James Frey - Sky Key

A full three minutes and 49 seconds after it began, there is silence.

Stillness.

Eben peels his hands from his ears. They are clammy, his fingers stiff, as if he has been gripping something with all his might for hours upon hours. He tries to open his eyes, but they’re crusted shut. He digs his fingers at them, wiping away crystals of ice and gobs of yellow, congealed tears.

He blinks. He can see.

He snaps his fingers. He can hear.

He stamps his feet. He can feel.

The pinkish light of the room is unchanged. He looks at the shiny wall, only centimeters from his face, striped with gold and silver. It is unchanged. He can see his splotchy, imperfect reflection there, just as before.

He breathes.

Breathes and breathes.

Holds his breath and turns.

The room is utterly undisturbed. The lamp hangs from the ceiling on its slender rod. The low gilt table, with the bowl and the pitcher, is on his right. The robes hang on the pegs on the wall. The jeweled breastplate from antiquity that Ithamar wore hangs there too.

The curtain is as before—straight and bright and clean.

“Same-El? Ithamar?” Eben asks.

No answer.

He steps forward.

He reaches the curtain.

He drags his fingertips across it.

He closes his eyes and pushes his hand through the parting and walks in.

He opens his eyes.

And there it is. The Ark of the Covenant, golden, two and one half cubits long, one and one half cubits high, one and one half cubits deep, the mercy seat lifted free and leaning against the wall, the cherubim on top facing each other in timeless reproach.

The only sign that Same-El and Ithamar ever existed are two fist-sized piles of gray ash on the floor, precisely two meters apart.

Eben stands on his tiptoes and tries to see past the leading edge of the ark and into the bottom.

But he cannot see.

He edges closer.

And there. Inside, a ceramic urn coiled in copper wire. A stone tablet without any markings. A wrinkle of black silk pushed into one corner.

And in the middle of the ark two black cobras, looped over each other in a figure eight, sleek and vigorous, chasing and nibbling at each other’s tails.

Eben reaches down and touches the edge of the ark. He is not smitten, not blinded, not driven mad.

He pushes his knees against it and leans forward and grabs a snake in each hand. As soon as his flesh touches theirs, they harden and straighten and transform into wooden rods, each a meter long, and each tipped with a metal snake head on one end and a golden spike on the other.

The Rod of Aaron.

The Rod of Moses.

He slips one under his sash.

He holds the other.

Eben kneels and reaches for the tablet and turns it over with a thump.

It is blank on both sides.

Eben huffs and his heart feels hollow. This is the covenant with the Makers.

A blank stone tablet.

Curse them.

He doesn’t dare open the urn, which is without doubt the manna machine. The Aksumites will guard it—having a machine that potentially makes food might come in handy after the Event, so long as they can figure out how to work it—but they don’t need it yet.

All that’s left is the crumpled pile of black silk.

Eben pushes the silk aside with the cane, and there—there it is.

He leans over and picks it up. Turns it over in his hand. Runs his fingers over it.

He shakes his head in disbelief.

Knock-knock.

Someone is at the hatch.

Eben spins and crosses the Kodesh Hakodashim. He opens the latch and lets the person on the other side push it inward.

Hilal pokes his disfigured head into the chamber. “Well, Master? I couldn’t just sit there and wait.”

“You won’t believe it.”

“Is it open?”

“Yes.”

“Who?”

“Same-El and Ithamar.”

“Did they survive?”

“No.”

“God take them.”

“Yes, my Player. God take them.”

“And what was in it?”

“These,” Eben says, indicating the snakelike rods. “They are living weapons. The rods of Aaron and Moses, the consuming snakes, the prime creators, the ouroboros. Our symbols of uncorruption, the hunters of Ea. Even if our line never finds the Corrupted One, the canes will serve you well in Endgame.”

“And what else? What of the covenant?”

“There is no covenant, Player. The tablet was blank.”

Hilal looks to the side. Through clenched teeth he asks, “Was there more, Master?”

“Yes, Player. And that is what you won’t believe.”

Eben holds it out and Hilal looks.

It is a slender sheath of black metal the size of a large smartphone, curved slightly and etched in one corner with a glyph.

Eben hands it to Hilal, and as soon as the Player of the 144th line touches it, it glows to life.

Hilal looks at Eben.

Eben looks at Hilal.

“To Endgame, my Player.”

“To Endgame, Master.”

Shiver.

He is free.

But exactly where he is free he does not know.

He inspects the instrument panel of the Lynx, locates the navigation system and the autopilot. Punches a few buttons on the touch screen and sees the English Channel. The lights to the north are Dover. He does not want to return to England, not ever, not ever blinkSHIVERblink ever blinkSHIVER ever blinkblinkSHIVERBLINKBLINKBLINK not ever.

An punches himself in the cheek to knock away the tics.

It works. “Chiyoko Takeda,” he whispers. “Chiyoko Takeda.”

Blood drips from his nose.

Shiver.

He blows out his cheeks. The adrenaline from the escape dissipates. The pain soaked into every cubic centimeter of his head revs like an engine.

He grabs the stick and arcs the Lynx low over the water, until his heading is 202?13' 35". He passes the still-burning destroyer three kilometers to the east, and prays that they don’t see him and that their guns are disabled, or that they’re too distracted by the burning ship to even bother with the guns.

And that’s when he notices a section of the controls that he isn’t familiar with, and realizes why the chopper was taking off dark, and why he is not at the moment being shot out of the air by a pair of F/A-18s.

It took off dark because it could.

The strange controls are a stealth array, and they are already active.

An can use this bird to disappear.

Blink. Shiver.

Why would stealth be active in the first place? If he had been on the Lynx as their prisoner, that would have made sense—he is a Player of Endgame, one of the deadliest people on the planet—but it was scrambling to take off before he’d even reached the flight deck.

So why take off dark?

Blink. Shiver. Blink.

And then he lurches forward, as if someone hit him in the back of the neck.

The metal box in the cargo hold.

The metal box the size of a coffin.

CHIYOKO TAKEDA.

An brings the chopper up 50 meters to keep a safe distance from the water and activates the autopilot, punching in a new heading of 140° 22' 07".

He spins out of the copilot’s seat and lands right in front of the box.

Shiver.

He takes a step forward and places his hands on it.

He doesn’t have to open it to know.