Artifact

by Vaughn Heppner

  CRYOGENIC CHAMBER

  STATION EIGHT

  Jack helped an ailing, bald, skeletal man out of the cryogenic tube. The man coughed every time he sucked air. His breath smelled horrible and his eyes were bloodshot, leaking a yellow fluid.

  “Wrap this around your shoulders,” Jack said, throwing a dusty quilt around the man’s neck. He’d found it in a chest in the corner.

  The man nodded as he raised skeletal arms. He looked wasted, which made sense. According to Samson’s note, the man had an incurable disease. It’s why they’d put him in a cryogenic tube.

  “Let me help you up,” Jack said.

  The man must have understood English. He allowed Jack to help him. The man was cold and shivering. Together, they moved into the hot corridor.

  “Maybe you should lie down,” Jack suggested.

  “Let… me lean…against a wall,” the man said, coughing afterward.

  “Can’t do that,” Jack said. “The walls are too hot here.”

  The man turned his bloodshot eyes on Jack.

  “The station’s running after a fashion,” Jack told him.

  The tall, stooped man kept staring at him. It was an uncomfortable sensation. “You’re not one of hers,” the man finally said.

  “If you mean Mother, no, I’m not. I belong to D17.”

  “I’ve never heard of it,” the man whispered.

  “We’re a ghostly American Intelligence organization. We haven’t known it, but I think we’ve been battling Mother for the last few years.”

  “Ah,” the man said. He sat on the floor, careful to keep on the quilt.

  “Do you want food, water, anything?” Jack asked.

  The man nodded.

  “Name it. I’ll see what I can do.”

  “First tell me. Why…why are you here?”

  “Have you ever heard of someone named Samson?”

  “Of course,” the man said. “That’s my name. Oh. Do you mean Samson Mark Three?”

  “Maybe,” Jack said. Yes, he could see the resemblance now that he searched for it. Without any facial hair and lacking more than one hundred extra pounds…this could be what, a clone?

  I guess it’s possible.

  “I am Samson Mark Two, an earlier model. We met, though. Mother has always striven to avoid that happening. I told Mark Three…” The skeletal man frowned, suddenly hesitant. “Why should I tell you anything?”

  Jack began to explain the situation. About a third of the way through, the skeletal Samson asked for water. Jack hurried to the chest, bringing the man dusty water bottles and old packages of concentrates.

  For the moment, Samson Mark Two was content to guzzle water.

  “Go ahead,” he told Jack. “Finish your story. It’s fascinating.”

  Agent Elliot did just that, leaving little out. Before he finished, Samson Mark Two tore open a food packet, eating the crunchy substance. Finally, Jack told him the latest, including the long journey down here to the cryogenic chamber.

  “I’m beginning to perceive that my brother desired me to help you. He must believe we’re in the final stages. You do realize that waking me like this dooms me to die?”

  Jack found it impossible then to meet the man’s gaze. Too many people had died lately instead of him. He was building a heavy blood debt.

  “It’s all right,” the withered Samson said, patting Jack on the shoulder. “I forgive you because I accept my brother’s judgment. He was a good man, a wise man, if possessed of too few of the critical facts. I felt it better to keep them to myself. I was never as trusting as he was. If I told him all that I knew, I wondered if he would ever thaw me out. Maybe I misjudged him.”

  “You actually know what’s going on?” Jack asked.

  The man endured another coughing fit and drank a long swallow of water before he could answer.

  “By ‘know what’s going on…’ I assume you mean the nature of the stations?” Samson asked.

  “Sure,” Jack said.

  “I have a good idea, yes. I was one of Mother’s original thinkers. I was part of the experimental brain team she created to help her solve what she couldn’t.”

  “I’m not sure I understand that,” Jack said.

  “No, of course not,” Samson said. “To be precise, Mother was too much of a primitive to know how to fix what she broke in 1908. Although, to be fair to her, many of the components had already been damaged before the Tunguska Event. She was born during the Black Death, sometime in the fourteen hundreds, sometime in the 1350s, I believe.”

  “She’s over seven hundred years old?” Jack asked.

  “Sounds strange to say it out loud,” Samson said. “The modern mind recoils at the idea. But the answer is yes. You should understand that the Mother before her trained our present Mother. I think the age limit with the serum is close to nine hundred years at the most. The various Mothers didn’t know about the stations then, although they had a few amazing devices. I suspect they used the various devices more like magical artifacts than simple tools. The point is this: Mother was raised and lived most of her life in a pre-technological age. Of course, one could argue there were technological revolutions in the Middle Ages with the windmill and—”

  “Excuse me for interrupting,” Jack said. “But you don’t need to get all technical with me. I’ll believe you. Mother thinks like a primitive. In other words, you can’t teach an old dog new tricks.”

  “That’s a colloquial way to say it, but it’s apt nonetheless. Yet, sometimes you can teach the old dog something new. It gets harder the older the person becomes, though. Mother thought of a brilliant solution. It involved some startling new discoveries and modern technologies.”

  Jack nodded impatiently. This was taking too long. Just like Samson Mark Three, this one liked to talk. If they were going to do something, the sooner they started the better.

  “Ancient legends have something of the truth in them,” Samson said. “That’s critical to how I discovered Mother’s method to solving her problem.”

  “Great,” Jack said.

  Samson coughed weakly. He had gained some strength since leaving the cryogenic tube. The water seemed to have helped the most. Now, though, the skeletal man began to tremble.

  “Are you too hot?” Jack asked.

  “No. I-I feel faint. C-cold all of a sudden,” the man stammered.

  “Stay with me. You can’t pass out now.”

  Samson Mark Two nodded. The weak coughing didn’t stop, though. He continued one cough after another. It got worse, and the man began to lose color.

  “Drink this,” Jack said, shoving a water bottle at him.

  “Shock,” Samson gasped. “I’m going—cough, cough, cough—through post-recovery shock. I’m—” The man’s eyes closed as if on their own accord. A second later, he collapsed, falling, striking his head as he began to thrash on the floor.

  -77-

  LEARJET 85

  CENTRAL MEDITERRANEAN

  Selene couldn’t believe it. Ney had just shot the pilot dead. The wide-eyed, French DGSE agent stepped into the aisle, passing the big man and Selene before turning toward them. The Frenchman aimed his gun at the soldier’s chest.

  “I will admit that I feel strange, monsieur, mademoiselle. I ask you to excuse my odd behavior.”

  “Put down the gun,” Marcus ordered in a stern voice.

  Ney’s eyes widened and the staring, hypnotic quality became even more pronounced. “I went under the mind machine, monsieur. You know that, yes?”

  “Why did you shoot Sten?” Marcus demanded.

  Ney grinned so widely that it revealed his back molars. “You do not understand yet, monsieur. You lack the final pieces to see clearly. But I, Ney Blanc, I see. I belong to the DGSE. I serve France and in doing this I have served humanity.”

  “You serve Mother,” Marcus said.

  “Yes, yes, I did. The mind machine turned me as it has so many others. But I am a cunning man, monsieur, the greatest agent France ever poss
essed. I have learned and studied you people. Piece by piece, I regained my native wits. Mother never suspected because I am the best of the best.”

  A frown touched the agent’s features. “I have killed many innocent people and many not so innocent. I have remained undercover all this time. I have come back to who and what I am, monsieur. That is what I am telling you.”

  “Why did you shoot the pilot?” Marcus snarled. “By killing him, you aided Mother. Haven’t you been listening to her?” He indicated Selene. “Bah! The mind machine scrambled your thoughts. You’re confused. Put down the gun.”

  Ney shook his head. “You are confused, monsieur.”

  Marcus stared at the Frenchman. Selene had the impression the big man wanted to launch out of his seat and rend the smug Ney in two. Finally, the soldier leashed his visible anger.

  “What do you know?” Marcus asked in a strained voice.

  Ney straightened his jacket as if preening. He seemed inordinately proud of himself. Still, Selene noticed he remained alert enough to keep his gun trained on Marcus.

  “The pilot was Mother’s watchdog,” Ney said. “He was coming to kill you, monsieur. I have just saved your murderous life. You are in my debt.”

  “The Hell you say!”

  “I will prove it.” Ney head gestured to Selene. “Go to the pilot. Check his pockets. Bring what you find there.”

  Selene glanced at Marcus.

  “Do it,” the big man growled. “Let’s see if this imbecile knows what he’s talking about.”

  Ney stepped back into a seat row, giving her space to pass. Selene eyed him as she approached. Ney’s eyes were glazed, fixed on Marcus. He didn’t even seem to be aware of her.

  With a growing sense of surrealism, Selene hurried to the pilot. She knelt by his cooling corpse, and she saw it. There was no need to check the pockets. Near one of the pilot’s hands was a small, black flat device with a tiny opening for a beam.

  “You see something,” Marcus said.

  “I do,” Selene said.

  “Of course she does,” Ney said. “Bring me the item.”

  Selene licked her lips, uncertain what she should do. Could Ney have spoken the truth? Why did he seem so…odd then?

  She picked up the device, showing it to Marcus. Then, she walked back.

  “Lift it up again,” Ney said, as he kept watching the soldier.

  Selene did as told.

  From where he sat, Marcus studied the flat device. “Sten had a heater,” the soldier said, sounding surprised. “How did he acquire it?” he asked Ney.

  “I must presume that Mother gave it to him in case he ever needed to kill you, monsieur.”

  “Why would he want to kill me? Do you have any idea?”

  “Oui. It is obvious. Sten heard your conversation with this dark-haired beauty, listening in by a bug. I would assume that Mother had given him orders. Sten either reported in to Mother and she just instructed him to kill you or the pilot felt the circumstances warranted your death.”

  “What would cause Sten to act on his own?” Marcus asked.

  Ney stood silently as if he hadn’t heard the question. Abruptly, he said, “We are no longer in communication with anyone, monsieur. I have a tracker… I know when Sten contacts Mother.”

  Marcus scowled fiercely.

  “Mother doesn’t trust you,” Selene told the big man. “The pilot and navigator—”

  “No,” Ney said. “He is just a navigator.”

  “You’re part of the watchdog team, too, aren’t you?” Selene asked Ney. He couldn’t have figured all this out otherwise. That was why he was behaving so strangely all of a sudden.

  The DGSE agent regarded her, nodding slowly.

  “Why haven’t you shot me then?” Marcus asked.

  “Oh, I want to, monsieur, most assuredly, I do. I feel the order in my mind, struggling to overcome my resistance. You see, it is only through my valiant effort to think my own thoughts that keeps my trigger finger from twitching and destroying you. I have broken the conditioning…because I am the best. It was the reason I was given this assignment by France.”

  “Lower your gun,” Marcus ordered.

  “Alas, I cannot.”

  “You haven’t completely broken the conditioning, have you?” Selene asked.

  Ney hesitated before saying, “You are correct, mademoiselle. Yet, there is more to my reluctance to lower the gun. Monsieur Marcus is a distrustful and arrogant individual. He will suppose I could revert once again to Mother’s authority. Thus, he will believe that his wisest decision would be to kill me the moment he has the opportunity.”

  “Why don’t you simply kill him then?” Selene asked.

  Ney smiled sadly. “Because I believe the world needs his talents. I frankly admit that I need his assistance.”

  “In order to stop Mother?” Selene asked.

  “Precisely,” Ney said. “Yet, despite my need for aid, I dare not trust him. It is a dilemma, no?”

  As Selene considered the dilemma, her knees lost strength. She sat down in the row in front and on the other side of the aisle as Marcus. “Even if we work together, how can the three of us possibly stop Mother?”

  “Our chances are minimal,” Ney said. “Nevertheless, we must proceed in the attempt. I have been listening to your theories, mademoiselle. I believe you are correct. In the past, the station builders must have almost destroyed humanity. Mother must be on a similar path.”

  “Let’s call for help,” Selene suggested. “Let’s ask Washington for D17 agents.”

  “There is no help,” Ney said. “We are alone. Our radio no longer works.”

  “How do you know that?” Marcus asked.

  Ney reached inside his jacket, pulling out a small radio. He pitched it to Marcus. The big man used his thumb to turn it on. A loud hissing noise emitted from the box. The soldier tried various frequencies. The same noises continued.

  “Mother must be doing that,” Selene said. “Or to be more precise, the stations are causing it.”

  “How?” Marcus asked her.

  “I’d have to know what the stations do,” Selene said. “What is their primary function?”

  Marcus shook his head.

  “You must have some idea,” Selene said. “Jack Elliot told me you produced antimatter. Why does Mother need antimatter?”

  “I have no idea,” Marcus said. “Look at Ney, consider his hidden task to watchdog me. Mother trusts no one. She has a hundred backup plans, each more secretive than the other. One of her wisest security arrangements is the need-to-know principle. Mother believes few of us need to know anything more than the most basic facts.”

  Selene nodded. “Well—”

  The Learjet lurched to the left before it began to plummet straight down. Selene lifted off her feet, floating in place. Several second later, her feet struck the floor. The engines roared and then quit altogether. The front edged lower, titling more sharply by the second.

  Ney’s gun slid away from him. He’d lifted and fallen just like Selene, dropping his weapon. He climbed to his feet. “Monsieur!” he shouted at Marcus. “Can you fly the plane?”

  Marcus didn’t bother to answer. He grabbed the back of a seat, hauling himself into the aisle. Then, the soldier charged down the rug-way, racing for the cockpit as the plane began to dive.

  -78-

  CRYOGENIC CHAMBER

  STATION EIGHT

  Jack sealed the cryogenic tube with Samson Mark Two inside. He was hoping that closing the lid would restart the—

  Yes, the machines began to clack. The small window in the tube frosted over as a glass refrigerator door in a supermarket would after someone had opened it.

  Jack gave the tube fifteen minutes. He couldn’t afford longer. He was hoping the process would help to stabilize the sick man. After the time limit, Agent Elliot repeated the thawing out procedure. He didn’t know if this would help or not, but he hadn’t been able to think of anything else. Soon enough, he helped a weary and
trembling Samson Mark Two back into the corridor.

  For a time, the skeletal man didn’t say a thing. He wheezed with his throat rattling. Finally, he peered up at Jack.

  “I don’t have much time left,” Samson whispered.

  Jack didn’t say anything to that. He didn’t like the idea of using the dying, trying to squeeze the last particles of utility out of them. His code of honor was conflicted on this. But he didn’t know what else he could do if he was going to have a chance of stopping Mother.

  “I was going to tell you before…” Samson whispered. “Mother found an ancient underwater chamber. It was deep in the Persian Gulf. Back in the 60s…the 1960s, some of her people opened the chamber. Inside was an ancient DNA stamper. It was a complex machine, able to take embryonic cells and modify them to specific aspects. There were various patterns preset in the machine…”

  “What do you mean patterns?” Jack asked.

  Samson gave him a ghastly smile. “Have you ever heard of Hercules?”

  “Of course,” Jack said.

  “The legends say Hercules was a demigod,” Samson whispered, “the son of Zeus and a mortal woman. It was the same with Gilgamesh among the ancient Sumerians. In the Book, it mentions the Nephilim, the heroes of old who came about through a comingling of humans with fallen angels. How did the bene elohim, as the text calls them, the sons of God, do this comingling? Could it have been with advanced genetic machines?”

  “Wait just a moment,” Jack said, incredulous. “I hope you’re not suggesting the stations have a supernatural origin.”

  Samson looked away, wheezing horribly. When he regarded Jack again, the withered man said, “It’s a definite possibility.”

  Jack frowned.

  “Hear me out,” Samson whispered, and there was a new intensity in him.

  “Sure,” Jack said.

  “Have you ever heard of the Book of Enoch?”

  Jack shook his head.

  “It tells of two hundred fallen angels that appeared on Earth before the Great Cataclysm. According to the ancient text, they taught humanity new and wonderful technologies. In the Book of Enoch, they called some of those techs sorceries.”