Truth Engine

by James Axler

  The woman’s shots struck the lead pair of hooded figures, and the one to her left fell, his robe sweeping up like a sail catching the wind. Then incredibly—impossibly—the figure sat up and pulled himself back to a standing position as if nothing had happened. Mariah felt a lump in her throat as she tried to swallow, watching the scene unfold before her.

  Another of the hooded figures swept his hand through the air, unleashing more of the small, sharp stones. They whistled slightly as they whizzed through the air, shattering drinking glasses and embedding themselves in the walls even as quick-thinking Cerberus personnel dived for cover.

  Sela rattled off a swift volley of shots, scampering beneath a table even as the hurtling stones hit their next victims. She cursed as she watched several of the diners drop as the pebbles struck them, falling facefirst into their meals or tumbling from their chairs, their eyes wide in shock. The stones were traveling at the speed of bullets, somehow picking up velocity once they had left their wielder’s hand. There was no time for Sela to worry about the victims now; she had to deal with these interlopers who had followed her up the stairs, had to defend as many people as she could.

  A number of the Cerberus personnel were battle hardened, and all of them had been trained in basic combat techniques. Immediately, the two-man team closest to Sela were on their feet, asking what they could do.

  “Are you armed?” she asked as she leaped between tables, her bullets ripping through the hooded shrouds of the interlopers.

  Several people in the room said that they were, producing four pistols and a combat knife between them. As Mariah and Clem watched from the far table, Sela’s shots struck another of the intruders—only for the man in question to continue walking forward, brushing the shells aside like raindrops.

  “Come on, Mariah,” Clem urged, leaping from his seat.

  “Where are we going?” she asked as the battle raged behind them.

  “Kitchen,” he told her, grabbing her wrist.

  Mariah hurried to keep up, her feet slipping on the tiled floor of the canteen. “What the heck’s going on?” she asked, glancing back as Clem pulled her through the swinging door into the cooking area. Something else was following the hooded strangers through the door, something tall and bulky, its footsteps shaking the room.

  “I don’t know,” Clem answered, hurrying over to the stove and grabbing a bubbling saucepan by its handle. Other cooks were hurrying about the area, wondering what was going on as they heard the gunshots and the barrage of stones pelting the walls.

  The word went out immediately—Cerberus was under attack. Several of the kitchen personnel grabbed cooking items, wielding them like weapons as they hurried outside, determined to help. A kitchen hand beside Mariah grabbed a vicious-looking meat cleaver and hurried through the door.

  “We should have heard the alarm,” Mariah complained. “Why wasn’t there an alert?”

  Clem looked at her anxiously as he adjusted the heat on the hob. “Perhaps these visitors hit the PA system first,” he suggested.

  “But there are—” Mariah began, pitching her voice loud over the sound of a grenade being launched outside.

  Clem cut her off. “Mariah, I need sugar. Top cupboard.”

  She stood there helplessly for a moment, trying to make sense of his request. Outside, the tarantella of bullets and stones rattled against hard surfaces.

  “Sugar,” Clem repeated, raising his voice but never sounding angry or rushed.

  Mariah opened the cupboard he had indicated, pulled out a large container marked Sugar.

  “What are you making?” she asked as she handed it to Bryant. “I don’t think this is really the time to start baking a sweet, Clem.”

  “You saw those people,” he reasoned. “They brushed aside Sela’s bullets.” On the stove, the saucepan of boiling water bubbled as he poured sugar into it. “In prison, they call this napalm. Boiling water and sugar—sticks to the skin and burns, just like its namesake.”

  Clem dipped a Pyrex mixing jug into the bubbling saucepan and filled it before reaching for a nearby mug with his other hand. “Come on, Mariah. Time to sound the horn and get in the hunt.”

  As if caught up in a whirlwind, she grabbed the steaming cup he passed her, and followed him back into the canteen. “Clem, I think you should know something…” she began.

  Clem was already through the door to the eatery, the steaming contents of the mixing jug slopping against its sides as he ran. His shoes slid on the tiled floor as he skidded to an abrupt halt, hardly able to believe his eyes. There, striding across the room like some animated cliff face, came Ullikummis, rogue scion of the Annunaki. He was bent down, his misshapen head ducked so as not to scrape against the ceiling, which seemed suddenly low in his presence. The rock lord’s feet slammed against the floor, cracking tiles and leaving dents with each mighty step. Even as Clem watched, a Cerberus staffer called Watts, who had joined Sela’s makeshift army, was cast aside, the Beretta in his hand blasting shots into the ceiling as he was tossed feet over head by a mighty backhand slap from the stone giant.

  “Oh, my goodness gracious,” Clem exclaimed, the words coming in an abrupt tumble like a thunder strike.

  “That’s what I was about to tell you,” Mariah said as she stood at his elbow. “Ullikummis is here.”

  Both Clem and Mariah had encountered the stone-clad Annunaki before. Her unfortunate meeting had occurred in Tenth City and resulted in her being very nearly indoctrinated into Ullikummis’s war cult. Clem had met the rock monstrosity later, during the exploration of the undersea Ontic Library, which housed all history and knowledge. Now they faced him once again, as his hooded troops rushed about him, clearing aside Cerberus personnel in swiftly fought battles.

  Suddenly, the overhead lights flickered and died, and for a moment the cafeteria was plunged into darkness, the only light coming from the horizontal slit windows located high in one wall. In the darkness, Ullikummis became a glowing network of lava, the streams outlining his body like some ghostly stick man, his eyes two fiercely glowing orbs.

  Mariah watched the would-be god’s mouth open, a shimmering orange in the darkness like the heart of the sun, as he spoke one word: “Submit.”

  Mariah heard Clem respond automatically, and she felt a strange sense of pride. “Never.”

  Then, with a plinking sound, the fluorescent tube lighting flickered back on as the emergency generator kicked in. But the light kept dimming, threatening to shut down again.

  Close to the far wall, Sela Sinclair was fending off two of the robed figures. She had lost her M-16 in the scuffle and was now wielding the Beretta 9 mm that she habitually wore at her belt, holding it in a two-handed grip as she pumped bullet after bullet into the torso of the one of the strangely garbed figures. The stranger slowed, knocked sideways by the impacts, but would not go down.

  Sela adjusted her aim, closed one eye as she targeted the figure’s forehead, which was hidden beneath his low-hanging hood. “Fuck it,” she muttered, blasting a 9 mm Parabellum bullet where she knew the man’s head must be. The bullet cut through the man’s hood, and he staggered in a two-step jig before falling to the floor.

  By then, his companion was on Sela, his hand sweeping up in an underarm throw. She sidestepped as a half dozen tiny flecks of stone leaped from the sling in his hand and rushed at her. The stones rattled against the wall behind her even as Sela turned the Beretta on the robed man and snapped off a shot straight into his face, as she had his companion. The figure made no noise as the bullet struck, but Sela smiled grimly when he staggered backward, crashing into the nearest table and sending dirty plates flying as he fell.

  She was already searching for her next target, ejecting the Beretta’s empty cartridge and slapping in the new one she had retrieved from her belt pouch. To Sela’s surprise, the figure she had first shot pulled himself up off the tiles and made to grab for the pistol in her hand. She reacted immediately, instinct taking over as she lifted the barrel out of the
man’s reach and drove the toe of her right boot at his face. The kick made contact and the man shook, caught as he tried to get up off the floor. Sela grunted, feeling a shuddering through her leg. It had been like kicking a solid brick wall.

  To Sinclair’s left, the second figure was rising from the table, as if she hadn’t shot him just a few seconds before.

  What the hell are these people? she wondered. Sela had witnessed a lot of strange things in her position with Cerberus, but she had never seen anything that appeared quite so ordinary and yet utterly invincible. It’s as if they’re made of stone, she realized, and her eyes flickered automatically to the towering creature who blundered through the canteen—Ullikummis.

  Then the first attacker was upon her, and Sela was driven back against a table as the Beretta jumped in her hand, blasting shot after shot into her foe’s gut. It was no good. No matter where she shot them these stone men would not drop, not for long.

  Sela yelled in pain as she rolled over the table-top and slammed against the floor. As she landed, the other hooded figure vaulted over the table and landed on her, driving his knees into her chest. She expended her breath in a gasp, felt her attacker’s fist strike her face once, twice, thrice, knocking her head back against the hard tiled floor. She struggled beneath the hooded figure, trying vainly to shift his weight and free herself from his attack. Then a blur at the corner of her vision caught her attention, and she turned just in time to see her other attacker run at her and kick, booting her full in the face.

  Sela Sinclair’s nose exploded in a bloom of blood, and her vision went dark as she faded into unconsciousness.

  Elsewhere in the cafeteria area, other members of the Cerberus team were falling to the strangely unstoppable intruders. Clem Bryant was ducking and weaving as one of the robed figures lunged for him and Mariah. Like Sela’s foes, this figure threw a handful of stones he’d pulled from the pouch at his belt, and Clem shouted an urgent warning for Mariah to duck. She did so just in time, though several of the stones clipped her shoulder as she tried to get out of their way.

  Mariah examined her shoulder, saw that the standard-issue white jumpsuit was torn and there were threads of blood appearing where the stones had—what?—grazed her? It felt like something more, and she reeled in horror as she saw one of the pebbles burrowing into her flesh. With a yelp, she grabbed for it, plucking it out of her skin even as it threatened to disappear.

  Before her, Clem pulled back his attacker’s hood and tossed the boiling sugar solution—the homemade napalm, as he had called it—into the enemy’s face. The figure beneath the hood looked human, quite a handsome young man, in fact, albeit with a stern set to his square jaw. He screamed as the boiling liquid struck, and Mariah watched in amazement as Clem’s foe crashed to the ground, clutching his burning face.

  “What did you…?” she asked, suddenly recalling the mug in her hand.

  “The sugar makes it stick to your opponent,” Clem told her briefly. “Like a scalding that just won’t stop.”

  Mariah swore, staggered at the man’s ingenuity. Clem—a cook and deep-sea diver—had somehow figured out something that could stop these incredible intruders who had infiltrated their home.

  “Ingenuity,” Clem said, as if reading her mind. “Come on, we’ll need to reload now that we’ve proved it works.”

  Mariah watched as the robed man continued to howl as he lay on the floor, his face burning away. Then she turned, ready to follow Clem back to the kitchen.

  Another of the robed figures was running at them, and Mariah realized that apart from a couple of Cerberus people who were just being overpowered, they were the only two left.

  Clem shoved Mariah back as the female assailant approached, swinging her fist at Clem’s head. He protected himself, fending off the blow with the empty measuring jug. Though ovenproof, the jug shattered at the woman’s blow.

  “Unsociable,” Clem exclaimed, as he ducked his foe’s next thrust. Then, shoulder down, he charged at the woman, forcing her to give ground, albeit just two steps. “The napalm!” Clem shouted, encouraging Mariah to toss the steaming contents of her mug.

  Mariah didn’t hesitate. She threw the cup, sugar solution and all, at their hooded foe’s face. The woman dropped back as the contents struck her. Some of it spilled across her robe, but enough hit her skin that she began screeching in pain, sounding like a stuck pig.

  Mariah felt sick at what she had done. She wasn’t a soldier, nor was Clem. They didn’t belong here, shouldn’t be doing this. She turned, peering around the room as the lights flickered and dimmed. They may not be soldiers, but they were all that Cerberus had left here now, everyone else in this room had fallen.

  “Clem,” Mariah cried, turning back to him. “We’re all that—” She stopped, the words freezing on her tongue.

  The impressive figure of Ullikummis stood before the door to the kitchen, hefting Clem Bryant high above the floor. Clem was shouting, but Mariah couldn’t make sense of what he was saying. It was like watching something in slow motion, it all seemed so inevitable.

  Mariah cried out a single word: “No!”

  But even as the protest left her lips, Ullikummis threw Clem across the room, until he slammed against the far wall like a discarded rag doll. Mariah turned and ran for Clem, feeling hot tears running down her cheeks even as she did so.

  “Clem,” she shouted. “Clem, no. Don’t be…”

  He was lying there, slumped against the wall, blue eyes wide as if looking at Mariah, his head at an awkward angle. The geologist knelt before him, reaching for his hair, brushing it off his forehead.

  “Clem, you’re not allowed to die,” she told him. “It’s the rule. I hadn’t told you yet. I hadn’t told you that I was falling in love with you. So you mustn’t die until after I’ve told you that. You mustn’t.”

  But Clem didn’t hear. He was dead already, had been so as soon as he struck the wall. Mariah watched as a trickle of blood seeped from his nose, spreading out through his mustache and neatly trimmed beard.

  She reached for his mouth, tried to push the blood away from his lips, feeling the warmth of his skin against her fingers. As she did so, she became aware of the towering shadow that fell over Clem Bryant’s still body.

  The voice came from behind her, sounding like two millstones being ground together. “Submit.”

  Mariah did not turn to face Ullikummis. Instead, she knelt at Clem’s side, wiping the blood from his lips, smearing it across his face, until two figures grabbed her and pulled her from her knees, forced her to stand.

  IN HER STONE CELL, Mariah Falk tried to cry again for Clem, but the tears wouldn’t come any longer. She had nothing left to weep with. Why had Clem died, and she’d been allowed to live? She was just a geologist. She had no place being here, locked away in a cell, treated like something inhuman. Why was she still living?

  Chapter 9

  Brigid found herself alone once more in the shadowy cave with just the mirror for company, haunted by her own face peering out at her from the darkness. She tried to recall what had happened, and remembered Reba DeFore in the storeroom, distraught, sitting in a pool of blood. Thankfully, the blood had appeared to not be her own.

  Brigid closed her eyes, pictured the way Reba had looked, so terrified and alone and small. But it was a picture; it wasn’t a memory anymore. Brigid’s eidetic memory, her ability to recall the finest details of events and the things she saw, seemed diminished. It was the lack of food and water, she knew, making her lose concentration. Her body was begging for sustenance.

  Her green eyes snapped open and she peered into the mirror, saw the red rings around them where exhaustion was beginning to show. Ullikummis had told her of the way the Annunaki perceived reality, the way it was all just a surface, that what appeared to be might not truly be what was. Ullikummis was in her head, she realized. Somehow, he had done something that was changing how she thought, how she saw things. An education.

  There was a gulf of time as Br
igid waited uncomfortably in the chair, thinking about the things Ullikummis had told her. Her whole life had been characterized by a single trait, the total recall of her eidetic memory. Memory was the thing that made an individual, she realized. A continuity of memory was what provided sentience. To find herself suddenly losing an aspect of that memory, however small, terrified Brigid. Whatever Ullikummis had done, he had opened her mind to the way in which the Annunaki saw the world. It was subtle, and yet Brigid Baptiste pondered upon it for a long time. She had battled with the Annunaki for years alongside the other members of the Cerberus team. She, Kane and Grant had led strikes against these terrible alien foes, and yet never once had she really stopped to consider what it was to be alien.

  The Annunaki had a continuity of memory like no other, Brigid understood. They shared memories through their whole race, were gifted at birth with a knowledge of all that had gone before. It made them intelligent, learned, and gave them a perspective on life and the lives of others that was radically different to anything Brigid had experienced. And it had also done something else—it had made them arrogant and, worse, bored.

  The Annunaki had the perspective of infinity, Brigid concluded, and so they played with lives, played a never-ending game where the rules must constantly change. But they were not unstoppable; she and Kane and the others had proved that, and others had found their way around the Annunaki, too. Brigid had met a group in Russia not so long ago who had hidden a doomsday weapon on a higher plane of human awareness, accessible only via transcendental meditation. It had been developed as one way to avoid an enemy who could read minds, and Brigid guessed there must be others, too. And if there were ways to avoid the Annunaki, to repel them, then there must be a way out of this chair, a way to overturn Ullikummis, to gain the upper hand. The secret must lie in memory, Brigid told herself, for that was the only weapon that he could never take away from her. Wasn’t it?