Relics

by K. T. Tomb

  He was to be the savior of Eden.

  The Daughters had balked at this notion. Were they not the protectors of life on Earth? She didn’t blame them. After all, they were a prideful and powerful bunch. So learned and experienced in some ways and simple in others. Ultimately, they were shielded from the plight of the real world. Exposed to it only in small increments at a time. Not really enough to know the harsh realities of what mortals faced, the fears that could grip them, some warranted and some not. The Chosen One challenged their very purpose. Jealousy aside, he was coming and he was going to do the job that the Daughters themselves could not do.

  She swung her feet now to the cold, flagstone floor. She allowed the cold to seep into her bare skin, scattering the weight of sleep from her body.

  It had been thirty years ago, perhaps, that she knew the Chosen One had finally been born. For the vague image in her dreams, the man with no name and no face suddenly had both. He was known as Knight and he was a hell of a good-looking man. She knew, thirty years ago, that a countdown had begun. An unknown timer in the sky had been set and the fate of Earth was in the hands of this simple mortal. Then again, perhaps he wasn’t so simple.

  She stood and dressed, feeling a sickness in the pit of her stomach. She was too old for this shit. She flicked on the lamp switch next to her bed. The light illuminated a small room, comprised only of a desk, a computer, a small sofa and an original painting from Michelangelo. A dear man.

  She sighed, thinking about him and their whirlwind affair one summer in Venice.

  She slid her feet into slippers and padded over to the adjoining bathroom. The bathroom was barely large enough for her tall frame. The bedrooms and bathrooms were all small for a number of reasons. First, they were carved out of solid stone, so space, time, and manpower were a factor. Second, she never wanted herself or her Daughters to ever become too comfortable. They were here to protect and to serve, whether the world knew it or not. Each of them had to be ready to defend at a moment’s notice.

  This latest nightmare had her still shaking. As she reached for the shower lever, her quivering hand slid off twice before she was able to grasp it and give it a turn.

  The winds of change were upon them. There was nothing else to do but weather the storm. Or die trying.

  Dying. It was a word that was rarely uttered by the Daughters. An irrelevant word to any immortal, but now, she tasted it, tried it on for size, and realized that she was ready to die. She had lived long enough. She had been, for many centuries now, in a deep fatigue that even the healing oil could not erase.

  As steam clouded the small room, she stripped down to her bare skin. The image in the mirror, ghost-like and hazy from the steam, was still trim and taut. Her daily workouts never ended. She should be the most fit person on Earth, if she counted all the workouts this body of hers had suffered through.

  She stepped into the pleasant hot jet of water.

  This was not a convent. Her Daughters did not sleep on wooden slats and did not shower in cold water. They were allowed some accouterments.

  She stood there for quite some time and tried to let the heat of the water reach and soothe her tired muscles. It was a relief that would never come, no matter how hot the water was, or how long she stood under its penetrating spray.

  Equipping their mountain fortress with modern plumbing had been a nightmare. It was a project that had started hundreds of years ago and only came to fruition during the last century. In fact, the fortress was in an almost constant state of construction and renovation, as progress swept through the twentieth century. The Daughters, who were trained and skilled in all manner of advancements, could only do so much. Although the Daughters had extensive training, they had brought in truckloads of workers, all blindfolded and drugged for secrecy, to build this modern fortress deep within the Mountain of God. They were paid well and suffered through the months of near darkness and isolation from the rest of world.

  The mountain itself was riddled with caves and natural tunnels, which the Daughters had hewn and sculpted throughout the centuries. The workers ranged from construction workers, to computer engineers, to architects, all devoted to building and equipping the mountain fortress with modern technology and weaponry.

  The end result was perhaps the eighth wonder of the world. An amazing entity existed within a stone mountain. The entire fortress was four stories high, with many tunnel offshoots leading to a myriad of rooms and workstations. It took an army of computers to keep the place afloat. The walls of the bathroom were pure basalt, carved straight from the mountain.

  Now dressed in a long white robe, black hair streaked with gray and pulled back away from her face, Myora IL Eve left her small sleeping chamber.

  Although she moved quickly, with unnatural youthful energy, she had the look of an elder. She had allowed herself to age into her early fifties before partaking of the oil. Myora had felt it necessary to set herself apart from her Daughters, to give them a proper mother figure. Now the gray in her hair and the fine lines around her eyes and mouth gave her the necessary maternal look. Myora insisted that all of her Daughters, and they were all her Daughters, begin ingesting the oil in their late twenties, after allowing their bodies to properly mature and strengthen on their own.

  She swept down the stone corridor that was lined with heavy wooden doors. These were the sleeping quarters within their mountain fortress, where each Daughter shared a room with a sister.

  Much of the fortress was built upon the foundation of the natural tunnel system, which was complex on its own. Many of their newer rooms—the computer control room, for instance—had to be hewn from the solid rock.

  Long ago, they had simply lived in the natural caves, like ants in a colony.

  Now the system was quite complex. Although many of the original tunnels were still in use, new tunnels and new rooms had been carefully hewed from the rock over the years. All levels connected to other levels through stone staircases, carved from the very mountain itself.

  Myora IL Eve swept along the corridor and passed the recessed doorways of the living quarters of her Daughters, some of whom would still be sleeping, having spent the night on high alert. The oil, for all the good it did, did not erase the need for sleep. The Daughters of Eve tended to need more sleep than mortals. She suspected that the rebuilding of cells happened in their sleep and it was a much deeper, dreamless sleep. Almost catatonic. She still had vague, wispy memories of her mortal days and the haphazard randomness of her dreams. Not now, though. She either fell into a dreamless sleep or had visions.

  She preferred the dreamless sleep.

  The central tunnel had been worn smooth over countless centuries of use. Her footfalls echoed and her breathing amplified. The walls were lined with electrical sconces, which replaced the torches from the days of yore, and cast a soft, yellow glow.

  Stone fortress or not, this was her home.

  The tunnel ended. Next, she wound down a stone stairway, her hand gliding lightly on the smooth wall for balance. More sconces lit the way. The stairway opened into another tunnel. This one was on the third and largest level of the fortress.

  The tunnel itself was a wide, natural artery that cut through the heart of the mountain. She passed a doorway that led to a massive natural cavern. Here, the Daughters practiced the art of hand-to-hand combat, using all manner of weaponry. Adjacent to the combat room was a thoroughly modern gym. Even now, she could hear one of them pounding the weights. The voice grunted and wafted out into the main hallway, along with the clang of the machinery.

  Myora smiled to herself and continued forward.

  Her Daughters were dedicated and loyal. Fierce warriors, they had given up their entire existence to protect Earth’s one resource that needed protecting above all others. They did so in obscurity and at great sacrifice to themselves, in ways that mortals would never understand. No one thanked them.

  Except her.

  The Mother Daughter.

  Chapter Nine


  She continued down the corridor, moving past the massive mess hall. Already she could smell bacon and coffee, as her stomach grumbled. The immortals were ravenous eaters, with the appetites of Sumo wrestlers. Much of their food was bought in bulk and brought out here by one of the Daughters, a month or so at a time. Each Daughter was assigned cooking duties, including herself. As the Mother Daughter, she allowed herself some perks, but avoiding cooking duties was not one of them.

  She moved past the cafeteria and its inviting scents.

  There would be time to eat later.

  She hoped.

  Don’t be so pessimistic. It was, after all, only a dream.

  But it had been so vivid. So real. She had seen the faces of the dead and each face she recognized as one of her precious Daughters. She had lost many Daughters over the years and although she recognized them more as companions and fellow guardians, they were still her Daughters.

  After all, she had given birth to each one.

  Her body was eternally fertile. When she lost a Daughter, usually through combat, although sometimes through accidents (and twice, her Daughters never came home from their visits into the world of the mortals—she assumed these Daughters had been murdered), she replaced them. She found a proper suitor, usually locally. Often they were big men, hearty men. Men with good genes. And a new generation of Daughters were raised.

  Now, with the loss of Rama, she would need to seek another man. The idea of making love again appealed to her. It had been a while. In fact, there had not been a new Daughter born into the family for well over two hundred years.

  That had been a hell of a dry spell for her.

  But first things first.

  She descended another flight of stairs on a broad stone staircase that led down to the second level of the fortress. The Command Level.

  Once on the Command Level, she followed a trail of thick cables that led from two humming generators that were stored at the back of the hall. The cables, placed off to the side, snaked along the passageway and into the Control Room.

  She stepped inside, and the Daughter on duty, Shala, looked up at her in alarm. “Mother, we have a disturbance!”

  ***

  Myora stepped into the massive room, hewed from a natural cavern within the porous mountain. Large video screens covered most of the wall space. Most screens depicted visuals from around the mountain, although one or two were real-time topographical satellite images of the immediate region. The room itself was filled with desks and personal computers and laptops, all of which not only ran the fortress, but also kept surveillance of the Mountain of God.

  Shala sat behind a laptop with a downloaded image of the area.

  Myora’s heart hammered restlessly. She stepped behind the guard on duty and peered over her shoulder. The satellite image was small and blurry. Myora could not directly see what exactly had caused the alarm. “What is it, Daughter?”

  “It appears to be a large cavalcade of trucks.”

  She saw it now, a small cluster of what must be trucks. “Where?”

  “Two hundred miles due east.”

  “Destination?”

  “According to the probability scale, their destination is here.”

  “How many trucks?”

  “Twenty-seven.”

  “ETA?”

  “They are making good progress, cutting across the desert floor. ETA is ten hours.”

  Myora stepped away from the small image on the computer screen. “Bring them up on the third unit.”

  Shala tapped away rapidly and a new image appeared on the massive wall monitor. Now much bigger, Myora could distinctly see twenty-seven vehicles. All appeared to be military trucks scattered across an area of perhaps a half mile.

  “Who are they?”

  “I checked with our contact in the Iranian National Guard. They have no scheduled maneuvers in the area.”

  “Scientific expeditions?”

  “It’s much too large.”

  Myora stared at the massive screen. So, they were coming. Her dreams had been accurate after all. She hated when that happened.

  “Mother Daughter?”

  “Yes.”

  “There’s one other thing. This just came in this morning, perhaps twenty minutes ago. Faxed over from our contact at Tehran Customs.”

  Their contacts believed the Daughters were, in fact, a branch of the Iranian secret police. With enough bribes and favors, they were often rewarded with such information. The younger Daughter handed Myora a faxed image of a very beautiful woman. The woman, of course, was Sulina, under the guise of Sulna Obvesky. It was a photo on her passport. She looked resolute and stoic as ever. She never changed. None of them did. Myora’s heart went out briefly to her oldest Daughter.

  Do not do this, Sulina, thought Myora.

  But Sulina was no Daughter of hers. She hadn’t been for thousands of years.

  “Men are coming,” said Myora, her back still to Shala. “And they are being led by Sulina. Alert the others.”

  Chapter Ten

  He woke, gasping.

  As he had been doing all night.

  He was covered in sweat, but that was nothing new. Shirtless, he sat up and looked at the nightstand clock. 7:39 a.m. He’d only had four hours of sleep, but that had been enough. He had become accustomed to very little sleep.

  Even the four hours had been too much.

  Next to him, out like a light, with her long black and white hair spread like a geisha’s fan over her pillow, was Jess. Her face was turned to him. She was wearing a robe and it was mostly open. He found himself staring, aroused. She looked so beautiful and for once, sweet and harmless. That was only the illusion of sleep. The warrior in her was still there, but buried under her slumbering.

  He closed her robe with a sigh. She didn’t move or stir. Perhaps immortals fell into a deeper sleep. He didn’t know.

  The dream had come again, but this time, he had recognized the raven-haired beauty as Jess and she recognized him. In his dream, they had been too late. He had wielded the flaming sword too late and the world lay in waste. In fact, the plague that had swept across the Earth, ravaging all of life, had finally found him. He had sunk to his knees as he watched the boils appear on his arms. His fingers dropped off from his hands.

  That’s when he woke up.

  In a cold sweat.

  He needed a shower.

  Their flight didn’t leave for another three hours, so he allowed the hot jet of water to wash over his body. Oddly enough, even after the long night he had, his body was not sore and actually felt quite refreshed.

  He wondered if the little bit of oil he had absorbed had anything to do with that and decided that it probably did.

  I’m thirty-five now. Just playing an afternoon of basketball will often leave you sore for days, let alone fighting for your life against the undead.

  And against one hell of an Amazon hellcat of a warrior in Jess.

  He toweled himself off and stepped over to the phone. Jess had moved, only slightly, while he breathed over the bangs of her white birth-marked hair.

  He could watch her all day.

  Instead, he tore himself away again from her beauty and picked up the phone and dialed a familiar number.

  The line picked up on the second ring, followed by a series of fumbling. Then a very groggy voice said, “You have any fucking idea what time it is?”

  Knight lowered his voice. “Quit bitching. I need your help.”

  Geronimo Bismark, owner of the voice on the other end of the line, groaned. “Damn it, Knight! Couldn’t you need my help in, say, three hours?”

  “No. In three hours, me and someone else will be on a flight to Germany, with a final destination in Iran. I need you to be there when we arrive.”

  “I’m not hearing this! I am not hearing this! Tell me I’m dreaming!”

  “You’re not dreaming. This is real and I need your help.”

  A pause. Knight looked over at Jess. She hadn’t moved.
>
  “Who’s the ‘someone else’?” asked Geronimo. Knight noted the tone had changed in his close friend’s voice. More businesslike, which was fitting since Geronimo was a homicide detective for LAPD.

  “Her name is Jess,” said Knight. He inhaled deeply and plunged forward. “She’s the one, Ger.”

  “What do you mean ‘the one’?”

  “The One.”

  Another pause and then his friend whistled into the phone. Knight had to briefly hold the receiver away from his ear. “The one you’ve been dreaming about?”

  “Yes.”

  “You have got to be kidding!”

  “No.”

  “Then you’re not insane?”

  “Apparently not.”

  “Damn!” said Geronimo.

  “Why ‘damn’?”

  “I just lost a hundred bucks to Molly.”

  “You bet your wife a hundred spot over whether or not I was insane?”

  “Of course.”

  Knight grinned. “So, are you coming?”

  “I wouldn’t miss this for the world!”

  “What will you tell Molly?”

  “That I’m helping my bud. What do you think I’m going to tell her?”

  Knight laughed.

  “So, how will I find you?”

  Knight gave him detailed instructions about meeting at the Ramsar Airport in northern Iran and then hung up.

  ***

  “Who was that you were talking to?”

  Knight almost jumped. He turned from his sitting position on the bed. She was propped on an elbow, with a look of concern on her face. Deep creases lined her pretty face, evidence of her undisturbed slumber. Her hair was only mildly tousled, except for a few renegade strands that were apparently trying to make a break for it.