by K. T. Tomb
She had made sure to pick up a couple of bottles of chocolate milk before the limo driver dropped her off.
Phoe opened one of the chocolate milk bottles and took a sip. She then took out her phone, sighed, and called her mother.
Her mother answered on the first ring. “Hello, Thalia. Why are you calling?”
Phoe shook her head. “Mom, I’m not going to beat around the bush. I know where the Spear of Destiny is buried.”
There was a moment of uncomfortable silence before Angelica Phoenix responded, “Why on earth would you think I would be a treasure hunter? Aren’t there enough people wasting their time doing that sort of thing?”
Phoe leaned against the broad trunk and peered through the large branches. She had a perfect view of the grave. “I’m not going to repeat myself, Mom. If you want the Spear, then meet me at Lone Fir Cemetery. I can’t be held responsible if you get here late.”
“Maybe I don’t take orders well, Thalia.”
Angelica’s voice wasn’t coming from the phone anymore.
She was standing right behind her daughter.
Phoe turned around. She spilled her chocolate milk on the ground when she saw her mother standing there. They both put away their phones.
Phoe was livid. “How dare you play that shit with me!”
“Watch your mouth, Thalia,” her mother said. “I’m here to protect you. I don’t think you know what is truly going on here.”
Phoe was about to answer when she noticed Emmerich Huber and Andrew Selig standing about twenty feet back next to a Douglas fir. Selig was eating what appeared to be a hotdog. Huber looked impatient.
Phoe glared at the two henchmen. “What are they doing here? They’re not CIA like you, Mother.”
If Phoe’s statement affected Angelica, she didn’t show it.
Angelica seldom showed her emotions. “I see that you’ve been talking to Eric. How is he? Is he eating?”
Phoe heard a car pulling up. She turned to see a taxi stop near Danworth’s grave. Eric got out of the back and handed the driver some money through the open car window.
The taxi drove off, leaving Eric standing alone. He immediately walked toward the burial plot and stood in front of it. He placed his hands in his jacket pockets and kept moving to try to stay warm.
Angelica and Phoe continued to watch Eric without making a sound. Huber and Selig remained quiet as well.
Phoe grabbed her last bottle of chocolate milk and turned to her mother. “Stay here. Don’t follow me.” Phoe scowled as she walked past Huber and Selig. She then disappeared behind a clump of trees.
***
It was now dusk as Angelica Phoenix watched as several Mini Coopers drove up to where Eric stood. When the last car arrived, she counted a total of fifteen.
She looked around to see if they had spotted her daughter, but even she had lost sight of where Phoe had gone. Huber and Selig stepped closer to the beech tree to remain hidden from view.
Several of Mueller’s henchmen exited the vehicles and took positions around the area to secure it. They each had semi-automatic weapons with lights attached. Mueller came out next.
Lukas Mueller wore a black parka and matching thin gloves. He walked straight to Eric. Eric fidgeted. He was intimidated by Mueller’s presence.
Mueller looked at the grave headstone. Charles Danworth. There was a grave next to Danworth’s. Patsy Friends O.E. “Which one, Phoenix?”
Eric looked at both headstones. “Danworth. She said Danworth.”
Mueller waved to two of his men. They took two shovels out of the back of one of the cars. Mueller grabbed them and threw one of them down on the grave. The other, he handed to Eric.
Eric looked around at Mueller’s army. He decided to pick up one of the shovels and started to dig in front of Danworth’s headstone.
Eric looked at the other shovel as he dug. “Expecting company?”
Mueller smiled. “Company’s already here.”
Angelica, Huber, and Selig all came walking out from behind the beech tree with their hands in the air. Behind them were four of Mueller’s armed men.
Eric wished that their mother wasn’t involved. There were several reasons. “Mom. Nice to see you.”
Angelica refused to smile. “Eric. How have you been? Are you eating?”
***
Phoe had worked her way around to a mausoleum. It gave her a good vantage point as well as keeping her concealed. When Mueller’s army showed up, she made it a point to watch where some of the armed men were stationed.
She also watched as her mother was captured. She sighed and got back to business.
It was time to even the odds, if they were all going to make it out alive. She decided to go after two of the armed men who had already stopped to light cigarettes. They weren’t in Mueller’s line of sight, which made her ambush that much easier.
One of the men had placed his weapon down on the ground and just lit his cigarette.
Phoe casually walked up to them. “Hi, guys. Can you suggest a good hamburger place near here?”
Without giving either of them a chance to respond, Phoe elbowed the armed man in the face. She then kicked the gun away from the reach of the smoker and punched him in the throat. He fell to the ground.
The other man recovered from her elbow attack. He pointed his gun into the air to signal his reinforcements.
That’s when she knew that he couldn’t fight. Their fighting knowledge was similar to the men she had beat up in Germany. They were skilled with firearms, but not in hand-to-hand combat. As long as they had a weapon, they were fine. Where did Mueller recruit these losers?
Even though it was dark, with help from the light that he had on his gun, she could see his finger squeezing the trigger. She instinctively jumped straight for him. Phoe grabbed his wrist that held his gun. She swung her body around while she held his wrist. She heard the wrist bones break as his weapon fell from his hand.
She moved so quickly that she continually punched him into unconsciousness before he had a chance to scream over his fracture. She looked up to see if the scuffle had attracted any unwanted attention. It hadn’t.
She grabbed their weapons and turned off one of the lights. The weapon that still had the light was propped up on a headstone, to give the illusion that at least one of Mueller’s men was still there.
Using pieces of their clothing, she bound and gagged the two men and then continued back to the mausoleum.
***
Every few minutes, Selig stopped digging. He was sweating profusely and it appeared that he was going to pass out. He rested as he looked at Mueller with pleading eyes. “Sir, I understand that you are most adamant about getting us to dig, but might I direct you to the muscular German man? He is so much stronger than I am.”
Huber glared at his partner.
Mueller looked at Huber. “You may have something there. You! German guy! Take the fat guy’s place!”
Huber growled at Selig as he took the shovel and started to dig.
Selig walked up to Mueller. “Thank you, sir.”
Selig then grabbed Mueller’s shoulders and kneed him in the groin. Mueller doubled over in pain as Huber and Angelica went into action.
Huber swung the shovel at two of Mueller’s men who were near the grave. He hit one in the gut and the other in the kneecap.
Angelica spun around and kicked the weapons out of the hands of the two men behind her. She followed up with both hands jabbing two fingers into each of their solar plexuses. Both men fell to the ground while they tried to regain their breath.
Phoe noticed the disturbance. Mueller’s men noticed it, too. They all started to converge on Mueller’s location with their weapons ready. Phoe was about to join the fracas when she noticed that Eric was continuing to dig, in spite of what was going on around him.
As the remainder of Mueller’s men converged on Angelica, Huber, and Selig, Eric’s shovel hit something solid.
“Don’t kill anyone!”
Eric shouted. He had only dug about two or three feet down when he’d struck something.
Mueller recovered and had been about to shoot Selig when he heard Eric. “What did you find, Phoenix?”
Eric was nervous and excited. “I don’t know! Something… metal.”
“This better not be a trick, because I’ll kill the lot of you right now!” Mueller threatened.
Eric started to clear away the dirt from whatever was buried. It wasn’t quite six feet deep, so a casket was ruled out.
Eric wiped the dirt away to reveal a metal door. The door was about four feet long and slightly rounded. There were steel rivets all around the door. Once Eric cleared away the dirt from all around the metal, the shape was cylindrical. Almost like a capsule of some sort.
The hole was now six feet deep. The capsule-shaped metal tube was completely uncovered. Eric got out of the hole.
Mueller decided to try to open it the only way he knew how. He started to fire his semi-automatic weapon directly at the metal tube. Bullets bounced off the tube in every direction. Anyone near the hole had to duck or get shot.
Angelica and Mueller looked at the tube. There wasn’t a scratch on it.
Chapter Eighteen
Phoe walked right through Mueller’s men.
Every time one of them pointed his weapon at her, she just smiled and said, “I’m the only one who can help your stupid boss.”
Phoe arrived at the grave and looked at the metal tube. “Hmm. Interesting. I guess shooting it didn’t work.”
Mueller recognized Phoe. He readied his weapon as he yelled, “You! The bitch who tried to kill me in Germany!”
Angelica was about to speak when Phoe grabbed Mueller’s weapon and turned it on him. She pushed the barrel to the tip of his nose. “I don’t want to help you any more than you want my help, but I’m here. Don’t get in my way! By the way, if you’d actually train your men, I wouldn’t have beaten them silly so easily. Now, are you going to get the hell out of my way so I can open this tin can?”
Mueller was shocked. He looked around at his men and then realized one important fact. He couldn’t open the door himself. He let Phoe take a closer look.
She jumped down into the grave, still holding onto the gun. Eric joined her. He looked at his sister with expectations of violence.
She did something worse.
She ignored him.
She examined the grave’s dirt walls. “Hmm. Interesting.”
Eric’s curiosity got the better of him. “What? What’s interesting?”
She wondered whether she ever wanted to talk to her brother again. After surmising her current situation, Phoe decided she needed someone to bounce ideas off of. “This grave was dug in a hurry. The dirt is uneven and it’s a real mess.” She crouched down and ran the dirt through her fingers. “The soil has recently been disturbed.”
“What the hell does that mean?’ asked Eric.
“What it means, my dear clueless brother, is that this situation is going to get worse before it gets better.”
Phoe examined the metal door. She ran her hands along the rivets. One came off in her hand. It was actually just the top of the rivet. She looked at the bottom and then dropped it back onto the door. “Magnet,” she declared.
Phoe took all of the rivet magnets off of the door. She then thought for a moment and started to place them back. She formed the Star of David. As soon as the star was complete, the metal door popped open.
Eric’s mouth dropped open in amazement. “Damn, sis! You got this shit down!”
Phoe ignored him once again as she opened the door. She shined the light from the gun into the newly revealed tunnel. She jumped down into the tunnel. It was about four feet down from the metal door. She saw that the underground tunnel led to the adjoining grave.
The grave of Patsy Friends O.E.
Phoe had figured that was an anagram for Spear of Destiny. She was right.
The tunnel that led to the other grave was only about two feet high and four feet wide. Phoe was able to make her way to the other grave on her stomach. Good thing I didn’t have that extra breakfast muffin.
Once she was in the other grave, it was hard to breathe. She closed her mouth and breathed slowly through her nose, trying to conserve oxygen. She turned to where she lay face up. The hole there was larger. It must have been at least six feet long.
She pointed the light at what appeared to be a long box. It was similar to a pool stick case. She grabbed it and shoved it through to Danworth’s grave.
Phoe turned back on her stomach and inched her way back the way she came, feet first. When she made it back to Danworth’s grave, she noticed that the long box was gone. Eric.
Phoe climbed out of the hole to see Mueller holding the long box.
Eric stood beside him.
Phoe was pissed.
“So, we’re good, right, Lukas?” asked Eric.
Selig tried to say something, but Huber held one finger to his lips.
Phoe walked up to Eric and punched him in the face. One of Mueller’s men hit her in the back of the head with the butt of his gun. Phoe fell to the ground, partially conscious.
Angelica ran up to the man who had hit her daughter and punched him once in the neck and once in the nose.
Another man was about to shoot Angelica when Mueller said, “Leave her alone! She is no longer a concern!” Mueller set the box on the ground and opened it up. In it was an old, black rounded piece of wood. It was about six feet long.
Lukas Mueller wasn’t as smart as he liked people to believe. He was a con man like Eric. He always happened to be in the right place at the right time. It would have helped him more, if he had common sense.
Mueller took off his gloves and dropped them on the ground by the box. He then picked up the stick.
Selig’s heart was in his mouth. “Hell, no!” he yelled. “You don’t know what you’re doing!”
Angelica looked puzzled. Obviously, Andrew Selig knew something that he forgot to share.
Mueller held the stick up over his head with both hands. “Hah! Do you know what this is?”
Selig lowered his head. “A mistake.”
Chapter Nineteen
Lukas Mueller felt like he was finally in control of his own destiny. Destiny had always been a funny thing.
A black energy started to emit from the stick.
Eric saw it and became more anxious. “We’re good. Right, Lukas? I don’t owe you any more?”
Mueller smiled. “Yeah. We’re good.”
Eric ran toward the beech tree as Phoe tried to stand. She rubbed the bump on the back of her head as she saw the glowing stick. She started to back up and away from Mueller.
Mueller’s eyes turned dark as the black glow surrounded him. He struggled as his hands started to shake.
Selig called out to him. “Lukas! Drop the Spear before it’s too late!”
Phoe glared at Selig. “You should know what that stick is, Selig. You buried it here. That’s not the complete Spear, though, is it? Maybe I should just call you by your given name. Isn’t that right, Charles Danworth?”
Angelica Phoenix turned in anger toward Selig. Huber just shook his head in disappointment.
A small wind originated from the Spear as Mueller’s pupils disappeared. He had an evil grin.
Phoe ran up to the newly-revealed Charles Danworth. “It’s only the wooden shaft of the Spear of Destiny. I get that! Charles, you need to stop worrying about your true identity being known and tell me how I can stop Mueller!”
Danworth thought for a moment. “I don’t know if you can. I’ve never touched the Spear without gloves before. I don’t know what’s going to happen, but without the spearhead attached to control the rest of the Spear, what comes next won’t be good.”
Mueller raised the Spear into the air with one hand and then thrust the other end of it into the earth. A shockwave spread out from the point of impact, knocking over headstones and several of those standing closest to
him.
Angelica, Danworth, Huber and Phoe ran behind the beech tree with Eric.
Danworth started to sweat. “I see it now. With each use of the Spear, the user grows more in control over it. Mueller will have it totally under his will soon.”
Phoe remained optimistic. “What’s the downside? I mean, seriously. With great power comes great… blah, blah, blah. There has to be a downside for Mueller. If anybody knows it, it’s you, Danworth.”
Eric became hysterical. “What the hell is this shit? This kind of crap isn’t supposed to exist!”
Phoe lowered her head. She had to take control of the situation. She always had to take control.
That’s exactly the way she liked it.
Phoe also realized that she had to act like a leader as she gave out her orders. “Mom. Take Eric somewhere safe and leave him there. He won’t be of any help to us anytime soon. Huber. Keep Danworth safe, but don’t go too far. I need his expertise. Danworth. You need to think of a way to stop the Spear.”
“What about you, Thalia?” her mother asked.
Phoe looked in the direction of Mueller. “I’m going after the asshole holding the Spear.”
***
Mueller was drunk with power. Never had he experienced anything like the Spear. He didn’t care about anything else but the way he felt. He was a god.
He should have watched his back.
Phoe attacked from behind. She used a two-fisted punch to Mueller’s lower back. He hit the ground face first, but still managed to retain possession of the Spear. Phoe then proceeded to kick him continuously in the side. For all of her training, she decided that a good old-fashioned street fight was the best way to go.
Some of Mueller’s men fled when the shockwave hit. Those who stayed remained hidden to see what their boss had planned. Phoe could see them as they poked their heads out from behind headstones and trees.
