by Paul Sussman
She didn’t seem to get what he was talking about and he had to repeat the question.
‘The uranium,’ he said wearily, nodding at the plane. ‘What are you going to do with the uranium? Given that your friend Saddam didn’t turn out to be such a good friend after all.’
She shrugged.
‘We’re not going to do anything with it.’
‘What do mean you’re not going to do anything with it?’
‘Exactly that. We’ll leave it here.’
‘Please, Molly, no more games.’
‘I’m not playing games, Flin. We’re leaving the cases exactly where they are, we’re not touching them.’
‘You spend twenty-three years and God knows how many millions of dollars scouring the western desert, you kill my friend, very nearly kill me and Freya, and now you’ve found what you’re looking for you’re just going to leave it here.’
She nodded.
‘What the fuck are you talking about?’ His voice exploded, hands clenching into fists, shaking at her, all the frustration and bewilderment of the last ten minutes erupting from him like spume from a geyser. ‘Twenty-three years and you’re just going to leave it here! Fifty fucking kilograms of highly enriched fucking uranium and after all this you’re just going to leave it here!’
She stared at him, unfazed by his outburst. There was a pause, Kiernan and Girgis exchanging another look. Then:
‘There is no uranium, Flin.’
Kiernan’s voice was calm, curiously matter-of-fact.
‘What? What did you say?’
Flin held a hand to his ear, clearly thinking he’d misheard her.
‘There is no uranium,’ she repeated. ‘There never was any uranium.’
He just stood there, gawping.
‘Leonid Kanunin, the Russian who was picking up the other end of the deal – he pulled a fast one; took his $50 million and handed over eight canisters full of steel ball-bearings. Someone in his organization tipped us off a couple of days after the plane came down.’
Behind them Girgis let out another throaty chuckle.
‘We confronted Mr Kanunin, talked it through over dinner. Sadly he didn’t seem to enjoy what was on the menu.’
He murmured something to his companions and they too broke into laughter.
‘I appreciate your concern, Flin, really I do,’ continued Kiernan, ‘but even if al-Qaeda or some such group did happen to stumble on the plane – which given the trouble we’ve had finding it I think is highly unlikely – well …’
She smiled.
‘I don’t imagine the might of the American military machine will be overly troubled by someone launching handfuls of miniature metal balls at them.’
All the colour had drained from Flin’s face and his arms hung limply at his sides. He seemed to have aged ten years in the space of as many minutes.
‘Don’t believe me?’ Kiernan came to her feet and held out an arm towards the plane’s door. ‘Take a look for yourself.’
He did, pushing past her and clambering up into the Antonov. The sound of movement echoed from within the plane before he reappeared with one of the metal canisters clasped in his hand. He unscrewed the lid and upended it. A rush of ball-bearings poured out, pattering onto the sand at his feet with a soft tinkling sound. His face was so pale Freya thought he was going to be sick.
‘But why?’ he mumbled, his voice dazed, unsteady. ‘I don’t understand. Why spend twenty-three years looking for a consignment of uranium that didn’t even exist?’
‘But we haven’t been looking for it,’ said Kiernan, moving across the glade and taking up position beside Girgis. ‘It’s not about the uranium. It was never about the uranium.’
‘So what the hell is it about?’
‘It’s about the Benben, Flin.’
His eyes widened.
‘That’s what we’ve been looking for all these years, ever since we picked up that last broadcast from Rudi Schmidt, found out the plane had come down in the Hidden Oasis. The uranium was never anything more than a side-show. It was the Benben we were interested in. It’s always been the Benben.’
Her voice was soft, almost seductive, her eyes glinting.
‘What is it that old cuneiform tablet says? The one in the Hermitage museum. A weapon in the form of a stone. And with this weapon the enemies of Egypt in the north are destroyed and in the south are destroyed and in the east and the west are beaten into dust so that their king rules all the lands and none shall stand against him nor come against him nor ever defeat him. For in his hand is the mace of the gods.’
She held the walkie-talkie above her head as though it were a weapon. Beaming, triumphant.
‘I tell you, Flin, if this thing is half as powerful as the sources make out there’s not an evildoer in the world that will dare stand against us. Not an Iranian, not a Russian, not a Chink. Not any of those tinpot African or South American oddballs. Nobody. Absolute power, absolute security, a new world order. A proper order. God’s order. When you look at it like that a twenty-three-year search and $50 million commission seem positively cheap at the price. Don’t you think?’
In front of her Flin stepped forward, mouth opening to speak. Before he could, the silence was shattered by a raucous laugh.
‘A rock! A goddam rock!’
It was the first time Freya had spoken. Up to this point she had remained silent, standing alongside Flin as the story unfolded, no less shocked than him, no less outraged, occasionally letting out the odd gasp or muttered expletive but otherwise keeping a low profile. Now she could hold back no longer.
‘You killed my sister for a piece of fucking rock!’ she cried, her voice teetering on the edge of hysteria. ‘You were going to cut off my arm because of some half-arsed legend? What sort of madwoman are you? What sort of fucked-up screwball …’
She started towards Kiernan, covering about half the distance between them before she felt Flin’s hand around her arm, pulling her to a standstill, heaving her firmly back to his side. Thirty seconds ago he had seemed a broken man. Now his entire demeanour was transformed, his body erect and tense, his gaze focused unswervingly on Kiernan.
‘Be careful, Molly,’ he said, his tone sharp and urgent. ‘Whatever you think you’re going to do with this thing, please, be very careful.’
Freya yanked her arm from his grip and stared at him aghast.
‘You’re not telling me you believe this shit?’
He ignored her, eyes still locked on Kiernan.
‘Please, Molly. There are things here we don’t understand, forces … you have to be careful.’
‘What is this bullshit!’ yelled Freya.
‘Molly, I’m begging you, this is not something to fuck around with. You can’t just blunder in there …’
‘We’re not blundering anywhere,’ said Kiernan. ‘We’ve had twenty-three years to prepare for this. We’ve got the best weapons experts, the most advanced scanning systems …’
‘For God’s sake, Molly, this isn’t something you can just press a button and detonate. There are things going on here, unknown elements … It’s beyond anything …’
He was fighting for the right words.
‘We don’t understand it,’ he ended up saying. ‘We just don’t understand it. You have to be careful.’
Beside him Freya was uncertain whether to scream in frustration or burst into derisive laughter. She didn’t get the chance to do either because at that moment there was a crackle of static and a voice echoed from the walkie-talkie in Kiernan’s hand. An American voice.
‘That’s it, Ms Kiernan. We’re all set up.’
She nodded. Lifting the unit to her mouth, she pressed the Talk button.
‘Thank you, Dr Meadows. We’re on our way.’
Flin started to protest again, but she held up a hand.
‘You’re a sweetheart, Flin, and believe me I’m touched by your concern, particularly after everything I’ve just told you. But from this point on the ones who
are really going to need to be careful are the enemies of America and our Lord God Jesus Christ. It’s His mighty hand behind this, I can feel it. I’ve always felt it. And let me tell you, Flin, the time is long overdue for that hand to strike down in righteous anger upon the heads of the wicked. Now if you don’t mind, I’ve been waiting many years for this moment and really would like to get up there and see what’s going on. You’ll join us, of course.’
This last comment was phrased as a command, not a request. She threw a hard, malevolent look at Freya – clearly displeased by her earlier outburst – and turned away, walking off through the grove of palm trees that surrounded the plane.
‘Oh, and Romani,’ she called over her shoulder, ‘you might want to give Professor Brodie a quick pat-down. I do believe he snuck a side-arm under his T-shirt when he went back into the plane.’
‘Shit,’ murmured Flin.
They returned to the processional way with its weed-choked marble pavement and interspersed sphinxes and obelisks, following it as it climbed gently upwards through the centre of the oasis. Kiernan, Girgis and his two colleagues walked ahead, the twins brought up the rear, guns in hand; Flin and Freya were locked tight in the middle of the group.
‘It’s a bluff, right?’ she asked, keeping her voice low. ‘All that stuff about the stone. You’re bluffing them, right?’
‘I’m deadly serious,’ said Flin, his gaze on the rock platform and monumental gateway looming above the tree-tops in front of them.
‘You’re telling me you believe all this X-Files crap?’
‘A lot of different sources from a lot of different places all say exactly the same thing about the Benben, which suggests there must be some truth to it.’
‘But it’s bullshit! A rock with supernatural powers! Bullshit!’
‘Two hours ago I flew over the Gilf and there wasn’t an oasis here, and then suddenly …’ He waved a hand around them. ‘Strange things happen. And if the ancient texts are to be believed, bad things to those who misuse the Benben.’
‘Bullshit,’ she retorted. ‘Hocus-pocus bullshit.’
He looked across at her and then away again.
‘Well it’s all academic because after everything Molly’s told us I very much doubt she’s going to let us just walk out of here. And even if she does, Girgis certainly won’t. First chance we get we run for it. OK? First chance.’
Their eyes met.
‘And whether you think it’s bullshit or not, when we get into the temple don’t touch anything or do anything that might …’
‘Make the Benben angry? Hurt its feelings?’
Her tone was sarcastic.
‘Just be careful,’ he said. ‘I know it sounds crazy, but please, just be careful.’
He held her gaze to make sure she’d got the message, then looked forward again.
‘Bullshit,’ she murmured underneath her breath. ‘Hocus-pocus bullshit.’
They trudged on, deeper and deeper into the gorge, their feet sinking into the sponge of moss with which much of the paving was carpeted, the cliffs to either side gradually opening out like the mouth of a funnel. The sun blazed down, its fierce light washing out the rich greens of the vegetation, everything blanching and merging so that the valley looked an altogether less beautiful place than it had when they first entered it. It was hotter too. Not as suffocating as it would have been out in the wider desert, but no longer comfortably balmy either. Flies buzzed and flitted around their heads; they started to sweat.
On several occasions Freya was sure that she glimpsed figures in the undergrowth. They were shadowy and indistinct, and with Kiernan setting a rapid pace in front of them there wasn’t time to pause for a closer look. The causeway started to rise at a sharper angle, the trees crowding in closer around them, the temple coming in and out of sight through the foliage ahead. They encountered flights of cracked stone steps. Sporadic at first, they became more frequent as the causeway transformed into a vast, root-covered staircase that carried them upwards at an ever steeper gradient until at last they emerged on the summit of the rock platform. In front of them, swaddled in heavy cloaks of ivy and creeper, rose the monumental pylon gateway they had seen from afar, each of its trapezoid towers carved with the obelisk and sedjet sign, its lintel with an image of the sacred Benu bird. Exactly the same as in Rudi Schmidt’s photographs but for one difference. In the photographs the gateway’s wooden doors had been firmly closed. Now they were thrown wide open.
Flin slowed to a standstill, taking it in. Kiernan and the Egyptians were in no mood to dawdle. Striding up to the gates, they hurried through with barely a glance at the surrounding architecture, the twins herding Flin and Freya through after them. They passed between the towers – soaring cliffs of milky limestone – and into a vast courtyard, its walls cluttered with traffic jams of hieroglyphs, its paving, like that of the causeway they had just ascended, choked with moss and grass and weeds. In places trees – palm and acacia and sycamore – had forced their way up between the stone slabs, heaving them aside, giving the space a curiously broken, crumpled look as if it was slowly folding in on itself.
‘Extraordinary,’ murmured Flin, gazing around, fascinated despite himself. ‘Unbelievable.’
They crossed the court, grass swishing around their ankles, and approached a second pylon on the far side. This one was even larger than the first and also decorated with images. On the left-hand tower a human figure with the head of a hawk held aloft an obelisk in the palm of its hand, while below, much smaller, a line of men seemed to stumble backwards, their hands clasped to their eyes. On the right-hand tower was an almost identical composition save that the human figure was now topped with a lion’s head, and the men below were holding their hands to their ears.
‘The gods Ra and Sekhmet,’ explained Flin as they drew near, pointing left and then right, ‘each embodying a different aspect of the Benben’s powers: Ra, a blinding light, Sekhmet, a deafening sound.’
‘You don’t say,’ muttered Freya, no more ready to believe any of it than she had been ten minutes previously.
They walked on through this second gateway, across another court – this one crowded with dozens upon dozens of obelisks, some plain, others inscribed, some no taller than a man, others ten times as high – and through a third pylon. As they emerged, Kiernan and Girgis came to an abrupt halt. Even they were now gaping in astonishment.
In front of the group a third courtyard opened out. It was twice as big as the previous two, which had themselves been enormous, its enclosing walls lined with gigantic statues of gods and men. At its opposite end the façade of a colossal temple reared skywards, every inch of its monumental stonework – walls and columns and architraves and cornices – painted in brilliant shades of red and blue and green and yellow, the colours rich and vibrant even in the glaring sunlight, every bit as fresh as when they had first been applied thousands of years previously.
It was not the temple itself that took their collective breath away, however. It was the gargantuan obelisk that erupted, rocket-like, from the centre of the space in front of it. Well over thirty metres tall and covered from base to tip in beaten gold, it gleamed in the rays of the sun, filling the court with a dazzling blaze of light as though the air itself was on fire.
‘Holy God Almighty,’ growled Girgis.
For a moment they all stood there staring at it, spellbound. Even the normally expressionless twins were wide-eyed with wonder. Then, with a click of her fingers to drag them back to the business in hand, Kiernan led them on. Passing the base of the obelisk – now they were up close they could see that each of its four faces was inscribed with minute columns of alternating sedjet signs and Benu birds – they approached the temple entrance.
Three muscular figures in sunglasses, combat trousers and flak jackets stood guard amid the columns lining the front of the building.
‘Who’s the boy band?’ asked Flin. ‘Special Forces? Or have you gone private for this particular jaunt?’
‘Christ, it makes Karnak look like a suburban bungalow,’ muttered Flin, gazing around.
Further and further they walked, moving ever deeper into the building – the only sounds the pad of their feet and the wheezing of Girgis’s cigarette-smoking colleague – until eventually they emerged into a courtyard at what must have been the very heart of the temple complex. It was a secluded space, smaller than the courts at the front of the temple, with a lotus-filled pond at its centre and a giant eucalyptus tree pushing up through the paving against its left-hand wall. Opposite, on the far side of the pond, stood a squat stone building. Plain and unadorned, it was constructed of crudely cut and unevenly laid blocks and seemed wholly out of place amid the imposing architecture that surrounded it. Although she couldn’t be sure, Freya sensed that it was far older and more primitive than the rest of the temple complex and had probably already stood on the site for an immeasurable age before the earliest foundations of the adjoining structures had even been dug.
‘Per Benben,’ Flin informed her. ‘The House of the Benben.’
Despite his obvious interest, Freya couldn’t help but notice a hint of anxiety in his voice.
They circled the pond and came up to the building’s single low doorway, which was covered by a reed curtain. A tangled spaghetti of cables snaked out and across to a row of portable generators grumbling in the corner of the yard. The man in the lab coat drew the curtain aside, revealing a short passage with a second drape blocking the other end. Again he spoke to Kiernan in hushed tones before waving them in.
