Pierce’s forehead creased in dismay. “Fiona is a Kohen and a Baal’Shem,” he said. “You know those words, right? She shares the same genetic heritage as the Levite priests. And she can speak the language of creation.”
“None but the guardian may see the uncovered Ark.”
Carter interposed between the increasingly frustrated Pierce and Mateos. “Abuna, you need to trust us. We respect your traditions and understand the risk, but Fiona has extraordinary abilities.”
The bishop conveyed the message to the older monk, and they shared another exchange in their common language, but Carter could sense Tesfa’s increasing obstinacy.
“We don’t have time for this,” Pierce growled.
Mateos turned to them again. “When the Ark is placed into the Holy of Holies, Abba Tesfa alone will enter to uncover it. He will make an offering of incense and pray to God to allow this.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Pierce relented. “But let’s get to it. Every minute we waste, the world goes a little crazier.”
Lazarus broke his customary silence, not to weigh in on the matter, but to shush them all. It the sudden quiet, Carter had no difficulty making out the source of his concern. A rhythmic crunching noise, like a squad of marching soldiers, issuing from the passage behind them.
Pierce muttered an oath. “Damn it. Someone must have followed us in here.”
“A lot of someones,” Lazarus said, his tone grim. “You guys take care of things here. I’ll deal with them.”
Before he could move however, the noise stopped. A few seconds later a lone figure emerged from the passage.
“Fallon,” Pierce snarled.
The tech-billionaire paused there. In his right hand, was a semi-automatic pistol, though judging by the way he held it, he wasn’t sure why he had it.
“Check you out,” Fiona said, her sarcasm almost — but not quite — hiding a quaver of alarm. “Looking all gangsta.”
Fallon ignored her, surveying the chamber like a mountaineer gazing down from the summit. “So that’s it. The Ark of the Covenant.” He shook his head in mock admiration. “Thanks for doing the heavy lifting, Pierce, but I’ll take it from here.”
“Like hell you will.”
Fallon stared back for a moment, then glanced over at Gallo, his face twisting in an unspoken promise of menace. He turned his attention back to Pierce. “The Black Knight is a resource with unimaginable potential. We could harness all the energy of the sun. Think of what that means. Unlimited energy. We could conquer every problem. End hunger and poverty forever. Colonize the solar system. We can’t let this opportunity slip away.”
“You know what’s happening out there,” Pierce said. “We have to end this now. Forever.”
“I can’t let you do that.”
“Just try and stop us,” Pierce said, nodding to Lazarus who returned the nod and started forward.
Fallon paled and retreated a step, stabbing the gun in Lazarus’s direction. His smile returned. “I didn’t come alone, you know.” He looked over his shoulder. “Little help?”
Four men with military buzz cuts and tan fatigues emerged from the passage. They were also armed, but unlike Fallon, they carried Uzi machine pistols, which they leveled at the advancing Lazarus.
The big man cracked his knuckles and continued forward.
“Erik!” Carter called out. “Don’t. There’s another way.”
She drew in a deep breath and leaned close to Pierce. “He might be invincible, but we aren’t. Get the others out of here. Hide in one of those other tunnels. The fewer people out here, the better.”
Pierce opened his mouth to ask the obvious question, but then closed it just as quickly. He knew what she was preparing to do.
She turned away from him and took another deep breath. Her ability — it felt more like a curse — was not some superpower that she could exercise with precision, the way that Fiona manipulated soil and rock with the Mother Tongue. It was more like a feral animal kept locked in a cage only by the power of her will. Mostly, the beast stayed quiet, but in dire circumstances — like having four Uzis pointed her way — it woke up and started shaking the door. Control meant not using it, keeping the cage door shut through an effort of will. Letting go was a lot easier, but it meant surrendering to something unpredictable.
It also meant taking, if not the lives of her enemies, their very souls.
Fallon could not possibly have understood what she was about to do, but he seemed to sense the abrupt power shift in the chamber. His eyes went wide with fear, and he turned back into the passage. “Advance,” he shouted. “Secure.”
The noise that they had heard earlier sounded again, much louder now, and as the marching figures materialized to either side of Fallon and began streaming down into the large hall, Carter’s heart sank. This was a threat against which she was powerless.
Robots.
FIFTY-SEVEN
The four human mercenaries backed up against the wall, making way for the eight humanoid automatons that filed down into the chamber. Each one was large as Lazarus, and from the neck down, they reminded Pierce of the T-800 machines from The Terminator movie series. Though, they were stripped of anything remotely Arnie-like, and they sported four articulated arms instead of two. The biggest difference was above the shoulders, where the human-like skull had been replaced by what looked like a gimbal-mounted spherical camera inside a protective cage.
“Like ’em?” Fallon crowed, his earlier arrogance returning with a vengeance. “A little project I’ve been working on. My own variation on the ATLAS robot developed for DARPA. Improved, of course. They’re utility bots, designed for working rescue, not combat. But I’d recommend keeping your distance all the same.”
Lazarus seemed to take that as a challenge, and charged the line. Pierce had seen YouTube videos of DARPA robots getting knocked down. He expected to see the humanoid machines scattered like bowling pins on impact, but the outcome was more like something from an NFL scrimmage. As the big man drew close, the robots turned toward him in unison, lowering and repositioning like football linemen preparing for the snap. One of them was staggered back a few steps by the collision, but it stayed on its feet. After a moment, it started pushing back.
Lazarus pivoted, trying to use the machine’s weight and momentum against it, but its processors and internal gyroscopes reacted faster than even his battle-hardened reflexes, matching him move for move as the others closed in around him like soldier ants.
He tried to break contact, but the robot’s metal fingers, stronger and more unyielding than flesh and bone, had closed on his arms like manacles. Instead of wasting energy in a futile attempt to break free, Lazarus widened his stance and shifted his weight onto one foot, then twisted his body hard, whipping the robot sideways and slamming it into the pair that was closing in from his left.
Once again however, the net result fell well short of a spectacular victory. The heavy self-balancing machines were merely jostled, and after staggering back a few steps, they recovered. While that was happening, the others closed in from all angles. Anchored as he was to the first machine, there was no retreat. Three more robots moved in, and despite his best efforts to kick them away, they managed to grab hold of his legs and yank him off his feet. The others regrouped and began moving toward the Ark.
“George!” Gallo’s shout was both a warning and a question: What should we do?
Pierce had no answer. They were outnumbered and overmatched. Even one of the automatons would have been a challenge for Lazarus, and Fallon had brought eight, in addition to the hired guns.