Project Solaris 2: Hero Rising (7 page)

"This way," Steve said as the bus rumbled to a stop. He slipped over the railing and dropped to the ground, shouldering a pack once he'd landed. He waited for the rest of us to join him before continuing. "The Egyptians take the security of their monuments very seriously. We'll be passing by armed guards, but don't be alarmed. Mohn has spoken with the minister of antiquities and they're aware of our presence."

The warning seemed unnecessary. I could see several guards armed with assault rifles. They scanned the crowds ceaselessly, but without much concern. Most of the people in the crowds were European or American, though there were quite a few Asians as well. The Sphinx must receive thousands of visitors daily if this crowd was any indication, so I doubted we'd warrant any sort of special scrutiny.

"How close will they let us get?" Jillian asked, as we began moving toward the line of tourists threading into the Sphinx enclosure.

"Right up to the structure itself. We can go down between the paws," Steve said. He fished out a laminated badge, and held it over his head. Steve walked right past the line of people waiting to get in, stopping in front of one of the guards. The guard briefly eyed the badge, and then gestured for us to pass. I could see the enclosure ahead of us, a narrow ramp leading down towards the Sphinx's paws.

Steve led us past a thread of tourists, most of whom were using phones or cameras to record the experience. I could feel the myriad signals drifting from those devices, a hundred connections to the Internet. That sensation I'd gotten used to, but there was another set of signals. One I tried to avoid. Those were thoughts and emotions, the mental broadcast every mind gave off. They were weaker than the cell phones, but strong enough that if I let them, they'd drown out anything else I was paying attention to.

"You okay?" Jillian asked, leaning in closer and glancing at me over the top of her sunglasses. I read the concern there.

"Yeah, crowds are just a bit overwhelm--" I began, trailing off as a thought flitted across my consciousness.

It wasn't my thought. It belonged to someone in the crowd. Someone who was staring right at me. That thought was tinged with malice, smugness, and more than a little anger. I stopped, sifting through the sea of thoughts as I tried to locate the person.

"What is it?" Marcus asked, pausing next to me. He released Summers' hand and began scanning the crowd for threats. Summers did the same, but facing in the opposite direction. They stood back-to-back, their long partnership welding them into a single unit.

"I don't know," I said, low enough that I hoped only they could here. "I felt something. Someone in the crowd--"

Time slowed to a crawl. One of the guards turned to face us, a man with a tan uniform and a thick, black beard. He raised his assault rifle in our direction, and it began to roar as bullets streaked in our direction. They caught Jillian in the face and chest, knocking her from the ramp and into the enclosure below. I knew there was no way she could have survived that, even with our regeneration.

Time sped up again. There was a moment of vertigo, and the guard was suddenly several feet away. He was no longer facing us, and showed no sign of firing. Jillian stood next to me, seemingly unharmed.

"You okay?" Jillian asked, leaning in closer and glancing at me over her sunglasses. It was a moment of complete deja vu. I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt I'd just experienced the exact same set of circumstances, and if I was right that meant the guard was about to--

"Get down!" I roared, tackling Jillian to the dusty stone. Marcus dropped to one knee, but Summers was too slow. 

The guard turned to face us, his assault rifle belching a hail of slugs that caught Summers in the back. She was flung forward, collapsing to the stone next to us in a shower of blood. The crowd around us erupted into screams, some fleeing into the Sphinx enclosure while others ran back the way we'd just come.

Chapter 13- Brawl

I was still deciding how to react when Marcus roared, thrusting a hand at the guard who'd fired. The man's neck jerked sharply to the right, and his body slumped limply to the ground. A hot flash surged through me, and I turned to growl at Marcus. He seized me around the waist, pulling me behind him as he raised his free hand.

Another burst of gunfire sounded, the slugs bouncing off the invisible shield that Marcus had erected between us and the remaining guard. The rest of the crowd continued to flee, and the area around us was quickly deserted.

"Help Summers. I'll deal with this asshole," Marcus growled, eyes fixed on the guard.

"No," I snapped, seizing his shoulder. "They're being controlled. We need to find the real threat. Hold him off while I find whoever is doing this."

Marcus' eyes flashed. He snarled at me, but turned back to face the guard. Another torrent of bullets ricocheted off the shield Marcus had erected, and he slid back a few inches from the force. I needed to do something quickly.

"Steve," I roared, grabbing the man by the arm. His eyes were wild, but he turned to look at me. "I need you to focus. We have to find out if there really is a chamber under the Sphinx's paws. Get down there and find the most likely spot."

"What about him?" Steve asked, gesturing at the guard firing. He winced at each new flurry of bullets.

"Focus on finding that room. We'll take care of guards." I gave him a shove toward the enclosure, and he started trotting down the steps.

"What about me?" Jillian asked. She scanned the area, looking for threats.

"We need to get Summers to safety," I said, kneeling next to the blonde. I wasn't a doctor, but her wounds looked bad. "She's breathing, at least. Hopefully her healing takes care of the rest."

"David, we need to end this guard and do it quickly. We don't even know who's attacking us," Marcus growled through gritted teeth.

"Give me a second," I said, opening my mind and scanning the area with a wholly different set of senses. Minds appeared all around me, little beacons giving off faint pulses of bright light.

"We don't have time," Jillian said, pointing. A figure was streaking towards us, with a body unlike anything I'd ever seen. It glittered in the sunlight, refracting the light like some some sort of diamond. She was definitely humanoid, but her body was clear crystal. 

Cracks spread with every footstep as she charged toward us, vaulting over a few frightened tourists and landing in a crouch near Marcus. She launched an uppercut, but Jillian was already moving. She caught the woman's hand, which went ethereal a split second before passing through the space Marcus' head occupied. Jillian reversed her motion, using the crystalline figure's momentum to knock her to the ground in a shower of dust.

A flash of green came from behind and above me, and Jillian's training saved my life. I instinctively rolled to the right, dodging the blast. The green light vaporized a large swathe of the rock I'd been standing on, obliterating stones that had existed for millennia. I reached instinctively for the most powerful offensive weapon I had, the little golden boomerang I'd taken from the grew men. A wave of green energy shot from the device, and the figure ducked back behind cover. I couldn't be sure, but the face looked familiar. It was the Latino kid I'd first seen back in Tuolumne, then later when we'd rescued Janaki.

That confirmed our attacker's identity. It was Dick, which explained how and why the guards were firing on us. He was mind-controlling them. Two could play at that game. I turned my attention to the guard, focusing my attention into a laser-like beam. I slipped into the guard's mind, the world going dark as I was surrounded by thoughts and memories.

Hello, David
, came an amused voice.
It looks like you've been practicing. 

I turned to see the spectral figure of Dick, his dark hair showing the first spots of grey. Even his mental projection wore an immaculate black suit. He gave me a cruel grin, eyes glittering. Then I felt something forcing its way past my defenses, and realized in horror what I'd done. The guard's mind had been a trap. Dick wanted me to over-extend myself, and I'd walked right into his little trap.

You're mine,
Dick said, dickishly. 

I fled back to my body, slamming my defenses into place. Dick followed, battering at the gates of my mind. I don't think he'd expected me to react that quickly, which was the only advantage I had at the moment. We were getting our collective asses kicked, and we needed an advantage. I had just the thing.

I concentrated, sending a signal to the mothership in high orbit above us. I commanded it to approach, and also commanded it to alert Kali. It was a calculated gamble. The ship appearing over Cairo would almost certainly alert the grey men, so we needed to get away from here, fast.

"David," Jillian's voice was high pitched and out of breath. "We're losing. I'm not sure how long I can keep her busy."

I shot a glance Jillian's way, seeing her dodge a swipe from the crystalline woman. The punch cratered the wall, sending sharp, stone shrapnel everywhere. It bounced off the crystalline woman, through Jillian, and straight into me. I winced as a rock sliced across my cheek, staggering back a step. I nearly toppled into the enclosure, just barely catching myself. 

There was no time to think. I aimed my boomerang at the crystalline woman and fired a full-strength blast. The light refracted crazily as it struck, sending off green beams in all directions. The blow didn't appear to hurt her, but the beams destroyed everything they touched. The stone she was standing on melted, and she toppled into the enclosure below. 

"Let's move," Marcus roared. He twitched his left hand, and the guard who was still firing occasional bursts in our direction dropped bonelessly to the ground. Marcus scooped up Summers and started rushing down the stairs towards the Sphinx. He left a trail of bright, scarlet drops in his wake. Summers was bleeding badly.

I rushed down the stairs after him. Another green beam came from above, vaporizing more stone near my left shoulder.

"Slow down and watch your footing!" Jillian yelled. A familiar rush of cool energy washed over us, and we faded from sight. It made descending the stairs treacherous, but it also provided more time to do so since our enemies could no longer see us.

"Dick will still be able to feel our minds. We don't have much time," I said, wishing I knew of a way to cloak us from Dick. I didn't. He had a lot more experience with telepathy and mind control, whereas I was learning on the fly. I was outclassed, and I knew it.

We stumbled our way into the enclosure, which was somehow even hotter than up above. The rocks around us radiated heat, and I could even feel it through my shoes. I wiped sweat from my cheek, quickening my pace now that we were on flat ground. The blasts of green energy had stopped, and there was no sign of the crystalline woman. That scared the piss out of me, because it meant Dick was regrouping. That probably meant he knew why we were here, and was waiting to hit us until we had our figurative pants down.

"Steve," I called as we approached the paws of the Sphinx. The structure towered above us, six stories high and thankfully blocking the sun. "Over here."

Steve looked up from where he'd been kneeling, scanning the area where my voice had come from. He couldn't see us, of course. "David? This is the spot where Doctor West theorized the chamber lays. If he's right, it's directly beneath me."

"Thanks, that's exactly what we needed to know," came a feminine voice from above. Even as I looked, the crystalline woman leapt from the top of one of the paws. She landed next to Steve, wrapping a glittering hand around the back of his neck. She turned in our direction, though she didn't seem to know where we were. "Come on out, David, or I snap your friend's neck. All we want is access to the satellite. You lot can walk away once we have what we want."

"Walk away?" Marcus roared. The crystalline woman dropped Steve as she was picked up and hurled into the Sphinx's massive paw. The impact shattered ancient stone blocks, filling the air with dust and more shrapnel. "Get up you bitch. I'm going to tear you apart for what you did to Summers."

A subsonic pulse echoed through my entire body, and it felt like I was being torn apart. I sagged to one knee, catching myself against the hot stone as I struggled to understand what had happened. We'd suddenly become visible, and from the shocked expression on Jillian's face, I guessed it wasn't by choice.

"You're right, David," Dick's voice called from somewhere above us, somewhere behind the stairs leading into the enclosure. "You
are
totally outclassed. None of your powers will work right now. You can surrender, or I can kill you all. Choose quickly."

I realized that I could no longer feel signals, no longer touch thoughts. The power that was always waiting deep inside me was curiously absent. My mind raced as I considered, scanning our surroundings. It was then that I noticed that the crystalline woman was gone. In her place was an Asian woman with long, black hair. She lay naked on the stone, cradling her head in both hands. Her powers had been cancelled, too. Someone on Dick's payroll could negate our abilities.

"All right," I yelled, glancing at Marcus. He'd evidently reached the same conclusion I had, and was kneeling next to Summers' unconscious body.

"If they're cancelling our powers, then she won't be able to regenerate," Marcus said, his voice cracking. He cradled Summers' limp form close to his chest. "We have to surrender."

We were suddenly covered in shadow. I looked up to see a massive, black stone pyramid, and I couldn't help but smile. The mothership had arrived. There was a flash of bright, white light, then a pair of figures materialized on the ledge near where Dick's voice had come from. Janaki and Kali.