Decipher, p.24
Decipher, page 24
She ripped the docket off. Stuffed it in a pocket and slapped her own documentation in its place. Destination: Antarctica. Judging by what Thorne was up to, she’d rather study these things herself than let them disappear into Rola Corp.’s vast and faceless research division. She had found these artifacts; they were hers. She leaned back from the crate as two Arab workmen retrieved it. Hauled it up and carried it off.
She did the next two in succession before Douglas called her over.
“Ah!” Scott exclaimed, finally getting a better look at the pyramid-shaped obelisk of crystal.
“Sarah, we’re going to attempt to move this now,” Douglas announced. They’d set up chains and winches as well as hoists and a cradle for the crystal, should they ever get it out of the stone armature, but there was a stone overhang nearest the wall. It was impossible to get at it properly where it was. It would have to be moved closer to the three crystal beams that came in on the ceiling from the three smaller tunnels.
Douglas pushed at the armature. “This thing lets us slide it out to the center,” he demonstrated. “It’s fairly easy. Takes a couple of people, that’s all. Must be one hell of a counterbalance the other side of this wall. Anyway, once it’s in the center we figure if we drill or hammer into it, one on each surface, we might be able to compensate for no laser and knock some chunks off. Once we weaken it we can destroy it, and take the pieces home.”
“No, there’s a problem,” Sarah said. “These crystal beams—they slope down at an angle. I think they’re supposed to connect with the pyramid somehow. There’s not much room for maneuver.”
“Let me worry about that,” was Douglas’s response.
“What happened to our prototype field laser anyway? Should have brought that.”
“No idea,” Douglas replied. “They told me it was being used.”
Scott was mortified. “You’re going to destroy it?”
“I wouldn’t worry,” Pearce added on the other line. “It’ll never work. They won’t even dent it.”
Beneath the C60 pyramid was where the spiraled tunnel’s own crystal strip came into the room across the floor and terminated by diving directly into the floor. Sarah made as thorough an inspection of the set-up as she could, to allow everybody on the phone time to digest what they were seeing, but it didn’t take a physicist to figure it out. “You’re right,” Scott sighed, relieved. “It’ll never work. There’s not enough room.”
“I know,” was all Sarah said.
Douglas did a double take before it dawned. “Oh, you’re on the phone. Thorne?”
“Something like that.”
Douglas waved in her face. “Hey, Rip!”
The retinal images of Scott and Hackett glanced at each other across the inside surface of her eyeball. “Who the hell is Rip?” Hackett asked. Matheson swore in the background.
“You know what the crystal is, don’t you?” Scott said excitedly. “That’s the benben stone. People have searched for it for millennia.”
November sidled up to him on the bed. Handed him a coffee. Scott could feel her warmth through her thin cotton night-shirt. “What’s the benben stone?”
Scott, coffee in hand, ran his finger over the outline of the crystal. “That.” He sipped his coffee. “The benben stone sat in the city of Heliopolis, the City of the Sun. Some say it represented the ‘Primeval Mound,’ where life began. The first place, some say, where civilization settled after the Flood. Others say the benben stone was the petrified semen of the sun god, Ra. It’s supposed to hold mystical powers.”
Hackett went to open his mouth. “I don’t know what kind of powers,” Scott chipped in quickly. “Where the stone sat in Heliopolis was believed to be where the sun’s rays first fell each morning. In honor of it, on top of each pyramid, a gilded capstone was placed. But the original benben stone, the one from Heliopolis that was later placed on top of Cheops’s pyramid—well, it disappeared.
“Benben derives from the word ‘weben,’ meaning ‘to rise.’ It’s from that word the Egyptian benu-bird comes, the original Phoenix—the bird that rose again from the ashes. The benu-bird literally represents the sun—destruction and re-birth.”
Hackett was mulling it over on the other screen. “To rise …” he said slowly. “I wonder if that bears any relation to the hole in the ceiling above the stone … ?”
Sarah suddenly took her flashlight out and waved it at the ceiling of the chamber. She hadn’t noticed that before.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” she said.
Bob Pearce didn’t know where to turn next. He had a choice of screens and on each one something new and wondrous was unfolding. But the string of computer data was paling against the tangible sights of the catacombs beneath the Sphinx. And the benben stone to top it all.
Pearce started muttering to himself, excitedly. Louder and louder. Attracting attention, but still nothing compared to the discoveries being made.
“In the ninth century, Ibn Abd Alhokim, an Arab historian, and later an Egyptian Coptic called Al Masudi, both spoke of ancient wisdom that said the Great Pyramid was built by an Egyptian King called Surid, or Salhouk, who lived three hundred years before the Great Flood. They said that there was a connection to Leo, and that this King had all scientific knowledge deposited into a place of safety, with strange beings placed by priests to serve as guardians and stop the knowledge falling into the wrong hands.”
Matheson came up alongside him. Concerned. “What type of beings?”
Pearce shrugged. “I don’t know.”
Matheson glared at him. “Bob, what’re you talking about?”
“I’m talking about history being proven correct yet again. I’m talking about … the vision.” His voice faltered in his throat. “The vision that I had. That chamber. It’s exactly as I saw it …”
But no one was listening. Something else was concerning Matheson. He crouched down beside Hackett and watched the spectacle as Douglas led a team of men and swung the huge crystal pyramid out toward the center of the room.
“What do you think?” Hackett asked warily.
“I think,” Matheson said quietly, watching the crystal move, “that’s a very bad idea.”
Hackett eyed him.
“Look at the way the room’s laid out,” Matheson said. “Look at how the crystal beams there are going to connect with the pyramid stone and the beam in the floor. We know what this stuff can do, Jon. A damn satellite picked it up under two miles of ice. What if this is what the Chinese did? Look at them—they’re creating a circuit. If they want that thing out of there, they better find another way of doing it because that whole room looks like a piece of machinery.”
Hackett rubbed his hand over his chin, disturbed. It was so obvious. “Yeah,” he agreed, “I think you’re right.” And that was when the alarm on his wristwatch went off. He eyed Matheson darkly. “The sun …” was all he said.
Sarah kept quiet as she listened to the discussion batting backward and forward. A giant machine? What were they talking about? And what on earth were “The Guardians”? She didn’t like the sound of that. “What kind of guardians?” She rapped out, “Are you saying there are some kind of creatures down here?”
Pearce went to answer but the crackle and hiss of static interrupted. Her radio was cutting in.
“Sarah. Come in. This is Eric, over.” He sounded faint. Perplexed. Distracted even.
Sarah fished the radio to her lips. “Yeah, this is Sarah, go ahead.”
A pause. Then: “We’re at the eleven-mile marker. We’re just setting up now.” A hiss. More static. A muffled noise. “Boy, this is weird.”
Sarah could feel the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end. She’d never felt comfortable down here, she didn’t want to be down here. Hesitantly she asked: “What’s weird?”
A moment later, partially cut out: “The, uh, writing on the wall stopped a couple miles back.”
“What have you got now?”
“Looks like circuitry.”
Sarah had to think for a minute. “Say again?”
“Circuitry,” Clemmens repeated. “And these massive Carbon 60 structures. The size of houses. But—woah!”
“Eric?” But he wasn’t responding. She got nothing.
Just dead air.
ELEVEN-MILE MARKER
It was like being inside a convoluted fist, Clemmens decided. All fingers interlocking. Each finger a massive expanse of Carbon 60. And this fist was clutching a lightning bolt. Energy was coursing throughout the C60 as if caught in a bottle.
Right where they needed to be, the tunnel opened out into some kind of chamber that was made up of interlocking swathes of C60, intercut at junctures by two-story-high oblong megaliths of horizontal layers of glowing carbon and darkened granite.
On the other side of the chamber the other two bikers had set up their laser-sighted radar packs. And one of them, Rinoli, had taken the opportunity of jumping straight back on his bike to do a lap of the chamber and race the energy wave that pulsated around the chamber walls. It moved faster and faster, but never diverted into the spiraled tunnel toward the Sphinx.
“It’s like it’s trapped,” Clemmens explained before realizing his radio had stopped working, he just couldn’t get a signal to transmit. He hung it on his belt, concentrated on getting his relay gear switched on and sending his data back to the computer set up at the entrance. He prayed the data made it.
All set, he rode out to the other biker, who stood like a speck at the foot of the entrance to one of two other massive darkened tunnels. The air was damp, the cavernous surroundings cold and eerie. There was a breeze coming from somewhere, accompanied by a harsh breath-like sound. Rasping.
Clemmens didn’t like it here, that much he knew. He pulled up alongside Christian and dismounted from his Beta Trials bike. It was a 250cc, single cylinder. Good with rough terrain and less to go wrong than some other bikes.
Christian operated his radar unit deftly. Used his flashlight to show what he meant when he said: “They’re both the same, these tunnels. They both slope down at about seven degrees in a straight line.”
“Any idea on length?”
“Yeah. But this can’t be right.”
“Try me.”
“Three hundred miles. One goes northeast. The other goes southeast.”
“What?”
“Each one’s filled with water. And take a look—see?” He moved his flashlight along the walls of the tunnel. “No spirals. No nothing. Definitely no more Carbon 60.”
“Are these things wells? Do they just bottom out?”
“Uh-uh. They change direction. Got a profile on this one. But where the hell it goes is anyone’s guess.”
The buzzing of the circling motorbike behind them was really starting to grate on Clemmens now. He spun on his heel, bellowed: “Rinoli! For chrissake, mind your equipment! Quit foolin’ around!”
Rinoli reluctantly zipped up to the other flooded tunnel, cussing in Italian all the way. Clemmens licked his lips and tried his radio again, but he still couldn’t get a signal.
“Just make a note of all this, will ya?” Christian nodded as Clemmens tapped the radio again. “I think it’s this place,” he said. “Something’s causing interference. I’m going back to the edge of the chamber, it seemed to work fine over there.”
Christian watched him as he kicked his bike back into gear and rode across to the spiraled tunnel, all the time acutely aware of the mysterious energy pulse still making its way around the walls of the chamber.
Rinoli keyed his radar unit. Took another reading and relayed it over to Clemmens’s unit.
And that was when he heard it.
A low deep rumble, almost out of his auditory range. He doubled forward, craning into the darkness ahead and trying to make sense of the noise.
There was a hiss. A plop. Bubbles were rising to the surface of the water. The rotten egg stench of sulfur filled the air and then there was the light: a small point. Fuzzy. Dim. In the center of the water. Far away, but getting bigger.
Rinoli couldn’t help but smile at the aquabound firefly. What was that? Another one of those whirling firework shows? He loved those. He turned, and in his excitement, called out in Italian to warn everyone. Which, as it turned out, was entirely the wrong language if he wanted to be understood.
Clemmens, his engine ticking over, heard Rinoli’s calls, but didn’t listen. He fiddled with his radio, determined to get through. “Sarah? Sarah, come in.” But the only thing getting louder was Rinoli.
Clemmens jerked his head back and to one side, growling: “What’s that wop bitchin’ ’bout now?”
He wasn’t normally a prejudiced man. But it was a pity to utter that kind of sentiment when there was a fair chance they’d be his last words.
“Ion,” from the Greek meaning “traveling.” Moving water, especially superheated water, carried an electrical charge, and liked to give up this charge just as easily.
Without warning, the water behind Rinoli suddenly reared up like a geyser, disintegrating into a boiling twister of vapor and spray. The torrent exploded from the tunnel and blasted the Italian across the chamber. The energy that came with it, all light and arcing electricity from deep down, shot out like daggers, connecting with the walls of the chamber and spinning around the room at the speed of light.
The whole place lit up for one brief moment, as if God had just taken a snapshot. And as Rinoli fried in the center of the room, convulsing on the ground, Clemmens could do nothing but let his jaw drop as the superheated water swirled around the chamber as if it were alive. It collected on the ceiling and around the walls at a colossal rate, forming into a vast hollow ball that filled the room and writhed. The noise was deafening, like being trapped on the insides of a jet engine.
And then it moved. Heading directly for Clemmens, and his spluttering motorbike.
They were getting ready to drill into it, the benben stone, when the call came in. A technician on the surface was watching the monitors when the tell-tale signs of another energy wave registered. Douglas’s radio had crackled to life with: “Brace yourself. Got a live one comin’ through.”
But before Scott or Hackett even had time to think to ask the question, rippling energy had shot up the crystal spiral in the tunnel and was ricocheting around the benben chamber.
Douglas sensed immediately that this one was different. It wasn’t dissipating like the others had. It wasn’t shooting down into the floor like the last time.
The benben stone was just inches away from the C60 beams arching down from the ceiling. Douglas instinctively snatched his hands off the crystal, and motioned for the others to step away.
The air became electrified, pungent with the smell of burning dust. Sarah could feel the building static charge creep across her skin and start to levitate her hair.
Then Douglas had a change of heart, because the light in the room had suddenly highlighted something he hadn’t even noticed before. Something vital. A hairline fracture through the benben stone. His eyes widened. He gritted his teeth. “That’s it!” he roared. “Let’s do it!” He lifted his drill, hauling it into position, and pulled the trigger.
“What’s going on, Sarah?” Scott asked, awestruck by the sheer magic of the energy wave.
“This uh happens all the time,” she explained nervously, looking to Douglas for support. But it was clear that this had never happened before.
A low hum vibrated through the granite, followed by a high-pitched whine. Then another. And another. The artifacts in the wooden crates were coming to life. Two Arab workmen who were carrying one of the crates suddenly dropped it in fright. Screamed and fled into the darkness as the wooden packing case splintered and the vibrating object spilled out onto the floor and bumped its way along. The three other drill operators suddenly stopped what they were doing, petrified. Leaving Douglas to continue by himself.
Sarah backed up against the wall. But that only made matters worse for her as she realized it was throbbing. Undulating like solid rock should never do.
“This doesn’t look good,” Matheson said as he leaned in close to the screen. “That crystal shouldn’t be close to those three—things.” He exchanged another look with Hackett, who took a deep breath and put his mouth right up to the microphone on the vid-phone.
“Sarah,” he instructed, “I think you should try and push that stone away from those connectors.”
“What?!”
“Push the stone away from those crystal beams.”
November had her hand over her mouth as she watched Sarah approach Douglas in his attempt to tackle the crystal. But Douglas leaned forward, putting his back into his drilling, not listening to a word Sarah was saying. And that was when Sarah felt it.
At first she felt light-headed. Then incredibly heavy, as if she were sitting on a roller-coaster.
Douglas was equally stunned. His entire face seemed to warp for a moment, stretch out of shape and snap back. It was as if, in an instant, reality had decided to take a raincheck. Sarah’s stomach heaved. She was going to be sick, she knew it. “Did you feel that?” she whispered.
In Geneva, Scott nodded. Swung Hackett’s phone line around. Hackett, Matheson and Pearce were all pale on the screen. “I know,” Hackett said. “We felt it here too.”
“Was that an earthquake?” Matheson was asking.
Hackett’s eyes were darting around the ceiling. The building was starting to shake. “No,” he explained, “but this is.” Equipment clattered to the ground behind him.
“A gravity wave?” Scott queried.
Hackett nodded his agreement. “The biggest one yet, for us to be able to perceive it.”
Scott shifted his attention frantically back to Sarah. But already her situation was changing.
Lightning bolts shot out of the Carbon 60 strip in the floor, arced to the benben stone, then shot down the hole directly beneath it. Seconds later a rod of pure blackness rose from the hole in its place and clamped itself into a recess that had gone unnoticed on the underside of the benben stone.
