My console pinged as I stepped out of the conference room. I’d barely taken two steps away from the door when it burst open behind me. Heggy flew out of the doorway like the Lass at Southmarch. Her hair was spilling down beneath her hair net like power lines downed in a storm.
Panic was written all over her face.
“Genneth,” she yelled, “Ward E, lobby, now!” She started running and didn’t let up. She didn’t even stop to look back at me.
The door hadn’t even swung closed when Jonan threw it open and ran out of the room, alongside Ani.
I managed to grab Ani by the arm. “What’s happening?!” I said.
She locked eyes with me long enough to yell, “Check your console!” before shaking off my grip with a fling of her arm and running down the hallway.
My consciousnesses recoupled as I was pulling out my console. The mind-world I’d been sharing with Andalon collapsed, with Andalon phasing into my view out from the ceiling overhead, descending toward me like the Angel Himself.
She was screaming.
Combined with the disorientation that came with recoupling, the shock of Andalon screaming at me sent me staggering. Because I was tail-heavy, I tipped backward. I managed to catch my fall with a blossoming plexus that I wove behind me in the shape of a hammock, which I then raised, bringing myself back to an upright position.
Andalon hovered above the floor in the fetal position, with her feet pointed downward and her head in her arms. Her pale nightgown trembled with her terror.
“What’s wrong!?” I yelled, not caring if anyone heard me.
At this point, it was basically a miracle I’d managed to keep my condition in the closet for as long as I had.
“It’s here!” she screamed. “It’s here!”
“What’s—”
“—It’s the darkness!” she yelled. “It’s here! It’s touched the hospipple! I—” Gasping, she uncurled and floated toward me. “I think it knows I’m here!” she said. She looked me in the eyes. “Mr. Genneth, we need to run away! Now!”
She was absolutely petrified—meanwhile, I still needed to check my console.
I pulled it out and tapped it on.
A torrent of messages spilled onto the screen. The topmost one was from Nurse Kaylin, which was odd. She’d collapsed in an eye-bulging coughing fit a little less than a day ago. She shouldn’t have been communicating with me on the official hospital channel—she’d been taken off duty once she’d taken sick.
Get your ass over to Lobby E, you bastards! It’s a fucking madhouse down here!
Beneath, there was a video attached, footage from the security cameras in our Ward’s lobby.
I turned it on, only to drop my console in sheer shock when I saw a bunch of armored knights suddenly appear in the middle of the lobby’s reception area.
Had they not appeared out of nowhere, I would have thought they were actors for the new season of Guardians of Time.
Speeding up my thoughts, I slowed time enough to scoop up my console with a plexus before it hit the ground. I undid the slow-motion moment as I pulled my console into my hands.
Andalon floated away from the console, pointing at it in terror.
“It’s there!” she screamed. “It’s there!”
A shiver ran down my spine, all the way to the tip of my tail.
According to tradition, gates to Hell were supposed to open up in the earth in the Last Days, once the war with Hell got serious.
Had something like Cranter Pit just opened up in WeElMed?
“Fudge…” I muttered.
It made sense. All the pieces were in place. Nina, Suisei, and Angel-knows how many other Blessèd were waiting in the wings, ready to engage the armies of darkness.
Technically, if you counted the military’s face-offs with the zombies, the engagement was already underway.
Oh God.
“Is Hell mounting a counterassault?” I asked. “Does this—”
—But I stopped myself, and instead of finishing my question, I did what I should have done in the first place: followed my colleagues!
I groaned as I set off in a run, wrapping plexuses around my legs to power myself forward.
I wouldn’t go so far as to call this technique “Magic Boots”, but they weren’t not magic boots, if you catch my drift.
Andalon flew alongside me.
“What are you doing, Mr. Genneth! We need to go the other way. The other way!”
I can’t just run away! I thought-said. I need more information!
“Wha? I—…” Andalon shook her head in dismay. “Why?”
I dashed into the stairwell. Yes, my legs were shot, but I didn’t have time to wait for an elevator. Fortunately, my powers had developed enough to pick up the slack.
I didn’t step down the stairs, I drifted down them, hop-gliding down the flights, hovering inches above the steps. I slid my grip along the railing to keep myself on course.
First Yuta and his family, I thought-said, then Verune, and now, knights of the Third Crusade? Something awful is happening, and the time-travel might just be only the tip of the iceberg.
“What?” she asked.
As I made my way down the antique stairwell’s turns, I wove blue and gold energy-cushions on the landing halfway down the stairs. They caught me like a cushion, bringing me to a gentle stop.
I’d be lying if I said the ride wasn’t exhilarating.
I faced Andalon as I leapt down the final flight of steps.
Are the infected going feral? I don’t know how quickly I’ll be able to pacify their souls, but it’s better than just sitting here and letting zombies turn every Type One case in the hospital!
Maybe this is because I’d walled off Lantor, I added. It’s like whack-a-mole, except with portals or whatever.
“It’s…” Andalon clutched her head. “I don’t know what it is.”
“Well then,” I muttered, “let’s find out.”
I threw the door open. I could hear gunfire coming from further down the hall.
“Beast’s teeth!” I swore.
“Mr. Genneth!”
Flying ahead of me, Andalon turned around and spread her arms, as if to block my path.
“Stop!” she yelled. Her limbs trembled.
There was such fear in her eyes.
I put my hands on her shoulders and then sped up my thoughts, slowing time.
She was as frigid as ever, and gasped at my touch.
—Andalon, I thought-said, you wanted me to help you save people and fight the darkness, and that’s what I’m doing. I’m here now, and I’m ready to help. I’m not going to abandon you, and I’m not going to abandon my post, patients, or colleagues, either—not as long as I can do something about it.
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“But—”
Through the slowed time, my lips curled in a kind smile.
—I believe in you, Andalon, I thought-said. It shouldn’t go one way, though. I believe in you, and you should believe in me. You have to be brave, Andalon—and, don’t worry, it might be scary, but I know you can do it, because you already have. Like you said, you never had help before. You’ve got so far, all on your own—and that took bravery. But bravery doesn’t end just because you’re no longer alone. You’ve got to be brave for us—for me, for Greg, for all the wyrms!
Andalon stammered. “For the w-wyrmehs?”
Yeah, I thought-said, for the wyrmehs.
“But…” she choked up, “what if you get hurt?”
Then we can run, and I’ll trust you and the others to help me get better. Now, c’mon, stop this!
“Mr. Genneth!” Andalon broke out in tears and flung herself at my chest, sobbing into me.
I sped up time just long enough to wrap my arms around her, and then slowed it down again. I stayed there like that for a moment, doing my best to comfort her.
Go to the Main Menu, Andalon, I thought-said, you’ll be safe there.
Lightheadedness momentarily washed over me as I ported Andalon into my Main Menu and conjured up Mr. Humby, some chocolate chip cookies, some slushies, and a picture book about nature and wildlife with endlessly many pages inside it.
She’d really taken a liking to that. She seemed to love learning about the world.
Inside the Main Menu, Andalon looked up at me, her face all wet with snot and tears. “But—“
—I called up a doppelgenneth to keep her company and then poofed back into my body.
We’ll be fine, I told First-Me.
Everything was coming to a head.
I might have already lost my flesh-and-blood family. I wasn’t about to let myself lose my work family, too. Not if there was anything I could do to stop it.
Slowing my thoughts, I let time flow once more.
I saw the world through two sets of eyes as I ran like crazy.
Everything was in chaos. People ran and screamed. Panic was as thick as the sickly sweet spore stench. Soldiers ordered doctors and civilians to keep their distance. Nearly every console I saw was playing footage of Verune addressing the crowd at the Melted Palace, his servant wyrms flanking him at all sides.
I ran down the hall and toward Ward E’s main reception area as quickly as I could. I knew where I was going; it was the thing so many others were running away from—patients and healthcare workers alike fleeing in terror. Boot-steps and military shouts stormed in the distance. Ailing, ashen-skinned nurses rolled beds and empty supply dollies out of the way, to make room for the passing crowds.
I didn’t bother to ask what was going on. I’d find out soon enough.
The double doors in the short hallway that linked Ward E’s reception area to the lobby and main waiting room were wide open. Soldiers had gathered in and immediately in front of the doorway, along with a crowd of hospital staff and many frightened patients and refugees—not that there was much difference. There was shoving and pushing. Nurses yelled at soldiers; soldiers pushed doctors or civilians aside.
Nurse Kaylin was absolutely right: it was a madhouse. The sight made me stop in my tracks. I had to brace myself with a curtain-plexus in front of my body to keep myself from falling onto my face or crashing into any of the handful of heavily armed soldiers.
Beast’s teeth!, I thought.
It really was Yuta all over again. Only this time…
“Please,” a doctor yelled, “I’m begging you, don’t shoot!”
A bunch of knights stood in the lobby. There was no mistaking the bands they wore around their arms, The insignia on those armbands would go on to become the Second Empire’s flag: the golden triangle of the faith on a red background with white stripes along the top and bottom.
Soldiers of the Third Crusade took to wearing that armband as a way to signal to fellow freedom-fighters that they supported the cause. Trentons loyal to Mu wouldn’t dare wear them. As far as colonial governors like Sakuragi were concerned, the armband marked its wearers for death.
Had this happened a couple days ago, I’d have spent a great deal of effort trying to justify the impossible, but I was enlightened now, and could just skip ahead to the inevitable conclusion.
These guys had come unstuck in time, just like Yuta and his family.
Was this what Andalon had meant when she said the darkness had “touched” the hospital?
Through the doppelgenneth in my mind, I asked her.
“I don’t know,” she said.
Fair enough.
I thought about whipping out my console to wave my privilege to the soldiers, but decided against it when I realized that healthcare workers were pushing their way through the troops, much to the soldiers’ dismay. I used a bit of psychokinetic oomph to get myself through.
And then I stepped into the room, and saw just what had transpired.
“Break the Tablets…” I muttered.
It was amazing seeing the knights up close; their polished armor, their weapons a-glistening. Amazing and horrifying, just like everything else. They belonged in a museum, or at a Rebel Times festival-restaurant, not in a hospital. They were fully decked in archaic arms and armor: plate mail, halberds, bastard swords, arquebuses, and more. They even had a packhorse—a living, breathing horse—covered from head to tail in a caparison patterned in red and yellow. It fared no better than anyone else; the horse lay sprawled on the floor, bleeding from the bullet-wounds in its flank. Several healthcare workers in PPE lay on the floor, clutching bleeding limbs. Over by the other hallways, the crowds were writhing in anger. Bullets had torn through the place. Upholstery came up from bullet-grazed chairs and sofas like white plumes.
The time-traveling knights stood near the middle of the room, clustered together in a tight formation in between two islands of chairs—both of which were empty, and one of which had capsized. The one that hadn’t been capsized had a horrific, four-limbed corpse impaled upon one of its chairs like a broken beanbag, made from two bodies that had presumably fused together when the knights had appeared in our era.
Two riflemen knelt on the ground, each on one knee, holding their rifle in their hands. The young one with the curly hair, faint mustache and sideburns was visibly trembling, struggling to fight back tears. He kept yelling “Fink! Fink!”
The other—the tall, slender one—though, was as stern as steel. Some of his companions were bleeding from their extremities, likely where they’d been grazed by bullets. As I looked, I noticed wavy, churning patterns in the metal—a sign of their ancient make.
The halberdier raised his weapon. His dark, scraggly beard reflected on the blade’s surface.
One of the knights had had a nervous breakdown. He stood off to the side, with his arm wrapped around a woman, holding a dagger to her neck. Infection ooze spilled down her neck and clothes in a foul bib. Splotches of black ooze on the knight’s armor had begun to bubble and fizz. As for the onlookers, scores of ordinary people cowered in terror behind sofas and rows of chairs. Others huddled up in the corners, their backs matted against the person behind them or the wall itself, too afraid to move.
It looked like the horse had gone wild, only to get put down by a spate of gunfire. Blood streaked across the vinyl where the animal had crashed, dragging furniture along with it as it had fallen.
It was a miracle there hadn’t been a widespread shoot-out, but I supposed that had more to do with the doctors and nurses who were standing in between Vernon’s soldiers and the bewildered time-travelers.
“Fink!” the young rifleman yelled. “You monsters! You killed him!”
“Get out of the way!” one of the soldiers yelled.
There were screams as the soldiers stepped out and started dragging kicking, screaming, coughing healthcare workers out of the way.
Then I saw the bodies on the floor—three of them, two of which were beheaded, one of whom was one of the knights’ own.
But the other?
My heart fell into my stomach as I realized the other headless corpse belonged to Yuta Uramaru. I didn’t recognize him at first, what with his head nowhere to be seen, but then I pushed through the shock when I saw Ichigo lying on the ground nearby, trembling in pain.
He’d been shot, and was unconscious—possibly dead. A nurse was leaning over him, trying to shield his body. There was a wound epoxy gun on the floor beside the nurse. Ichigo’s katana was next to that.
The young man’s arm had reached toward the blade.
I found the two corpses’ heads a moment later, on the floor, off to the side on the floor, underneath bullet-riddled chairs that had probably been upturned when the horse had gone out of control.
I wanted to ask someone for details, but it wasn’t really the time or place for that.
One of our soldiers spoke up. There must have been a microphone in his helmet, because his voice was magnified to a boom. “This is your final warning! Doctors, scatter. Guys in armor, let the civilians go. We will shoot if you don’t. We have orders.”
“Can’t you just use a stun grenade or something!?” someone yelled.
“We used them all up on the ride over here!” a soldier replied.
One of his comrades muttered: “Let’s just shoot them already and get this madness over with.”
“Where are the Mewnees?” the red-headed swordsman said. “Did the scoundrels scatter? Are Trentons at long last free?”
Mewnees. That’s what we called people like Yuta Uramaru—the Munine colonizers who sought to make Trenton lands their own.
Two sets of time-travelers—and from the same era, no less! I’d bet my first edition of Sina and the Wind that the two events were related.
The question was: how?
“Politics be damned, Eylon!” the hostage-taker yelled. “We are damned! We are dead to the world! We have no recourse!” He turned to the soldiers. “Send us back! Free us from this Hell!”
So, they think they’re in Hell?, I thought.
Well… they weren’t exactly wrong.
“Morgan!” the halberdier yelled. “Stop this madness!”
Morgan laughed like the madman he was. “We’re in Hell, my Lord! It’s what we deserve! The children,” he said, “all the children—it’s caught up with us! I told you it would, and now, now we are damned!”
“Morgan,” the halberdier yelled.
But then the crowd began to scream, sending out cries of “Stop!” and “No!” as a woman in a yellow, ooze-stained coat crawled out from behind a row of chairs. Creeping forward on her knees, she raised her hands—palms out—and shakily rose to her feet. Her hair was matted with sweat, and her complexion was as pale as death itself. The fungal hyphae growing underneath the skin of her face looked like dead trees in fog. Black ooze trickled down from her nostrils, and from an ulcer on her cheek. She coughed between seemingly every breath.
“Please,” she begged, “stop this.” She wept, twisting her head as she pled. “It’s too much!”
“Back, demon!” Morgan—the hostage-taker said. “Get back! You won’t take my soul!”
But she stepped closer.
My eyes went wide as I noticed her foot was twitching.
It wasn’t a natural movement.
“Oh no,” I muttered. “No, no no—”
—The woman in yellow teetered forward.
Morgan pulled his arm away and pushed his hostage out of the way as he turned to the woman in hello and attacked with his dagger, stabbing her in the stomach.
Suddenly, with a wrenching crack, her body spasmed. One of her arms bent at an odd angle as it reached out to grab Morgan by the arm and quite literally toss him aside. Flesh bulged in the woman’s arm where the hyphae within had tensed up like muscles, mustering a supernatural strength which flung Morgan several yards away, skidding him across the vinyl floor.
The woman’s body twitched uncontrollably. “It hurts!” she shrieked. She shook her head, sobbing hysterically. “Please stop. I—I—“ Her body spasmed. “I want to go home. I want my mom-mm-mm-aaaaaaaa…”
Morgan’s hostage screamed and stumbled back, only for her body to take on a mind of its own.
“Zombie! Zombie!” a soldier yelled. “Fire! Fire!”
And then everything really went to Hell.