The Infernal Aether (First Draft)

Chapter 39 - Armadeddon

Lieutenant Evans and I stood in a windowless room in the centre of the barracks and pored over a map of Greenwich. I found myself rather enjoying the process of pointing out lines of advancement and attack. Indeed, I had always thought that, were I little richer and a lot braver, I would have made a fine army officer. Maxwell had often scoffed at this ambition, pointing out that I would have had a fundamental difficulty with the whole idea of discipline and following orders. He had a very valid point, although the current process was of a different order entirely; we were very much the ones giving the orders.

"So if you can keep them occupied over this side," I said, pointing to the area away from the river. "It only needs to be long enough for us to get in and carry out our colleague's plan."

"How long do you need?" asked Lieutenant Evans.

"A couple of hours should do it. If we commence at midday then that should give you enough time to get back indoors before sunset, in case things do not go according to plan."

"What chance do you think there is of things going wrong with your colleague's plan?"

"I fear there is a pretty high likelihood. The creature we are fighting is incredibly strong. But we have precious little alternatives." I frowned and berated myself inwardly; if we were not confident, then why would these men follow us? "On the other hand, we have been in much tougher scrapes, and always come out the other side victorious. My colleague will find a way; he always does."

"What exactly are you people? Everyone else is helpless in the face of all this, but you are the only ones who seem to have a thought to fight back in an effective manner. Are you some form of Demon destroyers?"

I chuckled. "I like that. But no, we are just ordinary people who have been through some bizarre things. And we have a very extraordinary friend."

"I would like to meet him."

"Maybe you will, if this all goes well."

Lieutenant Evans lowered his voice so that the other soldiers in the room could not hear. "You have to succeed. I fear this may be our last chance. Before you came there was talk among the Generals of abandoning London."

"That may not be a bad idea," I said.

"Yes, but where would we go? From what I hear, things are no better out in the country or in the other cities. The whole of Great Britain is descending into madness."

"I can vouch for that," I said, thinking back to our journey and the various creatures we had encountered. "How have things been here?"

"Terrible. At first there was the odd rumour of strange creatures, but then there always is. Then a few weeks ago that hole appeared in the sky and ever since then..." he shuddered. "It is like we have been living in a twisted Fairy Tale. Creatures running about that I never dreamed possible. And that strange mist..." He looked up at me. "What is happening?"

"I do not understand it fully," I said. "But apparently that hole in the sky is to the Aether, some other place where these creatures live. And now they are coming through." I looked around the room, as the soldiers made their preparations. "So there is no problem with doing what we are asking? Do you need to run it past your superiors?"

"No. We have standing orders to protect the public and disrupt these...whatever they are. What you are proposing beats wandering the streets and running away from shadows."

"Must be frustrating."

"Very. At least when we were fighting the Russians we could hit them. Most of these creatures seem impervious to our weapons. But now we have a plan to get rid of them." He smiled at me.