In less than an hour, they saw Joppa-Cal on the distant horizon.
In the lead plane, Harry was within two miles of the city when he saw a glittering palace the size of a small mountain perched above the old, tattered city like a vulture above a carcass on the African savannah. The gods’ palace, which combined every great feat of architecture on Earth and more, had returned.
This changed everything.
Captain Reed knew that he was too late, too late to save his friends. He gripped his throat mic with one hand and veered off his plane with the other. “Break off! Break off!”
“What’s wrong?” Mac asked. She leaned forward and saw the massive palace floating over the medieval city. “Oh, the gods are early.”
Leo followed Harry’s plane back to a long-abandoned quarter of the city. After making a few passes, Harry put the plane down right in the middle of one of the quarter’s main streets. He knew that even though the planes had backtracked a few miles, the slave quarter was still well within visual range of Joppa-Cal and the monstrosity that hovered above it, so he and Leo taxied and parked their planes next to a hovel at the edge of town.
Everyone climbed out of the cramped planes, including Tae, who had regained consciousness. “Anybody got any aspirin?” he asked. He grinned, clearly happy to be alive, but then the grin faded as he noticed the rest of their long faces.
“Tae, Brett didn’t make it,” Leo said before the engineer could ask.
“Yeah, so what did happen, Stein?” Harry asked. He hopped down from the wing of his plane. “The last time I saw you, you were both making a beeline for the runway. You should have been right behind me.”
“What is it you’re trying to say?” Stein shot back.
“I’m not trying to say anything. Just answer the question.”
Stein glanced between Harry and the others as the rest of them focused on him. “We got jumped by the Mooks, okay? Besides, he was already dead when they started climbing all over us. I was lucky to make it out alive.”
Mac, Leo, and Tae held Stein’s gaze for a moment and then moved off to unload the planes. Harry didn’t look away.
“This isn’t World War II anymore Captain Reed,” When no one responded, he shouted, “Oh, would you prefer that he had made it instead of me? Is that it? You can all just go to hell!” and he stormed off.
“Stein!” Mac called after him.
“Let him walk it off,” Harry said.
Later that night, the Palace of the Gods was lit up like a beacon, and it could be seen for miles. Looking at its glittering splendor, Mac guessed it could probably even be seen from space.
Stein had cooled off and rejoined them. Mac made a few attempts to reconcile with the commando, but he blew her off every time.
The five of them gathered around a campfire; Stein standing apart and glaring at the empty buildings that surrounded them. They had agreed that they would stow the planes in the abandoned slave quarter and walk to Joppa-Cal in the morning, and now they sat in silence. After what had happened to Brett, nobody felt much like sleeping.
Mac saw that Harry couldn’t stop staring at the glowing palace on the horizon.
“Harry, why don’t you wait here?” Mac asked. “If all goes well, we’ll come back for you.”
“No, I’ve got to rescue my friends,” he replied without hesitation.
Behind them, Leo poked the fire with a stick. “Harry, if we don’t make it, and these ‘gods’ are as bad as you say, shouldn’t you wait a few days and then go after your friends? I mean, it’s going to be hard enough getting inside, but with the gods here, won’t it be next to impossible?”
Harry turned toward Mac. “Does that mean you’ve reconsidered?”
“No, I’m still going to make contact with the E.T.’s, but if I’m wrong, getting yourself killed isn’t going to free your friends either.”
Harry frowned. “That’s a chance I’m gonna have to take.”
“Captain Reed,” Tae said, “have you considered that your presence might agitate the E.T.’s and ruin our own chances of a peaceful first contact?”
Mac noticed that this line of thought affected Harry the most. It was clear from the look on his face that he hadn’t thought about endangering their lives. Mac wanted to tell him that she didn’t give a rip what the ‘gods’ thought and that he could come with them if he wanted to, but she sensed that they were beginning to sway him to stay, which she knew would be safest for him.
“Tell him,” Stein said as he stepped out of the shadows and into the campfire’s light.
“Shut up, Stein,” Mac said quickly.
“Tell me what?”
“Tell him or I will,” Stein threatened.
Mac gave the commando a hard stare.
“Maybe you should,” Leo added, much to Mac’s surprise.
“What is it?” Harry asked again.
Mac sighed. So this was it. As it turned out, it proved easier than she had thought. Once she started, the information that she had kept bottled up for so long just flowed right out of her. “Harry, I knew about your Awumpai because I read about it in your journal.” She saw Harry reach for the logbook that he kept in the pocket of his pants. “No, not that one — one we found on your body in a pyramid that lies beneath the ice of a moon that circles Jupiter.”
“That’s why it’s too dangerous for you to go with us,” Leo added.
“You want to run that by me again?” Harry said.
Mac did, and early the next morning, just before dawn, they left on foot for Joppa-Cal, without Harry.
In the light of the rising sun, Captain Reed watched Mac, Tae, Leo, and Stein through his binoculars. He saw them hike toward Joppa-Cal on a worn out road and then eventually disappear from view. He was alone once more.
He was moving back toward the campfire when a bright light suddenly rose up behind him. It was so bright that it illuminated the outline of his form on a nearby wall that the early morning light still had not reached.
“Hello, Harry,” a disembodied voice said in greeting. Its tone was music to his ears.
When he spun toward the light, he was surprised to see the same vibrantly colored cloud that he had seen Asha singing to by the river. “Who are you?”
“You know me, Harry. I am the SongBird Goddess of whom Asha spoke.”
“I thought you were…”
“I know,” the cloud giggled, “fireflies or igniting gas. It is common for your kind to try and explain that which you do not understand.”
Harry looked down at the ground.
“Why do you despair?”
“Oh, haven’t you heard? God seems to be nothing more than an alien astronaut. If that’s true, then my wife and daughter aren’t really waiting for me in the afterlife, are they? They’re nothing more than rotting corpses in the ground. Everything I’ve ever believed in is a lie.”
“Why do you doubt your faith, now?” asked a less god-like voice behind him. The voice belonged to his radio operator, Dougie Johnson. He now appeared before Harry as a young man, not as the decrepit old man he had become on the spaceship. But it wasn’t really Dougie. Looking into his swirling multi-colored eyes, Harry realized that it was still the SongBird Goddess talking; she had just assumed Dougie’s form.
“Shouldn’t I? The facts are pretty overwhelming.”
“The one who killed Asha and her mighty Awumpai guardian — who do you think he was?”
Harry shrugged his shoulders. “He told me he was God.”
“And do you believe that?”
“No, not God.” As he thought about this question more, his eyes widened.
Dougie disappeared, and Ba-Tu now addressed him. “That’s right, Harry. He is the Fallen One.”
“Khaos is—” Harry asked, but in his heart, he already knew the answer.
When Harry looked up, Ba-Tu was gone. He now saw Brett standing by a low wall. The good ole country boy had his arms crossed and one foot propped up on the wall. Harry noticed that he had various Mook weapons sticking out of his bloody corpse and a swollen eye.
“That’s right, Harry,” Brett said while walking toward him. “You must remember who Khaos is: he is the Father of Lies. If you knew the secret of all life, you would know this.”
Harry backed away from Brett’s corpse and tripped over his own feet. When he looked up, he saw the crew member from the downed Hail Mary, the one who had committed suicide, standing over him. The crew member, who was no longer wounded, extended a hand to help Harry up.
“What’s the secret?” Harry asked him. The pilot didn’t respond but rather put his hands on Harry’s shoulders and spun him around to face little Asha.
“Hi, Harry,” she said.
“Asha?”
“Yes, Harry. I’m here with the SongBird Goddess, but I can’t stay very long.” She crossed over to a nearby fountain and hopped onto the ledge of its basin.
“Why are you here?”
Asha playfully dipped her toes in the water. “I came here to warn you.”
“To warn me of what? What’s the point of this? What’s it all for?”
She hopped down and looked up at him. “Harry, knowing the answer to that question risks the time you have left in your terrestrial body. In the history of existence, no mortal has ever been told the secret of human life. To know it while you are still in this terrestrial form is to risk almost certain death.”
“Oh, haven’t you heard? I already know how I’m going to die, at least where my body is going to end up.”
“That’s true,” Asha said. She turned her head to the side like a bird, the way she often did when she was alive. “You are a unique soul, Harry Reed, but again I must warn you: to know the secret in your present form is to risk your physical body and your immortal soul. Do you still wish to know?”
Harry considered this for only a second. “Yes,” he answered. He was prepared to pay the price, whatever that price might be.
“Okay,” Asha said. She stood on her toes and gave him a kiss on the cheek before backing away from him and fading away into hundreds of glowing fireflies.
Harry looked around. No one was there.
Looking skyward, he clenched his hands into fists. “I said I wanted to know!” he shouted, but his words only echoed on the walls of the slave quarter and died on the wind. Then he saw her. She sat by the fire with her back to him.
“Julie?” he asked. No, SongBird Goddess, this is too much, Harry thought. Not Julie.
“Then I shall tell you and try to speak in terms you can understand.” It was Julie’s voice, but Harry knew in his heart that the SongBird Goddess was speaking through Julie’s form. She stood up and faced him. He recognized her summer dress and sandals from his dreams.
“What defines humanity is your faith,” she said as she walked toward him. “Angels cannot have faith, for they have been in God’s presence since their inception. They did not ask for this privilege. What Khaos says about your origin has some truth, but what he neglected to tell you is that what is inside those bodies was put there by his creator.”
“You mean our souls?”
“Precisely. You terrestrial beings have only your faith to guide you, and that is why the one true Father loves you most.”
“Thank you, thank you for telling me this. But what must I do?”
Julie disappeared, and a shimmering cloud took her place.
“You will know when the time comes.”
“Can you help me fight him?”
“You already have what you need.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You will. As you are well aware, you near your hour of death, Harry Reed. I’ve told you the secret to prepare for what you must do, but beware of telling others because to tell them is to risk their mortal lives as well.”
“I will,” Harry said solemnly.
“Oh, and Julie and your daughters wanted me to give you a message.”
“They’re — they’re with you?” Harry choked back his tears.
“Yes, in a way.”
“What …. what’s the message?”
“She misses you, and you will see each other soon. There’s just one more thing you have to do first. Most of all, she says … have faith.”
The light of the SongBird Goddess faded away.
Harry knew what he had to do. That thing that had killed Asha was not God, but the Father of Lies, and Mac and the others were headed straight for it, thinking they were just going to meet another alien.
The captain grabbed his gear out of his plane, checked his pistols, and set out after them. Despite the overwhelming odds against him, he walked with determination.
Harry had his faith back, and he was damned if he was going to lose it again.