by Jeff Long
Clemens hit him again. It was a club. It broke Ike’s leg.
There were no clever asides like in the movie. This was a killing. A slow one. The club fell again.
Ike crawled behind a statue. Clemens nailed him again. He wasn’t looking for a knockout blow quite yet.
Ike rolled away. Unless he got rid of that club, the game was over. His daughter would remain a prisoner.
He got up on his one good leg and lifted an arm. He made an opening. Clemens went for it with a home-run swing. The club cracked hard against the jade plates. Ike heard ribs snap. But with a grunt, he clamped down his arm and trapped the club.
Then Clemens made another mistake. He tried to get his club back. Ike went with the yank. He let Clemens draw him close, and then jerked the man backward and locked one arm across his throat.
That left one hand free to fumble for the bone sheath inside his armor. He bared the quill of nerve toxin. One last scratch of the pen, and the FIGHT SCENE would be over.
He gripped the quill like a knife and was just starting to reach around.
At that precise moment, his wrist exploded. It flew apart. Ike frowned, and then the shock dropped him. Even as he toppled into darkness, Ike saw his severed hand drifting through space, and the quill was still clutched in that now mindless fist.
One shot, one kill.
Beckwith took no pride of craft in this one, though.
It was pure luck that he had managed to stalk his prey on the run and climb this secondary pyramid and set up the shot and unscramble the wind. It went beyond luck—a miracle—that the bullet had vectored itself in. But one way or another, he had knocked the beast down.
For over an hour, Beckwith had been lying flat on his stomach on top of this pyramid. He had patiently followed his target through the scope, first through the rubble below, and then as the man scaled the stairs of a massive pyramid on the far side of the island. He had waited with his finger on the trigger, full of questions about the man’s armor and gray hair and the girl’s strange intent, praying she would lead his eye to wherever the rest of the children were hidden before Beckwith had to shoot him.
Even after the girl disappeared through a door on the summit, Beckwith had held his fire, waiting to explore whatever his target was exploring. The best snipers can do that. They can reach a mile and more away through their scope and enter the world of their prey, feeling it with its fingers, deciphering it through its eyes, using their target to uncover secrets on a distant bookshelf or computer screen or even in a mirror. Beckwith had done that once, watching a double agent fog a mirror with his breath to read its invisible message. Then Beckwith had shot him.
Everything he could do to be accurate, Beckwith had done. He had lazed the target—825 yards—and factored in the denser air and humidity, and dialed it in with the trajectory knob. The wind, he decided, canceled itself out with all its circles, and he had not touched that knob. Then he had centered his crosshairs on his target’s spine and waited some more. Together, sniper and prey, they had eased between the statues of animal-people.
When the one statue came alive and sprang from its pedestal, Beckwith was so startled he almost lost his target. For a long minute his scope filled with a blur of monsters. If he hadn’t recognized Clemens, he might have put a bullet through each of them, just to be safe.
But then he made out the familiar ruins of Clemens’s face and realized that somehow their guide had found the children. Clemens had been right all along and now he was up there, battling this armored killer, and all Beckwith had to do to save the children was save Clemens. Here was Beckwith’s chance to redeem his sins.
For another long minute, Beckwith did not shoot. He kept waiting for Clemens to clear away from the target. But when they locked together and the killer drew a slender weapon, Beckwith quit waiting. He squeezed the trigger.
The shot was off by a good ten inches. He saw it through his scope. If the man hadn’t raised his arm, the shot would have missed entirely. The bullet sheared the man’s hand off at the wrist and Beckwith would have placed a second shot into him, but the green armor had collapsed from view.
Beckwith stayed locked on the scene for one minute longer, making sure Clemens didn’t need any more help. Clemens kept looking around, frightened and awestruck. Beckwith shared his awe. Somehow he had been handed this chance to redeem his sins. Somehow he had made the shot.
They would share the story soon enough. But first Beckwith had to descend and pick his way through the wreckage and climb to Clemens and the girls. He scoped his surroundings and was satisfied. Haddie had vacated the premises.
Packing swiftly, Beckwith started down. He was already arranging the evacuation in his head. He would count the girls, and tend and feed them, and get them in motion. No one would be coming to whisk them up to safety. They were on their own out here, and home was still a long way away.
ARTIFACTS
CNN.COM
February 15
China Bills U.S. $1 Million for Plane’s Stay
Washington—China has sent the United States a bill for $1 million to cover the costs of one of its spy planes staying on Chinese soil.
But a U.S. State Department official said Friday that the government has no intention of paying it. “It’s nice to know they have a sense of humor,” a U.S. State Department official said on condition of anonymity, scoffing at the scale of Beijing’s charge.
The American spy plane was forced to make an emergency landing on the Chinese island of Hainan after colliding with a Chinese military aircraft that was shadowing it. The episode roiled relations between the two countries, with ties between the two nations tumbling to their worst levels in two years.
After a drawn-out diplomatic spat, in which China held the plane’s twenty-four crew members for eleven days, Beijing will now allow an American team to come and disassemble the plane and fly it back to U.S. custody this week. The United States had wanted to repair the plane and fly it out, but China said allowing the plane to fly off Hainan would be a national humiliation.
44
An elephant was standing on his arm.
Ike’s eyes fluttered open.
One wrist lay cinched across his chest. The other was missing its hand. He was inside the dome.
A ring of eyes peered down at him. He saw their pools of bruises and sores and runny noses and raw tattoos. Gems and colored twine adorned their hair. Eight, nine, fifteen. Ike lost count. He almost lost consciousness.
He was probably dying. His disappointment was something of a revelation. Not long ago, inside the tomb, he had done his best to cast loose from this world. Now he found himself trying to hang on to it. “Maggie,” he whispered.
“What’s he saying?” one of the girls said.
“Don’t go too close,” said another. “He’s one of them.”
“No, he’s human. I think.”
“He came looking for us. He told me. He’s somebody’s dad.”
“Not mine. He looks totally insane. Look at him.”
“It doesn’t matter,” someone said. “He’s dying. That’s all they do.”
Not one knelt to comfort him or offer water. His wounds frightened them. They went on talking about him as if he were a stray dog.
Above their heads he saw the sign of the ox on the domed ceiling. This was a temple dedicated to the angel’s son. My son, starving and buried inside some mountain. This was the mountain. Inside it lived his son. Ike remembered. As a reward for their worship, the angel had killed the city. Because they wouldn’t quit feeding his son.
Ike looked up at the girls. Another time, another world, he would have told them to run away before it was too late. But they were his barter. Even now, crippled and bleeding and tied like an animal, Ike clung to the hope that he could still buy his daughter’s passage back to the sun.
Then someone said, “He’s coming,” and they scattered.
Ike saw the circular room more clearly. The archway leading out howled with the wind
. Stacks of food and equipment stood against the walls, salvaged from the dead soldiers. The little tribe of girls had enough food for months here. With some concerted hunting and gathering, the cache could be stretched for years.
The children huddled together. Only now did he see a woman rocking back and forth in the corner, out of her mind.
A voice spoke. “Out with the old boss, in with the new.” Clemens appeared overhead. He was wearing the green armor. He patted the bloody jade plates, looking happy enough to dance. “You went fetching for the old gringo one too many times, my friend. Your dog days are over. You belong to me now.”
He squatted down with a small knife. Pain flashed white in Ike’s head. Clemens rocked back on his heels. He held up a bloody half shell: Ike’s ear.
“Do you remember marking me?” Clemens opened the armor and showed his slave marks and scars. “You were the first. You caught me and then you signed your name on me.”
“Not my name,” Ike whispered. “His.” He spoke the ancient name for God, which had a thousand meanings.
“You mean that animal you gave me to?” Clemens said.
“His mark saved your life.”
Clemens set his knife on Ike’s chest and drew a line of fire.
“What I could never understand,” Clemens said, “was why you didn’t run away from that thing. You and I both know he’s a lifer. He’s never getting out. He’s trapped. But you could have run free. What did you think you were doing down there?”
Killing evil. But Ike did not say it out loud. The wind whistled through the statues outside.
“I knew he’d send you,” Clemens said. His knife slid between two ribs. He was meticulous about it, nothing lethal.
“We’re brothers, you and me,” he said when Ike regained consciousness. “Think about it. We both came down. We both got captured. We both got changed. Only I got changed more. You have some catching up to do, a little wider smile, eyes that don’t close, a bit of spinal adjustment. We’ll get around to the modifications, but first let’s take care of this hand of yours.”
He scooted forward on his heels and bent his head to get a better view. His knife went into the bone joint. Ike lit up.
“This may seem gratuitous,” Clemens said, and stuck the blade in again.
It went on. The pain kept sucking him under. Ike kept swimming back.
The worst part of it was the absolute pointlessness. He had traded everything for nothing. In the end his daughter had replaced him in captivity, and the cycle went unbroken.
Even so, Ike fought in his heart. Until he was gone and lying in pieces, there remained some chance for freedom. Not his freedom, granted. He’d sacrificed that long ago. But for his child, or the idea of his child, and the idea of her freedom from evil. So that she would never have to face what he was facing now.
Clemens jimmied the knife blade. Twitching, barely conscious, Ike resisted. Why? His stoic self-control was in vain, a prisoner’s conceit. Give in. He had nothing left to surrender. But then it came to him. Nothing except his daughter.
Ike’s eyes opened. He had one thing of value left in the world. One bit of barter. His child. In that moment, he gave her up.
If his daughter could not be saved, then at least these others could be. It was more than that. She could never be saved unless they were saved, too.
Clemens came into focus high overhead.
“Take the girls away from here,” Ike whispered.
“What’s that, brother?”
“You can’t stay in this place.”
“Of course we can,” Clemens said. “We’re stocked. We’re ready for the long haul. The girls and I are going to be friends.”
“There’s something buried inside here. His son. The ox. It’s still alive.”
“More gods and monsters?” Clemens smiled. “Sorry. Wrong number.”
“Get them away.”
“You came all this way to give us a friendly warning?”
“He came for his daughter,” said the tall girl who had guided Ike here. She spoke it like a declaration of independence. Hope, Ike heard. She still dared to hope. Which only doomed her. Because Clemens would go after her now before she tainted the others.
Clemens called the girls over. The eyes and runny noses and greasy hair and bare feet circled around. “What’s the bad man been telling you?”
“You took his daughter away, and now he’s come to get her back,” said the tall girl.
“You told them that?” Clemens said to Ike.
“No,” said Ike.
“Yes you did,” said the girl. It was an article of faith. He was the father who would never quit searching for them. Ike could see it in her eyes, in all of their eyes.
So could Clemens.
“Which one is yours?” he said to Ike. “This one maybe?” He tugged one from the circle. Her wrists and neck were bruised in colors. She had butterfly wings painted on her bare back.
“No,” said Ike. “None of them. I was wrong.”
Clemens grabbed another. “This one?” Funeral jewelry hung from her thin shoulders and arms. He ran one hand under her bottom. She peeped like a bird.
“‘Hush little baby, don’t you cry,’” someone sang out.
Heads turned to the sound. It was the woman by the wall. Rocking, her heavy breasts swaying, she went on with her lullaby. At first Ike thought she was singing to comfort the children. Then he saw the scalp of braided blond hair cradled in her hands.
Clemens clapped wearily. “Father meet mother,” he said to Ike. “This is Rebecca. She used to be quite the beauty. But I’m afraid she’s not working out very well.”
“Maybe his daughter was Samantha,” someone said. “She’s the only one not here.”
The woman got louder. Ike put it together, the scalp and the name.
Clemens threw a pebble at her. She stopped. He returned his attention to the lesson under way. “All right, girls, who belongs to Dad here?”
Suddenly none of them wanted a dad anymore. Their eyes lost the shine.
“Nobody?” said Clemens. “Nobody’s his baby? Come on, here’s the savior. Nobody wants to be saved?”
“Samantha,” Ike said loudly.
Rebecca started singing again.
Clemens looked at him. He threw another pebble in the corner, but Rebecca wouldn’t quit. “Somebody take her out of here.” The group made a move to leave. “One of you is enough.”
The smallest child went over and took Rebecca’s hand and led her outside. The room got quieter.
“He’s not a good man, girls,” Clemens said. “He hurts people. He steals them and does bad things to them. See what he did to me? That’s what he came to do to you. I keep telling you I’ll take care of you. We’re safe in here. When it’s the right time, we’ll all go home.”
“Run,” Ike said to the girls.
Clemens turned to him with the knife, but had an idea. “Corey, come help me. Come on, now. It’s a little strange at first. But we’ve got to learn how to take care of each other.”
The other girls stepped away from Corey. She was the tall one. She didn’t come forward.
“Take the knife,” Clemens said. “We’ll do this together.”
“Run,” said Ike.
“Very well,” Clemens sighed, “I’ll do it myself.” The knife went in.
“Samantha,” Ike whispered. The world went white. The knife stitched out, then in again. Ike heard his lung hissing. “Samantha,” he repeated. The knife slid deeper.
Abruptly it stopped. The knife clattered to the floor.
Ike opened his eyes.
Clemens was squatting at Ike’s side. His mouth was jawing for air. His hands spasmed. He tried to see behind him, but suddenly his neck wasn’t working. Then he toppled to one side.
The woman Rebecca stood over him. She was holding the poison quill between her writing fingers, exactly as if she were in midletter. Next to Ike, Clemens mewed, eyes bulging. He was alive, but paralyzed.
She looked down at Ike and blinked, groping for purchase. He saw the struggle raging inside her, Rebecca versus her madness. “Fight,” Ike whispered.
The children needed a mother. Someone had to lead them out of here—now—before the hadals regained their courage and crept back in. It wasn’t going to be him. He was dying. She had to find her sanity for them.
Ike clung to the edge as long as he could. He didn’t know how to unlock her cage. There had to be a secret word. He tried. “Samantha,” he said. “She needs you.”
Rebecca’s eyes widened with horror. Then they eased and she started singing again. “‘Hush little baby.’”
A shadow appeared at the door. Run, thought Ike. But it was too late. The doorway filled with a shape.
Ike couldn’t hold on any longer. His strength failed. As he fell into the darkness, he heard a man say, “Ah, Jesus, what have I done now?”
45
The angel was kneeling on the iron-hard ground, washing Ali’s feet. He ran his finger between her toes. “The children are free,” he announced.
Ali heard the frustration in his voice. It exposed his treachery. It told her that he had not meant for the children to ever see the light of day again. He had sent Ike to bring them deeper. He would have used them and kept Ali and used her, too. But something had gone awry.
Ali felt a quiet triumph. Whatever else he was, this creature was not almighty. His schemes were fallible.
“Are they heading to safety?” she asked.
“If the tender mercies of man can be called safety.”
Tender mercies, she thought. What kindness would he show her now? Would he vent his rage on her, or go on with the washing? And why had he revealed his betrayal to her? It exposed his fallibility. It made him almost mortal. Ali tried to relax.
He went on kneading the ball of her foot. “It’s time to unlock my cage,” he told her.
The back of his neck was smooth as a baby’s. Ali had touched it. She had held on to it for dear life. He wanted to be everything to her, husband, child, teacher, student, master, slave.
