Chapter 111: Revelation
Friedrich woke up to the smell of something burning. He attempted to rush out of his bed, only to find he wasn't in bed. He stumbled around for the door to his room, only to find there was no door. He was outside, in a grassy meadow. Sunlight streamed down in his face.
"What the..." he muttered, "Where am I?"
The smell of the burning came from over a nearby hill. Curious, he walked up to the top of the hill, and looked down on a scene of pure devastation.
Berlin lay before him, in all of its imperial splendor--imperial splendor that hadn't been wiped off the face of the planet, that was. The city had been incinerated in some large inferno, with the inner buildings completely leveled and the outer buildings still smoldering. The streets were blackened with scorch marks, ashes, and the shadows of incinerated pedestrians, seared into the stone by the intense heat and light. Ash and rain rained down all over the ruined city, and in the skies over Berlin there was a black cloud shaped like a mushroom, pulsating with dark, snakelike, and demonic lightning. Friedrich saw no signs of life anywhere in sight, not even a body.
There was a rustling sound behind him, and he turned to see two small figures, clothed in ruined loincloths, their hair wild, their eyes red, and their backs bent forward. Their arms were outstretched with long fingers and even longer nails. If the barbarians had been men once, they weren't now.
The two barbarian brutes lunged at Friedrich, who desperately fumbled around his person for his dagger. Finding nothing, he simply ran, only to trip on a small rock and stumble on the ground. Just as the brutes got to him, he heard the sound of arrows zipping through the air, and the brutes cried out in pain. He heard the voices of men approaching, civilization coming back for him.
Somebody helped him to his feet. "Are you alright, comrade?" said the man.
"Why yes, thank you..." Friedrich began as he looked up at his rescuers.
Friedrich von Hohenzollern, though he was older and had a burn scar running over his right eye, looked back at him, also confused. "What the..."
"You're me," said Friedrich.
"No, you're me," said future Friedrich.
The other soldiers, wearing and bearing clothes and weapons ranging from farm clothes and pitchforks to legion-issued uniforms and flintlock muskets, simply looked on, awaiting orders.
"Fall back," said future Friedrich, "Get back to the base before night falls."
They headed away from the ruins of the capital.
In a village outside Potsdam
"So...what happened to Berlin?" said Friedrich, huddled close to an open fire in the middle of the village.
"It happened on the sixth of June, 1666 - several months ago," said future Friedrich, "I and some attendants and men at arms were journeying to Berlin from Potsdam for an audience with the Kaiserin. It was early morning, and it was barely past sunrise. Then all of a sudden we heard this loud scream, and some kind of a large metal arrow shot over us, leaving a trail of white smoke behind. Up ahead there was a bright flash and a roar. The light was so intense that those in my retinue who had looked directly at it were blinded. We continued on, until we were within sight of the city, and we saw it much as you did - ruined, destroyed, struck down by God. It was as if Berlin was a second Sodom and Gomorrah, so sinful that God rained down fire and brimstone upon it to punish the Reich. Only there were survivors. Hundreds of them. They came streaming out of the ruins, dozens at a time, from all walks of life—merchants, farmers, fishermen, soldiers, nobles, clergy, even
dynatoi—all fleeing from the divine wrath that had been levied upon them. They were all hideously deformed, scarred and burned and disfigured by the heat and the light. Within days, they had begun to die painful deaths; so many died in those first few days that the priests, those that had survived, that is, were overwhelmed and could barely administer the last rites before they had to move on. We dared not touch them, for fear of being poisoned like they were.
“The few priests who had survived could not explain what had happened. The destruction of Berlin had been so sudden, so thorough…what had we done to deserve this? What had we done to deserve a fate like the destruction of the First and Second Temples and the Jewish exiles? Why us? Why not the heretics? Oh, yes, let me get to that.
“We lost the war against the heretics. Once word of Berlin’s destruction and the annihilation of the Kaiserin and her entire government got out, the provinces began to rebel. Heretics took whatever land they could take. Gallia was the first to secede, its Parliament beheading your second uncle, the viceroy-king. Britannia, Hibernia, and Caledonia were next; they simply seized control of the imperial navy and used it to blockade the islands, preventing anybody from the mainland from going in. Hispania followed, taking with it the Inquisition and redirecting it against the Norse, West Africans, and Jews. Italia, Greece, and Anatolia remained loyal to the new Kaiser Regent, Otto von Habsburg, who ruled in Vienna. Mauretania, Afrika, Aegyptus, and Israel-Arabia fell into anarchy and were overrun by the Persians, Malians, and Abyssinians. There are rumors that the Mexica have landed troops in Hibernia, Caledonia, Britannia, Gallia, Mauretania, and Hispania.
“Now Germania is where it gets complicated. The Kaiser Regent in Vienna only has enough legions to maintain control over southern Germany, and even then he is contemplating moving his government back to Constantinople. The western and northern regions are scraps of wasteland fought over by heretics, bandits, savages, and the occasional Norse and Lithuanian. The Norse have taken Pomerania and Hannover, while the Lithuanians took Poland, Prussia, and Taurica, with their queen proclaiming herself the ‘Queen-Empress’ of a new ‘Commonwealth.’ Everybody turned back to savagery and feudalism, abandoning everything that we had worked for.
"They say that it was God who did it, God who struck us down. All because I refused to become Lucifer's vessel."
"Wait, what?"
"You heard me, me. I said no to Lucifer."
"That I would expect."
"This is the result of me saying no to Lucifer. Werner had me kill him and resolve the feud rather than give in to Michael. Michael still took a vessel and then began smiting all of the sinners of the Reich. All of them. For every sin. To him, Berlin was the center of the sinning, a second Sodom and Gomorrah, because of Mansur Shah Mukhtar, the Head Inquisitor, was getting desperate in fighting the heretics. He's dead now, the same way Friedrich Augustin III was killed. Michael made Wilhelm go insane, so that he wouldn't go back in time again to stop the Apocalypse."
"So then what?" asked Friedrich. "We just wait out here for Michael to smite us?"
"Actually, that's the plan, well, most of it," said future Friedrich, "We've got reports that Michael is going to show up in a neighboring village tomorrow. He's an angel, and we're all armed with anti-angel weapons, so we're going to trap him and kill him."
"Sounds like a plan I would make. What would I do?"
"Me-me? I'll go in for the kill. You-me? You're with the backup guys, taking out anything he throws at us."
"I always hated having all of the most important parts..."
"Don't worry. I hate it too. But at least you don't have to go through it..."
The next day
The war party edged through the ruins of the small village, daggers drawn and bows and guns loaded. Friedrich and future Friedrich led the party, their eyes alert and looking out for signs of angel activity.
Friedrich heard something move from behind a house. He gestured to the house in question, and five men advanced on the derelict building, daggers ready to strike.
One man crouched next to the door and motioned to the others. On the count of three, he kicked down the door.
And was met by a wall of fire.
The explosion wiped out all five men and incinerated their bodies, leaving nothing to be buried. The rest of the war party scattered as other houses began to explode.
"It's a trap!" somebody shouted.
There was the sound of flapping wings, and a man screamed as a dark figure wearing a noble's outfit clamped a hand down on his face. The man's facial orifices burned with holy light, and in seconds the figure released the body, now charred beyond recognition.
Another soldier lunged at the figure, dagger ready to strike, but without turning the figure pointed at him, and he was propelled back into a still burning house, which promptly exploded again.
Several soldiers lashed out at the angel, but a bright light and deafening ringing noise emanated from the angel, and the men clutched their ears and dropped to their knees in pain as their eyeballs were incinerated in their sockets and angelic energy surged through their brains.
Future Friedrich charged at the angel, a look of desperation on his face. Not even bothering to move, the angel snapped his fingers, and future Friedrich exploded in a shower of blood.
It was over in seconds. The entire war party, except for Friedrich, lay dead at the angel's feet.
The angel turned towards Friedrich, revealing his face - Werner.
"Hello, Friedrich," said Michael in Werner's voice, "No matter what you do, this is how things will end up. This is what happens when you refuse to become Lucifer's vessel."
"I will never say yes," said Friedrich.
"Listen," said Michael, "You have a feud, I have a feud. Your feud is with my vessel. My feud is with Lucifer. So why don't we just get along and you answer the question? Say yes. You can stop all of this, bring heaven to earth, and both of us can resolve our feuds."
Friedrich attempted to speak again, but Michael cut him off.
"I don't need to hear your answer," said the archangel, "You need to go back to your time. You will have 25 years to get ready. I'll see you soon."
Friedrich found himself in his normal quarters, with Berlin still intact around him.
