The Creation: Axis Mundi (The Creation Series Book 1)

by The Behrg

  “What the devil?”

  Remmy passed through the curtain and had to shield his eyes. The stained glass windows set into the exterior walls had become open doorways to a portal of pure light. Families were huddled beneath blankets, children burying their faces in their parents’ laps. Two men in the far corner of the room began hammering nails into the wall, blankets lowered over the window behind it. If Remmy wasn’t mistaken, they were using several blankets layered together and still the wool glowed like the white screen of a television set.

  “It started about twenty minutes ago,” Grey said. “You didn’t hear the children?”

  “Old age dulls first the sounds of children crying,” Remmy said, without taking his eyes off the people in the room.

  His people.

  “Has anyone gone out?”

  “In this? I wouldn’t let them,” Grey said.

  Remmy nodded. His mind ran through possible scenarios of what could be causing such a phenomenon, coming up short with each one. At least until his mind deposited him into the realm of considering nuclear attacks, dirty bombs, or radioactive poisoning. But who in their right mind would target a little village like theirs? Unless it had something to do with Dugan and what his men had been doing.

  He didn’t like where those possibilities could lead.

  There was a scratch at the front door, like fingernails running roughly over the wood, followed by a single thump.

  Remmy gasped. “Josue!”

  He pushed past Grey, forgetting momentarily about his injury until that jarring pain shot from his forearm all the way up to the crown of his head. And still he didn’t stop. Gently hurrying people out of his way. He had to get through.

  “Father,” Grey shouted.

  Remmy stepped over a body lying prostrate on the ground. “He slept outside — the fool child!”

  “Don’t open the door!”

  A shroud seemed to cover another section of the room as more blankets were lifted over another window, but all Remmy could think of was Josue — the child who had offered his bed, choosing to sleep outside to make room for one more. It was Josue who had inspired Remmy to open his own quarters to the displaced families of the earthquake. Inspired or guilted, though unintentionally.

  The boy was the closest ensample of a true Christian Remmy had ever encountered, and it was no act. Remmy recalled walking into this church those seven years ago. Father Rosales had passed away but Rome had offered no replacement, and so the church had sat for months with only the rats and spiders to occupy its pews.

  And a single forgotten child.

  At six or seven, Josue had lived alone those several months in the church which consisted of just the assembly hall and one adjoining classroom at the time. There had been no one to notice he was missing. No one to care if he was gone. The church was both his home and prison, Josue unable to leave for fear of what others would do to him, especially with Father Rosales gone.

  Remmy recalled meeting the child that first day, a child that looked and moved like an animal. His bones pressed against jaundiced skin, that dark birth mark covering his face like a blooming disease. Remmy had cried out in fright. And then the child’s words. Though Remmy understood little Spanish, especially back then, these were words he had heard before, words he knew well.

  “No me matas … No me matas.”

  Don’t kill me.

  Something thudded against the outer door just as he made the last hurdle.

  “We don’t know what’s out there,” Grey shouted.

  “But I know who is out there.” Remmy reached toward the handle. “Cover your eyes! All of you! Cieren los ojos!”

  Families nearest the door covered their children, realizing what he intended to do. He prayed the rest would join them.

  Keeping himself behind the door, he opened it just a foot — enough space to let a thin fourteen-year old boy through. Even with his eyes shut and the solid door deflecting the open doorway, searing light slipped through the cracks, catapulting itself into his vision. The back of his eyelids was not the fleshy pink color you sometimes saw when presented with a bright light; this was an assault, the sun’s reflection off snow, blinding and brilliant. It sought him out with an intensity of purpose, as if it were an entity with its own will. He couldn’t help but feel a dark malignancy in that pursuit.

  As he felt his eyelids begin to lift, not of his own volition but the surging glow accosting him, Remmy shoved his weight back against the door.

  It barely moved.

  He grunted, throwing everything he had at it, but felt a physical weight bearing down from the opposite side, growing stronger by the second. Not a body, not even Josue; somehow he knew this alien light wanted nothing more than to devour this room. The light hungered for them and, sensing a leak in the dam, desired to break it open, forcing an avalanche of awful whiteness.

  A second body slammed into the door next to Remmy, the added force only preventing the door from opening wider.

  “Help us,” Grey pleaded.

  No translation was necessary. Eyes still shut against the metaphysical barrage, Remmy couldn’t see who joined them, but felt hands groping, shoulders pushing. It felt like an army was behind him, and still the boulder they pressed against barely budged.

  At last the gap closed, the door settling into its frame. Remmy threw the deadbolt home, grateful the previous pastor had installed it, then let his head fall against the worn wood. Soft whimpering and voices trying to comfort came from behind.

  “Thank you,” he said, to Grey, to those who had helped, to God maybe. He was never sure.

  “What was that,” Grey said. It wasn’t a question.

  Remmy turned from the door, opening his eyes. A screen of white blanketed everywhere he looked, like the aftermath of a strong camera flash. He hoped this too would fade.

  Near the door, and sprawled across two bodies still hiding beneath blankets, was Josue. The child who had taught him to believe again. The boy had made it inside.

  This time Remmy did thank God.

  “Josue,” he said, bending down on one knee despite the pain of old bones. “You’re okay?”

  Josue reached back, pushing off the bodies and turning to Remmy’s voice. “I am wonderful, Father.”

  Remmy gasped for the second time that morning. It wasn’t the dark birthmark that infested the left side of Josue’s face that caused such a reaction, it was the child’s eyes.

  They were completely white.

  A pasty film covered the iris and pupil of both eyes, like a layer of scar tissue. Josue would never see again.

  “I think I saw God,” Josue said with reverence.

  A tear fell quickly down Remmy’s wrinkled face. “My son, I believe you are right.”

  Verse IV.

  Faye Moanna was enveloped in darkness.

  The cowl pulled over her head kept her from catching even a glimpse of her surroundings. Her arms were bound tightly behind her back, with men both in front and behind her. Their uneven footfalls echoed through the hall or chamber or wherever they were.

  Something jammed into the small of her back, causing her to pick up her steps. For a moment at least. The rough flooring had constant catches and sudden gaps which made walking blindfolded a task requiring concentration. More than once she had brushed up against a wall, jagged edges pressing into her hand or arm just before the fall of a baton forced her back. She wondered, when they finally pulled the hood from her eyes, how much of her tattoo would be covered in a multi-hued collage of bruises.

  “A donde vamos?”

  Her captors never answered, regardless of whether she spoke English or Spanish. As for the alcalde, or head of this illegal operation, she had yet to hear from him since their arrival in this subterranean dungeon.

  She trudged along, each step jarring. Exhausted, hungry and frightened. The rank smell of mildewed rags pulled from a forgotten load of laundry permeated even through the mask she wore. Or maybe it was because of the mask.
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  Her thoughts again turned to her father. Watching that smug Venezuelan bastard cut him down, the force of the bullets propelling Dugan backward.

  Her father’s shock, as if he had really thought he would live forever.

  A torrent of emotions overtook her, possessed her — emotions she never thought she would feel.

  Not for him.

  Hadn’t she come here to kill him herself? Why then did she feel so empty knowing he was gone? Was it the knowledge that she was finally alone in the world, without family? Or was it because she hadn’t been the one to pull the trigger?

  A hand grabbed her, turning her ninety degrees, then shoved her forward. The second left in this twisting labyrinth.

  Sweat dripped down the sides of her face, her arms, and the small of her back. Wherever she was being led, she knew it might be her final resting place. Destined to become just another name on a list of missing tourists. Another reason to stay clear of third world countries; vacation close to home.

  Her boyfriend, Donavon, wouldn’t come to her rescue. He’d try, maybe, but ultimately he’d decide she was dead before his search had begun. The famous action hero so many women swooned over was a pussy when it came down to it. A shame it had taken such extreme circumstances for Faye to uncover the truth about him. She wasn’t even sure if he would miss her before moving on to his next conquest.

  Grey might organize a search, but he’d try to go the diplomatic route. Contact the authorities or, more likely, reach out to someone in the States. Who would you contact for something like this? The FBI? Homeland Security? It wouldn’t matter; by the time there’d be any traction — if there were any — she’d be long gone.

  If only Sir William were still alive. Faye didn’t understand his connections or what the Englishman knew about this native her father had been chasing, but she felt confident the old astronomer would have been able to do something. He left far too many questions unanswered with his death. And what about this Indian her father had been after? This … Shaman. Would her father’s men give up the search with Dugan now out of the picture? Or would they come for him?

  Faye was suddenly lifted off the ground from behind, one of the soldiers carrying her like a bride across the threshold of a honeymoon suite. Though this bride kicked and screamed.

  The back of her head connected with a jaw and she was released, weightless for the brief second before she hit the ground. With her arms bound behind her, she hit hard, her chin knocking against rough stone. She came to rest against the jutting outcrop of a wall, the taste of blood in her mouth.

  One of the men rolled her over then spit on her, the force of his loogie actually knocking her head back. She found herself oddly grateful for the cover on her face. The smell of the room was harsher than where they had travelled before, ripe with rot and decay.

  “Where am I? Donde estamos?”

  Her only answer was the long creak of a gate closing, bars rattling in place. The voices of her captors carried down the corridor, fading away.

  A prison. But this wasn’t the same jail they had held the camera crew in when they had first arrived. This was a place people went to be forgotten.

  Los Disparacidos.

  The Forgotten Ones.

  If she was going to stay alive she had to be useful, provide something they needed, or make them think she knew more than she did. That, or find this Shaman, and pray that if her father’s men came for him, they would let her go as well.

  If he was being held in the same place as her.

  As ideas began to form, her mind was struck as if with a physical force — screams echoed from down the corridor. Not just the cries of those in pain or the distress of torture, these wails were animalistic. Savage. The final throes of someone being ripped apart.

  The voice went silent with a deafening finality, though the noises of flesh tearing and some creature — or creatures — eating continued for what felt like an eternity.

  Where the hell am I?

  She wasn’t sure she wanted to know.

  There would be no rescue. Her only hope was enwrapped in a single, desperate plea.

  That she would die quickly.

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  THE CREATION SERIES

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  The Behrg is the author of dark literary works ranging from screenplays to ‘to-do’ lists. His debut novel, Housebroken, was a first-round Kindle Scout selection. He has had numerous short stories published both online and in print anthologies. His ‘to-do’ list should be finished by 2017 (though his wife is hoping for a little sooner).

  A former child actor turned wanna-be rockstar, The Behrg served a mission for his church in Venezuela where his newest series, The Creation, takes place. He lives in Southern California with his wife and four children, pet Shih-Tzu, and the many voices in his head.

  Stalk him at TheBehrg.com.

  Table of Contents

  IN THE BEGINNING Chapter One

  AXIS MUNDI Chapter Two