All thirty members of the Four Horsemen arrived on the outskirts of Jerusalem within a few minutes of each other. For the most part two travelled together per each aero-car. They were an amazing development, the aero-car, &  although they were far from new, in fact the technology had been around for close to three centuries, the manufacturers continued to develop this form of transport to new levels of success. Although the first models were very limited in range, & carrying capacity, the latest models could fly non-stop around the world in just under a day. Furthermore, they were fast, as terrestrial transport was concerned, plus had added features such as an autopilot. Although not as comfortable, over long distances, as aircraft or maglev  trains, they meant ease & individual freedom that no other form of transport could offer. Furthermore, you could travel with weapons if this was required, however illegal that may have been.

At first, whilst Gideon was circling over Jerusalem, he did not know where the Four Horsemen would make their stand. They had to be some distance from the city, otherwise it would have been very likely that the Entity could take their souls as it attacked the city itself. They would need to observe from a distance before they could attack. And no one knew when that time might come. Yet they still had to be ready whenever that time might be. And they could not hide from the Beast. They would have to make an attempt sometime to save Humanity.

It was a pity, Gideon thought, that it was highly likely that Jerusalem & the 30 million people who lived there would more than likely be destroyed. It had become a living example of how Humanity could change its wrongful ways & embrace all that was good. Having been destroyed one thousand years ago in nuclear flames, the city had been rebuilt by all of Humanity. They had come from far & wide in order to make an example. Within a few years, the radioactive contamination had been cleaned. The environment had been healed, as much as it could have been. Then, when it was safe, the builders went to work. Not before long, the new Jerusalem was slowly being rebuilt upon the ruins of the old. And the sins of the past were to be left in the past as far as anyone was concerned.

Gideon took one last look at the new Jerusalem with sorrow. Especially at the great Shrine of Remembrance that now toped the Mount. No longer was there a religious building there intolerant over everyone else. Instead a Memorial stood there dedicated to all of those killed during the Tribulation & was open to all peoples of all creeds. Furthermore, it served as a constant reminder to everyone of the great cost Humanity had suffered once before. As such, when the Memorial was originally dedicated, not long after the new Jerusalem was opened for business, it was never to be a witness to the same rivalries that had ensured the deaths of so many innocent people. But today, that was probably all going to change.

The La Perouse jumped from Warp Speed with an urgent rush. It immediately entered Earth space well within the orbit of the Moon. Such a manoeuvre was not all that unusual, although returning long range explorer ships usually headed to the Moon first in order to make sure that they had no contaminants on board the ship which could damage the Earth’s environment. In many respects, the La Perouse should have done the same thing here as one huge contaminant was not far behind. Still, the powers that be within the Explorer Agency thought otherwise. They were eager to see, not the explorer ship, but the Entity that followed it.

The captain of the La Perouse, though, thought otherwise. He was not overly certain that this idea was a good one. Although his ship had not been attacked at all, by the Entity, he had not at the same time let the Entity get close enough for it to try an attack. Contrary to what messages were coming in from headquarters, he nevertheless manoeuvred his ship into an orbiting position on the opposite side of the planet to the expected entry location of the Entity.

To say that the experts, in the First Contact group at the Earth Explorer Agency, were nervous would be an understatement. An event such as this had every been attempted before. Previously, First Contact had taken place at a great distance away from Earth, either in deep space or at someone else’s planet. For the most part, these were successful, & even when the occasional First Contact was rather tense, again they usually worked in the end. But never before had First Contact been made with an alien creature at Earth, especially a non-corporeal one which showed signs that it was human.

With little warning the Entity exited Warp Speed & arrived at around the location where the La Perouse was only a handful of minutes before. It would be fair to say that both sides to the meeting were overwhelmed.  For the First Contact team, as well as everyone else watching on with either the naked eye or through a holograph vision set, it was simply an amazing sight. Nothing had prepared the people of the Earth for such an object, even though the Entity had been seen previously through either the data from the James Cook & the X-60.  But this moment was different as this time it was in person.

Similarly the Entity was surprised by the world before it. Everything seemed, on the one hand, so different, whilst at the same time everything seemed so familiar. It had a sense of deja vu. For some unknown reason it knew that it had been here before. But then the next thing struck the Entity. And that was a power which radiated from the surface. It was very different in nature from that felt at Babylon, yet it was power nonetheless. This is what it wanted from this planet before it, even if it felt that it was different to the power of fear, hatred, & evil, from before. In many respects it reminded the Beast of the taste it had when it attacked the X-60.  It had survived the taste of those few souls, so it could not see why it would not survive this harvest. Furthermore, the Entity sensed that they were seven billion sentient life forms on the planet. And then it decided to select the city that had the highest number.

But before that could be done, it was sent a message from the First Contact group. Unlike previously, no one had yet tried to contact it directly. For most of the time, it was vaguely threatened, but such messages were not transmitted on a frequency which it could immediately understand. This time, however, the message came in loud & clear. It was as if, whoever was sending the message, was standing right next to it. Furthermore, it needed no translation or some such to understand what the message was saying. It was as if whoever was sending it knew the Beast’s own language.

This somewhat stunned the Entity. It had, for a moment, lost track of its original intensions. It wanted to reap its harvest of this bountiful planet, but it kept on getting messages of peace & goodwill. Somewhere in the back of its mind it began to remember more & more of its former self. It could picture itself giving grand speeches in great halls & chambers to the creatures that it had fed upon only recently. Yet these memories were of long ago. A thousand years ago. Then it remembered wars. Lots of them. Then it recalled its own destruction at the hands of these beings that dared now talked of peace. It know of no peace, only war. And thus the Entity would make war upon these humans.

Now having rejected all thoughts, which had troubled its mind for some time, the Entity now returned to the job at hand. Noticing a city of 30 million souls, it decided that this would be its first target for harvesting. Ignoring the messages that the First Contact group continued to send, everyone was soon worried about the Entity’s intentions when it began to more towards the Earth. Without any reply to their messages, the First Contact experts now felt fear. The warnings of the others might be indeed right. The Earth could be doomed.

Gideon & his comrades looked up at the same moment that the Entity began to make its decent towards Jerusalem. At first not overly much could be seen from the ground. The dark menacing blue colour more or less made it more or less impossible to see at first, but then things soon changed. Soon it began to enter Earth’s atmosphere & friction began to make its presence felt. Soon, a small fire could be seen as the Entity continued its dive. Not long afterwards, the small fire had grown into a fireball which continued to grow until it was several kilometres across. As the Four Horsemen watched on, throughout Jerusalem millions began to look up into the sky as this great flame came hurtling down towards them.

The Four Horsemen did not know what to do. Knowing that the Entity would miss them, their hearts went out to the 30 million humans who would be trapped. The air at this point went silent. Little could be heard as the fireball came closer. A minute went by before the wind began to get stronger & a roaring sound was all that could be heard. The Four Horsemen braced themselves for the impact that was about to take place. And fear was beginning to take control. At that moment the Beast struck.

Within seconds thousands of souls had been ripped from the bodies of humans well before the dust started to settle back to earth. From a distance, all of the Four Horsemen had survived. But soon millions of their fellow kind would not. Forcing an effort to see though the dust & blue mist, thousands of blue flames could be seen shooting out at hapless innocents, killing them in the process. All the while the Beast fed upon the souls of these lost humans in a hungry frenzy. For what seemed like an eternity, but was in reality less than a minute, the rest of the world watched on in horror as the First Contact event, turned into total disaster, was being telecast everywhere. But the Four Horsemen did not need any holograph vision set to see what was happening. They were there in person.

It did not take much more of this nightmare before most of the members of the Four Horsemen could no longer restrain themselves. Watching the great holocaust of humanity taking place before their very eyes, they lifted up their swords & charged into the madness. Their four leaders, Gideon, Khan, Goodwin, & Wong, called out to them to return. Now was not the time for the attack. But with the thunderous noise, along with the fact that these men had lost all sanity, they charged on regardless that certain death awaited them.

They got no further than a mere one hundred metres before the Entity, completely mesmerised by its feeding frenzy, spotted these puny creatures who dared to challenge it. It gave no second thought as to any danger & lashed out with its blue flame of death. Within a few seconds, all twenty six of the crazed Horsemen had their souls ripped out of them with little warning. This was the result that the four remaining Horsemen knew would await any such attack. Now the future of then entire Human race came down to these few surviving brothers.

Yet, the taking of the Horsemen’s souls seemed to have an effect on the Beast. At first it was hardly noticed, considering the wild chaos all around, but it soon became apparent that the blue mist, which always surrounded the dark blue sun, began to swirl around the Beast unlike the apparent random movements of before. Soon this swirl began to speed up which was soon as violent as any tornado. Something was happening. Maybe the colleagues of the final four had not died in vane after all.

The Entity knew something was wrong long before its blue mist began its swirling motion. Having gorged itself upon 30 million souls, as well as the small group that threatened it with ancient weapons, it already felt something was not overly right. That, as before, there was nothing satisfying with taking these souls of the people of Earth. It first noticed this feeling after consuming the soul of the human known as Harvey. And now it was the same, only millions of times multiplied. There was no fear or hatred to speak of, in this feast of souls, rather, although each soul had committed a number of sins in the past, these had been forgiven. To the horror of the Entity, it realised that these souls were far from evil. These souls were those of the innocent. These souls were those of the good.

In a manner of a toxin, then, the Entity realised that it had poisoned itself on good. Instead of seeking the evil that made it strong, it had consumed the only power which could threaten its existence. It could take away its strength, not to mention its power. It could return to something of its former self. And now it appeared that was taking place. It quickly went though, in a matter of desperation, what had been the trigger that began its devolution. It could not think of anything until it remembered the band of madmen charging it with total commitment, showing no fear, only human courage. It realised that these men had willingly gave up their lives in order that others may live. At the very moment, when they were harvested, they were true saints. They had transcended everything that meant humanity could be & far more. They had become the best that humanity had to offer & even more. For once the Entity was terrified. For once the Entity was truly vulnerable.

Gideon, & the other three remaining Horsemen, looked on in wonder as the appearance of the Beast began to change. The blue mist, which had begun to swirl around it, went faster & faster. Soon a tornado formed in its centre which obliterated their view. Yet such things were not overly considered important, by the four men, as their personal safety was soon threatened by the wind. They grabbed whatever their hands could grip as the wind began to challenge their ability to stand. Soon the blue mist turned grey, more or less exactly like a tornado, & it began to expand in size. As it did so lightning flashed around it &, above the roar created by the wind, thunder could be heard. It seemed to come to a great climax as the tornado turned white. At that point a great blinding light could be seen at the base of the tornado which coincided with the fact that the storm began waning.

Within a minute the tornado had spun away into nothingness. The once great city of Jerusalem had disappeared. A great plan of destruction had been created instead, more or less void of any building or anything else worthy of description. As the wind settled down, which in turn let the dust settle back to earth, only one thing remained that struck the four survivors with complete surprise. Coming before them a man came walking. Although not everything about him appeared human, as this creature had that same menacing blue mist circling him as the dark star of death, it nevertheless appeared as human. The remaining Four Horsemen were unsettled, not knowing what to do, until Gideon had a good look at this strangers face & recognised who it was.
 

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