Dekker's Dozen: The Last Watchmen

The Finger of God

Dekker stepped into the command center and went to work. "Hull integrity?'

"One hundred percent," replied one of his live-aboard refugees. Their numbers included a plethora of tradesmen; they'd formed a perfect corps of repair and maintenance workers.

"Shield systems?" Dekker asked.

"We're running about eighty-five percent," replied another. "It's not a power issue; the generators output is probably stronger than it needs to be. Our shield-energy transmission towers were damaged in some areas by those grappler vines. Eighty-five is our new maximum shield threshold."

Dekker asked, "Weapons systems?"

"Laser turrets are beyond repair. Output energy banks are fine, we just can't fire them. Torpedo and flak ammo are around twenty percent. We have maybe a dozen rail gun cartridges left. We've got plenty of explosives if we had a way to fire them; that acid bath we got from the Valkyrie flagship did a real number on us. Gunneries are just too slagged to operate."

Dekker nodded, ready to conclude the briefing on essential systems. He stood to leave.

"Aren't you forgetting life support?" a woman asked.

So preoccupied with offense, it had slipped his mind as vital. "Yes, proceed," he placated her. But he couldn't make plans beyond the next battle.

"Air cyclers are at a hundred percent, now that hull integrity has been restored," she said. "The remaining systems and ratios are all fine."

He nodded and thanked them all, then went to his Watchmen. They'd set up a war room in the conference hall just off of the command center.

They reviewed the scenario briefly and quickly determined that a frontal attack against the cumulative forces arrayed against them amounted to suicide. Earth seemed a lost cause, by consensus.

"Our planet is fully seeded with the apothecium spores," MacAllistair stated. "The natural immunity factor is there, of course, but given what we saw in District Three, the survival of that minority is not a strong bet."

"Osix is alive, just as you thought," Shaw stated. "Or at least, there's some kind of massive life form living inside it. Sensor patterns closely resemble that of plant-life. Your last blast to the surface did do major damage, just not nearly enough. It opened the surface up so wide that you could hide three Salvations inside it."

"You don't happen to have any other tricks up your sleeve, do you?" Guy asked. "Maybe another time-traveling friend or ancient artifact of mass planetary destruction?"

"No. Just this." He set the reliquary on the table and the shell satchel next to it. The cartridges rattled against the ancient container inside. Dekker withdrew the long, decorative container Ezekiel had given him.

The box sat there like pure temptation. "We should open it," Guy stated.

Dekker shook his head, resolutely. "No. The old man said not to until the end... until my destiny arrives."

"Yeah, what was that about? The creepy old man said that the other day."

Vesuvius put her hand on Dekker's shoulder. She was the only one he'd told, and only recently at that.

Dekker sighed and leveled with them. "Ezekiel claims that it is my destiny to destroy reality. I'm the triggerman, although the real culprit is clearly Prognon Austicon, or whatever is living inside of him."

"How is that even possible," MacAllistair asked.

"Austicon claims to be the embodiment of a powerful demon. My family has battled him for generations now."