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CHAPTER
TWENTY-THREE

Marty lay in darkness.

He had fallen into a deep crack in the earth. By some miracle, he’d managed to slow his fall sufficiently to land on his feet without breaking anything. His fingers, feet, and knees were scraped to hell, and he prayed that the rest of the crew had gotten away without calling attention to themselves.

But after landing, his memory was mostly a blank. He recalled the smell of rotting eggs. The scent reminded him of a vacation he’d taken to see a childhood friend in South Florida. They’d visited a garbage dump nicknamed Mount Trashmore. It was literally the highest elevation in the southern part of the state. The methane emissions were controlled by burning the gas off through several pipes that reached deep into the grassy mountain. It was entertainment on a low budget for two seventeen-year-olds. Almost forty years later, he’d experienced a similar strong scent of rot and must have passed out.

The floor was smooth. Clay or plaster, or maybe dirt pounded flat by centuries of traffic. He couldn’t still be in the crack he’d fallen into. Someone had found him and brought him here, wherever here was.

Taking in deep breaths and letting them out slowly, Marty worked on calming his rapidly beating heart. Who had plucked him from the crevasse?

He was alive, at least. He had to believe that escape was possible. Horrible images came to mind as he imagined the reasons why the catlike creatures would have wanted him alive.

Food was a distinct possibility. Nothing is better than fresh.

Torture. They had summoned the crew to the ruins. If they really wanted to get all the so-called strangers, and if he was the only one they’d caught, then they might work on trying to extract information from him.

Bait was a third possibility. For some reason, they wanted the crew. One way to get them all might be to hold Marty as a prisoner to lure the others in.

Unless, of course, his friends were also prisoners, held in different cells. In which case, the cat-men might try to play them off one another.

His eyes were useless in the darkness. So Marty closed his eyes and focused on his other senses.

When he was a kid, Grandpa Chang had taught him meditation. It was supposed to help clear his mind, make him more open to clear thinking, and be more receptive to what his body—and his senses—were telling him.

Taking another deep breath, Marty found the air damp. It smelled of the grass, the humidity, and decay. And the air was still.

He was inside. Probably in one of the buildings.

He felt tiny vibrations coming from the floor.

Footsteps.

And the vibrations were getting stronger.

He felt for his ankh; it had been taken from him. Without a doubt, these weren’t friendlies.

A door swung open and blinding light poured into the room.

Marty squinted, trying to make out details of the two figures at the doorway, but the door slammed shut and the bright light snapped off. A dim blue light began emanating from a fist-sized rock one of the figures was carrying.

The rock was placed on the ground. As time passed, it glowed steadily brighter.

The interior of the room slowly came out of the darkness. Marty was already crouched in a defensive position, arms raised to deflect attack. The shadows melted away from the two new arrivals.

They sat cross-legged not more than six feet from him.

The stone didn’t put out enough light for him to really get a sense of colors, but these monsters had catlike eyes that seemed to glow in their dim surroundings. One had tabby orange fur and the other was tawny yellow. They were as tall as tall men, powerfully built, and dressed in kilts, cape, and sandals.

Marty sighed. For once, he’d like to encounter a new sentient species that was shorter than he was, and not threatening.

Orange Cat leaned forward and sniffed several times, its eyes squinted and its mouth held partially open, revealing long canines. It looked at Tawny Cat and shrugged.

Tawny Cat spoke in a very high-pitched voice. “You smell of the one, but you aren’t of the one.”

Marty blinked, trying to process what he’d heard.

Tawny Cat tilted its head. “Do you hear me, of the one who is not of the one? Do you understand what I am saying to you?”

Marty nodded. “Yes,” he lied.

Orange Cat donned a glove and drew a metal object from within its robe, and held up Marty’s ankh.

“This was in your possession. Such a thing is not for those who are of the one, it is for the others. You held such a thing?”

Marty nodded again.

“Yet it does not burn you,” Tawny Cat purred and both of the creatures’ eyes widened.

The cat-man had to wear a glove to handle the ankh. Might that explain why the ankh was so lethal to the Sethians? Something about the metal in the ankh was deadly poison to them, or maybe it caused a violent allergic reaction.

The cat-men kept sniffing at him. Did the crew smell different from the humans of this time? He resolved to ask Surjan.

“You are not of the one,” Orange Cat said, “but you are also not like the rest.”

Marty maintained a blank expression. He needed time and he needed more information. “I thought I was the one.”

Both cat-headed creatures shook their heads, and the one who did all the talking for the pair wrinkled its nose.

As he did so, Marty noticed that each of the creatures had a small ring attached to its septum. Just like the Sethians did.

“What are you doing here?” Orange Cat purred. “You are but one. We are looking for more than just one.”

A sense of relief washed over Marty. The rest of the crew must have managed to make it to the forest without catching these things’ attention.

Marty’s skin began tingling as adrenaline rushed through his system. The door opened, bathing the room once again in blindingly bright light.

The light had a yellow cast to it. Did that mean it was daylight? If so, perhaps the cat-people had fished Marty from the crevasse and stashed him in one of the ruins. If so, the seal on the door was impressive—when shut, it blocked out all light.

Marty squinted against the brightness and saw the outline of a large creature standing in the doorway.

It ducked its head and walked in.

It was a Sethian. And it was nearly seven feet tall.

Its yellow-eyed countenance focused on Marty and he felt malice boiling off the creature like vapor from a Halloween smoke machine. The Sethian spoke with a deep gravelly voice, “Are you Merit Nuk Han?”

Marty stared.

“The one asks for Merit Nuk Han,” Orange Cat said. “You know this creature, he is of your kind.”

So was the one the Sethian? Is that what the furball was talking about?

The Sethian snarled, and let out a loud guttural vocalization that was a mix of a growl and a bark. “Do you know where Merit Nuk Han is?”

Marty shook his head. “I don’t understand.”

The cat-headed creature turned to the Sethian, then promptly turned back to Marty. “The great one is clear about this, and the one speaks for him. You must die if you don’t help kill Merit Nuk Han and those who come with it.”

The great one? What in the world could that be? The Sethian’s boss?

Marty blinked as he rattled the words the cat creature had said around in his head, desperately trying to make sense of it.

He felt he was in some scene from the Book of the Dead, confronted by gods or demons with the heads of beasts. He couldn’t pass on until he produced the password the monsters wanted to hear.

Merit Nuk Han . . . 

The Book of the Dead, or the Pyramid Texts, or the Book of Breathings. These gate guardian or judgment scenes were common in ancient Egyptian writing.

Writing.

Written ancient Egyptian, much like modern Semitic languages, didn’t represent vowels very well.

Merit Nuk Han would be written as Mrt Nk Hn.

The Sethian again made a growling noise deep in its chest. “This is your final chance. You will find Merit Nuk Han and kill it and its people, or you will die.”

“So, you will let me go if I promise to kill Merit Nuk Han and its people?” Marty was fishing for information.

The Sethian snarled, spittle dripping from its bared canines. “No. You will lead me to him. Understood?”

Marty’s mind raced as he visualized the words the Sethian was saying. When encountering unknown words in written Egyptian, his mind strung them together into a single stream of consonants and then tried to find the skeletons of known words within.

Out of force of habit, his mind did the same thing now. M-r made an “overseer,” and t-n could mean “this,” but “overseer” was masculine and t-n was the feminine form, so that didn’t work.

Maybe the words weren’t Egyptian, after all.

Then a chill passed up his spine.

Mrtnkhn.

Martin Cohen.

How in the world could this monster know his name?

The Sethian drew a glittering dagger from its belt.

Marty’s skin tingled and his hands shook. He stood, backed away, and fell into a defensive stance.

Light flashed into the room as the door banged open. The cat-headed creatures hissed. A huge turbaned warrior raced into the room and slammed into the back of the Sethian.

Chaos erupted.

Marty launched a front kick at the chest of Orange Cat, sending it flying backward, its head smashing against the stone wall with a sickening crunch.

The ankh fell from its grasp and Marty scooped it up.

A bellowing roar erupted from the Sethian as he turned, flinging Surjan to the side.

Marty lunged at the giant creature, who sidestepped him, but crashed into Tawny Cat, knocking it backward through the entrance.

With a blurred motion, the Sethian slashed at Marty with its dagger; the blade buzzed through the air and just barely missed his face.

Surjan sank his ankh deep into the creature’s back and then yanked it free. A dark ooze flowed from the wound, splattering the room with its foul reek.

With his ankh in his hand, Marty feinted a slashing attack with it, which sent the Sethian one step back, and with a continuing fluid motion, Marty fell into a sweep of the behemoth’s weight-bearing leg and sent it crashing onto its back.

Before the Sethian could react, Marty slashed across the creature’s exposed belly, and then plunged the ankh into its inner thigh and slashed outward.

The creature howled and began scrambling to its feet. Blood poured from its wounds. The Sethian’s glowing yellow eyes stared at Marty and it growled. Marty backed out of reach.

Those wounds and the amount of blood loss would have felled a water buffalo, yet the creature climbed up into a crouch.

Marty braced himself for the attack and suddenly a metal spike blasted out of the creature’s mouth as Surjan yelled, “Surjan Marty fateh!” It was a call for their victory in Surjan’s native tongue, and the spike was the tip of his ankh.

The Sethian’s body convulsed and then collapsed, pulling the ankh from Surjan’s grip.

From the corner of Marty’s eye, he noticed a shimmering ball of light just as it touched his leg and blinked out of existence. He glanced in the direction it had drifted from and noticed Tawny Cat. Its skin had already started decomposing, just like the other half-human creatures he’d encountered.

Marty felt relief as he looked at Surjan’s blood-spattered face. “Welcome to the party.”

He stepped around the growing pool of bleach-smelling ichor flowing from the giant Sethian and noticed that Surjan’s left arm was hanging motionless by his side. “Your arm?”

Surjan winced. “Popped out of joint.”

Gunther and Lowanna poked their heads into the chamber. “Anyone need healing?” the German asked.

Marty pointed at Surjan’s arm. “Gunther, did they teach you how to pop dislocated arms back into place in the Army?”

Gunther nodded and walked over to Surjan as Lowanna announced, “We’ve got the kids. François has them hiding in the forest and is probably making them both fat on figs. Kareem is tracking down some of the remaining cat creatures.” She gave Marty an evil grin. “He’s pretty dangerous with a sharp stabby object in his hand.”

Marty pointed at the decomposing remnants of the Sethian. “Somewhere in that mess is a pretty nice-looking dagger. He might want to play with that.”

A blob of light bubbled up from the remnants of the Sethian and drifted toward him.

The blobs came from enemies that Marty had killed. Were they souls? Some life essence that only the crew could see? Was Marty a vampire of sorts?

At least, as François had pointed out, he fought to defend himself, and for the purpose of provoking this light-response.

As the ball of light drifted into him, a shock raced up his leg and warmth spread across his chest, making him gasp.

Surjan also gasped, but the world around Marty began to spin as noises and colors filled his senses.

And just as suddenly, it all stopped.

His heart raced as a wave of energy washed over him. Any sense of exhaustion vanished in the blink of an eye.

Marty heard footsteps outside the room.

He looked over at Surjan, whose arm was moving like normal again, and their eyes met. Something had happened to him as well, Marty could tell. “Do you also feel like you’ve just broken through to a new level of being?”

“I should say so. I guess that would be level number three for me. If we’re counting.”

“Yup, same for me.” Marty chuckled and recalled how as a kid he’d played an arcade game and felt a sense of euphoria after hitting a new level. The real-life version was much better.

If this was, in fact, real life.

Surjan laughed. “I feel reborn.”

Marty kicked the dagger away from the goo that remained of the Sethian. He retrieved another Sethian medallion. “Let’s take a very quick inventory of what’s here, take whatever we think we can use, and get those kids back to the king.”

“So far the only things we found are a stash of dried beans, just like in the outpost, and a pouch of gold nuggets, each about the size of a grape.”

“Good, now we have something to barter with. I find it interesting that the Sethians would have gold . . . I guess they buy and sell things, too.”

“Kareem is coming,” Surjan announced.

“How do you know?” Marty asked.

The head of security shrugged. “I can smell him. Believe it or not, I think my sniffer has gotten even more sensitive.”

Kareem appeared in the doorway, scanned the room, and nodded. “We’ve all been busy. There are no more of those cat things in this valley, praise God, but I think some may have escaped while we were ambushing the others.”

“Ambushing?” Marty felt a growing sense of camaraderie between the crew members. “Let’s take those kids home. On the way back, I’d love to hear what happened while I was unconscious.”


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