She had to admit looking at it that way made it seem much more plausible. It was well documented that the Vatican had banned and destroyed many books, along with any other evidence that contradicted their teachings, over the centuries, so why not this, too? The answer, Sarah reasoned, was that such a theory falls down when you think about the scale of the potential cover up. Could they really police the whole world so thoroughly?
Once again there was a counter-argument. What if the population of Homo gigantis hadn’t been that large, or had been condensed into certain areas? Not to mention the fact that fossil records, while appearing comprehensive, are anything but; this misconception was mainly due to the sheer mass of media coverage, films and books warping our sense of perspective. Conventional predictions indicate that a mere two per cent of all species that have ever lived will have been preserved. In many instances, millions of years go unaccounted for in terms of any kind of significant animal finds and evolutionary continuity is ridiculously underpinned. There is little to no proof that anything actually evolved at all, apart from the more recent biological remains and the observation of evolution in modern times.
The fact that evolutionary theory was correct was not in question in this instance. What was in question was the fact that it was not currently proved by the fossil record or by any other means of using ancient records. Extremely old, preserved DNA may begin to make this argument redundant, but for now it is a very real fact; we know very little about Earth’s evolutionary history and have only scratched the surface of what was in our past.
All these assertions, according to Sarah’s circle of like-minded individuals, were why a single powerful organisation such as the Catholic Church had the motivation, means and opportunity to be able to cover up the existence of a whole species.
A flaw still existed, however. Over the last hundred years many scientific discoveries had been made to challenge a whole raft of religious teachings, Catholic or otherwise. So why still cover it up? Something else must be going on, some other reason to hide this from the world. Wild claims suggested by her friends swirled dizzyingly around in her head as she drifted into a deeper sleep.
♦
‘Sarah!’
‘What?’ she murmured, rolling over, away from the sound.
‘Sarah, wake up will you.’
She felt a foot nudging her side; groaning, she opened bleary eyes and saw Trish looming large above her.
‘Sarah, I’ve been calling you for ages. The winds have died down, come on, we’ve got a few hours left till nightfall, let’s get to the dig site.’
‘Sorry, I must have been dozing.’
‘Sound-O is more like it,’ Trish said, amused. ‘Come on, Saz, let’s get going!’
Grunting a little, and accepting a helping hand from her friend, Sarah pushed herself up. ‘You’ve got far too much energy for your own good,’ she grumbled.
Trish laughed. ‘Ha! Pot, kettle, black is all I have to say to that.’
She had a point, Sarah had been like a woman possessed these past few weeks. She’d pushed her small team to the limits to cover as much ground as possible around the area where she had discovered the previous year’s finds, which included the hair, finger bones and the small cast metal pentagonal disc. The disc had a small hoop on one edge, like a pendant, enabling her to hang it in on a chain around her neck. Instinctively she pushed a hand onto her thick puffer jacket and felt the object press reassuringly against her chest. This was one thing she was determined never to let out of her sight again, doubly so in light of recent events. She’d been keeping it at her apartment while she waited for the other artefacts to be dated at the lab. Initial tests had revealed no residual presence of carbon-14 outside or within the disc, rendering it impervious to the dating technique. Luckily this had ensured it was not amongst the other objects when the vault was broken into back in Oxford.
With Trish by her side, Sarah made her way to the current site of excavation. A number of hours soon passed and after much digging and relocating, Sarah found herself off on her own on a particular bit of ground, slowly removing earth and rock with her pick and shovel. She’d found anomalies there with her favourite bit of kit, a hand-held ground-penetrating imager, which made finding fossils and buried objects much easier as the resolution meant you could virtually see through stone. It cut days or even weeks off normal dig times.
The imager had been around for some time, but it used to be extremely expensive and unwieldy; however, with innovative technical advances in its manufacture, it was now lightweight and a lot cheaper – still expensive, but well worth the money. Sarah had also upgraded the scanner’s software and added some lines of code herself to further improve performance, something she felt quite proud of.
Prior to Sarah’s reputation going down the plughole she had also managed to acquire some much sought-after satellite time. Using infra-red satellite technology enabled massive areas to be scanned from space, resulting in spectacular finds. The idea had been pioneered in the early twenty-first century when it had unveiled the lost cityscapes of Egypt, including the phenomenal finds of seventeen pyramids buried for millennia in the desert sands. Since then many lost tombs and treasures had been unearthed, eclipsing even those of the infamous Tutankhamun. It was truly a new golden age of archaeological discovery and Sarah had got in on the act and requisitioned mapping of some areas around Mount Ararat. At the time people bemoaned the waste of such resources on an innocuous piece of land, but Sarah knew that significant finds had been made there in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, when an Islamic expedition from within the Ottoman Empire had unearthed bones of giant humans.
The scriptures that indicated this had been found in an old Islamic library in the city of Samsun, Turkey. Supposedly Samsun also had many caves which had contained the bones of seven foot tall humans; none had been recovered, however. Sarah herself had been there many times without her searches coming to fruition. Obviously she hadn’t said in the official mapping request form that she was searching for giants based on passages contained within old Islamic texts. Instead she put together a feasible yet flimsy argument for finding Noah’s Ark on the plains around Ararat Lesser, the smaller of the two peaks of the Mount.
She hadn’t expected to get approval, truth be known, and when it came she had nearly fallen off her seat. The resulting scans revealed various anomalies, although none were boat-like or large enough to warrant further study – officially. Sarah kept the scans, however, and in her own time she went out on numerous occasions to the large expanse to unearth the more promising areas. That was how she had found the maps, fragments, hair and her pendant. If she were to find further evidence, it would be here.
Getting down on her hands and knees she heaved over a large stone to reveal – she held her breath – the skeleton of a long dead sheep. Cursing her luck she stood up and took a swig of water. That was the only downside to the imager, you may be able to find various things that looked like finds of the century, but ninety-nine times out of a hundred you’d end up with bugger all.
Jason came over to see how she was faring. ‘Anything?’ he said.
She pointed at the very ordinary bones with her foot.
He put his hand on her shoulder consolingly. ‘Shall we call it a night? The light’s almost gone.’
She looked up at the sky; night approached, its blackness seeing off its antithesis, the colours of the day. ‘Let’s get the generators out; we can get in another five hours minimum.’
‘Seriously? We haven’t got that much fuel left,’ he said, looking dubious. ‘If we run out it’s a long way back to the nearest town that can supply us with more.’
‘If we have to go back, we have to go back. It doesn’t make much difference if it’s in a couple of days or a week. Let’s push on now; we always get more done when we’re in the groove.’
‘You’re the boss, boss.’ He mock-saluted and went off to set up the lighting rigs, Sarah following to get the gennies started.
Sarah and Trish were scanning a new section of land some time later when a shout went up a hundred metres away. Sarah looked at Trish, who appeared as surprised as she must have done. They dropped their tools and half-ran half-leapt over the rough terrain to where Jason and Carl had excavated a deep trench. Lights blazed down as a generator chugged away in the background. A small digger sat motionless off to one side of the hole. They were lucky to have been able to hire one on such short notice, and Sarah hoped it was worth the money as she crouched down and peered into the pit, Trish alongside her. Jason danced a jig and whooped in joy while Carl, hunkered down against a wall of sediment, teased something from its vertical face, brushing round it with care. She caught a glimpse of what looked like bone.
‘What is it? What have you found, you fool?!’ Trish said to the exuberant Jason.
‘It’s only bloody amazing, it’s bloody beautiful is what it is!’ He came over and gave Trish a big hug and a kiss.
‘Argg, get off you big oaf!’
Sarah wasn’t listening to them; she was transfixed by what Carl was extracting from the crumbling layers. Finally, after what seemed an eternity, he moved it clear and held it up to the light for everyone to see. Trish gasped. Jason was ranting loudly and Sarah just stared in disbelief. Carl held aloft a skull. Not an animal skull, but a human one, and it was big … very big.
Cradling the object like a mother with a newborn child, Carl brought the skull over and passed it to Sarah, who gingerly, almost reverently, placed it on the ground so Trish and Jason could look without fear of it dropping and, heaven forbid, breaking apart. On closer inspection it wasn’t Homo sapiens, not just because of its size, but due to the massive ridges on the frontal bone, large nasal cavity, wide zygomatic bone and subtle elliptical orbits. This was not from an abnormally large human and nor was it a deformation, or not any that she knew of. Coupled with its location and her previous finds, there was only one conclusion, this was Homo gigantis. This was the holy grail of her quest. Proof beyond doubt!
A hand touched her shoulder, it was Trish. ‘Sarah, are you okay?’
‘I—’ She glanced at her friend. ‘Yes, more than okay.’
‘Only you’re crying,’ Jason said.
‘Am I?’ She wiped her face with the back of a grubby hand; looking at it she noticed wet streaks cutting through the dirt. She went back to looking at the skull, turning it over with the gentleness of a lover. With the greatest care she prised off some hard earth to reveal very human-looking teeth; very large teeth, but very human nonetheless.
Carl went to retrieve a secure container from the utility vehicle and on his return Sarah placed the skull inside, making sure it was well protected by surrounding materials inside the box. They all looked at Sarah in expectation, wondering what she wanted them to do next.
‘I think an all-nighter is in order,’ she said, staying calm. However, the sparkle in her eyes betrayed her excitement.
‘I suddenly don’t feel tired any more,’ said Jason.
Trish grinned. ‘Me neither.’
They turned to Carl, who just gave a solemn nod in agreement.
‘Let’s get to it then, people,’ Sarah said, clapping her hands together to gee them up.
By first light they had unearthed nearly a full skeleton, approximately eight and a half feet long, and that wasn’t all; after a few hours working in the trench, Sarah had gone back to the scan site that she had been surveying prior to the skull being found. She’d noticed a very strange reading; the imager’s OLED display appeared to indicate that there was solid metal below the ground.
Knowing the others still had their work cut out with the skeleton, Sarah desperately wanted to make a personal find of her own. She felt the anticipation growing within her as the hours passed, digging down ever deeper. A loud metallic clank accompanied by a vibration through the pick handle told her she’d hit whatever lurked buried below. Cursing her stupidity, she switched to a trowel. She prayed she hadn’t damaged whatever lay down there; she was getting tired, making mistakes. She was still annoyed at herself for letting the skull be taken out of the ground prior to in situ photos and other data being taken and catalogued. Get a grip, Morgan, she berated herself.
Taking a long draught of gasoline-strength coffee from her flask, she continued more warily.
More time came and went and sunlight blazed forth, announcing a new day, as she finally hauled out a strange oval metal casket. She caressed its smooth, unmarked surface. The pick had not made a scratch; it looked polished and shone as if it had been made only the day before. Brushing off the remaining dirt and dust, she pulled it a little further out of the deep hole she’d dug. It was heavy, perhaps thirty kilos. She hadn’t realised she’d been holding her breath; she let it out with a whooshing noise. She wasn’t sure what was more amazing, the skeleton or this. The skeleton, she decided, still the skeleton. But this – what is it? Is it related to the skeleton or is it Islamic buried treasure? It doesn’t look like any Islamic artefact I’ve ever seen.
It wasn’t, as Sarah had first thought, solid, as a fine gap encircled it. She ran her fingers along the line and around its whole circumference. Picking up the shovel, she noticed its flat straight blade and then looked at the casket. Well, the pick had no effect and it hit it hard, she reasoned, so prising it apart with this should be fine. She braced the casket by putting it back in the hole, but tilted it upwards to expose the join. Placing the edge of the shovel along the line she took a deep breath and brought her foot down with half-force – nothing. No movement at all. She tried again with full force – still nothing. Frustrated, she threw down the shovel and went to the pickup for a set of fine-edged bolster chisels, a club hammer and a pry bar. As she neared the main site, she noticed Jason at the side of the utility vehicle where the skull and other bones were being stored, looking furtive.
‘You all right, Jas?’ Sarah said, as she approached.
He spun round, looking a little worried that she was there. ‘Yeah, I’m fine, just putting some bones in for storage.’
She noticed he slipped something into his pocket as he turned round and made his way back to the trench. She watched him walk away, wondering what he was up to. Too wired and in the zone to give it any more thought, she collected the tools she wanted and went back to the casket. After a while she had all the chisels inserted evenly around the gap. Going to each one in turn, she knocked them in a little further every time around until the top popped up by half an inch.
With her heart racing again, saliva built up in her mouth in anticipation; she swallowed and calmed herself. Most of the chisels had dropped onto the dirt, so she pulled the last couple out and lifted the lid upwards. Since the winds had died down overnight it was very still out on the edge of the Turkish plain, and an odd metallic smell lingered in the air as she moved the lid away and looked inside. Sunken into a circular hole, the size of a dinner plate, a large handle protruded. She gripped it with both hands and pulled hard; it came out in one smooth motion with a satisfying sucking pop. Sarah stumbled back before regaining her balance, then put the insert to one side and looked into the now unobstructed opening.
A number of objects nestled inside; all were quite strange and nothing like anything she had seen before, apart from something that looked like a larger version of her pendant. Reaching in, she drew it out. Measuring two and a half inches in diameter, it felt cold to the touch, as if it had been stored in a fridge. It was also slightly different to her artefact, not only in size, but in design. Whereas hers was quite simple, pentagonal with a single circle in the middle, this was ornate in comparison. Multiple symbols had been embossed onto its surface in what appeared to be some kind of text, although it didn’t look like any script she’d ever seen. They weren’t pictograms so it was either made before the earliest major civilisations or later. Considering where it was and what they had just found, she was betting it was pre-Babylonian by a long shot; perhaps even pre-human.
She noted that, unlike
hers, this one had a metal clip at one end which she easily popped open using a couple of fingers. She looked inside to see it contained a roll of parchment. With her fingertips, she managed to coax it out. About to unfurl it, she paused. Was that an approaching vehicle she could hear? Slipping the paper-like material back into the large pendant, for it too had a hoop at one end, Sarah moved around from behind the craggy outcrop of rock where she’d been working to see that it wasn’t one vehicle, but five. Two black military looking short wheel-based lorries and three large desert-coloured SUVs roared up around the dig site, one peeling off towards Sarah, who rushed back to the canister-like box she’d just dug up. Yanking out items she stuffed them into her pockets; chucked a few under some rocks, and then they were on her. Two armed men jumped out of the SUV and grabbed her from behind, dragging her backwards as she tried to escape. She kicked, struggled and shouted at them before being slammed up against the side of the vehicle for her troubles. With rough efficiency, they then stripped her down to her underwear and removed all the artefacts she‘d concealed in her clothing.
She started to shiver as the two men swept the area. ‘Is that everything?’ one of them asked her after they had gathered together most of the items she’d hidden. Sarah glared at him with baleful eyes and didn’t answer.
‘It doesn’t matter,’ said the second man, ‘we’ll pick this site clean when the others get here.’
‘What others?’ Sarah said. ‘Who the fuck are you?’
The men ignored her. One of them picked up her clothes and shoved them into her midriff. After she had dressed they marched her over to the others. Trish looked terrified and Jason bled from a gash to his head. There was no sign of Carl.
Revelations Page 5
