His fantasizing was interrupted when he heard his name. “Malcolm Short, this is Professor Lisa Lange from UNLV,” Kaley was saying proudly.
“Pleasure to meet you professor,” Malcolm said and extended his right hand.
“You don’t look like the devious male chauvinist pig that Kaley has told me about,” she said effortlessly with a grin and riveted her green eyes on him.
He took a quick look at Kaley. She was clearly worried and silently mouthed the word, “No”. She then shook her hair defensively in the no gesture. Malcolm realized that for once Kaley didn’t have the upper hand, the lovely professor Lisa Lange did.
“Malcolm is a company lawyer, Lisa,” Kaley croaked to break the moment. “Lisa, he’s extremely smart. I wouldn’t mess with him,” she warned.
Malcolm now understood that Kaley was afraid that he and Lisa would make some sort of connection. What’s she concerned about?
But then he knew. Lisa moved close and tried to plant her body against his. Kaley immediately reacted and wedged in between them. “Let’s head to the room, shall we. We have to get ready,” she quickly said.
My God, Malcolm thought. She is jealous, but of who, Lisa or me? This is getting very weird.
But what Malcolm didn’t realize was that everything would get much weirder once they reached the suite.
Chapter Ten
Kaley knew where the suite was located. It was on the bottom floor of the hotel at the back end of the hallway. She shooed away the lurking bellboy and headed down the hallway with Lisa and Malcolm in tow. As they walked, she asked Lisa if she had brought everything she knew about Philon in her bag.
“I did, but I’m afraid it’s not very much,” Lisa replied like she was talking to one of her students.
“Maybe the police database will have more information,” Malcolm quickly offered. “I’ve got some contacts there. I can call them if you like?”
“Ha, I’m afraid they won’t be able to help us,” Kaley said with a laugh and a toss of her head.
“Philon’s history is a little older than any database,” Lisa agreed and looked at Malcolm sympathetically.
“But didn’t you say this guy Philon was responsible for making the recent sinkhole?” Malcolm questioned Kaley. He was confused by the current discussion.
“I did, but I’m not the expert,” Kaley responded. “I just know that he was involved.”
“Actually, I believe he is indirectly responsible for the sinkhole because he wrote a formula on how to create one over two thousand years ago,” Professor Lange explained. “The ability to produce a sinkhole is just one of his mathematical creations. There are many more.”
“Huh. What?” Malcolm bellowed and came to a stop. “Are you telling me that this guy hasn’t been around for over two millenniums and he wrote a formula to make sinkholes that are being produced now?”
“Yes,” Lisa said. “That’s correct. But he also wrote formulas to create many more natural disasters. We’ve seen several of them in just the last several days.”
“This seems like black magic,” Malcolm bellowed. No one can create weather.”
“It’s actually not that,” Kaley responded. “It’s using things that occur in nature to control the weather. As far as we can tell, you, I or Lisa could create one if we knew how.”
“Philon’s writings have been missing for almost two thousand years, but there is evidence that someone has found those writings recently,” Lisa explained. “There are too many natural disasters happening in the world today.”
“But why do you think that it’s his writings?” Malcolm wondered.
“Because the research I found in the sinkhole points directly to his codex and him by name,” Kaley pointed out. “Now let’s move along, we’re running late.”
“Yes, let’s hurry,” Lisa agreed as she pushed her blond hair away from her face. “They will be early.”
“What?” Malcolm uttered.
“Oh, nothing,” Lisa responded and waved her hand. It brought a sharp look from Kaley as they continued down the hallway.
“So where do you think the Philon writings are then?” Malcolm knew that a codex was an ancient book usually held together by some sort of rope and sandwiched between two pieces of board or other materials.
“That’s part of the mystery,” Kaley seriously said. “We know that this guy Ben Brown says he owned a suspect artifact that could be the writings and it went missing. I think the men we found in the trunks of the cars were involved. Suddenly a sinkhole opens and swallows them. Is it a coincidence?”
“I see your point,” Malcolm agreed.
“The other part of the mystery is who has it now? That’s what we desperately need to find out because if they have it, they seem to know how to use the codex,” Kaley said. “They did conjure up a sinkhole and could cause another natural disaster on demand.”
“Then what will we do when we find the codex?” Malcolm asked with concern.
“We need to take it from them by any means necessary,” Lisa hissed out with a grim face.
“Malcolm, I’m not going to kid you. There is a lot riding on us finding and recovering the codex,” Kaley pointed out. “It holds the ability to change the world.”
His suspicions were now confirmed. “This now sounds like more than a simple artifact recovery,” Malcolm suddenly blurted out.
“It is,” Lisa confirmed. It is getting weirder, Malcolm thought.
Changing subjects, Malcolm asked. “Well, who is this guy Philon anyway?” he snorted. “I’ve never heard of him?”
“I’ll tell you what I know for sure. Perhaps I’d better start at the very beginning,” Professor Lisa Lange said as she flipped her long blond hair to captivate Malcolm like she often did to the men in her classroom.
“Cut that out Lisa,” Kaley screamed menacingly.
She is jealous, Malcolm thought.
Lisa ignored her. “Some of us historians believe that he was the smartest human to ever walk the earth. He was a Greek scholar, author, scientist, inventor, and engineer who lived around 250 BC. He is often remembered as ‘Philo of Byzantium’ because he spent much of his time in the ancient city — although he seemed to have had the ability to travel to many other cities as well. Most of us think he was a wealthy person or in the military. But no one is quite sure.”
“Very little has ever been written about him,” Kaley filled in for Lisa.
“He was a prolific writer too. Some of his inventions employed moving parts. Those he called theaters. That was unheard of at that time. He also is credited with producing the first steam engine, although it did nothing but spin,” Lisa said and impressed Malcolm with her knowledge.
“His most important work, however, is simply called Philon’s Mechanics treatise,” Kaley noted.
“True, it’s a massive how-to-do-it set of books on many subjects,” Lisa explained.
“Everything was written in simple everyday Greek so anyone at the time could understand it. We believe that it was meant to be a DIY directory for the military at that time,” Kaley explained.
“He was the ancient host of ‘This Old House’ then.” Malcolm speculated. “But for the military.”
“Part of the writing was devoted to making such things as catapults, building sea ports and fortresses, and besieging and defending towns. Each book covered a different subject,” Kaley said.
“There were actually nine books in all in the treatise. Some of the codex books had hundreds of pages that were filled with mathematical formulas as well,” Lisa told him. “We believe that someone today is able to read and use the formulas from the ninth book in the treatise. It is about stratagems — strategies to win a war.”
“The treatise was among the most valuable codex books of their time,” Kaley added.
“So what happened to them?” Malcolm asked. “How did they go missing in the first place?”
“The scrolls were placed in the Library in Alexandria for anyone to use after Philon d
ied,” Lisa said sadly. “And we all know what happened then.”
“Wait, what happened then?” Malcolm quickly asked.
Before Lisa could answer, they reached the door to the suite. Kaley opened it and then glanced at her watch. The time was 11:55 A.M.
“Oh my goodness. We only have a few minutes. Hurry,” she implored them and tried to usher them into the suite.
“What’s going on,” Malcolm nervously cried out.
“You need to get naked right now,” Kaley ordered.
Is she saying that in a sexy voice or a panicked voice, Malcolm wondered?
Chapter Eleven
“Goddamnit,” a tough-looking man screamed into the phone. “Those assholes disappeared somewhere at McCarran airport. I’m really pissed.” He screamed into the cellphone.
The surly man on the other end of the phone was equally as tough and was also his superior. “Red, I’m telling you right now,” he warned. “If you ever talk to me like that again, they’ll find you in a drainage ditch with a bullet in your miserable head. Is that clear?”
Red was the member of ‘The Wild Rebels’ biker gang that had been assigned to find and follow Kaley and Malcolm when they landed in Las Vegas.
“Sorry Skull, I’m just a little mad is all,” the suddenly calmer biker shot back. He knew his leader was serious.
“We need to find them quickly,” Skull, the leader of the gang, said forcefully from his warehouse office on Dean Martin Drive in downtown Las Vegas. He slammed his huge fist on the desk top for emphasis.
“Why are these guys so important? We got the artifact back, right?” Red pointed out.
“Blue, in Florida, told me that they opened the trunks of the cars and found the three jihadists we killed. We know that they took the bag as well. We need to find and kill them before they learn too much about the artifact.”
“I’ve got several people ready to take them out,” Red told his leader.
“It’s a good thing that we left Blue to watch at the sinkhole,” Skull said. “It looks like we have another enemy now. One of them is a fine looking chick, I’m told.”
Skull, Red and Blue never used their real names while they were around the other members of the biker club where they belonged. They used names like: Wind, Dust, Steel and other strong sounding names. They never used their actual names because they all had records.
The names they used instantly told members how high they ranked in another more surreptitious organization. It was a furtive group known as only “The Effort”.
Any name with a color was a lieutenant. Any body part above the waist was leader. Skull was the local supreme leader. The only one above a Skull was the Brain. He lived in Chicago.
The members were spread throughout the world and were assimilated into every walk of life. They only had two things in common. One was a swastika tattooed under their arm pit and the other was a belief in the fascist writings of Adolf Hitler. The number of people that belonged to the Effort was staggering. And now they had a game changing weapon.
“I’ll get the rest of the guys to start looking for them,” Red promised. “They’re somewhere here in Vegas.”
“Have your men muscle all their contacts at the hotels,” Skull ordered. “One of them might have seen them.”
“We may have to crack a few heads,” Red warned.
“That’s what we do best, especially to illegals,” his leader replied.
Chapter Twelve
Once they were inside the suite, Kaley quickly kicked the thicker than normal door closed with an athletic maneuver. She pulled out a remote control device from one of her hidden pockets in her tight clothes and pressed a colored button. Malcolm could hear an audible click.
“What was that?” he quickly asked.
“I’ve secured the suite door so no one can get into this room even if they used a grenade,” Kaley replied smiling.
“As soon as we are done undressing, she’ll shutter the windows too. Once this place is locked up, then we’ll proceed into the single bedroom,” Lisa said.
“Kaley…?” Malcolm started, but was interrupted by Lisa Lange who offered her back.
“Please unzip my dress. It takes too long to do it by myself,” she explained in a husky voice.
Not thinking, he reached out and began pulling the zipper down. When it was halfway to the bottom, he realized that she didn’t have a bra on underneath her expensive dress. Her milky white back was completely exposed. He was just about to run his hand down it when he was interrupted.
“Malcolm, help me,” he heard Kaley suddenly mutter. She was on the couch with her legs high in the air. “I need you to pull my pants off for me,” she said in a rush. “They are too tight and will take forever to do by myself. Hurry we don’t have much time,” she said urgently.
“Okay,” he heard himself say he gulped like he was in a trance. He stepped between her legs and began pulling the leather pant legs. He had just made a couple inches of progress when Lisa asked a question.
“Kaley, are we doing it like last time? Do I have to lose the underwear too?”
“Everything,” a grunting Kaley replied.
Suddenly Kaley’s pants slid off of her tapered legs. Malcolm was tugging so hard he lost his footing and tumbled to the floor. Kaley immediately stood over him. She was shedding her vest and sweater while she talked.
“Do you need help? Lisa and I could get you undressed in a few seconds.”
“I think that would only make it harder for me to undress,” he answered in a deeper voice than usual.
“Well you only have fifteen seconds left and then I’m closing the shutters,” Kaley warned. “Lisa and I are heading for the bedroom.”
***
It took thirty seconds to get out of his suit. Meanwhile, the women went through the sun lit doorway and into the bedroom. This slowed down his undressing a bit as he was busy admiring their silhouettes as they passed through the bright opening. He then redoubled his efforts to get naked.
As he sprinted into the suite bedroom, he was disappointed to find that the women weren’t naked any longer. They had already donned new bras and panties. They had taken them from the three packages that the hotel had delivered. Two packages lay open on the bed.
“Hurry and open yours,” Kaley ordered and pointed. “You need to be dressed in less than a minute.”
“Kaley, this is getting very confusing. What’s going on?” Malcolm pleaded.
“I told you, you’ll find out in a few minutes. Now, hurry,” Kaley urged him.
He ripped open his package and found underwear, socks and shoes, and a green jumpsuit in his size. He looked up startled and saw that Kaley had a blue one in her hands and Lisa had already put on a red one.
“Why do I have to put on these clothes,” he demanded. “And tell me why we all have different colors?”
“We have to change clothes because any of us could have picked up some sort of tracking device. This room is especially designed to block any signals from leaving the room.”
“Why do we need to do that?” He asked in confusion.
“Where we are going is highly secret,” Kaley replied.
“What?” Malcolm said for the hundredth time today.
“Also the material of the jumpsuits will prevent any dangerous rays from affecting your body,” Kaley added.
“What rays?” Malcolm screamed.
“Don’t worry, you are safe as long as you follow a few simple rules,” Lisa explained with a huge smile.
“And the color of the jumpsuits is based upon your value to the organization,” Kaley said.
“Why am I getting the feeling that I’m inside some government black ops program?” Malcolm revealed.
“Well, quite simply — you are,” Kaley said cheerfully.
“Yeah, you’re now the rookie member of our team,” Lisa happily explained and rubbed his back.
“It’s called the MAD team,” Kaley explained. “It stands for the Mysterious Artifact
Department.”
“I don’t get it,” Malcolm muttered. “What if I don’t want to be a member of your team?”
“There are only two ways you can get off this team now,” Kaley said officially. “The first is when someone kills you.”
“And the second way is to complete your assignment,” Lisa filled in.
“What are you talking about?” Malcolm had only questions on his mind now.
“I thought that you would want to work under us?” Kaley asked. “You seemed to like working with me and you said that Lisa is very much like me,” she reminded him.
“It’s your bodies,” Malcolm screamed back. “I love being around your bodies, but frankly your personalities scare the crap out of me.”
“Well, maybe we’ll be less scary to you now that you’re a member of the team,” Kaley responded and jutted out her chin. “It would be kind of nice to know you better,” she said in a sexy voice.
“And now. What about Simon? You know, our boss?” Malcolm said sarcastically. “What’s he going to say when we resign from our lucrative positions?”
“I believe you will see him shortly,” Kaley said. “Ask him yourself. But if you don’t like his answer, you could be in for some big trouble.”
“Simon Stone is involved in this too?” Malcolm was suddenly incredulous.
“Yes,” Lisa said. “And there are many others.”
“So is this the whole team?” Malcolm asked.
“Well we did have another member, but he left the team,” Kaley said sadly.
“But didn’t you say…? He managed before he was cut off by Kaley.
“Yes, he was killed while on an assignment,” she shouted vehemently. “We weren’t happy about it.”
“I get it,” Malcolm said sarcastically. “I’m to be a naive replacement. I’m the point man — first one in and the first one to be killed.”
“Malcolm, for God’s sakes, we’re the good guys.” Kaley yelled back at him.
“We also know that you have something to offer this team. It’s an ability we need,” Lisa announced.
The Oracle Philon Page 5
