The Prophet: Life: A Sci-Fi Thriller

by David Beers

  She had told them the truth, though not all of it. There was a reason for meeting these Ministries. Rachel just didn’t know it yet. She’d seen that she would go, and what they would ask her, but the Unformed hadn’t shown her why.

  What was the reason behind it?

  Because Brail, even in his insolence, made very good points. It was a risk, and maybe they could actually kill her. She had them on the defensive, and should focus on keeping it that way. She needed to continue creating diversions all the way up until the moment that they realized none of the death, nor destruction, mattered.

  Yet, going to them accomplished none of that.

  Her four lieutenants eventually left, and Rachel sat alone in her home. Their plans were in place. They would lose ground and followers, but holding position or advancing wasn’t the point. Rachel was okay with all of it.

  She waited in her house for the contact that she knew was coming, trying not to focus on the reason behind it. Rachel, above all else, held faith in the Unformed. It would tell her when the time was right.

  Rachel Veritros had been guaranteed safe passage, though all involved knew it was a lie. Veritros’s side made threats, of course, that if she didn’t return, every city across Earth would burn to the ground. It didn’t matter. If their Prophet died, unrest would shortly follow.

  She stepped out of her transport and looked at the large building in front of her. The Constant’s Citadel. Her lieutenants had tried pressuring her to meet in a neutral place, but she’d seen this image before in her mind. Her stepping from the transport, her feet touching the perfectly white walkway, and looking up at the massive structure which held the Constant’s Representatives.

  This is where she was supposed to be.

  Nowhere neutral, but in the heart of the enemy.

  Escorts—guards—walked her from the transport and through gates stretching a hundred feet into the air. The gates opened slowly, all pomp and performance to let in a woman and four guards.

  Rachel did, though, cross into the Citadel’s embrace.

  Chronicling the beauty of what Rachel Veritros saw inside would be time consuming, and while the hands of man could create miraculous objects, it has no direct bearing on what happened that day. It suffices to say that she took in everything during her long march across the Citadel, and that such a march was probably intended to make her feel small. It had no such effect, and only showed how little the people in charge understood their enemy.

  Rachel Veritros entered a large chamber, and was brought to the center. The ceiling was curved in a dome, and the chamber empty of any furniture or adornments. The walls were bare, made of red brick, and besides the venting on the ceiling, there was little else to see.

  The door she had walked through slammed shut.

  The guards that had walked with her now moved against the walls, spreading themselves evenly across the room.

  None of this had been what was discussed, but Rachel was okay with it. She had seen this. All of it, from the high, curved ceiling, to the guards standing 25 feet apart. It had all been prophesied, and so she felt comfortable falling into her place.

  She still wondered why. The answer had not been delivered yet.

  “Rachel Veritros.”

  The air in front of her lit up with four faces, the Ministries personified. Their faces hung huge, 15 feet tall and 15 feet wide. The four digital panels curved slightly around Rachel, hanging above her so that she had to look up.

  She said nothing, but only stared into their giant faces.

  “Your quarantine here is clearly for our protection. Your aggressiveness throughout the four Ministries has caused innumerable atrocities, and it should be obvious that we fear for our safety.”

  Rachel remained quiet. The conversation was taking place just as she’d seen. The words the exact same, the pacing between them even identical.

  “We want to know what you want, Rachel,” the High Priest said to her left. She knew it was him because she’d heard the rumors about the True Faith keeping their Priests completely bald. Looking at him, she found it quite odd and took a second before speaking, ensuring she wouldn’t smile at such silliness.

  “What I want doesn’t matter. I’m a vessel for what’s coming next.”

  “And what is It? You know we’ve met It before, and you know we beat It … Do you even know what It is?”

  “The only God this universe will ever meet.”

  There were no calls of blasphemy, nor for her immediate death. They were taking her seriously now.

  “Then what does It want?” another Minister asked.

  Rachel blinked.

  She hadn’t foreseen this question. It wasn’t supposed to come next. No, the next one should have been, Where is It?

  “Hello?” someone asked.

  What does It want?

  Rachel snapped back to reality, forcing herself to look at the hanging faces.

  “It wants what is rightfully Its. This Earth.”

  One of the Ministers laughed. “And what gives It that right?”

  Rachel ignored the question, but only kept staring forward. Seconds passed in silence, and then another giant face spoke.

  “We want a truce. We want a truce with It, and with you, and your followers. This has gone too far, Veritros. The death has to stop.”

  Rachel looked at her feet. The conversation was resuming the tracks it should be on, but the questions from moments before still jarred her.

  What does It want?

  “The death will stop when you step down from your posts. When you renounce your gods and take on the one true God in the Unformed, and when It is Formed, you will bow.”

  The words were supposed to be said, just like everything else, but Rachel felt no conviction in them.

  “That won’t happen, and you know it. We understand that this creature who contacted you is powerful. We’re not denying that, and we’re not looking to kill It. We want a truce, some sort of disarmament. We want peace.”

  Rachel looked up from the floor at the speaker. She thought it was the One Path, the only Ministry to have a woman as their leader.

  “There is no truce with fate. You can’t bargain it away.” She took in a deep breath and felt herself returning, pushing away the earlier question with the same force that had forged her rebellion. “I’m not here to grant quarter. I’m here so that I can accept your unconditional surrender, and then the death will end.”

  “Tell us how you met It,” someone on the right asked.

  “It came to me. I didn’t go to It. That would have been impossible.”

  “Listen, we need to know more about what we’re dealing with, especially if you’re asking for us to surrender. What are we surrendering to? When will It arrive? What will happen?”

  Rachel closed her eyes.

  “You’re surrendering to a being outside of this universe. It will arrive within the month. I do not dictate what will happen when It does. What other questions do you have?”

  She kept her eyes closed, hoping that the conversation would change from the path she saw it taking. If she had a preference, they would surrender, and the death could stop. Her singular goal was to clear the way for the Unformed, and if people could be spared, then so be it.

  “We would like to study you.”

  “I’m here. Study me.”

  “You know what we mean. We would like you to volunteer to have our scientists look at you, to understand what’s happening. You’re sacrificing your own kind for some creature that no one knows anything about. You may very well be committing genocide of your entire species.”

  She opened her eyes. “And if your gods asked you to kill, would you not do it? Have you not already done it? Have entire populations not been wiped from the Earth because your books said it should be? How is what I’m doing any different?”

  “You’re talking about complete annihilation.”

  “No,” Rachel said. “The Unformed’s followers will survive.”

&n
bsp; “What you’re asking … it’s not possible. We’re not going to surrender mankind.”

  “Then our meeting has concluded,” Rachel said.

  “A week,” one of the Ministers said. “Give us one week with you, and after that, this bloody war can continue.”

  Rachel looked at the Minister for a few seconds without saying anything. She smiled. “A week with me, and you guarantee I survive it?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you think I’m the same girl who was born into the Constant? The one who was perfectly content growing up on a campus without ever having seen the opposite sex? Do you think my trust in you knows no bounds? Do you still think I’m one of your subjects?”

  “We’re looking for a way out of this, for all involved,” someone said. “Don’t forget, we won last time, Veritros. We stopped your god.”

  Why am I here? she wondered as she looked at the faces before her. The conversation had come to an end, and she understood that. There was nowhere else for either side to go, no more paths for their words to take. They would not surrender and neither would she. No quarter would be granted.

  Why am I here?

  No answer came, though. Rachel knew there was only one thing left to do. It’d already been prophesied. She had to decide whether to stand here and break with what the Unformed showed her should happen, or to follow the directions It gave. For Rachel Veritros, there really was no decision. The Unformed’s will be done.

  Rachel looked slowly across the four faces, all old and grave, as if smiles hadn’t crossed their lips in long, long years. Rachel wondered if the same would happen to her. If in 50 years her face would look as though it had never known joy.

  No. I follow truth. Lies created the people in front of me.

  Rachel closed her eyes for a second, and when she opened them, her eyes were gray fire.

  While we paid little attention to details when Rachel Veritros entered the Citadel, at this point it would probably be worth a closer look.

  Inside of the brick room her eyes were alight, and the outside structures stood as normal. A hundred foot high stone wall created the Citadel’s border, cutting it off from possible invaders (though there had been no attempts in the 7,000 years it stood). Vast numbers of buildings sat inside the wall, a city in itself truly, but the most massive stood in the middle. A domed building without gold adorning it, but instead sky blue reflected the sunlight that shone down. Large pillars adorned the edge of the circular structure, and it was the only building to stand higher than the stone wall. One could see the blue dome for miles and miles.

  Pilgrimages had been made yearly for the past seven millennia, with the Constant’s subjects coming to bow and pay homage to the force they worshipped. They would kneel in the streets, millions, and bow to the blue dome, knowing that their prayers and honors would be heard by the universe. That it would keep them safe.

  Rachel Veritros had done it yearly too, all the way up until her conversion. She’d prayed with the masses and offered her soul to what she’d been taught.

  This Citadel, this city, was a beacon to the faithful. In the same manner as the Vatican was utilized in the Old World. It was a symbol as much as anything, reminding everyone of the hope that could come from the universe—the eternal blue positioned across the dome’s exterior reflecting the sky’s eternal blue—the eternalness of what they worshipped.

  Rachel Veritros stood inside a room of the main building, but her eyes showed nothing of the blue outside. They showed only gray, and the faces looking down on them grew fearful, because they all understood what such a color meant.

  The shaking didn’t begin inside Rachel Veritros’s brick room. It started along the tall, stone wall. From the base, the foundation of that 7,000 year old structure vibrated as never before. The straight tower of stone began wobbling, and anyone near it stopped whatever they were doing and looked up—none understanding what was happening. Everyone spread their legs to better stabilize themselves, taking a wider stance as the ground shook them too; many didn’t know what was more fearful, their own legs shaking or the wall that had always been there, now nearly flowing like a ribbon in the wind.

  Rocks started tumbling from the top, shearing and breaking off of the ancient structure. The trembling ground moved further inside the Citadel, traveling underneath buildings without prejudice. Inside, stone and metal rattled and fell alike. Some objects caught people on the way down, maiming and killing as they did.

  Rachel Veritros’s eyes grew brighter and the glow spread from them. It moved across the brick room, though the room itself still wasn’t shaking. She didn’t flinch as the light crossed the room, gray static filling empty space.

  “What’s happening?” one of the giant Ministers called, though it was useless.

  And finally, the shaking took hold of the Citadel’s major dome, and thus the smaller room which Rachel Veritros stood inside.

  Bricks collapsed to the ground, falling through her beautiful glow like hail through moonlight. Death and beauty.

  The shaking intensified and the faces in front of her faded from existence, at least one Minister running for his own life. Most likely the Constant’s, the only one actually on the premise.

  Outside, looking at the city as a whole, one could see buildings beginning to collapse. Smaller ones falling in on themselves and crushing whoever was inside. Fire sparked on the north side, some sort of power source coming unhinged and unmanageable. A large part of the major dome fell in, and Rachel’s gray light flowed out, replacing the missing ceiling before spreading further. Out into the sky.

  People screamed and ran. Some still stopped and stared at the buildings, not comprehending that they could in fact fall. Others only looked at the strange gray light that flickered and filled their sky.

  There was no escape, nowhere anyone could run to because the gates were closed and the wall collapsing, crushing anyone who drew too close.

  Rachel Veritros’s lieutenants had said that nearly everything in this Ministry except the Citadel had been overtaken. Rachel Veritros walked into the Citadel, that which housed the most faithful—the most powerful—in the Constant Ministry, and she brought it all down.

  Every single brick.

  Nearly half of the Constant’s Representatives were wiped out—all who hid behind its walls.

  Fire raged and cries rang out into the sky.

  In the end, she stood alone, mountains of rubble surrounding her. She stood in the same place in which she’d given her ultimatum, her eyes still blazing. She was the only thing still standing, and she walked from the ancient city’s rubble, now completely destroyed.

  Rachel Veritros went home without being hunted, because any hunters inside the Constant Ministry were either dead or in chaos.

  She went home and did not answer calls from her lieutenants.

  She had gone to the Citadel without knowing the reason why, though she did now. It had been hidden from her until the job was finished, though perhaps she should have known. The reason had been simple—the whole world now saw her power, and thus the creature she served. She had conquered a Ministry, a woman alone, with nothing but her will.

  And everyone now saw it, without doubt. The entire world witnessed the defeat, and those inside the Constant’s territory only need look to where that blue dome once sat, and they would understand the power coming for them.

  Even with the reason revealed, and her enemies fearing for their very souls, the question came back to her. The one she hadn’t known was coming—the only one the Unformed hadn’t showed her.

  What does It want?

  It was an odd thing … to hear it, and yet never have thought of it before.

  What does It want?

  She turned the question over and over in her mind, as if there might be some trapdoor hanging on the letters, one which she would fall into and never return from.

  Even studying the question, nothing was revealed to her. It was simple, something she should have been able to answer.
Something that honestly should have occurred to her before, but it never had.

  What does It want?

  She didn’t know what It wanted, and as she thought on the question, a piece of her rose up against its very nature.

  And those that asked you, what does their god want? You’re not supposed to answer what It wants. That has never been your place, nor that of any servant of something so great.

  And there was truth in that. From the beginning, she served because when someone is placed before something so vast, so powerful, questions cease to matter. One simply submits, because to do anything else in the face of eternity isn’t only suicidal, it’s foolish on an unfathomable scale. One’s very existence fades to nothing.

  Yet, they had asked the question, and she couldn’t put it aside.

  What does It want?

  Rachel Veritros sat alone in her apartment, the world burning around her—because of her—and knew that she had no idea what her God wanted.

  Seven

  The moon was high and the night quiet.

  David and Rebecca had both been staring out at the sky, neither saying a word. David had seen it when he was younger, before his parents moved to the True Faith—but that had been a long, long time ago. He’d forgotten the moon’s majesty. It’s simplicity. Mankind tried mimicking it beneath the ground, but for all their technical advances and conquering, they couldn’t accomplish what nature had. Not truly.

  He knew Rebecca was completely amazed, her silence a tribute to the round orb glowing in the sky. It was her first time seeing the moon, having spent her entire life below ground. She hadn’t yet viewed the sun, but David knew her feelings now would be amplified a hundred fold.

  They’d been flying a few hours, their departure from beneath ground unannounced and unlawful—but there were no repercussions, because no one was left to chase them.

  Their transport had remained low in the beginning, beneath the continuously detonating clouds above. The transport would guard against nuclear fallout, but the explosions above would have destroyed it. David could have protected them if he wanted, but using the gray unnecessarily was a liability at the moment. He thought it might allow the woman to see him, destroying any secrecy he held.