Charger the Soldier Read Online Free PDF Page A

privacy, and respect for one another. Doorways existed, but
not doors.
    Visha followed his father along the halls for
quite a distance before entering a narrow pathway that led to a
lower level. This pathway was rough and simple in comparison to the
halls they had walked through. At the bottom, the pathway ended
before a wide opening where both Visha and his father stopped and
gazed politely at the ground. From deep within the room, a voice
spoke.
    "Si Eed, let the boy enter, then leave us.
Come forward, Visha, we command this." The tone was clear and
commanding, though seemed to have a slight tremor. Young Visha
turned to his father, concerned. Si Eed gave him a reassuring touch
on the shoulder and urged him onward.
    When Visha looked up and stepped inside, he
could see no end to the room, no matter where he looked. It was a
vast space with a dirt floor and a low ceiling made of rough cut
stone.
    The Nines were a shock to most who first saw
them, for they were in fact, nine human bodies, both male and
female, joined by the tops of their heads. They lay upon a special
star-shaped platform so that their heads, which had been surgically
attached to one another from youth, were all in the center of the
star. They never made eye contact with anyone, for they lay on
their backs always looking upward. But Visha was sure that they
knew where he stood and how he looked.
    Their brains had intertwined, and it was said
that this brain mass gave them incredible powers of intelligence,
perhaps nine times nine more than the normal person. Altogether,
there were nine groups of humans conjoined, in nine different parts
of the land, one at each point of the compass, north, south, east,
and west, and at the midpoints, northeast, southwest, southeast,
and northwest. And one special group in the center of all, the Nine
of Nines, where Visha now stood. The Nines decided everything for
the people of Mahoud, also known as Atlantis, for Mahoud was the
body and the Nines its mind.
    "Approach us, young one, and do not be
afraid, for we have need of you," said the clear voice. "Time is
becoming short. Not only have brutal primitives thrust themselves
upon us and made the world too impure to bear, the earth is also
destined for a vast coldness. We are too old for the journey that
Mahoud must take, and nine children have been called to sacrifice
themselves for the greater good. You have been chosen to guide the
city from this place to a new place of peace. You are to be one of
the Nine which will navigate the black skies."
    "I am sorry, great ones," Visha said, as he
bowed down and hid his face in shame. "I do not understand what you
are asking of me."
    "It matters not; all will be revealed when
you are joined. Celebrate this day with your family, for a great
honor is bestowed upon you," the speaker for the Nine said.
    The people of Mahoud were far advanced in
technology and intelligence compared to the primitive humans
massing on the rest of Earth and camping in their hundreds on the
strip of land connecting the city-state to the continent. Many
thousands of years before, the First Ones had met the Dinosauroids,
and not only respected them as superior beings, but used and
improved on their inventions. When the Dinosauroids suddenly
disappeared, as if swept from Earth in a single instant, this
branch of the First Ones secluded itself from the inferior and
warlike primitive humans by retiring to this near-island. They also
developed robotic guards, installing in each one a primitive
controlling device perhaps the size of a shoebox and powering them
with radioactive particles.
    The humans who lived in the villages lying
before the city gates had always been dirty, vile, and primitive.
They attacked other tribes merely for the pleasure of capturing
very young girls and scarring them for sexual gratification. The
Mahoud elders, from high atop their towers, were appalled as they
watched the aggression toward the young, the weak, and the
elderly.
    Lately,