by M. G. Harris
THE JOSHUA FILES by M. G. Harris
A complete box set
THE DESCENDANT (a Joshua Files prequel)
THE DESCENDANT - Contents
Start reading THE DESCENDANT
INVISIBLE CITY (The Joshua Files book #1)
INVISIBLE CITY - Contents
Start reading INVISIBLE CITY
ICE SHOCK (The Joshua Files book #2)
ICE SHOCK - Contents
Start reading ICE SHOCK
ZERO MOMENT (The Joshua Files book #3)
ZERO MOMENT - Contents
Start reading ZERO MOMENT
DARK PARALLEL (The Joshua Files book #4)
DARK PARALLEL - Contents
Start reading DARK PARALLEL
APOCALYPSE MOON (The Joshua Files book #5)
APOCALYPSE MOON - Contents
Start reading APOCALYPSE MOON
A note on reading order
We’ve listed these six titles in the order in which the author wrote the books. If you prefer to read these books in chronological order for the events of the story, start with INVISIBLE CITY and then THE DESCENDANT, ICE SHOCK, ZERO MOMENT, DARK PARALLEL, APOCALYPSE MOON.
The Descendant video trailer
For David,
While I was writing this with my broken leg, you were taking care of all of us. Thank you so much for helping me begin an exciting new career.
Contents
The Descendant video trailer
Abu Shahrain, Iraq, January 2003
Vial In Pocket
The Grey-Haired Man
A Test-Tube
Pyramid Sacrifice
On The Tepozteco
Silver Beetle
Marie-Carmen
Jumping Genes
The Poborsky Lab
Beltran Sequence
A Second Chance
IP Traced
Parting
The Princess
Chaldexx
archaeologyconspiracies
Melissa DiCanio
Hypnoticin
Carrier
Schwendi Bei Grindelwald
In The Shadow Of The Eiger
So Apocalyptic
A Proposal
The Bodyguard
Daniel O’Shea
Kleine Scheidegg
Isn’t The World Going To End In 2012?
Captain Connor Bennett
Medecins Sans Frontieres
Who Are You Working For?
Worried About Iraq
Lament For Eridu
Don’t Go For Any Heroics
Ninhursag
Frightening Splendor
Stars and Stripes
Friends in High Places
Civilian Geek-Boy
The Good Soldier
Agent Fletcher
Who We Serve
The Original Parents
End of the Line?
Those Who Waited
Acknowledgements
Copyright page
About MG Harris
The Descendant Alternate Reality Game
The Joshua Files on the Internet
Praise for The Joshua Files
Abu Shahrain, Iraq, January 2003
In the midst of the desert, the weapons inspectors found a well. There was little visible sign of it, only a vague discoloration of the sand between rocks. A young airman’s foot found it and under the sun’s scorching stare, it swallowed him.
Powerful flashlights beamed deep into the void, without sight of the bottom of the well. Light simply fell, apparently endlessly, towards the center of the earth.
Lieutenant Connor Bennett stumbled into the well. It was his first tour of duty outside the US – he’d hit the jackpot. He’d been escorting the team from the United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission. They’d crossed the desert near Abu Shahrain, about two hundred miles southeast of Baghdad. They’d pored over crumbled mounds; the ruins of the ancient city of Eridu.
Deep inside the darkness of the well, Lieutenant Bennett’s voice was clearly audible. Perched on a ledge about twenty yards down, he’d managed the drop with only an injured wrist. Moments later he flashed his torch down to reveal a plunging void. The embarrassment of his tumble vanished, replaced by a rush of relief, the thrill of discovery.
The political pressure to find concealed W.M.D. – weapons of mass destruction – was increasing by the day. Each member of the team held their breath. This well appeared on none of the detailed maps of the region. It was long-forgotten, or perhaps a well-guarded secret.
The team made preparations to the background of an energized hum; quiet anticipation. Their Geiger counters had detected only a normal, background level of radiation. If the weapons of mass destruction were indeed hidden down this ancient hole, they were efficiently shielded.
The managed descent of their infrared video camera was an exercise in patience and control. The inspectors gathered around the video monitor which they had set up near the opening in the ground. Long minutes passed during which the camera sent nothing but images of wall, wall, yet more wall.
Then, collectively they blinked as an image burst onto the screen. The camera panned slowly, revealing the subterranean chamber. The lead inspector tapped the monitor, indicating an area of intriguing complexity. The camera zoomed in.
The team members shuffled slightly as the images appeared on the screen. “Hieroglyphics?” breathed one.
The sole female of the group, Dr. Harper Fletcher spoke. “Not hieroglyphs; cuneiform. Ancient Sumerian.”
“Did the city of Eridu extend this far?” The team members turned to Fletcher. She said nothing.
The lead inspector frowned. Satellite scans had ruled out the existence of any underground structures this far from the main ruins of Eridu. Yet, there was no denying the images on the monitor. There were buildings down there. From what he could see on the monitor, these remains were remarkably well preserved.
“I need volunteers to go down.”
Lieutenant Bennett watched as Dr. Fletcher’s eyes came to rest on him. With a mere blink, Bennett acknowledged her silent instruction. He stepped forward.
“Let me go, sir.”
The lead inspector peered from under his baseball cap at another of his team. “How about it, Adams, you want to make the discovery too?”
Bennett waited, wondering why Fletcher hadn’t volunteered. That had been their agreement, quietly made at the airbase that morning when in front of his superior officer she’d shown Bennett her CIA identification card. “I’m representing the National Reconnaissance Office, airman. If I need assistance, you’re my guy.”
He could see Fletcher breathing lightly through open lips. She looked watchful, tense. He leaned back as one of the team attached a winch to the equipment which stood over the shaft, then clipped one end of the rope first to the weapons inspection team member called Adams, then to Bennett.
They began to lower Adams into the shaft. He vanished into the gloom. Bennett followed, no more than a minute behind. When Adams reached the bottom of the well, he called out. Bennett could see a flashlight dancing against the wall below. It disappeared down a tunnel as Adams began to walk. Bennett switched on his own headlamp, watched the light bounce back against the rock, less than one yard away.
“There’s a bunch of inscriptions,” came Adams voice. “Some kind of chamber. Looks like we got some of them there . . . what are they called? Sarcopha
gi. Yeah. We got some kind of burial thing going on here.”
Bennett’s boots hit the ground. He unclipped the rope, drew his weapon. He took six steps down the tunnel, following Adams. Then he heard it: air sucked in, a brief gasp of astonishment. Within seconds, the sound had transformed into a wail of abject terror. A scream of pain followed. For a moment fear gripped Bennett, held him breathless against the wall.
Adam’s voice rang out, piteous, horrified. “Oh God, help me, please . . . help me!”
In another second, Bennett overcame his own reluctance to budge. He rounded the corner into a hollow in the midst of space, dark shadows which hid walls that Bennett could instantly see, were man-made.
In the middle of this blackness Adams had fallen to his knees, a helmet light beaming from his forehead, his voice a prolonged scream of agony. Caught in the beam of Bennett’s own flashlight, dark fluid streamed from his eyes and mouth.
Bennett couldn’t move. “What did you do?”
But Adams could only turn to Bennett, his features now gruesomely disfigured by the blood pouring from openings in his face. From Adams’s hand an object fell, clattered to the ground and vanished into the shadows.
Bennett stared, struggling to regain the use of his own voice. In his earpiece he could hear the demands of the lead inspector above. Everything he saw was being transmitted to a monitor on the surface, where the team watched in silent, disbelieving horror.
“What’s happening? Lieutenant, report, now!”
Bennett’s voice was barely above a whisper.
“Sir . . . there’s something in this room . . .”
The voice in his ear ordered, “Get out of there!”
“Don’t leave me . . .” Adams begged. The words were barely audible as he began to choke on his own blood.
Bennett wanted to go. But his legs wouldn’t obey him. Instead, he found himself reaching out, taking the hand of the dying man. The light from his headlamp kept catching fragments of the walls in its beam. Wherever the light fell, he saw inscriptions.
A moment later, it was over. Adams slumped to the floor, landed with his face on one side. Bennett couldn’t take his eyes off him. So much blood. What was the explanation? A booby-trap? Poisonous gas?
“What the hell is going on down there?”
“Adams is dead.”
Then he heard Fletcher’s voice. “Airman, report.”
Bennett began to back away from the body.
“Is it W.M.D.?” insisted the inspector. “Bennett, did you find weapons?”
Shaking his head, Bennett spoke into his microphone, “It’s not W.M.D.”
The lead inspector stifled a curse.
Bennett began properly to examine the chamber. If there was some kind of poisonous gas, why hadn’t it affected him? His foot touched something on the floor – the object that had fallen from Adams fingers. Was that the source of the poison? He aimed his flashlight directly at the object. It was flat, roughly six inches long, appeared to be made of some pale, alabaster-type stone, its surface covered with inscriptions. Cautiously, Bennett turned around. In the center of the chamber was what looked like an altar.
The chamber had to be ancient. Maybe thousands of years old. Yet something within was still very much operational.
“There’s a reason they don’t want us down here,” Bennett murmured into his microphone. “This is something worth hiding.”
He wondered again about Fletcher, her last-minute reluctance to enter the chamber. He stared into the dead, blood-soaked eyes of Adams’s corpse. Only an airborne toxin could have ravaged the inspector’s body so swiftly. Bennett had never been more than two yards away – surely close enough to be affected.
Why wasn’t Bennett dead?
Vial In Pocket
Thin brown air simmered over Mexico City. Jackson Bennett leaned against the airplane window, pressed his cheek against the cold glass, gazed down at the city below. A dull ache was in his guts, as though a cold stone had become lodged there.
The anxiety wouldn’t go. He took a gulp of iced whiskey from his plastic tumbler. A burst of acidity rose from Jackson’s stomach as the liquid hit. Within seconds though, the alcohol began its soothing effect. He drank again, eager for relief from unsettled thoughts. He plugged the earphones of his iPod back into his ears and ran his fingers over the screen. He selected an Eminem track; “Mockingbird”. He hadn’t planned to think of his brother Connor but he did so anyway; he remembered the Christmas three years ago when they were still talking, when Connor had given him the CD.
Connor was older by a matter of minutes, but he had a way of making Jackson feel at least ten years younger. Now they were both nearly thirty. How could it be that his twenties were going to run out soon when it seemed like yesterday that he’d turned eighteen?
The airplane juddered as the undercarriage was lowered. The captain’s voice broke in over the in-flight entertainment system.
“We’re just making our final approach to Benito Juarez, Mexico City Airport. Please adjust your watches to the local time of 10.45am. May I take this opportunity to thank you for joining us on this Mexicana flight from San Francisco.”
In the right pocket of his jacket, Jackson’s fingers located the tiny objects of his disquiet; two small plastic test-tubes. Each contained a mere droplet of liquid; droplets which could land him in jail if discovered. Or at the very least in serious proceedings with the customs authorities.
But danger was theoretical – Jackson had never faced any serious consequences. Maybe this was the blissful naiveté of the inexperienced. Or maybe there was something special about his instinct for survival. After all, he reflected, wasn’t his twin brother a decorated US Air Force captain, a veteran of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan? His brother had been flying fighter jets since he’d left college, and always at war. If Connor Bennett had something special which helped to keep him safe, maybe Jackson had it too.
Technically, what he was doing was smuggling, no denying it. But he had more important things to do than to fill in some dumb, pointless form. He was three months overdue to submit his doctoral thesis and still had two chapters to write. His lab bench was a mess of partially completed experiments. He’d foolishly agreed to review the latest college textbook written by a good friend of his lab boss. Now this errand to Mexico City, quite out of the blue. There wasn’t time for everything.
Jackson knew perfectly well that the micro-organisms that he carried in those tiny test-tubes were harmless if handled correctly. His lab boss knew it too, but probably hadn’t realized that Jackson was planning to travel ‘vial-in-pocket’. The guy wasn’t a stickler for rules; he cared about nothing but the bottom line: results. Yet he’d stick Jackson with one hundred percent of the blame if he were caught.
It wasn’t unusual for biological scientists to bend the rules this way. Even so, Jackson always felt apprehensive when the moment came to stroll past the customs officials at the ‘Nothing to Declare’ desk. Lying didn’t come naturally and he didn’t get much practice.
The samples were harmless. They might, however, turn out to be worth a small fortune to the biotech industry. But that was in the future. Until the experimental evidence was in and the patents filed, these samples had a nominal value.
Definitely not contraband. At least, not in Jackson’s mind.
He knew that customs officials looked for signs of nervousness in the eyes and body language of travelers. Drug traffickers were their main prey, but he felt sure that they wouldn’t pass up the chance to bust a gringo carrying strange vials of an unknown, potentially lethal micro-organism.
So before landing, when travelling ‘vial-in-pocket’, Jackson made sure to steel his nerves, to relax muscles with three small bottles of whiskey.
Moments later he was waiting in the disorderly crowd that had formed at the customs station, just yards away. Ahead of him in the makeshift line, his neighbor from the flight glanced around. “I’ll say this for the system here: it’s pretty fake-proof.�
��
“Pardon me?”
“See those buttons?” explained the passenger. “You press the button. It’s attached to a random circuit which chooses – red or green. If you get a green light; that’s it, you’re through. Even if you look like Bin Laden. A red light, that’s different. Get a red light and you’re searched down to unrolling your socks and underpants.”
“You gotta be kidding.” Jackson felt sheen of sweat appear on his forehead.
“Narco-traficantes – the Mexican drug gangs. They know all the tricks to fake out the customs officials. But there’s no way to beat this system. Everyone takes the exact same chance.”
The passenger was saying this as he stepped up to the line and pressed the large red button indicated by the Mexican official. He made a face of mock anxiety and then exaggerated relief when the light turned green.
Jackson took a couple of quick breaths, forced a grin at the waiting official. He took his place in front of the button. He hesitated for just a second, wondering if any last minute reprieve could possibly save him from the potential disaster of a red light.
“Just press the button please, sir,” insisted the uniformed woman. There was the subtlest hint of force in her voice.
He blinked hard as he pressed the button. A second later he opened them to register the verdict.
It was green.
“You look just a little nervous there, sir, you got something to hide?” asked the customs official. It was impossible to tell whether or not she was joking.
“No, ma’am.” Jackson had rarely worked so hard to seem relaxed. “I just got a bus to catch. Didn’t wanna be late.”
With a dismissive wave, the woman lifted his suitcase onto the conveyor belt for the X-ray machine. Seconds later he retrieved it. He itched for a reassuring touch of the plastic test-tubes, but didn’t dare to reach into his jacket pocket until he’d cleared the crowded arrivals hall.
