Temple of the Gods

followed up with another crunching blow to his chest. ‘I should have shot you in Afghanistan when I had the chance!’ he snarled, lining up another strike at his head—

Eddie whipped up both arms, one taking the full force of the kick while the other clamped around Stikes’s ankle. Despite the pain he still twisted and rolled, yanking his opponent off balance. Stikes stumbled, landing heavily on one knee. He cried out — only for his yell to become a breathless groan as Eddie drove an elbow into his stomach. ‘Fuck off, you southern ponce!’

The Yorkshireman swivelled and unleashed a kick of his own that struck Stikes’s head with a satisfying crack. He pulled back to attack again, about to drive the former officer’s jawbone up into his skull—

A gunshot boomed across the ledge, a bullet smacking off the stone floor beside the two fighting men. Eddie froze, seeing Sophia striding towards him, the smoking Jericho in her hand. She sighed. ‘“Fuck off, you southern ponce”? Really, Eddie, the quality of your bons mots just keeps getting worse. Nina’s education clearly isn’t rubbing off on you.’

Stikes looked angrily up at her. ‘Why didn’t you just shoot him?’

A little mocking smile. ‘Because I didn’t think you’d appreciate the bullets going through you first, darling. Get up, Eddie.’ She gestured with the gun for him to stand, then looked back towards the entrance. The lava tube was now completely lost to sight, tons of stone blocking the exit. ‘You should have blown up the meteorite after all. We still have it, and we still have Nina and your father. And you, for that matter.’

‘Yeah,’ said Eddie, ‘but there’s not much you can do with it, is there? There’s no way out, and it doesn’t look like you brought a JCB with you to dig through the tunnel.’

‘There’s always a way out for the resourceful.’ She looked up at the circle of sky high above.

Warden staggered over to them. ‘What have you done?’ he yelled at Eddie. ‘You psycho! You’ve trapped us in here!’

‘Fuck me, so I have,’ Eddie replied sarcastically. ‘Hope you brought a packed lunch.’

Stikes stood, barking commands to his surviving men to secure Nina and Larry, then reclaimed his gun from Sophia. Seething, he regarded Eddie for a long moment as if considering pulling the trigger, then pointed at his other two prisoners. ‘Get over there.’

Meerkrieger and Brannigan, both visibly shaken, joined Warden. ‘What are we going to do now?’ asked the Australian. ‘Chase is right — we’ll never clear all that rubble.’

‘We might not have to,’ said Stikes, following Sophia’s gaze and staring up at the shaft above the temple. ‘It’ll be a tough climb, but I think it might be possible to reach the top of the volcano.’

Meerkrieger was far from pleased at the suggestion. ‘I’m eighty-one years old! How do you expect me to climb up there?’

‘I wouldn’t worry yourself about getting out of here,’ Stikes replied, his smug self-confidence returning. ‘There are ropes in the helicopter.’

‘And how are you going to get up to the helicopter in the first place?’ asked Nina. She indicated the temple. The collapsing tier had brought the first two flights of stairs down with it, making it impossible to ascend the structure. She turned to Warden. ‘Face it, you’ve lost. Most of the Group are dead, and while you might have got your precious sky stone, there’s nothing you can do with it.’

‘The Group will go on even without its individual members,’ Warden said angrily, then his expression suddenly became more calculating. He looked at the meteorite, then back at Nina. Chillingly, he was now smiling. ‘There may not be anything we can do with the meteorite — but there is something you can do with it.’

‘What do you mean?’ Brannigan demanded.

Warden hurried back to the rubble scattered around the entrance, searching the debris until he found the case he had dropped. He returned to the survivors and opened it, revealing the three small statues. ‘Put them together,’ he ordered Nina.

She shook her head. ‘Go to hell.’

‘Stikes?’

Stikes pushed his gun against Eddie’s head. ‘I think you know the drill by now, Nina.’

‘What exactly is this going to achieve?’ she said scathingly. ‘You don’t need the statues to tell you where the meteorite is any more. I mean, it’s right there.’

‘You’re forgetting the statues’ true purpose,’ Warden told her. ‘What did Nantalas call them? The keys of power? You can access that power — and move the meteorite over to the temple so we can climb up!’

Even with a gun pressed against his back, Larry couldn’t hold in an incredulous exclamation. ‘It’s the size of a bloody whale! How do you expect anyone to move that?’

‘Those little statues levitating is one thing,’ Eddie added, ‘but that? Come on, she’s not Yoda!’

Warden snorted in disdain. ‘You’ve just illustrated perfectly why the Group will ultimately win. If you decide something is impossible before even attempting it, then you’ve already failed.’

‘We see what’s possible,’ said Brannigan. ‘Then we make it happen.’

‘And in this case, we know what’s possible. The Atlantean texts describe Nantalas levitating the sky stone. If she can do it, so can you, Dr Wilde.’ He thrust the case at her. ‘Take the statues.’

‘And be careful with them,’ said Stikes, grinding the Jericho’s muzzle into Eddie’s cheek. ‘You wouldn’t want to drop one and startle me, would you? It could have very unfortunate consequences for your husband.’

‘Nina, don’t do it,’ Eddie warned. ‘If they get out of here with that DNA…’

He stopped as his wife’s eyes met his. Just a look — but he instantly knew she had something in mind other than mere surrender. He didn’t know what, but there was also an unspoken warning that he should be prepared for something major.

Nobody except Eddie picked up on it. ‘I… I don’t have a choice,’ she said, making a show of seeming conflicted. She took out the first statue.

It glowed in her hand, brighter than ever before. The volcano was evidently the site of an extremely powerful earth energy confluence point. The second statue joined the first, shoulder to shoulder. The eerie rippling blue light intensified, a brilliant line pointing directly at the remaining figurine.

Everyone watched the display intently as she cradled the two statuettes in one hand and reached with the other for the third. As in Takashi’s skyscraper and the Blauspeer hotel, she again experienced the electrical tingling coursing through her body.

‘Put them together,’ ordered Warden. ‘Do it!’

She gave Eddie a final glance… then completed the triptych.

The effect this time was more powerful, yet, because she was fully prepared for it, less overwhelming. She now knew that this was truly the source of life on earth, the feeling of having somehow come home undeniable. All life had started with the meteorite, and even after billions of years it was still linked, through the planet’s own mysterious energies. She could sense its myriad descendants even in the heart of the barren Ethiopian wilderness. There was not a corner of the planet that the offspring of the primordial DNA had not touched.

She kept her focus on the statues. If her desperate plan had any chance of working, she needed to learn how to control the power running through them.

And quickly. Through the maelstrom of unworldly sensation she heard Warden’s voice: ‘Take them to the meteorite. Now!’

Nina opened her eyes. The statues were not levitating; her hands were tightly clasped round their bases, holding them together, but she could feel the bizarre pressure as they tried to lift away from her. She moved towards the meteorite, everyone following with expressions of awe or expectation.

With two exceptions. Sophia took the opportunity to pick up Eddie’s gun… and Eddie himself kept a close watch on Nina, waiting for the cue to make his move.

Whatever that cue might be.

Nina reached the meteorite. The statues’ glow was now almost dazzling — and there was a strange charge in the air, as if the giant rock were humming in anticipation of the return of its long-separated splinters. She looked back. The faces of the surviving Group members were filled with rapacious greed.

‘Do it!’ Warden ordered again, but she didn’t need the prompt, already drawing a nervous breath… and touching the three statues to the sky stone.