by Rick Jones
“Honey, seriously—”
“John, there are pyramids all over the world in every country. More than ninety percent of them are buried and well hidden.”
“Look. We’re not going to destroy ourselves, OK? It’s over. Everything that had been a part of Eden is now gone. Everything.”
She lifted Savage’s hand and placed it on her abdomen. “John, what if I’m right? What if there are satellite stations all over the world? If what we read in the chamber of Anu was correct, then our child would have less than ten years to live.”
Savage wasn’t buying it. “Sweetie, you need to rest—”
“What if Atlantis isn’t just a folktale. What about other lost cities and the tales tied to them?”
“Honey, you need to relax and stop getting yourself all worked up.”
She groaned in frustration.
He patted her hand. “Try to get some rest.”
When he stood she reached out and snatched his hand, and smiled. “I love you, John Savage. And in time we’re going to have a baby. Its future is most important.”
He winked at her. “Try to get some sleep. I’ll check on you in a bit.”
“’Kay.” She leaned her head against the pillow.
When John left the room he grabbed himself a snack from the vending machine, a drink, and sat out along a terrace that overlooked Ankara. The city was strikingly magnificent with ornate and beautiful structures that dotted the landscape.
And in time he began to consider Alyssa’s concerns, believing her theories were driven by the probability of her pregnancy—that a mother’s instinct to protect her child was paramount and that any and all possible dangers existed, proven or not.
She was bright and intelligent and normally spot-on with her conjectures. So he could not dismiss her theory that Eden was a satellite station that had given birth to man, and would subsequently give birth to a new mankind.
Man had been a dismal failure. That was something that could not be debated as the cons certainly outweighed the pros by a wide margin.
Furthermore, the Second Generation did exist.
So who’s to say that additional humankind weren’t already in their locked bins waiting for a resurrection the moment current man decides to slice his wrists open in a carnage that would last for a period of six months during the equinoxes in 2021?
More so, Alyssa was correct when she stated that there were pyramids all over the world with most of them harboring mysteries. But the one thing they all had in common, the one element they shared, was that they all referred to Gods originating from the Heavens or distant planets. It was a common thread that ran throughout the world many thousands of years ago from civilizations that never joined, banded or contacted each other since they were so incredibly diverse in culture. Yet the notion of a God coming from the stars remained a global theme.
He thought of the baby. I hope you’re wrong, Honey. Between now and then, between now and 2021, I hope we as a people learn a lesson. I want my child to live.
But deep down inside he knew that it was a sick world out there and it was getting sicker all the time.
If he had any faith in man when he left Alyssa’s room, it was quickly fading away.
On some level he knew that Alyssa was right, that the images played along the wall inside Alnitak were detailed descriptions of everything that was wrong with mankind.
“Everything,” he murmured out loud, catching the attention of the person sitting two tables away.
He looked over the landscape and considered this: it was a big world with big mysteries that held the impossible. Were there more satellite stations out there? Were there more pyramids that housed the new beginnings of mankind that may be a kinder, gentler race?
If there are, then we will find you. We will traipse all over the globe if we have to. But we . . . will . . . find you.
He then held his drink out to the person sitting a few feet away and raised it in salutation.
“To a brave new world,” he said. “And to the mysteries it continues to hold.”
The person beside him turned his head away and ignored him.
“Salud.” He drank the fluid with a single tilt of the container.
When he was done he stared out over the city of Ankara, wondering what it would look like ten years from now if man truly ends his stay on this planet if he wasn’t capable of ferreting out these satellite stations if they did exist.
He wondered.
And then he sighed.
Are you out there?
His answer came as the sound of silence.
More From Hive Collective:
Familiar Stranger
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Synopsis:
How can a killer be 3000 miles away and at your doorstep at the same time?
Ashley Quinton is on the verge of madness after the release of a killer she helped put behind bars nineteen years ago. Upon the exact moment of his discharge, she immediately receives calls from a local payphone from someone who tells her things only the killer would know. And then she begins to see items connected to her past--items that were given to her by this man when she was a child, only for them to disappear in a haze of smoke and mirrors before others can confirm her claims. As much as she points an accusing finger at the killer as the culprit, he's proven to be three thousand miles away. Yet as far away as he is, he knows everything that's going on in Ashley’s life because he's also at her doorstep.
*Formerly published as The Man Who Cast Two Shadows
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While on a visit to the United States, Pope Pius XIII is kidnapped by a terrorist cell calling itself the Soldiers of Islam. If the United States and its allies do not meet their demands, they will execute the pope. So when FBI Specialist Shari Cohen is called to duty to track down the terrorist cell responsible, she learns that she is not alone. Deep behind the Vatican walls a secret order dispatches a clandestine op group of elite commandos known as the Vatican Knights. Their mission: bring the pope back alive. As Cohen and the Knights work in tandem they uncover a White House conspiracy involving high-ranking members on Capitol Hill. When she begins to get too close to the truth about the pope’s kidnapping, she becomes the target of indigenous forces trying to keep the conspiracy safe. However, in order to get to her they must go through the Vatican Knights.
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From the caverns under the Sphinx to ancient ruined cities in Pakistan, and then on to a secret government project in Alaska, the Morpheus team will ultimately track the Spear to the Statue of Liberty, along the way encountering new psychics, deadly enemies with abilities to block their visions, and mysterious ancient knowledge locked away in the most unreachable of places…
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
&nbs
p; Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Epilogue
Table of Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Epilogue
