by S. L. Duncan
Micah and Gabe nodded.
He looked again at the little backpack by the door.
“I told you we wouldn’t be here long,” Gabe said, motioning to their apartment.
“You will have one just like it in Iznik. The Nicene Facility, I hear, has become quite the engineering wonder. Unfortunately, I’m afraid the view won’t be as nice,” his father said, looking out the window. “My God. It’s an ocean of people.”
“They aren’t blind. Or stupid,” said Gabe. “The world knew of the Nile minutes after it happened. All those phone videos. Covering it up wasn’t smart. Especially when Vatican City suddenly shuts its doors to the public.”
“Religious and political unrest don’t mix. Trust me on this,” Micah said, looking out the window. Her voice was distant, reflecting on a memory. “I can tell you from my childhood in Iran that such a thing can make all rationality be forgotten. Men can become monsters. Won’t matter who gets in the way. Women. Children. Families.”
Her thought seemed to fade, and her eyes fluttered, drawing away from the scene in the street beyond the square.
“Yes. Panic would not be sustainable. That is why it is imperative we reach out to the Western Alliance and seek support of a more secular nature,” Gabe’s father said. “The vote by the Holy See was a strategic error. Likely, it will not be the last, despite their best intentions. So we will leave them to their politics and be thankful for at least Borelli’s support. He pulled many strings to ensure our travel is as safe as possible. If you’re ready, then, helicopters are standing by to shuttle us to the carrier.”
Gabe picked up his backpack. “What about Afarôt?”
“He’s made his own arrangements,” his father said.
“No doubt.”
“What has gotten into you both? I thought Afarôt was your friend.”
Gabe looked at his father, stone-faced.
“Micah?” his father said. “Care to shed some light on this for me?”
She shrugged, doing her best to play as if she knew nothing.
Gabe’s father seemed to study them both. “You don’t trust him,” he guessed.
Micah said nothing and looked to Gabe.
“Has he given you a reason?”
Gabe looked at his father. “What do we know about him? What do we know about his intentions, about his connection to the ring? He knows more than he’s letting on.”
“He’s your friend, Son.”
“I’m not so sure.” Gabe hoisted his backpack over his shoulder, and the simple exertion caused the world to spin. He collapsed.
His father rushed to his side and helped lift him as he struggled to his feet. “I’m fine. I just tripped.”
“Like hell, you’re fine. The effect of the ring is getting worse, isn’t it? You look exhausted. Take it off. We’ll find a way to secure it for transport. It’s not important enough to risk your well-being.”
Micah picked up his backpack and helped him put it over his shoulder. “It’ll be fine for the trip. You can do without it for a few hours, right?”
Gabe couldn’t look at either one of them, especially his father. He wanted to say the words, but they wouldn’t come out.
“Go on, Gabe. Take it off,” Micah said with a nervous laugh.
“Gabe?” his father said, his voice carrying a demanding edge.
“I can’t,” Gabe finally said. “The ring won’t come off my finger. It won’t budge. Not a millimeter.” He held up his hand, displaying the metal band and engraved jewel. The skin around it had turned pink and red. “Till death do us part, I guess.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The plaque on a nearby building read, Quo Aptius Atique Commodius, In Civitate Vaticana, Commaetus Rationibus Prospiceret, Paulus VI Pontifes Maximus, Hunc Helicopterorum Portum, Aperiendum Instruendumpque Curavit, A.D. MCMLXXVI—Pont. XIII. When they had arrived in the city, it had been under the cover of dark, so Gabe had missed it then.
Helicopterorum. That’s got to be a new one, he thought.
He didn’t know much Latin, but he was able to make out the plaque’s basic meaning: Heliport of the Pope. He squinted at the Roman numerals.
“Nineteen seventy-six,” Micah said. She smiled, her eyebrows arching playfully.
“Yeah, I know.”
Her gaze seemed to hesitate, lingering on his. As it fell, her smile drifted away, lips pulling tight with worry.
“I’m okay, all right?”
She smiled again, this one forced. “Okay.”
Situated between the edge of the far northwestern wall of Vatican City and the westernmost side of the Vatican Gardens, the pope’s helipad held a large, idling military-style helicopter, similar to the one that was sent to Axum to pick them up. A platoon of Swiss Guard moved into position to board. Gabe realized they were no longer wearing their colorful outfits but instead modern, black, urban-assault fatigues. Scythes had been replaced by automatic weapons and their ridiculous hats set aside in favor of military helmets that resembled hockey gear.
In the middle of the platoon, Secretariat Borelli stepped into the helicopter, assisted by his escort, who then jumped in behind him.
The whirling blades powered up to a thunderous speed, and the helicopter lifted skyward, sending debris and dust into the air. Another helicopter, which had been hovering in wait, moved into position for landing. Several helicopters orbited safely in the distance.
“The two of you will be taking separate helicopters to the carrier for safety,” Gabe’s father shouted over the noise. “Travel time shouldn’t be longer than an hour. Probably even less, depending on the traffic on the carrier deck. You’ve each been assigned an elite platoon of Swiss Guard. For all intents and purposes, you are their commanding officer. They have sworn an oath to each of you. Do not abuse that authority.”
Micah smiled at Gabe and mouthed, Cool.
“Yeah, cool,” Gabe said sarcastically, giving a thumbs-up. “Military guys love being told what to do by teenagers. No way this’ll end badly at all.”
“You take the fun out of everything,” Micah yelled over the sound of the engines. “You know that, right?”
Sergeant Alois, wearing his elite outfit, marched up to Gabe’s father and shouted, “Back in service, Highness!”
“Gabe, follow Sergeant Alois. He has been assigned to you. The next ride is yours. I’ll be taking the last one with Micah.”
“Highness, allow me the honor of escorting you to the hélicoptère,” Alois said.
Gabe rolled his eyes at Micah, who tried to hide her laughter with her hand. He shouldered his backpack, until one of the platoon soldiers removed it and carried it for him, and then ran toward the helicopter.
He couldn’t help but duck, even though the spinning blades were several feet above him as he climbed awkwardly into the open sliding door.
Once on board, one of the Swiss Guard gave him a large pair of old headphones, which he put on. A seam in the ear pad on one side scratched against his skin. The guard made a turning gesture with his hands around his head. The microphone on the headset was pointed backward over his ear.
Great. Your fearless leader, at your service, he thought.
The rest of his platoon joined him on board, followed by Sergeant Alois, who took the backward-facing seat in front of him, and the large door of the aircraft slammed shut.
Gabe looked out the window he now shared with Alois.
The sensation of liftoff was just as he remembered it from Axum. All the turbulence and violent rattling the aircraft experienced on the ground while its rotors spun up to speed disappeared as soon as the wheels cleared the helipad.
Gabe’s stomach rolled as he felt the rush of exhilaration, as the earth seemed to free-fall outside the window.
Behind them, he watched Micah and his father’s helicopter move into position to land.
Even from their height, the crowd gathered at the gates of St. Peter’s Square looked enormous. Much larger than he had realized.
A
s Gabe watched, a large fireball exploded where one of the satellite vans had been parked.
“Look! I think it was a bomb!”
Alois leaned against the window. Gabe heard the static of his breath catching over the microphone.
Bodies lay strewn on all sides of the mangled van. The Swiss Guard and the Italian soldiers retreated to the interior as the crowd panicked. Their men were being overrun by the surge. Gas canisters arced into the crowd.
Gabe looked to see Micah and his father’s helicopter lift safely into the air. “People are dying. Can’t we do anything?” Gabe shouted into the microphone.
“No. It is too unsafe,” Alois said. He then gave an order in Italian to the pilot, who reacted immediately.
The helicopter accelerated quickly west. In a matter of minutes, they were flying high and fast over the Mediterranean Sea, toward the island of Sardinia.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Gabe had sat in silence for half an hour, watching the sea pass below and trying to not think about the bomb. Thankfully, Alois gave up on small talk when Gabe faked a problem with his earphone receiver.
As the world streaked by beneath the helicopter, the things he’d read and seen in Alois’s office began to gnaw at his nerves. He looked at the ring, like a tumor on his hand, his skin raw and agitated around the faded gold. Either the band was tightening or his finger was swollen, but the effect was the same: the ring seemed to be absorbing into his body.
Gabe turned away, sickened by the thought. The rest of the guards seated in the cabin were not wearing headphones. Alois stared out his window, seated directly across the aisle. Gabe gently kicked his shoe to get his attention.
“Can they hear us?”
Alois shook his head, his eyebrows arching high. “No, Highness. Not a word.”
A moment of crackling radio silence passed between them. Gabe tried to remember exactly what he’d seen and read in Alois’s office and what he might be able to ask about the ring and Afarôt. The Frenchman was a weapons expert, after all.
And the ring is definitely a weapon. “So tell me about the ring,” Gabe said.
“What is it you wish to know?”
“Everything, I guess. What about its history? Where did it come from?”
“Ah. This is a bit of a mystery. There is a legend to which Solomon is credited, but the accuracy . . . well, it is a legend, no? A bedtime story.”
“I’ve heard that one. Solomon goes crazy. Not exactly a happy ending, is it?”
“Yes, but it is exaggeration. Like a children’s tale.”
“So Solomon didn’t go nuts?”
Alois shifted in his seat.
“How did Solomon get the ring?”
“The same way the ring comes to all who inherit its power.”
“So has Afarôt had it all along?”
“Oui. In a manner of speaking. He has kept it safe, no? But it has not always been his.” There was static in the headphones. “But the Ark must choose the one who bears the ring. And Afarôt has never been chosen. Nor has anyone else of late. That is why he remained in Axum so long. The Ark has not moved in quite some time.”
“Is he angry about that? About not being chosen?” Gabe asked.
Alois frowned, as if offended on Afarôt’s behalf. “No, Highness. Of course not.”
Gabe held up his finger. “This isn’t a children’s tale. This isn’t fantasy. What’s it doing to me? Why won’t it let go?”
Alois’s gaze dropped. “I am not certain—”
“You’re the weapons expert, right? Don’t lie to me. You know, don’t you?” Gabe’s hips strained against his seat belt, the rest of his body leaning toward Alois.
“We had theories.”
“Theories?” Gabe hissed.
“Oui. The legend as it pertains to Solomon we did not think would also pertain to you. Solomon was human. You are . . . more.” Alois looked regretful, like a doctor who had no more options for his patient.
“There is some evidence—literature,” Alois continued, “that suggests the time the human archangels spend in this form is . . . more temporary than we’d hoped. Without a need for an archangel in this realm, its essence will feel the pull to its rightful realm. If the ring chose you, it was for a reason. Do you understand?”
“Temporary?” Anger burned inside Gabe. He wanted to punch the window, the seat, Alois’s face—and even as he felt these emotions, he knew the ring had ignited them. He clenched his fist, squeezing the ring against his palm as if to force the rage back into the darkness. “I’m a person, too. So is Micah. No matter what we were in another life, this one is still ours. Do you understand?”
“But of course,” Alois pleaded. “You must trust that if I or if Afarôt could trade places with you, we most assuredly would.”
“Trust you?” Gabe said. “Trust you?”
“When we reach the Nicene Facility, we will make certain you are as comfortable as we can make you, Highness. This, I promise.” He placed his is hand over his heart.
“I’m not quite ready for hospice yet, thank you.”
Temporary. The word rang in Gabe’s mind like a church bell. What did it mean? How much time did he and Micah really have? Ridiculous images formed in his mind: graduating college, getting married, having a child, a house with a picket fence—a life that seemed more unattainable by the minute. As the fantasies spun, the silence between him and Alois became nearly unbearable. Thankfully, the helicopter began to bank, distracting them both as Gabe pushed back into his seat.
“Your government has all the latest toys,” Alois said into his microphone. He was smiling carefully, trying to make peace.
Gabe ignored him, his face against the window. Below, an aircraft carrier steamed ahead, flanked by three warships of varying sizes.
“Wasp class,” he explained. “LHA-6. Brand-new. For your Marines, n’est-ce pas? It is hélicoptère jump-ship.”
Gabe looked at the carrier, feeling the anger slipping back into the empty feeling behind his heart. “It looks small,” he said into the microphone, consenting to the small talk.
Alois laughed. “It is, Highness. Compared to its nuclear sisters. No jets. Only vertical birds. Harriers. Osprey.” He banged the side of the aircraft with his hands. “Les hélicoptères, non?”
Their helicopter banked hard again and approached from the rear of the ship. Gabe’s headphones screeched and hissed with static. He shuddered as the image of red eyes and shadow creatures flashed before him. His stomach turned, and Alois’s word echoed in his mind.
Temporary.
As another helicopter lifted from the carrier’s deck below, Gabe felt his aircraft swing into position. The sudden altitude drop made him a bit queasy. The familiar fever crawled across his skin again.
Alois was saying something into his microphone, but Gabe no longer wanted to hear him speak. The Frenchman’s hands were moving in gestures as if he were trying to explain. Gabe took off his headset and was met by the thunder of the helicopter’s blades. He imagined the shadow creatures, swirling around him, gnashing their jaws at him in anticipation of their kill. He quickly put the headset back on.
Temporary.
Gabe wanted to run away. To open the helicopter door and just fall away from it all. He felt so tired. So worn out. The carrier was the last place he wanted to be.
Across the aisle, Alois was saying something else and pointing out the window.
“Don’t tell her,” Gabe said.
“Pardon?”
“Don’t tell Micah about our time here being temporary.”
“Should she not know? Did you not just express your anger about secrets?”
Gabe’s gaze fell. “She’ll lose hope. It’s all she has, really. She’s the Michaelion. It’s going to come down to her.” He looked at Alois. “You know that, too, don’t you?”
Alois’s jaw clenched, and he nodded, a glimmer of sadness in his eyes.
The wheels of the helicopter touched the deck, and the aircraft s
hook like hell.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The sliding door pushed out and moved across the flank of the helicopter before the aircraft had fully settled onto the carrier.
Helmeted flight crews scurried around on the deck to attend to the helicopter and secure the landing.
Gabe’s platoon flanked him on all sides as an older woman dressed in formal military attire ran out to greet them, one palm holding her hat to her head. On her chest was a color chart as big as Gabe’s hand.
“I’m Admiral Keats,” she said. “Welcome aboard the USS America. We’re going to need to get those weapons from you, fellas. I promise we’ll keep ’em safe. My men will escort you to your quarters.”
“We are to escort His Highness at all times, Admiral,” Alois objected.
“It’s okay, Sergeant.” Gabe walked over to his platoon leader. “And for the love, Alois,” he said, his voice just loud enough to carry over the thumping helicopter blades, “lay off the Highness bit. It’s embarrassing.”
“Oui, High . . . sir.”
Several Marines disarmed Gabe’s Swiss Guard, the team reluctantly handing their firearms over.
“Now, if you don’t mind, Mr. Adam, please follow me,” Keats said as she led the way through a gunmetal door. A Marine fell in behind, his face expressionless. He had taken his weapon off his shoulder, and his finger stretched out across the trigger guard.
Behind Gabe, another helicopter was being waved down onto the deck.
Gabe sat in silence on the faux-leather couch in the Captain’s Quarters, twiddling his thumbs. Secretariat Borelli was doing the adult equivalent by reading a coffee table book about the history of the ships in the US Navy that had carried the name USS America. Occasionally, as if he were trying to reset the silence, he would offer the odd tidbit found in the book’s pages, like, “Did you know this is the fourth ship in the Navy’s history that was named USS America?” Or, “Did you know that the name America was meant as an homage to the American Revolution? It is the name of a Spanish conquistador, yes? America?”
Gabe nodded politely, giving monosyllabic answers, and forced an interested smile, hoping Micah and his father would arrive to fill the room with more purpose.