AllFreeNovel
Share Us
He chuckles, and Landon grins.
RYDER: You’re all aware of what we’re trying to accomplish. This place is a nexus. We don’t know why, but we know thathereone of the great gates is opening. Seven worlds, friends, besides our own. Seven worlds filled with wonders. And one of them?
He pauses for dramatic effect.
RYDER: One of them is waiting just... out... of sight.
He holds up a hand, as if he can almost touch that other world.
RYDER: Once, the secrets of these worlds belonged to mankind. Once, the Eidolons, those glorious kings and queens, shared their knowledge and their power with the kingdoms of earth. The Eidolons have been trapped. But you...youare going to be the first to bringbackone of the eidolons: the Seraph.
A murmur, worshipful, goes around the gathering.
LANDON: It’s not too late to stay, James.
Ryder chuckles.
RYDER: Would that I could. The Seraph is a being of beauty and immense power, but my heart has always yearned to serve another of its kin. The—
The tape abruptly runs out.
INTERVIEW
Dr. Vanya Kapoor
JULY 3, 2004
Dr. Kapoor and Dr. Andrew Ashford sit across from one another at a table in the LARC break room. Ashford is smoking, and his eyes are dark with shadows. Both he and Dr. Kapoor look more than just fourteen years younger than present day—their faces unlined, hair free of gray, a sharpness to their eyes that age and the burdens of their lives have dulled.
KAPOOR: You’ve seen everything now. Did you find what you wanted to?
ASHFORD: What I wanted to? No. But answers, nonetheless.
KAPOOR: And what about my answers? I think I deserve an explanation.
ASHFORD: Just one?
He laughs. The sound is hollow. He stubs out the cigarette.
KAPOOR: Let’s start with what the hell an Eidolon is.
ASHFORD: A king. Or a god. Or a demon. It depends on your point of view. There were seven. Seven kings of seven worlds. Long ago, long before the founding of Rome, the boundaries between their worlds and ours were thin. There were roads between them that you could simply walk down. The Eidolons demanded worship and tribute and sacrifice, and loosed horrors on humanity. Plagues. Monsters. Slaughter. And then they fell.
KAPOOR: How?
ASHFORD: There are many theories, but none of them is likelier than the next. Maybe some kind of disease. Or some kind of metaphysical change, like a natural—supernatural—disaster. Or else humanity fought back and won. Whatever it was, the seven worlds were broken. What remains of them now is to their original state what a rotting corpse is to a man. The Eidolons sealed away inside of them, behind what we call gates. Not literal gates, but metaphysical barriers, preventing them from entering our world.
KAPOOR: And if they open?
Ashford grimaces.
ASHFORD: Then surely these benevolent gods shall shower us with blessings. That’s what Landon thought.
KAPOOR: And this Ryder guy.
Ashford makes a noncommittal sound.
ASHFORD: Each world, each gate, is different. But in all cases, to open them requires people of our world who are insome way attuned to the one you are trying to reach. That attunement may be intrinsic, a matter of birth, or it may be manufactured by ritual or other unknown processes.
