Robert Doherty
Assault on Atlantis
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Bob Mayer is the Best-Selling author of numerous books, both fiction and non-fiction. He is a West Point graduate, served in the Infantry and Special Forces (Green Berets): commanding an A-Team and as a Special Forces battalion operations officer; and was an instructor at the JFK Special Warfare Center & School at Fort Bragg. He is the CEO of Who Dares Wins Publishing.
His books have hit the NY Times, Wall Street Journal, Publishers Weekly, USA Today and other best-seller lists. With over 3 million books in print, he’s the author of Who Dares Wins: The Green Beret Way to Conquer Fear & Succeed and Hunting Al Qaeda. He has appeared on/in local cable news around the country as well as PBS, NPR, the Discovery Military Channel, the Wall Street Journal and Sports Illustrated as an expert consultant.
Bob is an honor graduate of the Combined Arms Services Staff School, the Infantry Office Basic & Advanced Courses, the Special Forces Qualification Course, the Special Warfare Center Instructor Training Course and the Danish Royal Navy Fromandkorpset School. He is Master Parachutist/Jumpmaster Qualified, earned a Black Belt in the Orient and also taught martial arts and boxing. Bob also earned an MA in Education. He's spoken before over 1,000 groups and organizations, ranging from SWAT teams, Fortune 500, the University of Georgia; IT teams in Silicon Valley, the CIA, Romance Writers of America and the Maui Writers Conference. He brings a unique blend of practical Special Operations Strategies and Tactics mixed with the vision of an artist.
www.bobmayer.org
PROLOGUE
A thousand men manned the fortress walls waiting to die bravely as the High Defender of Atlantis had ordered and foretold. They were the elite of the Atlantean army, handpicked for this last mission and the survivors of a decade-long war against an enemy none who had faced had ever returned to describe. They were armed with spear, sword and bow and knew their weapons would be useless against the coming darkness. Still, they stood tall on the ramparts and looked out to the sea from which their doom would come.
The fortress was set on the smallest of thirteen volcanic islands in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Although the smallest, this island, centrally located, was the most important, as it was the seat of power for the Empire of Atlantis. The fortress wall surrounded a magnificent city, consisting of more than forty square miles of homes, temples, government buildings, and businesses constructed from a fine white marble, which gleamed in the late afternoon sun. In the very center of the city, a huge pyramid had been hurriedly built. It was more than three hundred feet high with a level top twenty feet wide. Contrasting with the rest of the city, it was built of black stone.
On the top of the pyramid stood Pri Tor, the High Defender. She was a tall woman, with short red hair and pale skin. She wore a white robe with red trim and a crystal amulet around her neck as a sign of her special position.
Her eyes were icy blue, and they were currently scanning to all points of the compass from the center of Atlantis. In every direction, darkness covered the ocean, a black wall over a mile high of an undeterminable depth: the Shadow’s domain. The circle of black was slowly closing in on the center island of Atlantis, the capital city of the kingdom that had once ruled the other twelve islands in the center of the Atlantic Ocean and colonies on both sides of the ocean. As far as she knew, the twelve were uninhabited now, overrun by the encroaching darkness of the Shadow.
Many had escaped, warned by the Defenders of the coming doom, spreading out across the ocean before the darkness finished encircling, the twelve tribes of Atlantis seeking haven, carrying with them the legend of Atlantis and the knowledge that had been given in visions to the Defenders by the Ones Before. It was only four days ago that the blackness had appeared, completely encircling the thirteen-island empire. In that time the darkness had constricted, overrunning the other islands coming ever closer.
Some warriors had stayed on each of the islands, unwilling to give up their homes so easily. The Defenders had felt their deaths as the Shadow closed in. Their defiance had not slowed the inevitable in the slightest.
A little less than ten years ago, the Shadow had first appeared in the form of a triangular-shaped mist upon the sea far to the southeast. A ship sent to investigate had never come back out, as had no ship since then. The mist had turned to darkness over the course of two years. Then the colony on an island near the darkness had been overrun; every person had been swallowed by it. In the following years, several other colonies, on the both sides of the ocean, had been absorbed by darkness that appeared nearby.
Then a select few among the Atlanteans, mostly woman, began receiving visions and hearing voices from some unseen entity calling itself the Ones Before telling them the nature of the force behind the darkness — the Shadow — and telling and showing them ways to combat the threat. At first, they were ignored as the warriors tried to use traditional means to fight the Shadow, but when all these attempts became abject failures, the people were forced to turn to these oracles.
Thus the Defenders were formed. The darkness to the south-west was destroyed by a pyramid such as and the sacrifice of a Defender and several warriors exactly as the Ones Before instructed. For a couple of years there was peace and no sign of the Shadow — until the previous week. Desperate visions warned of the coming threat and now it was here. The visions they were given and the voice that whispered inside their heads told the Defenders there was only one desperate way to stop the Shadow this time.
Pri Tor shifted her gaze to those gathered on the broad stairs of the pyramid, twelve priestesses like here, the Chief Defender from each island, especially chosen for this. There was a young girl, also with red hair and blue eyes, in front of them on the top step. Two warriors, the taller of which held a staff, one end of which was a razor-sharp spearhead and the other a seven-headed snake — the Naga. Behind her was large a large slab with the contour of a human etched into its stone surface.
Pri Tor signaled and her daughter came to her. The High Defender knelt so she was the same height as the young girl. “You must be brave.”
Her daughter, Pri Ker, could only nod. Pri Ker was the first of one born to a Defender and a warrior who had some of the sight and hearing, brought into light nine years ago. She was the future.
Pri Tor removed the amulet from her neck and placed it over her daughter’s head. “You must carry the knowledge of the High Defender.” She glanced over her daughter’s shoulder at the Shadow. “It will come back, and you and those who follow you will be the ones to fight it.”
Pri Ker finally spoke. “Will we ever completely defeat it?”
Pri Tor frowned. “I have not been shown that nor heard of it. I only know what must be done now. It is time for you to go. I do not know where your travels will take you.” She reached inside her robe and removed a slim metal tube, capped at both ends. It was covered with fine runes etched into the metal. “Take this also. It might help others some day. And perhaps someone can read the strange writing that we could not.”
Pri Ker swallowed, holding back tears, knowing such a sign of weakness would be insulting to tall the chosen ones gathered around. She took the tube, reached up and hugged her mother, then turned and made her way down the stairs where several warriors waited to take her to the strange ship moored at the dock.
Pri Tor rose to her feet. “It is time.”
The dozen priestesses bowed their heads in prayer for several moments.