The Apocalypse Script (13 page)

“
You let children
fight?”

“
Everyone does when push comes to
shove, Ben. We have been shoved.”

Ben was troubled by that, but
said, “That might explain Fiela’s expertise. She’s a force of
nature with a mop.”

Lilian smiled. “She is
Peth-Allati
. A
shadow horseman
.
The title originated long ago, when our warriors
rode horses into battle. Peth-Allati, or
Peth
, are the Nisirtu equivalent of
the ancient Knights Templar. She is an ardent believer in and
enforcer of the faith, which in this case is
the way of the Nisirtu
.”

“
Which is that anyone who is not a
Nisirtu is a slave.”

“
Which is that humanity benefits
from the guiding hand of the Nisirtu and should not bite the hand
that feeds it.”

“
And she seemed like such a nice
girl…”

“
She is, really. So long as you
aren’t on her bad side.”

“
I was joking, Lilian.”

“
I’m not. But here we are, Ben. We
can continue our discussion inside.”

The limousine had stopped in front
of a sad looking six-story brick building in a forgotten and
neglected part of town. Ben thought that the white brick structure,
built in the Italian Renaissance revival style, had probably been
constructed in the 1920’s. All of the building’s terra cotta
trimmed windows were boarded up and the door to main entrance was
merely a reinforced piece of plywood, across which stretched a band
of yellow plastic warning tape.

Ben stepped out of the car and
proffered his hand. Lilian took it and he gently pulled her
forward. She leaned through the passenger window and said, “I’ll
call for you, Mr. Fetch. Stay nearby.”

“
Yes, madam,” the driver said, and
pulled away.

Lilian gently touched Ben’s elbow and said, looking
up at the building, “Welcome to the Ziggurat.”

“
Hmmm.”

“
Not impressed?”

“
Well, no,” admitted
Ben.

“
This is merely the location being
used this evening. Tomorrow this will again be an abandoned
building.”

“
How do we get inside?”

“
We use magic,” she said. She took
off her shawl and waved it in the air theatrically. “Sésame,
ouvre-toi!”

There was a mechanical click from
behind the door, and a whirring noise. A tiny orange light blinked
twice and the plywood door swung outward in a surprisingly smooth
motion.

“
See?” she said, grinning.
“Magic!”

“
Bravo,” said Ben as she took his
hand. “Can you also pull a rabbit from a hat?”

Lilian led him toward the door.
Beyond it was nothing but an inky blackness.

“
Better,” she said. “I can put one
in.”

“
That’s not much of a
trick.”

She winked at him. “It is when the rabbit
disappears.”

They stepped past the door and
watched it close behind them. Ben saw a sliver of red light ahead
of them and they began to walk toward it. When they had almost
reached it Lilian moved aside a thick plastic curtain to reveal a
staircase above which dangled an exposed red bulb. They went up
several sets of stairs before emerging onto a broad landing
illuminated by another red bulb. Twenty feet in front of them was a
paneled wooden door with cracked but intact glazing at the top.
Faded yellow lettering on the glass pane read “Administration
Office.” Beneath that was a newly painted edition – a circular
labyrinth a foot in diameter that resembled a fingerprint, the
entrance at the bottom. It was similar to the one on the doors of
Steepleguard, except that this version had elven circuits instead
of five.

Next to the door stood a human
figure.

“
The guard,” whispered Lilian,
putting her arm around Ben’s waist and ushering him
forward.

As they approached, Ben saw that
the figure was a man dressed in a metallic skirt composed of rows
of overlapping gold plates, like the scales of a fish. His muscular
chest was bare except for a gold broad collar. On his head was a
tall, elongated bronze helmet decorated by rows of turquoise beads.
Four metallic wings had been affixed to his back, in the shape of
an X, like the wings of a dragonfly. A thick, black, and
intricately woven beard fell to his chest, where it was cut
horizontally. In each hand the guard held a bronze weapon that
looked like a massive fork but with three tongs at both top and
bottom.

Ben leaned over and whispered, “I’m sure he’s a
tough customer but those metal wings and skirt are going to be a
real problem if gets into a fight.”

Lilian replied, “Oh, he’s mostly
ceremonial. Like the single Marine guard at the door to the White
House. Besides,” she teased, “he has a big gun inside that skirt of
his.”

“
A
big…
oh.
Lilian, that’s not very ladylike.”

“
No, seriously, it’s a requirement
for the job.”

“
Lilian!”

“
I’ve seen him use it.”

Ben moaned. “Enough!”

The two stopped in front of the
guard and Ben saw the man tighten his grip on the two weapons in
his hands, as if readying them. The former Marine removed his arm
from around Lilian, suddenly alert. Lilian, however, was completely
at ease, as if the guard were merely a teenager responsible for
taking movie tickets.

She said,
“Vos es migdu Lilitu sef Sarganu, Mutu vil Benzira, pos
rindet es Temu. Adilnah.”

The guard glowered at Ben.

“
Show him the dowry, Mutu,” said
Lilian.

Ben held out his left hand and
made a fist, feeling silly.

The bearded guard bent over and inspected the signet
ring, cynically at first, but in short order his eyes widened and
his expression changed to one of bewilderment.

“
Badeel!
”
said Lilian forcefully and, to Ben’s astonishment, she
slapped the man viciously on the left side of his face. The stunned
guard slowly went to one knee and lowered his head, mumbling
something that sounded like an apology.

“
Be careful,”
Lilian seethed at the cowering man in English, daggers in her
voice, “or I will make you the fetch of
Nea’deez
.”

The guard mumbled something else,
pleading. Lilian towered over the censured man for what seemed like
forever, letting the tension build.

Then, it was over. She looked at
Ben and her radiant, carefree smile had returned.

“
Sorry,” she said and put an arm
back around his waist. “It’s so hard to get good help these
days.”

With that, the two walked through the door and into
the lair of the Nisirtu.

Beyond the door was a spacious
room that resembled, in size and furnishings, a large hotel
conference center. Dozens of round tables were scattered about the
room, each capable of seating ten people. The tables were covered
with red cloths and harbored lit candles at their centers. Each was
stocked with several bottles of liquor, wine, and water, buckets of
ice and a variety of glasses. There were also makeshift booths
along both walls. The walls were covered with thick black
tapestries that kept the room’s illumination from penetrating the
cracks in the boarded-up windows behind them. A ridiculously long
banquet table that offered all varieties of sinful delicacies had
been positioned at the back of the room.

While moderately extravagant,
these things would have been disappointingly mundane to Ben, given
that the people in the room - there were about a hundred, he
guessed - supposedly controlled his world, or large swaths of
it.

Compensating for the ordinariness
was what he saw in the center of the room: Two immense and imposing
statues, thirty feet long and ten feet high, with the bodies of
bulls, the wings of birds, and the heads of men. The heads were
almost exact facsimiles of the head of the guard Lilian had
reprimanded, with elaborately braided bears, elongated caps, and
scornful expressions.

Ben detected a slight flicker from
what he had initially assumed were spotlights on the floor around
the statues.

Lilian followed his gaze.
“
Lamassu,
”
she said. “Guardians.”

“
Holograms,” marveled
Ben.

“
Yes. Centuries ago, the statues
at the Ziggurats were real, but that was when the Nisirtu could
safely meet in one place for years without detection. Today we must
be mobile and you can imagine the logistical difficulties of moving
such immense stone statues secretly from place to place. These look
very realistic, don’t you think?”

“
Incredibly realistic,” agreed
Ben.

“
Let’s sit down,” said the woman.
They took a booth and sat beside each other facing the entrance. “I
want to be able to see who comes and goes. Drink?”

“
Water.”

She arranged two glasses. Ben
could hear the people in the booth behind him talking but they were
speaking in what sounded like the same language Lilian had spoken
to the guard. What was it called?
Agati?

Lilian handed Ben his water.

“
Thanks,” he said, taking a sip.
“Tell me then, how is it that the Nisirtu came to be the masters of
the world? Did the Illuminati go bankrupt?”

“
You’re humoring me?” she
asked.

“
Isn’t that what I’m supposed to
do?”

She nodded. “We are the
descendants of the
Madihee
, a nomadic tribe that
originally migrated in and out of what are now Iraq, Syria and Iran
five thousand years ago or so. Our ancestors bred superior horses
that were capable of traveling further and faster than others. They
also developed primitive rope varieties of saddles and stirrups,
though historians today would argue that neither existed in the
period.

“
At that time, wheat was being
harnessed and the region was becoming agricultural. The Madihee,
however, remained nomads, and because the tribe was constantly on
the move and had a far larger range than other nomads, the tribe’s
horsemen were often paid to carry messages or small items between
individuals and villages. The messages were, at first, only verbal
and the items were often canisters of clay tokens and runes that
had special significance to the recipients. But this was cumbersome
so-”

“
No, wait…please don’t tell me the
Madihee invented writing.”

Lilian nodded. “It was a
necessity, don’t you see? Why tote a thousand runes or little clay
spheres when their meaning can be impressed in a clay tablet that
requires a fraction of the space? That allowed each Madihee courier
to carry ten times as many messages, or more, than before. This
greatly increased the tribe’s efficiency and profits. Of course, at
that stage, the cuneiform did not denote sounds and no one thought
to use papyrus. Those developments came much later.”

The researcher breathed out.
“Right…this is a bit hard to swallow.”

“
It was an economic necessity,
Ben. Who would have more impetus to create a writing system than
the people would profit by it? Necessity is the mother of
invention. Can you offer an alternative?”

“
Well, no. I mean, I can’t point a
finger at a specific person or group as the creator of writing. It
was an evolutionary process.”

“
True. The Madihee constantly
improved upon their rather crude initial product. Needless to say,
they tried to keep it to themselves. It was a secret technology
that was immensely profitable. But that was an impossible task.
They inadvertently spread their insight to others like bees spread
pollen amongst the flowers in the field.”

“
Stimulus
diffusion
. I get that. But the Madihee? No
historical record references them as the founders of
cuneiform.”

“
Who
does
the historical record say created it?”

“
Well, it doesn’t.”

“
Using your logic, then, writing
was never invented.”

Ben rubbed his face and mumbled.
“Fine. I won’t interrupt again – go ahead with your
story.”

The woman nodded. “Once messages
could be written on tablets, those became our couriers’ primary
cargo. Cities and kingdoms were founded and armies began to march
between them. These entities became the primary customers for the
Madihee’s services. Soon, not only messages but also contracts and
maps required transport. Demand was so great that our nomadic
ancestors began recruiting members from other tribes, which
extended their reach. Eventually the network extended for a
thousand miles in every direction from its epicenter. The Madihee
diversified and began to travel by river, also. The tribe was, in a
way, the postal service of its era. Not surprisingly, the Madihee
had the best translators, who were especially useful to traders and
monarchs.