The Stolen Future Trilogy
(Books 1-3 Box Set)
Brian K. Lowe
The Invisible City
The Secret City
The Cosmic City
Contents
The Invisible City – Book 1
Chapter 1 I Depart
Chapter 2 I Arrive
Chapter 3 I Become a Monster
Chapter 4 I Am an Alien
Chapter 5 I See Wonders
Chapter 6 The New World
Chapter 7 I Give Chase
Chapter 8 The People Rise
Chapter 9 The Dungeon
Chapter 10 The Library
Chapter 11 I Receive My Education
Chapter 12 Kidnapped
Chapter 13 The Garden of Death
Chapter 14 I See War
Chapter 15 I See Battle
Chapter 16 Tiger Spiders
Chapter 17 In the City of the Apes
Chapter 18 I Am Given a Vision
Chapter 19 I Meet a Visionary
Chapter 20 I Have Hope
Chapter 21 The Revolution Begins
Chapter 22 I Go Behind the Lines
Chapter 23 I Am Given New Life
Chapter 24 I Take Companions
Chapter 25 We Are Pursued
Chapter 26 The Dead City
Chapter 27 I Am Caged
Chapter 28 Living with the Man-eaters
Chapter 29 In the Arena of the Mind-Mutants
Chapter 30 I Conceive a Plan
Chapter 31 Battle in the Control Room
Chapter 32 Fight for Freedom
Chapter 33 I Am Shanghaied
Chapter 34 I Am Robbed
Chapter 35 I Fight
Chapter 36 The Dark Lady
Chapter 37 Conspiracy
Chapter 38 Attacked by Night
Chapter 39 Mutiny
Chapter 40 I Do Not Hesitate
Chapter 41 I Betray Myself
Chapter 42 Sky Raiders
Chapter 43 I Renew a Friendship
Chapter 44 Return to the Dead
Chapter 45 I Become a Ghost
Chapter 46 We Enter Dure
Chapter 47 The Invisible City
Chapter 48 In the House of a Friend
Chapter 49 Before the Council of Nobles
Chapter 50 J’accuse
Chapter 51 Triumph and Tragedy
Epilogue
The Secret City – Book 2
Prologue
Chapter 1 My Return
Chapter 2 Among the Desert Men
Chapter 3 Condemned
Chapter 4 Confession
Chapter 5 I Form a Plan
Chapter 6 My Life of Crime
Chapter 7 I Am a Fugitive
Chapter 8 Return to the City of the Apes
Chapter 9 I Learn the Worst
Chapter 10 I Study Human Nature
Chapter 11 United
Chapter 12 Peril and Rescue
Chapter 13 Decisions
Chapter 14 Aboard The Dark Lady
Chapter 15 Wilderness Warfare
Chapter 16 A Quiet Interlude
Chapter 17 A Catastrophic Defeat
Chapter 18 Stalking the Catacombs
Chapter 19 Disaster in the Dark
Chapter 20 On the Hunt
Chapter 21 The Enemy of My Enemy
Chapter 22 The Secret City
Chapter 23 Slaves of the Lizard-Men
Chapter 24 To Serve and to Protect
Chapter 25 Armed Amidst Enemies
Chapter 26 Jast-ball
Chapter 27 Fight
Chapter 28 Flight
Chapter 29 Escape
Chapter 30 Capture
Chapter 31 Trial
Chapter 32 Duel Without Swords
Chapter 33 Reversal of Fortune
Chapter 34 Midnight Inspiration
Chapter 35 Homecoming
Chapter 36 Every Hand Raised Against Me
Chapter 37 Out of Danger into Peril
Chapter 38 Back to the Underworld
Chapter 39 No Way Out
Chapter 40 Assault from Above
Chapter 41 In the Enemy Lair
Chapter 42 Strange Allies
Chapter 43 I Assume Command
Chapter 44 The Battle to Stop a War
Chapter 45 Under Fire
Chapter 46 A Suicidal Gamble
Chapter 47 Against Two Navies
Chapter 48 An Unwelcome Visitor
Epilogue
The Cosmic City – Book 3
Forward
Preface
Chapter 1 I am Handed the Universe
Chapter 2 The Chronologic Institute
Chapter 3 Besieged by Monsters
Chapter 4 A Skillful Interrogation
Chapter 5 Trapped
Chapter 6 Fort Sumter of the Time War
Chapter 7 Assault in the Darkness
Chapter 8 Taken
Chapter 9 Hunted!
Chapter 10 A Terrible Theory
Chapter 11 A Dubious Honor
Chapter 12 A Lesson in History
Chapter 13 The Phantom of the Procyon
Chapter 14 A Friend in Need
Chapter 15 A Shocking Confession
Chapter 16 An Unwanted Reunion
Chapter 17 Hiding and Seeking
Chapter 18 The Ruins of Time
Chapter 19 The Desert Hunters
Chapter 20 My Ally, My Adversary
Chapter 21 The Unknown Past
Chapter 22 I Ask a Favor
Chapter 23 Of Gorillas, Goats, and Girls
Chapter 24 Gone Underground
Chapter 25 An Immodest Proposal
Chapter 26 A Painful Lesson
Chapter 27 The Invisible Enemy
Chapter 28 The Tunnels of No Return
Chapter 29 The Monster and the Maiden
Chapter 30 Aiding the Enemy
Chapter 31 A Tumultuous Meeting
Chapter 32 The Cave of Light and Darkness
Chapter 33 Bridge of Doom
Chapter 34 The Invisible Snare
Chapter 35 My Plan, Interrupted
Chapter 36 My Plan, Continued
Chapter 37 The Door Beneath the World
Chapter 38 A Stunning Revelation
Chapter 39 Prisoners of the Cave Men
Chapter 40 Infiltration
Chapter 41 Exfiltration
Chapter 42 The Mechanics of Space and Time
Chapter 43 Betrayal
Chapter 44 Rescue and Peril
Chapter 45 A Devil’s Bargain
Chapter 46 The Truth Will Out
Chapter 47 Return to the Center of the Earth
Chapter 48 Fish in a Barrel
Chapter 49 Farren’s Mistake
Chapter 50 Race Through Hell
Chapter 51 A Contentious Briefing
Chapter 52 We Gather Our Forces
Chapter 53 Assault on the Procyon
Chapter 54 Outnumbered
Chapter 55 Battle on the Surface of the Sky
Chapter 56 Air Pursuit
Chapter 57 Mile-high Death
Chapter 58 The Final Showdown
Chapter 59 Battle of the Monsters
Chapter 60 The Future Restored
Thank You!
About the Author
Copyright
The Invisible City – Book 1
The Stolen Future Trilogy
Brian K. Lowe
Copyright © 2018 Brian K. Lowe
Published October 2018
All rights reserved. 3rd Edition. July 2020.
To Marlene. I would wait a million years for you.
Chapter 1
I Depart
Notwithstanding all of the
fantastic things that have befallen me since the last day I spent on this Earth in the service of a king and country not my own, none has had the same nerve-destroying effect as the shelling.
When I came to war in the spring of 1915, with tales of German atrocities ringing in my ears, hell-bent to defend the land where I had spent a magical year researching the legends of Robin Hood, I still saw war as the romantic adventure of centuries gone, hardly changed from the days of stout yeomen and knights in brightly-beribboned plate armed not only with steel but with the religious certainty that God fought by my side. In that I resembled no one as much as our own generals, who still believed that messengers from both sides should ride forth the night before the battle and arrange for a mutually agreeable starting time the next day. I had not anticipated (nor had they) the changes wrought when the battle ceased to be one wherein you saw with your own eyes the men you killed. They had still to come to grips with the shells and the gas.
In that we differed, for I had first-hand knowledge of what they refused to see.
That morning, the shelling had stopped after three straight days and nights. It was March, and our company was pinned down in a long straight trench dug just east of the town of Pont à Mousson. If you had asked me who first excavated that trench, I couldn’t tell you, because we had been trading the Germans the same strip of land for four months. We’d dug in right before what would have been Thanksgiving, in the States, and huddled in frozen hell through the winter. The German lines had been barely forty yards away when we started. When it wasn’t snowing, one side or the other might try to gain ground: those who weren’t cut down in the open were met with hand-to-hand combat.
On occasion, we would push the Germans out, usually when they were too tired or cold or sick to fight us effectively. The next day, fresher troops would arrive, and we would become the defenders. If we won out, we stayed; if not, we fled for our own original position while bullets whined around us, or stopped with a flat smacking sound that meant another empty spot on the line. Sometimes we simply abandoned our prize and crawled back through the snow under cover of darkness.
By now I didn’t know if we occupied their position, or our own.
“Corporal Givens reporting, sir.”
I wearily returned the sloppy salute of the courier I had sent down earlier. If he hadn’t spoken, I wouldn’t have recognized him, covered with the swampy mud that coated the sides and floor of the trench. The company commander was situated less than half a mile away; it had taken two hours to get there and back.
“What orders, corporal?” I asked in a voice a good deal steadier than I felt.
“Captain MacLean instructs you to choose a small detachment of men to cross no-man’s-land and survey the enemy’s position. He says Headquarters thinks the shelling may have been a cover for a withdrawal.”
I bit back my first comment. “Right,” I said. “Pick two privates who aren’t too ill and report back here.”
The corporal didn’t move. “Beggin’ your pardon, sir, but the captain gave me strict orders that you wasn’t to lead the patrol. ‘Lieutenant Clee is not to undertake this mission under any circumstances,’ he says. Sir.”
This time I didn’t muzzle myself. Captain MacLean knew that I would want to take the scout party out myself; we both knew what it meant to venture into no-man’s-land if the Germans hadn’t retreated. But commissioned officers were in short supply on the line, and he couldn’t risk losing me, particularly on a mindless mission that was probably the result of a bet between two half-drunk colonels in a Paris brothel.
Angry as I was, I couldn’t say that to the corporal. Normally I would be his sergeant’s problem, but that poor devil lay thirty yards into no-man’s-land, taking his orders now from God. The simple solution to my dilemma came to mind quickly enough.
“Good job, Givens. Give the captain my compliments.”
He frowned. “And…?”
“That’s all, Givens. Just give the captain my compliments.”
“Ah…yes, sir.” With a heavy sigh he adjusted his gear and turned to go. Then he stopped, turned again to look at me queerly, and said: “Good luck, sir.”
I cobbled together a patrol out of three random soldiers whose names I have since forgotten. One was a Canadian boy, but more than that I cannot recall.
I ordered them to spread out, and climb over the edge only after I had cleared it. Captain MacLean to the contrary, I was not about to order one of my men into a situation I would hesitate to go into myself. First, though, I raised my helmet above the lip of the trench, balanced on a borrowed rifle. An old trick, and one the Germans had caught onto, so I was not surprised when it was not blown back by a burst of machine gun fire. I lifted it again with my head still well below the line of fire, and when it drew no attention a second time I decided the coast was as clear as it might be.
The third time my helmet showed itself to the sight of God and everyone, my head was inside of it. Ten seconds later, finding myself still alive, I clambered out into no-man’s-land.
Perhaps “clambered” does not properly describe the mechanics involved. The rain had eroded the lip of the trench to the point where no man could climb out unaided, and even with a ladder the footing was treacherous. While I scrambled for purchase on level ground, my Canadian pushed from below in a fashion that would have earned him a court-martial in different circumstances. I tried to keep my muddy boots out of his face, but I am not sure I succeeded.
Before I had covered a score of feet I found myself nose-to-nose with one of the men who had failed to survive the last retreat. I held my breath and moved past. If Headquarters was right and the Germans had withdrawn, he would be buried today. If not, I would soon look just like him.
The shooting still had not begun, so I looked back for my men and cautiously waved them forward. What remained of my uniform was unspeakably fouled with mud, and in a moment of inspiration I smeared it on my face and helmet as well. As my patrol drew abreast of me, I pantomimed for them to follow my lead, and I was pleased to see that it did seem to help them blend with the ground. I confess I was most pleased because it meant that I blended in, too.
Thus disguised, we wormed forward. Every few feet we would stop, our eight eyes anxiously roaming the near horizon for any bit of movement, any hint that we were lambs being lured to slaughter. None came.
All at once we were peering down into a German trench—and no one was staring back.
The trench was not set out in a true line; we could see only a few yards in either direction. Fearful of any sound lest it alert a thousand Huns huddled around the next bend, I tapped the Canadian on the shoulder and motioned him to follow me. Signaling the remaining pair to remain, I slid into the trench. Like our own, there was no way out unaided. If it was a trap, I was committed.
With my guard at my back, I crept forward, straining for every sound. The pernicious rain, eager to heap upon me the greatest amount of suffering, began again to drop its offerings into the ankle-deep puddles, fogging both sight and hearing. The wet squishing of our boots made a mockery of our stealth.
After a short time the trench straightened, and as far as I could see the Huns’ retreat was confirmed. We retraced our steps, passing our original ingress, which spot we anticipated by softly calling to our companions lest they take us for the enemy. I reported our findings and moved on, but we returned even more quickly than before: The Germans were nowhere to be seen. This line, at least, had been abandoned.
I sent the two men up top back to Captain MacLean with my report and kept up my search. Truth to tell, now that I had apparently survived my fool errand I was none too eager to face him and admit my flouting of his orders. It surprised me to realize that I had not planned my life that far ahead—that I had in fact expected to die in no-man’s-land. A wave of relief swept over me that almost made me forget the mud—a feeling quickly stilled by an unmistakable wisp of movement up ahead.
The Canadian boy gave a start beside me, so I knew t
hat he had seen it too. Again I took the lead, hugging the side of the trench, unpleasant as that was. Cold mud sucked at my back as well as my feet. I had not seen much, only that it was too large for an animal, and my mind retained an after-image of grey. Without that I would never have noticed it at all, but it stood out even in the rain against the universal muddy brown of the surrounding earth. Only the sky was grey, leaden where it was not black.
Where the path straightened again, we saw him, a lone German soldier striding strongly but unconcernedly away from us—his grey uniform unspotted by mud and his black boots gleaming where they showed above the water line. I stopped suddenly and pulled the boy up against the wall with me, fearful that the Hun would turn and see us.
“They must have a secret tunnel somewhere up ahead,” I hissed in his ear. He nodded dumbly. “We’ll follow him.”
By some miracle we kept out of sight, although at no time did the German stop to look behind him. More astonishing, however, was that his uniform seemed impervious to mud or weather, as did he himself. He seemed no more concerned about nature than he did about anyone following him. Overall his appearance began to take on a supernatural air, and I am not sure how much longer I could have taken the strain when he turned a bend and vanished.
Throwing caution to the winds I scrambled forward to keep him in sight. As I drew abreast of the curve I saw that this disappearance, at least, lacked anything magical: The trench had been built to take advantage of a small natural cave at the base of a hillside. Beyond the cave mouth it stretched on ahead, but the perfection of placement made the underground grotto the best candidate for a secret German redoubt. I congratulated myself on my perception—and very nearly into an early grave.
Thinking to listen at the cave mouth for guards, I crept forward and bent down toward the entrance—and the first shot spat up mud on the wall behind me. The enemy wasn’t in the cave—he was fifty feet further down the trench!
The mud stole my footing from me and I went down, saving me from the next volley. Wallowing like a crippled turtle, I shouted at the boy to get back.
“I’ll hold them here! There was a ladder back there—get back to our lines and tell them it’s a trap!”
To be sure, I was no more certain that I could hold back the Huns than I was that he could cross no-man’s-land alive, but neither of us had any choice. I brought my revolver around and fired blindly; the Germans were so thickly clustered that I couldn’t miss. Perhaps they’d thought they had hit me, because the shot panicked them and they fell about themselves as helpless as I.