Changeling (26 page)

The bridge connected to a larger cylindrical tower that stretched from the cavern floor below to the unseeable reaches above. It might have been a massive support column, but Jade knew it served a far more important purpose. If the vault was a computer, then this was its central processing unit.

An arched opening led inside the cylinder, where she found herself immediately confronted by a choice. To the left, a flight of stairs curled upward, following the curve of the wall. To the right, the stairs went down.

Up felt like the correct decision, so she headed in that direction and bounded up the stairs. She ascended for at least a full minute, the stairs stretching up in the cramped confines of the passage like something from a surreal nightmare. Thankfully, the ghosts and whispers had not chased after her. Something about the composition of the stairwell walls evidently shielded her from the infrasound effects. When she caught a glimpse of a lurking figure, she knew the seemingly endless ascent was nearly at an end. She was not wrong.

The stairs brought her to a wide balcony overlooking a bowl-shaped pit that occupied the center of the cylindrical column. The pit was not deep, in fact it looked to be only about twenty feet from the top of the utilitarian stone guardrail to the bottom. The balcony ringed the pit, and on the opposite side, the stairs continued, disappearing into the space between the outer and inner walls. Overhead, the pit was mirrored by a domed ceiling which, Jade now realized, created yet another spherical chamber.

“If you’re going to kill me, just get it over with.”

The voice startled her, and not just because of its clarity.

Professor
?

It was definitely Professor, and what he had just said confirmed her worst fears. He was in trouble. Either Shah had betrayed them and somehow gotten word to his jihadist confederates, or the Changelings had caught up to them.

That question was answered a moment later when she heard Kellogg’s voice, and then the woman she had heard earlier. The voices seemed to be coming from the pit, but Jade knew this was just an acoustical trick. They were close, probably in a room or passage somewhere above this place.

She ignored the not-too-distant conversation and turned toward the rising stairs. She did not know what she would do when she found the others. Judging by Professor’s statement, the Changelings were armed and she was not. Maybe she could distract them and give Professor a chance to gain the upper hand. She would think of something once—

She stopped suddenly as if a wall had suddenly appeared in her path. In a way, that was exactly what had happened, although the wall was not a tangible thing of limestone or concrete. Rather, it was a sensation, like a kind of magnetic repulsion pushing her back. She felt an overwhelming premonition, not of danger exactly, though that was certainly part of it, but of having missed something profoundly important.

She turned back, and it was as if the magnetic poles reversed. She staggered toward the balcony rail, throwing her arms around it for fear of being pulled over. The attraction was all in her head and she knew it, but that did not make the sensation any less real.

I need to go down there
, she thought.
The answers are down there
.

Some part of her offered a weak protest. Professor needed her. Urgently. Whatever this was, it could wait.

But she knew it could not wait. A window of opportunity had opened. The Vault was offering her its secrets. If she turned away now, the window might close forever.

She had to know.

Jade shrugged the rope coil off her shoulder, wrapped the loose end around the rail, securing it with a bowline knot, and heaved the rest over the side. With a couple of quick adjustments, she reconfigured the carabiner on her climbing harness into a rudimentary rappelling brake and then eased herself over the railing.

She reached the end of the rope and hung there in darkness, just a few feet above the floor. Her flashlight revealed a chamber that was remarkably like the Oracle Room in the Hypogeum, but with one significant difference. Scattered across the floor of the pit were dozens of smooth shapes that, from above, had looked like scattered stones. Now she saw that they were elongated skulls.

She dangled above the grisly tableau, turning slowly, playing her light in every direction, looking to see what other mysteries the pit concealed.

“Okay, you got me here. What am I supposed to—”

Before she could complete the question, the vortex opened and she was swept away again.

Professor had no
idea why he was still alive, but he sensed his execution had merely been postponed.

Kellogg and the other Changeling—the man who still wore his face—walked a few steps behind him, their guns still trained on him, though not quite as aggressively as before. They kept a safe stand-off distance, close enough to maintain control but far enough away that Professor would never be able to get the jump on them. Further evidence of professional training. Shah and the woman walked ahead of them, continuing along the rotunda. Her hand was on his arm. It might have been a merely practical arrangement, a blind person and her guide, but Professor doubted the woman needed any assistance finding her way and there was something possessive in her manner. Shah seemed to be tolerating her touch, but only just.

“What is this place?” Shah asked. “Who made it?”

“Better that you see the answer for yourself,” the woman replied. “Know this, however. It is old beyond imagining. A gift of knowledge sent from the heavens.”

“Knowledge?”

“A revelation.” The woman made an expansive gesture. “The prophets of old came to this place in secret to receive the Word. Now the gift of the revelation is given to you.”

“The Prophet came here?” Shah shook his head. “No. The writings are clear on this. Muhammad was visited by the angel in a cave near Medina.”

“Do you believe he could not have traveled, in secret, across the sea to this place? The cave where your Prophet prayed was a resonator, an echo of this place, just like the Hypogeum. He saw the way to the vault, just as Jade Ihara did. The revelation is not for everyone. It wasn’t for her, but it was for him, just as it was for the prophets of old who came before. Jesus. Moses, Abraham. Adam. And now, it is for you.”

Shah was incredulous. “They all came here?”

“All. A vision is given and a prophet goes forth. But with the passage of centuries, confusion sets in, the people lose their way, and it is necessary for another prophet to be called.”

“And I’m supposed to be the new prophet?” Professor thought Shah sounded skeptical rather than awed. “The chosen one.”

“You were meant for great things, Atash.”

“Chosen by you,” Shah said, insistently.

The woman stopped and turned her face toward Shah. “Who do you think we are, Atash? We have been safeguarding this secret, and watching over all of humankind, for ten thousand years. In the holy writings, we are called angels. Messengers of God.”

“Angels with rubber faces,” Professor muttered. “And contact lenses.”

The woman’s face turned toward him, but she ignored the remark. “Yes, we chose you. That is why I came to you, worked with you to lay the foundation. Roche’s interference forced us to accelerate the timetable, but this was always your destiny.”

“Don’t believe it,” Professor said. “It’s a con. That’s all they are. Con artists, selling whatever lie they think will get you to do what they want.”

He had braced himself against an expected blow from behind, but none came. Instead, the blind woman continued to regard Shah with an intensity that might have been mistaken for worship. “When you have seen, you will be able to decide for yourself whether I am lying or not.”

She pointed in the direction they had been traveling. “Up there, you will find a door. Go through. What you see is between you and God.”

Shah hesitated. “You’re saying the revelations of the Prophet, and all the prophets who came before…came from there?”

An impatient frown cracked Gabrielle’s façade. “What difference does it make? Would you prefer a burning bush? An angel floating above you? You will see what you need to see. Trust me.”

“Spoken like a true con artist,” Professor said.

“Go, Atash. See for yourself.”

Shah stared at her a moment longer, as if there was more he felt he needed to say, but then he turned away and headed off on his own. Professor waited until he disappeared around the curve of the rotunda before addressing his captors.

“Now that he’s gone, would you care to tell me what’s really going on?” He turned around to see if either of the men would give answer, but they were as stonily silent as the blind woman. “No? Then maybe we can talk about why I’m still alive.”

“It’s up to him to decide your fate,” the woman said, not looking at him.

“Him? You mean Shah?” This was unexpected. He had made no secret of his antipathy toward the Iranian journalist, but they had reached an accord and Professor did not think the man would countenance further bloodshed, especially at the urging of the Changelings. Maybe they believed that sparing Professor’s life would give them leverage over Shah, or perhaps they intended to continue using him as a hostage to assure Shah’s further cooperation, but if either was the case, they had misjudged the nature of his relationship with Shah.

“When he has received the vision, he will face a choice. Spare your life and risk you telling the world about the vault, or kill you in order to preserve the secret.”

“Ah, I see. So really, you just want him to be the one to do the dirty deed. Just like when you sicced him on Jade.”

Her smile confirmed his accusation. “You’ve misjudged him,” Professor said. “He hates you. Hates how you used and manipulated him.”

“He will be a different man once he has received the vision,” Gabrielle said, her tone a mockery of reverence. “He will understand that everything we have done was necessary.”

“See that’s what I really wanted to talk about.  Maybe you’ve convinced Shah with that nonsense about being angels, but you’ll have to try a lot harder to convince me.”

“And why would I waste my breath talking to a man who is already dead?”

Professor glanced at the two men but their expressions were as inscrutable as hers.

He had worked all the angles, counted the number of steps separating him from the gunman, rehearsed the moves in his head. In some of the scenarios, he succeeded in killing one of the men, but never both. No matter which of them he attacked first, the other would be able to shoot him dead. There was only one scenario where he did not die. Not right away at least.

“Okay,” he said. “No more wasting our breath then.”

He sprang forward, diving at Gabrielle like a baseball player trying to steal second. He could sense the men behind him tensing in response to the attack, fingers on the triggers of their pistols. He didn’t think they would fire. Not if they were trained as well as he thought they were. Too much chance of a stray round hitting the woman. If he was wrong….

But he wasn’t wrong. The two gunmen held their fire and Professor hit the unsuspecting woman and bowled her over. As they went down, he wrestled her body around, using her as a human shield. To keep them at bay, he wrapped one arm around her neck. “I’ll kill her.”

The threat stopped the two gunmen, but Professor knew the standoff would not last indefinitely. In fact, it would probably not last more than a few seconds. If he made good on his threat, he would be throwing away the only thing keeping him alive, ergo he dared not kill the woman. If the two Changeling gunmen had not figured that out already, they soon would. His only play was to double down.

“Drop the guns or I’ll break her neck,” he snarled. He shook her, hard. “Do it! Now!”

When the men did not comply immediately, Professor knew they had called his bluff.
Damn it. Can’t kill her, can’t let her go
. What did that leave?

He hauled her erect, lifted her off the ground so that his body was almost completely covered by hers, and started walking backward, in the direction Shah had gone. He had no idea whether he could count on Shah for assistance, but standing still was not an option. Unfortunately, his steady retreat was not much different than remaining where he was. The two gunmen matched him step for step, and he could see them growing bolder with each passing second. One of them would charge, or perhaps both at nearly the same instant, and then the loaded dice would be cast.

“Stop!”

The shout from behind startled Professor so much that he almost stumbled. The two gunmen were equally surprised, and whatever offensive action they had been contemplating was stillborn. The shout had come from Shah.

Professor twisted half-around, careful to keep Gabrielle between himself and the gunmen, and regarded Shah warily. Even a quick glance was enough to confirm that Shah seemed changed by whatever he had experienced in the vault. Though he had been gone for only a couple minutes, he appeared shaken, as if the foundations of his entire life had been hit by a magnitude eight earthquake.

“Atash?” Gabrielle’s voice was barely audible. The pressure of Professor’s arm across her throat made it difficult for her to breathe, much less speak.

“I’m here.” His voice was flat, distant.

Shell-shocked
, thought Professor.

He stared at Gabrielle for a moment, then met Professor’s gaze. “Let her go.” It was neither command nor plea, but more an indifferent suggestion.

Professor relaxed his hold enough to let the woman gasp in a hoarse breath, but did not release her. “Not until those guns are on the ground.”

Shah turned to the men. “Do it.”

The two Changelings exchanged a look with each other and with Gabrielle, and then by mutual accord, stooped over and placed their pistols on the cavern floor.

“And the one you took off me,” Professor added.

Kellogg produced the Beretta and laid it beside the others.

“Now, take a great big step back.”

The men conferred silently a second time, then complied.

“Shah, how about you collect those guns.”

Shah knelt and picked up one of the pistols, then used his foot to send first one then the other skittering away down the passage he had earlier disappeared into. Professor frowned as he watched the guns vanish into the shadows, wondering if Shah was not thinking clearly or if he had intentionally deprived him of a weapon.

“Let her go,” Shah said again without looking at Professor. “I need to speak with her.”

Professor let his arm drop, allowing Gabrielle to stumble away. As she did, he tried to move nonchalantly in the direction of the cast-off pistols, but Shah immediately stopped him with a meaningful gesture from his gun hand.

“Damn,” Professor muttered, looking up from the gun pointed at him to meet Shah’s eyes. “Well, I can’t say I didn’t see that coming, but I was hopeful. So, I guess the con worked. You’re buying into the Messianic malarkey?”

Shah ignored the jibe. “Gabrielle, what I saw… Tell me it’s a trick. Special effects or something.”

The blind woman shook her head. “No tricks.”

Shah was not satisfied with the answer. “Jade Ihara said that sound frequencies can trigger hallucinations. Is that what happened?”

“Would you question the means by which God chooses to deliver his message? If he called you on your phone or spoke to you from a television set, would you consider that unseemly? The message is what it is, Atash. There is no god but God, and you are his Prophet.”

Professor studied Shah’s expression. The man did not seem particularly overjoyed by his calling. “The others came here? Muhammad? Jesus?”

“From Adam at the founding of the world, to Bahá'u'lláh.”

Professor recognized the name taken by Mírzá Ḥusayn`Alí Núrí, a Persian Muslim from the 19
th
Century, who claimed to have received a new revelation from God and subsequently founded the Baha’i religion.

“All came here?” Shah repeated. “Yet there is no mention of this place in any of the Holy writings.”

Gabrielle was visibly displeased by Shah’s refusal to simply embrace his new role in the divine plan. “You are the Prophet. It is for you to decide what you will share, but just as you have questioned the seemliness of the manner in which the revelation was given, know that there are others who would also do so. They might demand to see it for themselves. That is why the prophets of old did not reveal their journeys. And…” She gestured in Professor’s direction. “It is why he can never leave this place.”

“That’s right,” Professor said, sarcastically. “You can’t have me telling the world that your religion is complete hogwash, and that the Wizard is really just a machine being run by a crazy old guy hiding behind a curtain.”

Shah stared at Professor. “A cover up.” It was a statement not a question, but there was nonetheless an undercurrent of disbelief.

Gabrielle’s frown deepened and when she spoke, there was no hiding the disappointment in her tone. “You are the Prophet of God. Start acting like it. He is an unbeliever. His presence here is sacrilege. An affront to God. You know what must be done.” She paused a beat. “It is not necessary for you to do the deed, Atash. Simply give the order and it will be done.”

For several seconds, Shah just stared at the gun in his hand. “No,” he said finally. “I’ll take care of it.”

Then he aimed the gun and fired.