Land of Nod, The Artifact

by Gary Hoover

  Then Rasp struck.

  A beam of energy shot from the locket, and Jeff raised the bat instinctively.

  . . . And it stopped the beam!

  The two of them looked at the beam which was going from the locket to the bat.

  Now the fear came in smashing waves.

  Jeff had no idea what to do now. The creature was clearly frightened, but Jeff didn’t know why, and he didn’t have the confidence that should have been the flip-side of that fear.

  The energy beam continued to hang there. It shifted and crackled, but stayed linked to Jeff’s bat which he gripped with both hands.

  Jeff wished he knew why the pheerion was afraid . . . because Jeff wanted to do whatever it was that was so frightening to him.

  There was a pushing force being transmitted into the baseball bat from the beam which continued to crackle and waver. Jeff’s arms were beginning to tire.

  He pushed the bat in the direction of the General Rasp, and when he did that, the energy beam shot back at the creature.

  There was a bright flash, and the general was knocked back, but at the same moment, Jeff’s action seemed to cause a concussion wave that also blew back and knocked Jeff down.

  Everything went black.

  Chapter 60:

  Jeff was drifting in and out of consciousness.

  As he began to gain some clarity, he saw Baldwin moving. He tried to speak, but couldn’t.

  Baldwin was over him now, shaking him.

  “Are you alright?”

  The locket, Jeff thought, but the words didn’t come out.

  He tried to point, tried to tell Jeff to get the locket. He had a strong . . . very strong, very clear feeling that the locket was the key - not only to the General Rasp’s energy blasts, but also to the shield and gun.

  We have to get that locket!

  Rasp was beginning to stir, but Baldwin was too concerned with Jeff to notice.

  “Get . . . the . . . locket . . .” Jeff finally managed to force the words out, and he was able to point feebly in the direction of the, now clearly conscious, pheerion.

  Baldwin looked over his shoulder, and seemed to see the locket in the pheerion’s hand, but was, himself, paralyzed - not from the earlier blast, but from fear.

  Baldwin pushed himself up, but his knees buckled as he made his way toward Rasp.

  The pheerion’s legs and arms started to twitch as he re-gained control.

  Baldwin approached, slowly, tentatively . . .

  Hurry up! Jeff’s mind was shouting but his voice was silent.

  . . . Baldwin was breathing quickly and mentally forcing each footstep to push a little ahead of the previous one. It was like learning to walk all over again. What normally came naturally now seemed to be a conscious process.

  He was close to the pheerion now, but the closer he got, the slower he moved.

  Jeff tried to will him closer – like a golfer or bowler trying to get his ball to move in the right direction while it was already on the way.

  Rasp’s eyes were open and looking at Baldwin. His limbs twitched, but he clearly didn’t have full control of them . . . yet.

  Baldwin leaned down . . .

  . . . And snatched the locket with a quick, sweeping motion.

  He ran back to Jeff’s side, keeping one eye over his shoulder on the pheerion.

  Jeff forced himself up into a sitting position and took the locket Baldwin offered him.

  He opened it and saw his own - younger - face looking back at him.

  Chapter 61:

  Dave was beginning to stir.

  “See if Dave’s okay,” Jeff instructed Baldwin. “We’ve got to get out of here . . . now.”

  Jeff wanted to keep an eye on Rasp. He was sure that the locket was the key to his energy beams, but he didn’t know if he had any other weapons or abilities. The cannon was in the corner of the room, as were some bulky electronic devices. Jeff could see a sliding door above the gun that opened to allow it to protrude.

  Jeff was sure that everything was linked, in some way, to the locket. If he could get it off the ship, the shield and cannon would be disabled.

  ‘Do it,’ the pheerion croaked.

  “Do what?” Jeff asked, puzzled.

  ‘Kill me.’

  “I. . . I don’t want to kill you, I just wanted to stop you from using . . . that gun.”

  The pheerion looked away, and Jeff sensed anger . . . shame.

  ‘You’ve already done it. Now it’s just a matter of whose hand finishes it, yours or the king’s. . . KILL ME!’

  Baldwin was helping Dave to his feet.

  “Let’s get out of here.” Jeff said urgently.

  The three of them headed for the door, but before they could get there, two gun wielding pheerions blocked their path.

  Chapter 62:

  ‘Excellent, excellent.’ Rasp hissed.

  The three humans backed away from the new arrivals back into the room toward Rasp.

  Rasp was on his feet and approaching Jeff.

  Jeff concentrated. He tried to channel the energy from the locket and shoot energy beams as Rasp had, but nothing happened.

  Rasp took the locket from Jeff and then spoke to the guards.

  ‘Very good work. Do you know what would have happened if they had gotten this off the ship?’ He held up the locket.

  The guards stared dumbly.

  ‘If they had gotten this off the ship, our shield would have dropped, and we would have been defenseless. If we hadn’t turned around at that moment and gotten out of these waters, the human’s weapons could have destroyed us. We would have had to try to escape before they realized what happened and took advantage of our weakness.’

  Jeff found the statement . . .very strange. Why is he telling them that right now with such emphasis on what might have happened? Isn’t he embarr. . .

  Before Jeff could finish the thought, the room was filled with a brilliant flash.

  And then, the two guards slumped.

  Chapter 63:

  Jeff was confused. He looked back at Rasp.

  Rasp approached, knelt, bowed his head and held the locket up to Jeff. ‘This belongs to you.’

  Jeff took it from him, speechless, as Baldwin and Dave gawked.

  ‘Take me with you . . . please.’ He looked up at Jeff.

  Jeff had the feeling that ‘please’ was a word that wasn’t often used in the pheerion language.

  “He wants to go with us.” Jeff explained to Baldwin and Dave as they stared.

  “He . . . we . . .” Dave couldn’t seem to find the words.

  “We should be able to trust him,” Jeff reasoned. “Look at what he just did for us.”

  “Let’s do whatever will get us the hell out of here quickest. Bring him along.” Dave said, exasperated, and ran out the door.

  The four of them were running so fast they were almost floating with their feet just skimming the ground with each step. The noise had brought several pheerions out to see what was going on, but Dave just charged ahead, making sure Jeff and Baldwin were with him. Rasp brought up the rear.

  The pheerions seemed too confused to act, and Dave had made it to the railing with little difficulty. He helped Jeff and Baldwin over the railing and then followed them. He paid little attention to Rasp who followed right behind him.

  Jeff hit the water and sank much farther than he would have liked. He tried to remain calm in the cold, eerie quiet of the ocean and then worked his way back to the surface.

  He broke through the surface in time to hear Dave shouting: “We’ve got to get clear of the ships!” Dave reached into his pocket. “I’ve just activated the beacon.”

  Jeff heard some shots coming from the ship, but he couldn’t see any bullets hitting the water or his friends. He hoped that a little more distance would make them difficult to see in the dark and put them out of range of the guns.

  Baldwin was well ahead of the others with Dave relatively close behind and Jeff was watching the distan
ce between himself and Dave lengthen. He was simply running out of strength, and he began to think he wouldn’t make it.

  Then he felt something on his arm. Rasp had taken hold of his upper arm and was pulling him along. Rasp was an excellent swimmer.

  They approached Dave, and Rasp reached out with his free hand. Dave lurched when he felt Rasps touch and gave him a confused look.

  . . . But he wasn’t too proud to accept assistance considering the circumstances, and soon the three of them had caught up with Baldwin at a point near where the shield – which was no longer there – would have been.

  The four of them treaded water.

  There was no sign of Nahima.

  Chapter 64:

  Dave looked nervously up at the ship closest to them. “I’m thinking we should put a little more distance between us and the ships.”

  While it made sense, Jeff didn’t really like the idea of getting farther out into open water. The four of them continued to move - but at a slower pace.

  “Where is she?” Jeff asked. He turned his head from side to side looking for some sign of Nahima.

  “She’ll be here,” Dave said.

  “Unless something happened to her,” Baldwin added.

  Jeff didn’t want to think about it. After all they’d been through, it was just overwhelming to think they might have made it this far just to drown or be re-captured.

  An eerie silence hung over the black water.

  “I wonder if the beacon’s working,” Dave commented. He shook it and looked at it, but Jeff suspected Dave didn’t have a clue if it was actually working.

  More silence.

  Jeff began to wonder if they had sharks in their oceans . . . or maybe something worse.

  Silence.

  Then Jeff thought he saw something.

  No. Just a reflection. There was a feeling of desperate terrifying isolation out there in the ocean. In some ways, it didn’t seem as frightening as fighting some sort of monster, but would a slow drowning death leave him any less dead than a fearsome struggle against a warrior creature?

  Jeff was getting tired now . . . very tired. His limbs were numb and they began to refuse to do what he wanted of them. He was concentrating on each movement and the harder he concentrated, the more difficult it became

  Silence.

  Then he saw it.

  Coming in low and fast.

  Nahima!

  She hovered and helped Baldwin, then Jeff, then Dave onto the deck of her vehicle . . . then she jumped back.

  She had just seen Rasp.

  Jeff had never seen her scream, but he thought she was real close at that moment. He smiled to himself.

  “It’s okay. He’s with us.”

  Chapter 65:

  “Fantastic! Just fantastic!” Artimus beamed as they told him the story. “I’m going to contact Blackbuck, and he’ll wipe out the fleet.”

  “No!” Jeff said suddenly. “We have to give them time to get away.” He looked at Rasp.

  Artimus looked from Jeff to Rasp and understood . . .

  . . . But he was a soldier at heart, and the idea of allowing an enemy to flee to fight another day bothered him.

  He fidgeted uncomfortably. “If you feel strongly about it. I’ll watch to see when they pull up anchor.”

  “I think they’ll be moving soon,” Jeff said, “the General made it clear to them that they’d be defenseless if the locket was taken.

  Artimus went up to the front to check the monitors, and Jeff gestured to Rasp.

  The two of them found a private corner to talk, and Jeff pulled the locket out of his pocket.

  “Where did you get this?” He asked.

  ‘From my king. . . I don’t know where he got it . . .and now . . . I’m afraid there will be a price on my head so high I won’t be able to show my face in public. . . so it won’t be easy to ask him.’

  Jeff thought about that for a while. At least he knew something now. Had a little bit to work with. “How does it work? How do you make it shoot those . . . beams?”

  ‘You need this.’ He showed Jeff an electronic device on his glove. ‘. . . And you need a machine that is back on the ship. The King didn’t want anyone to have too much power, so he built safeguards into it. He controls the devices and has ways to disable them.’

  “So it’s useless now?” Jeff asked.

  ‘Useless?’ Rasp seemed confused. ‘It may no longer have powers, but is it not still the Artifact?’

  Chapter 66:

  The food wasn’t the best Jeff had ever had, but the celebratory dinner in the mess tent was, almost without question, the greatest moment of Jeff‘s life.

  Jeff couldn’t stop grinning as people pounded him on the back, congratulated and thanked him.

  Artimus, Dave, Baldwin and Nahima were all getting similar treatment. Rasp had stayed in Princess Trina with Benji. Artimus thought that would be for the best.

  No matter what happens from now on, Jeff thought, I’ve got this moment. Today . . . I . . . we made a difference. Nobody will ever be able to take that away.

  “I guess there’s no question now,” Artimus said to Jeff. He had to shout to be heard above the cacophony. “You can’t deny you’re The Raja. Remember Prophecy 11: ‘Only The Raja has the power to wrest the Numino from the Warlord’.”

  Jeff thought about that for a moment. Well, actually, Baldwin’s the one who took the locket from Rasp, he thought to himself.

  He looked at Baldwin who was looking back at him. He could tell Baldwin was thinking the same thing, but Baldwin was also thinking something else:

  Don’t you dare tell him about that.

  Jeff took another bite of food.

  Of course I’m still the one who fell from the sky . . . unless you count when we ran out of energy on our way to Dave’s . . .

  Jeff looked at Baldwin who looked back at him with a ‘What’s that look about?’ expression.

  Jeff had some more food – a hearty mouthful this time. It was starting to taste a little better.

  He was getting used to it.

  He reached into a leather pocket on his belt and pulled out the locket.

  He opened it and looked at the young . . . so very young . . . face.

  My father must be here . . . somewhere.

  Dedicated with sincere appreciation for the encouragement and assistance:

  Gordon F. Aiavao

  Oscar Brito

  Alicia Buffa

  Thomas Collins

  BJ Corbitt

  Sherman Hayes

  Scott Hooker

  Linda Hoover

  Madaline Leonick

  Elizabeth Lewis

  Regina Mayorga

  Mary Mitchell

  Christy Rabe

  Erika Slivka

  Doug Vaughn