Matt Archer: Legend (11 page)

“Well, if Archer didn’t have a God complex before, he’s
bound to now,” Brandt said with an ugly sneer as we rode back to camp.

Quick as a snake, Uncle Mike got right in Brandt’s face.
“Let’s get something straight, Captain—we’re all on the same team, whether you
like it or not, so no more comments about Matt. And since you have time to
complain, I’ll add one more thing to your list. From here on out, I’m taking
over as mission commander and Matt’s lead wielder, no objections allowed.”

I watched the scene without passion. My mind was still
reeling with the idea that I held the fate of the human race in my hands. I’d
heard this before, more than once, but seeing my older self in Ahmatku’s
sketchbook made it more real.

There’s no use worrying about this now. The wielders’
roles were set before any of you were born. We’ve been waiting for you longer
than Zenka’s people have. Longer even than the Maker’s people. We’ve waited for
all the ages of the world, since dark arrived.

All the ages of the world?

“Why so long?” I whispered, scared to hear the answer.

For your blood to be strong enough. It took generations,
but finally you all were born under the right stars, with the right blood, at
the right times.

“I don’t understand. What stars?” I asked. Brandt shot me a
look, but didn’t comment.

I lack the human words to explain. But there is one who
can. He is far away, but coming closer. In time.

The knife-spirit retreated from my mind, leaving me
frustrated and annoyed. Questions rattled around my head like billiard balls
after one of Will’s better trick shots. Like that old show
The X-Files
,
the truth was out there, but I had no idea when it would come, or what I’d
find.

“I have a question,” Johnson said, dragging my attention
back to the dusty Humvee just in time to hit a bump that nearly jarred my hips
out of joint. “If this Ahmatku is dead, why are the monsters still roaming
around here? They finished what they came for, it seems like.”

“Maybe it’s something else,” I said. “We don’t know for sure
these new monsters are related to the Lions from the last set of eclipse
attacks.” I nodded to Brandt. “Right?”

“Truth is, we don’t know exactly what’s prowling around out
here,” Brandt said. He glanced around the cab of the Humvee, looking defensive.
“They might…be Lions. We’re not sure.”

“Wait,” Uncle Mike said, his voice dead calm, but I could
tell it wouldn’t stay that way. “Are you saying a few of the old monsters may
still be alive?”

“It’s possible, based on the remains of the victims—claw and
bite marks are similar. But I took out the exact number we expected to see last
time, unless the whole multiples of thirteen thing was a bad assumption.”
Brandt’s shoulders drooped. “That’s not all, though. The reports we’re getting,
they don’t make sense. Some baloney about devils in the desert, haunting the
cliffs. We’ve been out to various sites a half-dozen times, but we didn’t find
a thing.”

“What if this is related to those cave drawings?” Uncle Mike
asked. “Because what you’re talking about sounds unrelated to the original
infestation, even if the monsters are cat-like in some way.”

I leaned back in my seat and closed my eyes, letting their
theories wash over me. I’d need to send Mamie an email when we returned to base
camp. Maybe she could turn something up for us. She was really good at
researching ancient religions.

“Maybe the messiah over there knows,” Brandt said. “He looks
like he’s receiving divine intervention as we speak.”

A flash of annoyance caused my hand to fly without my
consent. Before I even opened my eyes, I had Brandt pinned to the back of his
seat with my forearm across his throat.

Well, wasn’t that just awesome? As much as he deserved it,
I’d be in some deep crap now. I tried to pull my arm away, but it stuck in
place like I’d been magnetized. Brandt’s face turned purple as he scrabbled at
my wrist. Behind me, Uncle Mike was telling everyone to calm down. Lanningham
stared at me over the front seat like I’d grown a tail and horns right there in
the vehicle. And Johnson? He sat back and let it all play out, looking kind of
pleased by my reaction.

Tell him that’s a warning
, Tink commanded, and the
words echoed, like Brandt’s own blade-spirit was agreeing with mine.
Tell
him, or we won’t let him go without pain.

I blew out a breath and tugged at my arm. Brandt tried to
pry me off, too. Still, I held him in place; neither one of us would win this
battle of wills. A millennia-old spirit had a lot more patience and no actual
skin in the game. She was also more stubborn than any human I knew. She could
wait us out, easy.

“It’s not me,” I said to Brandt, glaring right into his
bugged-out eyes. “You know it’s not. But the knife-spirit says she won’t allow
me to let up unless you stop acting like a jackass. Uncle Mike warned you
first. Now my knife’s saying to cut it out. If you’re not careful, your knife
will be next. I’ve been punished by them before. You won’t like that much.”

A hush fell inside the Humvee. God, I hated it when the
knife-spirits made me look completely insane. “Look, all Captain Brandt has to
do is agree to take the mission more seriously. He does that, and we’re all
cool, okay?”

“Fine,” Brandt croaked. “No more messiah jokes.”

“And you’ll pull your weight from here on out? Because I
know you’ve been slacking off, and don’t even try to lie about it.”

“You have my word.”

My forearm went limp and I sat back to let Brandt get some
air. My temples started throbbing immediately after. Bleeding off the magic
after a hostile takeover sucked, and I put my head between my knees, feeling
like I might puke. “Can we go back, now? It’s probably not a good idea to keep
me in a confined space for much longer.”

Brandt’s guy put the Humvee in gear. “Sir, yes sir.”

* * *

The headache lasted three hours despite a prescription dose
of ibuprofen and all the water I could drink. It was dusk before I staggered
out of the tent to forage for dinner. Everyone stopped talking when I appeared,
quieting around the small campfire like they were afraid I’d conjure up some
voodoo and turn them all into flying monkeys. Brandt’s guys looked particularly
wary, watching me with furtive glances. The news of my strangler act on the
ride home had been shared in full.

My pulse sped up and my nerve-endings started feeding me
garbage about how I need to brace for a fight. This time, though, I wasn’t in
the mood to let Tink run the show; it was my turn to control our programming. I
breathed in a lungful of smoke-tinged air. Something about the smell of a campfire
always took me back to campouts with Mike when I was younger, to a place where
I was happy and safe. For a moment, I could forget I stood in the middle of the
Kalahari. I could forget that an ancient spirit of Light wanted me to get into
a rumble with a half-dozen Green Berets…or that my uncle was keeping an extra
close eye on me, in case I went into overdrive for no good reason.

I just couldn’t forget what Zenka told us, and what it
meant.

Feeling the weight of the universe crashing down on my
shoulders, I waded through the group, picked up an MRE and went back to my tent
without addressing anyone. I thought it was pretty obvious I wanted to be
alone, but five minutes later Uncle Mike pushed through the tent flap and took
a seat on the cot next to mine.

“You okay?” he asked, then rolled his eyes. “Strike that. Of
course you aren’t okay.”

“Not the best day I’ve had, no.” I scraped the last of my
enchiladas out of the pouch and forced them down. This might’ve been the worst
MRE I’d had yet. The whole thing had congealed before I took a single bite, and
the tomato sauce smelled like ketchup rather than something you’d put on
Mexican food. “The rations suck…at least that’s a constant. I’ll cling to
that.”

Uncle Mike wasn’t deflected. “You know something—more than
what we heard from Zenka before. I could see how unsettled you were on the way
home, muttering something about stars. You have me worried, Chief.”

I lay on my bunk and stared at the ceiling. “The knife told
me it’s been searching for our bloodlines, for the wielders, for all the ages
of the world. Searching for
me.
What if Brandt’s right? What if I’m the
Sentinel?”

Mike was quiet for a long while. “And so what if he is? We
already knew you were special to some extent.”

“To some extent?” I said, feeling a hollow ache growing in
my chest. “This is a whole new ‘extent,’ Uncle Mike.” I sat up, clenching my
fists in my lap to keep my hands from shaking. “If it’s true, this means I have
to save the human race, or die trying. And if I do die trying, then so does
everyone else.”

Uncle Mike reached across and gripped my shoulder. “Then we
don’t let you fail.”

“But what about that missing scientist, the Australian lady
who got kidnapped in Canada? Or the new stuff popping up in China? What about
the next round of eclipses? The first one is only two months away. It’s all
happening at the same time…it’s just so much to take on.”

“Don’t forget there are five wielders, Matt. Five. And Jorge
is pretty formidable in his own right. You do not have to shoulder this burden
on your own. We won’t let you.” Uncle Mike gave me a rueful smile. “Hey, you
know how you eat an elephant?”

I groaned, but the corners of my mouth turned up, too. “One
bite at a time.”

One bite at a time.

The next morning, I woke up early and decided to knock out
some studying before Mike prodded me into it. I started up my satellite
connection to log onto the school’s website, fully intending to read more about
the exploits of old Millard and the gang, but decided to check my email
instead. Good thing—Mamie had sent me a message. I smiled; sometimes my sister
seemed to have ESP. I’d forgotten to send her an email last night, but it’s
like she knew I had planned to.

Matt—

How are
you? Is everything okay? I just had a bad feeling all day.

At that, Tink chuckled in my head.
And you’re concerned
about
our
shared consciousness? It’s almost like she’s reading your
mind.

“She’s just a pro worrywart. It must’ve been my day on her ‘concerned’
to-do list.”

You should tell her that worrying is a waste of time, but
I assume that would fall upon deaf ears.

“I would say, ‘you have no idea,’ but you do, so…yeah. On
the other hand, are you able to read what I read?”

I see with your eyes. Of course I can read this letter.

Great. I sighed and went back to reading.

…J
ust out
of curiosity, I’ve been doing some research on the San people of the Kalahari.
Their cave drawings are some of the oldest in the world—some even date back
thirty-thousand years! It’s fascinating stuff! Listen to this…their DNA is also
some of the oldest, most preserved in the world. They’ve been an isolated
culture until just recently…well, recently as in the last few hundred years,
which really is recent when you think about how long the human race has—

And here’s where she gave me a history lesson. Email was the
way to go when Mamie went into lecture mode. I could skip to the end.

…Anyway,
the San’s religion mirrors the religions of other early civilizations, with its
own creation story that involves light and dark. They believe that the dark is
associated with the god of death. There’s not much more than that online,
though. I’ll try the university library, but I’m studying for midterms, so it
might be a week before I have anything concrete. Still, I believe that Africa
might be more active during the eclipse than anyone thinks. Peru’s not under
totality this time…maybe you should ask for additional backup. You might need
it.

Love you!

Mamie, the
world’s greatest sister

P.S. (The
next time we’re home together, you owe me a turn at doing dishes. That’s my new
fee structure for research projects….did I mention I’m taking economics this
semester? Supply and demand.)

I laughed. “No, sis, you didn’t.” But I’d do the dishes for
her, assuming I was ever home at the same time she was.

Her idea about us needing more backup was interesting. There
wasn’t any way of knowing what would come slinking out of the dark when the
eclipse happened, but better to over-prepare, right? I forwarded sections of
Mamie’s message to Aunt Julie, so she could do some extended research for us
and ask General Richardson if he thought we needed more help, just in case.

I also let Aunt Julie know that Uncle Mike was doing okay.
He hadn’t mentioned her once since we arrived, like he was maintaining some
distance, and that bothered me some. If he could grill me about my
relationships—or lack thereof—I could return the favor. Baby Kate and Aunt
Julie deserved a status even if Mike didn’t check in like he should.

By now, camp was beginning to stir. I didn’t know what we
had planned for today, given my self-imposed exile last night, but Uncle Mike
had said something about visiting the villages that had been attacked in the
last few weeks. I didn’t love detective work—I preferred being the neighborhood
exterminator—but it was a place to start.

Johnson stuck his head inside the tent. “Breakfast. We roll
in twenty.” He glanced at my computer. “I can’t believe it. You’re actually
studying. I’m gonna owe the major ten bucks.”

“Why?” I asked, snapping the laptop shut and reaching for my
boots.

“Because I told him it was a lost cause, making you study
out here. He told me you had more discipline than that.”

Now wasn’t this a dilemma? I could tell Johnson the truth
and make Mike cough up a ten, or I could keep up the ruse that I’d been working
on homework instead of reading email.

When in doubt, avoid getting in trouble. “You know me—Mr.
Diligent.”

“Uh huh,” Johnson said. “Well, it’s a two week bet. Let’s
see how you feel after we’ve been crawling the hills on a hunt.”

I shrugged and made my way outside. Two Humvees were loaded
with equipment and ready to go by the look of things. “Who’s going on this
little jaunt?”

Johnson glanced around. “Captain Brandt’s leaving a couple
of his guys here. That’s it—everyone else is rolling out. The major’s team is
headed south today, and Brandt’s team is going east. We’ll meet back here at
nightfall. Major Tannen wants to visit at least two and maybe three villages.
It’ll be a long day.”

I squinted up at the sun, already shining a brilliant white
in the sky. “No doubt.”

* * *

As the weeks wore on, the daylight hours grew longer and the
days were brutally hot. But no matter how hard we ran or where we went, our
team was always too late, always a step behind. As news of other strikes
against nearby villages came in, Uncle Mike redoubled the searches. Brandt and
I took rotating teams out into the desert, searching caves and barren stretches
of the savannah. We didn’t turn up so much as a track, let alone a den or any
other sign.

The hunt seemed to go on forever, and even with the knife’s
prodding to stay on my guard, I found myself spending more and more time
studying out of a sheer lack of anything useful to do.

Johnson paid Uncle Mike that ten dollars when I aced my
online midterms.

A few days before Thanksgiving, I sat outside a straw hut in
a village twenty miles from camp, listening to Twi translate the story of a
young woman whose husband had gone into the bush to hunt and didn’t return. It
was the first lead we’d had in a while. Two other villages, nearly sixty miles
away, were missing people as well.

The woman spoke quickly, gesturing with her hands. Her eyes
were red and she touched her abdomen frequently. Based on the round stomach
showing beneath the thin blanket she wore around her waist, I realized she was
pregnant.

“She say they find part of his body yesterday.” Twi
scratched his head and looked at the sky. I’d learned this was his way of
recalling the right English to explain. “Not like animals. Uh, not rummage?
Like birds?”

Rummage? I racked my brain for a synonyms, then asked,
“Scavenged?”

Johnson, who was assigned to do interviews with me, nodded.
“So, like he had been attacked and killed, but then other animals hadn’t
touched the body afterward?”

“Yes, yes!” Twi beamed at him. “Like it was…cursed? Curse,
yes?”

Cursed? Well, stranger things had happened. If scavengers
were scared of the remains, it sounded like we might be on the right path.
“What did the people do with the body?”

Twi gave me a suspicious look. “Buried it. We do not like
the dead.” He gestured me close and whispered. “Gaunab will take us if we come
too close.”

“Gaunab?”

Twi put a finger to his lips. “Don’t speak of him so loud.”
He looked over his shoulder. “Death will follow you.”

I stared at the ground, thinking about the Shadow Man.
“Death always follows me.”

Twi didn’t hear me; he’d turned back to the woman to ask
more questions. Johnson had, though, and raised his eyebrows. “You all right?”

“Yeah, just trying to figure out what to do next.” I stood
up and stretched my aching back. “It’d be much easier if we could find these
things. I prefer a straight up fight.”

“Me, too,” Johnson said. “This is what it was like in
Afghanistan, though. Months of searching before we found the lair.”

“And I was the divining rod that finally brought us there,”
I said, completely frustrated. “So why can’t I find anything this time?”

Peace,
the knife sighed in my head.
Patience. The
fight will come soon enough. Why don’t you rest while we still have the time?

I made a face. “I could’ve rested at home.”

When I heard how grouchy I sounded, I instantly felt like a complete
jackass. People were dying out here, and I was complaining. Still, I missed
home. I missed Mom and Mamie and Will. I even missed Brent, who’d be home for
just two days over Thanksgiving before heading back to school to play the final
game of the season. Another thing I’d miss—Washington State had an outside
chance at playing in the Rose Bowl if they won, just like Brent had predicted
last year, and I wasn’t around to cheer him on.

And I missed Ella, but the mark she’d left on my heart
didn’t like me to admit it too often, so I kept that loneliness separate,
buried.

Johnson watched me with a bemused expression. “Not so glamorous
now that you see the real side of deployment, huh?”

I thought about something Mike always said about long
deployments: “Weeks of boredom punctuated by minutes of sheer terror.” Yeah, I
was beginning to get the picture, and the people here didn’t care about my
frustration. All they cared about was sleeping at night without worrying about
monsters slipping from the shadows to steal their loved ones.

Twi touched my sleeve. “She ask if you would find the…thing
that killed her man.”

I looked at the woman. Her face was empty of hope; all I saw
was a glimmer of vengeance in her eyes. Now
that
I understood. “Tell her
we’ll find it, and I’ll kill it so her baby will be safe.”

Because, when you got right down to it, that’s why I was
here.