He’d done it! He’d freed Tiamat! Sonofabitch.
25
King leapt away from the thing as the lid’s surface melted into the same hazy liquid of the doors he’d stumbled through. An acrid plume of blue-green vapor rushed from the sarcophagus, filling the laboratory with a cloud of unbreathable air.
He winced as he caught a whiff of the stuff. The thing sprayed sulfur into the air. The creature inside breathed sulfur. King had no doubt that’s what the terraforming device hidden somewhere in the downed craft—the same device King had come to destroy—was spewing into the air above Eridu.
A sudden thought struck him. Not a device. His lungs burned, eliciting a fit of coughs while he put the pieces together. The terraforming machine—technology designed to make an uninhabitable planet into a habitable one—wasn’t merely some piece of machinery hidden somewhere onboard. He thought about the never ending corridor, how it seemed to far exceed the dimensions of a craft capable of entering the Earth’s gravitational pull. He thought about the liquid metal tech that seemed tantamount to the ship’s overall architecture. And everything fell into place. I’m not looking for a device. It’s the entire ship. The ship itself is the terraforming machine.
The ship was supposed to land, and then burrow into the Earth’s soil. Once properly positioned, the liquid metal could spread out, creating a subterranean network of tunnels like the roots of some huge, demonic plant. Then, taking the minerals and nutrients from the Earth itself, it could convert all the resources it discovered into a breathable atmosphere for Tiamat’s people. To stop it from happening, King was going to have to discover a way to destroy the ship.
His coughing intensified. His eyes watered from the toxic fumes burning in his lungs.
I’m not going to destroy much of anything, unless I figure a way out of here.
He glanced around the room for a way out of the increasingly inhospitable space. The door he’d entered through had disappeared when he’d removed the disc. And now, the disc was hidden somewhere within the metallic soup of Tiamat’s opening sarcophagus. Once the sulfur saturated the air, he’d be as good as dead. And with no source of oxygen, King wasn’t sure his regenerative abilities would be able to restore him.
Adding to his dilemma, he couldn’t be sure any action he took was his own. The creature had somehow manipulated him into setting aside the spear. Then, completely unaware, he’d been compelled to open the one thing he’d had no intention of opening.
The gas was quickly filling the room. No longer just coming from the containment chamber, King noticed plumes of sulfur shooting out from vents in the ceiling and floor, as well. With few options, he dashed to the nearby wall, grabbed the spear and turned to face the sarcophagus, just as a long, bony arm reached out through the liquefied lid.
The creature inside pulled itself up. Distracted by the sight, King was unaware of a series of hisses behind him, signaling the sudden release of sixteen more stasis tubes. Sixteen black, carapace-covered bodies began to shake with new life as the liquid that had sustained and nourished them for three millennia drained away into the floor.
All King could do between coughs was watch, as a pale, slender form slid from its prison and lifted itself to its full, twelve-foot height. The creature before him was unlike anything he’d ever imagined. Its pale blue skin shimmered in the ambient light, rippling with energy. Its two legs and arms were extraordinarily long and skeletal, giving King the impression of a great insect. But unlike the Girtablilu, the alien was bipedal. Distinctly humanoid. Its head was much larger than its wire-thin neck should have been able to support. Despite its unnatural bodily appearance, it was the face—or lack of a face—that held King’s attention. The skeletal structure of the face suggested eye sockets, a nose, a mouth and jaw, but it’s ‘face’ was a sheet of shimmering skin. No eyes. No mouth or nose. For a moment, it seemed impossible, but there were species on Earth that breathed through skin and absorbed nutrients without a mouth, so King could understand how a creature such as this could exist.
The creature was completely nude except for an ornately decorated headdress that adorning its massive head—a headdress that looked very familiar to King. But closer reflection on that would have to wait. As he continued assessing the creature’s appearance, he was stunned by a new revelation. The lack of clothing revealed something even more disturbing than anything so far. Its anatomy suggested that it was indeed very much a female. Two round breasts heaved as she stretched. They were positioned relatively in the appropriate anatomical position to any human’s breasts, which made her appearance all the more unnerving for him.
NOW I CAN LOOK ON YOU, her thoughts boomed in King’s oxygen-deprived mind.
He wasn’t sure how she could see him without eyes, but no good would come from him trying to understand her anatomy. He tried to lift the spear to throw at her, but his arms were already far too weak for such an exertion.
I’m going to die. Again.
YES. YOU ARE, she said. AND AFTERWARDS, THE BOY YOU HAVE SWORN TO PROTECT WILL BE BROUGHT TO ME. I WILL TAKE VENGEANCE ON THE SON OF MARDUK.
Belshazzar? Unable to speak, King could only think the questions now rapid-firing through his mind. But why? He’s done nothing to you.
HIS ANCESTOR WAS THE OFFENDER. NIMROD, WHO IMPRISONED ME HERE. IF I CANNOT HAVE MY VENGEANCE ON HIM, I WILL SEE HIS OFFSPRING SUFFER IN HIS STEAD.
I doubt Nimrod will care.
King dropped to his knees in another fit. A spray of crimson spewed from his nose and mouth with each cough. If not for his grip on the shaft of the spear, he would have collapsed completely to the floor.
A sudden cacophony of clicks brought the weakened King’s attention behind him. Sixteen Girtablilu now stood around him, watching the exchange with interest. Their multiple insectoid eyes shifted simultaneously between him and their mistress, Tiamat. Other than that, their arachnid-like limbs remained in place. Their saber arms unmoving.
This was supposed to be his army. They were supposed to have assisted him with his mission.
So why aren’t you guys doing your thing?
BECAUSE THEY CANNOT. I ALREADY TOLD YOU, THEY CANNOT HELP YOU. Tiamat moved toward him, her movements little more than a glide across the room. With a grace that King would have thought impossible for a creature of her stature, she knelt down and turned her empty face toward his, like she could look at him eye to eye. Gently, she removed the spear from his hand and laid it aside. THEIR REBELLION WAS VANQUISHED. THEY HAVE SEEN THEIR ERROR AND WILL SERVE THEIR MISTRESS WITHOUT QUESTION. YOU ARE WITHOUT HOPE.
Tiamat drew closer. She reached a long, slender, three-fingered hand up to his face and stroked it gently. Almost apologetically.
YOU ARE A MOST FASCINATING HUMAN, JACK SIGLER, she whispered in his mind. YOUR REGENERATIVE CAPABILITIES INTRIGUE ME IN WAYS YOU CANNOT POSSIBLY IMAGINE.
“I just have one thing to say before I die,” he managed to say aloud. Blood bubbled from his lips, dripping down his tunic to pool onto the floor around his knees.
AND WHAT IS THAT?
“I...understand why you...leave the fighting...to the Girtablilu.” In one swift motion, King shot up from the floor, pulled the sword he’d taken from the unconscious soldier from his belt, and swung it directly at the creature’s head.
The clang of metal echoed throughout the chamber, as Tiamat sprang back from the blow, backhanding King in the process. Her insect-like arms were surprisingly strong, and he flew back into the awaiting arms of a gargantuan Girtablilu.
FOOL! YOU THINK I CAN BE KILLED SO EAS…
The voice in King’s spinning brain flickered out before the thought could be completed. The creature staggered back, reaching up to her head in surprise and anger. An arc of electric current shot out from her headdress, striking her extended fingers with a sharp crack. She screamed something in a language King couldn’t understand and pointed accusingly at him with a skeletal finger.
The Girtablilu stared at her.
She
screamed another indecipherable command, but the monsters still didn’t budge.
King wheezed for breath as he extricated himself from the scorpion man’s razor-sharp arms. The lacerations to his skin were already healing, but he wasn’t certain how much longer he could survive in the sulfurous atmosphere. It didn’t matter much at this point.
He’d already won.
“You made…” He hacked uncontrollably for a moment, then resumed speaking. “…you made one major mistake, lady. You shouldn’t have threatened the kid. It just pissed me off.” King looked at the sixteen scorpion creatures that towered over him. “I don’t know if you guys can understand me or not.” He nodded toward Tiamat’s trembling form. “She’s all yours.”
The Girtablilu glared at their alien mistress, who continued shouting unintelligible commands. Ignoring her, they scuttled slowly forward, raising their mantis-like forearms aggressively as they did. The last things King heard before allowing the darkness to take him were the strange alien screams and the sound of rending flesh.
It was a good way to for King to die.
26
The Ruined City of Eridu, Topside
The battle raged, but Sereb-Meloch couldn’t contain his grin as he looked over the blood-soaked battlefield. As sword and spear clashed below him, the heavens roared above. Though it was approaching noon, the sun hid trembling behind a wall of blue-green clouds, casting the land into near darkness. Thunder crashed as streaks of lightning pierced the sand-swept earth like great lances.
My queen’s wrath, the high priest reflected. Her assistance in our time of need. Thank you, my goddess. Praise be to you, Mistress Tiamat.
Nebuchadnezzar’s forces fell like ants beneath his boot. Some even dropped dead without so much as a scratch from an enemy blade. More of Tiamat’s might, he supposed. Her powerful reach slew her enemies, even while she was confined in her tomb. Granted, even his own men seemed to be dying inexplicably as well. But they were paid mercenaries. Only loyal to the gold coins that jangled in their purses. They neither knew the wonders of Tiamat nor her true power, which would soon, as a consort to the mighty queen, be his.
“It will not be long now, Your Highness,” Sereb-Meloch said to the prince caged beside him. “Soon, your grandfather’s army will be little more than drying bones soaked in their own blood, and we will enter the goddess mother’s sacred tomb.” He turned to glare at Belshazzar. “And you will be handed over to her as the final sacrifice.”
The prince scowled at the lanky priest, then spit between the bars. “Achelous will find a way to stop you.”
Sereb-Meloch returned his gaze to the bloodbath below and chuckled. “I doubt that. Though I am not certain how he managed to survive our last encounter, my spies reported that he entered the tomb earlier this morning. The goddess predicted as much. It was part of her plan from the beginning. Your protector will have freed her by now, which means, he is already dead.”
The priest had already accounted for every possible eventuality. There was nothing the child, or anyone else for that matter, could do that would surprise him.
For now though, he contented himself with watching the carnage ensue. The three hundred warriors that had begun the fight had dwindled down to nearly a hundred and fifty. Namtar and Tiamba had been a most awesome spectacle to behold. Their powerful scorpion tails lashed out madly at their enemies, impaling them before hurling them away like rubbish. Those that their tails didn’t kill were dispatched by their blade-like arms, slicing whole men in two with a single swipe.
Beholding their power, Sereb-Meloch found himself thankful once more for finding the strange headdress he now wore within Nimrod’s treasure hoard. It had been that single discovery that had set him in motion to his destiny. It was the moment he’d placed the head piece on his brow that the goddess Tiamat had revealed herself to him. She’d waited patiently for over three thousand years for a man such as himself to come to her aid. A man with vision enough to see the putrid stench of the decaying world, who could understand the need for the destruction of the old, so that a new, more glorious world could be established. The fact that she had promised him dominion over the new world had been only a small incentive for what he’d done.
Another blast of lightning lashed out at the great ziggurat’s foundation, shaking the earth beneath his feet. For a moment, the fighting ceased and all eyes turned to face the destruction left in the wake of the blast. A giant chunk of ancient temple had been crushed to powder, revealing a strange metal surface underneath.
The Great Sarcophagus.
The high priest’s heart hammered in his chest. This was it. His queen would soon reveal herself to the world. He watched in rapt attention as the colorful metal underneath the old stone shimmered and swirled, turning itself into a rippling pool of molten liquid.
“She’s coming!” he shouted. No one but the prince could hear him amid the rumble of thunder and tempest of wind that sailed past them, swooping down into the valley.
Finally, after an eternity of waiting, something stepped through the new opening. A long, black, spider-like leg. Then another. And another. He watched as even more extricated themselves from the ancient tomb. One by one, sixteen massive Girtablilu scurried out from the rubble of the fallen temple’s stones. Countless tiny black eyes surveyed the stupefied warriors who gawked hopelessly back at them.
“Her honor guard,” Sereb-Meloch said. Pride and triumph practically dripped off his tongue with each word. And why shouldn’t it? His victory was at hand. His kingdom would reign before the day was finished.
And then, as if a great hammer had been hurled down from the sky to crush his aspirations to dust, the foreigner, Achelous, emerged from the swirling portal. A great spear clutched tightly in one hand and a large, light blue object in the other.
“What has happened? What could this mean?” Sereb-Meloch’s voice nearly squeaked.
Belshazzar answered him with contempt, but Sereb-Meloch hadn’t heard the prince. He was too busy watching as the unkillable man pointed here and there, sending his army of Girtablilu into the fray. The priest watched in horror as the old man, Daniy’yel, rushed up to Achelous with a great smile, leading two horses along on leads. Then, after a quick embrace with the prophet of Yahweh, Achelous mounted a horse, sat tall upon its back and scanned the terrain. After the briefest of moments, his gaze stopped directly on Sereb-Meloch, who sat astride his own horse, on the top of the ridge. Achelous lifted the round object high into the air.
The thing was featureless, but still recognizable as an oversized, almost feminine... Sereb-Meloch choked when he realized what it was.
It was a head.
The head of his goddess.
Tiamat was dead.
Seeing the high priest’s recognition, Achelous’s smile broadened. He hurled the decapitated head into the middle of the battlefield, then pointed directly at the high priest.
The meaning was clear: I’m coming for you.
A wave of anger shot through Sereb-Meloch’s veins like an infusion of magma. How dare the infidel lay hands on the goddess! How dare he discard her sacred head as easily as he would that of a sacrificial bull!
But the foreigner’s arrogance would be his undoing. With Nimrod’s headdress, Sereb-Meloch could turn Achelous’s own army of Girtablilu against him. The same device that had allowed him control of Tiamba and Namtar, would also enslave their brothers as well.
Sereb-Meloch looked on as Achelous, upon his horse, bolted across the valley, sweeping through the field of stupefied warriors, who were now busy defending themselves against the onslaught of scorpion men. The high priest waited patiently, allowing his enemy to draw closer.
Then, believing his timing would be perfect, the high priest released his mental command, trusting the headdress to relay it to the monstrous creatures below. Tiamba and Namtar stopped and turned to seek out Achelous. Their sixteen brothers did the same. Sereb-Meloch could almost see the hunger building in each monster’s multitude of eyes
, and he held his breath in anticipation of their attack.
But it never came.
Instead, the great beasts swept behind the racing horse and followed the foreigner, as he beelined toward the high priest’s position.
Panic building, Sereb-Meloch reissued his command, but the scorpion men ignored it. “Do as I command!” he shouted, but Achelous and the eighteen Girtablilu still charged forward. Now desperate, he sought out Captain Zaidu in an attempt to signal the mercenary regarding his current predicament. But Zaidiu was nowhere in sight. Warriors from both sides could now be seen scurrying away from the carnage of Eridu, fleeing the rampaging horde of scorpion monsters led by a single human champion. Both Nebuchadnezzar’s and Sereb-Meloch’s own men were running for the hills in all directions, as the thunder boomed angrily overhead.
Out of options, the high priest of the fallen Tiamat wheeled his horse around and followed the example of his mercenaries.
27
The Ruined City of Eridu
King, Belshazzar and Daniel watched as the last of the Girtablilu slipped through the portal and into the subterranean ship. It had taken two weeks to do it, but the creatures, with the help of their human companions, had managed to repair the vessel enough to soon break Earth’s orbit. The remaining repairs, however, were best left to those genetically predisposed to such tasks.
“So are you going to tell us now?” Belshazzar asked impatiently, as the liquid metal door to the ship solidified.
“Tell you what?” King asked. He leaned back against a large stone that had once adorned the ziggurat.
“What happened in there,” the prince said. “You have been promising to tell me ‘later’ ever since you pulled me out of that cage.”
King glanced at Daniel, who smiled back at him. After several moments, King shrugged. “Sure, why not,” he said. “You know that the Girtablilu aren’t from this world, right?”
Jack Sigler Continuum 1: Guardian Page 12