by Francis, Ron
Kimi was recording as much as she could through her visor. Jesse could tell she loved the place. He overheard someone call out, “This place is massive,” and he had to agree, although he really hoped they would not have to search the whole temple.
As they entered the temple, he motioned Cassie to guard the entrance and comm them at the first sign of trouble. He let Josiah lead the rest of the team into the Temple as he took up the rear position. The inside of the temple was as beautiful as the outside. The same patterns that decorated the outside of the temple also decorated the inside, except they were inscribed with golden lettering. Row after row of giant intricately carved columns stood off to each side of the doorway giving a straight and wide view to the decorative altar in the front. The altar was the first place they checked and then next to it there was a raised platform with a three sided podium built into it. After checking the area around the altar and the podium, they began checking the inner rooms located between the rows of columns and the outside walls. After almost two hours of searching the inner rooms of the ancient temple, they began checking the rows of columns. Soon after, Wennagal pointed to an order in the artwork of one of the columns that looked odd. Every row of columns they had come across had the characters carved into them facing the same direction. This row had four characters facing the opposite direction.
“Good catch, Wennagal,” Josiah said enthusiastically as he began to search around the area. Josiah figured the four wrong-facing characters to be a combination lock of sorts, and he pressed the four at random. Nothing happened. He tried again, this time in a different order, and again, nothing happened.
Jesse came over and said, “I’m no treasure expert, but why don’t you look at the patterns of the other columns and see if there is anything else off about this row besides the four wrong-facing characters. Maybe that will give you an idea as to the combination.”
“Jesse, that’s brilliant,” Kimi replied. “I can already see another difference.”
“As can I,” Wennagal added.
After about ten minutes of collaboration, Josiah, Kimi and Wennagal came up with the right combination. Each of the four wrong facing characters were in a specific order on one of the other columns. When entered in the order shown on that particular column, the symbols began to light up. After lighting up, the column began shaking as it slowly began to slide to the right, revealing a stairway to a lower level. They descended into the darkness, and the portable lighting units began to flare to life. Jesse wedged a large stone in the hinge of the open column. Reece shot him a questioning look and he replied by saying, “If it can open, it can close, and I don’t want to be stuck down there if it does.”
Reece gave him an acknowledging nod and they continued. They came into an elaborate room made of solid gold, adorned with different colored precious stones in fantastical patterns. There were several statues of gold throughout the room, and Jesse called out, “Are we sure that this isn’t the treasure?”
“This is definitely not it; there are no coins, trinkets, or artwork. No jewel-encrusted weaponry or gold plated eatery. While I’m sure these statues have value, we don’t even know if they are pure gold.” Reece replied.
“They are not,” Kimi said as she was looking at the reading on the HUD in her visor. “But I do see a small statue in the corner that is.”
As they were making their way over to the corner, something didn’t sit right with Jesse. “Stop,” he shouted, “Josiah; is that statue part of the treasure hunt?”
“No, it isn’t similar to anything we have, and it doesn’t fit any of the descriptions of the ones we don’t have. Why?”
Jesse paused and replied, “I just have a bad feeling about it. Let’s just leave it and get what we came for.”
“Agreed,” Wennagal called from the back. “That is just too convenient a place to leave something so obviously valuable. It seems like a trap for looters.”
They all passed by but none of them went near it. Cassie was at the front of the temple, and the wolves were at the top of the stairs. So far, they hadn’t run into trouble, but Jesse didn’t want to push his luck. “Let’s wrap this up. Let’s find what we came for and get back to the ship,” he called while nervously looking around.
“It’s over here,” Kimi yelled.
“Don’t touch it yet,” Josiah yelled back as they all made their way over. “Everybody back up the stairs,” he continued to some puzzled expressions. “If this is a trap, no sense in all of us getting stuck down here,” he explained.
“Alright; let’s get everyone except Josiah and me upstairs. If the column starts to close for whatever reason, do whatever you have to; just keep it open,” he added.
The rest of the crew ran back to the stairs and made it out. As soon as they called down that they were in position, at the top of the stairs, Josiah approached the final artifact. The artifact was the most impressive one yet. He wondered what role the artifacts played. He also noticed the map fragment folded up underneath. The artifact stood on a golden pedestal with markings and trim distinguishing it as a place of honor. He was readying himself to reach out and grab the last remaining pieces to the puzzle. He had a grappling hook clipped to his belt in case he was in need of a rapid exit. He was as ready as he would ever be. He took a deep breath and grabbed the artifact and map fragment in one motion and for an instant, nothing happened.
Then, a low rumble started from the floor below, and all of the statues began to swivel in his direction. They focused on him and they began to shoot a type of energy he had never seen before. Jesse had seen enough, and was ready to press the recoil button on the grappling gun which would get Josiah out a lot faster, if not a little bumpier. As Josiah was running out of the room, one of the beams of energy hit his leg, tearing through his battle suit and opening up a large gash in his leg. He went down and Jesse pressed the button. The statues all at once fired on where he had been a second earlier, and then they began readjusting to the motion at the edge of the room. As Jesse helped Josiah to his feet, he noticed the solid gold statue crackling with energy and threw himself and Josiah to the floor as a beam shot out above them and took out a good portion of the wall.
He picked Josiah up in a fireman’s carry and ran to where the stairs had been as energy beams were shooting out all around them. The stairs were gone and he could hear a motor trying to close the columned entryway above.
"I’m glad I wedged that rock in there," he said as he fired Helga's grappling hook up through the hole into one of the neighboring columns, ruining the perfect artwork in the process. He didn’t care about the column. He just wanted to get Josiah out of there. He clipped Helga to his belt, grabbed his first officer, and pressed the recoil button. As they were pulled into the air, he could see Reece and Wennagal straining to keep the column from closing on them. He could also see Kimi wedging more rocks in the hinge. It wasn’t going to hold for long, but they only needed a few more seconds. Either way it was going to be close. As he reached solid ground, he quickly pulled Josiah through the hole as the column slid shut with a loud thud.
“We should get going,” he grunted as he threw Josiah on his back and began to run. No one argued, and as they made it to the Temple’s entrance, they felt the earth beneath them begin to rumble.
“This is going to be very bad,” Kimi yelled as she ran for the speeders with Cassie and Reece. They loaded the speeders very quickly and began to drive full speed towards the exit carved into the stone with the warriorbots running next to them. Suddenly, the exit began to close.
“Are you kidding me?” Kimi screamed as she hit the steering yoke hard in frustration.
“Punch it, Kimi,” Josiah wheezed through the pain.
As the three speeders quickly approached, they realized they weren't going to make it through the closing entrance. Suddenly, the closed entrance exploded into rubble as Jesse fired the rockets he had installed on the Mag-lev speeder. They turned back in time to witness the entire cliff collapsing quickly in
to the sea temple and all as they prayed they could outrun the collapse. As the collapsing ground began to catch up to them they continued to drive at full speed; not knowing how far out the collapse would go or if they could outrun it. After nearly five kilometers the collapse finally started to slow.
"We're not gonna make it!" Reece yelled as his speeder began to lose purchase on solid ground. The speeder carrying Reece Wennagal and Shadow teetered on the edge of the cliff as Jesse and Kimi fired grappling guns into each side of the speeder, clipped them to their speeder and began trying to tow them to safety. They weren't making much progress and they were beginning to slip back towards the abyss until the warriorbots chipped in each grabbing the front of the speeder and pulling. The group effort was still not going to be enough to save the speeder, but it was just enough for Wennagal, Shadow and Reece to abandon their seats and climb to the front of the speeder. They were able to jump to solid ground and run to the other speeders as their speeder fell into the chasm. Reece looked up with a smile that said he would rather not do that again. The two speeders continued pushing their limit with the bots beside them just in case, but it looked like they were safe for now.
As they breathed a collective sigh of relief, Collin was making his descent to pick them up when they saw three large armored shuttles descending through the clouds and coming towards their position. They opened fire as both remaining speeders loaded at once with the warriorbots, and the landing bay hatch began to close. Collin had de-cloaked the ship and dropped the shields, as the speeders came aboard and he knew he had to get out of there quickly or they were going to start taking damage.
Jesse called up to the bridge from the landing bay. “Collin, Topanar probably has the Interrogator and two other frigates above us in orbit. The shuttles have probably called in our position. What I need you to do is make best speed to the other side of the planet before we leave the atmosphere. And Lieutenant, buzz the transports on the way out, would ya?”
"Yes, Sir," Collin replied as he hit the thrusters, Endeavor roared past the shuttles only meters away. The violent wind of Endeavor’s wake knocked them off course and caused two to collide in mid air before they righted themselves to finish their descent. Endeavor cloaked when they reached cloud cover and came out of the atmosphere on the far side of the planet. Jesse had made it onto the bridge by that time and noticed that Cassie had taken Josiah’s seat because Josiah was already in the recovery pod. Jesse was sure Suzy was worried about a wound that deep being completely healed just as he was. But they had gotten him in pretty quickly, within seven or eight minutes of the injury. Hopefully it would be enough. Kimi had locked the new pieces to the puzzle away on her way to the bridge.
Jesse had Collin pull Endeavor into close proximity of the Interrogator and instructed SAMMI to intercept and record any communications. He also had SAMMI route them to his comm, and his comm only. His vigilance was rewarded when Captain Topanar received a message from his uncle.
“Marcos beat us to the last clue,” Joldas sighed, frustration evident in his voice.
“Idiot, that artifact is the most important one. We can make do with seven of the ten artifacts, we can even cobble together our own with the dimensions that your woman Kora gave you, but we cannot get the treasure without that final artifact and the key. Right now, we have one artifact and the dimensions of five more; we have to find a way to get that last one.”
“But we have the map, Uncle. Neither Marcos nor Garrinoras will even be able to get to the treasure without it,” Joldas explained.
“True, their map will get them to the right planet, but our map get’s us to an exact location once we have the planet’s location. It also explains how to use the artifacts,” Eliphaz replied. “What happened on the planet, Joldas?”
“Marcos beat us there, I’m not sure by how much, but we arrived just in time to watch the temple collapse into the ocean. Endeavor was fired upon by our transports on the way down but they blew past our ships into the clouds. Their wake caused some minor damage to two of the shuttles. We lost them after that, but it appears they have yet to leave the planet.”
“Well, put your final plan in motion to get Jesse Marcos’ artifacts, we don’t have much time.” With that, the connection was terminated.
Jesse couldn’t wait for Josiah to wake up to share what he’d learned about the treasure. He was sorry for Cassie that Kora was in fact the mole, but he was grateful it was not Reece. Now that he had all of this new information, new plans could be formed. He knew they were only one step away from the treasure and it was only going to get more dangerous from here.
Chapter nine
______
Josiah’s injury was pretty severe; the gash had gone straight through the calf muscle and all the way to the bone. There even seemed to be some damage to the bone. He was in the pod almost forty minutes, which was unusually long for a single injury. That also meant it would be almost a day before Josiah could add his expertise to deciphering the last clue. Suzy looked worried as she went over the data from the recovery pod.
“I was worried about this,” she began. “The wound was too severe for the recovery pod to fully heal. He will make a full recovery, but he’s going to be in some pain for a while. He’ll probably be moving a bit slowly for a couple weeks. He’s going to have an ugly scar, too. It’s a good thing you got him out of there and back to me as quickly as you did, or he might be in even worse shape.”
“This is gonna kill him,” Jesse added. “He’s probably not going to be ready for the final mission to get the treasure. That is, unless we don’t find it for a few weeks. Is there any way we could have him field ready in the next two or three days?” He looked at her imploringly as he asked, not wanting his best friend to miss out on fulfilling his childhood dream.
“Unfortunately, the answer is no,” she started.
“Come on, Suzy, please!” He interrupted. “This is his dream.”
“You think I don’t know that, Jess? You think I don’t care? Of course I do. I know how much this means to him. But my main concern is getting him healthy. I’m sorry, but I just don’t see it happening.”
“I’m sorry, Suzy,” he relented. “I know you care about him as much as I do. I didn’t mean to imply otherwise.” As he turned to leave, he looked back and added with an apologetic smile, “You've always gone above and beyond to take care of both of us, sometimes I forget that.”
______
Jesse reached the storage room and found Kimi and Cassie putting the finishing touches on the last imitation artifact. They had done a great job, and it looked as authentic as the other imitations Josiah had made. Some of that had to do with the fact that it was SAMMI’s processing that added the finishing touches, but the rest of it was just plain artistic skill.
“I had no idea you ladies were such talented artists,” he broke in with a grin.
“Neither did I,” Kimi replied. “I just picked it up from watching Josiah; he’s the master."
“Same here,” Cassie added. “I’ve always been a pro at spotting a fake, but until I saw Josiah working, I had never actually created a fake.”
“Alright, here’s the plan. We're going to bring all of the fake artifacts out to treasure-hunting central, including the fake key. We're going to tell the crew that while Josiah is laid up, we need everyone’s help to get a jump on deciphering the last clue. We’ll be working on it pretty late. After we all get tired, we’ll leave the artifacts out. Josiah's the one that always insists they be locked up, so it will hopefully look to Kora like we forgot or don't have the same vigilance when it comes to the artifacts security. Everyone knows what’s going on except Reece. I haven’t had a chance to talk to him yet. We will be landing back on Kaldor in about fifteen hours, at which time Kimi and I will be going directly to see Mayor Valinor. Hopefully, she’ll make her move while we’re out. Kimi isn’t going to see the Mayor. She is going to be hiding, ready to follow Kora, hopefully to Topanar’s ship. If we get lucky enough, we can g
et his artifact and his map, and then we’ll have everything we need. The mole will be gone, Topanar will have bad info and we’ll be on our way. Plus, there will be one less player in the game."
______
Reece did not take the news of Kora’s treachery well. Even after Jesse let him listen to the intercepted transmission, he was still unsure. Apparently, Reece had very strong feelings for Kora, and wasn’t quite ready to let go.
“But if I can just talk to her…”
“Absolutely not, Reece,” Jesse countered. “Anything you say could put our entire plan in jeopardy. You can’t confront her at all. Look at it this way: if I’m wrong, and she doesn’t try to take our artifacts, then nothing bad has happened. I’ll apologize profusely for my lack of trust, and eventually we’ll get past it. But if I’m right, and it appears at this point as if I am, then we find out for sure. Not only that, but this way Kora doesn’t get hurt and we trip Topanar up in the process.”
“I don’t know if I can do it, Jess. I really like her. I know I’m always confident around women, but I don't find one I really like very often.”
“I'm sorry, Reece, but this is how it has to be."
“Jess, this is really hard for me,”
“I know it is, and we are all here for you if you need us. But you have to promise me, you won’t confront her or hint in any way that we know about her and Topanar.”
“You have my word,” he replied. “Now, I just hope this is all a big mistake.” He added as he turned and walked away.
______
As Endeavor landed in Kaldor’s spaceport, Jesse, Kimi and Commando left immediately in a speeder the Mayor had sent for them. Kimi got out of the speeder about a half-kilometer away and jumped into an aircar with a man the Mayor had sent. The man identified himself as Agent Sandstorm. They found a nice place within sight of Endeavor’s landing bay to wait for Kora to take the bait.
