The Deadliest Earthling

by Gibson Morales

  “Shut up,” Johnny snapped. “You’re not part of our team now. You’re going to be a prisoner.”

  He thought about the Games with a tinge of guilt even if he had nothing to feel responsible about.

  “You’ll receive fair treatment,” Johnny added sternly, but it still sounded forced.

  “But try anything and you know what will happen,” Skunk said, baring his teeth.

  The Ascendi nodded, face impassive. He knew the drill of being captured all too well, didn’t he?

  “I’m probably safer with you than with the Sinsers.”

  Johnny ignored the implications of that and checked his watch. It survived, thanks to the gravity Conifer’s field. It read 12:01 p.m. There was still a chance that the Ascendi could try to activate the Ark. He wouldn’t rest until they were safely past 12:10 and Mars’s signal lost its perfect alignment with Earth.

  “Let’s each take a Conifer,” Johnny said. A touch of sadness hit him as he realized his Conifer, his parents’ Conifer, was gone.

  Right now he’d be responsible for the Ascendi. Which meant he’d keep the gravity Conifer. He slipped the other two to Hamiad and Sarah.

  “What, nothing for me?” Krem said snarkily, still on the ground.

  Johnny smiled. “Sorry. But I thought you’d be better off recovering.”

  Krem waved it off.

  The staccato of gunfire and pulse surges cut their little exchange of humor short. Startled, they tensed up and looked around. Not too far away, Brotherhood soldiers were spilling down the crater, rounding up slave and Anunnaki alike. Some Anunnaki were resisting. Futile against so many militia. Not quite as many as Johnny remembered. He wondered if a glider had killed some of them as they’d tried to escape.

  Facing the Ascendi, one more pressing matter forced its way out of him.

  “What’s to stop the Sinsers from sending in a glider or reinforcements?” he asked.

  The Ascendi studied him, genuinely surprised. As if the possibility never crossed his mind.

  “I thought you understood. I went rogue a long time ago. They would’ve killed me once the Ark was activated.”

  Right. An image of the Ascendi’s dead clone came to him.

  “So what does that mean?”

  “I cut off communications with them. Prevented outgoing signals unless they were necessary to avoid suspicion. Communications were minimal here, anyway. It was hard enough for the others maintaining contact without their visors.”

  The others. That piqued Johnny’s curiosity, but somehow he didn’t feel enough to ask. His parents taught him a long time ago that you never showed your prisoner weakness. Never let them see the opportunity for friendship. And for as harsh as that was, he wasn’t about to risk anything right now.

  “It might help to tell your soldiers to stand down,” Johnny said, watching the militia gun down several more Anunnaki. They were shouting all around. But a good shouting. In control and orderly.

  He could hear them running up to them from behind.

  And then a rattle of gunfire sent shivers through him. Too close for comfort.

  The Ascendi staggered forward, and he saw the blood on its head. The soldiers had shot it.

  “All of you, hands up,” a crude voice said. Several rifle slides pulled back.

  Johnny pursed his lips, let the idea of the dead Ascendi sink in. “Hide your Conifers,” he whispered.

  He got the sense that these militia were hardly any better than the Anunnaki.

  Chapter 53

  They surrounded them, guns leveled. Johnny studied the Ascendi. There was no point in trying to heal him, was there? The militia obviously wanted him dead. After the Minor used the gravity Conifer to take away their guns, they probably decided the Ascendi were too dangerous to leave alive. Still, he felt the need to undermine the obvious overuse of force.

  “We could’ve used the Ascendi,” Johnny cried. “As a hostage.”

  “No one asked your opinion.”

  But you would if you knew I was the deadliest earthling, Johnny thought.

  The man was tall and lanky for a soldier. Still muscular, though. Wearing a dark red jacket and jet-black jeans.

  “I am Callisto,” he said with an accent Johnny couldn’t place. “I speak for this militia group.” He gestured to the men already setting up tents and plopping down barbed wire around the perimeters of the crater. “What I would like to know is how this happened? How five teenagers have survived and how this crater got here?”

  Johnny’s first instinct was to look to his friends, but he stopped himself. That would be a dead giveaway that he was planning to lie. Instead, he faced Callisto, catching the scent of coffee and something burned.

  “My name is Johnny Aldrin,” he said, hoping his voice came off steady.

  Callisto’s eyes narrowed. “You’re the deadliest earthling?”

  Johnny nodded. He’d have to play this up.

  “So then, what happened? Where are the Conifers?”

  “The Ascendi was going to execute us. Then the shuttle crash-landed and we ended up inside. We activated the gravity generator to its highest setting. That killed most of the Anunnaki soldiers.”

  Callisto turned to his men and exchanged words in a language Johnny didn’t know. The men and women overwhelmed him with their unusual appearances. Piercings, dark eyeliner, red and green sunglasses, copper necklaces and rings, hair dyed in bright colors, faces tattooed with rich, intricate designs, rainbow-colored canes. Some were still dressed in the fake worshipper white thobes. But others wore everything from black, tattered shirts to grey, wrinkled robes to inside-out hooded jackets and jeans.

  “We saw you floating,” Callisto said. “Care to explain that? Or how you survived the gravity generator?”

  Johnny didn’t think they’d question him so much. He did think he’d come up with some kind of an explanation. But he was exhausted, shoulders drooping and muscles aching.

  A few seconds passed in silence.

  “Well?” Callisto barked.

  Johnny didn’t mean to hesitate, but he was short of an answer. The men moved in to frisk them. As soon as he recognized the gesture, Johnny dug his hand into his pants pocket and felt the gravity Conifer. In the seconds between them moving in and actually frisking him, he flattened it out with its own power.

  They patted him and the others down, but sure enough, they didn’t notice the flat Conifers under their clothing.

  Callisto seemed unsatisfied.

  “You lot aren’t leaving until we get some answers. Think of it as a debriefing.”

  Johnny held his ground. He wasn’t in any rush to get back. In a way, he preferred to stay here. To make sure the Ark wasn’t somehow activated.

  The Brotherhood militia sorted him and the others into separate tents. Checking his watch proved a silly idea. They removed it as soon as they noticed it. And so, sitting there on the dirt, he was left to mentally count off the minutes. But little by little they passed.

  When he heard a commotion, he worried that somehow the Anunnaki had found them. Instead, he detected cheering.

  “What happened?” Johnny asked the two guards in his tent.

  They only shot him dirty looks.

  Going by the time, it must’ve been ten minutes past the hour. The planets were unaligned by now. Despite the fact that he was a prisoner among fanatical soldiers, he smiled inwardly. For now, humanity was safe. The Ark could no longer be activated no matter who got the Conifers.

  His spirit spiked. But the monotony of the waiting dampened things after that. Callisto came by and asked him if he was ready to talk. He merely shook his head. After a few attempts by Callisto, Johnny began responding, “Let us go. We’ve done nothing wrong.”

  Callisto laughed the first time. Then he only seemed annoyed, frowning and storming out of the tent. Johnny passed the time resting. His guards didn’t care that he lay down and slept. In the moments of alertness, he listened to the chatter around. It was mostly in that language h
e didn’t understand. But sometimes he swore he heard the word “Conifer.”

  A sick thought dawned on him. Maybe Zacharia tasked the militia with bringing back the Conifers. He could’ve easily offered them a monetary reward or even just introduced the possibility to them. Surely a resistance-fighter network would covet the Conifers as weapons.

  But could Zacharia really have put them up to this? All to punish him for trying to get out of his role as the deadliest earthling? He didn’t know Zacharia enough to say either way. That was the trouble.

  He could only hope that his friends didn’t give anything up. Not that they had a reason to. So long as this didn’t lead to torture or anything twisted, Johnny saw no reason not to wait this out.

  He found himself digging his hands through the dirt. Partly out of boredom but also out of hope that he might stumble upon his Conifer. See the ruby red shining through the black. Could it really be gone after all these years? He doubted anyone could find it through all the rubble. At least not for a few days. Anyway, it didn’t matter, since he wasn’t the deadliest earthling or the Keeper now. Strangely, the notion didn’t mean much anymore. It felt like having a birthday by himself. Sure, he knew there was a change, but it was arbitrary. Meaningless in and of itself.

  A couple of hours later, Callisto came in, already saying something. “You’re lucky he vouched for you.”

  Johnny was half-asleep and stirred at the intrusion. He must’ve missed something.

  “Who? What?” he muttered.

  “Get up. We’re sending you back.”

  I’m free? Johnny wanted to ask, but that sounded far too good to be true.

  He decided to go with the flow. Following Callisto outside, he found his friends standing there too, all as confused and relieved as he was. Sarah greeted him with a smile. Hamiad with a sterner, wearier look. He must’ve overslept. Krem and Skunk simply nodded.

  Another pair of soldiers led them past rows of tents, bonfires, supply stacks, and barbed wire up the slope. When they were atop the ridge, Johnny turned around to see what had become of the Tabernacle site. It resembled an encampment. A settlement even. Kids and women carrying babies were flowing in from around the crater. What a place to start a new life. And after a few seconds, he recognized an individual passing by them. Leaky Sam. The bartender from New Bagram. Thinning hairline, mustache, and all.

  He smiled at the coincidence and couldn’t stop himself.

  “Hey,” Johnny said.

  Leaky Sam paused, clearly stunned by the coincidence. “Johnny Aldrin?”

  “The one and only.”

  Saying this, Johnny noticed the camera hanging on Leaky Sam’s shoulder.

  And because their escorts seemed pacified compared to Callisto and the men who aimed guns at them earlier, Johnny said, “I owe you a photo, don’t I?”

  He stepped onto the slope and posed in front of the Tabernacle.

  “This’ll make a hell of a photo,” Leaky Sam said. “The Keeper at the Tabernacle.”

  But when he gave Johnny a pen, he signed it as the deadliest earthling.

  As they mounted camels, he recognized more and more people. New Bagram refugees.

  The ride back was quiet. He and his friends could’ve said a million things to each other, but they stayed silent. Not because they were still tired or weak. But because they didn’t have to.

  Epilogue

  After what Johnny and the others had accomplished, he wouldn’t be surprised to hear of increased abductions, probings, and orbital strikes on Watcher strongholds. Johnny didn’t care to worry about that. Now that his friends were safe, he spent the time either catching up with them or thinking about rescuing Orun. As for the one who vouched for them, he figured it was either a New Bagramite or Zacharia. Or maybe the Brotherhood thought the Eagle was a man.

  For safety, they had returned to a sub-outpost then rode camels to a village farther east. It delayed Johnny’s chance to see the Eagle and get a proper debriefing for a few days. They waited at the village until a hot Tuesday morning when a courier delivered a message and meeting place. It was only a few blocks from where he and his friends were staying.

  So here he sat in Dagos’s makeshift private chamber, his friends waiting downstairs for their debriefings, Juan outside. It was a standard bedroom with an old shattered television, bookshelf, a few rifles, and lamp. Papers cluttered a small desk, and Johnny imagined the various mission details and battle plans these might carry. He recognized one as the paper Dagos looked at sometimes. Only now, he saw the other side. It was a faded photo of a young boy. The one the Ascendi Major took from her.

  From behind the desk, she gestured to the chair before her.

  As Johnny sat, dust shot out from the sitting pad.

  Dagos smiled. “The fugitive life just isn’t what it used to be. Even when you’re the most wanted.”

  “It’s nothing.”

  When he’d imagined this debriefing, he figured the Eagle would never convince him to say much. He thought he’d be bitter and resentful. But really he was glad to see her. Compared to the Brotherhood, she didn’t seem so bad. It was strange how the right people got you to drop your defenses sometimes.

  “I can’t forget, you’ve really been through battle now. You’ve seen things.”

  “I’m not the little boy you knew at Bagram,” he said quietly.

  “No and since you aren’t, I value your opinion that much more. Do you have anything you want to report in particular? Any major concerns? No pun intended.”

  Johnny hesitated. Like trusting the militia to save my friends? The thought refused to stay dormant. But he couldn’t say that. “No.”

  Dagos’s smile was a labyrinth. “Then if you wouldn’t mind giving me a rundown of the events.”

  Johnny spent a few seconds gathering his thoughts. He fleshed it all out. The good, the bad, and the extraterrestrial.

  The Eagle’s eyes dimmed at the mentions of Sledge, Demo, and Ninja.

  But she didn’t seem as crushed as he expected about her daughter. Then he understood why.

  “Laura reported much the same,” the Eagle said.

  Johnny’s face lit up. “She made it?”

  The Eagle nodded. “The Brotherhood soldiers found her in the rubble.”

  Johnny stammered on his own words. He felt like he needed to say how glad he was. That at least Laura made it. But it wasn’t that simple. A jumble of emotions stopped the words in his throat. Pain at losing Sledge and slight horror at Demo’s and Ninja’s deaths.

  The Eagle offered a faint, but reassuring smile. Not that they could do anything to change what happened, but a smile that said she knew how he felt.

  “There were a lot of road bumps. Demo and Radius lost so suddenly. The Snake-eaters are some of our best soldiers. Were…” she corrected herself.

  Johnny nodded. What if he had lost his friends, too? If the Brotherhood militia had continued their earlier onslaught, they might’ve wiped out many innocent slaves. The more he tried to shove his qualm aside, the more it nagged him. And she had tried to warn him. There are a lot of snakes out there, she’d said.

  “It is hard for a woman in my fugitive position to speak to a large audience and ask this, so I ask it in small circles. Let’s give a moment of silence to those who died at Mount Nebo. On the strike team and the militia army.”

  They shut their eyes, bowed their heads, and said nothing for ten seconds.

  Then Dagos breathed deeply and fixed her gaze on Johnny. He decided he’d say something now and get it over with.

  “The Watchers aren’t going to work with the Brotherhood again, right?”

  The Eagle issued a sigh, her eyes a faded black. “Unfortunately, I am only a figurehead. Men like Zacharia are the ones with the agendas and the leverage.”

  “But we’re all on the same team, aren’t we?”

  “Yes and no. Zacharia has always held his own views about how to wage this war. And he’s always had his supporters. We’ve never quite se
en eye to eye, if that’s what you’re asking.”

  Johnny clenched one arm in his hand. “Would he ever do something to put me in danger?”

  “I sincerely doubt it. I don’t believe he’s that strong in his beliefs.”

  “But something about him seemed wrong.”

  The Eagle nodded. “Even we humans have our flaws. Best not to worry about it now. I hear you are done as a soldier.”

  Johnny opened his mouth, then closed it. He’d thought about this on the journey back. About the things the Eagle was now disclosing to him on the divisions even within the Watchers. The deadliest earthling persona wasn’t something he wanted for himself. But he had a miserable feeling that if he gave it up, the Eagle or Zacharia would replace him with someone else. The idea had struck him that maybe he should stay as the deadliest earthling and at least do some good with it. Because he could accomplish good things with it, right?

  Anyway, he still needed to save Orun.

  “About that,” Johnny said. “I’m going to stay on a little longer, if that’s okay. Until we rescue Orun.”

  A hint of surprise glimmered in the Eagle’s eyes.

  “I’ll do everything on my part to see that the perfect team is formed to save him. The deadliest earthling title was originally his idea.”

  That took Johnny aback. He didn’t think she’d bring this up to him.

  “Yeah, he used to call me that,” Johnny said, disheartened.

  “He wanted you to use the title,” the Eagle said, confirming his worst suspicions. That Orun never really saw him as more than a soldier. “He believed the best way for you to move past others’ pity was for you to take on a new role.”

  “What?”

  “He knew, as we all did, that many people looked down on you because of your parents. And I believe he wanted far more than for you to always live in their shadow. So he proposed that when the time was right, you don a new title. One that would set you apart from the name Aldrin.”