The Deadliest Earthling Read online

  “I’ll have a beer,” Johnny shouted over the noise.

  “We need you sober,” Orun said.

  Johnny grumbled, but followed him as he ordered one. The bartender, a boy no older than ten, served it in a clay cup along with soda for Johnny and Morris. They carried these to a table next to an Anunnaki whose wooden stools squeaked and wobbled as he grunted and snarled in Nebirian. Judging by his black visors, the Anunnaki was engaged in a heated conversation with someone remotely.

  On the other side, four Anunnaki enjoyed themselves a little more responsibly.

  Johnny watched Orun converse with the four off-duty Anunnaki flickers. Of course, to him and Morris the conversation came off as a mix of deep grunts, slithers, and chirps.

  Orun raised up his designator, and two Anunnaki blackened their eyes with visors. They traded looks.

  Johnny nursed his soda, trying to ignore the annoying ring tones that threatened to pierce their earplugs. It wasn’t hard. Soda was such a rare treat at New Bagram. Johnny only ever received a small bottle for his birthdays from a local shop owner. The sugar shot through him and left his head racing.

  Suddenly the sunlight-intoxicated Anunnaki at the next table over was gaping at him, visors retracted. Johnny glanced down. The edge of his Conifer peeked out from under his kaffiyeh. The soda must’ve upset his concentration. Johnny immediately pulled his kaffiyeh down, touched a finger to the Conifer, and thought to cloak it.

  A quick scan of the room told him no one else had noticed.

  As long as he kept to himself, he figured nothing would happen. On the other hand, he’d seen drunk recruits act rowdy at past Feasts of Endeavors. A disgruntled aura hung over the Anunnaki as if his remote conversation had ended badly. Add in the intoxication factor, and this could prove problematic. Johnny admittedly felt a bit unnerved.

  As he watched the bubbles fizzle in his cup, the Anunnaki’s guttural noises clawed at his ears. Johnny nodded, but that only seemed to insult it more.

  “He doesn’t like you,” Morris said quietly.

  Orun wove his hands in tandem with his speaking, telling a story that was earning him many nods from the Anunnaki. Johnny didn’t dare interrupt him now.

  Then the flicker shoved his shoulder. The force almost threw him off his chair. His insides boiled. If the Anunnaki wanted to let off some steam, he’d chosen the wrong earthling to mess with. Johnny clenched the Conifer in his right hand and the cup in his left. He would get up and accidentally spill his soda on the Anunnaki. See how he liked that.

  “Yeah, and I don’t like him either.”

  As soon as he turned to face the Anunnaki, another hand smacked into his chest. Johnny’s anger skyrocketed. He couldn’t stop himself. Lunging out of his seat, he shattered the cup across the Anunnaki’s cheek.

  All eyes landed on him as the Anunnaki fell among pieces of broken clay. Right, a lowly earthling had just knocked out a flicker. He should’ve at least cloaked the whole thing with his Conifer. Johnny let his eyes shut for a few seconds. The room quieted. Sweat rolled down into his clothes.

  Orun leaned over. “We’d better go.”

  As soon as they stepped outside, Johnny apologized.

  “Taking you into a bar full of Anunnaki was a recipe for disaster,” Orun said. The disappointment in his voice was clear. He’d expected more discipline from him, Johnny thought, trying to shake off the same.

  A burst of Nebirian drew their attention. Two of the Anunnaki from the bar stood outside the door, their eyes on Johnny. Orun responded in Nebirian. They waved and returned to the bar.

  “Maybe you shouldn’t be apologizing.” Orun’s smile was full of reassurance. “You’ve just signed yourself up for the Ascendi’s Trial.”

  Chapter 26

  For the second time in a week, Johnny found himself cooped up with Morris and Orun in a guest house of sorts. They had taken the main road through a maze of cinderblock walls and old shipping containers. As they emerged to a row of disheveled, rusting military trucks, a dark-skinned man in a blue robe offered them a room to stay in until the Ascendi’s Trial began.

  Their quarters were converted from one of the shipping crates. The room smelled like diesel and the only fresh air came through a small crevice in the ceiling. Due to a lack of windows and the dim glow of the lamp, Johnny had to whip out his Conifer for real light.

  Johnny and Morris sat on the two cots, the wooden frames creaking under them. Safe in isolation, Johnny released the facial alterations he’d formed with the Conifer for the past few hours.

  Orun pulled up a chair from the corner, cleared his throat, and explained the rules of the Ascendi’s Trial.

  “So I defeat three fighters in a row, and the Ascendi Major will drop in to meet me?” Johnny asked a few minutes later. “And they’re human fighters?”

  Orun nodded. “Yes and yes.”

  “Say he stops by?”

  “You decline his offer. But first I stick a Kheper tracker on him.”

  Johnny wondered on the Ascendi Major’s service. What if he accepted? That would get him a lot closer to the Ascendi. “But what kind of service does he ask for?”

  “One of the Conifers allows for mental manipulation of humans.”

  “Mental manipulation?”

  “A mind-control Conifer. I suspect the Ascendi seeks to create his own stock of human spies he can use to infiltrate resistance-fighter networks. He probably set up this Trial recently as a way to lure in ideal candidates. Strong, young men such as yourself.”

  Johnny slapped his hands against his legs. If Orun attached a Kheper onto the Ascendi, they could spend a few days monitoring his movements. Once they knew the Ascendi’s every move, Johnny had no doubt that the Eagle could call in support for a Watcher operation to capture the Ascendi the right way.

  There was no way they could attempt it tonight. Fort Bloodhound attracted too many Anunnaki.

  Morris fished a small Bible from his thobe pocket.

  “I see you’re taking this Ark of the Covenant thing serious,” Johnny said smugly. He couldn’t help finding the idea a bit bizarre.

  His cousin looked up at him without much love. “Not all of us are trained soldiers,” he said quietly. In other words, he wasn’t reading for information about the Ark of the Covenant. He was reading for comfort. Somehow Johnny had forgotten that his cousin really didn’t rank as the fighting type. As a kid, he’d seen his cousin get bullied a lot.

  “I’ve always told you I could teach you a few techniques,” Johnny said tentatively.

  Morris closed his Bible. “After the firestorm, I said you should have faith. How’s that going?”

  Johnny bit his lip and leaned forward on his cot. They’d both pestered each other about something too much.

  “That’s different,” Johnny said, pulling a deck of cards from his pocket.

  “How?”

  “You could learn to fight. You choose not to, though.”

  “Yeah, and having faith is so hard,” Morris said, an edge to his words.

  Nothing suggested Johnny’s friends could have survived a firestorm, though. The way he saw it, faith only ever sprang from the miracles in your life.

  For Morris, the miracle had always been the way working with the church turned his reputation around. In his first year as a recruit, an older cadet named Duncan used to make wisecracks about his cousin some days after PT. You know, that guy Morris said he thought that the angels in the Bible were actually Anunnaki, Duncan brought up to his buddies. What an idiot. Why would he say that if he’s working with the church? someone else said. Yeah, our teacher chewed him out for that big time. They shared a laugh.

  Johnny overheard things like this a number of times, but he let them go. So long as Duncan didn’t try to insult him over it, he wasn’t going to get involved.

  Then one day he stopped seeing Duncan hang around. He heard that his father had gotten into a nasty bar brawl and seriously injured himself. Worse yet, his wounds were infected. All throughout
training the next week, Duncan stayed quiet. The general consensus was that his dad would die. A few days later, Duncan resumed his normal schedule of hanging around after PT and trading news with his friends. One recruit asked him, You hear the stupid thing Morris said today? Johnny was as surprised as anyone when Duncan declined. Leave him alone, Duncan said casually. And that was the end of it. Duncan and his friends didn’t insult Morris again.

  The next time Johnny passed by the infirmary to check out a nasty looking cut on his shoulder, he saw Morris tending to a sick woman, offering words from the Bible. And he knew what Morris had done for Duncan’s father, who was as healthy as ever.

  That was Morris’s miracle. The source of his faith. But Johnny had nothing in his past that encouraged faith. His parents had died in vain, and he’d spent his childhood taking orders from an Anunnaki.

  Johnny flicked his hand dismissively. “Whatever. Let’s stack some cards.”

  Morris cracked open the Bible. “I’m going to read this.”

  Johnny groaned. “Come on. Let’s stack some cards. I’m gonna be fighting for our lives tonight.”

  He knowingly exaggerated his impatience. Too much apparently.

  “Hey, Orun, how much does one of those snake holes cost?” Morris asked, his face weary.

  Orun returned half an hour later with a plate of naan bread, a canteen of water, and fresh clothes. Johnny accepted the bread and bit off a piece, but slowly.

  “You took him back to the bunker?”

  At first, Johnny decided Morris was probably just exhausted. But then he realized that back in the New Bagram escape tunnels, his cousin never said good-bye to his parents before joining him, the Eagle, Orun, and Juan. Meaning, his parents must not have made it out of New Bagram. How stupid of him to overlook something so obvious. If he’d thought about it more, he wouldn’t have pestered Morris to stack cards.

  “No. A village on the other side of the mountains. He’ll be safe there,” Orun said, sitting on Morris’s cot.

  Johnny nodded, wondering how safe the bunker was.

  “Are you prepared for tonight?”

  Johnny couldn’t help grinning. “I’ve trained my whole life. If I’m not ready now, I’ll probably never be.”

  Orun’s voice hardened. “The Ascendi’s Trial isn’t simply entertainment for these people. The Anunnaki at the bar warned me the losers are killed. I won’t be able to intervene if the Anunnaki take you.”

  Johnny frowned, a leech of doubt sucking at him. He shrugged. “If the firestorm never blew up Bagram, I’d still be risking my neck, right?” he said heavily.

  “That isn’t the point,” Orun said. “I need you to focus on the task ahead if we’re going to track the Ascendi.”

  Johnny felt his jaw clamping, his pulse speeding up. He swallowed and let his eyes drop.

  “Yeah. You’re probably right,” he said, trying to keep his tone even. It was all he could do to stop himself from snapping at Orun. He looked at him again, not sure why. Maybe he expected something from Orun. Maybe he didn’t. “I’m going to rest up.”

  A blanket of dark clouds made up the early-evening sky, allowing only a trickle of light from the dropping sun. The clouds from the same storm that hit New Bagram only a week ago. Johnny folded his arms over his chest. He’d left his jacket and kaffiyeh in their room. His long sleeved brown shirt barely held back the cold.

  He blinked, hoping to speed up his eyes’ adjustment to the light. Depending on where he fought, the lighting might play a big role, he warned himself.

  Orun led him through a divergent path in the cinderblock and shipping-crate maze.

  Despite the voices in the distance, a chill of desolation hung in the air. The town seemed dead compared to earlier that day.

  A minute later, Johnny registered the chanting of a hungry crowd. Chanting in intervals, as if of a single mind.

  Weaving around a dark dining hall, graffitied with the words To Serve Man, the scent of a bonfire greeted them. Smoke welled skyward, and that’s when Johnny noticed the flickers lurking along the top of the building. Their armor blended so well with the grey above, he’d practically missed them. He chided himself for that. Fighting required full alertness.

  The ring of metal shipping containers and old barracks stretched around them, oil drums nurturing fires as the locals hooted and thrashed their fists.

  He tried to stand on the tips of boots to see who was fighting, but too many arms and wild hands blocked his view.

  A glance at the surrounding structures gave him nothing on the number of Anunnaki. Even squinting, their extradermal layers were indistinguishable against the evening sky. Whatever happened, battling an incalculable number was out of the question. Instead, he studied the Anunnaki sitting over the edge of the shipping freight above him.

  It wasn’t a normal Anunnaki. The foggy eyes and symbol of an eye locked inside a triangle were a dead giveaway. The Ascendi. Exactly as Orun had described his appearance. A ripple of rage made him long for his rifle.

  A hand on his shoulder guided him forward.

  Swallowing, he felt his throat roughen from the smoke.

  “Orun, look,” he whispered, motioning to the Ascendi Major.

  Before he could get a response, the crowd closed around him and prodded him onward. Orun dropped out of sight in the midst of it all.

  He hesitated. This made things easier, then. All he needed to do was survive and decline the Ascendi’s offer. Orun could put the Khepers on as soon as Johnny cloaked him.

  Yet he didn’t feel any more relaxed by the notion. Did the Ascendi get off work early and decide to stop by? he asked himself wryly. Because according to the rules, the Ascendi was supposed to arrive after he proved himself by winning three fights.

  A terrifying thought pierced the forefront of his mind. Could the Ascendi have figured out his and Orun’s ruse somehow? He refused to give in to that possibility. There was no way. And yet there were a hundred loose ends, weren’t there? The Anunnaki who had sold Orun the designators. The Anunnaki in the bar who noticed his Conifer. The crevice in the ceiling of their guest room that a suspicious local could’ve used to eavesdrop. The wild ideas swirled in his head, dissolving the concentration Orun asked of him earlier.

  Just as anxiety and the spectators threatened to smother him, he emerged into the center of the ring. A single figure stood there, his bald head tilted in boredom, meaty arms hanging at his sides. The combination of dancing flames and glistening sweat showcased the muscles of his bare torso.

  Trying to steady his breathing, Johnny stepped forward. A grey hand shot out in front of him. The Anunnaki pointed to a small metal plate on the gravel. A scanner to ensure he wasn’t carrying any weapons under his longsleeved shirt or jeans. He had no choice but to oblige. At least they couldn’t detect his Conifer, thanks to his cloaking it. The ball chain necklace was all their scanners would pick up. And people were allowed to wear those.

  Orun warned that it might be risky to bring it into hand-to-hand fights. But Johnny figured that if there was a chance he might die, he wasn’t going to increase it by leaving the Conifer with someone else. If he wasn’t wearing it, he knew the scanner would’ve detected his real face and matched it up with the person who appeared with a Conifer briefly in Kandrazi.

  A couple of seconds, and the Anunnaki shoved him off. Johnny let it pass and studied his opponent. Throbbing veins decorated his arms all the way down to taut, red knuckles. This wasn’t his first fight of the night. A good thing or a bad thing? That depended on whether he was warmed up or tired out.

  Judging by his muscle mass, the man weighed twenty pounds more than him. The strategy was obvious. Potshot his joints and midsection while keeping his range. He’d need to test the man’s capabilities first, though.

  “All right, you ready?” Johnny began.

  Under the blanket of dim light, the bald man’s fist brushed against his chin. Thanks to his own quick reflexes, he evaded the brunt of it. The blow left his jaw aching
instead of staggering him. Johnny jumped back and threw his head around to stay evasive. Now to see how his opponent reacted to his attacks.

  He sprang forward, jabbed his fist at the man’s gut, and retreated as soon as he’d made contact. His knuckles were laced with sweat.

  “Fight or die,” someone shouted. At first he thought it was a random spectator. But the voice came from the Ascendi Major’s sitting area. Johnny tightened his jaw, lurching back every time the other fighter’s hands showed the faintest sign of propulsion.

  Fight or die. That spoke for itself. A sense of trepidation concocted in him as he noticed the blood streaked across the gravel. When one of them stopped fighting, that person died. Meaning he couldn’t quit or make the other man quit.

  Where did the dead end up? At a crackle, he turned to an oil drum. Blazing orange, a shriveled hand lingered over the edge. He shuddered. Well, it saved them the trouble of digging graves, he thought grimly.

  He jabbed to circle around and let himself glare at the Ascendi. These were his twisted rules. In that instant, the bald man swept his elbow at his face. Johnny reversed and the elbow met his chest. The Conifer’s ball chain jingled.

  “What you got there?” The man’s voice rose on his last word as he charged, launching his right leg at Johnny’s stomach. He brought up his own leg, checking the kick with his shin. A dull pain jutted in him, but his opponent’s wincing indicated it hurt him more.

  “I asked what you got there,” the man shouted hungrily.

  “It’s a chain necklace, see?” Johnny said, pulling out the chain from under his shirt. Tucking it away, he parried two jabs and delivered counters to the man’s stomach. A side step equipped him to counter the next punch with a body shot.

  The calls and cheers of the crowd should’ve drowned out any sounds from his Conifer’s chain. But the adrenaline heightened their senses. The longer they fought, the greater the chance the man would somehow notice his Conifer.