Following the Footsteps of the Lost Tribes

by Yossi Soika

  She had many questions, and I couldn’t not give her any answers.

  For long time I stood, half-shocked in the face of this stunning development, and finally I replied, “You knew that I’m forbidden from telling you about it, so why do you have to make things difficult?”

  “If that’s so, let’s take a walk in the tunnel. It seems most fascinating to me,” she finished and started to walk to the illuminated entrance of the tunnel.

  “Melanie, please stop! Don’t rush!” I pleaded with her, “I really don’t know what to do under these new circumstances.”

  “Perfect. In that case, stay put and I’ll take a short walk through the tunnel.”

  Begrudgingly, I held her hand in mine, and we both turned back into the tunnel. Shortly after stepping inside we encountered an invisible barrier in front of us that we were not able to pass through or even step a small step further. The unseen barrier baffled us, but I was able to see deep inside the tunnel. I wavered for a while, then picked up a pebble, and threw it against the invisible wall. I was taken by surprise when the pebble bounced back, rolled on the ground and finally rested next to my feet. I knocked on the invisible wall… but nothing – neither thud nor echo was heard.

  “Melanie, it’s getting late. We must go up before the elevator stops working, and they close this place.”

  Melanie glanced at her watch and said, “I’m afraid you’re right, but I have to get through this odd barrier,” she asserted emphatically. “Twenty one days have passed since I first laughed at the sight of the black ring, but as time goes on, I keep getting more answers that confirm that what you said was true, and now I’m stressed to the limit and anxious to uncover your secret.”

  “I really appreciate it; at least I have finally succeeded to gain your faith,” I uttered with a brief chuckle, “and now I’ll repeat my suggestion – tonight we sleep in the nearby guesthouse and tomorrow we take the first cable car up to Masada.”

  ***

  “Dan, wake up already!” Melanie’s voice resonated close to my ear. “Dan, what’s going on with you? I still don’t understand the place we visited yesterday! I have a lot of questions!”

  “Oh my!” I cried with dismay, “It’s time for your endless investigations. I’m begging you, I’m too tired to come up with answers right now,” I replied half asleep.

  “Aw, come on! I need answers about that strange place. How were we able to go down without an elevator? How did the floor sink? Who on earth built that place, and where does it lead to?”

  I jumped out of bed and called out, “Oh the hell with it, you shouldn’t be asking all these questions! You know that I’m not going to give you any clues, so why then do you insist on pushing so hard with such a sensitive issue?”

  At the break of day we made our way to a cable car that lifted us up to Masada.

  “Melanie,” I reiterated, “I’m asking you –no questions please, and you – you shouldn’t ask about the things you see there. If you don’t promise me, you can’t go down to the secret place with me.”

  “I give you my word,” she answered succinctly.

  Soon after the first cable car made its way uphill, it landed at the guards’ quarters, at the head of Masada. I took her hand, and both of us raced toward the cisterns.

  “Why are you moving like greased lightning? I’m out of breath!” Melanie emitted and gasped for air.

  “Melanie, you must know that in few minutes the whole place is going to be flooded with many visitors, and you certainly know that we don’t want any prying eyes and questions about our visit in the cistern.”

  I stopped and turned the ring on my finger, and then I felt the floor sinking under my feet. Then, only for a second, it stopped and the tunnel opened to us.

  Melanie walked slowly, examining the secret rooms with a look of wonderment, while I rushed her to move on.

  “I have a lot of work to do,” I uttered impatiently. After a quick survey of the tunnel, I returned to the opening of the lit tunnel, but suddenly my nose started to shake from excitement. For a second I became overwhelmed by a strange, portending sensation. Melanie, who sensed my excitement, took my hand in hers, but her body too began to vibrate slightly. We took small, slow steps until we reached the barrier.

  Can we pass the barrier? I pondered. Is it possible to dig underneath it? I immediately dug through my rucksack and pulled out a sharp commando knife and started to dig slowly, but not for long because I soon stopped the strenuous work.

  “It’s impossible. It’s impossible to dig into a hard rock with a knife,” I remarked faintly.

  “Perhaps we can drill it with a cordless drill,” Melanie offered.

  “It’s impossible. The barrier is not only made from hard rock. The barrier is also made from an unfamiliar matter, and similarly to the black ring there is no way to overcome it. It’s impossible to crack this damn barrier!” I yelled angrily, and banged the transparent barrier with my fist. At the same moment that my ringed finger touched the barrier, something breathtaking happened… a sharp whistle was emitted and snarled through the air, and very soon after that, the tunnel became shrouded with a blanket of thick haze. But before I recovered from my surprise, my body began to float in the air, at an irritating pace, and with my head first, it passed slowly through the barrier… I floated in the air for a short while as if I was in a dream, but only for a short moment because my body became stiff and accelerated through the air until it was hurtling through at a dizzying speed. For a moment I wanted to call out to Melanie but I was at a loss for words. My God, where am I going?... What’s going on? I was too dazed to figure out for how long I had been hurtling along but suddenly the pace slowed down, and immediately I was back on my feet. For a long baffling and blurry moment I stood lost in confusion, while many thoughts raced through my head.

  I must persevere, I made up my mind and tried to move from where I stood but I couldn’t get through: my feet were fastened to the ground as if they were wedged into it.

  “Well, hello there, Dan and Melanie,” I suddenly heard the so familiar voice of Arthur Da Costa. “Don’t search for me, please. Your eyes are not able see in this place, I’m standing exactly two steps away from you.”

  “That’s impossible,” I said and then heard the gurgling sound of his laughter reverberating in the air.

  “You still see nothing, but soon you and Melanie will be given a chance to see a world that no person on Earth has had the privilege to see before. Please notice Dan. On your left there is a box; in it are two rings: one for you and the other for Melanie, your girlfriend. Remove the black ring you wear on your finger and replace it with ring of the New World.”

  “I’m sorry but I still don’t understand what’s happening here, and how my body was able to transcend and fly in the air, not to mention, what is this place where I am right now?”

  “Dan, put those questions aside, please, and put the ring on your finger,” Da Costa asserted decisively.

  I turned my head to the left, and two steps away from me I saw a wooden box decorated with beautiful drawings. I opened it very carefully and found in it two green rings with a Biblical Hebrew inscription of the word truth engraved on them.

  “What’s going to happen now?” I asked the invisible Da Costa.

  “Don’t be afraid. Just put the ring on and don’t forget to return them at the end of your visit to the New World.

  “What visit? Where is the New World? I don’t see anything!”

  “Unbelievable.” Suddenly I heard Melanie’s voice, she had seemed to disappear as if she’d evaporated into thin air.

  “It’s unbelievable!” she exclaimed enthusiastically once again.

  “Melanie, where did you disappear to? What’s going on here?”

  “Sweetheart, just put the ring on, and stop whining,” Melanie exclaimed impatiently, “hurry, every minute counts. This
place is simply amazing.”

  I removed the black ring with no problem at all and replaced it with the green one. The moment I put it on a strange light started to gush from the ring. I looked at it with amazement. Only then I understand why Melanie had yelled out so enthusiastically. Now I was able to see Arthur Da Costa. He was standing near Melanie who then stepped forward, awe-inspired and completely moved by the sight of the New World.

  “I have to pinch myself,” she said, “it’s completely fantastic…. it’s impossible… am I dreaming?... where am I? How did I fly through the air? Which kind of world is it?”

  To tell the truth, I was also dumbstruck, standing there amazed at the marvel and surveying the elegance and the enormity of the huge hall ceiling above me. We gradually calmed down after our flying experience and at the sight of such a magnificent hall.

  “Make yourself ready my young friends. Soon you’ll be out of here, on to destinations that you never thought you would visit, even in your wildest dreams, and for now, please sit down,” he commanded loudly and pointed to the armchairs that stood next to us. Shocked and thrilled, I stepped forward and dropped into the nearest one.

  “I’m very happy to meet you again and certainly to meet your charming girlfriend – welcome!”

  Melanie was moving like me, and rocked as if she were drunk until she reached the nearest armchair and sank, agitated, into it.

  “Well my inquisitive friends, I have followed your footsteps from the time you descended into the cistern. You weren’t aware of it, but without my consent, you wouldn’t be sitting here. Dan – I’m delighted to see you after such a long time. To be honest, I was waiting for you and I was sure that the day would come and we would meet again. For now please tell me what’s new in your world and how is your sweet friend, Sue?”

  First I inquired about his health and then I continued to tell him about completing my dual-degree in biochemistry and physics.

  “That’s outstanding,” remarked Da Costa with a wry smile, “I’m happy to hear about people who commit and sacrifice themselves, study hard in order to search for the arcane knowledge of our world. However I am happy to inform you that very soon you may learn that you were very far from the real arcane knowledge of our world, and that the knowledge you hold is very far from what is required in order to understand our surroundings.”

  Naturally I went on to tell him about Sue, an old friend… and about her sad departure to the film industry in Hollywood. I concluded with the story of the professor, and how his frantic efforts led him to attempt to cut the ring and the next day – to attempt to cut my finger.

  “And now,” Da Costa intervened, and beamed a wide smile, “I have the pleasure of meeting your girlfriend, Melanie, whose name, and entire history, I learned the moment you had arrived at the cistern at Masada.”

  His words seem enigmatic and inscrutable.

  How is it possible to learn Melanie’s complete history in such a short time and only from her visit to the cistern? How can this be possible? Many questions swarmed in my head, but suddenly I lost my tongue and couldn’t manage to utter a single syllable.

  “My young friends,” Da Costa began, “it’s hard to imagine, but I’ve watched you and heard your entire conversation from the moment you entered the cistern. Here, on the upper floors of this building, is a control center and it allows for surveillance of the all the tunnels that we have dug around the world; of course you can also hear whatever goes on in them. Today you learned that no one can penetrate the tunnels without our consent – even if they find the small secret room in Masada, no one will be able to penetrate the barrier of the tunnel. Such barriers can be found globally in all of our tunnels, which we have designed to protect us against foreign invaders. No human can infiltrate these tunnels. You have probably witnessed for yourselves that the barrier is made neither from stone nor from metal; the AfulaMagen, which is made from cosmic rays and undetectable by the human eye is what protects us. Many years will pass in your world until you learn to make such a thing. And now please look around the beautiful decorative hall in which we are currently sitting – it is truly magnificent, but only a small part of it is real, and as a matter of fact, a great part of it is made from the AfulaMagen. While the naked truth is that these rays, when they are diversified with hues, are capable of creating this splendid illusion of a setting. Since I’m familiar with the needy human nature that favors keeping themselves surrounded by a skin-deep beauty, I have exclusively created this extraordinary setting of illusions for you, but it is nothing but a Kingdom of Illusions. And now for the part in your story about your flight through the tunnel, well my young friends, in the same way, it’s all about the rays of the AfulaMagen, that provide the energy needed to draw you through the tunnel at such a high speed, and they protect your body from being burned up at such velocity. Now I must also add something new and unknown – there are many channels scattered around our outer space made from the AfulaMagen that provide users with fast lanes to travel between worlds. I know with great certainty that you are not aware of the speed at which you traveled. Well, my young friends, it took you exactly ten seconds to get here.”

  “Wow, that’s impossible – thousands of miles in a few seconds! It sounds like a crazy illusion. Even our fastest rockets don’t get closer to such imaginative velocities! Aren’t you exaggerating a little?” I expressed my disbelief to him.

  “Dan, you graduated in biochemistry, but I have a bag of tricks that might upset all your knowledge of the physical universe.”

  “I must admit that I’ve had some inexplicable experiences – the secret of the black ring, the strange barrier in the tunnel, my incredibly fast tunnel flight – that totally removed me from all I knew about physics. Although, I must admit that I’m not willing to blindly believe every tall tale and event. For each exceptional event I must first look for some scientific explanations of the phenomenon.”

  “Dan, soon you are going to witness many phenomena that will interfere with the way you conceive and see the world. You are going to see many fantastic phenomena that cannot be translated scientifically. I must bring to mind a simple fact: that the science of your world is still in its infancy and this explains why you’ve not yet found a solution to speed through the interstellar orbit. On the day that man encounters members of faraway worlds, he will learn the extent of inferiority and meagerness of his knowledge about the universe. On that day the whole world will undergo a tremendous turnabout that will eclipse many nations, religions, sects, and cults, and many of them will collapse and vanish immediately. On the day that you encounter other members of the infinite cosmos your eyes will be opened to learning the extent of inferiority and destitution of Earth. And now I have something very interesting, exclusively for your ears.”

  He ended his speech, and stared at Melanie”Listen to me. All the tunnels lead to one place, which is where you stand right now. Can you guess where you are standing right now?”

  I glanced at the nearly permanent look of spaced-out astonishment on Melanie’s face. My mind was brimming with conflicting thoughts but I couldn’t come up with an answer. All we could conjure was perfect silence.

  “Well, my young friends, it’s easy to see the marvel in your eyes that roam gazing in deep space, and of course I’m here to help you. You are currently standing on the Land of the Ten Tribes.”

  “What?” I exclaimed in astonishment, “I can’t believe my ears! It’s impossible!”

  A moment later I heard Melanie exclaiming in surprise,”Dan, why are you so excited by the discovery of the Land of the Ten Tribes? What’s so fascinating about that?”

  For a moment I searched her face with my gaze and almost swallowed my tongue.

  “Melanie,” I emphasized, still enraged by her disturbing utterance. “Melanie, can you grasp the immensity of such a moment when we touch on history of 2750 years? From the time the Ten Tribes disappeared to this day no
one knows what befell them. Melanie, my great friend who is standing here in front of us has dedicated most of his energy and time to finding the Ten Tribes, and now we are privileged to see the great wonder of the Land of the Ten Tribes that he discovered. Just picture to yourself, the Ten Tribes are living and well; these are the same Ten Tribes who disappeared from the pages of our history books.”

  “Indeed, it’s a marvelous thing,” Melanie cried out loud with excitement, “I just started to grasp the magnitude of the situation, and many things now are getting clearer. Indeed, it’s a bizarre phenomenon. I’m feeling proud of you and honored to be here.”

  “My dear friends! I promise you here and now that you’ll have enough time to exchange your opinions and experiences. In a short moment I am going to take you on a tour to the Land of the Ten Tribes, and then you’ll be able to witness with your own eyes the New World, hidden from human eyes.”Mr. Da Costa, are you telling us that we are deep at the belly of the Earth, right now, underneath the highest mountains on Earth?”

  “Not exactly. We are currently at one of the highest places on Earth, at the observatory of the Sons of the Ten Tribes. In a little while I will tell you about the link between this place and the Land of the Ten Tribes; and you will also witness a great marvel with your own eyes.”

  “Does that mean that the light which I can see reflected is not sunlight?”

  “Absolutely true. It is emitted from a probe called Lightstoron.”

  It took me a while to recover my wits, and I said,” Mr. Da Costa, please give me evidence as to our exact location on Earth!”

  “Well my inquisitive friend, right away, I’m going to present you and your girlfriend with such evidence. And now follow me please.”

  Immediately I left my place, taking Melanie’s hand in mine we followed him. A few moments later we arrived at a light blue room, and the door was closed behind us.