Evil Star

fired. He hadn't had time to change the trajectory of the satellite, and even without guidance it had continued moving, Horowitz, Anthony - [Gatekeepers 02] - Evil Star making for its final resting point. Of course, it wouldn't stop.
    Perhaps it would end up crashing into the Earth. But that didn't matter. At the very instant that it reached its correct position, the alignment of the stars would be complete, the combinadon lock would be forced, and the gate would open.
    And that was what was happening.
    The gate was opening after all.
    Matt felt something tremble underneath his feet. He looked down and saw a crack appear in the sand. It began quite close to where he was standing and then twisted and zigzagged into the distance."
    Another crack ran across it. Several more began to spread in every direction. It was as if the entire desert were breaking up. At the same time, some sort of liquid began to ooze out from below, spilling onto the sand. It was dark in color, somewhere between brown and red, with the consistency of glue or treacle — except that it was obviously blood, because Matt could smell it everywhere in the air, sweet and sickly. The cracks widened. Matt actually felt himself moving. It was as if he had been caught in an earthquake, except that this was somehow slower and more deliberate. The mauve light in the sky was pulsing harder than ever. Something somewhere began to scream. The sound came from everywhere, thin and high-pitched.
    Matt wanted to put his hands over his ears but he knew it would do no good.
    He understood something now that he hadn't under-stood before. He had come to Peru looking for a second gate and had thought that it would be found somewhere in the Nazca desert. But he had been wrong. They had all been wrong. Because the Nazca desert was the gate. The whole thing. He could actually see the famous lines from where he was standing, even though it should have been impossi-Horowitz, Anthony - [Gatekeepers 02] - Evil Star ble. They were glowing. There were circles and triangles, rectangles and squares, drawings on a vast scale, activated and ready after a wait of more than twenty thousand years.
    The ground was rumbling. He could feel the vibrations traveling through him. He tried to refocus, to gather in his own power, but it was hopeless. He was as completely alone as he had been told he would be. There was nothing more he could do. The rumbling grew louder, and at the same time an icy wind sprang up all around him, throwing the sand into his eyes and sending his hair flapping against his forehead. Matt lost his balance and staggered. He heard laughter echoing across the plain. His vision shimmered and then there was the sound of what could have been a huge whiplash, so loud that it almost threw him off his feet. Light burst out of the desert floor, slicing through the air, lancing up into the sky. Blinded and battered, Matt fell to his knees.
    Silence. Everything had stopped.
    Then the creatures began to appear.
    There was an eruption as if from a volcano. A huge bird exploded out of the ground in front of Matt and hung, static in the air, its wings beating so fast that they were barely visible. The earth boiled all around it. Matt felt the air buffeting against him and covered his face with his arms, afraid of being blinded. It was a hummingbird.
    Its eyes were black and brilliant and full of wickedness. Its beak was half open, and Matt knew that if it chose to, it could swal-low him whole.
    Four massive, hairy legs suddenly appeared, reaching out over the edge of the desert, and a gigandc spider pulled itself up from below.
    Matt saw the poison sac hanging under its belly. Two glistening fangs jutted out of its neck. It paused for a moment, twitching, then Horowitz, Anthony - [Gatekeepers 02] - Evil Star scurried away.
    There was a screech, and a monkey leaped out of nowhere, its tail curling and uncurling, its teeth stretched in a grotesque smile. One by one, the pictures that he had once seen from the air sprang to life.
    Matt stayed where he was, on his knees, waiting for his own death to come.
    For perhaps twenty seconds, nothing more happened. Matt heard a buzzing sound. It started low and distant, then rose, getting louder and louder until it was as if there was a chain saw trying to cut the world apart. Matt pressed his hands against his ears, and the next moment a vast cloud of insects burst out of the cracks in the ground and twisted into the air. They were flies with