Chapter 18

Bill smiled as he marched around the pool as a liquid metal started to form in the water. The priests were starting to become little more than chanting skeletons. Muscles dissolved by the second, but they continued to chant. Hair started to fall out and fluttered to the ground.

Circe walked up. “You should probably get through the portal as quickly as possible,”

Bill laughed as he turned to look at her. “You really expect me to stand here and let you go, witch.”

Bill gave a look to Jesse who walked toward the portal. Bill spoke an order. “Guard the portal. Juan, you will act like a Nazi trying to grope Mary. Mary be quiet except for screams. Jesse send your sister through the portal first.”

Circe laughed. “You really think that you can do anything to me before the priests turn to dust. It irks you that the last of the Atlantean religion will be here till the end of the world while you at best will be hoping from body to body all because you can’t recognize that things end.”

Bill walked closer to Circe. Mary got thrown into the portal while Juan walked forward in some sort of mechanic’s outfit that apparently Circe had kept. His walk was an exaggerated march with a raised roman salute.

“Mein Kampf, mein Fuhrer!” Juan screamed as he fell into the pool of silvery metallic water. Bubbles popped up.

Jesse walked from the pool with no expression. Circe didn’t back away. “You think that you can kill me with your little slave, Chronos.”

Bill smiled. “It doesn’t matter to me, Circe. Your caste was supposed to be dead over 10,000 years ago. Despite your service to your Archon today, you are merely an anachronism that needs to be expunged for your crimes against the Archons.”

Jesse started to march towards Circe, but then lighting hit Jesse square in the chest pushing the altered man down. His clothing that he had worn originally had a black hole with a large scar now on it.

Jesse looked like he was trying to recover, but it was taken him longer to get up. Coming out of the jungle into the clearing, there stood Merlin and Ashton who was brandishing a gun.

Bill had already started to back away. The priests started to fall apart as they continued to chant. One priest’s hand turned to dust.

“Well Merlin, I’d say that I’ll see you in the future, but time is wasting away it seems.”

And then he was in a run. Merlin tried to shoot him with a bolt of electricity, but Bill surprisingly ran quickly despite his pot belly. Passing Jesse, he yelled. “Come along. We need to get through the portal.”

Ashton realized what was going on a bit too late as more of the priests started to turn to dust. Arms and bodies just turning to dust. Running with the gun, he started to pass through the lines of priests who started to dissolve into dust. Jesse and Bill jumped into the portal.

Bill smiled as he dropped into the liquidly water.

But as the priests started to pop into dust, Ashton got to the pool which had changed to water. He stopped dead next to the pool. Dropping to his knees, he did not get drawn into pool across time and space. Ashton stood there stunned not at silverly liquid just water.

It was Merlin who finally taped him on the shoulder. “Ashton, I am sorry lad. We have to get out of here quickly.”

He looked back at Merlin. There was Circe just standing there in the background just walking around through the dust that had once been priests. She picked up a skull of one of the priests that had not changed to dust completed. She examined the skull.

“Why is she not dead?” Ashton asked.

Merlin restrained Ashton. “She isn’t worth killing, and besides, she can’t die the way you want trust me I’ve tried.”

Circe smiled at Merlin. “Hey, how are you doing?”

Merlin frowned. “Circe as I said when I last met you as Camelot burned to embers- we always seem to meet at the worst of times.”

“Before we start to wonder why we are surrounded by a bunch of dead priests who turned to dust. I did get an incredibly important part to a long-time plan that I’ll explain after I get some sleep.”

Merlin rolled his eyes. “And you still killed a bunch of priests, many Aztecs, many Tlaxcalans, and several people from the future. Also, what happened to your machine-man?”

“I used most of its parts and armor to repair my skiff. I wouldn’t worry too much about it,”

Merlin tapped his foot and Circe finally admitted what had occurred. “Okay, most of it was used to repair the kid Jesse’s machine. Nothing left that really matters. Anything else was used to repair my skiff.”

Then Merlin got up and walked away from Ashton. “You have been repairing the Atlantean moon base after I destroyed your island.”

Circe sighed. “Yeah, I have been repairing parts of the moon base. The Moon Canon can never be repaired since it was atomized by a Murau cruiser which sacrificed itself to do so. However, for the past three thousand years I have been getting the moon base operational.”

Merlin nodded at Circe. “Well, that’s a decent excuse, but why did you destroy Camelot by teaching Arthur’s half-sister blood magic?”

Circe laughed. “The same thing that I always do follow what has been foretold to me.” She swayed her arms around. “It has always been that way. I see horrid futures that always come to pass, and I follow them to make them work to my advantage. But I am trying to find the best future for humanity.”

“And that includes allowing Chronos to escape this timeline?”

Circe looked at her feet as she explained. “I need a part, and if that shard of Chronos had stayed, he would have eventually found a compatible body earlier than where they are going now.”

Circe encircled her thumb and ring finger in front of her right eye. “His followers are growing in Europe despite your little escaped in Judea during that so-called Christian Crusade, Merlin.”

Merlin nodded. “I suspected as much that even if I got rid of the rot in those knights that some piece of it would survive.”

It dawned on Ashton what Merlin and Circe were talking about. “You are talking about the Illuminati.”

Merlin looked confused. “It was part of a group of poor knights who fought in the First Crusade, and I noticed some of them acting strangely. I think it was called the Poor Fellows of Christ. One of them found a device that held a shard of Chronos. It took me and several of the more righteous brothers to destroy it.”

Ashton shook his head. “If you just woke up, a group of what became the Poor Fellow Soldiers of Christ and the Temple of Solomon eventually resurrected worshipping something similar. However, the Templars as they eventually got called ended up being tried in France I guess recently.”

Merlin looked at Ashton. “What do you mean recently?”

Ashton looked sheepish. “It’s hard to know exactly how long ago something was when you think the year is around 1315 or so. I am not sure. And my knowledge of the Knights Templar goes to a history of the Crusades, Conspiracies about their downfall, and an episode of In Search Of.”

Circe laughed, “What is ‘In Search Of’?”

Ashton then realized that the witch was just standing there. “Why is she here?”

Merlin shook his head. “She unfortunately is not easy to get rid of, but at the moment, we do not have any quarrel with her. What is ‘In Search of’?”

Ashton explained the rest sheepishly. “It’s a program that a couple of . . .people watch on what we call in the future television about things of the unknown.”

Circe laughed. “And does this program know about me?”

Merlin shook his head. “I doubt it knows about us if we continue to play our hands right.”

Ashton sighed as he realized the biggest issue. “How am I going to get home?”

Merlin nodded. “I have a method, but I doubt that it is the easiest one to deal with.”

Ashton looked at Merlin. “Does she need to be here to hear it?”

Merlin nodded again. “Circe, I will discuss what your role has been in this with you later.”

The witch nodded. “I have to go take care of one last task, but I think he will accept if my last vision was correct.”

She then disappeared into the jungle. Merlin led Ashton back to the shuttle. “How I am going to get you back to the future is easy. The Avalon has several pods designed for suspended animation. Despite developing FTL technology, we never develop near instant travel like the Naga. And as we have discussed, my fellow countrymen are still in transit back from the great enemies’ home world most likely.”

That was when Ashton realized what Merlin was trying to point out. “You are going to put me into suspended animation till the year 1984.”

Merlin nodded. “It’s not the most elegant solution, but I can assure you that it is completely safe. You won’t be alone down there either. My former student King Arthur Pendragon sleeps in a similar way as well.”

Ashton looked at Merlin. “Why hasn’t he been awakened?”

Merlin looked at the night sky. “It’s quite simple, Ashton. When the Battle of Camlann, Arthur was mortally wounded, and the only way to save his life was to place him into suspended animation until a viable doctor might arrive.”

“So, he sleeps on Avalon is accurate?”

Merlin nodded. “Though I have had to move him once or twice over the years, but the suspended animation device is viable.”

“Are there any problems that I should know about and what about the machine knight?” asked Ashton.

Merlin nodded. “The worst is that the pod fails, but they have their own backup systems. You will wake up in that case, but depending on where you are. That is the worst place. As for the machine knight, I’ll transport it on the Avalon as long as I can.”

Ashton nodded. “I guess I am going to have a bit of faith in that case.”

Merlin nodded. “That’s all we have a lot of times. When we get back to the Avalon, I will go and place you into suspended animation. I will use my drones to destroy the remains of the machine men taking any parts that I might need, and then I will go to the lonely isle and probably sleep for twenty years. Maybe after I wake up, I’ll see if Circe has actually gotten some part of the Moon working.”

“That would be something to see,” said Ashton. “To wake up to see the Earth in a window would be something.”

Merlin nodded. “Well, I think that we shall see each other again in 1984, young Master Ashton.”

The two walked towards the shuttle.

Circe laughed as she saw the skeleton of what had been her machine man. There was still a control room. With Juan disappearing and Joe the last alive, it was important to speak to Tenoch.

Wearing the golden robes of an Atlantean priestess with a golden undersuit, she made sure that the golden crown as she walked into the court of the Tenoch in the newly constructed city. Drones carried her golden cape while two others monitored that she wasn’t struck.

“You have come, Messenger of the gods.”

Nodding she made sure that her translator worked correctly. “It appears my suggestion of using the machine man to help complete the final pieces of your great city of Tenochtitlán has worked.”

His hair long, Tenoch nodded as the priests observed every motion that Circe made. “Messenger, I have heard disturbing reports of failure of the rest of the messengers of the gods. And that we have suffered vast setbacks.”

Circe did not hide that fact. “Judgement has come for the one known as Juan, and he was dragged back to the underworld.”

The Priests nodded. “However, the one known as Joe is yours to decide the fate of, but I would not spill his blood. He has been useful in constructing your city. The giant that you hold may not be able to fight in a war now, but it can guard and help in construction in this city. It is just not in a position to fight in a war.”

Tenoch nodded. “Then what do recommend for the one named Joe. If the giant only responds to one of his blood, I cannot kill him as the one named Juan suggested.”

Circe nodded. “The gods recommend keep him alive and he can teach his children how to control the giant, but be warned, someday another messenger of the gods may return and the giant will not withstand his weapons.”

Tenoch nodded. “Then we shall continue our battles against the Tlaxcala with our own spears for the blood to sate the gods.” The priests nodded slyly.

She twisted around with the cape fluttered behind her, and she walked from the chamber. She would have visited Joe, but it was better to just leave him always wondering. If he knew that she saved him for a vision, he would probably wonder if he could save him just like Merlin was going to save Ashton. However, she wasn’t Merlin, and as she strolled to her skiff, she knew that Joe would grow to love his lot in life.