The Pharos Objective

by David Sakmyster

  “Sorry, but at least you found it. The question is, what does that vision tell us about the scroll?”

  “That’s what we’re going to find out,” Helen said. “If you’ll join us, we’ve got a flight already booked. It leaves in the morning for Venice.”

  “But—”

  “I saw one more thing after that vision.” Phoebe wheeled closer, almost running over Caleb’s foot. “A church with Roman-style arches and a bell tower. I found it quickly, in the same guidebook, fifteen miles from San Leo Fortress, in the town of Rimini.”

  “The Tempio Malatestiano,” Waxman said, pronouncing the Italian very slowly.

  “What does that have to do with it?” Caleb asked.

  Waxman sighed. “We think Cagliostro may have had a connection to that church. And since he knew the authorities were after him, he might have stashed the scroll somewhere inside.”

  Caleb suddenly felt exhausted from it all, and actually missed the solitude of his prison cell. “What do you want from me?”

  “Caleb, you have to take my place,” Phoebe pleaded, thumping her chair’s wheels. She leaned forward. “They need a good psychic to go along, one that’s more mobile than I am.”

  A refusal formed, but then Caleb let out his breath. He imagined her down in that tomb, her hand reaching up, begging him not to let go. He remembered the feel of her fingers slipping away, and the dwindling of her scream before she hit the bottom.

  He could not deny her this. He took a breath and glanced from her to his mother. In his mind flashed a vision of excavators in Herculaneum, chipping away at the volcanic rock and sediment, retrieving scroll after scroll. The possibility that they’d found just the one they were looking for and that it might hold the secrets of the Pharos—and the answer to Lydia’s death—proved an irresistible temptation. He saw Julius Caesar again, bathed in torchlight, standing before the defiant caduceus, the scroll in his hand.

  This was a chance to discover what Caesar could not, to pass beyond, into the one place he had failed to conquer. To reveal the secrets of Alexander the Great. And perhaps to reveal the truth about ourselves. Why my family has these powers, these visions.

  Despite his transition, or perhaps because of it, his path was clear. He wanted the same things: to see whether the Pharos hid merely a treasure of gold and silver, or whether, beyond the door, lay all the secrets of the human race. The mysteries of the spirit and the soul, secrets that had survived a brutal two-thousand-year war waged upon them by the twin armies of ignorance and evil.

  His mind calmed and his pulse settled. “And you’ve already booked our flight?”

  Waxman smiled. “I may not be as good a psychic as any of the Crowes, but I did foresee you’d be coming with us. We leave in the morning.”

  So they had one night to rest, but unfortunately there was little time for it. A deep breath of stale hotel air filled his lungs as Caleb rejoined the others in the main suite. They were discussing the scroll.

  “If we can get our hands on it,” Helen said, “and unroll the remainder . . . there’s a new technique out of BYU that has been successful in restoring damaged ancient scrolls. And our University of Rochester is getting in on the act, with Xerox and Kodak contributing equipment and funds for analysis of the Dead Sea Scrolls.”

  “The cameras are there if we need them,” Phoebe said. “We can photograph the scrolls at various wavelengths—say, ultraviolet at 200 nanometers or infrared at 1100—to see which will best differentiate the ink from the background.”

  “That’s all assuming you can still manage to open the scroll.”

  “True.”

  “After we return from Italy, why not come back with us?” Helen asked. “Everything’s ready back home. We’ve got the house set up for research, a quiet room for introspection and drawing. The Morpheus team comes over twice a week, so we can use their skills as well.”

  Caleb groaned. “I thought the Initiative was disbanded.”

  “New members,” Waxman said, puffing on his cigarette.

  “Come on,” Phoebe urged. “You can get the pleasure of joining me aboard Old Rusty. The museum is closed again, but you can still see the exhibit.”

  He blinked at her. “It was turned into a museum?”

  “Didn’t you read my letters?”

  “I was a little busy. Anyway, no, I’m not going back there with you.”

  Still that voice from his dreams . . . Go home . . .

  “I told you,” Waxman said under his breath. “Useless as ever.”

  “No,” both his mother and sister said at once. Helen moved over and looked into Caleb’s eyes. She scrutinized his face, every line and crevice, and he started to turn away when he noticed her eyes were filling with tears.

  “You look like him,” she said, and brought her hand to Caleb’s chin. Her eyes held his, and her lips moved, just barely. “I miss your father,” she whispered so only Caleb could hear. “And I’m sorry.”

  “What do you mean?” The room dimmed slightly, as if the lights flickered, and the air shimmered and everything seemed less tangible, less real.

  “You know. I—” Suddenly she stopped and frowned, and her face took on the look of a hunted animal. Her eyes darted around and finally settled on a corner, near the television.

  Caleb followed her gaze, and for just an instant Caleb saw him, the tall man in the green jacket, matted hair over his face. Just standing there, trembling in the shadows. And then, he was gone.

  “Did you—?”

  Helen snapped her head back and stared wide-eyed at Caleb.

  Waxman moved in between them, pulling her aside. “Listen, kid. We need to show you something, something about your late wife. After that, if you still want to bail on us, that’s your call. Just see what we’ve discovered.”

  Phoebe wheeled herself to one side of a rectangular oak table where Waxman sat in front of a black laptop. Helen leaned in over his shoulder and turned the screen in Caleb’s direction. On the monitor was a blurry black and white image, a photograph taken of a group of people standing between the forepaws of the Great Sphinx.

  “This picture,” Waxman said, “came from an unpublished book called Keepers of Nothing. It was written by a man named Alex Prout, an author known for his paranoid, disjointed and unconvincing beliefs in all manner of nutty ideas.”

  Phoebe cleared her throat. “His first book was titled George Bush and How America Collaborated in the Upcoming Alien Conquest.”

  Helen smiled at Caleb. “Anyway, you get the drift. In this latest book, however, Prout seems to have hit on some actual facts.”

  Waxman tapped the monitor. “After we learned of your incarceration and the charges against you, we started looking into the background of Lydia Jones.”

  “How much did you know about her past,” Phoebe asked, “before you up and married her?”

  “Not much,” Caleb admitted. “I didn’t want to share my history with her, so it somehow felt wrong probing into hers.”

  Looking away, Helen said, “We found her credits as a publicist, and that got us started. One of the books she had marketed was written by a respected Egyptology professor from the American University at Cairo. When we took a chance and dug into his history, we came across some serious criticisms of his work, all coming from the website of Alex Prout.” She raised her eyebrows. “Seems this professor was a regular target of his.”

  Waxman lit up a cigarette. “We got a copy of this photo from Prout’s website. The manuscript for his new book was in his possession when he was mugged in Central Park late last year.”

  “He was strangled to death,” Phoebe said. “His papers torn to shreds and scattered into the East River.”

  “Fortunately,” Waxman added, “he was so paranoid that he backed up the whole thing to a secure website every time he worked on it.”

  Caleb frowned. “Then how did you get them?” He leaned closer and stared at the picture. There was Lydia, dressed in a gray suit, head bowed reverently, leanin
g against the Sphinx’s left paw. Surrounding her were three other women and thirteen men. But Caleb zeroed in on one man. It was the same face. The same hair. She had been talking to him in St. Mark’s Square. He was the one from the hospital.

  He pointed, and before Waxman could answer the earlier question, Caleb said, “I’ve seen that man!”

  Waxman nodded. “Lydia’s father.”

  “What?”

  “Nolan Gregory. The Egyptology professor, the author. Sixty-two years old. Jones is an alias. Your wife’s name was Lydia Angeline Gregory, born in Alexandria.”

  Caleb pulled out a chair and slumped into it. His head hurt. The two cups of coffee had only added to the throbbing. All his muscles were cramping, not yet having recovered fully from his confinement.

  Waxman continued. “Prout investigated this man, Nolan Gregory, and bribed a few of his acquaintances into giving up this picture. He believed it was the only photograph of the current members of an ancient society known simply as The Keepers.”

  “Guess what it is they’re keeping,” Phoebe challenged, before tossing a handful of airplane peanuts into her mouth.

  Caleb stared at the photograph again, and Lydia’s eyes dreamily stared back at him. “The Pharos Treasure?”

  Silence answered. Caleb could hear the ticking of the clock in the next room.

  Helen stood up. “The rest of Prout’s book goes on to describe his discoveries about this group. He claims these Keepers are all descendents of high priests and scribes from the Ptolemaic Dynasty.”

  Caleb looked up. “The legends of Thoth. The Books of Manetho and the Emerald Tablet . . .”

  “Lost when your library burned,” Helen said. “We read your book too.”

  “Nicely written, big brother,” Phoebe said, raising a can of Sprite. “Although I notice you didn’t give any credit to your sister in your dedication.”

  “Sorry.” He stared at the screen again. “So . . .”

  “So,” Helen continued, “Prout believed that the members of this group pass down their secret legacy to one family member each generation.”

  “And this legacy?” Caleb asked. “What is it?”

  Phoebe fidgeted in her chair. “The truth about a storehouse of wisdom that could change the world.”

  “Crazy nonsense,” Waxman said. “Usual stuff about Atlantis and ancient technology. Radical power sources and miraculous medical techniques. That sort of crap.”

  “It’s the truth,” Caleb said, “if you believe Plato. Or Herodotus. Both claimed that old priests in Egypt recounted the demise of a prior civilization, and that Thoth had brought the whole of their knowledge to Egypt and started again.” He took a breath. “Which is why you see such a high degree of civilization in Egypt right from the start, with their hieroglyphics, farming, astronomical lore, culture—”

  “Whatever,” Waxman muttered. “The point is these guys know something. But Prout’s book never actually mentioned the lighthouse. He believed the Keepers moved this stuff to Giza and buried it long ago under the pyramids or the Sphinx.”

  “He quoted the psychic Edgar Cayce,” Phoebe said, crunching on peanuts. “And his visions.”

  Caleb held his head in his hands. Closed his eyes and felt it—felt what had been building behind a wall of denial every bit as secure as the one below the Pharos. A wall that now cracked, splintered and erupted into a flood of anguish. “Lydia . . .” he choked, “she was a Keeper. Using me all this time . . .”

  “. . . to get inside the Pharos vault,” Helen finished. “Whatever they know, they don’t have the way in. Not anymore.”

  “Although” Waxman added, “they’ve been trying to find it for years. Centuries, maybe.”

  Caleb shook his head and bit his knuckles, thinking. “No, something’s not right. These people are supposed to keep the secrets, keep them safe. That’s their mission. My vision of Caesar in the lighthouse confirms it.”

  Helen nodded. “That’s what I said. I remembered your dream of the father and son. They had the scroll and died to save it, to protect the secret.”

  Caleb scratched his head. “But since then, that scroll was lost.” He stood up and started pacing. “Which means the other Keepers have lost the way in. They may not even know what it is they are guarding anymore.”

  “There could be other copies of the scroll,” Waxman suggested.

  “Doubtful,” Caleb countered. “The way those two were defending it, I’d bet that was the only one.”

  “Caleb,” Phoebe said, “we haven’t heard what you did under Qaitbey. How far did you get?”

  “Not far enough.” He told them about the symbols on the floor, their meanings and how he had made it past the first two.

  “Yeah,” Waxman said, “we found those symbols too. Three years ago, we went back and mapped out the whole chamber, took photos from every angle. But those symbols . . . never could figure out their importance.”

  “Did you see the rings?”

  “Yep,” said Phoebe. “But didn’t imagine what they were for. Not like you. Maybe you’ve turned out to be the better psychic?”

  “Not really,” he said. “It’s still nothing I have control over.” He took a deep breath. Thoughts were flying about in his mind. He remembered Lydia’s last words, spoke them under his breath, “We can’t wait for you.”

  “What?” Helen asked.

  “It’s what Lydia told me before she died.”

  Waxman closed the computer. “Well, it sounds like the current generation of Keepers feels it’s kept the secret long enough; they want the treasure for themselves. They’ve tried with Caleb, and failed. We need to be on our guard. They may try again to break through.”

  “Let them,” Caleb said, and those words came back to him, words Nolan Gregory himself said: “The Pharos protects itself.”

  Waxman shook his head. “These clowns might screw it up and make it so no one else can get to it.”

  “Do they know you might have found the scroll?” Caleb asked.

  “Not unless they have us bugged.”

  “Isn’t that possible? Not to sound like Prout with his paranoia, but—”

  “No,” Waxman said. “I checked.”

  “How?”

  He shrugged. “There are ways. Trust me, they don’t know what we know. That’s what frustrates them.”

  “And it might be why they’re stepping up their activities,” Caleb said. “They can’t very well protect anything if there’s a bunch of psychics running around, seeing their way past the defenses.”

  “We’re cheating,” Phoebe said, grinning.

  “Or maybe,” Caleb said, again thinking of Lydia’s words, “maybe we’re only fulfilling the prophecy, achieving what the original designer had anticipated.”

  “What do you mean?” Helen asked.

  He shrugged. “Just a thought, but in alchemy the goal is to achieve your own personal contact with the One, the infinite.”

  “God.”

  “Yes, but not necessarily the Judaeo-Christian version of a meddling, demanding, all-powerful figure. The early Hermetic beliefs conceived of an omnipresent energy which infused everything, quickened every atom, every star and scrap of matter as well as thought. As Above, so Below. Everything’s connected. It’s all spiritual and divine. Unfortunately, our material bodies and the temporality of this world somehow interfere with that connection, distracting us. Alchemy, including the Emerald Tablet and the sacred texts, is a way to restore the lost connection. And if you succeed and regain that contact with the divine, if you’re freed of the impurities of this false world, you perceive all truth and can do and experience things that seem miraculous or supernatural.”

  Phoebe thought for a minute. “Like what we can do?”

  Caleb nodded. “Think about it. This is the only thing that explains the existence of our abilities. How can we see things in distant lands or times, just with our minds?”

  “Because reality isn’t what it seems,” Helen said, nodding. “
It’s all connected.”

  “Exactly.” He looked out the window again. “Many religions carried on the Hermetic message, transforming it slightly here and there and incorporating its beliefs into their own. Buddha maintained the world was an illusion, a veil pulled over our eyes to blind us to our inward spirituality. Early Gnostics and Copts taught that we lived in a material prison created by an evil god, and only through meditation and purification could we pull our spirits free.”

  “Excuse me, but how did we get off track?” Waxman threw his hands up. “Why are we in the Twilight Zone? This is about treasure, not religion.”

  “It is about a treasure,” Caleb said. “But not what you and Mom have been thinking you would find. It is knowledge of man’s inner divinity. The power of life over death, of spiritual freedom.

  “Alexander the Great went into the Egyptian desert and found the tomb of Hermes, of Thoth, and took the ancient tablets he found there. When he emerged, the oracle proclaimed him king of all the world. Alexander studied these tablets, and the teachings clearly went to his head; eventually some of his own generals began to fear him and moved against him. But he and his followers had hidden the treasure, maybe under the Great Pyramid at first, as Cayce claims, then according to Herodotus and Plato, in the temple of Isis at Sais, and then ultimately moved to Alexandria.

  “And,” he continued, “at a pivotal moment in man’s history, when we had a choice between two paths, we chose darkness and subjugation over light and freedom. Copies of these books were rounded up and destroyed. The practitioners were demonized, tortured and killed by the thousands. Yet all through history these secrets have been preserved, hidden away, surfacing only in veiled disguises—in Renaissance art, in symbolic literature like the Grail legends and chivalric poetry. In short, they were hidden in plain view.”

  “What?” Helen asked.

  “In plain view,” Caleb repeated. “It’s one of the other tenets of Alchemy. ‘Conceal in plain view what is secret.’” He closed his eyes and thought again about the sealed doorway, and for a moment he thought he had it. The answers were right there. Or very close. Then the opening revelation faded.