Destiny of Coins (17 page)

“Is that all? Surely there is more,” said Alistair, When Francisco grew silent while typing new commands into the computer.

“Giuseppe obviously failed, and had it not been for my ancestors’ fear of the Conquistadors, they would’ve killed him on the spot,” continued Francisco, smiling at my boy after finishing his latest command input. “Instead, Zalik destroyed the map Giuseppe had made of his journey to the castle. Then, several of Zalik’s most trusted men led the embittered monk back to La Paz blindfolded. It almost proved to be our undoing, as Giuseppe remembered enough to recreate the map, which is the very one Kaslow apparently used to find the castle. Fortunately for us—at least back then—the Spanish were focused on procuring gold and precious gems, and not at all interested in a seemingly meaningless silver relic. Giuseppe eventually returned to Madrid empty handed. He died in poverty in 1609, and it was nearly seventy years later that his diary ended up in Rome, after a Vatican Cardinal heard the legend of the Franciscan monk who had witnessed the most unusual coin attributed to you, Judas, as part of the blood money payment.”

Francisco’s voice was compassionate. Nonetheless, the words cut through to my very core. I might’ve been sucked down into a terrible void if not for what he said next.

“Would you like to behold your coin, Judas?”

“What do you mean?” A logical question, but I knew what he meant by his query. “It’s not in the castle, is it?”

“No, it isn’t.”

If he had been worried about everyone’s attention earlier, certainly all eyes were upon him now.

“Here it is.”

He pulled out a piece of yellowed cloth from his breast pocket and handed it to me. Even before he did, my left hand began to tremble horribly, like a crack-starved junkie about to take a hit. I could see the soft blue glow in circular form beneath the ancient cerecloth that still bore wax residue from nearly two thousand years ago.

Roderick saw it, too—his eyes said as much. Everyone else could at least discern the significance of what was placed inside by palm by this latest Essene Superior—the very last of his kind, according to what he told Roderick the night before.

“Can we see it?” asked Amy. Her gorgeous green eyes were filled with childlike wonder.

“Maybe later,” I told her, while images of my Lord’s night of betrayal swirled ever closer. All that protected me from the onslaught was the cerecloth of the disciple who picked up the coin as I fled Simon Zelotes’ courtyard.

“It will have to be later,” advised Tampara, drawing everyone’s attention back to the plasma screen. “Look!”

Viktor Kaslow was no longer meditating and sniffing the air around him. He had found one of the cameras and torn it out of its perch, and now brought it close to his face, giving us a less than lovely view of those garishly chiseled features that were once handsome, and his cold steel-blue glowing eyes. But it wasn’t the worst aspect for me…that came from the feeling he looked right at us.

Realization spread to everyone else, amid hushed gasps.

He chuckled in response, and smiled menacingly.

“Peek-a-boo, I see you!”, he sneered into the camera’s audio recorder. “See you in a few!”

The screen went blank, and before we could begin the discussion of what in the hell to do next, the bunker’s lights flickered. The floor began to tremble beneath our feet. Those of us who had seen firsthand the FGR technology in action understood all too clearly that the world outside our bunker room was disappearing. Within the next minute, Kaslow would be dropping in on us for a visit.

Chapter 14

One might think the smart thing to do was access the secret doorway in the restroom and scurry into the tunnel that would take everyone to safety several miles from the castle. It was, in fact, exactly what Francisco and Rafael set out to do in an orderly fashion. But all hell broke loose when the first bright blue rays from Kaslow’s FGR seeped into the bunker. The left far corner of the room began to disintegrate, and what was left of the cave wall on the other side of the bunker’s cement façade collapsed into the room.

Everything still attached to the walls on either side of the growing hole in the corner either disappeared before our eyes or fell on the stone floor eroding beneath the carpet. The large plasma television screen exploded as it fell face down…but that event happened before the screen reached the floor. Part of it looked impossibly stretched, as the molecules that made up the screen’s frame were pulled into the FGR’s
powerful sapphire beam.

The enormous human holding the device stepped over the crumbled wall fragments, his heavy boots resounding loudly as he turned off the FGR and laid it on the table. Without saying a word Kaslow surveyed his mostly terrified audience and pulled out a semi-automatic Steyr, equipped with a silencer. Not that such discretion mattered at this point.

He pointed the gun at Rafael’s head. I understood the tactic, as did Cedric and Roderick, since one of our Soviet enemy’s favorite tactics during the Cold War was to take the weakest member of a group of captives and immediately put a bullet between their eyes. Then, he would calmly introduce himself and use the bleeding corpse as a reminder of his willingness to use the most brutal means available to coerce cooperation from everyone else.

There wouldn’t be time enough to intercept Kaslow this time—at least not by Roderick, Cedric, and myself. We were the only ones with the rare skills to offset his cunningness as a human being. But the last of this monster’s humanity was long gone—we already knew this. Rafael was going to die.  Even this mild-mannered Essene recognized his fate, closing his eyes and placing his right hand over his heart while murmuring an ancient prayer.

I froze, I admit. To try and overpower Kaslow would mean several more of our companions would wear bleeding holes in their foreheads. Kaslow’s only distraction was to leer contemptuously at Alistair and Amy. My boy clung tightly to his beloved, his arms trembling as he moved to shelter her. No matter how I ran the various scenarios through my head, they all resulted in the likelihood that only Tampara, Roderick, and I would remain standing with Kaslow in the next twenty seconds.

We needed a miracle. I never dreamed it would come from a mortal human being.

“Both Rafael and I are ready to be with Elohim, and enter His eternal joy—something you will never experience!” said Francisco, with what turned out to be the perfect blend of serenity and confidence.

He stepped in front of Rafael, who stopped trembling upon Francisco’s announcement. Francisco brazenly moved closer to Kaslow, whose weapon was now trained instead upon the Essene Superior’s chest. Francisco’s behavior made me wonder if he had an inkling he would die that day, and it was why he told Roderick last night the long reign of Bolivian Essene Superiors would end with him.

Meanwhile, Kaslow snickered with deep contempt. But the fact he hadn’t shot anyone yet made me wonder if Francisco’s unexpected behavior had thrown a small foil into the fiend’s plans. It certainly had done something…and as Kaslow glared angrily at the unflustered ruler of the castle, I had the sudden inspiration to make a move. The idea that occurred to me could be no more insane than Francisco’s maneuver, but it certainly carried the risk of losing everything.

I acted upon it anyway.

While the immortal monster focused his ire upon Francisco, I quietly stepped away from everyone else. Kaslow’s FGR had pulled away enough of the wall to where I could likely squeeze through a small opening next to the bunker’s main entrance. Once I was within a few feet of the crevice, I opened my palm and pulled away the cerecloth from my coin. It took incredible willpower to push aside the rush of memories that flooded in from the shekel’s touch upon my skin. But a false move here would prove fatal to more than just me.

Kaslow’s initial response was almost magical. The coin glowed in the most intense cerulean shade I had ever seen—including my Lord’s eyes from the past night’s dream and even the FGR’s intense blue light. The coin pulled Kaslow’s complete attention, and his malicious scowl from a moment before faded into a look of child-like wonder. Surely, Francisco and Roderick witnessed the intense color as well as Tampara—at least their expressions matched our enemy’s awe.

As for the others, they couldn’t detect the coin’s magnificent sheen, as I expected. Instead, they looked at me with either surprised or horrified expressions. I’m sure it looked as if I was bailing on them all, and had only waited to flee the bunker until I could taunt Kaslow with the prize he coveted.

It brought a slight impish smile to my face. After all, I had yet to deliver my verbal insults to him.

“You didn’t even know I had this on me, did you?” I said, pretending to be calm while my heart raced. “Your supernatural gifts, it seems, have waned since you started taking super-roids. Let’s see if you still have any natural cognitive skills left, asshole—I’m about to put this bad boy back in its protective cover and then hide it to where you’ll never find it. ‘See you in a few’, you stupid jackass!”

I launched myself into the crevice, calculating I had maybe two seconds to get through it unscathed. I was right about that part. It took me three ticks to do it—long enough for Kaslow to sink four shots into my right leg and shoulder. Hollow points are especially painful, and I grimaced while scaling the stairs as quickly as I could. I focused my thoughts on closing the wounds and dissolving the bullet shards, since that seems to help sometimes. I didn’t allow myself to think of him turning his weapon—along with the other guns he carried on his back—upon everyone else. I was banking on the cold-hearted competitor I had known for decades—that this nature would still be entwined inside whatever Kaslow was becoming. If I was right, he would ignore the others and be on my ass before I made it out of the narrow tunnel.

It turned out I was pretty damned close in my prediction.

I worried about the commotion I heard coming from the bunker, but the explosion that sent splintered rock shards into my backside just before I reached the first ‘bigger’ tunnel on the way back to the castle confirmed my hope. I prayed for enough of a head start to get inside the castle before he caught up to me. And, yes, I fully expected Kaslow’s enhanced physical stature to aid him fully in that regard. I didn’t care if he did catch me…just as long as I had the chance to hide my coin first.

* * *

I worried the echo from my footfalls as I raced up the tunnels would become my undoing. That was the illogical side of my brain talking, since Kaslow already knew I was heading back to the castle. To my knowledge, this was the only route to get back there from the caverns.

Even with his arsenal—which I assumed was still strapped on his back—he was steadily gaining on me. An explosion erupted from the wall to my right as I sprinted the last two hundred feet to the castle. I had no doubt a fresh, massive cavity now existed in the wall where the grenade-rocket exploded behind me. The wound would surely be a near-perfect match for the gaping hole that marked what remained of the castle’s ancient doorway to the tunnels.

“Stop, William!” Kaslow shouted from behind me. “Stop, or I’ll obliterate your very essence from this planet!!”

I’m sure he meant it. But obliteration would be my eventual fate at his hands anyway. I glanced briefly over my left shoulder…he was less than one hundred feet behind me.

“Go screw yourself, Viktor!”

Now, I’m certain many would wonder why I didn’t shout something more vulgar—especially since by now everyone has seen I have no real qualms about using colorful language to make a point. Such vulgarities are beyond commonplace in the line of work that Kaslow and I once engaged in. And, I knew he would use my verbal reaction to gauge my emotional state in determining his next move. Me raising Cain and allowing a full serving of the vilest vernacular to pour from my mouth would only point to an out of control temper. That in turn makes for an easy mark, and a quick elimination as a target. Had it been Cedric running and not me—given my old friend’s fondness for swear words—he would never reach the recently widened doorway alive.

Those few extra seconds while Kaslow tried to determine where I might dodge and weave next—since that’s how I was running at the time—could improve the infinitesimal chance my head might still be attached to my body as I crossed the threshold into the castle. As it was, I encountered three close calls where rockets raced past me and crashed somewhere inside the castle. More granite blocks toppled to the ground, from where they had been carefully stacked and bonded onto each other for twenty-five thousand years—the age of the castle, according to Francisco. There were bullets, too, and fortunately most of the shots passed through me without hitting my most vital organs.

“One way or the other you will die today, William!” Kaslow called from behind me as I scurried past the entrance. Damage to the inside of the castle was extensive, and I knew then that Francisco, Rafael, and the rest of their Essene tribe would soon be looking for a new home—if they survived beyond the afternoon. “Give me what I’ve come for, and I will kill you quickly and leave your pitiful son, his fiancée, and your wife alone. Otherwise, if you push me any further, I will make all of them suffer!”

I didn’t stop running, and would be in the reception area in just a moment. My mind was filled with a flurry of images, as I tried to subtly picture a suitable hiding place for my coin. Another quick glance over my shoulder confirmed what his nearer-sounding voice had hinted at. He was less than fifty feet away. There wasn’t anywhere suitable on the main floor to flee to, and I briefly considered trying to race him to the front of the castle and then out the door to the other cavern and beyond.