The Cydonia Objective

chant incomprehensible syllables.

Feeling the eyes of everyone upon him—especially those of his brother—the boy steps up, raising the spear with both trembling hands. He meets the agonized eyes of the sacrifice. Chooses his spot, hoping for a clean kill, and closes his eyes before he wills his arms to strike.

A gasp and a shrieking cry of pain.

Laughter.

Isaac’s mask is off, and he’s barely able to contain his glee, pointing…

The spear point is stuck in the captive’s breastplate, just under the throat. He’s missed the heart completely.

Jacob lets go, turns and drops to his knees. Bile rushes up out of his mouth, soaking the floor. Calderon shakes his head, then nods to Isaac who moves in. He puts his foot on the captive’s chest, pulls out the lance, then quickly drives it in, lower and to the right, spearing the heart and ending the man’s cries.

Jacob crawls away, into the shadows where he curls up, safe in the darkness.

Alexander lurched back in his seat with a sudden jolt. Turbulence.

Isaac was back in his seat, cross-legged. Eyes closed. Remote-viewing with a smile on his face. But Jacob looked ashen, staring at Alexander. “You saw…?”

Nodding, Alexander glanced away, out the window to the snowy terrain rising up to meet them. “Why… what was that?”

“A re-enactment,” Jacob whispered. “Marduk and Tiamat. The whole planetary war thing. Everyone has to do it, our stepdad said. And… it was supposed to prepare us for what we needed to do.”

“What—to kill a lot of people?”

Jacob gave a weak nod.

“But you… you’re not like your brother.” Alexander took a breath, and with it, found some hope. “This doesn’t have to happen. You can help us.”

Jacob shook his head. “It’s already done. It’s over.”

“No,” said Alexander. “Our dad’s still out there. He’ll figure out a way. He’ll stop this.”

Jacob looked down, then back to where Calderon had just now opened his eyes. He was exhaling calmly, but his eyes shone with an emerald tint. “I’m not sure I want to. You don’t understand what we can become…”

“What?”

“Don’t you get it? It’s what we were meant to be. It’s what we were promised.”

Alexander frowned, trying to remember his dad’s lessons. The stories and myths.

With a little enthusiasm returning to his voice, Jacob said: “We’ll be gods.”

“I’m a kid,” Alexander said quietly, fixing Jacob with a cold stare. “That’s all I want to be.”

Calderon slipped the tablet back in the leather case on top of the translation tablets, then raised his cane and nudged Xavier, who didn’t move. His eyelids were rapidly flickering.

“Look sharp, boys!” Calderon called. “The HAARP facility is standing ready for us. We’re landing in ten minutes. And then…” He turned his gaze out the window, looking out of over the expanse of the polar realm, and Alexander imagined he considered himself observing the whole world.

A grunt, then a familiar voice filled the cabin.

“Don’t celebrate yet,” said Xavier. He was blinking, rubbing his eyes. “I just popped in on my half- brother.”

Alexander saw Calderon’s shoulders tense. He gripped the cane with both hands. “And?”

Xavier flashed Alexander a smile of reassurance. “And it seems, dear Caleb has found it.”

“No… Nina should have stopped him by now.”

A shake of his head, and then Xavier gave a light chuckle. “Seems old flames have been rekindled. And Lady Liberty has given up her deepest secret.”

“The spear…” Calderon almost choked on the word, then reached for his cell phone.

Xavier nodded. “Yes, call in your troops. Alert Homeland Security, and hope he hasn’t already booked a flight. Because he’s got it.”

Alexander’s heart was pounding, his throat tight with excitement and hope.

“And,” Xavier continued, “he’s coming for you.”

BOOK THREE Myth and Marvel

1.

Caleb didn’t relax until they were over the Rocky Mountains and the majestic range loomed out the windows, presenting an imposing sight, rising tall and proud. Finding comfort in their strength, as if they offered protection from any pursuers, he leaned back, clutching the satchel to his chest as he exhaled.

On the seat across from him, Nina smiled. She hadn’t taken her eyes off him since they’d sat down, making him nervous. He wondered what those cat-like jade eyes were seeing. Was she regretting her decision to come with him, to turn against Calderon and their boys? And was she even sincere? That was the bigger question, and Caleb had spent the past six hours nervously looking over his shoulder.

Back in New York City, Caleb had called Phoebe and had their new friends provide transportation, a jet fueled and piloted by one of Temple’s trusted men. Despite fears of a last-minute assault on the runway, they took off and traveled quickly and without interruption.

Refusing to speak to her just yet, Caleb closed his eyes.

“Rest,” he heard her say. “You’ll need it.”

He gave a nod, but that was all. His mind was already drifting, losing its grip on reality, bumping and shifting visions with the turbulence.

A flash of city streets, mobbed with cheering people as a familiar man stands on a balcony, framed by huge red banners, displaying the Nazi swastika. He’s shouting, raising his fists defiantly to the churning clouds above, while down by his legs, out of sight, rests a narrow case, open, revealing a gleaming metallic shard inside.

Another rumble, the jet dipped.

Caleb’s eyes stayed closed. And dimly, he nudged his consciousness along… Show me what they were planning.

And the theater in his mind dissolved, replaced with: a vast tunnel, a yawning cavern. Frosted, gleaming with enormous icicles. A team of twenty men in parkas and heavy woolen hoods, brandishing flashlights as well as sub-machine guns, red armbands proudly displaying the same swastika. They advance slowly, toward a smooth wall with a similar design, much larger and carved with deep precision. The rectangular wall section is guarded by a pair of ram-headed sphinxes that stand crookedly on the uneven ground.

One man steps forward and unwraps something long and narrow from a cloth bundle.

“Our fuehrer will be pleased,” he whispers to the nearest man, who merely snorts.

“We don’t do this for him. But for us, for the true masters of this world.”

“You think they will notice us?”

“With the spear in our possession? They must. Everything we’ve learned, what the mystics told us… They’ve been seeking this, and now it is ours to offer up to them.”