Autumn Harvest

[Inquisitor Rosenadel]

The clang of bullets ricocheting off the bulkheads rang in Boss’s ears. He lined up his sub-machine gun and shot a three-round burst into the security guard who had shot at him. Boss and the rest of the Coven moved as a unit, as if they read each other’s thoughts. Chops and Smoke moved along the walls, covering doors, and disabling laser-triggered defenses. Castor and Bear covered the hallways. Between them, Ghost moved carefully, constantly looking around, as if searching, and Boss played rear-guard, covering their back trail. They had trained long and hard to get to this point and had gone through much pain and challenge. This was the mission for which they had trained the last two years. The Boss would see to it that they succeeded.

Peter remembered the first day the agents were in his classes. There was a buzz at school about the men who always wore black shirts, pants, trench coats, and sunglasses. The teachers tried to ignore them, but they always gave the agents nervous glances from time to time. The second and subsequent days, they were only in his math and science classes. He tried talking with one once, but his responses were short, and Peter didn’t get very far. If there hadn’t been a so much controversy over the cloning of humans, and the difficulties involved, Peter could have sworn they were clones.

Castor typed a few commands into the small keyboard, which was linked to a small black box that was hooked into the computer terminal. Ghost stood over him, watching. His eye flicked across the screen and the lines of text. When he got to the end, Castor then typed more commands, and suddenly, doors in the hall opened, tracked security robots emerged, and alarms started ringing in other parts of the building. Guards ran about, disorganized, and the Coven moved unnoticed through the chaos created by the security robots.

“Damn it,” Matt muttered, “I lost track of the one they were in.” The cars he and Tristan were following were swerving back and forth between lanes and switched places with each other, obviously trying to lose the two teenagers. Two turned to go to Furmon Orchard High School. “There! Follow those two! I’ve got a good feeling about them.” They pulled into the parking lot and saw agents rush two football players into the high school. They followed, and watched as the agents took the two boys through a plain door, down a flight of stairs, keyed a code, entered a room, and closed the door behind them. Matt and Tristan were about to follow, when a Furmon Orchard High police officer stopped them.

“Where are you boys going?” he asked non-chalantly.

“Oh, we’re just trying to get to the band room,” said Tristan with perfect ease.

“Well, it’s over that way. Take a right, then right again,” he said sternly.

“Thanks officer,” Tristan said, and he and Matt hurried off in a different direction. Except for the police uniform, the officer looked exactly like the agents in black.

The Coven moved into the maximum-security area of the base and moved directly to the control room. Each of them pulled a USB 3.5 cable from their forearms, and plugged themselves into a computer terminal. They sifted through massive volumes of data, terabyte upon terabyte of information. It took them all of two minutes to find and download the information they needed to. They then disengaged themselves from the computers, and continued on their way, stalking through the halls toward their final objective.

[Inquisitor Rosenadel]

The man in the black trench coat who had slammed into his van got up, staggered for only a second or two, and then ran off into the night. Kevin would have chased after him, but the huge hairy thing that landed on his van next made him decide to stay inside. It was tall, hairy, and its eyes glowed from the car’s interior lights. Kevin could see it breathing heavily. It looked like the beasts he had only read about in books.

It was looking straight at him with its yellow eyes, as if deciding what to do with him. Kevin jumped out of the van and sprinted towards the nearest house. He heard a scuffle behind him, and turned to see that the dark clothed man had tackled the beast, and the two were fighting in the street. The man was holding his own for now, but he couldn’t hold out long against the inhuman strength and ferocity of the beast-man. Kevin saw a glint from the streetlight on a black object by the street curb. It was a handgun. He picked it up, felt its weight in his hand. He pointed it at the scuffling pair. “Stop,” he said, “or I swear I’ll kill both of you.” The beast released the man, who rolled away and got up. Kevin kept the gun on the hairy thing. “You stay put,” he told it. It snarled at him, a half-human snarl, and stayed still.

The other man did not move, either. But he spoke. “Please, I’m on your side. Give me the gun, and I’ll get you home safe, and get your car repaired. No one but you must know that this ever happened. On pain of death.”

Kevin was shocked. “I just saved your life!” he nearly shouted at him. But that man was already moving. Kevin was not fast enough to stop him, and felt a sharp pain, and then nothing as his vision faded… until he woke up next morning, with no pain, and his father explaining the accident he got into with the van after Kevin got home and was safely in bed…

The six dark-clothed, armored figures moved as one unit, reacting to each other as a single entity. They all based their movements around a single point, the figure of Ghost. He was not the original leader of the group. But now, he gave commands with little more than a thought, and the rest of the Coven, his podmates, reacted instantly. And he did it all without speaking.

The six friends were all herded into a black van. They tried asking questions, but the agents in the van merely signaled them to be quiet as a medic went around and applied antiseptic and gauze to their wounds. They were still in shock over the massive, beast-like men that had tried to kill them. The agents had come to their aid at the last moment.

They arrived at Furmon Orchard South high school, and the agents rushed them into the building, through the plain wooden door, down the stairs, and through the heavy iron door. They then took an elevator down, and felt as though they were nearly weightless, as if they had just taken an elevator ride down a skyscraper. What they saw as the huge doors opened awed them.

It was a vast complex, with stainless-steel walls and floors. They could see computer terminals, libraries, laboratories, and training grounds. They saw huge vats that contained teenaged specimens, including the two football players all six friends recognized as being from their high school, and also as star athletes. A man in a jet-black suit approached the party of agents and teenagers and motioned for the six to come with him. Sven started to ask a question, a look of defiance on his face, but the man in the suit interrupted him. “I am Montre’gärd. You undoubtedly want to know ‘what the Hell we’re doing with you’. What you need now, I assure you, is rest. I will tell you about your situation when you awake.” He took them to their sleeping quarters, which were quite spartan. “Sleep well, children. Tomorrow your innocence ends.” The lights turned off, and the six teenagers found themselves immediately asleep.

The Coven moved to the maximum-security hangar. They split up, each moving to a different door on the hangar. They manually entered the codes to open the doors. The doors opened with a hiss, and they all started to run out to their respective stations. But they all stopped, and stared with awe at the gargantuan machine in the center of the hangar.

“What I’m about to tell you may shock you, but it’s the truth, so you’re going to have to deal with it.

“For centuries, a war has been waged in the shadows of humanity. It is between us, the Praetorians Aetas, and the so-called “League of Truth”. We fight for the purity of humanity and its right to justice and freedom. They fight for chaos and anarchy. We have been at war since before known history.”

“Wait a minute,” Eric said unbelievingly, “we’ve found Dead Sea scrolls, writings from ancient Greece, and even wall paintings that say we’ve been around for a very long time. When does ‘known history’ start? How many years B.C.?”

Montre’gärd snickered. “Well, if ‘Christ’ were real, we have been at war since 9872 B.C.”

It looked roughly humanoid, but had missile racks on its shoulders, its feet had blades, and its arms were weapons. One ended in two short barrels, with a huge spherical bulb just before its elbow. The other was a very long rectangular box with a large cube where its shoulder would be. It had several point-defense pods at various point on its torso. This was the Retributor.

“Like modern nations, we have each developed new weapons to use against each other. While the rest of the world fell beneath swords, we were annihilating our enemy with the first experimental lasers. Over time, we focused less on actual technology, and more on the people wielding the weapons. We started modifying our willing soldiers to have enhancements. We started with simple things, like better hearing, low-light vision, and more efficient blood. Then we started gradually modifying more and more. Our latest weapon is the ‘Sentinel’. They were in your classes, and they brought you here yesterday. They are clones of one of our past agents whose fieldwork was exceptional. Their DNA is periodically modified to introduce some new gene that will better help them combat whatever new threat the League of Truth comes up with. They are a testing platform, if you will. They were created when we realized that we would always see new threats, so we would simply modify what we had to combat specific threats. We’re currently working on another weapon that should prove even more effective that Sentinels.”

“Sentinels were in response to the League’s latest weapon: what we have taken to calling ‘Grendels’. They have increased strength and aggression. One side effect is that they have increased hair growth, which they obviously see no reason to trim. They were the things that attacked you last night when you were brought here. They killed your families. And most likely and other loved ones you had who had regular contact with you.”

Peter interrupted. “How often is ‘regular contact’?” Everyone else was silent, and they all felt empty.

“We don’t know,” said Montre’gärd sadly. “From what we can tell, you now have no living relatives aside from distant ones, and no friends aside from those who barely remember you from school. And even they will be mind-wiped and convinced that you died in tragic accidents. Or were kidnapped. It doesn’t matter. The point is that, at this point, you do not exist. Not within government records, not within the memories of the people you knew. You were never born.”

Ghost climbed into the cockpit of the Retributor. He could see the outside world through the holo-viewport in front of him. Once he commanded the rest of the Coven to plug in their USB cables, he could see their holo-viewports, as well. Seemingly all on its own, the machine started its power-up sequence. Ghost commanded the computer to open the hangar. Daylight burned into Ghost’s retinas, and his irises immediately closed to slivers. This was the first time in more than 6500 years that the Retributor saw the sun.

[Inquisitor Rosenadel]

“Before Sentinels, we had developed ‘Stalkers”. They are quite strong, and have a drastically increased healing rate. As their name suggests, they are quite good at infiltration, sabotage, assassination, and so on. Unfortunately, they are very sensitive to sunlight, and get sunburned very easily. Though they do not have a need for blood, some flaw in our gene-splicing give them a sort of addiction to ingesting it. You see, all the legends about werewolves and vampires are simply cover for the technology we were using. “Werewolves” were what attacked you two nights ago. I must say you all did an admirable job trying to defend yourselves.

“Speaking of which, we will start your training program, today if you wish. You will become agents for the Praetorian. You will be trained to fight everything that we’ve ever come up against, and be given the best technology we have to fight with and complete missions in tandem with our Sentinels. We cannot allow you to go back to any normal sort of life, because already, you know too much. So, if you accept, simply follow me to the combat sparring room.”

None among the six teenagers stayed behind.

The Retributor stepped out of the hangar, which had risen out of the ground, and paused. Boss could see over miles of the flat, snowy countryside. He could see the village where they had stayed while they searched for the underground compound, and where they had prepared for their final mission. As the huge war machine walked away from Site 157B, Bear triggered the explosives. Suddenly, the ground shook and heaved. The hangar spat a great gout of flame. A mushroom cloud burst forth from the ground. Immediately a voice reverberated in Boss’s head. “Coven, what are you doing?! You have orders to proceed to sector AA-105.78 now! Move there or we will be forced to destroy you! Coven One restore order to your team!”

Boss simply ignored it.

“Eric, step forward.” The curly-haired, lean teenager stepped up to Monte’gärd and bowed. Montre’gärd put a dog tag around his neck. “Your tracking, infiltration, and assassination skills are commendable. You are now ‘Ghost’.” Eric stepped down.

Montre’gärd repeated the process for each of the six teenagers. Kevin, with his durability and disposition towards heavy firepower, became “Bear”. Tristan, with his technical knowledge and computer skills, became “Castor”. Sven, with his keen eye and ability to nearly disappear, became “Smoke”. Matt, with his awesome strength, fearsome ferocity, and large sideburns, became “Chops”. Finally, Peter, with his commanding presence and ability to quickly assess the situation, became “Boss”.

“Congratulations,” Montre’gärd said. “You are now the ‘Coven’, for you are brothers, and you will always fight as a team. Follow me. You will now receive your first assignment.”

The newly named Coven stared at Montre’gärd incredulously. Peter spoke first. “We have our own mission? Aren’t we just helping the Sentinels hunt down the Grendels?”

Montre’gärd smiled, but seemed vaguely disappointed. “Come now, you can’t think we gave you advanced gauss and microwave weaponry, neuro-chip communication that lets you sense with your podmates’ senses and talk to them without speaking, and computer terminal interfaces in your arms that allow you to connect to any computer undetected because you were going to be a plan B now, did you? We have been watching you develop for years. Your school was an experiment. District 107 is where we take recruits from. You six came out to be the best in the entire district! That is why you were selected for the Coven Project. That is also why your families were killed: the League found out about our plans, and tried to stop you from receiving your training. Don’t you get it? I told you that we have been developing weapons since we came into existence. Sentinels were not as effective, even with their upgrades, as we would like them to be. They are going to supplement you. You are the new weapon.”

As the Retributor crested the hill, Ghost brought it to a halt. He barely hesitated before commanding his podmates to lock onto the structures below and fire.

“Ghost, although Boss is your leader, you are the most important. There was much we forgot and lost in the aftermath of what you know as World War II. We came to know of a massive weapon system buried in the northern wastes of Finland. But during the war, the League stole the data. We are working hard to locate the weapon. Its name is Retributor. We are actually still unsure how it came to be on Earth. We did not manufacture it, and we are sure the League would have used it immediately if they had built it. However, regardless of its origin, you are the only one that can control it. You will be trained to control your podmates’ thoughts, and be able to command them so that when we find where the Retributor rests, you will be able to use it.”

Ghost remembered his training. He remembered how Montre’gärd had explained the controls with perfect memory. Montre’gärd had been the one trained to use it years before, but the terrible cataclysm of World War II and its aftermath, the Cold War, had deprived the Praetorian of the Retributor’s location. So Montre’gärd had explained to his pupil how to control the monstrous machine with only his thoughts, and how to command his podmates to assist him.

That knowledge was now being used against him. Had he not made one mistake, he might now rule the world. The Praetorian’s brainwashing of he and his friends had almost completely fooled them. Almost…

Ghost could not believe his eyes. He could sense, through his neurolink, that his podmates could not believe theirs, either. “This is… horrible,” Smoke whispered. He looked dejected, and simply stared at the computer screen.

Chops and Bear, meanwhile, looked furious. The rest of the Coven were beginning to feel the same way. “They… they killed everyone!” Castor almost screamed. “They killed our parents, our friends… they even killed my boss! Anyone who had even the slightest memory of who we were is gone!”

If they ever found a way how to, they promised vengeance. Ghost learned of a way. He would have to take control of his friends’ bodies, one by one. Even though Ghost could hide this thoughts from the Praetorian, if they ever found out his plan through his friends, the justice they so desired would never be realized.

For a while after the Retributor’s computer intelligence shut down the weapons systems because of severe overheat, Ghost merely sat, seemingly entranced. All the emotion he had ever felt, everything the Praetorian had suppressed, was coming back to him, and he was overwhelmed. Then a voice came on in his head. “Coven Six, Coven Six, do you read? This is Lot 413 alpha. Code?”

Ghost let out a long breath. “Code 41277. Praetorian target four-four-two destroyed.” Finally, they were gone. Their greatest weapon had destroyed them.

Despite all their psychology analysis, conditioning, and subtle bribery, the Praetorian Aetas did not make the Coven loyal to the fascist terror organization, but made them realize all they had lost in becoming part of it. Freedom, emotion, humanity. Ghost had none of this now. He was still controlling his friend’s minds.

The voice interrupted his thought. “Coven Six, you may bring your team to coordinates 9920-b5h.”

“No, League. We cannot come back. We know too much. We do not wish to endanger humanity any longer. If we were found out, we would be unstoppable, and a nation might use us to rule.” Ghost was letting his podmates speak through him, along with his own thoughts. “We are not even human anymore. We are no longer individual. We will go elsewhere, and start anew. Farewell, League. You have taught us much, and we are eternally grateful.”

With that, Ghost keyed the bit of code the Coven found in the control room, and the huge spacecraft now above the Retributor opened a hatch, and extended a ramp. Ghost piloted the huge war machine up the ramp, and into the blinding light of the hangar.