by Rick Jones
Alyssa moved beside him. He was right, she thought. It was the only opening in the room. “The fifty-fifty chance was our ability to survive the shift,” she said. “We either live through the challenge or we don’t. And for those who did are granted the right to move ahead to the Chamber of the One. And since there’s no other outlet . . .” She stared at the opening.
After Hillary picked up on her line of sight, he said, “You’ve got to be kidding.”
Alyssa shrugged. “There is no other way,” she told him. “This has to be it. This has to be the way to the Chamber of the One.”
Hillary, now bordering on hysterics, tried to climb the angled floor but found the incline too steep and the surface too slick. In his efforts he whimpered like a lost puppy, realizing that the climb was becoming insurmountable. When the reality of his undertaking appeared hopeless, he surrendered by sitting on his backside like a petulant child.
Savage had to wonder if Hillary was exhibiting what everybody else was feeling: panic. So he raised his hands and patted the air to promote calm. “Look,” he said. “There’s a solution to everything.”
Hillary finally spoke. “Four men just died by falling into that hole. And you think there’s a solution by climbing into the abyss when there’s no other way out? Seriously? Is that what you’re telling us?”
“I’m saying there’s a solution to everything.”
“And your solution is to kill ourselves?”
Savage ignored him as he circled the edges of the abyss, looking for that solution a moment before holding his hand out to Alyssa. “In my backpack,” he said, “there’s a flashlight.” He turned so that she could rummage through it.
She looked through the pack’s pockets, found it, and handed it off to Savage. Its luminosity proffered a feeble cone of light that could only penetrate twenty feet of darkness. He then went to his knees and flashed the light into the hole beneath the surrounding edges. On the other side of the opening and about a foot beneath the rim, his light reflected off something that had an oily sheen to it, something that looked wet and glossy. Panning the light back and forth, he came to realize that it was a ladder made from black silica, its color camouflaged by the surrounding darkness making it nearly invisible to the naked eye. Even after 14,000 years, he thought, the rungs appeared strong and sturdy. “There,” he said, pointing to a location opposite his position. “There’s a ladder just beneath the edge.”
Demir joined Savage and redirected his shoulder lamp, spotlighting the ladder. He then tracked the length of the ladder until his lamp could penetrate about fifty feet down, the ladder continuing to descend into the depths and eventually disappearing into darkness that was as black as pitch. “That’s a long climb down,” he said.
“Maybe so. But that ladder has to go somewhere, right?”
Savage turned to Hillary. There’s the solution.
Hillary leaned over the edge. Even against the flash of his light it was difficult to see the ladder.
Savage gestured his hand toward the opening, and then to Hillary. And with a smile that showed even rows of teeth, he said, “After you.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
But Hillary refused to be the first to descend into the depths of the abyss.
Instead, Alyssa took the lead. She was tethered by a 100-foot nylon rope as she descended the ladder, the rungs as thick as rolling pins as if they were built to accommodate something larger and heavier, the distance of the steps farther apart than the normal placement of rungs on a ladder. As she descended she gripped a small flashlight between her teeth, pivoting her head to access better fields of vision. The surrounding walls were flat and made of black silica, and reflected back the light like mirrors. As far as she could tell, for as deep as the light would shine, the walls led to the bottom of the abyss, however deep it may have been.
Amazing, she thought, all that black silica. And to engineer it in a way that was seamless and never-ending.
“Are you all right,” Savage called down. He was holding the rope.
She shot him a thumbs-up. Everything’s A-OK.
He allowed her slack as she continued to descend the ladder.
Sixty feet down—the walls looked the same, black and glossy and looking as if they were newly created.
More rope.
Along the walls Alyssa noted several bas-relief carvings of creatures, as well as the blending of archaic script with cuneiform. She traced the light over them, the carvings of scarabs, a common beetle—the writings, however, were lost to her.
When she reached her 100-foot limit of rope, Savage carefully tied an additional length of rope by securely knotting the ends together.
When Alyssa hit the 150-foot mark, something to her left sparkled like a gem when the light glanced over it. But it wasn’t a gem at all. It was a walkway of clear crystal that extended over the abyss like the plank of a pirate’s ship. It was thick and sturdy looking, the walkway leading to a trapezoidal opening in the wall. Along the doorway’s edges was recognizable script
ўяўлен তালিকা হয়েছে।ьнямі ўц তারিখে ২০৭.
(To The Chamber of the One Shall You Pass)
Above that was the master symbol of the Orion Star Mintaka, the symbol .ڱ
She cocked her head: Mintaka? Why did the symbol of the second largest star in the Orion Belt adorn the header beam of the entrance?
She then tugged on the rope, a signal, and called up. “I found it!” she cried. “I found the opening!” I found the way out!
Topside, John Savage gave Hillary a hard look as he gripped the rope with both hands. “There’s your solution,” he told him.
Suddenly the rope went slack.
#
After untying the rope Alyssa stepped immediately to her left, to the point where the crystal walkway ended, and found solid footing. She flashed her light, the beam drawing over the crystal, and then to the ladder, which continued to descend toward an undetected bottom. She then focused the light to the mouth of the doorway, to the perfect trapezoidal shape and the odd symbols surrounding it.
She then took tentative steps forward and tested the walkway beneath her, finding it nice and solid all the way to the mouth of the opening, a twenty-foot walk from the ladder.
The header beam to the opening was fifteen feet above the floor, quite high for an entryway, she considered. Then she flashed her light into the entrance.
Cauldrons used to light the corridor were much larger than the founts discovered in the temple of Eden and in the corridor above her. In fact, she immediately intuited that these wells were constructed to cater to something much larger than the average individual.
She passed the light over the bases of the cauldrons, noting the similarities from one cauldron to the next—that of a serpent entwined and rising upward along the pedestal until its head curved directly over the bowl with its jaws extended, the opening of its mouth an obvious conduit that vomited oil into the cauldron to keep the fires lit, an incredible feat of engineering for something that was 14,000 years old.
She flashed the light down the corridor, the beam penetrating so far, hitting a veil of darkness. Then she flipped it back to the cauldron beside her—at the head of the snake that appraised her with immobile indifference as glimmers of firelight reflected from eyes fashioned with red gems. Surrounding its head was a hood of black silica that flared in warning, the hallmark of a cobra, which was just as frightening in its chiseled stillness.
“Creepy, isn’t it?” Savage shined his light at the head of the cobra, his beam joining with hers.
Additional lights were in the background as Demir’s team began to descend the ladder and made footing on the landing.
“A cobra,” she simply said. “I also saw bas-relief carvings of scarabs on the way down.”
“Which ties this in with Egyptian pictographs, tying Egyptian culture with Eden?”
“Possibly, yes. But you know what’s worrisome about all this?” she s
aid, flashing the light along the snake’s length rising along the cauldron, emphasizing it. “Do you remember the sculptures of the creatures that we discovered inside the temple of Eden? Do you remember the bear, the bull, the Megalania Prisca—everything that was once indigenous to this area when it flourished?”
He nodded.
She then set the center of the flashlight beam to the sculpted head of the cobra, its eyes proffering spangles of glimmering light. “Snakes adapt, John.” She then flashed her light down the corridor for as far as the beam would go, to an eventual wall of darkness.
Lights joined in as Demir’s team began to congregate at the tunnel’s mouth. Some were still on the ladder, descending. While Hillary and the ministers touched down on the crystal walkway.
Hillary, feeling insecure, took uncertain steps, little steps, with his arms held outward as if walking a thin line upon a walkway that appeared invisible beneath his feet, the clear crystal giving him the illusion that he was walking on air with the view of the abyss underneath him, an endless drop.
When he reached the entrance he was incredibly relieved—could feel the feverish drops of sweat on his forehead suddenly cool. When he stepped beneath the header beam and into the corridor, he noted multiple cauldrons set against the walls, each one evenly spaced from one another, until the rows finally disappeared into distant shadows.
Above him the eye of the cobra winked, a firelight flash from the corner of its eye.
Completely enamored with the flickering stone, Hillary’s eyes detonated with something like lust, an electric discharge of desire as the glimmer of light enticed him. So he reached for the twinkle of its jeweled eye and pressed an impulsive fingertip against the gem. The eye of the cobra, cold with indifference, slowly retreated from his touch and fell back into its skull, disappearing.
The world once more began to alter and shift . . .
. . . Again . . .
#
By the time Alyssa reached out to grab Hillary’s hand to stop him, it was too late.
The gemstones retracted into the cobra’s skull, blinding it. And as the world shifted, the weights and balances hidden behind the walls began to move, changing old corridors into new ones, offering new paths to new locations.
From the wall of the abyss a crystal lever with a black silica hammerhead attached to the end of it swung outward then down, the hammer perfectly gauged to strike and demolish the crystal walkway, which it did, shattering it to countless pieces that were no larger than chips of diamonds, the crystal raining down into the abyss as glinting pinpricks of light, then gone.
As the hammer swung towards its upward apex and reaching a height until it stilled, it then began to swing in the opposite direction with two of Demir’s men still clinging to the ladder.
Motivated by the power of the hammer which was now swinging their way, they climbed up the ladder with speed and agility, back to the choke point of the room above.
The hammer was moving in a smooth and fluid arc, its momentum gaining speed.
The two commandos were half way up when the hammer passed them by, missing them by a few feet, the swipe of the hammer’s head close enough for them to feel the passing breeze against their flesh.
When the hammer swung to its apex and began to swing back the other way, there was a sound of ratcheting; a cranking noise that indicated that with every swipe of the hammer it was somehow resetting itself to move closer to the ladder for the final blow.
. . . Whoosh . . .
The hammer missed them by a foot and began to arc away into its upward motion, then stilled, the sound of something ratcheting, and then it began its downward shift.
The commando on the top rung reached for the edge, found purchase, and began to haul himself up. His comrade, however, was not as lucky.
. . . Whoosh . . .
The hammer was so heavy it didn’t even slow down when it smashed the black silica ladder into countless shards and pieces, decimating it. The commando on the rungs found himself falling backward into the abyss with his legs kicking for something that wasn’t there, his eyes flaring with the sudden surprise of his own mortality, the world around him moving with the slowness of a bad dream. Above him he saw impotent faces looking down at him—each one confirming that there was nothing they could do to save him.
He then closed his eyes, opened them, the bad dream continuing, the faces watching him now growing to the size of pinhead dots while the hammer continued to swing from one side to the next.
. . . swinging . . .
. . . swinging . . .
Then darkness that was completely whole engulfed him.
#
The commando who made it to the top hung along the edges of the room’s choke point by the crooks of his fingers. Beneath him the hammer continued to swing like the needle of a metronome. Then with great effort he hauled himself up and over the edge, eventually finding comfort on the landing. He then lowered his lip microphone, calmed himself with deep breaths, and contacted Demir.
In Turkish: “Mulazim awwal Demir?”
Static over the headset, then: “Kaya, are you all right?”
“I’m fine,” he said. Then: “We lost Aslan.”
“I know.”
The hammer continued to swing but was beginning to lose its momentum.
Kaya got to his feet and examined his surroundings with his shoulder lamp. The floor was steeply angled from all sides, funnel-shaped, with the only entryway sealed when the walls shifted. The man was a prisoner with no way up or down.
He then cupped his palm around his lip microphone. “Mulazim awwal Demir, I have enough provisions to last me a few days. I’ll be fine.”
“Hold tight, Kaya. We’ll find our way back to you. In the meantime, maintain contact every fifteen minutes.”
“Copy that.” Kaya lifted his microphone until it swung up over his beret, undid his backpack, took out a small container of water, drank, and then he lay against the angled floor with his hands locked behind his head and waited.
#
Demir snapped his lip microphone over his head in anger. He lost another man and another was trapped. After a moment of stewing he turned to Hillary, who looked like a frightened child who was enfolding himself with his arms crisscrossing in self-embrace. “What the hell did you do?”
Hillary garbled nonsensical utterances as he pointed to the cobra’s head. Its gemlike eyes were gone.
“You’re to touch nothing!” yelled Alyssa. “As an archeologist you’re supposed to know that!”
Hillary was beside himself—a life lost and another trapped, all due to triggering a device that was no larger than a marble. “I didn’t . . . I didn’t—” He cut himself off, not sure how to respond since he was a seasoned vet who had no excuses.
“This entire facility,” she went on, “is wired for people like us. Places like the temple of Eden and The Chamber of the One were engineered mainly for the high priests who knew every nuance of these structures and knew how to avoid them. They’re protective mechanisms—the first alarm system, if you will—manufactured against those who trespass on territories not meant for anyone outside the ranking of those within the priesthood . . . And that would be us.” After pointing an accusing finger at him, she then added, “And you just broke the cardinal rule, Hillary.” She quickly turned and walked away, leaving Demir to look upon the senior archeologist with eyes teeming with anger.
Hillary continued to stutter, and then he fell silent, his shoulders slumping in defeat.
Demir took position beside him and leaned into the old man until his lips were inches from Hilary’s ear. “You’re becoming a major liability,” he stated softly and evenly a moment before he left Hillary to stand alone.
When Demir joined Savage and Alyssa he had one thought on his mind: abort the mission. “You were right. There’s nothing we can do to combat something like this,” Demir told them, waving a hand to indicate his surroundings. “All the elite commandos and firepower in the worl
d can’t compete against the engineering of this place. We need to get out of here.”
Alyssa and John agreed. Human curiosity had its place in order to learn and grow. But people were dying, the situation dire.
Alyssa walked over to the entryway. The causeway was gone and so was the ladder. There was no way up, no way out.
And below lay the abyss.
Now they were forced to take the only route available to them.
Alyssa fell back from the trapezoidal-shaped doorway and flashed her light down the corridor, the beam penetrating so deep, the light pushing back a wall of darkness that seemed to be fighting against the luminosity with an equal and opposite reaction, a stalemate.
But she knew without a doubt that beyond the veil of darkness the walls and floors shifted into new designs, old configurations resetting themselves to offer new and deadlier challenges for those trespassing within these hallowed halls. The structure itself was compelling them to move forward by offering no other option.
Now there were sixteen people left, Demir losing half his team in less than two hours.
And Alyssa could feel the morale melt around her like the tallow of wax—the spirits of those surrounding her becoming as fragile as glass.
“Ms. Moore.” When Demir spoke it seemed to galvanize her.
She took a step toward the wall of darkness, her light pressing forward, the shadows pushing back. “We move forward,” was all she said. “In the only direction this facility is allowing us to go in.”
With two of the Maroon Berets taking point with their assault weapons leveled, Alyssa found little comfort knowing that this structure was much too big and powerful. There were no set of combat skills or military training that could outwit, outmaneuver or overshadow the unseen forces within. Eden had proposed the same fate. But Eden also allowed her the privilege to survive by using her ability to manage her way through riddles, and to solve the ciphers that proffered her with the advantages to move from one level to the next, ultimately leading her to the truth of mans’ origin.
