partial protection. Judging by the size of it, Conrad could only assume the rest of such a creature required little else.
Creature, he thought. Is that what his true father was? Is that what he was? He had more in common with the man next to him than whatever creature used that harness.
“There is no way in hell I’m related to the thing that belongs here,” Conrad told Yeats. “It would have shown up in my DNA tests or something.”
“If Serena is right and the Atlanteans are the so-called sons of God from Genesis,” Yeats said, “then your biological father was a generation or two removed from the first coupling and more or less human.”
“More or less human?” Conrad repeated. “That sounds even more-”
“Show me the goddamn Seat of Osiris, son. We’re running out of time.”
Conrad nodded. “It’s got to be somewhere in here, closer than we think,” he said. “If we split up, we’ll double our coverage in half the time.”
“Then you can hold on to this.”
Yeats tossed over the Scepter of Osiris, which Conrad caught in one hand. The thing was practically vibrating with raw energy.
“Now switch your headset to our backup frequency,” Yeats said. “It’s marked with that little blue tape on the back. Blue is for backup.”
“I get it. I get it.” Conrad switched to frequency B. “Check.”
“Check.”
For a minute or two Conrad could hear Yeats’s gravelly voice in his right ear as they continued exploring. But it didn’t take long for Yeats to move out of range. By the time Conrad was satisfied he had explored every surface of the top story of the obelisk and returned to the central platform, Yeats had disappeared. Conrad was alone and disappointed. He had found nothing and wondered where Yeats went and what he had found.
Conrad stood there on the platform, inside the top chamber of the obelisk, and pondered the alien nature of the obelisk’s interior. For all its strangeness there was something about this place that persuaded him to believe he had been here before. Or somewhere like here. An inner urge prompted him to look up at the ceiling. Something about it had bothered him. Now as he flashed his light on it he could see what he had missed before: a small square pad, just like the earlier one.
There was one more, hidden chamber above him, he realized with a surge of excitement.
It was also two meters beyond his reach.
Conrad managed to use the control lever to nudge the platform up half a level, careful not to squash himself against the ceiling, and placed his hand on the square pad. Suddenly the outer ring of some sort of hatch appeared before it split open to reveal another chamber above him with a cathedral ceiling-clearly the very top chamber of the shrine.
Conrad rode the platform up to the top level. His light scanned the chamber, revealing a large high-backed seat that lay horizontally on a kind of altar and pointed to the apex of the cathedral ceiling overhead.
Eureka, Conrad thought. The Seat of Osiris.
“Yes!” Conrad exclaimed out loud. He fumbled anxiously for his radio. “Yeats, I found it.”
But there was no response. Where the hell was he?
“Yeats.” The silence was eerie, unsettling.
He cranked his ear full of static until it hurt and still he heard nothing. So he switched it off. He wondered what Yeats could be up to, if he was OK. He felt a sick knot forming in his stomach. Well, he couldn’t wait.
Slowly he circled the empty chair and surveyed the scene. His flashlight showed nothing else in the chamber. No artifacts, markings, or any evidence this room had ever been used before. But it all felt very familiar.
It was as if he had stepped into an ancient hieroglyph come to life. Ancient Egyptian reliefs of Osiris often showed the Lord of Eternity sitting in his chair and wearing his Atef crown, like the one inside the Seti I Temple at Abydos. Conrad also recalled the Man in the Serpent sculpture from the ancient Olmec site of La Venta, Mexico, which depicted a man seated inside a mechanical-looking device much like the chair before him. Then there was the sarcophagus lid inside the Temple of the Inscriptions at the Mayan site of Palenque in Chiapas, Mexico. That, too, revealed a mechanical design involving a man who appeared to be seated inside some kind of device.
Yes, he had been here before, he thought, feeling sweat begin to bead on his forehead. His hands felt heavy and clammy. Only this time the chair was real, the very Seat of Osiris. And so was the small altar like base next to it, clearly the receptacle for the Scepter of Osiris. The only thing left to the imagination was for him to take the scepter, sit in that seat, and behold the Secret of First Time.
Conrad ran his hand over the smooth contours of the chair. It was like an empty eggshell. Conrad pressed the surface, felt it bend to his touch. He wanted to sit in it. But he remembered what had happened with the scepter in P4 and paused.
This time was different, he rationalized. The first time was a mistake. He knew that all too well. This time he was trying to correct that mistake, and if he didn’t try, billions of lives could perish. Yes, he concluded, whatever his own shortcomings, however unworthy, he had to sit in the chair, if not for himself, then for humanity.
Conrad slipped into the Seat of Osiris, inserted the Scepter of Osiris into its receptacle, and looked straight up at the pyramid like ceiling. This is interesting, he thought, feeling like one of his students on the Nazca Lines tour, waiting for some great revelation to materialize that never does.
“Sure, Conrad,” he said out loud, just to hear the sound of his voice. “You’ve finally made something of yourself. You’ve self-actualized yourself and become your astral projection. You are the Sun King.”
He laughed nervously. If Mercedes could see him now, she’d be taping everything. He could picture the ads on TV: “Live from the Shrine of the First Sun! The Secrets of Atlantis Revealed! Witness the End of the World!” The way things were going, unfortunately, he soon would.
A wave of depression suddenly washed over Conrad as he sat in the Seat of Osiris. Had he traveled so far, and would humanity have to suffer so much, only to discover this was all some cosmic joke? What if the Secret of First Time was that there was no secret?
No, Conrad decided. Somebody went to too much trouble to build all this. And there were clearly some astronomical correlations he was missing. There must be a way to stop the earth-crust displacement. Perhaps he was simply the wrong man to find that way. He felt overwhelmed by a sense of helplessness. He had failed Serena. He had failed humanity. He had failed himself, period. What more could he do? This was indeed the end of the line.
Conrad leaned back in the seat, closed his eyes, and prayed: God of Noah, Moses, Jesus, and Serena. If you’re there, if you care at all for Serena and all she cares for, then help me figure this thing out before Osiris and his kind screw your kind over for good.
Conrad opened his eyes. Nothing happened.
Again Conrad leaned back in the seat, and as soon as he did, he realized it had settled into a pocket and locked in with a click. Conrad tried to lean forward to look. But the egg like capsule, while comfortable, held him back.
He felt a sequence of vibrations shoot up his spine.
The chair was squeezing him, tightening around his waist and pushing down on his shoulders, devouring him. A metallic console telescoped itself beyond his forehead.
“Yeats!”
Suddenly the console overhead came to life with a beep. It glowed an eerie blue and a panel of instruments lit up. A tremendous shudder reverberated throughout the obelisk and Conrad could feel vibrations building in the back of his chair.
“Yeats!”
A single shaft of intense white light from above blinded him.
“Yeats!”
Then another flash shot up from below, imbuing the entire chamber in light. Conrad realized it was sunlight through two shafts above and below his reclined seat. Just like the star shaft in P4. Sunlight? Where did that come from?
Conrad managed to put on his sunglasses and gaze out the shafts. They were windows and framed a lightening sky. He had opened the doors of the silo.
Another shudder, and suddenly all became clear.
