The Return of the Watchers (Armageddon Rising Book 1) (15 page)

              Dinner came and went and his mother asked what they were working on. Yuki looked at Dorian, waiting for him to come up with an answer so she wouldn’t have to lie to his mother.                                                         “Were trying to find out what is in my blood that makes me different and why some people would be after it,” he answered, to Yuki’s dismay. His mother sort of snapped to attention with a shocked look on her face.                            

              “It’s okay, she knows about it,” he said looking at both his mother and Yuki. “I suppose that statement applies to the two of you. Of course my mother knew about me being different, but she obviously doesn’t know about the recent events we’ve experienced,” he said to Yuki.                             “Mamma, don't worry. I trust Yuki; she's one of the few people I know that can help me sort through all this and make sense out of it,” he said with a smile looking towards her.                                                                         “Arigato,” she said, with a humbled expression.                                            Iduna, however, did not have a peaceful look on her face.                             “Are you going to tell me what you are talking about?” she asked, sounding short of breath.                                                                                                   He spent the next half hour explaining all the events that had occurred over the past several weeks and showed her the object fused to his skull. His mother's expression turned dour, as if she could scarcely believe what she had heard. Suddenly her eyes widened.                                          “Oh....I completely forgot about it until now. This must be what she was talking about. I think it’s time, then,” she said to him.                             “Time for what?” Dorian asked.

              Iduna got up and went to the bedroom she was staying in.                             “It is a good thing we came to the cabin. I had forgotten I left it here,” she said, her voice muffled. The sounds of shuffling and furniture being dragged were heard from her bedroom. Several minutes later she returned with what looked like a piece of metal in her hand, about the same thickness as a credit card, in the shape of a heptagon. It was a bit bigger than a standard postcard and shimmered with a translucence similar to the garment worn by the alien that he had seen in Hawaii. She scrunched it up in front of them, then set it on the table and it returned to its natural shape.                                                                                                                 “What is it?” Dorian and Yuki asked in unison.                                           “I have no idea. I had forgotten about it all these years. I left it in the cottage a long time ago when we first started coming here. She just told me to give it to you when the time was right, that I would know when. At first I carried it around everywhere we went, thinking something was going to happen, but nothing ever came of it so I stored it away and completely forgot about it until now. I always knew you were special Dorian; I knew from the moment she gave you to me,” Iduna said, looking uncomfortable.                                                                                                                 “Umm, mamma, who are you referring to? Who told you to give this to me?  Are you telling me the representative from the adoption agency here in Norway gave you this alien-like object and handed me over with some cryptic message about knowing when the time was right? Or is there something you haven’t told me?”                                                                       “You were not brought to us from an adoption agency Dorian.”               “What? What are you talking about?” Doria asked.                                           “Your father and I decided it would be best not to tell you, out of fear you would leave us or say something to the wrong people and end up like one of those lab rats,” she said with a look of shame on her face.               “I thought that all you knew about my biological mother was her name. What are you saying? That she dropped me off?” he asked in disbelief.                                                                                                                               “I don’t know if it was your birth mother, dear. The person who handed you to me was not like anyone here on this planet that I have ever seen,” she said, lowering her voice. “She was much like the one you described earlier; a head full of fire, almost alive, but no heat. Her eyes were terrible and powerful; radiant. I cannot put it into words. We thought she was an angel. The sound of her voice was comforting, as if many were speaking at the same time in harmony. Somehow she knew I wanted a child but was unable to conceive. She said that she had watched me for many years and that I would be a good mother for you. Your father was there also; otherwise I think he never would have believed such a crazy story. We were both petrified. She handed me this object and told me to give it to you when the time was right.”                                                                       Dorian and Yuki looked at each other in bewilderment.                             “We had no idea what you were going to be like, you know, like Superman or something,” Iduna said with a laugh. “It almost seemed like that story. You are not that different from the rest of us; perhaps a bit stronger and faster. Well, that and of course your hair and those eyes of yours. You still look the same after all these years. Honestly, I'm just grateful you didn’t have a tail, or could disappear. Who knows what mischief you would have gotten into then huh?” she said smiling.                             “Your eyes?” Yuki asked.                                                                      “Custom full eye contacts. Worn them since I was a child. Not that I need them to see, but you can imagine what someone might say if they saw this,” he said, pulling the lens away from one eye to reveal its glowing green color, which almost appeared to be illuminated from within. Yuki just put her hand to her mouth in amazement.            
                                            Iduna continued, “Anyway, this belongs to you.” She placed the object on the table. “It doesn’t appear to do anything apart from returning to shape when you crush it,” she said, once again demonstrating its remarkable ability.                                                                                                                 Dorian slowly brought his hand over the object and picked it up.              “Aaaaagh!” he shrieked with a terror-stricken face.                                           Yuki and Iduna were stunned.                                                                       “Just kidding,” he said with a devilish smile.                                           “Oh, you! I’m going to give you a big hurt for that,” Iduna said, reaching for the wet dishrag on the sink and hurling it at him.                            “Whaaaat?” he asked, in mock protest. “Lighten up, everyone, sheesh.” He focused his attention on the object once more. Holding it in his hand he began to see faint symbols light up on the object.                             “There’s definitely something there, can you see it?” he asked holding it up for them.                                                                                                   “I see nothing there, dear, where?” Iduna asked.                                           “Right here,” he said pointing to the symbols on the object.                             “I don’t see anything either,” Yuki said, straining her eyes to see what was there.                                                                                                                 “What does it say?” she asked.                                                                       “In the common tongue it reads 'One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them, one ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them', he said, smiling again.                                                                                                                 “Can you take this seriously for once?” his mother said, her patience wearing thin.                                                                                                   “Okay, okay. It just reminds me of that, the way the symbols light up on this thing when I hold on to it. I can see dots along one of the edges in groups, and the next edge has symbols. On the next edge are other symbols that are different. Each edge has a different set of symbols. Below the set of dots are more dots, different in number; then to the right below the first set of symbols are different symbols but similar in their manner, and so on. Yuki, do you have any paper? I’ll copy them down.”             

              She handed him some paper from her calendar and he started to trace the symbols as they appeared on the object. He flipped it over and found more dots, symbols and such like those on the front. After about four hours he managed to finish writing everything down.              

              It was getting late and he was tired from the day's events, coupled with the jet lag, so they all said goodnight to get some rest.

              That night he had another nightmare, more real than the last one, where he saw the same beings trapped or imprisoned in a cavern. It was as if he was being forced to watch their suffering and suffer with them. He awoke to Yuki shaking him.                                                                                                   “Get up, sleepy head, we have work to do,” she said, pressing down on the mattress and generally annoying him.                                                         “What time is it?” he asked, rubbing the back of his neck where the ice-cold imbedded object was.                                                                                     “It’s almost noon. We’ve been up, ate breakfast, talked and walked. I thought you were going to sleep the day away,” she said looking frustrated at him.                                                                                                                 “I can’t help it, Yuki. Whatever this thing is on the back of my head, it seems to have an effect when I sleep. I saw these beings howling and shouting at me, mixed with this terrible feeling of dread and gloom. It’s been getting worse each day. I don’t think I can take much more of this. I’m going to have to try and get this thing off somehow.”                            She put her hand on the back of his neck where his hand was and touched the object.                                                                                                                 “Ow! It’s freezing cold. How can you stand it?”                             “Believe me, it’s very painful. There’s something going on here, I wish I knew what,” he replied. He went into the bathroom to warm up some water and soaked a washcloth in it, using it to heat up the object on his neck. It seemed to help lessen the pain a bit so he continued by taking a shower until all the hot water was used up.                                                          “What are we going to do today?” Yuki asked through the bathroom door once the water stopped running.                                                         “I need you to try and scan a copy of what I wrote down last night so I can email it,” he said.                                                                                                    “Who are going to send it to?” Iduna asked in place of Yuki.               He opened the door wearing a towel around his waist as steam poured out of the bathroom.                                                                                                   “I’m going to send it to the linguistics department at the University of Cambridge and see if any of the symbols represent any known languages. We don’t have a scanner here in the cottage so you and mom may have to go into town,” he said.                                                                                     “What are you going to do?” Yuki asked, feeling left out.                            “I’ve got to try and get this thing off of me. Mahin mentioned the people behind the strange email might be able to help. If that doesn’t work- well, I’m going to saw the damn thing off.”                                                         Iduna walked over to him and gave him a hug. “I hope you know what you are doing, dear.”
                                                                                                  “I don’t have a clue, but I have to try something. Yuki, could you come here for a moment?” he asked, still wearing nothing but a towel. She felt heat rise in her face and followed him inside the room.
H
e closed the door behind them. Water droplets were beaded on his muscular chest.             

              “If anything happens to me I want you to promise that you’ll leave this all alone and go back to the University. I don’t want your life getting ruined for no reason. You have my permission to use my blood to research whatever it is you want, just don’t go looking into my longevity. Believe me, it would end up being far more trouble than it’s worth.”                             “Hai,” was all she could say.                                                                                     “One more thing,” he said, drawing her body close for a passionate kiss. She held him in her arms and pulled closer, absorbing every ounce of the moment. He ended with a smile and gently brushed aside her hair from her face. She smiled in return, feeling somewhat dizzy from the whole event.                                                                                                                                             He opened the door to the room. “Mamma, take Yuki out so she can try and get this paper scanned. Have some lunch while you are at it.”  He felt it was best for them not to be there for what he was about to do, in the event that something went wrong.                                          

Nine