The Gospel of Eli

Chapter 1

The Stasis pod door slid closed over Doctor Nicholas Rush, he stood with his eyes closed and hands clasped in front of him. The machine hummed into life and his breathing stopped, his body became stock still. A blue haze quickly filled the pod giving the illusion that it was filled with ice. The process complete Young turned to Eli and asked him

'You sure about this?' Eli's face took on a serious look.

'I've never been more sure of anything in my life.' He replied, his face let a smile out and he held his hand out to Young, who ignored it instead pulling Eli into an embrace.

'You're a good man Eli.' He said as they pulled apart. 'You'll get this done, I'll see you on the other side.'

'Right.' Said Eli breaking into another grin.

'Right.' Replied Young, who turned and stepped into his own pod. Eli pressed the start button and the door slid down on him.

...

And then the door slid open.

Cold. That penetrated right to his core. Young drew in a long torturous breath and stepped out of the pod. Instantly his legs gave way and he fell forwards his freezing numb arms managing to catch the side of a table to break his fall. He lay there half slumped on the floor his breath shallow and rapid, his body shaking violently, his vision blurred. Muted sounds seemed to be all around him as if he was hearing voices underwater. The room he was in was small and circular and dark, definitely not the room he was in when he and the crew entered their pods.

The other pods!

The thought hit him like a bullet where were the other pods? He shook his head trying clear his vision, when the door at the far side of the room opened with a loud mechanical whir. In walked two aliens tall, their bodies shaped like twisted parodies of men, jaws filled with razor sharp teeth, their heads dominated by large soulless black eyes. They advanced on him with a hideous shrieking.

Young, his reactions taking over from his fear lunged at the first one but his body betrayed him and he fell short on unsteady legs. The aliens jumped him pinning him face down on the cold metal floor. Young felt a needle in his neck and immediately numbness spread throughout his body, as consciousness left him he looked at the table that had supported him, it was made of wood, there wasn't any wooden furniture on Destiny. That was his last thought as the darkness swallowed him up.

And then he opened his eyes.

Coming to twice in a couple of minutes was a disorientating experience. The cold of his previous emergence had gone, to be replaced by a sharp headache. Young raised his hands to his face. Or tried to do, his arms appeared stuck and a glance down showed he was lying horizontal on a bed with some very secure leather straps on his wrists keeping his hands down by his waist.

'You're awake then' said a female voice.

Young turned his head to the left where a young woman sat in a wicker chair next to his bed. She was slim, brunette with youthful pretty features. The room they were in was small with no features aside from the door, the chair and the bed he was currently strapped to. Of the two horrific aliens there was no sign. Young asked her the first of the many questions flying around his head.

'Where am I?' The young woman eyes seemed to search his face as if she was having a hard time concentrating on him, finally she replied

'The science vessel, Harro'than'.

A ship thought Young; he was no longer on Destiny.

'Where's my crew' he asked. Again her eyes took in his features.

'Before I answer any more questions I have one for you' she said, her expression suddenly serious. Young nodded in acquiescence.

'Are you really Colonel Everett Young, commander of the Destiny?' Young nodded.

'Yes I am and I want to know where my crew is?' The woman's face lit up as he said this.

'I knew it, I knew it was you everything matches, your face, your location, the Gospel of Eli is true it's all true!'

None of this made sense to Young. It was all wrong, like a bad dream. He should be on Destiny, waking up to his crew, his family ready to start the next phase of their mission. Not here, not tied to a bed with some woman he'd never met. Anger flared in his chest and he strained at the restraints keeping him tied down.

'Get me off this bed!' he shouted at the suddenly shocked woman. 'Get me off this bed and tell me where my crew is!' She backed away from him in obvious fear and ran to a small control panel by the door.

'Doctor' she said pressing a button and holding her mouth close to the panel. 'He's awake and agitated; I think you should come down here'. Then without another word she walked quickly out of the room leaving Young by himself.

Young lay there turning the situation over in his mind trying to keep the rising panic away. He was no longer on Destiny that much seemed clear; when he awoke it wasn't the same room so his whole pod must have been moved. Clearly Eli's plan to simply skip the dangerous part of the voyage hadn't worked and now he had been kidnapped by either aliens with human servants or possibly even the other way round. Eli! He thought, that's what she had said "The Gospel of Eli". Perhaps Eli was here, there were too many unanswered questions. But he had to keep it together, presumably the rest of the crew had been similarly captured, he needed to survive long enough to work out what had happened, long enough to save the others it was his duty.

The door opened again and in walked the young woman, this time she was accompanied by a much older man. He was in his late 50's by the looks of him, his short hair turning quickly to grey, he was tall at least 6 foot and walked with a steady measured gait. He sat down on the wicker chair previously occupied by his female companion and spoke to Young.

'Colonel please forgive the restraints, my orders I'm afraid. You attacked two of my men I couldn't be sure of your mental state until you awoke'. Young glared at the newcomer angrily.

'Your men? You mean the two creatures that attacked me!'

The older man looked momentarily puzzled then regained his composure.

'The "Creatures" are called Alex and Hussein, and they are as human as myself. I dare-say you suffered a hallucination, not uncommon, considering the amount of time you have allegedly been in stasis.'

This threw Young's train of thought for a second.

'Amount of time?' he said 'How long have I been under?'

'Approximately 450 years, I'm sorry' said the man quietly meeting Young's gaze.

This barely seemed to register to Young. 450 years, then everyone he knew on Earth was dead, long dead; Jack O'Neil, Colonel Telford, his wife Emily. Everyone. He lay there looking at the man the horror clearly evident on his face.

'Colonel, my name is Doctor Michael Harding, this is Callie Wilson' said the man indicating the young woman still standing nervously by his side. 'We have found you by following a hidden set of instructions in a book we call the Gospel of Eli. After we entered the complex your pod was in, an automated system activated the revival process. I would have much preferred to have woken you to more pleasant surroundings.'

Young struggled to maintain his composure in this nightmare scenario and asked again.

'Where is my crew?'

Doctor Harding leant back in his chair and shrugged.

'The simple answer Colonel is that I don't know. The only pods here were yours and an empty one. Whoever was in there had left long before we arrived.'

Young nodded, Harding appeared to be telling the truth he was relaxed and kept his gaze straight at Young's eyes.

'What's the Gospel of Eli then?' He asked 'Is it Eli Wallace? Is he here?'

'The great Eli Wallace died some 400 years ago Colonel. The Gospel of Eli are effectively his memoirs, or at least the memoirs he was allowed to publish by the Collective' said Harding.

'The Collective?' asked Young.

Harding sighed

'Callie undo his restraints.' Callie moved to Young's bed and began to untie the leather straps binding him to the bed. 'I think I can save us both a lot of to and fro if I explain the events of 450 years ago.'

Young sat up and rubbed his now free wrists and gestured for the Doctor to continue.

'Around 450 years ago our civilisation was at the brink of destruction. As I am sure you have guessed by now we are descendants of a previous Destiny crew. The same people you encountered at the destruction of Novus. The majority of our people were crammed into sub-light star ships headed for the nearest off world colony. This would have taken us more than 200 years to complete with no guarantee of success. Other colonies had one by one started to succumb to natural disasters borne of their host planets. Others were being eradicated by automated drones that would descend from space and annihilate any settlement they found without mercy. We call this era the Dark Times, suddenly out of nowhere one of the first ancestors appeared to the colony Dapricord. It was Eli Wallace, alone on the mighty star ship Destiny. Dapricord was under attack from a Drone Ship for weeks they had been hiding in the hills of its northern continent, slowly but surely they were being killed off by relentless attacks. Destiny was armed with a weapon that had never been seen before in a single moment it had deactivated both the Drone Mothership and the Drone fighters. Eli had saved the people of Dapricord. He took many of them aboard as his crew and led them into combat with other Drone ships attacking our colonies. One by one they fell before the power of Destiny. Once they were disabled newly trained engineers boarded them, installed life support systems and began to crew them. For every Mothership that fell, our fleet gained a new one. Once they had been defeated Eli used the Destiny to track down the Novus sub-light ships. It took him weeks of searching vast distances but he found them and carried them to the colony world Era. There they set up the Collective, a new government to govern over all the humans over all the colonies. The Drone Motherships became our navy, our commercial vehicles and our hope for salvation a great gift from Eli Wallace.'

Here Harding paused.

'At least that's the fairytale we tell our children at bedtime. The truth is there are many of us that believed it's not quite true. Take yourself Colonel where were you? Or anyone else? The historical records show a large number of people lived on Destiny, where were they all when Eli rode the Destiny against the Mothership on Dapricord? Eli was a scientist, founded our educational system developed a great many innovations in the years after he saved us. But he wasn't a warrior.'

Young interrupted him.

'So what do you think happened?' he asked.

'I believe, as do many others following the Gospel of Eli that Eli was just a figurehead, I'm sure he came up with a way to stop the Drones and he certainly advanced our culture during his time with us. However the Collective was the true power behind the expansion and Drone War. I believe that they forced Eli to do these things they had some way to keep him in line and following their policies. The gospel he wrote, as I said before were his memoirs. But they contain a lot of metaphor and double meanings, I believe that it was his way of trying to show us the truth, and you my dear Colonel are the final proof of this theory.'

Young was bewildered, this was a lot for him to take in and his headache was making it that much harder.

'Final proof' he asked. 'How am I the final proof?'

Harding smiled and became more excited, more animated.

'Because Eli told us where to find you. Hidden in his writings, you are "The Lion and the Sword" and you have been found "Under the Tainted Sun".'

Young shook his head.

'I don't understand what this means.' He said

Harding stood up and helped the Colonel to his still unsteady feet.

'I know you don't Colonel, I know you don't. But I promise I can explain it in more detail. Better yet I can show you. But not now, as strange as it may seem considering where you have just been, you need sleep.' He helped walk the Colonel out of the door and into a corridor lit by florescent lights spaced evenly along the ceiling, Callie following in their wake.

'I have had some quarters made up for you, sleep now and when you wake up you'll be far better prepared to understand the rest of the story.' Said Harding.

Their footsteps echoed down the metal floor of the corridor after a couple of turns Doctor Harding touched a button next to a door which slid instantly open to reveal a much larger room. This one had far more comforts than the previous. With a table, chairs computer terminal even the walls had been painted a brighter colour, a very light yellow. There was also a bed, a proper bed with blankets and sheets and pillows. When Young saw it he realised how tired he really was, it was an ache that seemed to run to his very bones a wave of weariness washed over him. He was led unresisting to the bed where he lay on it gratefully. Harding and Callie went back to the door and as they left Harding turned back to him and said.

'Tomorrow Colonel I promise I will show you the Gospel of Eli. Then you will see exactly what I mean.' With that he closed the door which slid down with a metallic hum.

Young lay on the bed his mind buzzing with the information he'd just received. How Eli have done this to them he thought. Surely Eli would have woken them up if he'd discovered a way to stop the Drones with such apparent ease. His mind jumped to another train of thought. 450 years, that would make the year somewhere around the 25th century. Young wondered what sort of a place Earth was now. Doubtless the existence of the Stargate had long since been revealed to the public. Young supposed whole worlds had been colonised by the people of Earth. The feeling of sleep was fast overtaking him now and he let these thoughts drift away as his head sank into the pillow. Then there was a buzzing sound he looked up and there at the foot of his bed were dozens of tiny coloured of lights, as he watched they began to spin around each other like tiny solar systems. They started to break apart dividing as they span around faster and faster dozens became hundreds became thousands. Suddenly they all blurred together and sat at the foot of his bed was Eli Wallace. Young gaped in amazement, Eli looked at the Colonel his face a picture of misery.

'Hello Colonel.' He said 'I guess I owe you an explanation.'

End of Chapter 1