The Prometheus Objective

30

With the six elite guards who had been with him since Long Island, the ones he trusted not to be on the mind-susceptible drug, Xavier secured the control room, stationed two men outside the main doors, and had four others patrolling inside.

Diana got to work accessing the systems, locking out other users and establishing a secure channel only to the bunker under the White House, to Edgerrin Temple, and to this room.

“Expecting trouble?” she asked, head down, scanning the control functions and security measures, determining what she had access to down here, and rerouting the command functions.

“Always,” Xavier responded. He pulled up a chair. Sat and faced the door. Hands clasped in front of his face. His eyes were pained, brow furrowed. Elbows on his knees, he started to rock.

“Xavier?”

When her hand touched his shoulder, he flinched. He still hadn’t quite gotten used to this body. The way it reacted to her touch. It was… off, detached and not yet integrated somehow. He cursed Mason Calderon again, and every day. It shouldn’t have been this way.

Beats the alternative by a light year, he reminded himself. But still, what she must think of him. The sacrifice of going from the man she fell in love with, to this… monster. He could only imagine, and the unshakable doubt gnawed at him every day, to the point he wanted to brush off her every touch as underserving. He couldn’t accept it, despite her assurances that she didn’t see skin deep. This was different. Xavier couldn’t even bear to look in the mirror some days; and like now, by habit, he still wanted to run his hands through his thick red curls, only that was someone else.

A person long gone.

He shuddered again as her hand massaged his neck, then gripped him tighter.

“What is it?”

“I sensed something.”

He met her eyes and saw her look of anguish. This was hell for her. For everyone, but she must be tortured by so much more. To have so many questions, and she had been caught up in a world of mystery. From the death of her father, to the shrouded archives of the Smithsonian where she had worked and had been denied the truth over and over.

And then of course… to the man she loved, who just so happened right now to be carrying the one artifact that prevented her (or anyone) from glimpsing anything about him psychically. He hadn’t been sure what glimpses she had up until now, until Orlando handed over the sphere for their safekeeping and protection on their way out of the Masonic Building, but if she hadn’t already learned too many things he’d rather she didn’t know, then it was too late now.

The ancient sphere rested in a bag at his feet, along with a .45, a satellite radio, a couple of power protein bars and a bag of hostess donuts. Orlando’s habits had been rubbing off on him.

“The planetary shield,” she said, grimacing. “I see the component elements from the earth’s magnetic core. Exit points through ancient sites and ruins of lost cities.” Diana held her head with her free hand. “But, I can’t quite see… what was done before. I see there was a shield, ages ago. It was up, and the world was like now. People couldn’t handle it. They tried. Changed the frequency, using some sound-harmonic thing. I see it, an array, like at HAARP.”

She reached for Xavier, pulling him close like she had just lost something so dear and needed to cling to anyone, anything.

“Calm,” he said. “You must be asking the right questions, and damn you’re strong and focused, to see that far back. It must be… millennia.”

She shook her head, almost sobbing into his neck. “I don’t want to know. Not really, not when…” She groaned. “I can’t stop it, all the visions coming from questions I’ve had locked away my whole life. Boxes in a vault with its door ripped open.”

She backed up slightly, eyes fluttering back, and he watched, helpless but encouraging. She needed this, and just maybe it would clear her thoughts enough to focus on their main task at hand.

Because God knows I can’t focus.

All he could see was death and destruction.

She went on, speaking non-stop, breathlessly, about the locked finds in the Smithsonian hidden archives, about tearing open vault after vault and spilling relics that shouldn’t be, revealing things about the breath of the Phoenicians’ travels, about jackal-headed Egyptian envoys crossing the Americas, about Roman-style ships landing on the Caribbean isles; she raved about flying vessels glimpsed over Niagara Falls in some prehistoric era. She went on, unlocking and uncovering things, trying to veer back to the mission, trying to see the way to destroy the shield or stop the impending comet, but she couldn’t focus on either.

We’re quite the pair, he thought, struggling with his own onslaught of visionary Armageddon, interspersed with other equally heart-stopping visions:

A cascading series of fireballs streaking into the atmosphere, selecting targets and blasting into population centers or the oceans and causing massive tsunamis, darkening the skies, flattening the cities…

Another glimpse, of a different alternative, as the same remnants of Icarus slam into an invisible shield above the earth, shattering and disintegrating, while below…

A man in a crimson cloak with a samurai helmet sits upon of a throne of ebony on a mountain where skulls hang from chains on a long trek up the trail. A devastated earth, blasted by nuclear war, littered with corpses and bloated carrion birds, desolate cities and farms run by slaves, erecting monuments of grandeur and new cities of staggering, obscene beauty.

In yet another vision, there’s a frozen pyramid and a ramp leading toward a doorway in its midsection. Snowmobiles and Sno-Cats race toward the entrance, chasing another vehicle as grenades explode and the ice shreds from automatic weapon fire.

A final glimpse: a figure in a black hooded cloak with an emerald gem around his neck, floating before a dazzling golden tree whose branches and vines grow from his back, and he wields a power from his fingertips, spearing energy through countless rifts in space and time, absorbing (or corrupting) other universes, subjugating other races while whole worlds bend to the devastating truth of one who straddles realities.

The images shake, the universes spin and collide and merge and explode, and this hooded figure, fueled by the unlimited power of the One-Tree and the serpent winding around and around it, eyes sated with fulfilled purpose…

And that emerald gem around his neck, glittering, as the hood peels back.

“Let me see, let me see…”

Xavier willed it, commanded it like he’d never commanded any vision before, knowing full well that of all the visions he’d ever experienced in his life, all the life-saving glimpses to forestall his death, this was the one he would never avoid.

Never, unless he could see that face.

Unless he knew who it was that claimed the gem, who could bring about the destruction of everything, everywhere and send this whole house of cards cascading into oblivion, ending the game forever.

It wasn’t the man in red. This was someone else…

He gripped Diana’s hand, realizing more than ever, he didn’t want it to end. Not yet, not when he had something to live for.

“I can’t see it,” she moaned. “I can’t help. You have to…”

Xavier caressed her hand. Settled his breathing and tried to clear out the vision of the hooded man — and the near-glimpse of his face. It was so close, and he knew, just knew that the features would be familiar. He had to try again, but this was more pressing. They had to stop the immediate crisis or nothing else would even matter. Despite the looming threat he had just seen.

“I’m blind,” he said. “I can’t help, I’m just getting non-stop visions of the end of the freakin’ world.”

“You can swear around me,” Diana said, trying to force a laugh. “After all we’ve been through, your gentleman phase is a relic at this point.”

“Hey, I’m always a gentleman,” he countered. “Or aim to be, despite the shithole body I’m in.”

“That’s why I can’t stand to be without you, my dear.”

She gave him a smile as beautiful as any sight he’d ever witnessed in all his visions, all the more so because he knew how much she was suffering, and how magnificent the effort.

He sighed. “I can’t see anything else, you know. But I want to help you. Beyond deciding on what we can stop, comet or shield…”

“I thought we determined the shield is the priority.”

“Well, if that bitch Miriam wanted it up so bad, I want it down. But still…” He blinked and saw afterimages of the comet’s fury crashing into the earth.

“Something’s blocking me, though.” Diana said it calmly, and after touching Xavier’s cheek. She turned him to face her. She took a deep breath, moved in close, and gently pressed her lips to his.

“Your visions?” He wondered after the kiss. “Your father?”

Her head moved side to side slowly, as her eyes never left his. “I’ve seen enough of the truth there, enough to know that if we bring down the shield and I never see another thing without the use of my own eyes, I’ll be happier. Some things are best left unknown.”

He felt a swelling in his throat. Not just for her experience rising to his level, for the maturity and wisdom she’d achieved just in such a brief time, but for what she had implied.

“I know what’s blocking you.”

Her eyes finally left his, going to the same place he now looked: at his feet. At the bag.

At the sphere inside it.

“Seeing too much blue?” he ventured.

She nodded, but still held his cheek. “I don’t want this. Don’t want to pry, but I have so many questions. So many… fears.”

“About me.”

A tear welled up and threatened to drop along her cheek. “I’m sorry, I can’t help it. We met, and you were so mysterious…”

He smiled at the memory. “Swooping in on a hand glider. Gotta admit, not bad as far as first meeting stories go.”

“Not bad at all.”

He gazed into her eyes and saw there a host of memories — not visions, but pure, powerful memories. Of their adventures, of quiet moments, of dinners, of drinks or cups of coffee and runs at sunrise. Of pondering the density of distant stars, the geology of the closest mountains, or the mystery of the soul and what comes after.

Reaching down, he hefted the bag, set it on his lap. “I’m far from an open book, Diana.”

“I know, and you don’t have to…”

“There are some secrets, as you’ve just said, that are better left unlearned.”

“I know, and I really don’t want to know everything. But I try to focus on our mission, and I see you, and I go there — and it’s blocked like you’ve got a door in your house that I can’t enter.”

“Or the west wing. That’s forbidden,” he chimed, quoting Beauty and the Beast, her favorite Disney film.

“Yeah, or that.” She clenched her eyes shut. “I’m trying, but…”

When she opened them again, he was standing. Or, returning to her. The guard behind him had the satchel and was heading for the door.

“About ten yards out there should do it,” Xavier called over his shoulder. “And don’t let it out of your grasp until I tell you to come back.”

Diana swallowed hard, sighing. “You didn’t have to.”

“I did,” he said, and sat and took her hands.

“But now we’re in danger. They could…”

“They always could,” he said. “It’s not that great a secret, if they wanted to find us, whoever ‘they’ are. But believe me, we have much worse fates in store if you don’t succeed. If you don’t…”

“Oh my god!” she shouted, standing up and shoving his chest. Her eyes were wide, pupils up, leaving almost all white. She trembled and jittered like being electrocuted, then as he came toward her, she held out both hands.

Doubled over, heaving, she urged him away.

“I’m sorry,” he stammered. “Damn, you must be good. I don’t know what you saw, but really I can explain.”

“No.”

“Yes, please. Trust me. I was an asshole, especially early on, but what I did — all the bad shit — it wasn’t just to save my own skin. It was everyone, I had to…”

“Shut up.”

She looked up, and her features were not what he expected.

No recrimination. No anger or condemnation.

Nothing… but excitement.

“I saw it!”

He blinked at her. “What? Just like that?” He took a tentative step forward. “Was I doing something noble, then?”

She rolled her eyes as she spun around, took her seat and started tapping out passwords and accessing systems. “It’s not always about you, dear. But thank you for your trust in me. Call back your man.”

“But…?”

“You’re right. I don’t want or need to know everything. And what I might be curious about?” She turned to him quick. “I’ll fucking ask. And you better answer.”

Floored, he could only nod, and mouth the words, I love you.

“So, you saw it? The past, the shield?”

“—coming down hard!” She was bent back over the keyboard. “Accessing HAARP now, and this better work. We’ve got the clearance?”

He came up behind her and peered over her shoulder as she worked, and as he motioned to the guard to call his colleague back inside.

“That’s what Edgerrin promised. Loaded us up with everything we might need.”

“HAARP it is,” she said. “Your old friend. Scalar wave tech from the arrays. I heard the sound, saw the notes in my head, the high priestesses had them all designed out on some massive tapestry, and these crazy sonic cannons I think they were, all aimed at one point in the sky.”

Xavier leaned down, watching her work, watching her type in the frequency delineations for the array, and then highlight a target location.

“I think it only needs one big rip in its makeup to bring it all down, to resonate across the continually-phasing shield and disrupt it, but…” She grinned. “Because I can, and because the arrays are built that way and we don’t want to take chances, I’m going to hit a dozen spots across the northern hemisphere.”

“I love you,” he whispered in her left ear, then stood and watched the projection on the main screen as she highlighted the remote cameras for the HAARP facility on one screen, and then accessed the satellite over New York for another, while other screens around them were showing riots, massive protests, flames and fury and chaos across the world.

“Now or never,” she said, looking back at him as she pressed the button to start the sequence. “And, Xavier?”

He met her eyes, and for a moment as she spoke the next words, everything was right, and going to be just fine again.

“I love you too…”

Before he could lean in and kiss her the way he wanted to, one last vision pulverized his emotions and drilled into his sight:

The one bone-chilling prophetic vision he couldn’t shake, the one that stood victorious as the other visions of doom all now faded into oblivion.

The hooded figure in black, with the emerald gem around his neck, astride the stars, floating amidst the wreckage of the earth and the moon as the sun burnt out and the stars shredded themselves into oblivion…

Xavier came to on his back, with Diana over him, looking ashen.

“What did you see? Where’d you go? You just fell, and it’s been ten minutes.”

He tried to lift his head, but barely had the energy.

“I saw…”

“What?”

“Behind the hood.”

“What hood? Whose?”

He struggled to rise. Shook off her restraining hand. Got to his knees. “No, we won’t be able to warn them by conventional means. They’re already in the pyramid.”

“What? Who?”

“Our team.” He took her shoulders, stared at her with loss and absolute terror. “It’s all for nothing unless I can warn them before he gets the gem.”

“Before who gets it?”

“I saw behind the hood,” Xavier mumbled. “That little shit…”

“What?”

He got himself into a cross-legged position. “I don’t know if I have the strength for much when I project there — or if I even can get myself there, but I have to try. Maybe just a few words, one maybe would be enough, if I can make them understand.”

He thought for a moment while breathing deeply, calming himself, preparing to separate his soul again and send it on one last, desperate and all-important flight.

He thought some more, found what he wanted. Then he smiled.

“Perfect,” he said, and left his body.