Meanwhile, the recruits and local volunteers were filling the streets around the temple. She had no idea how any of this would turn out. Maybe the Ascendi wouldn’t try to take the Conifer when he saw not only the local guards and their guns but the additional number of Hamiad, Skunk, Krem, and the other recruits. If Zatra was correct and the Sinsers still monitored the Ascendi’s actions here, then he couldn’t open fire on them. Not without a justified threat.
She sucked in a breath, feeling the weight of the warm water and humid air in her lungs. It was hard to believe, but maybe her stepdad hadn’t been as nuts as she thought.
Almost a year after he’d nearly strangled her, she’d been studying in the kitchen when she heard someone walking toward the study. Tobias and her mom had gone to dinner, meaning it was Krem. Sure enough, she caught him in the doorway, staring into the study.
Look at all this, he said.
She didn’t want to go near the place. Come on, close the door, she urged.
Look at this first, though.
I’ve seen it before.
Yeah, but…just look.
She relented and decided she’d peek inside only to satisfy him. As many photos, drawings, and typed-up pages covered the walls as she remembered. Some were loose, dangling by a single piece of tape, others framed in wood.
She’d promised herself only a small peek. But this was too much to take in at once. She wanted to know what it all meant. What it led to. Blue thread linked certain pieces together, like evidence of some great conspiracy. She noticed the raw wood lining the edge of his desk as if someone scraped it off. A lopsided rack sat in the bookshelf, a few books shredded down the middle.
Pitying Tobias, she picked up a photo of Anunnaki off the ground and placed it back on his desk. Then she and Krem closed the door. He must’ve known they’d entered somehow because the next day at breakfast, he said, “Interesting stuff in my study, huh?”
She decided not to beat around the bush.
“I’m sorry. I only wanted Krem to leave it alone….”
She trailed off. He didn’t even seem angry. Still, that room was full of triggers for his PTSD. Just talking about it seemed a danger.
“I’d wonder too. I do, in fact,” he said, pulling up a sheaf of papers and placing it on the table. “These are intercepts of Anunnaki conversations from overseas.”
“Intercepts?”
“Yes. Nothing dangerous.” He gestured to his long-range radio. “I receive broadcasts of some of the shows they play for their human supporters. And I copy down the words with that.”
He motioned to the brown, cold-looking typewriter.
“What are you looking for?” she asked, and immediately wished she didn’t. What if the answer was his trigger?
“It’s not what I’m looking for. It’s what are the Anunnaki looking for?” He swept his hand from one side of the room to the other, landing on a black-and-white photo of a jewel that looked like Johnny’s Conifer. “In the last few years of the Shroud War, I was part of a team who guarded something. I’ve listened to hundreds of radio shows with Anunnaki and humans. Every so often, someone mentions rumors that the Anunnaki are looking for powerful stones. That is a picture of a device used in the Shroud War, which may still exist. I believe the Anunnaki are seeking those. Anunnaki with this symbol.”
He pointed to a drawing of an eye within a triangle.
“But I don’t yet know the exact purpose.”
He seemed keen on telling her this. The truth was that she didn’t really find it all too interesting. She’d wanted to interrupt and say she needed to go back to schoolwork, but he might consider that rude. That would mean a lecture.
“Since you’re so interested, follow me.”
He grabbed a couple of books on Nebirian linguistics off the shelf and led them into the kitchen area. She got the sense this was his way of punishing her without yelling or screaming. Maybe he was enjoying it.
“I’m going to teach you Nebirian,” he said, plopping the books down on the table. They hit hard. “You and I are going to figure out what the Anunnaki are up to.”
“And what if we can’t?” Sarah asked, trying to imagine what he’d say if she admitted she didn’t want to do this. Sometimes, she’d heard him speaking Nebirian and thought he was having a flashback.
“Then we’ll train you to be a translator for the Anunnaki. They’ll need translators when they take over for good.”
She was going to smile because he must’ve been joking in the dark way he sometimes did. Only he looked dead serious, mirthless and focused, as he flipped open the first book.
There was a knock on the bathroom door. Zatra. Sarah asked her to knock at eleven thirty. Drawing a bath for herself proved soothing for her muscles and nerves. She’d almost removed all traces of worry from her mind. But now it was time.
She reached down into the tub, focused on the warm, blissful smell of roses and cream for a couple of seconds, and tugged at the drain. The air against her skin brought with it the ominous reality of what waited outside.
So many of the Anunnaki conversations she’d overheard with Tobias proved useless. Nothing more than social calls, really. Criticisms of the Sinsers’ smallest decisions, fussing over the latest fashions of famous Anunnaki, endless political arguments. Pointless things. Not anything military related. The conversations were all Anunnaki-to-Anunnaki messages intercepted from the World Tree by resistance hackers and transmitted to Tobias. Because they were intended for Anunnaki, the messages contained a lot of rambling. They could afford to ramble with their long life-spans.
One night Dolores invited Sarah to a gathering at her house. She had such a lack of experience questioning Tobias that she blurted out her request.
“Do I have to do this tonight?” she said when he brought her a radio with the recorded intercepted messages. “Can’t I go out instead?”
“What do you mean, do I have to do this tonight?” he asked, clearly offended. “This is what you do every night.”
“I just meant if maybe I could skip it tonight?”
“Is that what you want to do?” he asked, voice rising.
She found herself constantly at a loss for words around him. Anything she said he could twist around, and that left her with nothing.
“My friend invited me to her house tonight.”
“Did your friend know you would be busy?”
“Yeah, but…”
“But what?”
“I…I…” Sarah stammered. She was sick of listening to Nebirian and writing it down for him. She wanted a break. But she couldn’t say that to his face. His triangle-shaped face.
“I only thought maybe it wasn’t working.”
“What’s not working?” He wasn’t yelling. He was speaking loud, though. Loud and controlled. Really getting into it.
“Me translating the intercepts.”
“You haven’t been in my study lately, so how would you know?”
She couldn’t maintain eye contact with him. But she wouldn’t let herself look away. Instead, she found herself focusing on the spot where his nose curved into his brows. Had it always been that size? His ears seemed to grow out of proportion too.
“I guess I wouldn’t.”
“Exactly,” he said emphatically. “Let me tell you something. I know you don’t like doing this, but you can’t run away from it. You’ve never fought in war, so you don’t know what it’s like to live under the Anunnaki. You can’t run away. They’re not lurking out in the stars. There isn’t a chance they will try and conquer us completely. They’re here on Earth. They tried to control us once. And they’re going to try again. It’s a certainty.”
Sarah dried herself with a couple of towels off the rack and pulled fresh clothes from the door hanger. Simple brown pants and a black-blue long-sleeve shirt she’d found in the dresser of room 24. A lot more suitable than a tunic top, given the circumstances. She slipped the medals, Johnny’s medals, into her pocket and added her clip-on knife
sheath.
As she dressed, a shadow passed over the glass panel, steam still lingering. She gave her hair a last squeeze, pressed it back, and entered into the bedroom. It was dark except for a glowing candle on a dresser.
Zatra sat atop the bed, her head wound healed thanks to Samir’s generosity with the temple’s water. Her eyes gleamed back as she tapped her fingers to the designator. No doubt compiling evidence to incriminate the Ascendi.
She opened her mouth to tell her good-bye when a crashing noise beckoned her to the window. The flaps were closed, leaving only a trickle of light. She pressed her eyes to it, and in a spot where the wood flap splintered, she saw the Anunnaki soldiers lining the streets, New Bagram’s recruits and local guards staring them down.
A woman screamed outside of a house as two Anunnaki dragged dresser drawers from it and swung them onto the street, clothes flying everywhere.
Chapter 13
This looked like a raid as if the Anunnaki were New Bagram police searching a criminal’s house for evidence. But they weren’t. Sarah studied the recruits and locals. They were holding their ground, rifles in hand. Hate filled their eyes.
The Anunnaki soldiers moved to a second house and smashed through the front door. After a few minutes of thudding and crashing noises, they marched out with drawers of silverware and a cardboard box of plates and cups.
“There is nothing dangerous in my house. Please leave,” a man begged from outside, clutching his wife and son to his sides.
The Anunnaki must’ve known that they wouldn’t find Zatra or the Conifer inside. It was as the Ascendi hinted, I wouldn’t want to disturb your town. If Samir wouldn’t give him what he wanted, the Ascendi planned to provoke a surrender.
Sarah explained it to Zatra.
They are following standard operating procedure, I am afraid, Zatra said. There is nothing you can do but let it pass.
Sarah figured she’d better see how Samir and Ibdan were holding up.
I’ll come back as soon as I can, Sarah told her.
Be safe, Zatra said.
Sarah bypassed the guards and worked her way down into the lobby. It was practically empty. For now. If a battle broke out, Samir had decided that those injured would come here. It would be safer than the infirmary. The few people standing around consisted of a couple of guards and two women in white who must’ve been the doctor and nurse. They, too, were caught up in the commotion, pinned to the window.
Sarah walked past them, through the hotel grounds, and joined a group of onlookers in the street. A hundred feet down the stretch, an Anunnaki soldier snatched a teddy bear out of a child’s hand and tore it in half.
“What is the point of this?” the mother cried, grabbing her son.
The soldier ignored her and tossed the shredded bear halves to the dirt. They moved to the next house, passing by Krem, Skunk, and a few other recruits, standing as serious as statues. Fighting back anger, no doubt. Trying their hardest not to take the revenge they deserved. Others trembled, swallowing or breathing out slowly through their mouths every few seconds. As soon as Samir allowed it, the doctor had given each recruit sips from a canteen of the fountain water. The guards armed them with rifles of their choice.
She issued a long sigh. The Ascendi had to know the Conifer’s location. But he wanted to start a shootout, didn’t he?
It could happen at any second. One of the recruits or a local might decide enough was enough, raise his gun, and pull the trigger. All hell would break loose as easy as that.
She held back the urge to call to Krem. To remind him he didn’t need to be out there, endangering himself. She’d promised their mother never to fight, but he’d promised himself to New Bagram’s sponsors as a recruit. He’d only ever enlisted because he hated Tobias as much as her. I’m sick of his condescending tone. And why is he spending so much time in his study when he ended up almost killing you?
Tobias had always dared Krem to do it. Join and wash out. That’s how most of their arguments had ended.
She visited Krem in his cargo-plane barracks once early on. Almost immediately one boy said, “Hey, it’s the sister of what-would-Johnny-do boy.”
Krem grimaced and walked with her outside.
“What do they mean?” Sarah asked.
“It’s something I said once. They won’t let me forget it.”
“Huh?”
Krem’s cheeks burned red with shame. “I, well, I didn’t want to bring up Tobias. So I said I joined because it’s what Johnny would do. And I think that was probably the stupidest thing I’ve ever said.”
“Tell them the real reason.”
Krem cast his head from side to side. “It’s more than that. I feel like they know I don’t want to be here.”
She asked him to explain, but he never brought himself to. And she knew there was nothing she could do. He’d have to work his way through this. Apparently he had by befriending Johnny, Hamiad, and Skunk in their pranks, acting on their orders even if it meant setting himself up for latrine duties or getting a bloody lip from the other recruits. She’d always wondered what their dad, their real dad, would’ve said about all that.
Chatter in Nebirian jarred her from old concerns.
They aren’t taking the bait. Should we continue?
The Anunnaki paused, then nodded. I understand.
He nudged a soldier next to him and grinned a serpentine grin. The Ascendi’s going after the Conifer. Wants us to continue, though. Eventually we’ll break them.
Sarah wanted to call out to Krem more than ever as panic coiled inside her. The situation was rapidly spiraling out of control. If the Ascendi was going for the temple…no. There was only the hope of the wailer. Once Ibdan convinced Samir to resist, Sarah asked Zatra for the wailer. She tweaked it to only affect Anunnaki hearing, and they gave it to Ibdan. He determined to hide the wailer inside the temple and activate it only as a last-resort scenario. That was, if the local guards and recruits there didn’t deter the Ascendi and his troops.
How did he plan to make them disperse? Likely some nonlethal method. Maybe an oratory irritant. It’s what they used on larger crowds. And it was authorized by order of the Sinsers. Not that it mattered. Because as soon as the Ascendi tried to take the temple, Hamiad would activate the wailer. And battle would officially commence. Because even if it only stunned them, the Naga considered using a wailer against them a violent act.
The only hope was to reach the temple before that time. She began running before she even knew where she was going. In minutes, she found herself in the hotel’s garden. If she crossed through, she’d arrive near the main entrance. And the temple wouldn’t be much farther. A few streets away at most.
But as her feet raced over the grass, a burst of machine-gun fire echoed across the city. Ibdan. It sounded so close, icing her eardrums. On instinct, she ducked.
Rifles went off. From Krem’s location. Pulse surges followed. Hot, searing acid erupted inside her. The Anunnaki had every excuse to go on a shooting spree now. They could claim Utbashi was full of hostiles, and technically that was true. Ibdan had fired the first shot.
The safe idea was to stay here. Stay here and avoid the fight altogether. The Anunnaki deserved to die, but she’d made a promise to her mom.
Soon after Krem signed up as a New Bagram recruit, Sarah began to get the idea of joining herself. Girls couldn’t normally join without petitioning. And she was sure Johnny would serve as her sponsor.
But that spring, Tobias received his annual “checkup” from nurses. Sarah recognized this nurse because she used to go to the same school.
She came out of Tobias’s bedroom in a black trench coat that hid most of her curves, nursing a cigarette. Sarah stopped her sketch of Johnny and looked up.
“Can you draw me?” the nurse asked.
That took her aback. She’d gotten pretty good with portraits, but only under her mom’s helping. And she didn’t normally do requests.
“I still remember your mom’s art
class,” the nurse said. She had black hair, but pale, powdery skin. “I asked your mom about drawing people at an angle. I never could get the hang of that.” She gave a weary sigh.
“Why?” Sarah said, unable to help herself. “Why do you do this?”
The nurse brushed back her hair, patting her hands where her trench coat covered her legs.
“I hear you got some combat skills. A girl like you could do well as a Watcher enlistee. I thought about doing it, but no one was going to sponsor me. All the other guys saw me as…well, this.”
That decided it for Sarah. After Krem joined, her mother had filled canvas after canvas with paintings of him for a few weeks. Most she never finished. Sometimes she’d sketch him only to crumple the paper halfway through. Losing their dad, now Krem. She would join, but not right away. Only time could help her mom.
So Sarah waited until that October. The deadline to begin a petition was October 15. But even then, months since Krem moved out, her mom didn’t paint in the same way she used to. She’d taken off that fall from teaching, opting to spend her free time more around the house. Helping Tobias when she could, or preparing lunches for Sarah.
She couldn’t bring herself to ask her mom to sign the parental release form. Sooner or later, she would know, but better later, Sarah decided. She picked up the petition form and forged her mom’s signature on all the necessary papers.
Sarah turned it in the next day before school. As they’d planned, Johnny would go in to petition for her later that day. Only, he confessed after school that he couldn’t do it. She couldn’t believe it. After all their talks about how they hated their stepdads, he’d gone and betrayed her. Ended her chance to escape Tobias.
When she returned home, her mom sat hunched over the table, red-eyed. Tissues filled the trash. The recruiters must’ve sent the form home after Johnny refused to petition for her.
The Deadliest Earthling Page 32