The war-room buzzed with activity. The first volley had been struck, signaling the beginning of Telpolemo, the final war.
But Papa Omega was not happy. He had sensed in the days proceeding this, that things were aligning for him and his mistress the great She. But there were too many loose ends to tie.
His war room was situated in a flying machine named Tefra, which currently hovered somewhere between the upper atmosphere of the Earth and Venus in the thick energies of empty space.
“Why do they fight against nature?” Papa Omega complained loudly, as he attempted in vein to communicate with the Harbinger.
“It’s because they arrived so late in the game Papa. They feel robbed,” Thermiatos responded lazily, waving a dismissive hand at her colleague, with whom she had worked since the very beginning of all things.
“She won’t be happy that they continue to resist. It is so unnatural.”
“They’re just scared. And let’s face it Pa, She’s never happy. If it’s not the end, it’s the beginning. If it’s not the beginning it’s the end. Pick a damn lane I say.”
“You would do to watch your language. If She ever heard you say that, She would dismantle you piece by piece.”
“You underestimate them. They are just like us Papa.”
“They are nothing like us. And they have no place in the next iteration.”
“And you do Pa? Are you that certain of this promise, that you would so quickly end all of it?”
“You have me questioning your allegiance Thermia?”
At this Thermia laughed.
“I have as much doubt as anyone. Including you. But you have my allegiance because I was made to give it to you. I remain the mother of the cold. I welcome the darkness of the Universe. It’s what I crave - it’s in my DNA. I don’t care about the next iteration, but if there is one, I’ll be there. Every beginning has an end, as the children of the Universe often say. But just because I long for it, doesn’t mean I can’t understand what it means to want the opposite.”
“You’re annoying me Thermia.”
As he tapped commands into his terminal, a series of buzzes signalled a failure of the command to initiate. The Harbinger had stopped responding.
“Can’t your animal listen when it’s told what to do?”
She laughed again, but this time a hint of anger permeated the confected joy.
“The Harbinger isn’t my animal. It wants so desperately to end its misery that it will do anything She wants – if it would bring its end about. Be thankful it agreed to help us. It may be just what we need to finally stop the clocks.”
He punched in a series of commands, but again nothing seemed to happen.
“This machine and that animal are taking me beyond my limits.”
“Oh hold on you old bore.”
She held out one hand, into which a staff composed entirely of dark and anti-matter fizzed into existence. A jumble and dance of particles colliding with their opposite lit the room brightly.
“Harbinger. Do you heed me?”
“Mistress of the darkness, keeper of the distance between atoms, dark-energy animate, emissary of the cosmic winter I hear your call.”
“Harbinger, please just call me Thermia. Listen friend, we had a deal. Are you going to risk eternity when we are so close to the end?”
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There was a pause.
“But they are children Mistress.”
“That they are. But no one will be spared at the coming of the end. Not man or beast. Not even children.”
She held the staff horizontally above her, and it glowed more fiercely than before, causing all in the vicinity to stop what they were doing and stare up at her magnificence. She spoke something into the air, which was drowned out by the sound of the magic exploding around her.
The Harbinger could suddenly see in its mind – which it housed in the swirling miasma of its cloud like form – the end of all things. Thermia demonstrated to the Harbinger the glorious peace that was possible in its end should it choose to take it. It was and end just tantalisingly out of reach. This is what the Harbinger longed for more than anything. This is why it had agreed to this terrible task.
This time, there was no quarter for the children of the school of Stuff Magique. The Harbinger delivered a series of lightning strikes, which grew more frequent and more destructive with each passing moment. And with its deadly magic, now fully unleashed, the Harbinger carved up the school before anyone on the ground could react. And as they ran, in terror, or in fear of being crushed, the students were picked off one by one, and set to Shrieking. The Harbinger ate their delicious souls, and it filled the great beast with a special misery.
The Harbinger knew, that none of the souls it ate that day was the one his Mistress had hoped for. And he would not tell them.
“There,” Thermiatos said, returning the staff into the ether. “Are you happy now Papa?”
“My happiness has nothing to do with it Witch.”
“You could have fooled me old man.”
“You should be more concerned that Prostasia is waking, and Dr Alpha will soon follow. We keep losing this battle. But this time we have the upper hand.”
Thermia sighed. “Now that’s, at the very least, a fight I am looking forward to!”
“You make me laugh child. Prostasia would cook you off like a puddle in the summer sun. You’ll need more than a fancy glowing stick to take her on. And she’s rested up.”
“Oh and you could do better than me could you?”
“Negentropy is a parlour trick. I’m the fingers that click before the end.”
“Ohh…I’m quaking Papa. Then click your silly arthritic fingers and end it all. You know what Papa, there was a time you were a little more humble about these things. And if you truly understood Her you would know why we’ve been so unsuccessful.”
“Bah. Don’t you have some atoms or heat or whatever the hell, to disperse into the Universe –trifling girl.”
“Why she ever gave you form I’ll never know.”
And with the Thermia collapsed into a stream of matter, and disappeared into the ship. She needed to rest a while.
“Parchigo, has the one survived the onslaught?” Papa Omega called to his second in command.
Parchigo stood over the Crystal pithanotia, a dome of quantum energy. It was a machine designed by She herself to divine the probabilities of the existence of a fact. Parchigo inputed the command with his mind, and what returned he knew would anger his patron.
“My Lord Omega,” he said his hand floating above the Crystal. “There is nothing. It’s as though he never was.”
Parchigo braced himself.
But Papa was too distracted to be angry with his second in command. He knew that there was only one reason he should not be able to detect a life in peril…why there was no boy to detect.
“It seems we will have to get our hands dirty Parchigo. Prepare the All-Ship Tefra to enter Earth’s atmosphere. We are called upon to visit old friends.”
“Yes your Holy Decrepitude. You heard him you mugs! Prepare for Hard entry into Earth’s waiting arms. This is the Telpolemo, This is Her Ending. If you are scared - you are right to be. If you are not, then I’ll make you! We have but one mission!”
Papa left the Command room, and made his way to his chambers. He would commune with the Universe tonight. But before then, he would speak with Her.
The Boy had always been a feature of the end. A different boy each time, and each time they had failed to bring about the end. There was nothing more to do but persist in the face of adversity. But still, he pondered, when would the end really come?
The door to his chambers opened, and he stepped inside.
“Oh,” he said, surprised to see the outline of a boy standing at the centre of the room.
“Apetche, my boy. It’s been an eternity.”
Apetche’s form was unstable, and moved like the ripples of water in pond.
“You think it’s your time Papa. You believe that this is the version that delivers the natural end.”
“Yes, I feel it in my bones.”
“The outcome is on a knife’s edge. But it tilts your way. The shadow obscures the light dear Papa.”
“Is it the closest we’ve been my boy?”
“Yes Papa. You can tell your Master that the one who is like me lingers. And though he has friends, he is alone.”
Papa poured himself a glass of Tzin and drank from it.
“She is not my Master. She is the inevitable.”
Apetche’s form vanished as quickly as it had appeared leaving Papa Omega to consider the apparition’s words.
A knife’s edge…Bah! He thought. Not this time. The Shadow would engulf all of creation and that would finally be that. He would go to Earth and find this boy himself. There was always a boy, always a choice, but this time, the dice will be loaded.Their army of Sku-Zo were already unleashed upon the world. It would be him and Dr Alpha, in the end like always.
Nothing awaits.
He took another draft and smiled.