Deathstalker 08 - Deathstalker Coda

and walked away.
    “Then who would spread your damned warning?” Owen yelled after him.
    “It is time for us to leave,” said Lucifer, not looking round. “We cannot stay here any longer, and be responsible for more violence, more deaths. Perhaps a few of us will stay behind, hidden from sight, to observe and watch over Humanity as it builds its Empire. As a species, you show potential. You may yet evolve into something worthwhile.”
    “You should have helped Hellen,” said Owen.
    “We couldn’t even help ourselves,” said Lucifer.
    He gestured at the fanatics lying shocked and terrified on the floor, and they rose quickly to their feet and ran out of the cavern, shoving at each other in their haste to get into the tunnel and away. Lucifer looked back at Owen.
    “Before we go, one last piece of information. It is possible that we have encountered your friend Hazel, the object of your pursuit through time. She appeared here, in this place, a few weeks ago—drawn to our presence. I think we intrigued her. She manifested only as a mental impression, wrapped in a field of unfamiliar energies. She did not seem . . . human. Her presence reminded us a little of who and what we used to be. She scared us. There was nothing of restraint or passion in her. She had amassed power at a frightening rate while plunging back through time, draining it from the lives and worlds she passed. It seemed to us that there was no limit to how much power she might drain, or what she might become.”
    Owen nodded. He knew he had been draining energy from somewhere, to power his continuing passage through time, and now he knew where from. That extra power was why he was able to do all the things he’d never been able to do before. The concept appalled him. There was a very old name for creatures that lived by draining life from others. But he knew the truth wouldn’t stop him; nothing would now. He had to go on, either to stop Hazel becoming the Terror, or to find a way to deal with the Terror in the future.
    He didn’t tell Lucifer that Hazel would eventually become the Terror. It would only have upset the Illuminati.
    “Before you go,” he said flatly to Lucifer, “there’s something I want you to do. Something to help Humanity and at the same time preserve your warning. You said Humanity might evolve into something better; but I’m here to tell you that’s not going to happen by the time the Terror finds them. Unless you and I give them a helping hand. Together we’re going to build something; create something that’s never existed before. Something to give at least a few people a fighting chance. It will be called the Madness Maze. And if you ever consider saying no, just think of Hellen, who died because you wouldn’t help her. And remember what I did to the New Frontier fanatic.”

    And so, under Owen’s specific instructions, the Illuminati created the Madness Maze. On learning what it was to be, and what it was supposed eventually to do, they decided it would be far too dangerous to create or leave on Hearth, so they took Owen with them through their secret silver tunnels to a planet on the other side of the galaxy. And only Owen knew that one day the world would be called Haden. In a cavern deep below the surface of the world, lit only by the flickering rainbow glow of the Light People, they brought into being the Madness Maze, creating it through a group effort of concentrated will, focused through Owen’s mind and power. And when they were finished, it looked just like he remembered it.
    Owen looked at it, and thought for a long while.
    By creating the Maze, I have made tomorrow possible. I have made the Terror possible. But the Light People might have created it anyway, at some point. At least this way I get to put my stamp on it. And without the Maze we could never have brought Lionstone and her Empire down. Perhaps if I hadn’t done this, Hazel would never have been able to become the Terror, and all those worlds and civilizations would still be alive. Or perhaps someone or something else would have become the Terror, and then Humanity would have no defense against it.
    I don’t know. The Maze is woven irretrievably throughout human history. Do I have the right to unravel such a knot? No; we need the Maze, and in the end, that’s all that matters.
    And if I’m wrong?
    Then I’m wrong.
    The Illuminati fluttered around the thing they’d made, studying it and considering its possibilities. Lucifer