The Grail

CHAPTER 2

The lion had been in one place for two hours watching the grazing herd of gazelle slowly make its way through the high grass. The big cat was old, several steps slower in just the past year, and because of that, it was hungrier and more patient that it had ever been. Just two years ago, the lion would have sprung from its hide and chased down a tender youngster, culling it from the herd.

Now it watched with narrowed eyes as one of the herd wandered away from the main group. An old grandfather — the flesh would be stringy, the lion knew, but it would be meat. Over a week had passed since the last kill and there was little interest in being finicky.

Muscles tensed, claws grabbed into dirt just a little deeper as the lion prepared to spring. Another five feet and he would be assured of a kill. Suddenly the herd froze and all heads turned, not toward the lion’s hide, but to the sky near the rim of the crater, behind the lion.

Then they began galloping away. The lion slowly uncoiled from its spring position, its meal rapidly disappearing toward Soda Lake in the center of Ngorongoro Crater. The large shaggy head twisted and peered up, searching for what had startled the herd. Yellow eyes blinked, making no sense of the strange flying creature that had just cleared the edge of the crater.

It was far larger than any bird the lion had ever seen, over ten meters long, and slightly less than half that wide. A long, arced neck stretched up from the body to a serpent’s face with large jaws filled with black teeth. The eyes were dark red. Two short wings extended from each side, but they were stationary, not flapping like a bird’s.

The lion forgot about hunger and pride as it bolted after the gazelle in a desperate attempt to get away from the dragon.

Inside the flying machine unearthed from the Airlia cache in the upper levels of the Qian-Ling tomb in China, the human-Airlia clone, Elek, had his hands on the controls, slowing forward speed and bringing the craft to a hover.

Below the dragon, stretching twelve miles from rim to rim, Ngorongoro Crater was a throwback to a time before man made his presence known in the wild. Teeming with animals, it was isolated from the land around by the two-thousand-foot-high crater rim that surrounded the over one hundred square miles inside. The rim of the crater was over a mile above sea level. The center of the crater was covered in water, Soda Lake.

There was a flash of light to the right and Elek pivoted the dragon, known as Chi Yu in Chinese legend. The display screens in the cockpit located just behind the chest of the machine registered a second flash and Elek moved toward the light.

“Do you see me?” The voice over the radio was sexless, easily belonging to a man or woman.

“I see you, Lexina,” Elek confirmed as he brought Chi Yu to a landing near the source of the light.

Three figures waited. In the center was Lexina, the head of The Ones Who Wait. For decades she had tried to maintain Artad’s side of the truce, first from the secret base in Antarctica and now from the remains of an Airlia base underneath the crater. Now there was no more truce for Lexina to try to maintain — recent events had seen to that. It was time for action.

The back ramp, underneath the dragon’s tail, dropped down. Lexina, followed by her companions, walked on board.

“The spirits have passed on.” Elek nodded to the other two — the recently cloned and reborn bodies of Gergor and Coridan, two members of The Ones Who Wait. The previous Gergor and Coridan had received a fatal dose of radiation in the process of destroying the Russian Area 51 on Novaya Zemlya Island.

“The spirits have passed on,” Lexina echoed as she took a seat to the side of his. “Now let us make sure that Artad’s true spirit has not passed on.” She extended a long, thin hand. “Back to China.”

Turcotte’s arms were ready to give out as the bouncer finally slowed and descended toward the desert floor. As soon as his feet hit the soft sand, he let go of Mualama, who promptly collapsed onto his back, eyelids rapidly blinking over unseeing eyes.

“You’ll get your sight back when the effect of the flash-bangs wears off,” Turcotte told him as the bouncer settled down next to them. He could see the body hanging in the cargo netting, a stream of blood down the smooth side of the bouncer.

“Where are we?” Mualama sat up.

“In the desert,” Turcotte said. “Where’s Duncan?”

“In the Black Sphinx, underneath the stone one. She’s with the Ark. She is safe for the time being inside — Al-Iblis cannot get to her there.”

The hatch swung open and Yakov appeared, followed by Captain Billam. They went to the body, untangling it from the webbing.

Turcotte got to his feet and took Mualama’s arm, helping him up. “We need to get on board.” He could sense Yakov’s eyes upon him, but he avoided meeting the Russian’s gaze as he guided Mualama up the side of the bouncer and inside. “I lost three men at the Sphinx and we left two bodies behind,” Captain Billam informed Turcotte.

“I saw,” Turcotte said.

“Where to, sir?” the pilot of the bouncer asked.

“Duncan is underneath the Sphinx.” Turcotte was checking the function on his MP-5. “If—”

“We cannot go back there,” Yakov said flatly.

“They’re disorganized now,” Turcotte said.

“No, there’s more of them now,” Yakov disagreed.

“We can’t abandon her.”

“We can’t get to her,” Yakov said.

“She is safe for now,” Mualama interjected. “She is with the Ark, and it does not allow anyone not wearing the proper attire close to it.”

Turcotte had no idea what Mualama was babbling about. “We need to go back to Area 51,” Yakov said.

Turcotte glanced at Captain Billam. His team had lost almost half its strength.

“I don’t see what we can do,” Billam said. “We don’t have a plan. We don’t know exactly where this place is that Doctor Duncan’s being held.”

“Sergeant Boltz has lost a lot of blood,” the team medic informed him from where he was working on the NCO wounded in the assault at the Kremlin. Reluctantly, Turcotte removed the magazine, pulled the bolt back to eject the chambered round, and put the MP-5 down. “Head for Area 51.”

Duncan heard a noise, the slightest of movements. Her senses were running on super-alert, every input magnified. She reluctantly put the Grail back in the Ark’s cradle and turned. The four sphinx heads mounted on the poles that held up the white veil surrounding the Ark had all turned toward the chamber’s entrance. Their ruby eyes were glittering, as if they were alive.

Duncan was a slight woman, her slender body weighted down with the garments she had on. She wore the robes of the ancient one who had tended to the Ark. The costume was elaborate and precisely layered. First, a white linen robe; over it a sleeveless blue shirt that Mualama had called the meeir, then the ephod, a coat of many colors fastened by two stones at the shoulders; the essen, a breastplate encrusted with a dozen precious jewels of various colors; and over her short black hair a crown, made of three metal bands. Each band represented two things, according to Mualama: the three worlds of existence, heaven, hell, and the Earth, and the three divisions of man, spiritual, intellectual, and physical. At least those were the legendary representations.

It was this clothing that had allowed her to pass the inspection of the four heads. Airlia technology was built into the clothes and accoutrements, technology that mated with the guard system of sphinx heads and had allowed her to pass unscathed.

She turned from the Ark, which rested on a waist-high black platform. The Ark of the Covenant was three feet high and wide and slightly over four feet long. It was gold-plated and the two long poles that had been used to carry it were poking out on either end through the rings on the bottom of the Ark — just as it had been described in the Old Testament.

The most intriguing aspect were the two “cherubim-sphinxes” on the lid. They were shaped exactly like miniature versions of the head of the Black Sphinx, with ruby-red eyes. As soon as she had entered the veil, both had turned and fixed their inhuman gaze on her, as had their cousins on the top of the veil poles. A sophisticated, automated defense system that had existed for millennia to guard the contents of the Ark.

Duncan walked to the veil and slid through. A tall man in a dark robe stood in the tunnel entrance — Al-Iblis, Duncan had no doubt. Two men in unmarked desert camouflage with automatic weapons stood behind him. Al-Iblis was tall, a couple of inches over six feet. A hood left his face in shadow, the glint of dark eyes the only thing visible in that dark pocket.

“Give me the Ark,” Al-Iblis said.

“Where is Professor Mualama?” Duncan asked.

“I’m holding him outside. If you do not give me the Ark, I will have him killed.”

“Then kill him,” Duncan said coldly.

A long silence followed that statement.

“You don’t even know what you have,” Al-Iblis finally said.

“I have the Ark which holds the Grail.”

Al-Iblis laughed, a sound like worn brakes going downhill. “You have no clue what the Grail is, do you?”

“I know I have it and you don’t,” Duncan said. “If I give it to you, then I have nothing. That would be stupid. I don’t believe you are someone to be trusted.”

“Then I will take it from you.” Al-Iblis gestured and the two men dashed forward, weapons ready.

They made four paces when the two veil-pole heads on that side released a flash and bright red beam that struck each man in the chest. There was a sharp sizzle, and both men fell to the floor, a hole burned neatly through their chests.

“That was even stupider,” Duncan said.

“They matter nothing,” Al-Iblis said. “There was always the chance the security system might not work after all these years. Even Airlia technology has the potential for failure. Come here. Give me the garments so I may get the Grail. If you do not, I will have your friend killed very slowly. I have men trained in causing pain.”

“If I give you the clothing or the Ark, then I will be the next victim of those men,” Duncan said.

Al-Iblis reached inside his robe and pulled out a 9 mm pistol. “I could kill you,” he said to Duncan as he took aim at her, his hand perfectly steady and on target.

“Then you would leave these—” she ran her hand down her body “—here with my body and these clothes are the only way someone can get close enough to open the Ark. Nothing will change.”

Al-Iblis nodded. “All right. A standoff. I have much experience at that. I have dealt with kings and prophets and heads of state. I will raise the ante elsewhere then.” Al-Iblis paused before he left. “Perhaps you do have an idea how important the Grail is?”

“Perhaps,” Duncan said.

“Who are you?” he asked her. “Why have you sought the Grail?”

She met his gaze and held it. “Who are you?” she asked in turn.

“They currently call me Al-Iblis.”

“Who are they?” Duncan had heard the name, but she knew little about the man behind it.

Al-Iblis considered the question, as if it had never been asked before. “The people of the desert. Nowadays, intelligence agencies also use that name for me because they think I am a terrorist. As usual, they are clueless. In past time, prophets, seers, men who claimed to be wise and weren’t as bright as they thought. Caliphs and ayatollahs. Women who claimed to be—” He paused suddenly.

Duncan took a step forward. “What do you call yourself?”

“You want to know who I am? Perhaps more importantly, you should ask what I am. The end to all this is coming, so it doesn’t matter if I tell you. Then, perhaps you will understand how powerless you are and accept the inevitable and align yourself with me. It is the only smart choice.”

The tall man pulled his hood back, revealing a pale, narrow face with black eyes set like stones on either side of a hatchet nose. He smiled, revealing long teeth, almost predatory. “This body is just a garment, like those clothes you wear now. The body allows me to walk the Earth. I am a Shadow.”

“A shadow of what?”

“More a shadow of who.”

“Who?”

“You can call me Aspasia’s Shadow.”

Duncan shook her head. “Aspasia is dead. He was killed aboard his Talon spacecraft.”

“The original being known as Aspasia was killed. As I told you, I am a Shadow. I had his entire consciousness imprinted many years ago.” His hand went to his own chest and rested there for a second. “And because I — my consciousness — have been alive all those years, I am more than he ever was. Wouldn’t you agree?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “It is best he finally died. He was—” a twisted grin crossed his face “—out of touch? Antiquated? Like the gods of ancient Egypt, which, of course, he and his followers were. He, and his, would be out of date in this new millennium. I will lead my people to victory.”

“Your people also died with Aspasia,” Duncan said.

“No, my people — the Guides, The Mission — have struggled with me for millennia here on Earth while Aspasia and his followers hid on Mars. We have earned the right.”

“The right to what?”

“To rule. To become the Gods that Aspasia and his once were. Gods for a new age, a new world where technology is more important than faith — and we have the technology.”

“And the Airlia on Mars? The ones left behind there who control the guardian at Cydonia? Do they give their allegiance to you?” Duncan asked.

“Left behind?” Aspasia’s Shadow smiled once more without humor. “They know nothing of what it means to be left behind, almost powerless, for thousands of years. They slept while I struggled and fought here and died again and again only to be constantly reborn. Now they have no choice but to obey me.”

“There is always a choice,” Duncan argued.

“Free will?” Aspasia’s Shadow shook his head, indicating what he thought of that concept. “You are very ignorant and naive and know nothing of what you speak. You talking about free will is rather ironic if you are what I think you are.”

“What do you mean?”

Aspasia’s Shadow shook his head. “You will either discover what you are looking for or you won’t; it is not my concern. There are larger issues than the things you think you are concerned with.”

That made no sense to Duncan, and she wondered if he was trying to confuse her. “How did this all start?” she asked.

“How it started isn’t important,” Aspasia’s Shadow said. “The end is all that counts. And that is coming very soon.”

“Why did the Airlia come here?”

“That is not important.”

“Why are you here? Why is the Grail so important?”

“You have no idea what you have,” Aspasia’s Shadow said. “If you—”

“I know more than you think,” Duncan cut him off, tired of his threats and his declarations of her ignorance.

“You are not who you’ve pretended to be,” Aspasia’s Shadow said. “I should have known of you, the one who uncovered Area 51, who stopped Majestic-12. Your Captain Turcotte killed Aspasia and stopped the fleet, but you were the one who started it all, who put Turcotte in place to do those things. Does he know he is being used? Does he know who you really are? Do you know who you really are?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “There have been others like you before, those who upset the delicate balance and caused great grief and death. You’ve hidden well, Doctor Duncan, but you cannot hide anymore.”

“You babble,” Duncan said. “You are old and need to be put down like a mad dog.”

A cruel smile curled Aspasia’s Shadow’s thin lips. “You try to bait me. Very good. But I have lived a long time and met enemies much greater than you and defeated them all. I am still here and they have long ago turned to dust.”

Duncan crossed her arms on top of the essen. “So you think. But I’m where you want to be. Did you talk to those old enemies like you talk to me? Did they hold what you want?”

“But will it do you any good?” Aspasia’s Shadow asked. His eyes went up and down her, noting the garments. “Do you have everything you need?” Once more he didn’t wait for an answer. “When you find you don’t, we will talk again.”

Aspasia’s Shadow turned and disappeared into the tunnel that led out of the Ark chamber. Duncan went back inside the veil and looked at the Grail. Once more she put her hand over one end. It opened and the empty depression appeared. She knew that was what Aspasia’s Shadow had meant when he’d asked her if she had all she needed. The stones were needed for the Grail to work and the alien creature had known it. Did he have them? And if he did, how could she get them from him? Or were they hidden as so many other Airlia artifacts had been?

The chamber around her seemed smaller than before, the weight of the plateau above a palpable presence. She was safe for the moment, but she now knew she was also powerless.

Duncan stood by the veil, the four bodies her only company. She looked up to the top of the chamber, but her mind went further, through the rock, to the surface, into the sky. She knew Mike Turcotte would come for her. The thought did not give her as much comfort as it had a few days ago. She turned back toward the Grail, troubled by the words of Aspasia’s Shadow.

There was something lurking at the edge of her subconscious trying to come forward, but she couldn’t draw it out. Her eyes rested on the Grail, sensing in it a key to unlock whatever it was that was hidden in her mind.