A Game of Gods: The End is Only the Beginning (The Anunnaki Chronicles Book 1) (13 page)

39

Hundred feet below the earth, Captain Hernandez struggled to pull himself up as he watched the seventh man walk across him towards the center of the chamber. He wore a black robe and his face was partially covered with a black hood, only revealing his pointed chin. Meanwhile, the sixth man blew another kick to the Spaniard’s back, this time sending a stream of blood back to his heart. He screamed in pain. The seventh man turned back and gestured for the captain to be spared.

‘Throw him out of here. There shall be no blood or departing soul here tonight. It might hinder the arrival of the Anunnaki. We have waited four thousand years; we cannot let this act of arrogance ruin our effort.’ The man said in a voice shrill as an owl in its wisest hour, ‘There shall be no human blood!’

‘The portal has opened, O Honorable Va-zier.’ One of the five informed the short statured seventh man.

‘Very well, send each of the three sacrificial entities along with the corresponding chants- the bull, the cat and the crocodile. When Sekhmet arrives, send the divine woman for Atem, and thus they shall arrive again on this doomed planet, to take what is theirs.’

‘Honorable Va-Zier, so shall it be!’

‘Remember, the woman should not wake until Atem attains the state of unity with her. She should neither bleed and neither should she stop breathing. I have always prepared you for this day, but we must be careful, for this is our only chance.’ The man commanded.

‘Who… who are you?’ Captain Hernandez tried to know.

The short man, who was summoned as the Honorable Va-Zier, came forward, kneeled down near the writhing captain, and said, ‘Depends on this, do you believe in god?’

‘I…I… I believe in our Lord, the Almighty God…’

‘Oops… wrong answer, you fool. A fool, who chose to believe what
they
told you, does not deserve to know who we are.’ He looked into the captain’s eyes, it was full of fear. ‘Do you know why you are a fool?’

Silence.

‘You are a fool, because one of you chose to doom the one who engineered you so that your kind can be the supreme rulers of this planet. And when you realized you did not have the power to control the rest of your kind, you fabricated a virtual overseer… an all-seeing entity, and in the name of that God… and that too in different names and forms, few of your kind ruled over the rest of you like kings and you did not even realize that you were just sheep… little lambs… brainwashed… enslaved…’ alleged the evil Va-Zier

The sixth man walked towards the platform and picked up a small case that was lying on the other side. He opened it and held the content towards the bright source of light above them. It was a thick organ, a dark brown genital- The Fertile Bull. The genital ascended into the source.

‘That shall serve progeny for the creator.’

‘C…c…creator?’ Hernandez asked.

‘Yes, those who created… Mankind… those whom you betrayed…’

‘There is only One Lord, He is the Creator, and He is all merciful. Are you invoking Satan?’ Hernandez trembled as he inquired with all the knowledge that he had about his religion.

‘Poor you, Isn’t what
they
tell you? Yes, there is only Satan, and that is no supreme being… It is you… wretched humankind…’

The sixth man picked up a second case and this time he brought out a little brain- The Holy Cat.

‘Behold, the guardians of the underworld… Let immortality embrace the great ones…’ the Va-Zier proclaimed with great pride as he saw the negligible sized organ ascend to the
heavens
.

The chanting had got louder and there was a whizzing sound inside the chamber that originated from above.

‘Who are you?’ Hernandez cried.

‘Mesha Mes-en Saret…’ declared a voice from the chamber’s entrance. The intruder’s voice carried a heaviness of the heart and the glory of knowing.

The short man rose and looked at the intruder approvingly, as if he had been waiting for him all this while, ‘So, you are here… finally!’ he said.

Hernandez turned towards the entrance, from where he heard the entrant’s voice. He was expecting one of the giants in black robe, but it was an ordinary man in shirt and jeans, tall nevertheless.

‘You have come thus far, but now it is time to make the ultimate choice… Son of Adam…’ he paused, took a deep breath, and exhaled a name, ‘Manav…’

40

Few moments ago

After finding the opening in the sand, Manav quickly climbed down along with his guardian angel. He could hear harmonic incantations from below and followed the chants. He walked for another thirty minutes through a narrow passage that ultimately led him to the entrance of the chamber from where the incantations originated. He also heard a distinct conversation in English, which surprised him. He decided not to jump inside the chamber; instead, he stood at the corner of entrance with his back on the wall of the passage and listened to the conversation. A conversation between a dictating evil hunter and the poor hunted.

Strangely, one of the voices, presumably of the hunter, sounded familiar yet distinct in its tone. It was penetrating with an overflowing ego that was the direct result of over bearable knowledge… born of Wisdom…

The Army Born of Wisdom… Mesha mes-en Saret.

41

‘How… how do you know my name?’ Manav asked bewildered by the Va-Zier’s cognizance.

‘1989… January 3… A pale little baby was born in a small town in India, unlike other babies this one did not cry at birth. In fact, he cut threw his mother’s womb, only to breathe his last… However, destiny had a different plan for him, a mysterious force injects life into the baby and he breathes… and cries few minutes after coming out of his mother’s womb…’

‘Who… are you?’ The filmmaker’s frustration fuelled his curiosity for this was his birth’s story, something he learned from his mother when he was eight years old. His mother had told him that God saved him by sending an angel, and he had always liked the idea until he was sixteen when he decided to be an atheist under the influence of his first girlfriend.

‘You already know who we are… and when I tell you who I am, you’ll be surprised that you did not know… yet you know me.’ The Va-Zier ejaculated in his shrill voice.

Amidst the mystical power of the incantations, Manav found himself weak in the belly, as if he was being carried upwards. Indeed he was. The giant in black robe picked him and threw him under the Va-zier’s feet. His arms flailed as he tried to rise from the hard granite. He turned his head to the left and saw the writhing white man from Spain, helplessly trying to get up. He looked around for Kun-Ha, but it was nowhere in sight.

‘What the hell are you doing?’ Manav yelled at the man in the black hood.

‘Mankind, as you know today does not deserve to be the rulers of this planet, when the fact is that they were created to be slaves.’ The short man revealed, ‘Thus, the heavens and earths were completed, and all their hosts…’ he looked into Manav’s eyes and continued, ‘he saw the Earth and all the gold it hid in her womb, but there was no man to dig into this ground…’ chanted the evil Va-Zier.

‘How dare you degrade the Holy words?’ An infuriated Captain Hernandez asked as he tried to catch the Va-Zier’s feet to topple him.

The Va-Zier shook off the captain’s desperate attempt and said, ‘But a mist of gas spurred off the glass canal and was immediately treated with water, and an entity was created and into it blew the life giving elements did the great one who descended from the skies. And man became a living being.’

‘Noooooo!!’ Hernandez cried like a little child whose greatest gift was being taken away.

‘Then he took man and put him into the mine to work on it and find what was needed. The creator commanded the man to work without questioning, and if he does, he will be killed, forbidding him from knowledge of who he is and how he came to be. To live like the slave for his master, and until the day when the slave overpowered his master and doomed the master forever.’

‘No…you motherfucking bastard…I will kill you! How dare you corrupt and distort the words of…’ Hernandez threatened, but he could not even get up.

‘Manav, you always questioned the existence of god, tonight you get to choose between the truth and the superficial lie… the one that you always loathed. It is your choice that will decide the fate of this world.’

‘How do you know everything about me?’ Manav yelled.

‘When the Pharaoh Khasekhemwy doomed the Anunnaki from entering the Earthern plane, his honorable Va-zier received a prophecy from Ma’at, the Goddess of Justice. She warned him that the Army of Mazduk, the God of Maz-Durs, were planning to annihilate the Anunnaki upon their arrival on Earth. She knew of the greed for power in the minds of the humankind, and took advantage of the ambush that the Pharaoh Khasekhemwy had set up to trap the Anunnaki…’

‘…Stop spitting such blasphemous theories about Our Lord the God!’ The furious Spaniard interrupted.

‘Shut up, you fool. You must be happy that I validated your theory of creation… in fact I just rectified whatever you were getting wrong… all these ages!’ The Va-Zier shouted at Hernandez and then looked at Manav, who was now on his knees. He continued, ‘The Pharaoh had planned to disrupt the ritual of Atem, thereby dooming the Anunnaki from entering Earth, and taking control of the planet from them forever. However, the forever was just a period of four thousand years, and that was just equivalent to a few thousand breaths of the mighty Anunnaki. We…’ He spread his arm and pronounced gloriously, ‘the Mesha Mes-En Saret were thus incorporated by the great Goddess of Justice to preserve this knowledge, so that when time comes, we are here to release the Anunnaki… or those who from heavens came, as you may like to refer, when the portal opens after four thousand years… and that time has come…

‘However, she forecasted about the Chosen One… The son of Adam, who shall be decisive now, for what he chooses, shall prevail, and what he rejects shall see total annihilation. For if the Chosen One speaks of mankind, then the Goddess of Justice shall call back the Anunnaki once and for all, leaving this wretched planet in the hands of the slaves, who will ultimately annihilate themselves. Or…’ the Va-Zier paused and smiled wickedly at the filmmaker who was breathing fire of fury. He offered, ‘if you choose the Anunnaki, then your kind… your civilization… your world will be reduced to ashes by the powerful Anunnaki. And you will be rewarded by the boon of immortality, you will be raised to the ranks of the Anunnaki,’ He searched for a change in Manav’s eyes expression, when he noticed the curiosity he said; ‘You will be god.’

‘No man can be God!’ Hernandez howled at the Va-Zier.

‘O Chosen One… It is time for you to choose…’ The Va-Zier pronounced.

‘I am no chosen one… I am just a storyteller… an ordinary human being. I do not know how you knew so much about me, you must have been crazy to watch over me since I took birth, driven by the motivation of some mythical prophecy.’ Manav argued.

‘There was doubt at first, but gradually when I got closer to you I started getting sure. In addition, tonight I am sure that the prophecy is true; otherwise, you would never have reached here. I do not leave explanations to coincidence.’ The short man paused for a moment and walked around Manav. When he stood right behind Manav he said, ‘Don’t you remember this myth? Haven’t you already created this myth somewhere?’

‘It was… it was just a story.’ Manav admitted.

‘
A Game of Gods
was not just a story that you wrote; it was an account of everything that your soul had witnessed in a previous life… when you were the Pharaoh Khasekhemwy, when you chose to doom the Anunnaki to rule the Earth. Because the Pharaoh believed the existence of an Almighty Lord greater than the Anunnakis.’

‘No! There was no such Pharaoh as Khasekhemwy. He was just a fictional character I created in my book.’

‘Deny you may now, but the truth shall remain. You knew everything, just that you did not realize what you were or who was narrating that story in your mind,’ the Va-Zier spat swiftly as he pulled Manav towards him and said, ‘I knew it was you, the moment I read your book. And then I simply chose to befriend you until this day…’ and then he let the hood fall back revealing a face that shocked the life out of Manav.

A Face that he knew… for years… and now he realized that he had known that face for ages.

42

The giant raised the penultimate entity and the heart of the crocodile ascended into the source of light. There was a burst of fire somewhere above and the temperature inside the chamber multiplied in magnitude. But the heat inside the chamber hardly brought the frozen heart of Manav back to life. Frozen by the shock of revelation.

Finally, he spoke as if in a trance, ‘Khalid…’

‘We have always been destined for this. This is your chance to write a new story, the story of a new beginning.’ Khalid said as he offered Manav his hand.

Captain Hernandez tried hard to understand what was going one. He stammered, ‘So…So… You guys know each other?’

Manav took the Va-Zier Khalid Abdullah’s hand and got up on his feet. He brushed off the dust from his shirt and looked at Khalid and asked, ‘So, that’s why you befriended me?’

‘For ages, the Va-Ziers had travelled miles and years to select their correct successors. They gauged the stars and celestial alignment at the time of birth of the suspected ones, and only those were chosen who had the same celestial alignment as at the time of the birth of the first Va-Zier, the great minister of Pharaoh Khasekhemwyh. We were passed the secret of mankind and protected the knowledge.’ He pointed towards the giant men who were chanting at the center of chamber and said, ‘They are Nephelims, born from the Anunnaki’s seed of woman’s womb. They live for centuries, and only a few remain now and they are here. And when we will send this divine woman to the vortex, the Anunnaki shall be released from the vortex onto this plane.’

Khalid walked towards the center of the chamber where the woman was kept and it was the first time Manav saw the woman. An image flashed in front of him, something that he had seen in a previous dream. He shook his head and came back to reality. The chamber was rocked by another explosion from the vortex, and Khalid looked up at the blinding source of light- The vortex.

‘And when the Anunnaki step on Earth, they shall destroy their greatest creation- Mankind.’ Khalid revealed and looked at his friend.

‘Just stab that fucking woman, let her bleed and these godless bastards will never succeed in their plan!’ Hernandez cried out desperately, for all this time he had felt a soft corner for this unknown woman, but now he had to place a rock on his heart. He prayed for her death if that stopped the Anunnaki from destroying entire mankind, ‘Just do it… I heard him saying that she should not stop breathing if these merciless creatures were to descend successfully.’

‘My dear fool, the Chosen One has already made his choice. I have done him favors for a long time, haven’t I? All these years I produced your ideas without ever asking a question unlike other producers. I made you the most successful Indian filmmaker. If it was not for my money you would have still been a petty little writer.’ stated the short man with all his might.

‘I will always be grateful to you.’ Manav said.

Khalid’s face drew a diabolic smile.

‘But, I have a whole nation to thank for accepting my stories, for loving my films. I feel so sad tonight thinking that all those people will not be there once the Anunnaki land on Earth, and there will be nobody to mourn their death but me.’

‘Sacrifice, my friend. Greatness comes to those who give up everything they have.’

Manav closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He brought his arms behind his back and locked his shoulders and observed a moment of silence. The Va-Zier proudly looked at his victory and gestured the sixth Nephelim to prepare the woman for ascent.

Sulking for breath, Hernandez closed his eyes and prayed one last time, ‘Our Father, Who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy Name; Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done…’

Huge balls of fire from the vortex hit the granite floor around them. The helpless Spanish Captain dodged one of them that came to hit him. With a steady heart and trembling body he continued praying, ‘Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our sins,’ His voice thumped as he was lifted by the Nephilum and thrown towards the entrance, but Hernandez continued, ‘as we forgive those who sin against us,’ The impact was so hard that his eyes opened, he saw Manav standing with his head bowed down and hand holding onto something behind his back, ‘and lead us not into temptation,’ he looked at the devilish Va-Zier who had now started laughing loudly, ‘but deliver us from evil.’ He closed his eyes and chanted, ‘Amen!’

Manav looked at his friend who now stood above the divine woman, looking up and chanting something in an unknown language, the Nephilum was heading towards the platform to raise the woman unto the vortex. In a flash of a second Manav jumped onto the platform, pushing Khalid on the floor and in his right hand was a small pen knife that he always carried in his pocket. He had been holding it in his hands for the last couple of minutes.

‘Oh god! I do not know who you are or what your fucking plan is, but I cannot let mankind die tonight.’ He looked at pale white woman, Eva. ‘We shall live and we shall unite, I have hope,’ He raised the knife in air, ‘I have…’ he drove the knife into the woman’s heart and said, ‘Faith…’

As blood oozed out of her heart, the Va-Zier’s eyes dropped off its sockets and as the soul left her body, the vortex exploded into whiteness.

Complete whiteness.