Babel Found

by Matthew James

  And with that, Todd spun on a dime and quickly disappeared around a corner, flattening himself against a wall, breathing even harder than before. He waited to hear the clicking of heels before leaving his improvised refuge, his hands still shaking from the frightful discussion.

  Gender and beauty aside, he felt something else emanating from the raven-haired mystery woman, but he couldn’t put his finger on it.

  Ding.

  An icon appeared in his glasses’ Heads-up Display—the HUD. It was the international symbol for an email and it was labeled with a simple letter: M.

  Ben?

  He whispered, “Open.” It was barely loud enough for himself to hear let alone anyone else within an earshot of him, but it was plenty loud enough for the NVS comms to pick up. The file opened and he quickly read it, having to reread the slightly coded message again to fully understand it.

  He raced down the hall, turned another corner, and came to an ordinary wooden door. From the outside, it looked like it belonged to a janitor’s closet, but on the inside—downstairs really—it held his entire life’s work.

  Everyone’s really.

  Ben had taken up residence in Dr. Boyd’s vacated office, having offered it to Hank first. He remembered the conversation. Hank immediately refused it, stating that he was never around and that it would go to waste. But Todd knew the real reason was that Hank didn’t want to be surrounded by the memory of his father whenever he didn’t have to be. It was still too painful for him right now.

  Todd pulled out his unmarked black keycard, holding it up to the top right-hand corner of the door. A soft click emanated from somewhere within the frame, swinging the camouflaged blast door in. He quickly slipped inside and descended the stairs to the basement level. There were only six of these keycards in use. Every single one belonged to their team and no one else.

  Motion sensor lights flicked on as he made his way to the end of the moderate sized corridor. It dead-ended at another door, his door. What used to be a large storage closet was now the heart and soul of the NVS network…along with a few other toys Todd had been working on for a rainy day.

  Directly across from Ben’s office—on the right-hand side—was Kane’s office. He, like Hank, was mostly in the field, but when they did come back to the Castle, it’s where he would spend a lot of his time, going through contacts and setting up other off-the-books activities. It was barely set up—mostly still packed with boxes. When the incident in Mexico occurred, they had to drop everything and leave.

  Olivia had a lab next to Kane’s office, twice as big in size, filled with all kinds of high-tech gizmos. Todd couldn’t pronounce half of them, let alone understand what they did, so he rarely stepped foot in it. He was afraid of releasing some sort of toxin or something else dangerous like that. Olivia continuously told him that her lab was perfectly safe, but he steered clear just in case.

  Hank actually shared an office with Nicole. They were here the least and only saw it fitting to consolidate their work environment when taking in Todd and Olivia.

  Todd turned in front of his door and looked back towards the end of the underground hall, back to the steps, visualizing the grizzly scene on that fateful day. Ben and Nicole filled him in the week he arrived. Dr. Boyd being shot, Hank holding his dying father in his arms, and Nicole and Ben weeping for their fallen comrade.

  Goosebumps raced up and down Todd’s arms when thinking about it and a tremor raced up and down his spine as well. He turned back towards his office but felt the shaking again.

  The heck?

  He looked down at his legs, expecting to see them shaking with fright or nerves, but he saw nothing. But the ground shook still. A low rumble, just enough to sound like the hum from a big rig came next, causing Todd to sprint back towards the blast door.

  He took the steps two at a time, quickly unlocked the magnetized door, and then shimmied through before it even opened halfway. As soon as he made it back to the main hall he could hear screams coming from the front of the building, drawing him further forward. The shaking also grew in strength as he moved closer.

  He pushed through the clogged entryway, using his lanky build to his advantage, and made his way down the steps, stopping once he reached the front curb. He looked east and found nothing, just a mass of people moving away from him. They all had a look of shock on their faces and were also looking past him to the west.

  Confused, Todd turned and faced the same direction, seeing something that didn’t make a lick of sense.

  “Zoom,” he said, commanding his glasses to telescope in. They complied and magnified his vision.

  “ENVY,” he said, talking directly to his custom-made automated system. It was the brain behind the NVS network. As of now, he was the only one that had vocal access to it. The others could voice-activate certain app-like programs within, but Todd could actually converse with it. It was a new development, one he hoped to have implemented in the coming months. He continued, “Can you please tell me exactly what I’m seeing?”

  His eyes widened and his legs buckled at the answer.

  “Just like Teotihuacán,” he said to himself. It was, in fact, almost exactly like what Coaxoch did except that was in Mexico and she used a pyramid. This was D.C.—the nation’s capital.

  He shook away the vision of what was coming towards him and spoke. “ENVY, record and deliver video to predetermined field operatives. Also, send an SOS and a holy shit!”

  Todd wasn’t one to openly curse, but watching the statue of Abraham Lincoln stomp through his own reflecting pool seemed as an appropriate a time as ever.

  Site “A”

  Outside Djanet, Algeria

  “Pharaoh!” Ben shouted, doing as Kane had taught him.

  The two men stationed around the dig’s raised perimeter, snapped their assault rifles towards the newcomer, zeroing in on his head and chest respectively. It was a command word Kane had set up if, and possibly when, something bad happened. All they needed to do was watch and wait. If Anu did anything out of the ordinary, they had the authority to take him out.

  Smiling, the southerner slowly raised his hands, never taking his eyes off the Israeli historian. “You have some nerve, Dr. Fehr. You should’ve just played nice. Y’all would’ve survived longer that way.”

  “Funny you should say that,” Ben retorted, making sure everyone around the site could hear them through their various comms systems. All the men here, including Joshua, wore run-of-the-mill military grade earpieces and tactical mics. It was another precaution set up by Kane, one that was being put to good use at the moment. “I thought the exact same thing when you showed up unannounced. You should have called ahead. The result would have been different.”

  Ben and Joshua sidestepped the intruder, making their way up the inclined ramp. They backpedaled as they moved, always watching the man in black.

  “How did you get here?” Ben asked as he continued backwards, pulling his stunned assistant along. “Who are you working for?”

  Anu slowly turned, seeing another red dot appear on his chest as a third gunman stepped into view behind his prey. One more move and the professionals would shoot. “How did I get here?” He smiled again, chuckling out a laugh. “Let’s just say I dropped in.”

  “And your employers?” Ben again asked, his voice starting to shake. He was having trouble keeping up this front. “We both know you don’t work for who you say you do.”

  “True,” Anu replied, shrugging, “but I do, in fact, work for a friend of Mr. Boyd’s. Who it is exactly, I can’t say.”

  “You can’t say, or you won’t say?”

  Anu just answered Ben with another silent voracious grin. The answer was pretty clear. He wouldn’t be talking.

  Okay, Ben thought, what would Hank or Kane do?

  Hank would summon his gifts, something he’d been getting better at the last few weeks. Todd had outfitted him with a few new accessories, making it easier for him to call upon, and therefore, control the fires within.r />
  And Kane?

  Kane would just march right up to the guy and start swinging, or if push came to shove, he’d just shoot the guy where he stood.

  The problem was neither were here.

  Was there a third option? He looked around and knew what they needed to do… Run

  “Joshua…” Ben whispered, pulling the younger man in close, “run.”

  The twenty-something from Raleigh stopped and looked into Ben’s eyes, his mouth opening and closing like a fish trying to breathe in air. Ben shook him, squeezing his shoulder hard, getting his attention.

  “Run, damnit—don’t stop. Hide if you have to, but do not, under any circumstances, follow me.”

  “W-why?” Joshua asked, shaking.

  “Isn’t it obvious?” Ben replied, glancing back down to the blue-eyed man. “He’s here for me.”

  Joshua’s jaw unhinged, unable to form words. He didn’t have to, though, Ben spoke for him.

  “Damnit, Josh, go!”

  He turned and ran, heading straight through the command tent, heading for the back entrance. Within his earpiece he could hear the security team conversing, surrounding the man named, Anu. They were ordering him to the ground and from what Ben could discern, Anu was surprisingly listening and obeying.

  Ben didn’t stick around to find out, either way. He bolted through the back flap and leapt into one of the excavation’s uncovered Jeep Wranglers. It was waiting where he’d left it earlier in the day and he started it, putting it into gear.

  Shots erupted from the other side of the tent, originating from the direction of the site. Ben’s foot paused just above the accelerator as he listened to the battle waging atop the orichalcum slab.

  He groaned at what he heard. It didn’t sound promising.

  He was instantly struck with a gust of wind that collapsed one of the tent’s supports, making it list to the left. But it wasn’t the damaged tent that really caught his attention, it was the bodies sailing into the air above him, screaming the entire way up until they were out of earshot. Something—someone—had just thrown part of the security team sixty-plus feet into the desert sky.

  The Jeep tore its way back towards the village. Ben didn’t need to see the men land to know their fate. He only had one life to be concerned with right now. His.

  As he cruised over the UNESCO-sanctioned national park, something that was jailable on any other day, he was alerted to an incoming call from ‘Q.’ The notification popped up in his glasses’ lenses, just on the outer edge of his vision.

  “Not now, Todd,” Ben said, connecting the call as he concentrated on his route. The wind behind him began to swirl, howling like a funnel cloud was forming right behind him. He peeked into his rearview mirror, seeing exactly what he didn’t want to.

  “Oh, God…”

  7

  Marriott Stanton Hotel

  South Beach, Miami, Florida

  We continue our retreat and turn right, heading around the northern end of the hotel. Nicole and I flinch in time with one another when the sound of a gunshot echoes off the buildings around us. I hurriedly check us both but see no wounds. It’s only when we stop and turn back towards the water that we see the tree I slammed the waiter into begin to fall.

  “No way,” I say a little awestruck, Nicole tugging on my arm.

  “Yes way,” she says, getting in front of me. “We need to get to the car and get back to D.C.”

  “And then call in the army…” I add. I meet her serious gaze and understand what she means, shaking my head in disbelief. Best case scenario, we get away unscathed. If this goes poorly—a likelihood that’s becoming more and more of a possibility with every second—the people of South Beach are going to get a magic show of a lifetime.

  The two differences are A) it’s starring me, and B) the magic is quite real and not some cheap illusion or slight-of-hand trick.

  “Rargh!”

  The angry shout reverberates around us like the tree snapping, pushing us forward even faster. We round the northeastern corner of the hotel and continue into the Marjory Stoneman Douglas Ocean Beach Park. We enter, cutting through some of the decorative shrubs and flowers, completely ignoring the marked pathways. It sits directly between our hotel and the next one to the north. Looking around, I see stunned expressions turn our way. I guess seeing two people only dressed in bathing suits, pushing through the hotel’s hedges is an odd sight.

  If only they’d seen what I have.

  A rumbling sound starts shaking the grounds around us, drawing our attention back to the beach. Voices of shock and panic erupt from the other people in the small park, sending them into a frenzy—and for good reason.

  Nicole sees it first, gripping my arm hard, digging her nails into my flesh. I ignore the pinch in my bicep, seeing what she did a second later. While she’s holding onto me, all I have to hold onto is a false sense of hope.

  A wave, easily thirty feet high, is coming straight for us, racing across the surf like it was just summoned by…

  Damn.

  I’ve seen this before, but it was in a dream—a vision really. Nannot—The End—did the same thing to his homeland, just before he wiped it off the face of the earth. The only positive is that this wave is considerably smaller than the one that helped flatten Atlantis. It’s not directed at the coast as a whole either. It’s heading directly for the park.

  “Damn.”

  It’s as wide as the area around us, aligned with our exact location.

  Nicole turns to run, but I stop her and pull her in close.

  “What are you doing?” she asks, not understanding my motives for staying. “We need to go!”

  “Trust me,” I say, motioning to the people around us. “We need to get them out of here first. I having a feeling that if we run the wave will just follow us and even more people will die.”

  She bites her lip, but agrees and starts yelling for people to run, as I do the same to the other part of the park. Thankfully, the wave is easily seen and everyone—minus us—starts to scatter. I watch as the hotel patrons head into various buildings, or instead just sprint north or south down Ocean Drive.

  “So,” she says, standing beside me, fists clenched, “what’s the plan.”

  I just smile and pull her in close, kissing her hard on the lips. She kisses me back, sharing the odd moment. It’s not exactly the most romantic of settings, but it’ll have to do with what I’m about to attempt.

  “If this doesn’t work—”

  “I love you too, Hank,” she says, cutting me off. “Just don’t get us killed.”

  I shrug and raise my right hand above my head, eyeing one of my newest additions. It’s what is allowing me to conjure my powers so easily. I then pull Nicole in tight with my left. “I kind of thought after the show you just put on, you’d want to die, or at the very least, disappear forever beneath a maelstrom of water.”

  Her face pales. “Did that many people see me?”

  I nod. “Every man is jealous of me and every woman on the beach hates your guts.”

  Under the circumstances, her cheeks actually flush a little with a hint of rare humiliation.

  “Don’t worry, Marion,” I say, closing my fist, watching her eyes roll. “I got this.”

  I hope….

  I breathe in deep and push.

  * * *

  “Report,” the voice spoke, echoing through their shared consciousness.

  A pressure built up in his head, warning him of three incoming communications. When he was young, a single pulse almost killed him. It was the first time he experienced the mental intrusion, but now taking as many as he was now was second nature, like feeling a phone softly vibrating in your pocket.

  “Underway in Orlando, Susanoo,” a feminine voice said.

  “And in the desert,” added a deep masculine voice.

  He waited for a third confirmation. But it didn’t come.

  So instead, he sent a stronger pulse to her, hearing a squeak as it hit, causi
ng her a small amount of…discomfort.

  “And you?” he thought.

  “Yes, Susanoo… My apologies. Everything is underway in Washington as well.”

  Susanoo smiled, projecting his emotion into the thoughts of the others. They would see to their own duties and eliminate their targets. It’s the only way they could all take the next step unhindered.

  He had confidence in the others, even her. Over the years, she had softened her stance on things, but in the end, she always completed her tasks. No matter how reluctant. They were his equal in countless ways. Their targets were also the most exposed and the weakest of the quarry they sought.

  But mine, he thought, this time only to himself, this one is different. He holds the power of the Ancients.

  Susanoo laughed. If only he knew the true potential of his abilities… The Chosen and the Source together. He smiled at the thought.

  He completely disconnected from the realm within and forced his consciousness back into the physical world. A tree lay by his feet. It was the first time in years that he lost his temper like that.

  He forgot how good anger felt.

  As he practiced countless times, he quickly composed himself and cleared his mind, facing the ocean. Susanoo reveled in the salty breeze wafting off of it. He simply raised his hands out to the side, like he was saying a prayer. But he wasn’t… He was calling to the elements. He was calling to his element.

  A pull on his stomach threatened to pitch him forward, but he fought through it, concentrating on the task at hand. It had also been years since he used this part of his gift. The talents were handed down to him and the others at birth from their parents. Then when they were still young, their training began.

  Young…

  How long was it now? He couldn’t fully recall honestly. When you’d been alive as long as the Judges, time really meant very little. Their bodies and minds never aged—never slowed. They’d live among the scourge of the world, or sometimes they’d stay in hiding for just as long, bored with it all.