Valley of Dry Bones

by J. F. Penn

  Morgan looked over at Jake. He shook his head almost imperceptibly, and she cursed his need to fulfill the mission, to retrieve the relics as well as Naomi. She trusted him enough to follow through with whatever he had in mind, but she felt the threatening edge of her own weakness lying beneath that certainty.

  Luis nodded at Lashonda. She opened the pack, pulling out the packages that held the finger bones. Morgan found herself holding her breath in anticipation. These relics had not been together for centuries and whatever the truth of their mythological power, they had been protected for generations. Was the Hand of Ezekiel really of God, or was it from the darkness?

  Lashonda laid the finger bones on a workbench, and for a moment, Morgan thought they were free and clear. They could just walk out with Naomi and make it back to San Francisco for a late-night drink.

  But then everything changed.

  Luis bent to examine the bone from Lima. He looked up sharply, his eyes blazing with anger. “This one is empty. It’s a shell. The powder inside is missing.”

  Jake shrugged. “It was in a pile of bones in the lost chambers of a catacomb. We were lucky to even find it.”

  Luis thumped his fist on the table, shaking the other relics. “It’s not enough. You’ll pay for the failure. We need more test subjects, and she will be the first.”

  He turned toward Naomi, but Jake didn’t even wait for the end of the sentence. He moved fast, spinning low, ducking under Julio’s arm. He thrust up hard, knocking the barrel of the gun up and away.

  Julio shot off a couple of rounds. Luis ducked and pulled Lashonda down with him as bullets pinged off the metallic pipes above.

  A sudden hissing sound filled the room as one burst. Water sprayed out, dripping down the walls.

  Morgan dove sideways, rolling to her feet, pulling the ceramic knife from her boot, yanking back Julio’s throat as Jake pinned his arm. She held the blade at his jugular. “Easy now.”

  Jake took the gun off him and pointed it at Luis and Lashonda cowering on the floor. “Now we’re going to do this my way.”

  A moment of silence, then a voice, reedy and weak.

  “Jake.”

  Naomi stood against the bars, one hand clutched against her chest. Red blood soaked through her gown where two bullets had torn into her. She sank to her knees, eyes closing as she collapsed.

  “No!” Jake shouted.

  His distraction gave Julio an opening. The big bodyguard thrust both fists behind him, raking his fingers down Morgan’s burned legs. She howled and backed away, explosions of white-hot pain wracking her body as she dropped to the ground, clutching at her thighs, breath fast.

  Julio snatched for the weapon.

  Jake spun back toward him, enraged. He used the butt of the gun to whip Julio on the side of his head, knocking the man to the ground, taking his rage out on the bodyguard even as Julio fought back.

  The men tussled, sliding through the water that dripped onto the floor from the leaking pipes, but Jake’s anger drove him harder. He straddled the bodyguard, punching him over and over –

  The high-pitched whine of an alarm filled the room. Elena’s monitor. Her heartbeat had stopped.

  “No!” Luis shuffled over to his little girl’s bedside, Lashonda ahead of him.

  She checked the monitors, grabbed defibrillator paddles. She paused with them over the little girl’s chest. “This is the fourth time tonight. She can’t take much more.”

  Luis urged her on as tears streamed down his face. “Do it, please. Don’t let her go.”

  Lashonda placed the paddles and shocked the tiny body. The monitor flared into life again but then died. She pressed the button again.

  Morgan watched from the floor in a haze of pain. As they worked on the little girl in desperation, she finally understood why this broken man was willing to risk everything, perhaps even eternal damnation, to keep his daughter alive.

  Jake held Julio down with a bloody fist and punched him hard one more time. As the bodyguard slumped in a daze, Jake ran over to Naomi in the cell.

  He touched her hand. “Hold on now, we’re getting you out of here.”

  Naomi looked up at him, her arm clutching her chest as blood pooled around her.

  “It’s too late,” she whispered, reaching up and stroking Jake’s cheek. Then she gazed across the room at Elena. “Save her …”

  Naomi’s arm dropped, and her head lolled to one side. Jake reached through the bars, pulling her to him.

  At that moment, Elena’s monitor flatlined, and from where she lay, Morgan saw the shadow of death lengthen in front of her, while those who fought against it stood like Ezekiel pleading with the Lord for one last breath.

  “There’s still a chance,” Lashonda said, once again the cool-headed scientist. “I’m almost there with the formula. The last batch was so close. Perhaps one of these bones contains the missing element.”

  “Test them,” Luis said, his eyes glazed as he looked down at his daughter. “Do it. Now.”

  Lashonda went to the table where the relics lay. She gathered them up and carried them over to her lab bench. Morgan watched as the scientist used a syringe to plunge through the wax of the most intact finger bone and extract some of what lay within.

  “I’ve already synthesized a formula based on Haitian voodoo and records gathered from West Africa.” Lashonda placed the off-white powder in a vial and shook it. “But something was missing. I used it on batches of test subjects, and some came back, but they were raving, they were animals. We had to …” She pointed beyond the curtain to the dead bodies on the gurneys. “So, there has to be something else.”

  She placed the vial in a mass spectrometer and began the analysis of the bone powder. “This will take a few minutes, and then I can compare the samples. Find the differential.” Her eyes flicked over to Naomi in the cell. “Then I need to test the batch.”

  Jake whirled around, his eyes blazing in anger. “No. You can’t use her that way. It’s not what she would have wanted …”

  His words trailed off and Morgan saw realization dawn on his face. Naomi’s outstretched arm still reached toward Elena and her last words had been for the little girl.

  Luis pulled a bunch of keys from his pocket. “They spent time together in the last days,” he said softly. “Naomi spoke of her lost sister.”

  He threw the keys over to Jake. “Here, lift her out and help me move them both into the resurrection room back here.”

  Jake caught the keys and stood for a moment looking down at them.

  Then he straightened up and unlocked Naomi’s cell, pulling her from within. He lifted her prone body, and she lolled in his arms, her blood soaking through his shirt. Morgan pushed down the pain in her legs and pulled herself up, following them into the resurrection room.

  It was shadowed inside with the sweet smell of incense in the air, a far cry from the bright lights of the medical lab beyond. This was a place of worship, a place where the saints could intercede for the living. But the smell of the dead was here too and in the glimmer of candlelight, Morgan noticed stains on the floor, offerings to an ancient god who demanded blood sacrifice. The bodies on the gurneys had been shot in here, executed when they had returned as something less than human.

  A thick scarlet candle stood on a plain stone altar, casting flickering shadows over the silver box that lay open on top. The box of bone they had only seen in pictures, the box that completed the Hand of Ezekiel.

  Luis laid Elena down on one of the gurneys. He tucked a blanket around her, and even as tears streamed down his face, he shackled her tiny wrists to the metal frame. His hands shook, his eyes never leaving her.

  Jake placed Naomi’s body down on another gurney next to the little girl, her face just as innocent, her skin barely marked with a wrinkle. Morgan reached out and checked Naomi’s pulse, but she already knew there was nothing left in this earthly shell. She had not known the woman in life, but she was a fellow agent, and deserved better than this accidental d
eath on a cursed island.

  She looked at Jake. “Did she believe?”

  He nodded. “Her faith never encroached on her work at ARKANE. Somehow she managed to reconcile both worlds.” He sighed. “More than I could ever do, that’s for sure.”

  Lashonda rushed into the room. “I think I found something.”

  25

  “I tested all the bones, and there’s an element common to all that I missed in the first stage.” Lashonda held up a test tube containing a thick paste. “But I think this will work.”

  She took a step toward Naomi, but Jake stopped her, his hand against her chest. “Oh, no. You’re not using her as a lab rat. Try it out on Elena.”

  Tears ran down Luis’s face as he reached out with a shaking hand. “She’s all I have left. Please.”

  Morgan took a deep breath. “What would Naomi have done?”

  Jake thumped a fist into his open hand then exhaled sharply. “She would have volunteered herself rather than hurt a little girl.” He backed away from the bench, handed Morgan the gun. “But I can’t … do what might be necessary.”

  Lashonda walked to the side of the gurney with the mixture. Morgan stood opposite her holding Naomi’s hand. As she looked into the scientist’s sapphire eyes, she saw a glimmer of darkness, like the writhing coils of a sea-serpent underneath calm waters. How many lives had this woman taken in pursuit of conquering death? How many more would she be willing to sacrifice?

  Lashonda spooned some of the paste from the test tube. Doubt clouded Morgan’s mind, and she put a hand out to stop the scientist.

  “Wait. There must be a reason why it’s called the Hand of Ezekiel. If it was just some relic paste, why call it the Hand?”

  Lashonda held the spoon to Naomi’s lips. “It’s only a legend. Means nothing.”

  Morgan pushed the spoon away, covering Naomi’s mouth. “Myths always have a grain of truth in them. Faith and science wind together like strands of DNA. They’re inseparable.”

  “She’s right.” Luis’s voice was tired, as if he carried a great weight in his soul. “In my family journals, there’s a passage about the Hand, about words said over the corpse so it might rise.”

  “I’ll get the relics.” Jake dashed out into the main room.

  He returned quickly with the finger bones, but as he swung through the door, a wash of water came with him. It smelled of brackish sea water and an edge of industrial oil. “It’s flooding in there, but slowly, so we have a little time.”

  Morgan took the box of bone from the altar and opened the intricate lid. Together, she and Jake fitted the bone relics into the box so they stood tall, five fingers of five saints, those who believed the dead could truly rise.

  “Now what?” Jake asked.

  Morgan carried the box and placed it on Naomi’s chest. “We prophesy as Ezekiel did.” She nodded at Lashonda and the scientist spooned the paste into Naomi’s mouth, rubbing it over her full lips.

  Morgan spoke the words of Ezekiel. “Come, breath, from the four winds and breathe into these slain, that they may live.”

  She knew the words of Jewish scripture by heart, an allegory of the nation of Israel who had turned away from God. But could it possibly be more than that?

  Would such words work when spoken by someone who doubted, even though she had seen miracles in the fires of Pentecost and darkness within the Gates of Hell?

  Morgan spoke again, stronger this time. “Come, breath, from the four winds and breathe into these slain, that they may live.”

  Naomi lay still, her skin cooling, the paste a white mush on the bow of her mouth. No breath stirred her.

  Lashonda hung her head. “This can’t be right. I’ll try another formula.”

  Suddenly, a far-off rumble echoed through the room, the storm finally overhead. Then the ground shook, and a rushing sound came from the lab beyond.

  Jake turned to the door and yanked it open, letting in another wash of water. “We need to get out of here. The flood is rising. This place will be underwater in a few minutes.”

  “Wait.” Morgan pointed at Naomi’s foot. It twitched for a second time and then she felt pressure on her fingers. “Something’s happening.”

  She moved the box of relics back to the altar.

  Jake pushed Lashonda to one side so he could get closer. “Naomi?” His voice held a note of hope.

  Naomi’s eyes flickered a little and then she opened them. Morgan looked down at her, seeing gold flecks in the chestnut hue as Naomi blinked with confusion. For a moment, Morgan saw life there, intelligence, humanity – then it was as if a sandstorm blew across, a tempest in the desert sweeping away all before it, scouring life from its path.

  Naomi’s top lip curled and she bared her teeth as she snarled, her fingers curving into talons. She raked at the air. She writhed on the gurney, pulling at her restraints, rattling her chains, straining muscles that tightened with every movement.

  Morgan and Jake stepped back out of her reach, waiting, hoping that somehow the real Naomi might come back.

  Lashonda shook her head. “This is what happened before. Something is still wrong with the formula.” She looked over at Luis as he bent over his daughter. “I can fix this. I can try again.”

  Jake wiped his eyes, then his expression hardened into anger. “Maybe there’s nothing wrong with the formula. Maybe that’s what an army of the dead looks like.”

  His words struck Morgan’s heart with a measure of truth. There was no resurrection in this life, there was no rising from the dead until the End Times, and those who sought to conquer death would find only the taste of ashes in their mouths.

  The sound of rushing water grew louder, the flooding now around their ankles.

  Jake looked at the grunting animal that had once been Naomi Locasto. “We need to let her go and get out of here.”

  Morgan nodded. “I’ll do it. Go see to Julio. I’ll only be a minute.”

  Jake sighed and went to the door, taking one last look at Naomi, then he walked out into the ever-deeper water.

  Morgan felt the chill of the flood as it crept up her legs, covering her inflamed burns, numbing her wounds for one glorious moment. Then she realized that it was part of her now, and pain meant that she was still alive.

  She looked down at the former ARKANE agent. “We’ll remember you,” she whispered. “We’ll look after your family.”

  Morgan held the gun to Naomi’s forehead and pulled the trigger, the harsh sound a final violation. The body lay still, finally at peace.

  Lashonda turned to Luis. “Let me try one more variation. I have an idea that might just work. We can bring Elena back.”

  Morgan held up her gun, pointing it at the back of Lashonda’s head. Something in the scientist’s eyes had given her a glimpse of a world to come. She would never stop pursuing this research, she would not give up her quest for immortality. This lab would be underwater soon, drowning the research, but Lashonda would remember it. She would take it to another billionaire, another off-the-radar lab. The dead would rise again, and next time, there might not be anyone to stop her. Morgan couldn’t let that happen.

  Luis stared back at his scientist, looking as if he was only one step from the grave himself. But Morgan also saw a spark of realization in his eyes. He knew it was the end.

  Luis shook his head. “No more. If Elena cannot rise, then no one else will either. It ends here.”

  With one smooth movement, he raised his arm, gun in hand, and shot Lashonda in the head at close range. Her body dropped heavily, floating in the rising waters as blood pooled around her.

  Morgan stood silently, her own weapon pointing at Luis as he held his gun out toward her. A moment passed as their eyes met.

  Then he blinked, dropped his arm, turned back to Elena. Morgan slowly lowered her weapon. Luis was now a broken man, his ambitions ended, his family line finished. He climbed onto his daughter’s bed, wrapped his arms around her and closed his eyes, waiting for the waters to cover them both
.

  Morgan grabbed the box of bones from the altar and waded through the flood back into the lab. Sparks flashed from equipment overhead as lights faded in and out.

  Jake stood at an open emergency stairwell by the elevator, a still-woozy Julio by his side. Morgan lifted the box higher as she crossed the lab, the water now chest-height. Jake helped her out of the flood, and they began to climb away from the doomed lab and up to the main island above.

  They emerged from the emergency tunnel on the outside of the morgue. Rain lashed down as thunder rolled overhead, lightning slashing the sky into shards.

  Jake pushed open the door to the morgue and cuffed Julio to the old table where he might be found in the morning.

  “I didn’t know he would take it that far.” The bodyguard’s eyes were haunted. He shook his head. “I’m Catholic. I know the dead should only rise in the End Times. Is he –?”

  Morgan nodded. “He died next to Elena.”

  Julio hung his head. “That’s how it should be. Thank you.”

  They left him there in darkness as the storm raged about them, and together, Morgan and Jake ran back toward the parade ground. The pain in Morgan’s legs arced through her as she pushed on through the rain but now it felt like a blessing, a promise of life, a feeling of renewal as her skin sought to heal.

  They reached the edge of the parade ground as the rain began to ease. As they stood together looking out across the bay, it was as if they were alone in the world. Fog hung over the water, a dense cloud that blocked everything from sight, deadening sound. There were shadows out there in the gloom, strange shapes with claws and teeth and scales, wandering souls amid the haunting cry of seabirds.

  Morgan looked down at the engraved box of bones.

  “No one should have these. We can’t take them back.” She dropped to her knees and placed the box on the ground. She opened it and pulled out the finger bones, laying them on the rock. She picked up a lump of concrete and lifted it high, ready to smash it down.