Transit of Ishtar,(Book 2 of Sinnis)

by Gibson, Natalie

  She kicked the un-dead back out the way she came. She took a moment to unfurl her control over the adolescent boy. When he was alert again, she made sure there were no other zombies inside. She left him to guard while she went back out to deal with the one she had evicted.

  Chapter 5

  The doctor sat in his fully reinforced bulletproof office stewing over his computer. The spread of local newspapers strewn across his desk told him almost everything, but he relied on science to confirm it. A small chime from the computer confirmed the algorithm was finished. He hit the print button and heard the printer across the room start up.

  Without bothering to stand, he rolled his chair over to the printer and picked up the probabilities chart. He pushed his glasses back over his balding head and left them staring up at the ceiling as he studied the page. Violence was up. Any moron who could read the headlines could see that. His program calculated the probability that the violence was caused by the proximity to an Akhkharu.

  It was beyond probability and into certainty. The monster was headed right for them just as the doctor wanted. He was ready, but didn't warn anyone else. Everyone was expendable when the possession of the life giving fluid was so close. Blood from Nephilim and Akhkharu alike could be used to make the serum. He would not fail as his predecessors had.

  He wouldn't be caught off guard. He had a trap set and had been sending out bait for months. The bait was women. Women in pain called to both Nephilim and Akhkharu. The former seemed drawn to protect the weaker sex, the latter were drawn to any violence towards them. Violence radiated off of this building and acted as a homing beacon to both. He was glad a Akhkharu was taking the bait instead of a Nephilim though.

  The basement levels of this complex were devoted to bringing pain, but the doctor never stepped foot down there. Though he ordered and approved every torture and torment, he never actually sullied his hands. He was a scientist. Let the barbarians do the dirty work. There was never a shortage of men willing and able.

  He knew he had little time before the beast was among them. At this time of year there was very little time between the sunset and the moon rise. The Akhkharu would have but a few moments to get from his daytime hiding place and into the building. Minutes were more than enough time for a creature such as an Akhkharu. Even without his tabalu ability, he would be lightning fast.

  The doctor knew the Akhkharu would not risk being caught in the moonlight. While it wouldn't hurt him, a full moon would call out his location to all Nephilim. He would be easy pickings for a circle of vengeful Nephilim bent on bringing justice to their brother. The doctor knew more about the Nephilim and their betrayer brothers than any man alive, save other Paion's of the Fellowship. He hoped his knowledge was enough to keep him alive.

  He punched the intercom button on the wall next to his printer. “Bring me number 603”, he spoke nonchalantly as if he was ordering up a value meal at a drive through. His order being made, he stood slowly, stretching his aching back as he did. He knees cracked. The holy blood could not get here soon enough. If he didn't get some serum soon, his time would be up.

  There was a knock on the door. The doctor punched the button and buzzed them in. His permission was the only way to gain entrance to this room. His office was a fortress inside a fortress, built to withstand not only man but sons of gods.

  Two people stood in the open doorway. Well, one and a half people anyway. 603 had been broken long ago and could hardly count as a human being. A young man in scrubs brought her in and sat her down in the chair to which the doctor indicated. 603 never lifted her eyes from the floor nor made any move to resist.

  603 had a name at one time, but they'd taken it from her. They'd taken everything from her that could be taken. She was just a shell of the girl she was when they brought her here. She was wearing a tiny hospital gown that barely covered her, but she didn't notice. It did nothing to hide the evidence of years of cruel treatment she had received at the hands of her handlers here. And those scars did nothing to diminish her beauty. That was too bad for her. No matter how they hurt her they could not lessen their desire for her. She was at the mercy of her sadistic handlers. Even the one who had brought her in, stood close enough to be in constant contact with her bare skin in the gap in the back of her hospital gown.

  Her legs never stopped moving. She had sewing machine leg just like a person with a fear of heights on a balance beam or a common junkie. That's what she was after all. All the women imprisoned here were hooked on the stuff. The doctor had forced a woman with the Ingenium ability to help him create it. It gave women the power they needed to work their various magics. The doctor held the only samples of it here in his office, so that they would all be eager to come here and work for him. He glimpsed the smile on her face, even though she leaned her head forward so that her hair hid the excitement.

  The doctor took out his little case of syringes from the desk drawer and patted it as he asked her, “Would you like to help me tonight?”

  Her eyes were locked on the black case that held the doses of cloud nine. She nodded. She would help him. She would do anything he wanted for just a little hit of the corrupted bliss.

  When he instructed her to “Assume the position”, her handler didn't give her a chance to obey as she most obviously would have done. The large man pulled her up by her neck and slammed her face down on the news paper covered desk. She whimpered a little as he held her by the back of her head. He roughly kicked her feet apart so he could stand between them behind her. He pushed her against the desk with the weight of his body.

  The doctor took out one of the syringes, held it up and thumped it, pushing the air up and out of the needle before injecting her. He couldn't have her die because he had rushed things. He carefully pushed the needle into the base of her head right in the spine, delivering the dose to her brain directly.

  He dropped the used needle into a bio-hazard container on the wall behind him and then watched as the drug took over. Her eyes, so black normally, went cloudy and then solid white. Her handler was excited and could hardly keep his hips from a thrusting motion into her trapped backside.

  “Leave us for a while, Kwabe. We have work to do here. Why don't you go take out that sexual energy on 414? ”

  The orderly who had looked like grumbling for a second liked the suggestion. 414 wasn't as pretty as 603, but she was new and still had some fight left in her. He liked a bit of struggle with his sex; it meant he would have to be forceful. As soon as he let go of her and stepped back, 603 limply slid off the desk and onto the floor bringing a pile of newspapers with her.

  He went to lift her up again, but stopped when the doctor waived his hand. Kwabe shrugged. If the doctor wanted her on the floor, that's where she would stay. Once the door had closed, the doctor prompted 603 with a question, “Will we capture the Akhkharu this time?”

  603 pushed the papers around on the floor, searching them for the answers the doctor wanted, utilizing them as any reader would use their medium. Like a gypsy with her tarot cards, 603 saw her answer blazing before her, “No, but you will get some of his blood.”

  The doctor purposefully never spoke of the blood to a woman of power so that when they spoke of it he knew it was a true seeing. He didn't have time to think about it for long before she started again, “He'll kill every man, but he won't be caught. You might save yourself by giving him entry and offering to help him find what he searches for.”

  The doctor knew this was ridiculous. A Akhkharu couldn't be bargained with; they had lived with violence for so long that it was their only thought. The doctor humored her, “And what is it he is looking for?”

  “He wants Ereshkigal's abhorred knife that can cut through the thread of life.”

  A deafening alarm sounded cutting off any follow up questions the doctor had. The alarm's tone said the outer gate had been breached. The doctor turned to his computer and called up the security cameras for that gate. The ten foot high, two foot thick electrically charged, ra
zer sharp edged gate was missing. Both sides had been torn out by their hinges and flung back into the desert. The doctor could just make out their dark silhouette against the light colored sand.

  603 started laughing softly. She rocked and wrapped her thin arms around herself as she started to mutter to herself. “He's coming to free us all...our savior...the glowing god...he doesn't know only she can wield the weapon...”

  The doctor thought the injection must have started to ware off more quickly than usual. Maybe the doses were breaking down; they were made quite a while ago. The one coming for them was more likely a monster than a glowing god. 603 was imagining a Nephilim come to save her.

  He switched the cameras to the hallways. His men were getting into position. They each carried two types of dart guns. One was equipped with poison for the Nephilim, the other would tranquilize the Akhkharu. They would know which to use based on how the intruder looked. A golden god would get the first; a monster the second.

  He already knew though that this had to be a Akhkharu. He buzzed in a handler to retrieve 603 who was now a nervous wreck on his floor. As the orderly dragged her out the doctor gave him instructions, “Strap her to the table and wheel her into the observation room. Get ready. He's coming.”

  The last was said just as the alarm changed. The beast was inside. The doctor took his time going through the safety precautions. Once the door was closed, sealed and barricaded with the reinforced steel bars, this room was better than any bank safe. He got back to his computer as the alarm cut off. He was breathing as heavy as the guards he could see in the hallways. As he looked, suddenly a giant man appeared where there had been empty space before.

  Had he tabalu'd or just moved faster than anyone could see? Now that he was here, it was obvious this was no Akhkharu. This man was not monstrous. He was tall and muscular, and almost nude. He was wearing what could have been an unbound turban wrapped around his waist and hips. He looked like a dethroned Arkanian king with his dark hair twisted into an haphazard knot on the top of his head and his dark beard curled into ringlets than hung down to his chest.

  The doctor's security camera had no sound, but he could see when the guards opened fire on the Nephilim. Darts struck him from every angle. They each emptied their magazines into him and then stopped, expecting him to fall. Nothing happened. The doctor watched as the guards emptied their other darts into him. Again nothing happened.

  “Oh, my god”, was all the doctor could say. He was stunned that this being hadn't reacted to either paralyzing agent. This was something he was totally unprepared for and he prided himself on being prepared for everything. He had to think fast. What could he use to bargain for his own life? What had 603 said this one was looking for?

  He was already recording the encounter, but switched it to save and broadcast to the nearest fellowship compound to this one – 300 miles away. If they were all killed tonight, then at least all wouldn't be lost. He typed his last notes furiously to his fellow Paion's and watched as whatever that was made it's way along the hall towards the bait and trap.

  The god-king barely paused at each alcove in the hall, but a wave of destruction was left in his wake. He was leaving no stone unturned, no man un-torn. He picked up one then the other, draining them of blood in a snap. None of them had any chance. He left their limbs in piles as he unconsciously followed the path the doctor had laid out for him.

  When he got to the observation room, the lesser scientists were waiting on him and the trap was sprung. There was no way out of that room. It was a trap for Nephilim and Akhkharu alike so whatever this one was, it should hold him, thought the doctor. He was watching through a closed circuit video, but the other scientists were watching live and close up. The window between them and the ancient one was made of the strongest polymer in the world. The doctor had been assured that no bomb, bullet nor drill could penetrate or break it. He had then ordered it double thick.

  Too bad for Kwabe, who had still been following the doctors orders when the trap was sprung. 603 was strapped to the table, but Kwabe had missed the window of time to vacate the observation room. He was pounding on the window, no doubt begging them to open the door. The scientists were avoiding eye contact. They were looking over his shoulder.

  Kwabe spun around. The giant man was right there. He was smiling at Kwabe. Kwabe fainted.

  Careful not to bother the body, the ancient knelt beside it. He carefully, almost lovingly, fed from it. When it seemed he had almost drained Kwabe dry, the god-king bit his own wrist and pressed it to the dying mans lips. Kwabe drank, but the fount of life was taken from him as quickly as it had been offered.

  Kwabe was helped up by his almost murder come savior. He stood transfixed, but unstable. The giant said something into his ear and then let out such a roar that the doctor could feel the quake in his office. Kwabe staggered at the reverberations but showed no signs of fear.

  The powerful king then turned his attentions to the woman strapped to the table directly in front of the observation window. He smelled her and then turned in shock to face the scientists. They were not like the men he had killed in the hall. They were smaller and wearing white coats and had a look of happiness on their faces. They were happy to see him. This is what they wanted. One of them gestured towards the woman laying prostrate in front of him.

  They were making an offering. A woman of power, though not of his lineage, was extraordinarily tempting. He approached her and ran his hand over her backside. She squirmed and whimpered, but this only encouraged him. He got behind her and gripped her hips with both hands, crushing her pelvis without effort. With the scientist looking on, he roughly forced himself into her all the while cutting and tearing at her back with his teeth and claws. Akhkharu, he had to be, thought the doctor. No Nephilim would rape and mutilate a woman. At least not with any witnesses.

  Kwabe began to shake. Then he started to convulse. His head whipped this way and that. His knees bent back in the wrong direction and he dropped to all fours. His bones and muscles were changing. He grew in both mass and density. His bones of his face shattered and reformed in a muzzle. Hair tore through his skin. When it was finished and he stood on all four lion like paws, he was more terrifying than any werewolf movie ever portrayed.

  The bearded violence monger seemed to be enjoying Kwabe's pain and screams so, that he almost didn't notice the small needles. When he had finished ravishing 603, he moved around the table to her side and sank his teeth in deep. He drained her almost dry as he had Kwabe. Again he tore his wrist and forced it against his victims mouth. She tried to resist the offering. She didn't want to become the monster that Kwabe had. He forced her. As she drank, he felt the pricks in the soles of his feet. He picked up one foot and saw the syringe retract back into the tiny hole in the floor where it had come.

  The men in white coats had stolen his blood. He roared in outrage and it shook the earth. He darted from this side to that, but everywhere he stopped, ceiling, floor or walls, a needle found it's way into his skin. The men looked very calm behind the bulletproof wall, sure he could not come through. They were wrong. He punched both fists through the glass and pulled a man the doctor knew by the name of Ray, through the jagged opening, tearing off his white coat and most of his skin.

  He tossed the bloodied and broken man behind him. Kwabe made quick work of devouring the poor man. In an instant 603 stood on the table naked and convulsing. The doctor watched expecting her to change as Kwabe had, but she didn't. All of her wounds closed up, but that was the only change. It was the only change he could see until she looked up at the camera, almost locking eyes with the doctor. Her eyes were solid black side to side and lid to lid. When she smiled it was more terrifying than seeing Kwabe. Her teeth were all incisors. She looked like a shark and she was hungry.

  She jumped down from the table and crossed to where Kwabe was feeding. The beast backed away from it's meal as she approached. It knew it's place in the food chain and it was below hers. Keeping her eyes on Kwabe, s
he reached into the bloody pulp that had been Ray and came up with his heart (and maybe the liver?). She hopped back up onto the table and sat with her legs crossed as she sucked the organs dry.

  Then the spawner of evil creatures reached into the hole in the window through which Ray had come. He gripped each side and pulled. A giant section of the Plexiglas broke free. He burst through into the small crowded observation room. He tore each man limb from limb as they begged him not to. He chose the one with the most evil in his heart and took the small second necessary to convert another monster. A voice speaking the language of his childhood came from nowhere. “We are here to serve you, Mighty King. We provide the violence and blood you desire, oh great Lord. I open my gate to you, knowing you could destroy me with a thought.”

  A light on the far wall changed from red to green and a door opened a crack. He slammed it open and found himself in a small room furnished with little except paper, files and modern machines. The small baled man behind the desk bowed and spoke again in Sumerian, “Welcome, Your Majesty.”

  The Sumerian King spoke that ancient language for the first time in centuries, “Open, and let my children out into the night. You are keeping them from my work.” His voice was a legion of voices and his word was law. The doctor bowed to him and gave the computer command.

  The two newly made vrykolak made for the exit on all fours, building up quite a momentum for such a small space. The vitala followed them closely, appearing as a blur on the monitor. The doctor switched the screen just in time to catch a glimpse of the beasts as they fled the compound towards the mountains to the west in the light of the full moon. He thought one had paused to howl at that moon, but without sound he couldn't be sure. He didn't see 603 leave, but that didn't mean she wasn't gone.

  The doctor pushed his glasses back up his nose as he straightened and smiled. “Anything else, Holy One?”