Destroyer Of Worlds

Chapter 3

3

Dr Morgan Sierra stood on the edge of the bomb crater at the center of Trafalgar Square. The air was still thick with dust and she coughed a little, trying not to inhale too much. She ran her fingers through her dark curls and shook her head as she looked down at the destruction below.

The red alert code had beeped on her phone just after dawn and it had taken her less than two hours to get here from her home in Oxford. In that short time, an enormous tarpaulin had been erected over the scene, protecting what lay beneath from the prying eyes of the media. The military guarded the perimeter of the crime scene and the central city was in lockdown. After all, Buckingham Palace and the government buildings of Westminster were only a block away.

The sound of helicopters buzzed overhead with the incessant desire for more news. The media reported a terrorist attack, but Morgan knew it was more than that.

This was a raid on a place that few knew existed, hidden in plain sight although it wasn't on any official plans. Even the Prime Minister wasn't privy to its secrets. Below Trafalgar Square, wound between the foundations of ancient buildings and the modern Tube lines, lay the labyrinthine global headquarters of ARKANE, the Arcane Religious Knowledge And Numinous Experience Institute. The public-facing side consisted of academic papers on religious artifacts and dry conferences in dusty universities, but in reality, ARKANE was a secret agency investigating supernatural mysteries around the world. There were secrets held here that the world wasn't ready for and the vault below the city protected artifacts that could destroy civilization itself. The secrets ARKANE kept below were more than just a threat to a single nation, they could be used for power on a grander scale.

Now the vault had been breached.

Morgan felt the scar on her side throb, and she rubbed at it through her shirt. It pulsed sometimes when she drew close to the darkness, reminding her of the battle with the demon in the Bone Church of Sedlec. The Devil's Bible was down in the vault. Could that have been what was stolen? What else was down there? Part of her desperately wanted to know, while another part wanted to delay that moment of truth just a little longer.

Her stomach churned at the possibilities. Agents had died to bring items here for safekeeping, to hide them from the world and prevent them being used for evil deeds. She had personally added items to the vault, expecting never to see them again, and she still had nightmares of what she had seen in Houska Castle, unleashed from the Gates of Hell. But it seemed that her short leave for recovery was over. As a specialist in the psychology of extremist religion, and with military experience from the Israeli Defense Force, Morgan knew that she would be back in the field as soon as they could get a lead on the bombing.

"Coffee?"

Morgan turned to see her ARKANE partner, agent Jake Timber, holding two steaming cups.

"I think we're going to need a lot more of this today," he said as he offered her one. Jake gave a rueful smile, the corkscrew scar over his left eye crinkling a little, but his dark eyes remained hard as he surveyed the damage to the iconic square.

Morgan lifted the cup to her lips, taking a sip of the bitter black before sighing deeply.

"I can't believe it," she said, shaking her head. "Who did this? Do we know any details yet?"

"Not much," Jake said. "There's bad news, though. Marietti's in hospital. The Director's tough, but he's unconscious and badly injured. Apparently he was working in the lab nearest the vault."

Jake leaned over the edge of the crater. From their vantage point, they could see the top of the vault and the sliced-open spaces that the ARKANE researchers worked in every day. Construction workers in hard hats scurried around the levels, securing metal pipes, beams and other broken parts of the complex below the surface.

"What was he doing down there?" Morgan asked. The Director's office was above ground in a building to the side of the square, part of the public-facing side of ARKANE. He should have been safe.

"He's been increasingly worried about something," Jake said. "I know he's had migraines for months now. Apparently he's been working late every night in the lab, but we don't know what on. At least no one else was here and he's the only one injured. The bombers did a targeted smash and grab."

"Surely Martin can find out what Marietti has been up to?" Morgan said.

Martin Klein was ARKANE's official librarian and data archivist, nicknamed Spooky because of his ability to find patterns in the chaos of information that streamed into the databases every day.

"Apparently Marietti wiped the logs every night after he finished. He really didn't want people to know what he was doing." Jake pointed down into the hole. "Martin's down there right now trying to fix the defenses. The security system was hacked directly after the bombing and that wasn't meant to be possible. He's also checking the vault's inventory to see what's been taken."

"We should get down there," Morgan said.

Together they walked away from the center of the square and down Duncannon Street to a nondescript doorway next to the Halfway to Heaven pub, an appropriate name for one of the hidden entrances to the ARKANE lower levels.

Security was tight and they had to pass automatic biometric checks as well as human defense protocols before being admitted into the lab-level corridors. This end of the building was undamaged and there were technicians working on decoding artifacts, business as usual despite the bombing. Marietti would be pleased, Morgan thought. He hated anyone to waste time and there was always so much more to do to hold back the dark.

They emerged into the exploded section of the complex and dodged around the scaffolding being erected to reinforce the lower levels. The door of the vault was open and Martin Klein peered into the innards of the electronic keypad. He muttered to himself, shaking his head and tapping away on a tablet as he bobbed up and down on the balls of his feet.

"How can we help, Spooky?" Jake said as they approached.

Martin turned with a start, his concentration broken. His shock of blond hair stood up in clumps, a sure sign that he had been tugging at it as he worked.

"Morgan, Jake. Glad you're here." Martin pushed his thin wire-framed glasses up his nose. "I need to show you something."

His fingers danced over the surface of the tablet computer.

"My office is buried," he said, "but I can still access the databases from here." He pulled up video footage of the vault and played a short clip of the attack. He froze the image as one of the intruders lifted a box from the vault, a military balaclava obscuring his face. "They knew what they were looking for. They went directly to this box and then left quickly."

"What's inside?" Morgan asked.

Martin swiped the screen and quickly brought up an inventory of treasures from the vault. Morgan wanted to read the whole list, the researcher in her desperate to know what else was hidden down here. Before joining ARKANE, she had worked at the University of Oxford, specializing in the unexplained between science and faith, that which fell through the gap of psychology and religion. This vault was one of the reasons she had joined ARKANE in the first place. The knowledge and secrets down here haunted her dreams, yet she had been out in the field on missions since arriving, with no time to lose herself in study.

Martin pulled up an image of a bronze statue, a dancing god surrounded by flames.

"Shiva Nataraja," he said. "One of the primary Hindu gods portrayed as the cosmic dancer who is both destroyer and creator. It's a common enough statue in India." Martin pointed out aspects of the figure. "He dances within the flames of the universe and his left hand holds fire, signifying destruction. His left leg is raised and he stands on a demon of ignorance."

"Lord of the Dance," Morgan whispered, bending closer to look at the image. "It's said that Shiva's long dreadlocks come loose as he dances and they smash the stars into each other, destroying the universe. The snake around his waist is Vasuki, one of the nagas or snake gods."

"This attack is a lot of effort for just a statue," Jake said as he gestured at the destruction around them.

"It's not even a whole statue," Martin said. "It's only one piece. The notes indicate that the sculpture was broken into four. The dancing Shiva, the flames that surround him, and then the base in two pieces. The ARKANE vault only contained the fire segment." He tapped on the screen again to reveal the history of the piece. "Marietti lodged it here back in the late 1980s, just after he joined ARKANE from the Vatican. But there are no notes as to its provenance, where it was found or why it was in the vault. As you said, Morgan, these statues are common enough in India. There's no indication as to what is so special about this one."

"Go back to the video," Morgan said. There was a detail about it that bothered her. Martin flicked back to the video and they watched it again. Morgan tapped the screen, freezing it as the men entered the vault. The leader used a device to scan the area.

"That looks like a Geiger counter," Morgan said. "Was the statue radioactive?"

Martin nodded. "A little, but there are plenty of other radioactive artifacts down here so it must have a distinctive signature." Jake raised an eyebrow. "Oh, don't worry. That's why the walls are so thick and we discourage people from spending much time inside. But there's nothing in the records as to why the statue was radioactive. Another mystery."

"We need Marietti," Jake said. "How's he doing?"

Martin tapped the screen again and it shifted to display a hospital room. A figure lay on the bed under white sheets, wires from his body attached to machines and the steady beep of monitors pulsed rhythmically from the screen. Graphs showing Marietti's vital signs popped up under the video feed. Martin shook his head.

"He's still unconscious and has been since the military first on scene found him under the rubble. But the doctors have said they could wake him under extreme necessity."

Morgan looked at Jake and saw indecision in his eyes. She knew that he had a history with Marietti and the Director's injuries were severe. Waking him would be dangerous. But she and Jake had both lain in hospital, injured after their battles with demonic forces and human foes. Marietti knew the risks of their job and he would have ordered the same if the circumstances were reversed. Jake turned to Martin.

"Tell the hospital we're coming," he said.

Martin nodded. But as they turned to go, he called them back.

"Wait. Can you … come inside the vault for a minute?"

Morgan frowned at his words and Jake looked as confused as she did, but they followed him into the vault.

"The cameras are down right now," Martin whispered. "It's safer to talk here, but we must hurry."

"What's going on?" Jake asked.

Martin exhaled sharply, steeling himself. "There's no way a breach like this could happen without someone inside leaking specific details. I've also found evidence that someone was monitoring Marietti's movements."

"They knew he was down here?" Morgan said.

"Yes, definitely," Martin said. "I don't think he was meant to survive."

Jake shook his head. "There have been rumors of a power struggle within ARKANE and some are concerned it's been infiltrated by those who would see darkness triumph. It's hard to believe but …"

"'Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven?'" Morgan said, quoting Paradise Lost.

"Indeed." Martin tapped at his screen. "If you go after this sculpture, you need to proceed carefully and I think we should keep it off-books as much as possible. I'll sort out funds and logistics from here, but keep a low profile if you can."

An hour later, Morgan and Jake walked into the private wing of an exclusive London hospital. Despite the luxury, the smell of antiseptic made Morgan's skin crawl. She and Jake had both spent enough time in hospital after ARKANE missions, albeit not quite as plush as this. Hospitals were not her favorite place.

After clearing security, they found the Director's room. It had a large picture window with reinforced glass looking out over London, stylish furniture and artwork on the walls. But the view didn't matter to this patient. Marietti lay on his back, his eyes closed, his skin sallow. His chest moved up and down as he breathed and the machines around him beeped softly, the rhythm a welcome sign of stability.

Morgan walked to the bed and stood looking down upon him. The Director had lied to her at the beginning of her time with ARKANE, but she had grown to trust him anyway. There were things that he knew, things that would make even the strongest turn away, and yet he had made it his life's work to protect the world's secrets and keep them all safe. But what had he been doing down in the labs last night – and what was the significance of the statue? Why had it been stolen now, after it had been in the vault for years?

It was clear that they knew little about the Director. Even Jake, who had known him the longest, recruited back when he had been in the military in Africa, still knew little of the Director's past. Morgan laid her hand on Marietti's unmoving arm and willed him to wake up. They needed to know what to do next, and usually it was the Director who sent them on a mission. He was stalwart and strong and his shoulders were broad enough to carry all of them.

But now he was reduced to this.

We are so fragile, Morgan thought. This human frame that seems so strong is easily broken. Now Marietti was brought low, there was only a thin line between the people of London and the supernatural that crouched in the shadows waiting for darkness to fall so they could claim dominion.

There was a sudden long beep and a line spiked on one of the machines.

Marietti coughed, his body wracked with shudders. Jake pressed the emergency call button by the bedside as Morgan leaned forward and put her hand on the Director's forehead, trying to calm him.

"It's OK," she said, stroking his brow as he shook under her hand. "We're here. You're going to be OK."

Marietti's eyes flew open.

"Don't let the pieces of the statue come together," he whispered, his voice hoarse and cracked. "The weapon is–"

His words were cut off by a gurgle as blood spewed from his mouth. He clutched at Morgan's arm and his fingers tightened around her as a doctor and attendant nurses rushed into the room. Then his body stiffened and he seized, collapsing in convulsions on the bed.