‘They were taken by our neighbours as hostages, in the hope that, if we were rudderless, we would be rendered incapacitated. That act did not destroy us, but it did cause us irrevocable damage. The structure of our society could not survive such upheaval following the removal of its hierarchical head, and it almost collapsed, as everybody wanted to rule and demagogues appeared to plague us and seduce us.
‘The extreme perfect democracy that followed kept stirring the pot of discontent - a bit of disloyalty here, envy and animosity there, you get the picture -into a vortex that placed us at each other’s throats.’
‘Just like in Athens and the modern world.’ Katerina said.
‘The children are made out of the genes of Plato, Aristotle and Pericles and DNA collected on one of our trips through the portals. We wanted to adopt Plato’s rule of the philosophers as the way of government for our society and to use Socrates’ dialectic method to confuse and defeat our enemies and we wanted Aristotle and Pericles, because we admired them too.
‘Now, because of the conflicting philosophies and ideologies of their “fathers”, the children are in terrible internal conflict and we must help untangle the webs of their minds that are fighting a novel civil war, giving the term infighting a new meaning. If we don’t solve that internal war, we could not resolve ours. And there lies the crux of the matter, what you must do to help us. That will be your test for the opening up of the final stretch of road out of here.’
‘But how can we help you?’ As Katerina said this she had a strange image of being at a weekend camp on personal development and bonding and having to lead the process for solving a challenge, a test.
‘Your blood will do that. We only need a little bit. It has been foretold that the blood of the visitors will save us.’
Vasilis, Katerina, Lara and Aristo looked at each other. They did not need words to say the thought they knew each of them shared. They had become a blood bank. This was the blood donation van. Call to all fans. Climb aboard. Would there ever be enough? Thank God they had some time to recover. That lovely meal certainly helped.
The blood transfusion seemed to work for the children and the rest of the inhabitants of this place, but it had a curious and dangerous side effect. It started to randomly open up portals around the place. The expected screams of the crowd did not materialise.
They had already admitted that they used portals to other worlds for their experiments. This meant that they must have seen this firework-like portal-opening display before. Perhaps it was an event that occurred frequently, at regular or even irregular intervals. It seemed it was definitely not just a one-off occurrence, a side effect of the blood transfusion.
These people admitted that they had also used the portals believing they were calling for the help those doors of hope hid. They thought they saw the promise behind those places that seemed so much better than their own. Well, anything would in their desperate situation.
But the portals turned out to be a curse. They knew now that they should no longer use them and should no longer let anyone come out of them. The four visitors had done all they could for them. They would have to do the rest themselves.
At least now they had a fighting chance to rebuild their lives. It was time to go. The people thanked their benefactors and they in turn wished them luck.
* * *
A gelatinous substance began to seep out from the sheer rock turning itself into Ruinands who were repeatedly hurling themselves at Katerina and the others at great speed.
When Katerina and the others thought they had seen from the Ruinands all they had had to throw at them, more Ruinands appeared from all directions surrounding them. Katerina and the others muttered under their breaths: “Not more of them”.
They felt like the four “musketeers”, four friends in the same boiling pot. They thought they were finished; they were so vastly outnumbered.
But when they thought the game was up, the Ruinand lookalikes were then transformed into white light, angel-like creatures that spoke with one voice.
‘We bring a message for you and for the future.’
The last Byzantine Emperor look-alike walked through the angel-like creatures and came to a stop before Katerina and the others.
‘I’m not finished with you yet. You have done well so far, but you will have to mix your blood with that of your enemies.’
The Ruinand blood was the last ingredient they needed. They put that into the mix expecting fireworks. The Emperor look-alike was playing with our minds, they thought. The finished product was foaming at the edges, at the edges of Katerina’s and the others’ sanity and of their conscience.
But the process had a good effect. They made peace with their erstwhile enemy, for at least this one night. They injected the mixture into the people of the mist and the side effect caused by the previous formulation of the cure disappeared.
But some Ruinands did not honour the at least one-nightly truce that had been declared, like an ancient Olympic truce that was sacred through the duration of the games.
The Emperor look-alike smiled. ‘You have done all you could do here. Don’t forget your final gift. Good luck on the final leg of your mission.’ A jar containing the last Emperor’s brain landed at their feet. The final piece of the jigsaw.
The Emperor look-alike’s famous last words redolent with finality. Yet they hoped it was not his final farewell, otherwise that meant that they had failed in their ultimate mission to wake him up. Then they heard an echo.
‘It is important that you do not remember what you saw. Now tell me, have you misplaced your brain with help from your old friend, Alzheimer’s, the taker and thief of memories?’
Katerina and the others felt involuntarily coerced to obey. All four of them replied with a loud and wholesome “yes”, as if replying to that voice was what was expected of them.
They emerged out of the cave dazed, the adrena-line still coursing through their veins at the speed of a poison, but slowing down. But they could not deny it was an exhilarating experience. Nobody would believe what they had just witnessed. They couldn’t believe it themselves let alone convince others.
It was still pitch black. The date and time was still the same as when they entered the tunnel on Mount Zalakas which could mean that, even though they appeared to have outrun the Ruinands inside the tunnel and the cave, there might be Ruinands still waiting for them outside so they proceeded with caution.
They wondered what the Ruinands coming up behind them would make of the things they would witness inside, the worlds they would pass through in their pursuit of Katerina, Vasilis, Lara and Aristo.
They wondered what the inhabitants of the worlds in that cave would make of the Ruinands and whether they would manage to restrain them, for their own sake, and to stop them from coming after Katerina and the others.
They wondered whether the Ruinands would cause irrevocable damage in the worlds of that cave. But there was nothing Katerina and the others could do about it now.
They were convinced that they could not go back there once they had accomplished their mission and resolved the issues troubling the worlds of the cave. They had to let those creatures fend for themselves and survive like they seemed to have managed to do so far.
Relieved to have completed the ordeal, Katerina, Vasilis, Lara and Aristo let themselves collapse on the ground for a much-needed rest that they could not afford. They soon ended getting up for, with the resilient Ruinands on their tail no doubt, the completion of the mission was now more urgent than ever.
CHAPTER 63
Limassol, Cyprus
Present day
Katerina, Vasilis and Aristo returned to their respective tunnels. Vasilis joined Giorgos and John on the seaward-side tunnel. Katerina and Aristo joined Elli on the castle-side tunnel.
Lara never did appear to be allowed to exit the opening and come with them. She reluctantly stayed behind, bitterly disappointed to miss the forthcoming action, the drama and the excitement,
and, perhaps, danger, as she believed she had caught its unmistakable whiff.
But as they came back they narrowly avoided serious injury. They just managed to miss, by only about a couple of inches, the chandeliers that appeared in the tunnel.
After what they had all experienced, they tried to hang onto reality with gritted teeth. They tried to control their imagination and their curiosity from running wild.
There were more openings, but they did not seem to allow access to what was beyond them. Another time, perhaps? Wishful thinking, perhaps? Who knew? They hoped to find out sooner rather than later. But it appeared that for the time being it could wait.
It seemed that they had what they needed and had to proceed to the doorways opening up to the main area containing the fabled structure they longed to see with their own eyes.
Aristo was first in line. As he went under the doorway he stopped abruptly with Katerina and Elli crashing into him. Aristo stopped just in time to prevent his falling to his death, for in front of him was a huge chasm. Thankfully, Katerina and Elli were walking slowly and had their wits about them, which was crucial for them to put the brakes instantly and only gently bump into Aristo. Otherwise had they been even the slightest distracted they would have pushed him over the edge to oblivion.
At the moment that they stepped through the doorway the central structure sent out a bright light to break the pitch-black darkness. Now they could see that they were in a huge chamber.
In the middle of that space was a strange structure that gave the impression that it was suspended in mid-air, as it did not appear to be connected to any of the walls, ceiling or floor of the chamber. They were all mesmerised.
Katerina was the first to react. ‘Now, is this what we think it is?’
‘It could be, but this would be the last place I would think you would expect to find it.’ Aristo replied without moving.
‘But I don’t understand. What is the symbolic significance of this place?’ Katerina said and at the same time tried to peer through the semi-darkness to get a sense of the space they were in and the size of the structure that greeted them and that appeared to be challenging them to a duel.
‘Why they chose Cyprus, and specifically Limassol, I don’t know. But look at that structure in the middle that seems as if it is floating. Do you two know what it is?’ Aristo did not wait for a reply and he continued. ‘It is a shrunken replica of the Church of Ayia Sofia in Constantinople combined with a shrunken replica of the Church of the Holy Apostles, also in Constantinople, the now destroyed church where Byzantine Emperors had been buried from the time of Constantine in the 4th century A.D. to the 11th century A.D. The church was destroyed after the Ottoman conquest of the city in 1453 A.D. to make way for the tomb of Mehmed II the Conqueror and the Fatih Mosque.’
Giorgos who was listening in through their earpieces confirmed Aristo’s analysis. He studied the scroll. The plan on the scroll showed walkways as dotted lines starting from the doorways on each side and extending to the middle structure, and detailed the process for the use of the keys to activate the walkways.
Following the instructions on the scroll, the three keys Aristo and Giorgos had collected in Athens had to be inserted in their allocated place. Giorgos and Vasilis looked around them and they saw, on their side, two doorways, slightly recessed from the wall. They shone their torches around the doorways and above each one there was a plaque with the names of Alexandria and Athens respectively.
Aristo, on his side, found himself facing the doorway with the plaque labelled Constantinople. Clearly each of the three keys corresponded to each of the doorways. They looked through the doorways and, in the dim light, saw that they opened up into sizeable caverns beyond them.
They suddenly realised that they no longer needed their torches to see what each cavern contained for as soon as they stood at the doorways the darkness that reigned inside until then lifted to reveal an extraordinary sight.
There must have been a mechanism that detected that the keepers of the keys had arrived, a mechanism that felt that it was now safe, that it was now the time to lift the veil of secrecy under which the contents of the doorways lived protected for so long.
Each doorway appeared to open up to a small representation of the respective city the labelled plaque above its entrance announced. Each representation appeared to have been constructed of an extraordinary material that reflected the light of an artificial sun-like object floating in the air above it. A glow was emitted from a particular building. They went close and saw what from its shape looked like a receptor for the key each of them was holding.
According to the scroll all three keys had to be inserted and turned at the same time. Aristo, Giorgos and Vasilis went through their respective openings and each stood by the respective receptor of his key. Giorgos was leading this part of the mission.
‘OK, guys, ready?’
‘Yes.’ Replied Aristo and Vasilis in unison.
‘Insert.’
‘Done.’
‘Three … two … one … go.’ The three keys were turned at the same time.
Nothing happened for a few seconds. Then suddenly there was an almighty roar as if there was an earthquake that was shifting continental plates. It was the sound of rock sliding on rock.
The simultaneous action activated the walkways that started from under them and extended to the central structure. Aristo, Giorgos and Vasilis exited their respective caverns and stood by the edge of the tunnel on their respective sides.
The walkways were narrow and below them there was a huge chasm. There were a couple of near misses and slips, with an undoubtedly fatal destiny waiting for them in the seemingly bottomless pit below, but they managed to hold onto each other and stay firmly planted on the walkways.
But the cross was a daunting task, at the same time terrifying and, for that reason, agonisingly slow, as they knew it could be an expensive venture that cost them their precious lives.
They were relieved when they finally reached, from opposite directions, the main structure floating in the middle of the cavern. The team was reunited once more.
Elli, Katerina, Aristo, Vasilis, Giorgos and John simply paused for a while where they stood, comfortably away from the walkway and the edge, the highway to oblivion and entrance to the underworld. They all felt they needed to catch their breath before moving on.
Soon they came up to a chamber and any words they may have had were trapped and died in their throat, without so much as an effort to escape, without so much as a sliver of sound, their vocal chords lost the hang of their ability to vibrate and resonate with any substance.
In the middle of the room on a raised platform, but held by glittering chains suspended from the ceiling was a glass casket. Inside was an embalmed body dressed in royal regalia. The regalia of none other than the Palaiologi dynasty and the last Emperor Konstantinos XI Palaiologos. Bewildered, they went closer.
* * *
Eleni’s dismembered body was placed inside the drawer that had come out from under the Emperor’s sarcophagus and had the label Eleni on the inside of its open lid.
They poured one of the phials of blood from Iakovos into its receptacle, the small bowl next to the sarcophagus. The other they used to douse Eleni’s body parts and the lid of the Emperor’s sarcophagus.
They then placed the Likureian icons on the chest of the Emperor’s sculpted likeness on the lid of the sarcophagus as was clear that was the space made for them.
The Book of the Pallanians, together with its sevenpage part “On the Pallanian Resurrection”, was placed inside the sarcophagus on the Emperor’s real chest now reassembled from the parts collected through the openings in the tunnel.
The Emperor’s parts were reassembled inside the sarcophagus. The Emperor’s ring with the Imperial seal was placed on the finger of the Emperor’s sculpted likeness on the lid of his sarcophagus.
Giorgos noticed a little cameo on the edge of the ruby stone seal that started to glow at
the moment it slid onto the stone finger. He touched the ruby stone seal and a tiny scroll started to roll out.
They watched as it transformed slowly into a multiple of images one after the other until, finally, like a roulette ball that stopped turning and lodged itself at a random number, it stopped at the image of three people, two of which they recognised; the identity of the third they guessed.
* * *
The Emperor’s eyes came to life; the muscles, veins and arteries and skin began to contract and expand and move; each cell, each part slotting into place as if by magic, literally attaining the ambition of a second chance for a life of its own, or directed by a software programme to carry out its appointed function.
The Emperor rose and stood before them in the flesh. Next to him was Eleni Symitzis and in the middle was a child, each of his hands held by each of his parents.
A voice rose above the deafening din of silence. The voice spoke in a strange language, in Byzantine Greek, then in Giorgos’ and the others’ language, Modern Greek; involuntarily all present showed their respect and submission to the Emperor in two stages.
As a first stage they fell to the floor in front of the tomb taking the kneeling position. For the second stage they bowed to the Emperor.
‘You have earned the reward of the temple of wisdom. There is no other reward, no greater power as some may misleadingly and wishfully have believed. Thank you.’
As soon as the Emperor had uttered his final word, he, Eleni and their child and before now missing heir, turned and looked above them where the upper part of the dome started to slowly come down towards Giorgos and the others present.
On its way down its shape changed to a building very much like that of the Library of Alexandria. The structure landed at their feet and its doors flew open. Aristo and Giorgos were completely thrown off balance from the shock of another encounter with a nemesis from the recent past.
For it was none other than Ptolemy who stood in profile at the door with his back to the wall, and gestured his welcome to the intruders, a clear-as-day-follows-night invitation to enter.
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