The gate opened.
It was as simple as that. A little song, a little dance, a little open sesame, and here we were. Good-bye to electric blankets, good-bye to hot showers, good-bye to fast food, designer clothes, fast cars. And so long and farewell to the human race. In the end, I guess it all balanced out. In the end, it was the end.
My vision returned and I saw the gate swirling sluggishly on the wall, eighteen feet tall by nearly the same number wide. Through tears in the rippling and foaming gray light, I could see glimpses of a velvety purple sky dotted with stars nearly as big as your fist. Air wafted through, warm and redolent with sulfur, bitter musk, and sweetgrass. I remembered the smell. It was the scent of lava rivers, massive animals that moved as majestically as ships, and grass a shade of green no longer found in nature. It was…
"Home." The Auphe said it for me. In their rasping, sand-scraping tongue they said the word with more reverence than I'd known they had in them. "Home."
With the energy gone from me and now bound into the gate, I was dropped back onto the floor. My arms were still extended and I was shaking with the effort to hold the rip in time and space. "No time like the present, boss," I gritted between clenched teeth. "This baby isn't going to stay open much longer."
Behind me came a snake's hissing sigh from a hundred mouths that yet managed to sound as one. A culmination of centuries of want and work had arrived and the Auphe were joined as one in the moment. And together they took that first step in perfect synchronicity. I heard it: a ponderous thud that echoed like thunder. The lightning came a split second later in the form of a sword stroke when Niko and Robin came out of the left speaker. It was like a magician's trick: Now you see them, now you don't—only in reverse. Niko's blade had split the speaker cover from the inside with one quicksilver slash. Stepping through the opening, my brother paused as his eyes took in the Auphe army and then locked on me. His hair was gone. The waist-length, dark blond hair had been sheared close to the skull. It meant something, that. I wasn't sure what, but it tickled in the back of my mind like an itch I couldn't scratch. Robin appeared behind him and freed my attention.
The speaker, damn, that was ingenious. I'd noticed the imbalance when I had sung. I'd assumed a mechanical malfunction. I'd been wrong. As I'd ordered, Samuel had provided me with speakers… one for me and one for betrayal. It was one frigging inopportune time for the son of a bitch to develop scruples. He must have gone to his niece to track down Niko and then collaborated to bring him and Goodfellow here. When his conscience reactivated it'd done so with a vengeance. I should've eaten him when I had the chance.
Sweat prickled the back of my neck as the gate continued to swirl, and I could feel its pull growing stronger. Within minutes it would exhaust the power within it and begin to siphon my own life force. If that happened, it would instantly turn me inside out. While a nifty special effect, it wasn't exactly in my best interest. I was willing to work for the Auphe; I was not willing to die for them. I doubted it would come to that, however. As deadly as Niko and Goodfellow could be, the Auphe had the numbers in this situation. The numbers, the rage, and the desperation. Even Nik would have to fall before that.
"Nik." I gave my brother a wolfish grin. "You didn't say it. How disappointing. How's it go again?" I hummed a tune from an ancient cartoon. "Here I come, to save the day."
Robin was studying the gate with a peculiar mixture of horror and longing on his triangular face. His hand moved to Niko's shoulder and squeezed until his fingers blanched white. "No. It cannot… ektos mas. Niko, it is the past. It's a time before humans. If the Auphe go through there…" He didn't have to finish. I could see Nik grasped the implications immediately.
"Close it." He moved until he stood between the gate and me. The point of his blade rested in the hollow of my throat. "Now."
The resulting trickle of blood coursed down my chest until it bisected the flesh over my black heart. Out of my sight I could hear the Auphe rushing forward. There were almost on us; I could feel their murderous outrage like a heat at my back. Then the sawed-off shotgun dispersed that heat with some of its own. I watched in disbelief as Robin, joined by Samuel, pulled them from beneath their coats, moved to flank me, and fired. What the hell? Had they mugged Rambo on the way over or what? Still tied to the gate, I turned my head to see Auphe flying through the air, some of them in pieces. "Ah, shit." I staggered and whipped my focus back to the gate. It was destabilizing. Setting my feet, I held on to it and did some more cursing. This time it was in my own language, one that was all but made for foul words.