Bill’s powerful voice cut through the cacophony that Nick’s escape had caused, forcing a decisive end to the din. Calmly he produced his hand held tracking unit and noted that Nick was still on this floor, though he had covered quite a bit of ground. He had a multitude of new questions to add to his list but had no time to address them now. His first priority was capturing the two people loose in the base. They all pulled out the standard issue emergency lights they were carrying and ignited them casting the hallway into an eerie greenish relief. Bill surveyed the scene in disbelief and then looked over to the lone body on the floor. From his size and build, he could tell at once that he was Annunaki. The man stirred feebly and was immediately surrounded by his men, their weapons trained on him. Bill made his way over to the injured man and knelt beside him, looking him over for a moment before questioning him.
‘What is going on at the moon base?” he barked, the most pressing of all his questions.
The man looked up at him, a combination of pain and defiance in his eyes.
“What are you doing here?” Bill further demanded.
“It’s our time” was the telepathic reply, forcing Bill to wince under its power. The man rolled his head away from Bill so that he was looking up at the ceiling and then closed his eyes and drew in slow, laboring breaths.
Bill knew what was coming. He was performing Xerhalk, the Annunaki death ritual. It was a technique they used to separate their soul or essence from the physical body when it was close to death. They didn’t refer to it as death though they called it a progression as the spirit doesn’t die with the body but goes back to source energy and continues to experience things necessary for its continued growth. Bill had only heard about it before and watched in awe as the man's breathing continued to slow and then ceased all together, his body going slack and limp, yet looking blissfully at peace. Bill stood up and said “We won’t get any information out of him now, he’s gone”. He surveyed the body again, more to buy himself time to think about his next step than to reflect on what he had just witnessed.
“OK first things first” he said, “Search the body and see what you can find.” Bill commanded.
Jack nodded quickly to one of his men and the man stowed his weapon and then started to search the body. Bill turned away and consulted his hand held tracking device, noting that Nick didn’t seem to have moved since he last checked.
“Jack”
“Yes sir,”
“I want security alerted to what’s going on and all exit points to have a guard stationed there. Nobody is to try and apprehend them.” Bill said.
“Yes sir” Jack again intoned and then relayed the orders into his radio.
“Is there anything we can do about these lights?” Bill asked no one in particular.
His transmission finished, Jack replied “The lighting system is computer controlled. I am sure once it senses an outage it will reroute the power around the damaged section and the lights should come back up on their own”
“We can’t waste time waiting for the lights to come on so we move forward as is. Everyone fall in. We're moving out” Bill ordered. Everybody scrambled into two short lines. This time they would move as one unit. Bill straightened his clothes and set his resolve; he would get the answers he wanted or die trying.
‘That was some quick thinking Nick. Well done’ Telarc said, patting Nick on the shoulder. They had stopped panting, trying to catch their breath.
‘How do you think they found us?’ asked Nick
‘That is puzzling. I didn’t sense any security measures’ said Telarc, visibly troubled.
‘Perhaps there is some form of human made security that I failed to sense’ he pondered.
Nick remained silent for he was just as puzzled over the whole matter. Pushing those thoughts aside for now he asked Telarc if he was OK.
‘I was hit with one of their weapons but it must have been on a lower setting because it only stunned me’ he replied. ‘By the way, who was that?’
Nick’s blood went cold at the thought, even as the rage welled up inside him. ‘That was Bill, the guy who got me into all this in the first place’ Nick responded
Telarc suddenly went quiet and Nick wondered what was happening. Were his injuries catching up to him? Nick tried to contact him but there was no reply. Then he could feel something in his head. It started out as pain. Not excruciating but enough so that he could feel it. It was there but a moment and then he was filled with an overwhelming euphoria so blissful and pure that he forgot all about his present situation. He fell to his knees, his eyes filling with tears. It was so pleasant he didn’t feel anything and just wanted to stay in that feeling forever. It was pure unadulterated love. Like a million hugs and kisses from your mother all rolled into one beautiful moment. It seemed to last an eternity but in reality it was over in mere seconds.
‘What was that?’ he asked of Telarc, quivering as the feeling left his body.
‘Rinalx has progressed’ Telarc replied, although he didn’t seem sad about it. “Died, in your language” he added as he saw Nick’s confusion.
‘I’m sorry’ Nick offered sadly
‘It’s not a time for sadness Nick. The next part of his journey has begun.’
‘Do all Annunaki feel his progression’ Nick asked
‘Normally when someone goes on, he or she will share the experience with those that were important to them’
Nick felt honored and humbled at the same time that Rinalx regarded him in this way.
‘Why did I feel so good? It was like I was suddenly plugged into to pure happiness.’ Nick asked
‘Everything in the universe is created from the same source, but everything resonates at a different frequency. That is how we recognize differences, by the frequency they are vibrating at. When someone moves on and they contact you they have returned to the source so they are bridging the gap between this world and the source. As you found out, the source is love.’ Telarc answered wistfully.
‘It was a wonderful feeling’ said Nick ‘I didn’t want it to end’
Telarc started to answer when the lights overhead flickered once, then again, and finally returned to full functionality. Nick and Telarc looked at each other. Nick could see that Telarc was more injured than he let on as there was a large hole burnt through his jacket in the stomach area and Nick could see the skin underneath was raw and bloody.
“I'll make it Nick” Telarc said reassuringly as he noticed Nick’s eyes wide with shock at the sight of his wound. Telarc gestured to the lights ‘I think the time has come for us to move on’
Nick agreed and they both stood up from the kneeling position they were in and Telarc touched the closest wall with his eyes closed, concentrating deeply. He then announced they had gotten farther away from the core in their flight but he could still get them there to complete their objective and they set off down the passage. Nick knew what to feel for this time so he kept his senses open to the feeling of any human beings in the vicinity.
Bill stopped cold as the lights flicked on, startled by the sudden brightness. He discarded his emergency light and looked at his hand held tracking device. He could see that the lights coming on had pressured Nick into action as his device was showing that Nick was on the move again. Bill watched for a moment, quickly plotting an intercept course.
“Double time” he urged over his shoulder to the men and they all noticeably picked up the pace in response.
Nick and Telarc were moving at a deliberate pace, feeling the pressure that Bill’s presence had generated. They could only suspect that Bill was still in pursuit and they wanted to reach their target as soon as possible. Nick kept his senses keen, searching for any sign that Bill and his squad was nearby. For now it seemed that they were alone. Nick wondered what time it was as they were passing many more doors now and sometimes a window or two. He kept wondering if they were going to be discovered at any moment but either they were lucky or there just weren't a lot of people on th
is level at the moment because they didn’t see anybody. Telarc stopped again and touched the wall. ‘We're getting close Nick” he said excitedly and then continued on, taking a left hand turn at the next opportunity. The turn led them to yet another long hallway with a series of doors evenly spaced along its length, as well as connecting hallways and elevators and ended at a curved wall that Nick could only assume was the core. Wow, he thought, if ever there was a spot they would be found out, this sure looked like it was the place. They started off again, keeping low, and moving with purpose. They had barely gone more than a few steps when Nick sensed that Bill was not as far away as he would like.
‘I think Bill has caught up with us’ he related to Telarc
‘No matter Nick, we are at our objective now. Just a little bit farther’ was the response and they started to run. And they ran headlong into Bill as he rounded a corner just in front of them. For a moment everybody froze, like a scene out of a movie. Nick and Telarc started to backpedal, frantic to get away. Bill, weapon in hand, trained it on Telarc and fired and Telarc fell in a heap. He was laboring to get up and Nick stopped and came back to him, firing his own flash gun indiscriminately in response causing Bill and his men to flee back down the hall they had come from seeking cover. Nick reached Telarc and helped him up, noticing that he had a grisly wound on his back now to match the one on his stomach. He was grimacing in obvious agony and Nick put his arm around his shoulder and moved as quickly as he could away from Bill.
“Security all over the base has been alerted Nick” Bill bellowed from safety.
“You will never get out of here alive Nick, surrender now and things will be a lot easier for you”
Nick was struggling under Telarc’s added weight and couldn’t muster a response. He was trying door after door and none would budge. Then he saw a button on the wall and he mashed it with his free hand.
“We can talk all this out Nick” Bill was continuing.
Nick was sure he was buying time for some of his men to get around to the other side of the hall and cut off his escape. Bill came out from the corner and started walking toward Nick, his hands out in an apparent gesture of peace. ‘I don’t want to see you get hurt Nick. The other security personnel won’t be as forgiving as me’ he said.
Nick couldn’t restrain himself any longer
“Forgiving” he said “your whole plan was for me to die on Nibiru, and now I am supposed to trust you.’ Nick shrieked
Bill stopped in his tracks stunned, so he had been to Nibiru and now was back.
The door to the elevator opened and Nick turned to go in and was hit from behind with a blast and he let go of Telarc who fell to the ground and didn’t move. Nick rolled into the elevator and used his telepathy to reach out to the elevator, telling it to close the door. The door started to close and Nick scrambled to his knees and was reaching to drag Telarc into the elevator car when Telarc’s voice reached his brain, faint and strangled.
‘It’s OK Nick, my time has come. Take this and fare well my human friend. You give me hope for your kind.’ and his hand flopped to the edge of the closing door. Nick didn’t have time to think about it so he reached out and grabbed what was in Telarc’s hand and had just enough time to get his hand back in the car before it was crushed by the closing door. He looked down at his hand and in it was the EMP device that they were going to use on the core. He tried to get the elevator to go up but its only direction was down so he went with it. He slumped back against the wall of the elevator and looked down again at the EMP device he had in his hand. As he was looking he felt a dull pain and then again the euphoria of being connected to the source. It was just as beautiful this time as it was the first time, tainted slightly because now he knew what was happening and why. As the glorious feeling drained from his body his eyes filled with tears and he said a silent goodbye to Telarc. He had learned so much from him and he realized that now he was on his own and it was the time to put that knowledge to use. He stood up, stowed the EMP in his pocket and readied himself for what would happen when the elevator opened. Nick had to assume that Bill was telling the truth when he said that security had been notified. His thoughts raced as he tried to formulate some sort of plan for when he had to get off the elevator. What could he do? He suddenly realized how vulnerable he really was now that he was all alone and longed for someone more experienced to give him guidance but none would be coming. It was all on him now, no more free rides. And then it came to him, his only hope really. He drew himself up to full height and squared his shoulders. He could tell the elevator’s ride was almost complete and he took a few deep reassuring breaths to steady his nerves and focused hard on the image forming in his mind.
Chapter 20