by Tom Hunter
“You have been a thorn in my side since the day we met. I hated you at first sight,” he confessed. Ms. Welker bent back further under his weight, her hands grasping at his to pull them from her throat. “You’ll die first,” Ramon informed her, his face cracking into his efforts at a smile. “Then…” he added, the smile growing wider one side of his lip tugging up into a sneer. “Noah will die and his fortune will be mine.” As he spoke, the woman stopped her struggling and her strangled gurgling went silent. Ramon was shaking with anger and shaking Ms. Welker, but as her body started to go limp and her mouth slack, a sharp noise ripped through the air.
Good, he thought. The wicked bitch is dead.
POW! He stopped and listened for more. Then he looked at Ms. Welker now crumpled on the floor where he’d dropped her.
Ten
Thomas Knight watched the big man drop over the barrel of his smoking rifle. He couldn’t help remembering a mantra he’d committed to memory just a few short months ago, ‘should’ve let him drop’. Thomas smiled at the thought, glad he’d finally made good on his promise to young Howard after Ramon had been revealed as a spy and Ms. Welker had shot the boy in cold blood.
Ramon rolled onto his back and looked into the steely eyes of his shooter. Thomas had shot him in the shoulder, but had managed to hit a nerve, and the pain was excruciating. But he’d never let them see. The wincing he couldn’t help, but he wouldn’t go down without a fight. Thomas raised one eyebrow as Ramon gurgled curses in English, Portuguese, and some kind of gibberish no one could understand.
Thomas leveled his rifle down and aimed it at Ramon’s chest. “I really have no problem shooting you…again,” admitted Thomas. “But I need information and you have it. So, since I’m one of the good guys…” he cleared his throat. “Tell me where Noah and the drum are, if you want to live.”
Ramon looked up at him, his mouth set in a determined line. “No?” Thomas turned at a scuffling behind him to see Robbie holding back a raging Mochni. “Hmmm…okay by me. But I promise you this. A quick kill shot to the chest would be a mercy compared to what that giant kid back there would do to you…just sayin’.” Thomas shrugged. “Up to you.” “Let…me…through…Rob-bee!” screeched Mochni as Robbie caught him scrambling toward Ramon and Thomas.
“No,” Robbie said, grabbing at the Woidnuk youth. “Pediah, Alexia…Abby. Help me hold him.” It took cajoling from Abby and Alexia and brute strength from Robbie and Pediah to hold Mochni in check.
Thomas adjusted his rifle slightly and raised his eyebrows at Ramon’s staunch refusal to answer. “You know why he’s so…angry, don’t you? You killed his family.” Thomas quirked his mouth and twisted his body so he could keep one eye on Ramon and the other on Robbie and Mochni. “Well, not you exactly. More like because of you. His father was the chief of his people and had the Kisgar well in hand. But nooo…you guys just had to see what all the fuss was about once we found that damn diary. Ashbridges are fools. They have no idea the Pandora’s box history holds.”
“Mochni,” Abby spoke soft and low. It was the voice a teacher might use to control an unruly student, full of compassion and warning. The youth turned toward her. “We must retrieve…get…the drum from Noah. Your drum. Your people’s drum.” She gripped his arm tight and gave a gentle squeeze. “But we can’t do that if Ramon is dead. He knows where it is…or more likely, how to get it away from Noah. That’s what we all want, right?”
“But – “
“Right?” she insisted. Mochni’s eyes blazed fury at Ramon, then he dropped his head when he turned back toward Abby.
“Right,” he agreed dryly.
“Well, you’re saved from him. For now,” admitted Thomas. “But, as for me,” he raised the rifle higher, aimed, and began to apply pressure to the trigger. “I’m not so – ”
“Thomas. No.” Pediah placed a restraining hand on his shoulder. “You would be shooting an unarmed man. This is not who you are.”
“People change,” Thomas replied through clenched teeth. “Things…change.” He looked at Pediah with hard, dark eyes full of pain and fatigue.
“Unarmed?” Robbie asked incredulously. “I’m sorry. Did you not witness him take out an assassin? Without his gun, I might add. The man is a trained killer with a capital “T” and a capital “K”. Robbie’s voice rose in consternation.
“It is not for us to decide, Robbie. Thomas. Who lives? Who dies? Only God himself can render judgement,” Pediah explained. “This is what I was taught, and I know I have seen many terrible and troubling things, but none have shaken my faith.”
“I’m sorry, Pediah. I cannot trust your god. And if I don’t trust HIM, then I sure as hell don’t trust – ”
“Look out!” Robbie exclaimed, and Thomas turned just in time to see a glint of steel in the dim light of the miniature museum. He fired. Ramon fell, his eyes wide and staring at nothing. A large knife he had pulled from an ankle scabbard dropped from his hand.
Thomas stepped over Ramon’s large bulk and looked back as he might at a dead cockroach. No remorse. No reaction. “Let’s move,” he commanded, pointing ahead of them. “Noah had a head start. It’s likely he’s deeper inside these catacomb-like walls.”
“What makes you think Noah’s that way?” Alexia frowned, looked back at Ramon’s broken body, and back to Thomas questioningly. She had a bad feeling about this but knew there was no going back now. The dead did not rise and the devil was ahead of them.
Thomas glanced back over his shoulder and jutted his chin toward the still form of Ms. Welker. “Her.” Alexia narrowed her eyes and tilted her head. Thomas Knight sucked in a breath and explained, “Ms. Welker would do anything to protect Noah. Anything,” he stressed. “So, it stands to reason, if she’s here, he’s up ahead.” Thomas paused and considered his next statement. “She must have been fighting Ramon to give Noah time to escape. Noah escaped with his life. She didn’t.”
He was so focused on catching up with Noah Ashbridge, Thomas didn’t think to check if Ms. Welker might still be alive and breathing. There wasn’t time. Guards were breathing down their necks and they were running out of time.
As they ran, Thomas’ eyes cast a sweeping gaze over the artifacts and relics which populated the little museum. He noted with controlled animosity that most of the items were his own finds. Noah had populated the space with stolen goods, and one in particular stood out. While technically the journal belonged to Noah because it was his grandfather’s, it had been Thomas who had actually discovered it.
“And this is how the whole damn thing got sent down the rabbit hole,” Thomas muttered, shaking his head at the injustice of it all. “Reginald Ashbridge’s journal. Hmmm…” His mind raced. What would happen if he…lifted…the book from Noah’s museum? Noah had stolen it from him. He would just be stealing it back. All’s fair in…war. He turned. Combat boots thundering in the catacombs and the shots firing reminded him there was another job to complete first.
Damn! The book would have to wait. Well, that…and all his finds to which he could lay claim. Ripping his eyes and thoughts from Reginald Ashbridge’s journal, he picked up speed to catch up with the others and pushed forward.
Eleven
The slap, slap, slap of Noah’s shoes against the hard ground rang hollow in his ears. Gathering his breath as though he were slurping noodles, he passed by a supply room. Things like ropes, poles, carabiner clips, spikes, and more were haphazardly scattered as though someone had either left in a hurry or didn’t care because they didn’t expect anyone. It was a kind of casual mess and it gritted at him like nails on a chalkboard. He pushed the chaos and the desire to straighten it or shoot someone for leaving it that way from his mind. He didn’t have time for that. Not today. And not now.
Sucking in the stale air as he ran, he clenched his eyes for a moment and powered through the room until he stopped short at a stairwell. He’d almost missed it, so dark was its inlay but he took the steps two at a time, leaping downward into the aby
ss. He switched on his night vision goggles, finally remembering he’d snagged them from the rack and shelving in his command room.
A door! He wrapped his small, stubby hand around the handle and pushed. Nothing. Shit! He glanced back over his shoulder, adjusted his grip on the door, and pulled. Nothing. Damn! Damn! It was locked.
In his haste to escape Thomas Knight and his team, he’d momentarily forgotten this room had a prototype-like variation of the Genii lock. He’d need to manipulate the pin and tumblers for each magnet at the correct distance. His fingers flew and he exhaled sharply as the catch released and the door swung open to reveal a curved interior.
Within the dome-like room sat one object; a single chair. Noah sailed into it at full steam. As he sank back into its embrace, he thought of Ms. Welker and hoped she was safe. But a sudden fluttering in the pit of his stomach offered him little consolation his hopes would be realized.
At the sound of rhythmic thumping beating a tattoo toward his door, he raised his eyes, but in the dim light couldn’t determine who it was had gained on him. Was it Ramon and his men or Thomas Knight and his team? Noah squinted as the sound came ever nearer. His heart sank. Ramon’s uncouth band of mercenaries sounded like a herd of elephants when they approached. Today, he supposed, would be no different.
The pit in his stomach clenched and he speculated on what had become of Ms. Welker if Ramon and his men were closing in. His ire surged at the thought and spilled out of his mouth. “You will rue the day you were born, Ramon, if anything has happened to Ms. Welker! You and your men!” Noah raged and snarled, hissed insults, and vulgarities; then he went silent. As if a switch had been toggled from irate anger to steely calm – the calm before the storm.
He recalled Ecknom’s Folly and pulled it toward him. What better way to put the drum to the test than now with everyone hot on his heels? He mused. “A dry run,” he mumbled with a sardonic grin.
He began a steady beat and the room designed to amplify sound directed outward filled with the cacophony of thundering footsteps and the PUM, POM, PUM, POM of the drum. Noah had renovated this chamber initially to display the drum separate from his other collections. Quickly, the plan had evolved as theoretical testing on how to safely attack sites far from wherever he and the drum might be. He would be more than the general on the hill, he would be the creator of a new world.
He played through the nagging feeling his father, Clark, would be proven correct. He wondered what his father had known or which devil he’d made the deal with as Noah faced the possibility his father had imagined – Death Valley would be the death of the Ashbridge clan.
Noah played to his emotions and as he thought of his father and grandfather, the drumbeats grew steadier, rising in crescendo, until at last they broke through the walls and reverberated throughout the chambers. The rumbling beneath his feet gave credence to his success at waking the creatures from their once docile slumber. It was working! A devilish grin cast an eerie shadow across his features.
He breathed in the sounds, and giddy with power, he turned his head toward the opening. He hoped his voice carried as well as the drum. “You should have Ramon in check!” he bellowed in a high sing-song voice. “I’m the one with the power now!” He heard muffled voices, someone falling, and the wavy earth beneath his feet intensified with each blow to the animal skin stretched across a circular band of wood with intricate carvings.
Twelve
Thomas caught up easily with his team as they’d slowed briefly to consider their next move. In his haste, Noah had inadvertently left a trail for them to easily follow, not the least of which was the unique tread imprint his shoes left in the dirt.
“How does he see down here so well?” Alexia had asked as she nearly steamrolled into Pediah in the dingy space. He caught her before she fell and shrugged.
“I’ve no idea.” He paused. “Well, night vision goggles maybe?”
“Makes sense,” chimed in Robbie. “Too bad we don’t have any of – ”
“No time for small talk, kids,” Thomas cut in. “Seems the boys found their captain, and, well, they ain’t happy.” He jerked a thumb behind him and everyone heard the shouts, curses, and roaring voices vowing vengeance.
“Okay, so which way?” asked Pediah, ever the pragmatist.
“We could…turn…” Mochni made a twisting motion with his fingers and nodded in the direction of the mercenaries behind them.
Abby had been bent over, struggling to catch her breath, but at Mochni’s suggestion, she shot upright in surprise. “Do you mean to suggest we go back…toward…a band of mercenaries?” She shook her head in disbelief. “Not just any mercenaries, mind you, but Ramon’s?” she asked incredulously.
Mochni nodded vigorously. “Buy…time.”
“I don’t think that’s such a good idea, Mochni.” Robbie interjected. “Besides.” He held up a hand to stop Mochni from an angry response. “You’ve been injured. We can help heal your body and, more to the point, your people need you. You are the chief of the Woidnuk. I know that is a terrible responsibility, but I think you’re well prepared and your father would be quite proud of you.”
Abby, Pediah, Thomas, and Alexia nodded their agreement.
Thomas’s mouth twisted side to side as he worked through and considered plans. “Well, we can’t split up,” he said at last. “We have to make a decision.”
“Hey guys…” Six heads swiveled in Alexia’s direction.
“What is it, Alexia?”
“Look.” She pointed to the footprints they’d been following. “See how they stop and then a deeper darkness…appears?” she asked, her eyes glued to the ground as her mind raced. A glint of silver bounced of some source of light she couldn’t place.
“Yes,” Thomas nodded. “I see it.”
A chorus of “me, too’s” followed and as Alexia followed her gut instinct, she strode toward where the last footprint met its end. “Stairs!” she reached out to put her hand on the railing and lifted her foot when they felt a rumbling beneath their feet. Alexia clasped a hand onto the corner of the rail to keep her balance and twisted slowly with a sudden realization. “I know that sound,” she began, her heart pounding and her stomach plummeting. “We’ve heard it before…it’s – ”
“Ecknom’s Folly,” Mochni finished. His forehead wrinkled deeply as he frowned and tilted his head to listen. “It should not be so loud. Not here.” He turned to Abby. “Why?”
“I don’t know, Mochni.” Abby shrugged, watching the Woidnuk with concern. It seemed to her the sounds of Ecknom’s Folly didn’t stir only the Kisgar’s anger and rage. She nodded toward the others. “Let’s go. The others are halfway down the stairs, it seems,” she suggested. At Mochni’s nod, she added softly, “And into the lion’s den we go.”
“No idea!” Thomas exclaimed in response to Mochni’s question. “But there’s no time to stand here and figure it out. We need to chase it and shut it down.” He leapt down the stairs and rushed forward, nearly causing a dogpile at the bottom step.
Within spitting distance of him sat Noah in what looked to be something like an echo chamber. The man’s eyes were closed with an odd beatific smile on his face as he beat a tattoo on the drum with the flats of his palms. The chair and the drum were angled, Thomas realized, to direct the sound outward from the echo chamber for optimal sound – something like ancient surround sound.
“Stop!” Noah Ashbridge’s eyes flew open and landed on Thomas Knight. He saw the glint of a gun in his hand.
Doesn’t have the guts to use the damn thing!
“It’s over, Noah! It’s all over!” Thomas was shouting, but it sounded more like the buzz of an annoying housefly to Noah’s ears and he raised his hands as if to stop. Thomas raised his gun, preparing to shoot, and in a surreal bit of choreography, the bit of Earth in front of him exploded.
The large head of a lizard-like creature cracked the Earth as though hatched from an egg. It stretched and craned its neck, then opened its mouth wide,
emanating a screeching caw. Its head and shoulders filled the space between Thomas and Noah. The Kisgar blocked any attack from either side. It twisted and pushed, trying to get free of its prison below the Earth. In the background, a host of clattering destruction laid testament to the chaos of the Kisgar. Then more screeching, cawing, a host of screams as the Kisgar attacked within the villa itself, and a rumbling not unlike that of a train about to derail met their ears.
Time seemed to stand still as Noah and Thomas regarded the Kisgar between them and it regarded them. Its head swung first one way, then the other. Making its choice at last, the Kisgar’s head swung and leveled its gaze at Thomas Knight and his team, who were already backtracking their steps. Thomas waved them back slowly as he turned to race away from the creature, muttering curses under his breath. As if the creature had heard him and taken insult to his mutterings, it gave a final heave as it struggled to free itself and come fully into the echo chamber. As soon as it had its footing it leapt toward Thomas Knight and his team and lunged in attack.
Thirteen
In the space of a breath as the Kisgar leaped toward Thomas Knight, Noah brought his hand down in a resounding slap on the ancient hide of the drum. When he realized its attention was fully focused not on him but the fear it could smell before it, Noah brought his other hand down and continued his steady beat of the drum, a hypnotic melody which fed the Kisgar’s rage.
Thomas fired a shot over his head. The creature looked up and Thomas backed away. “Get back!” he called over his shoulder. He gauged the distance. Would he be able to hit it in the eye? He quirked his mouth. It was snaking its way toward them at breakneck speed. He fired shots from time to time to distract it and he was running out of bullets. He only had two left by his count.
