Conflagration by Mick Farren Page A

even collapsed. It was followed by another and another. A chain reaction was under way, The Four had done all that they could do, and this version of the Other Place was collapsing around them.
    “Okay, out again! Get clear! We’ve stopped them.”
    CORDELIA
    Cordelia fully reentered her body, and was shocked to find she had gone blind. Then she realized that she was wearing a gas mask. Either Slide or some enterprising individual in their escort had taken the initiative when the Dark Things had appeared, and put gas masks on their four inert bodies, which was extremely good thinking considering she was encircled by exploding Dark Things, and black gas billowed around where she sat. The fight around the grassy knoll, where the tiny Dark Things had charged in massed assault, appeared to be over, but she still drew her sidearm as she eased out of the semi-fetal jumping position and rose carefully to her feet. A surviving Thing bounced for her throat, but training kicked in, and she shot it almost without thinking. Large areas of burnt grass gave testimony to how effective The Four’s flaming in the Other Place had been. Hundreds of the little suckers must have dropped through, but The Four, and Slide’s swiftly assembled men on the ground, seemed to have done an efficient job of exterminating them before they did any damage. As the breeze quickly dispersed the gas, a dozen or more young officers were pulling off their masks, leaning on their sabers, and breathing hard.
    The others were also getting to their feet, and as soon as the air was clear, Argo pulled off his mask, breathed tentatively, and then indicated to the others they should do the same. The rubber made a sucking sound as Cordelia followed suit. Enough gas still lingered to cause a catch in her throat. She coughed, but decided it was better than having her head encased in rubber. “Damn.”
    Jesamine wiped the sweat from her face. “We really jumped into that one.”
    Raphael looked less than happy. “You think that’s it? Was that their best shot?”
    Jesamine shrugged. “It must have taken a fuck of a lot of energy to generate and deliver those things.”
    Cordelia’s instincts agreed with Jesamine. So much energy had been expended she doubted if another attack was immediately imminent. “None of us wants to go back Inside right now.”
    “If they had reserves of power, they would have launched a full-scale battlefield attack. Not just used it to nail Dunbar and cut off the head of the Albany attack.”
    “They didn’t even provide support. There were no Mothmen, and no sign of the sports model. They used us to get vector, but there was nothing to make things difficult for us.”
    Cordelia agreed, and not only because she didn’t want to jump again. “I didn’t sense the hand of Jeakqual-Ahrach in any of that. I want to believe those wrigglers were localized; that they were created by Zhaithan at the other end of the valley; that it was all the paranormal Ab Balsol had left.”
    Cordelia didn’t have to tell the others that previous clashes with Her Grand Eminence had left her very sensitive to the presence of Jeakqual-Ahrach behind any attack, and Jesamine totally bought the logic. “So we stay on this side and watch the skies?”
    Raphael looked worried. “It’s a gamble, but I know I couldn’t do that all over again, unless it was really life and death.”
    The jump into the Other Place had left them all dazed, but the terrestrial battle continued to rage on. The entire area around the grassy knoll was on the move as the second wave of infantry and fighting machines assembled at the head of the valley in preparation for entering the carnage. Although it was hard to accept, their encounter with the new variety of Dark Things was just one small, if unusual, skirmish in the full epic of the battle. If they survived, they would have a story to tell, but so would thousands of others; cavalrymen, gunners, foot soldiers, the airmen in the sky