you arrived, and so assumed command over the warrior caste that were already nearby. Our world is vast and her rivals are elsewhere. By now, word of your
…
invasion
…
has surely reached them, and so some will be on their way. But in the meantime, this one has taken advantage of the situation. Undertakers are feared and hated amongst the
Malum
, so defeating you publicly would greatly strengthen her political position. That’s why
bavarak
will occur quickly, immediately, before another Royal can arrive and perhaps usurp her authority over the crowds who come to watch.”

“Fantastic,” I muttered.

“How do y’all take power?” Sharyn asked. “You dudes hold an election or something?”

“No,”
replied the creature.
“The contenders will conspire against each other and vie for support and, when one or two of them feel confident enough of their position, they will begin assassinating the rest, one by one.”

“That’s
also
horrible,” Helene said.

“It is. But it’s been our way since the dawn of our civilization.”

“Sorry to hear it,” said Tom. “But how’s ‘bout we keep our eye on the ball? Will she free us if we win, or won’t she?”

“She will have to,”
Little Bob said.
“You were correct about that. To go back on her word, when given so publicly, would undermine her bid for the throne. The honor of
bavarak
is highly prized among the
Malum
.”

“Good to hear,” I replied.

Then the little guy said,
“But you won’t win.”

Again, we looked at him and then at each other. “Why not?” I asked.

“Because she will call on the
kotha
.”

Sharyn asked, “The …
what
now?”

“The
kotha
are of the warrior caste,”
Little Bob explained.
“But they are bred, as many of the specialty castes are bred, for a very specific purpose. In this case, that purpose is to participate in
bavarak
.”

“Gladiators,” Tom said.

“Your gladiators were simply humans with combat training. The
kotha
are born to be what they are: arena fighters. They are larger and stronger than even the royal caste. They have no fear and no pity, and once ordered to attack, they will keep attacking
…
no matter what happens
…
until their prey is dead.”

“Ouch,” Helene muttered.

“How does it work?” Tom asked, sounding as unflustered as ever. “Will the four of us be put up against four of these
kotha
?”

“The odds in
bavarak
are never one to one,”
Little Bob said, sounding a bit sickened.
“More likely three or four to one. Officially, this is to make the combat more of a spectacle, since
kotha
will often fight each other in their frenzy to reach a shared prey. But the hidden reason is that the Royals can’t risk someone actually winning against them.”

“Crap,” I said.

“Major smelly crap,” Helene added.

The creature nodded its weird head almost sagely.
“Quite so. But to answer your question,
bavarak
is traditionally fought between
kotha
and a single alien champion. You will have to choose amongst yourselves who will go into the arena. But know this: That single warrior fights for all your lives. Upon his or her death, the despised daughter will immediately order the rest of you to be executed.”

Tom nodded. “Okay,” he said matter-of-factly.

“Okay?” I echoed, incredulous. “Chief, we’re in deep trouble!”

“Yeah,” he replied thoughtfully. “We are.”

“I ain’t worried,” Sharyn announced, and I couldn’t help but wonder if she meant it. Then she held up Vader. “I got
this
. So bring ‘em on!”

“A weapon,”
Little Bob mused, his blue eye coming forward to examine the shining sword.
“I’ve heard of such things, but never seen one. They are forbidden here.”

“Yeah, well, we don’t have pinchers at the end of our hands and a hundred teeth in our heads,” I said.

“Yet, you came,”
the creature said.
“Four of you, and without the means necessary to accomplish your goal.”

“We
thought
we had the means,” Helene replied. “The Binelli was supposed to do the job.”

“No, he’s right,” Tom said. “Steve’s freeze gun was cool, but it was a long shot and we all knew it. Without Fore, the odds were stacked against us.”

Little Bob remarked,
“Nevertheless, you risked it. Why?”

I opened my mouth to reply, then closed it again. The little dude had a point. And I had no answer for him, at least nothing more informative than “Undertakers be crazy!”

But the chief, as usual,
did
have an answer. “Because we needed to hit back.”

Little Bob’s blue eye turned toward us.
“I don’t understand.”

“Your kind invaded our world, killed our people, and would have wasted our whole planet if we’d let you. Did you really think we’d forget about you and go on with our lives? How do we know that in … I dunno … thirty years, you won’t regroup and try again, sacrifice another whole mess o’ Builders, pop another Anchor Shard off the Eternity Stone, and punch another hole from here to Earth? The only way to stop you is to trash that crystal. So we came.”

He stepped closer. “But here’s the thing. This time there’s only four of us. But next time there might be forty. And, if they blow it, there might be four hundred, or four thousand. With better weapons. Smarter plans. But, sooner or later, we’re gonna blast that big crystal doorknob of yours into a million useless pieces. ‘Cause we’re human … and
that’s
what happens when you piss us off!”

“I understand,”
Little Bob replied, sounding thoughtful. Then, with his green eye turning back toward us, he said,
“Perhaps our two species aren’t so different after all.”

“Now that’s just nasty!” Helene snapped.

“I meant no insult,”
the creature said.
“I simply suggest that we share the same determination, the same drive to advance our purpose. Your victory against the Queen was more than unexpected. It was unprecedented. Tales told of the exploits of the Undertakers are quickly becoming legend. Already, the ranks of the Fifth Column have grown as more and more of my people, from across all castes
…
or nearly so
…
realize that this terrible path we’ve walked for so long may not be the only path. You have inspired us.”

“Glad to help,” Tom said dryly. “But it don’t do much to improve
our
circumstances.”

“It might,”
Little Bob said.
“But only if you can win
bavarak
. Such an act would be as unprecedented as your winning of the war, and might very well galvanize like-minded
Malum
into open revolt.”

A civil war, I thought. Here in this giant Void in the Ether. Ten-legged monsters against other ten-legged monsters, with the fate of the universe at stake.

“Sounds like a low-budget sci-fi movie,” Helene said.

She’d read my mind.

“But possible,”
Little Bob assured her.

“
If
we win,” said Sharyn and, when she did, I thought I caught something peculiar in the tone of her voice. Her usual bravado wasn’t there. What’s more, when I glanced at her, she wore an odd expression. Not defiant, or even confident. This look was more thoughtful, considerate, as if something was going on between her ears, something she didn’t want to share. At least not yet.

“If you win,”
the creature echoed.
“If not, then the hated daughter will use your defeat to try to swing political power in her direction. As I said,
bavarak
is of considerable cultural importance to my people. Victory or death in the arena is said to be the edict of fate. You
must
be victorious.”

“How can we be?” Tom asked. “If these
kotha
are as bad-ass as you say they are, then what chance have we got?”

For a long time, a really long time, Little Bob didn’t answer. When he finally did, it wasn’t an answer I liked.

“Very little, I’m afraid.”

Champion

Three hours later, the walls came down.

It happened without warning. Suddenly, the roof over our heads began to pull back, starting at its peak and working downward from both sides, as more and more of the tiny
Malum
detached from one another and skittered away.

Once our interview with Little Bob had ended, and not on an optimistic note, Tom had insisted that we all try to rest. So the four of us had stretched out on the hard black Ether that served as our floor and struggled to get as comfortable as possible. I’d even tried to sleep. I really did, remembering the soldier’s rule about stealing rest when you could.

But, in this case, I was just too terrified.

“Looks like time’s up,” Sharyn finally remarked.

Tom stood first. We all followed him. Then, as if sharing the same thought, we turned toward the spot on the back wall where Little Bob had done his talking. But if he was still there, he’d tucked himself in amidst his brothers, and we couldn’t tell him apart from the rest. Besides, what would be the point? He’d helped us all he could.