The leader of the aliens, Aspasia, was now hooked into the machine also. It was activated by one of the Airlia. Aspasia’s memories, his mind, his essence, were transferred into the machine. When that was done, Aspasia stood and walked over to the tube, looking down at the body for several moments before going to the machine. He removed a medallion in the shape of two arms extended outward, a ka, from the top of the machine. It now held all his memories, his personality, and his essence, up to the moment of transfer. He held it in his six-fingered hand for a moment, as if weighing it, then returned it to its slot. He pushed the lid shut on the body, then set a timer on the top of the tube before quickly departing the chamber and returning to the mothership. He was leaving behind the machinations that would produce his Shadow, long after he and his opponent had gone into deep sleep.
From Sinai, the mothership continued on its way around the world, making several more stops. One was at the island farthest removed from land in the southeastern Pacific, which would not be known as Rapa Nui or Easter Island for millennia. Here another golden pyramid was secreted in a chamber deep under an extinct volcano. A handful of humans were deposited on the surface of the island, left to fend for themselves as the mothership moved on to the east.
Another stop was high in the Andes Mountains, where both a pyramid and another thousand humans were deposited, along with one of the aliens named Virachoca, to secretly rule in this most inhospitable terrain. After a few more stops, the ship was empty except for the crew and Aspasia. It headed to the least-populated continent, North America, and to the most desolate and deserted spot in that land.
Hovering next to a barren mountain, a golden beam from the nose of the craft burned a hole large enough for it to fit through and carved out a chamber inside from the solid rock. Using bouncers and their tractor beams, the crew off-loaded struts from another cargo bay and placed them on the floor of the cavern. The large ship carefully edged inside and settled down on the struts. The crew used metal to brace the cavern and built a rock wall, covering up the entrance, leaving one of the golden saucers outside. The mothership was powered down, a low power beacon was activated, and the crew departed via a small tunnel, which they blocked with stone behind them before they got on the golden saucer and flew back to Atlantis.
Aspasia had sown the seeds that would haunt the world for the next ten thousand years.
Two days after the mothership had departed, a second mothership, identical to the first, approached the island of Atlantis. There were still thousands gathered around the temple and living in the city. While many had left via sailing ship, most chose to stay rather than venture out on the wide sea, hoping against logic that things would go back to the way they had been.
The remaining people didn’t even realize the mothership was a different one, but they knew something was changed when instead of docking with the top of the palace, it slowly descended to just above a large field on the outside of the city walls. A metal gangplank was extended to the ground, but there was no sign of life on board the ship and no priests from the palace to give instructions.
A few brave souls ventured up the metal way into the ship. When they reappeared, saying it was safe, thousands poured out of the city and crowded their way into the ship. This went on for hours. There were still hundreds on the gangplank and tens of thousands more crowded about on the ground when the metal abruptly began to withdraw back into the ship and the cargo door slid shut, slicing in half several people who tried to climb in. Hundreds more fell to their death and the thousands left behind wailed in terror as the ship gained altitude.
Those screams were echoed by those who had stayed in the city as seven spacecraft lifted out of the top of the palace, lean black forms silhouetted against the rising sun. The seven ships headed straight up, Aspasia and the remainder of his Airlia on board, dwindling from sight. Now the people knew the rumors were true — the Gods were indeed abandoning them.
Those on the ground could feel the displacement of air as Artad’s mothership passed by overhead, finally coming to a halt a mile above the top of the palace. In the shadow of the huge ship, people in the streets fell to their knees, hands raised in supplication. Warriors looked up, holding spears and swords, aware of the uselessness of this display. In the harbor a few ships whose captains had dawdled raced to put to sea, their decks crowded with refugees.
On one of those ships a man and a woman stood side by side. They had waited to see how this latest chapter played out. She was short and slender with pale skin. A white robe fringed with silver covered her body, the hem touching the wood deck of the ship. She had dark hair, liberally marked with premature gray. The man wore leather armor, stitched in many places where blows had hit their mark. He was of average height but broad, with well-defined muscles. In his hand was a curved sword with a notched blade, the metal tinged with dried blood. Neither spoke, nor did they pay attention to the crew desperately rowing, trying to put distance between their vessel and Atlantis. Their focus was on the mothership and palace.
The air became charged with static. A bright golden light raced along the black surface of the mothership in long lines from one end to the other. It gathered at the front end and then pulsed downward in a half-mile-wide beam, passing through everything on the surface into the ground below.
Those on their knees prayed harder. Those fleeing ran faster. The oarsmen on the ships pulled more quickly. Some warriors futilely threw their spears into the air, screaming curses at the Gods who had first abandoned them and were now destroying them. On the ship, the man and woman simply continued watching, as if this was something they’d seen before and knew what to expect next.
The light once more ran along the skin of the ship, gathered at the front, and struck downward. Ten times this happened.
There was an abnormal moment of silence, as if the planet itself recognized the end of something. Even those praying paused.
Then the Earth exploded. The core of the planet below the island surged upward in one swift and devastating blast. The shock wave killed tens of thousands instantly. More died as molten magma sprayed upward and outward, almost reaching the bottom of the mothership.
Warriors held shields up against the onslaught, only to be incinerated in a second. Fathers and mothers threw themselves over children to protect them, and died. The island had lifted in the initial explosion, but now it imploded inward and downward. The ocean absorbed the force of the explosions and a wave on an unparalleled scale was born, rushing outward.
Where Atlantis had been there was only boiling sea.
Above, the mothership was slowly moving away, gaining speed. Those humans crammed in the cargo bays had not seen what had happened, but the destruction was so vast it was as if they had picked up the raw emotion of their fellow beings killed and their homeland destroyed. They moaned, cried, and prayed, now uncertain of their fate.
On the sailing ship the man called out to the ship’s captain, advising him to turn the stern directly into the oncoming wave. The man slid his sword into a worn leather scabbard and watched the towering cliff of water approaching. The captain did so and as other vessels capsized and were swept under, this ship rode up the face. So high and steep was the wall of water that all on board scrambled to grab hold to prevent being thrown overboard. The man wrapped one powerful arm around the woman’s waist and with the other he grabbed hold of the wooden railing.