One Hundred and Sixty-Nine

It should have been impossible.

A military encampment now lies in ruins beside the ancient stonework of Puka Pukara. They had entered through a portal in Telis pushing Ikart back into Cuzco. Smoke coils into the dimming sky, thick black columns rising from far too many places at once, the way grief rises when a world ends. Fires still smolder where the bombardment struck, their glow faint against the coming dark, pulsing like dying embers in a hearth no one will tend again.

The darkest plume rises from the crater where an angel’s spirit-frame fell.

This was no rebel attack. This was an execution: carried out with precision that leaves no room for mercy, no space for accident. Each strike calculated. Each detonation measured. The kind of violence that requires planning, approval, intent.

I know what stood there before the ground turned maroon and the sky went black. I have walked those streets. Homes alive with laughter: adobe walls painted in ochre and turquoise, doorways hung with woven textiles that moved in the mountain wind. Markets overflowing with potatoes and quinoa and corn, vendors calling prices in Quechua and Spanish, their voices rising and falling like music. Smoke from cooking fires drifting through the air, mingling with the scent of eucalyptus and the calm of nearby waters. Elders guarding sacred ground, their weathered hands tracing offerings into the earth. Children chasing chickens through narrow streets, their bare feet slapping against stone worn smooth by centuries. Tourists wandering ancient paths in reverent awe, cameras raised to capture what they could never truly hold. The rhythms of ordinary life: precious because they are ordinary, sacred because they are small.

I have seen this before. One hundred and sixty-eight times, across as many worlds. The pattern never changes. Only the names. Only the faces.

Now the homes are blasted and burned, walls collapsed inward like broken ribs. The smell of burnt flesh is everywhere: human, animal, indistinguishable. No amount of prayers or prana can wash it away. It clings to the throat, settles into the lungs, becomes part of you. Animals cry or wander lost: llamas with singed wool stumbling through debris, dogs circling the places where their owners fell. The elders, their senses scattered like ash, can no longer remember where they lived. No landmarks remain.

The chapel is rubble. The fountain is dust. The plaza where children played is now a blackened scar. The soft wind is burdened with smoke, ash, and stench, carrying the despair of those who remain. It lingers over this once-happy place where villagers danced during Inti Raymi, celebrating harvests, weddings, and saints’ days with chicha, drums, and songs older than memory.

The region has been pushed into a new Danse Macabre, its desolation unmistakable. Death is the only partner left.

On this mournful day, Pachamama’s aura hovers among angels and restless spirits, a presence felt rather than seen, a warmth against the cold, gathering the remains of her children. She moves through the ruins like a mother searching for the lost, her grief vast and silent.

On this mournful day, Pachamama’s aura hovers among angels and restless spirits, a presence felt rather than seen, a warmth against the cold, gathering the remains of her children. She moves through the ruins like a mother searching for the lost, her grief vast and silent.

As she passes, the dead are silent. They would have cheered had they known reinforcements were already moving toward the Altiplano, drawn by the region’s strategic weight, by the network of ley lines converging beneath these mountains, and by the sacred sites that have stood for millennia as anchors between realms. The souls would have believed their adversary’s satisfaction would be short-lived, that hubris always precedes the fall.

But I know better.

Ikart catalogued vulnerabilities in the enemy’s mechanical design. Weaknesses we might exploit. I read them and thought of soup stretched too thin, sustenance losing potency with each dilution. Whatever advantage we find will evaporate before we can wield it. They are learning. Adapting. And we are discovering that the invulnerability we took for granted was never guaranteed. Only unchallenged.

Ikart is wounded in ways the medical report will not capture. I know this because I trained him. I know the weight that settles into a warrior’s bones when the fundamental assumptions of warfare shift beneath them. When what should be impossible becomes ordinary. When angels bleed.

He calls it soul damage. He is correct, but not in the way he thinks.

Listen carefully, you of carbon and dust. What I tell you matters. Not in theory, but in ash and sulfur and the bodies of children who will never grow old.

Some words may resonate and stir your conscience. This is intended. Listen to your heart. You may recognize patterns, see the spirits behind the veil, and feel called to respond.

Even if you see me, you will not recognize me by my appearance. I can appear as anything you imagine, even something amorphous. I have served the Council of Ancients for longer than your civilizations have existed. I have witnessed the rise and fall of empires, the birth and death of stars, and the pattern of creation and destruction repeating itself with the inevitability of breath.

I was traveling to Rosocova when everything changed. I heard from a spirit in Puka Pukara.

Before I tell you what happened there, before I show you the message that altered the course of this war, you should know that I have seen this before. One hundred and sixty-eight times. The pattern never changes. Only the names. Only the faces.

I was just outside Rosocova when Camille carried the message to me.

Priority transmission from Captain Ikart. Encrypted. Urgent.

I had been thinking about Lakita, my mentee, turning over whether she had truly mastered the empath technique I had taught her: the trick of catching black-hole currents and letting them shear you through time. And I kept wondering how she’d meet me when I came back: formal with respect, or with that exasperated affection of someone who’s sure she’s outgrown her teacher… and hasn’t.

Small concerns. The kind you allow yourself when the world feels stable.

The tone of the transmission told me stability had ended.

I allowed the message into my presence twice. The second time, my wings were steadier than the first.

Start of Encrypted Message

Commander,

I am Captain Ikart, currently deployed to investigate emerging threats in the Cusco region. Situation has escalated. Theater of operations shifted to the Altiplano.

What followed was an attack unlike anything I have encountered in six centuries of service.

Summary: Celestials are now vulnerable to mortal weaponry.

The strike came from forces demonstrating advanced tactical intelligence. They knew my designation. They knew my capabilities. They engaged with intent to neutralize, not merely to resist.

New weapon class encountered. I am designating it an emo-charge pending official classification. The device targets psionic and spiritual vulnerabilities directly. It struck me and caused temporary incapacitation: approximately four minutes of complete systems disruption. Recovery was possible but concerning. Celestials have never been vulnerable to directed energy weapons of any kind. This represents a fundamental shift in the strategic landscape.

I recovered and retaliated, forcing enemy withdrawal. However, the technology behind this weapon suggests development by entities with knowledge of celestial composition and weakness points. Origin unknown. Threat assessment: severe.

The enemy withdrew in organized fashion, suggesting coordination and command structure. They will return with refined tactics.

Before departing the region, I will submit a comprehensive after-action report. Enemy forces are mobilizing. I have identified several exploitable weaknesses in their mechanical design, detailed in the full report. However, I assess these vulnerabilities will be corrected within days. Window of tactical advantage: minimal.

Request: Dispatch specialized response team for immediate consultation. Recommend private briefing on classified aspects of this incident.

Note: I understand Colonel Telel has been assigned to Rosocova for recruit evaluation. Given the escalating threat environment, recommend priority reassessment of training protocols. We are preparing not only for conventional engagement but for conflict across multiple planes of existence.

I have been granted medical leave. Soul damage requires recovery time. The battles will not cease, but I must.

Until we rest, in Paradise.

—Capt. Ikart, Field Investigator

End of Message

I did not continue to Rosocova that day.

Instead, I turned myself around and took my thoughts towards the Altiplano. Toward the ruins. Toward whatever new pattern is emerging from the ashes of the old.

I have been a Watcher for millennia. I have stood between Jehovah’s destructive love and the worlds he sought to unmake. I have held the line between order and chaos, between the Lamb and the Lion, between the filled world and the hungry Void.

But something has changed.

Something stirs beyond the Void, not within it, but beyond it, in a place even Essence cannot see clearly. Something neither flesh nor spirit gathers there. Something that does not ache to be filled but hungers to consume. It waits like a storm forming on a horizon no one is watching, building pressure in the deep places where even the Ancients do not look.

And now mortals have learned to wound us.

The pattern is repeating, but with new variations. The soup has been diluted once more, and I fear we are approaching the moment when it ceases to nourish entirely.

I am telling you this because you need to decide.

Do you feel the call to defend creation? Not the romantic notion of it. Not the glory of battle or the pride of righteous cause. The actual work of standing between the Void and everything you love. The work of watching children dance in plazas that will become blackened scars. The work of training warriors knowing many will fall. The work of holding the line when the line keeps shifting beneath your feet.

The Council will invite those chosen by Essence to join us. You will be confirmed by the power of Chauvin material: that ancient force forged from opposing principles, order and chaos bound together. You will be elevated to become Controllers: guardians of all that is made.

But understand this: peace will never reign. The Lamb will lie down with the Lion, yes, but only because you will watch from above, commanding sky and sea and land, keeping both at bay through vigilance and force.

This is not a call to heroism. This is a call to necessity.

The Void is growing again. Not slowly. Not gradually. But with intent.

And we who have stood guard for millennia are learning that we, too, can fall.

So I ask you: Will you stand with us?

Will you become what creation needs, not what you imagine it deserves, but what the moment demands?

The choice is yours.

But choose quickly.

The pattern is accelerating, and I have seen how this story ends—one hundred and sixty-eight times before.

I would very much like the one hundred and sixty-ninth to be different.