The Deadliest Earthling Page 6

  Another burst of gunfire went off in the distance. It might only be one or two local insurgents, but that could be enough to attract more Anunnaki reinforcements.

  Orun always carried a stash of gold dust, but Erich wouldn’t take it. Per Anunnaki law, any humans found with monetized gold were liable to executions or probings. Just one of the many ways they maintained their domination over Earth’s populous. Plus the Anunnaki’s scientific pursuits ate up a lot of gold.

  Johnny ran a hand through his mop of hair, feeling the dryness of his scalp and a painful bump.

  “Most of New Bagram’s people survived, right?” Johnny asked.

  He knew the population of New Bagram ranked up around ten thousand. Babies, kids, students like Mitchell, veterans, mothers. While they wouldn’t all play a role in resisting the Anunnaki forces, they’d all shaped his life as the Keeper. For better or worse, he sat here now with the Eagle and Orun because New Bagramites had hoped he could one day hurt the Anunnaki. Not all believed it, but a lot did.

  “Correct,” the Eagle said.

  His eyes met the ground and his black boots. A couple of weeks ago, he’d attended a school party with Krem, Hamiad, and Skunk. While drunk, he’d passed by Mitchell and heard something he never would’ve expected. I want to believe he can stop the Anunnaki, but look at him. If he’s our best Watcher, we’re dead.

  Johnny managed to let that go only because he pretended he’d imagined it. But deep down, he recognized the truth in Mitchell’s words.

  Whatever the Anunnaki were planning, stopping them was the only way to truly avenge Hamiad, Krem, Skunk, and the rest of the cadets. To ensure the Naga weren’t ever able to fire up the cauldron of violence again.

  Johnny swallowed hard. “Tell them I’ll take the oath.”

  “The oath?” the Eagle parroted.

  Johnny only knew of one instance of someone taking the oath. When New Bagram was still floundering, trying to stabilize itself as a self-sufficient city, supplies fell short and an outbreak of Naga flu killed many Watcher cadets. Naga flu wasn’t really a flu, but a sickness caused by bacteria the Anunnaki had inadvertently brought from Nebiru.

  His own father swore an oath to eliminate an Anunnaki loyalist spy who had managed to steal valuable data on New Bagram’s location and inhabitants, including the Eagle and Orun, in exchange for supplies and vaccines.

  The militiamen guffawed. One straightened his posture. “You’re serious? What could you possibly do?”

  “Do you know what they’ll do if you fail?” the Eagle asked gravely.

  Johnny could guess. Bagram’s funders didn’t amass unholy amounts of wealth by being idealists. His teachers always said they wanted the Anunnaki out of the picture so they could profit in a freer economy. If they didn’t get to see the Anunnaki weakened, then they would profit from the Anunnaki.

  They would sell out the location of New Bagram’s refugees as well as the Eagle’s, Orun’s, and his.

  “I know,” Johnny said, wishing she would let him do this before he changed his mind.

  “But you don’t know what they’ll ask of you,” Orun pointed out.

  No one ever did. Not until you made a vow did they give you a mission. And you had to accept. Rumors were they sent bounty hunters to all corners of the globe to ensure no one double-crossed them. There was no way to escape their wrath if they chose to unleash it.

  Chapter 17

  He entered the small room with the Eagle and a radio on the table. Complete with an aluminum microphone and frequency codes.

  The Eagle started by hitting the receiver and requesting a direct broadcast to an intermediary line of the New Bagram funders. They waited five minutes as the message bounced through a series of minor intermediaries. Only someone of her fame could even hope to be granted access to an intermediary line. This was why Sarah’s mother traveled so long to see them every year. Anunnaki sometimes monitored radio broadcasts, and long conversations almost guaranteed a leak. Plus there was the fact that negotiating in person was easier than over the radio.

  You have two minutes, a high-pitched voice said.

  “Go ahead,” the Eagle said, patting Johnny on the shoulder.

  He sucked in a deep breath and raised his hand, even if they couldn’t see him. A paper in front of him gave the oath.

  “I, Johnny Aldrin, do solemnly swear that I will support and defend humanity against all enemies, terrestrial and extraterrestrial.” Johnny sighed, knowing this next part was the point of no return. “I take the oath now that I will obey the orders and accomplish any one task requested of me by the powers that be. I recognize the risks, dangers, and costs should I fail. Ask of me what you will.”

  Ten minutes later they received a response. The voice was so deeply distorted, it could’ve been anyone or no one. You will deliver all four Conifers to the Watcher Zacharia by Easter of this year.

  “Him, huh?” the Eagle breathed. At least she knew Zacharia.

  That was it. The Eagle thanked them, and they left.

  Erich proved to be more helpful than his attitude let on. Before leaving to his own compound, he supplied them with a sack of rations, fresh clothes, and of course, information on their safe house. Johnny couldn’t help but think the olive-drab shirt, kaffiyeh, and jeans Erich gave him blended well with his blond, tousled hair.

  It was funny. Johnny assumed he’d be nervous as hell after taking the oath. Instead, he was still coasting on a high. Somehow, committing himself managed to boost his spirits. In a way, he figured that either he’d succeed or fail, and that would be it. No uncertainty in those possibilities. And he intended to succeed. The question was whether or not he could pull this whole thing off.

  When he delved into the details of the task at hand, he did experience a shade of anxiety.

  Easter was just short of two weeks away. Johnny kept confirming in his mind that they had one Conifer as they trekked through the trash-laden streets of Old Bagram. An obvious fact, yet it helped lighten the load. Still, when he considered the mile-deep gap between one Conifer and three, his insides dissolved to a numbing acid. He cast his head from side to side. They needed to reach the safe house. Only then could they catch their breath and really think this through with genuine hope at coming up with a solution.

  A pulse surge sounded from the next street over. Johnny felt himself duck on instinct. The Eagle swiveled around in her burka. She pointed to an alley that led to the other street. A massive grey figure swept past, a mere blur that set Johnny’s mind afire. An Anunnaki soldier.

  They quickly found their next stop, an old apartment complex, and disappeared into an underground tunnel.

  Hours later, they emerged. Palm trees and long-abandoned vehicles greeted them on either side of a highway. Torches and lamps glimmered from all around a sea of houses, apartments, and storefronts. They had reached Kandrazi.

  They followed a dirt road up one of a pair of hills bordering the highway. As the road steepened, the buildings grew scattered, and the path all but disappeared, replaced by rocks and jagged ridges.

  “There,” Dagos said. She cocked her still-masked head at a simple-looking building. Nothing made it stand out. Then Johnny noticed something dangling by a string from the roof. A large metal ring with an eyeball painted on a small piece of wood. As a real-life object, he probably would’ve missed the imagery. But really he had seen it a thousand times on paper. The symbol of the Watchers. The freedom fighter network Dagos and New Bagram recruits took allegiance with.

  She removed the Watcher indicator and lifted the wooden peg from the door lock, and they entered. Aside from a table, two chairs, and a bookshelf, there didn’t look to be anything hospitable inside.

  Then Juan swept a tattered purple rug up and removed a wooden board from the floor. His flashlight revealed a set of thin metal stairs. They replaced the board above them and descended the stairs to a hallway on the right.

  At the end, Juan wrenched the metal panel with a logo of a smiling sun and the wo
rds Turning the sun’s rays into easy days off of a power box. He toggled two red buttons, then flipped the handle down. A mechanical groan rumbled underneath their feet, reverberating through the entire compound.

  “Well, you made it after all,” said a smug voice followed by the unmistakable cocking of a revolver.

  Chapter 18

  Dim halogen lights flickered on in the surrounding rooms, but all of their attention was focused on the man in the doorway. A lit cigarette poked from his mouth, his black hair slicked back, dark circles around his eyes. He wore a blue shirt and baggy, cargo pants. Propped against his waist was his revolver.

  “Who are you?” the Eagle spat.

  “Careful, Amelia,” the stranger said. “As a benefactor representative, I expect a certain level of courtesy.”

  Her eyes narrowed, but her tone softened. “How can we help you?”

  The man grinned and lowered his revolver. “I know what you’re thinking. Johnny already took the oath. Now all he needs to do is collect the Conifers. But what the benefactors don’t tell you is that we like to ensure you can achieve the task we give you. So you’re getting a little warm-up.”

  “A warm-up?” Johnny asked, adjusting his footing.

  “You’ll understand what it is soon enough. If you accomplish it, you’re fine. If you don’t, well, you’ll figure it out.”

  With that the man glided for the stairs. To Johnny’s surprise, no one tried to stop him from leaving. They remained still as he pushed the floor board aside and disappeared. Once the board was replaced, the Eagle exhaled deeply. “Secure the perimeter.”

  They split up. Everything from the back escape hatch on the east side to the crank-operated blast door at the foot of the stairs checked out.

  The compound’s floor and ceilings proved by far the most astonishing part. They were composed of unevenly assorted geometric shapes. Stealth panels spread along the floor and ceiling like the surface of the stealth aircraft at New Bagram. Walking across was almost as awkward as the climb up.

  If Johnny had to bet, he’d peg the stealth panels to deflect Anunnaki ground-penetrating radar so they wouldn’t be able to detect, let alone map out the bunker.

  Another few minutes checking the bunker produced a closet armory, chock-full of assault rifles, spare ammo, and a variety of grenades.

  Afterward, the Eagle said nothing of their visitor. She simply asked Johnny to rig up booby traps in the entrance.

  Johnny gathered a cardboard box of string, grenades, strips of cloth, knives, pipes, and a big sniper rifle and walked it up the stairs with Orun. What he would’ve given for a couple electrostatic bombs. An electrostatic bomb altered the Anunnaki’s magnetized bodies, temporarily preventing them from using just about all of their technology except their pulse surge blasters.

  He noticed Orun reach into the box as they entered the mud-brick building.

  “I thought you couldn’t take any hostile actions,” Johnny said.

  Orun tossed a flash-bang up and down. “I’m not going to set these traps. But I can help you set them up.”

  He didn’t say it with a rude tone, but it didn’t invite further conversation either. So Johnny went about setting traps quietly.

  The key to setting good booby traps was starting from the very outside and moving inward. Outside the mud-brick hut, Johnny found a soft area of dirt, stomped a pipe in with his boot, added a touch of coarse dirt, and stood a knife inside of it. He stared at it for an extra-long second. He’d taught Sarah how to make a similar trap a long time ago.

  As if on cue, Orun grabbed a second pipe from the cardboard box for Johnny.

  “I’m sorry about your friends.”

  Johnny only nodded, not knowing what to say. Then Orun added, “I lost some myself over the years.”

  “During the Shroud War?”

  “On Nebiru.”

  Johnny looked away. Orun had never spoken of his time on Nebiru. Heck, he’d never really spoken of anything beyond training or lessons. Johnny almost laughed. It was a little late to offer condolences.

  He wondered how much Orun actually regretted. He’d never hesitated to cut off Johnny’s peer interactions in his youth. One time Johnny had been complaining about wanting to join a baseball game his friends invited him to. Orun handed him a bat but said it would only be for practicing as a weapon. When his friends walked past the house, Orun bolted the front door of their house with his Khepers just to discourage the possibility.

  “Well, not much I can do now but try and find the Conifers, right?” Johnny said. He moved inside the mud-brick structure. There, he tied a string on the end of a nail lodged into the wall, ran the string to the other side and attached it to another nail, leaving a stretch of dangling grenades.

  A flash of light immediately followed by a thunderous rumble drew their eyes to the doorway. A blinking ship plummeted from the cloudy sky and dove at the desert a mile out from Kandrazi. A deep boom echoed across the sleeping city. Johnny and Orun darted onto the hillside for a better look. Something large was rising out of the ship.

  Chapter 19

  Little by little, a metallic creature emerged from the ship, red lights blinking across its surface. Even with all of his studies on the Anunnaki, Johnny had never seen anything like it. Slowly, the creature floated into the air, four wings unfolded from a central orb that hosted a glowing yellow light.

  “What is it?” Johnny asked.

  “An Anunnaki hunter drone,” Orun said. “Haven’t seen one in decades. Not since the Shroud War.”

  “Is that why my teachers never mentioned them?”

  Ignoring the question, Orun hummed in contemplation. “I hope you’re prepared for a battle.”

  Johnny watched the machine float through the night sky, covering a few feet every second. He wasn’t exactly impressed.

  “I’ll just shoot it.”

  “These things are resilient. Won’t go down with a few gunshots. Once it locks on to a target, it will hunt it for years, ready to attack at any time.”

  The red lights streaking its wings stopped blinking. A solid blue line replaced them on each flap. Suddenly, the wings cycled clockwise, and the drone shifted in their direction.

  “I think it’s locked on to us,” Johnny said, stepping back.

  The thing had picked up its pace, too. He estimated less than a minute before it would be overhead. His stomach churned at the realization that now the Anunnaki would know someone occupied the innards of the mud-brick structure behind them. If they suspected resistance fighters, this would only be the first of many drones. He’d worry about that later, though.

  Overlooking the city was the fifty cal sniper rifle he had set up before they began installing the booby traps. Johnny dove to a prone position right behind it and ripped back the bolt. The bipod would steady his aim, and he peeked through the scope. The blue lights against the somber clouds made it an easy shot. In a second, he’d placed the drone in his sights.

  Orun started to say something just as he squeezed the trigger. The recoil sent a jolt through his shoulder, the thunderous blast leaving his head pounding, and he pulled back to survey the result. He smiled. His shot had torn the drone into two pieces. Fifty caliber rifles usually pulled through. Except that both halves of the drone were still cruising toward them.

  “They’re very stubborn,” Orun groaned. “You can blast them apart all day, but it’s comprised of hundreds of tiny self-sufficient pieces.”

  “Kind of like your Khepers?”

  Orun had to think about that one. “Not that tiny. Almost as annoying, though.”

  “I’m guessing I’ll have to blow this thing up all at once?”

  Orun nodded. “But if you mess up and the pieces survive, we’re stuck dealing with a swarm of little killers.”

  That sounded less than encouraging.

  Johnny got to his feet and shifted his shoulders. “We didn’t set these booby traps for nothing. I’m cloaking us now, alright?”

  He didn’t
wait for a response. One thought and the Conifer turned the two of them completely invisible. Yet the drone continued right at them. With a mechanical whir, the wing flaps on both halves shifted, extended at the ends. A whine emitted from each as it leveled with the hillside.

  “Run,” Orun yelled, his transparent blue form rushing his way.

  Johnny threw himself forward, hitting the dirt right as a series of pulse surges massacred the rocks and tussock behind him. Glancing up, he registered the hunter drone fixing its aim on him. Now they knew the drone’s target. And that it used infrared vision. Even the Conifer couldn’t hide his body heat. If only he possessed a chameleon suit, like his drill sergeant had said Watcher scientists were developing for him to wear. Dust clung to his sweat-ridden forehead as he grabbed a handgun off his back pocket, readied it, and fired six quick shots at the right half of the drone. Six marble-sized pieces broke off and sped at him like angry bees, their sharp edges glinting under the starlight.

  Johnny clenched his teeth. Clawing at the dirt, he pivoted and staggered back up the hill. Half a dozen booby traps lurked inside the mud-brick facade. Any of which he might trigger by accident if he rushed in. Given the circumstances, he couldn’t think of a better option.

  “Find cover!” he cried, charging for the mud-brick structure. The drone’s blasters hummed in his ears. He willed his legs to carry him a little faster. The next thing he knew, he tore through the doorway, the six satellite pieces stabbing into the wall beside him. Pieces of dirt exploded around him as the drone halves unleashed their pulse surges.

  Falling to his knees, he slid the rug aside, propped open the wooden floor board, and stumbled in. Instinctively, he squeezed his arms against his face and tucked his legs in close.

  Every joint and muscle banged against metal step after metal step in anguish. Raw aches and pains ravaged his body.

  His head throbbed so hard the subsequent explosion and burst of heat against his skin felt a thousand miles away. A few seconds passed, and he began trembling, the whole world ringing in his ears, the stairs swirling around him. Time seemed meaningless as his senses returned to normal.