The Yoga Zapper--A Novel, page 27
The enemy aircraft set upon the flying flowers with great fury. The vimanas shot back with small pods which, upon contact, sprouted thick stems with huge thorns, immediately entwining the opponents’ craft. Within seconds, they resembled flying bushes and when the thorns pierced their fuselages, they crashed into the ground, exploding upon contact.
As Steve lay spread-eagled in the sky, dozens of bubble-shaped vimanas, accompanied by many bowl-shaped ones, sped past. The iridescent bubble craft floated over the battlefield and he laughed at the incongruity between their beauty and the horror below.
“Steve!”
The voice was unmistakable. He looked around, shocked.
“Steve! I’m down here!”
Shanti, just ten feet below, piloting a bubble-shaped vimana, floating in its middle as if lying on a bed of air, waved to him. It spun round at inconceivable speed, changing its shape from a sphere to a cone as it traveled through the sky.
“What are you doing?” he shouted.
“Same thing you’re doing,” she retorted. “I am protecting the dharma!”
“This is dangerous.”
As he spoke, a shot bounced right off Shanti’s whirling bubble, slowing its rotation for a fraction of a second. “I feel like I’m falling!” she screamed.
Indeed, Shanti dropped just a bit, but in less than a hundredth of a second, the craft resumed its rotation, safely sheltering her again.
“Go back. You’ll get shot down.”
“No. If we are serving Kalki Avatar, why should we be afraid?” She had a determined look about her.
“Then let us join forces,” he finally agreed.
Jack flew over. The brothers took positions on each side of Shanti’s bubble, Steve looking forward and Jack guarding the rear. Suddenly, two pyramid-shaped enemy fighters approached, spitting sharply spinning balls of energy at them. The bowl-shaped craft, protecting all other vimanas, immediately jumped to intercept the red, purple, green and yellow energy pulses, which flew around inside them for a moment and disappeared. As the enemy zipped by, Jack swung his sword. The fighter exploded with a mighty bang while the second one whipped right past.
“Let’s go after it,” shouted Shanti and they shot off after the second attacker. It engaged in desperate maneuvers, shooting straight up, turning on a dime, flying behind other craft and diving down. The three of them, along with the bowl-shaped craft, followed close behind at enormous speed, bobbing and dodging other vimanas, striking at passing enemy craft, fashioning a trail of destruction through the skies. Steve shrieked with excitement, dipping, weaving and diving at enormous speed, warding off enemy shots with his shield, zipping behind other craft and firing bolts of lightning with his magical sword, the enemy craft exploding in front of him, their broken parts zinging off into the sky.
Suddenly the hunted craft slowed as it approached the cliffs. Shanti, using her mind, let go a stream of small bubbles. They hit it dead on. A thin film coated the fighter and it struggled to escape but within seconds, the covering hardened, rendering it immobile and the doomed craft fell to the ground, exploding in a ball of fire.
“Wow!” screamed Steve as they stopped to observe the destroyed aircraft. He held his hand up, saluting her victory and Shanti confidently raised her fist. She didn’t resemble the shy, young woman he first met but revealed a lot more; things like courage and sacrifice.
“Go ahead,” said Jack suddenly, saluting his brother. “I want to try one of the other vimanas.”
“Wait!” Too late, Jack had left. Steve steamed. How could Jack fly off leaving them alone? He understood Jack enjoying the battle’s adventure, but to leave Shanti unprotected on one side? He turned red and shook his head.
“What are you thinking?” asked Shanti.
“How thoughtless Jack can be. Same old Jack. If he stayed with us, we could continue fighting, but now, one of your flanks is unprotected.”
“So what do you want to do?”
“Let’s go back to Shambala. We can keep an eye out for any enemy vessels that may come there.”
“Are you sure?”
“Absolutely!”
“Okay,” sighed Shanti. “Let’s go back.”
* * * * *
Jack reappeared in a liquid mercury vimana which stretched and moved like a floating amoeba. He saw everything on a silvery screen that sometimes stretched and bent like the mercury his craft was made of. His airship had no rigid structure and he felt as if he was swimming, as it sometimes bucked and heaved like a mechanical bull, pulling him from one side to the other at incredible speed.
The enemy laughed at its stretching itself into odd shapes, moving herky-jerky above the plains, and shot at it. The craft instantly stretched, throwing Jack to one end while the bolts of energy passed harmlessly through the liquid mercury at the other side. Obviously, it couldn’t be destroyed in the usual manner. He guided it low over the battlefield and stopped over the enemy. Instantaneously, hundreds of rifles escaped the soldiers’ grasps, flew straight up and stuck to the vimana’s outside skin. His jaw dropped. Seconds later, the metal, transformed into thousands of pellets of shot, hurled back down, killing hundreds. The survivors ran away as fast as their legs could carry them.
A shell flew right over Jack’s vimana and exploded near the hill where the Avatar stood. He traced it back to a group of mortars at the other side of the battlefield and guided his craft over to the cannons, not really knowing what to do. Two other mercury vimanas floated over. A strange thing happened. The three craft came together and joined seamlessly, creating one giant mercury ball roughly fifty feet in diameter. The two other pilots joined him in his cabin laughing and gesturing excitedly.
The now-large vimana descended. To Jack’s amazement, one of the cannons slowly lifted off the ground, stuck to the craft’s exterior and melted into it. The vimana lifted a hundred feet up into the air, changed hue to a milky white and spit out hundreds of spears, which, traveling at immense speed, impaled the fleeing soldiers. Seeing this demonstration brought a chill to his heart.
Once he destroyed the battery of mortars, Jack bade farewell to his companions, popped out of the top of the liquid mercury craft and flew into the sky until he had a view of the entire battlefield. He looked around unsuccessfully for Steve and Shanti. He shook his head questioningly. Strange. Did they leave for Shambala already?
Jack landed on the hill next to Kalki Avatar. The Avatar pointed to a long tangerine-colored flying obelisk vimana. “Watch. This vimana is guided by my mind and targeted with my eyes.”
The vimana inverted itself, its pointed top facing down, and positioned itself above the battlefield, its insides glittering with the reflections of the sun’s rays and, after several minutes, blazed from top to bottom like an enormous exclamation of fire in the sky. Suddenly, a hundred-foot-wide beam of intense blue light, like a million lasers, shot out from the vimana’s peak and scorched to death every soldier unlucky enough to be under it. The hot blue light devastated the enemy and melted all metal it shone on. As the obelisk crisscrossed the battlefield in several measured sweeps, the men ran away shouting and Kallin’s platform swiftly moved discreetly away to a safe distance.
The battle possessed a strange beauty. Jack had to remind himself that behind the muffled, distant explosions, the whine of ordnance zipping by, the small puffs of white smoke in the blue atmosphere, the pillars of fire floating in the sky, the purple and gold flying monkeys, the iridescent bubbles, the yellow and orange shell-bursts, the shiny mercury craft which reflected the sky above and the battle below, the black fighter planes flitting like flies and the strange floating flowers, a deadly war unfolded and when evening fell and the fighting slowed for at least a while, the air would be rent with the cries of the injured and the agony of the dying.
* * * * *
The battle lasted for days and immense was the slaughter on both sides. The armies of the Heroes were decimated by the coordinated attacks of the Functionals who seemed to anticipate the movements of Kalki Avatar’s men. The army of the Heroes retaliated, killing millions. Finally, the victor emerged, but at what a cost! The vimanas worked their magic and, with the help of the bears, monkeys and the army of the great Heroes, destroyed the enemy army and most of Kallin’s air force. Kallin swiftly retreated from the battle scene on his flying platform, his entire army decimated, with not a single soldier left alive. On Kalki Avatar’s side, only a few thousand men remained to celebrate the bloody victory.
Chapter Thirty Four
At the Battlefield, End of Kali Yuga
“What are we going to do?” questioned the national security advisor. “Some of our aircraft are saved, but the army is totally destroyed.”
The floating platform moved slowly in the early morning over the previous night’s battlefield. A strange, burnt electrical smell, mixed in with the stench of coagulating blood, filled the air. On the plains, as far as the eye could see, lay the bodies of soldiers, many of them staring into the sky with wide-open eyes. Heads, arms and legs lay scattered about.
“I will never give up,” proclaimed the Hand of God wrathfully, oblivious to the carnage. “I will get the power of time travel, even if it means sacrificing every single person on this planet.” He scratched his white beard. “Gather all the Raks you can find and bring them. Use whoever is left of the police to round them up.”
“Untrained Raks! How can they fight? They are not army material. They’re all deformed. The only Raks we’ve used so far are the Functionals!”
“It doesn’t matter. When injected with the military grade DNA implants, the Raks will be controlled automatically.”
“But sir, isn’t that dangerous?”
“Stop arguing with me,” yelled Kallin. “From now on, I’ll make all the decisions around here. Bring every Rak you can by tomorrow night. Get going!”
* * * * *
With the decimation of Kallin’s troops, Steve, Jack, Hanuman and Kalki Avatar flew back to Shambala, joining Shanti, Parvata Rishi and the rest of the community under the trees.
“Congratulations on winning the war!” announced Vishnuyasha, beaming at Kalki. Though they destroyed the enemy, none felt any happiness, but sadness at the loss of almost the entire army of the Heroes, and of the poor, miserable enemy soldiers, by whose misfortune they served an evil master. Yet, relief arrived with the fight’s end.
Suddenly, a small pyramid-shaped airplane appeared at the far end of the valley, flying silently, close to the ground, while being hunted by two other craft. Making desperate maneuvers to escape its followers, it weaved and bobbed all along the valley, dodging its pursuers until hit by a shot of cannon A seat ejected and drifted into the jumble of rocks near the waterfalls, as the fighters climbed up and flew away. The seat’s back remained visible though the occupant lay hidden. Jack ran towards it, joined by several young men, and pulled it over.
“Jack, is that you?” inquired the man. Jack jumped back in surprise. A familiar face, square-jawed, with brown skin creased like sandpaper, stared back.
“General Contog! What are you doing here?” blurted Jack.
“I escaped from Kallington.”
By now, the rest of the group arrived. “He’s our friend,” reassured Jack, “not an enemy.” Exclamations of surprise sounded all around.
Contog unstrapped himself and stood up. His face showed the weariness of days of imprisonment and the strain of escape, but his eyes gleamed merrily at the prospect of liberty. He breathed deeply. “Ah!” he exclaimed, “the sweet smell of freedom!”
As Contog and his rescuers returned, Kalki Avatar invited him to sit down. Jack came to the front and introduced the general to the assembled personalities in simple Sanskrit, detailing their previous encounters and the help the general had offered.
“Dear general,” questioned the Avatar, after Jack’s lengthy history. “Please give us news of the enemy.”
“I have heard of the great battles fought here. I offer my heartiest congratulations to all of you for your brave struggle against the supremely evil Kallin.”
Jack smiled. “It is only by the blessings of Lord Kalki, not to mention Hanuman and the Heroes, that we defeated the enemy.”
Contog nodded, but concern flashed across his face. “The enemy is by no means finished. He is gathering a huge number of Raks at the plains not far from here.”
Kalki stroked his majestic mustache. “Is that so? Please tell us more.”
A hush fell over the gathering as the general described Kallin, his heartlessness and his ambition, of the great cities, the vast slums, the degraded lives of the Raks, the corruption and the greed of the Elite. The simple inhabitants of the valley could only shake their heads in disbelief. So this evil violent system confronted them!
“General,” requested Kalki Avatar, “do you have any suggestions as to how to overcome Kallin?”
“Yes, but I don’t know if you will be able to do it.” Contog pulled a small metal object out of his pocket, the size and shape of a grain of rice. He gave the DNA implant a small twist and out of its top shot out a dozen extremely thin wires, each about three inches long and fine as spider strands.
“What is this?” exclaimed Jack.
“This is a military grade DNA implant, his ultimate weapon. It performs all the functions of the regular implants plus a few more. Not only does it measure the DNA and the proteins in the blood, it also sends tiny electrical pulses into the brains.”
“For what purpose?”
“The implants receive transmissions sent from the moon installation which travel along these metal wires into the soldiers’ brains. By this, their moods are controlled, with the goal being to make them follow orders unquestioningly.” All shook their heads in amazement. “You have destroyed his army, most of his armaments and aircraft, but Kallin’s installation on the moon, which controls everything, still remains. It scans the battlefield continuously and transmits information to every single soldier by way of the implants and moves them in coordinated ways. If this system is destroyed, you have a good chance of vanquishing Kallin. Otherwise, his men will descend upon you like flies and overwhelm you with their incalculable numbers and uncountable weapons.”
A stark silence enveloped the assembly. For a long while, no one said a thing.
“What do you suggest?” asked Jack finally.
“Destroy the moon-base. It is not easy. Not only is it far away, it is also extremely well-guarded. I don’t know how you will do this. You don’t have much time. As we speak, Kallin is organizing for the final battle.”
“Why hasn’t he attacked Shambala directly? We are such a small valley. If he bombed us, we would be finished.”
“This is Kallin’s mad greed. He is convinced that the means to travel through time lies here. He wants immortality and he wants absolute power.”
The sages shook their heads. The shastras clearly stated that lust, greed, anger, envy and illusion are the greatest enemies of the spiritual seeker. One who fell prey to these can never advance in consciousness, but the question was, would he take them all with him to destruction.
Kalki Avatar walked to the middle of the gathering. “It is absolutely correct that we need to destroy the moon installation.”
“I would be happy to help,” declared Jack, his eyes shining.
“And so would I,” added Steve.
The Avatar laughed. “Good. We need brave young men. But those decisions can be made at the proper time. First you need to get out of harm’s way and ascend to the grand vimana. This place has become too dangerous. Even if the dictator doesn’t directly attack Shambala, he could occupy it.”
“But I love this valley,” objected Shanti. “I don’t want to leave!”
Kalki smiled. “I appreciate your attachment to Shambala but imagine, after the war, when the whole world will be like this valley.”
Shanti agreed. The villagers, with the strength of their years of sadhana, chanted mantras softly under their breaths and were transported to the largest vimana, the one that floated highest in the sky.
* * * * *
General Contog observed the dictator standing on the platform. Kallin wielded a cable of some kind, lengthy enough to come to about twenty feet from the ground.
“What is that?” inquired Kalki Avatar. He, along with the brothers, Hanuman and the remaining warriors stationed themselves at the entrance to the pass, which the Avatar felt was easier to protect. As they peered, the dictator snapped the cable and out of its end emanated a stream of flashing electrical pulses, striking the unfortunate Raks below who screamed loudly enough to be heard across the battlefield.
“My God!” exclaimed Contog. “He’s whipping his troops!”
Kallin moved back and forth, mercilessly flogging the Raks, laughing, thoroughly enjoying the sadistic experience. Each swing from his whip produced pulses that cut into the bodies of a hundred, maybe two hundred soldiers at a time. They howled like dogs, driven mad with pain, and rushed towards the pass. Already pained by deformities, the Raks hobbled on misshapen legs, crying in agony, their eyes red, their twisted spines bearing the brunt of the terrible whippings, being nothing but worthless fodder for Kallin’s insane ambitions.
