These cans of oil had been found in their food crates in place of food and were of no use, except for what David’s friend had cooked up. The tops of these large cans of oil had been carefully punctured and old rags and cleaning towels had been inserted into the oil, so that just a few inches of oily rag was visible.
Now a procession of polar scientists made their way to pre-marked positions along each side of the runway, placed their oil cans on the ice, and using flairs ignited the oily wicks. The light of the burning oil was not red like the flairs, but was a bright yellow. The two dozen smudge pots outlining the runway shone like yellow fog lights through the snow haze and darkness.
The flight to the Pole was somewhat more turbulent than the previous run to McMurdo, and David was again aware the conditions outside were not only pitch black, but cloudy. The running lights on the wingtips often disappeared as they passed through thick snow clouds. There was no conversation in the headset until the pilot had begun his descent. Again lowering the landing skids, he punched some numbers into the communication console and hailed the lab. There was no tower at this air strip, but someone immediately responded.
The voice said, “McMurdo flight zero-zero-one, you are clear to land on strip number one; there is no other traffic in the area.”
Although the pilot was tense, he chuckled at this landing clearance and replied, “Permission to land this grocery truck on runway one; but we can’t see anything in this low cloud ceiling and blowing snow, how is it marked?”
“You can’t miss it,” came the reply.
And on cue, a double row of yellow lights became faintly visible through the wind screen, and the pilot adjusted his glide toward the runway. The wind here was approaching 20 knots, and the landing was rough. The pilot sat the big LC-130 down hard and struggled to keep it running straight as he reversed the thrust of the four big engines. Snow billowed around the wings and fuselage as they drifted to a stop. Turning around, the food-laden LC 130 taxied up to a cluster of 47 dancing and waving scientists.
On the way back up the runway, David noticed the makeshift smudge pots and immediately realized what they were. How to make lemonade out of lemons, he thought to himself, as he watched the child-like dancing in the flickering light amid this winter darkness. He was suddenly struck by an image of the miracle of the oil for the altar lamp when the Second Temple in Jerusalem was cleansed and rededicated in 165 BC following the Maccabean Revolt. As a child on winter solstice, he had celebrated Hanukkah with singing and dancing and children’s games. In all those years, since his early childhood, he had never been filled with the true Joy of God’s miracle of the oil as he was at this moment. This is a true Festival of Light.
11
The Well of Souls
And after the earthquake a fire;
But the Lord was not in the fire:
And after the fire a still small voice.
-I Kings 19:12
After he had waved to David and watched the LC-130 lift off from the Christchurch field on its way to McMurdo, Oliver scratched his scruffy, three-day beard and looked at his wristwatch. He suddenly realized it was not Wednesday, but Thursday, the 12th of June. Their flight from the U. S. had taken them over the International Date Line on the way to New Zealand.
“We’ve even less time than I thought,” he said out loud to no one in particular.
Maxine walked up to the tarmac with her luggage and placed it next to Oliver’s. “How’s the arm?” she asked.
“The bleeding’s stopped, but it hurts. Fortunately the muscle was not too badly injured, and I may be able to walk around without this sling in a day or two. By the way, I’m going to have to buy some loose-fitting, cool clothes when we get to Jerusalem. It’s going to be hot there, and I want to cover this bulky bandage on my arm. None of these heavy winter clothes will do. We’ll both have to do some quick summer shopping upon arrival in Israel.”
“I agree, we’re going to have to look like tourists on this sensitive mission. And Oliver, once you get your arm out of that sling, you should shave. We certainly don’t want to attract attention to ourselves.”
Oliver noted Maxine’s somber mood had lifted somewhat after yesterday’s tragic events. They boarded the aircraft when the fueling was completed and the pilot had done an extra-thorough walk-around. Oliver’s pain medication had made him drowsy, and Maxine had noticed his sleepiness even before they entered the aircraft.
“You sleep while I fly the airplane,” she said, pulling a blanket up over him as he reclined in his seat.
He replied, “Max, you just saved my life back there, I trust you completely.”
For the first time since the deadly gun battle, she gave him a warm smile. Oliver felt relieved, knowing she was now beginning to relax following this attack. He knew the two of them would be working closely together in Jerusalem as they faced their most dangerous challenge yet. This next mission would require a calm and rational approach he was sure Max was capable of, but which he was only now beginning to see in her demeanor.
The G450 rose from the Christchurch field and began the long flight across the Tasman Sea and North Australia to Malaysia. Maxine took the first turn at copilot so Oliver could rest. After six hours, when the pain medication had worn off, Oliver awoke with a stiff left arm; but once he stood and moved around, the pain was no worse than before. Maxine had left the cockpit and was again thumbing through the Bible Oliver had earlier pulled out of his bag. “I can’t find any reference to ‘Foundation Stone’ in the Bible. What and where is it?”
“Jerusalem was already very old city when the Temple of Solomon was built on a hill, around 960 B.C. The central part of the temple, the Holy of Holies, was built upon the ‘Foundation Stone’, where it is believed Abraham stood with knife in hand preparing to sacrifice his son. Jews and Christians believe this son was Isaac, and Muslims believe it was Ishmael. All see this stone as the foundation of their faith, the origin of their people.
“After the Temple of Solomon was built, this stone became the resting place for the Arc of the Covenant, within the Holy of Holies. Over the centuries the original temple was destroyed and rebuilt. After the Second Temple was destroyed in the first century by the Romans, this place of worship was reconstructed by Muslims as the Dome of the Rock. For some period of time this mosque, built around the ‘foundation Stone’ of Abraham, was Islam’s most holy place, even surpassing Mecca in importance.
“Today, the Western Wall is all that’s left of the old Jewish temple and is regularly visited by Jews as the place now closest to the Holy of Holies, the center of the old temple, now denied to them because it’s the center of the Dome of the Rock. There’s an underground cavern some call the Holy of Holies that is now an attraction near one end of the Western Wall. They call it that only because it is as close as they are allowed to get to the true one. You can visit it by walking through an excavated tunnel, part of the old viaduct.”
“I thought all excavation under Temple Mount was stopped by the authorities to prevent more Israel-Palestine tension.”
“It has been, but this access was opened a century ago and does not lead far beneath Temple Mount. I did hear of some rumors indicating illegal excavations have been carried out by unknown parties to open up those tunnels that run under the Dome of the Rock. Since the holiest of rocks, ‘The Foundation Rock’, sits upon the Well of Souls, many have sought access to it over the years believing it is connected to an ancient network of water viaducts that run underground throughout the old city.
“During the crusades The Dome of the Rock became the headquarters for the Knights Templar as they provided protection for Christian pilgrims visiting Jerusalem. There’s a set of twelve steps, created a thousand years ago by the Knights Templar, leading into this underground room about the size of my I&A office. Few have access to this entrance since it lies within the Mosque.”
“Could a tunnel have been secretly opened from the Western Wall to the Well of Souls?”
“It wou
ld have to be carefully hidden, but it’s possible. We’ll have to find out for ourselves.”
The conversation about this location, and possible time of the final meeting place for the conspirators, continued as the flight swept across Australia on autopilot. Oliver pulled his calendar from his note book and began marking down the days upon which each of the attacks had occurred trying to find a pattern. As he was staring at this small calendar book his eyes fell across the page of notes upon which it was resting. There were his notes containing that peculiar Sanskrit line from the Bhagavad Gita: “I am become death, the destroyer of worlds”. According to David Benjamin, this line was quoted by Robert Oppenheimer at White Sands, New Mexico, at the first atom bomb detonation. He had code named this first atom bomb test ‘Trinity.’
Suddenly he exclaimed, “Sunday!” so loud Maxine dropped her copy of the Bible. “This coming Sunday, June 15, is Trinity Sunday; now it all falls together. We have to find the three before this coming Sunday, and we may have to break some civil and religious laws in the process. We must contact I&A and suggest that they bring together a group of agents who are Christian, Jewish, and Muslim who can effectively assist in the apprehension of these three men in a manner that does not desecrate this holy place or attract any public attention. Not only must these three be stopped, but it must be done in such a way the world is unaware. If any word ever got out about this intended act, assuming we can stop it, it could result in violent acts between the zealous members of any of these great religions, each holding the other responsible.”
During the refueling stop in Malaysia, Oliver had contacted Director Clark in Washington and spelled out the plan to stop this final act in a twisted morality play conceived and directed by Benton Spencer.
Clark replied, “Robert Swift is already in Jerusalem meeting with three members of our embassy there and is expecting to meet you when you arrive. In the meantime, I will ask him to work on finding the right agents from the internal affairs programs of Israel, Palestine, or Jordan. You will be able to meet with them after you arrive at your hotel and brief them on what you’ve learned about this plan. The Israeli intelligence office has informed us that if each of the three conspirators carried a third of the weapon’s plutonium in a shielded suitcase, he would not trigger airport or border-crossing detectors. You must assume that a weapon is already in place and armed.”
Since leaving Christchurch, Colonel Joshua Cohen had not heard from his team in New Zealand and feared they had been captured or killed. He had made his way back to Jerusalem by way of Beirut where he had met with Ibrahim and obtained his third of the device of final judgment. Not knowing if the attack on the Dark Sector Lab had been foiled, as had been the one at CERN, he had contacted Spencer and Gilani. He warned them to assume they were being hunted by the forces of evil. They should take all possible precautions as they approached Jerusalem.
In order to avoid recognition and possible arrest, Joshua had moved from his former apartment to a small hotel on the other side of Jerusalem. Now attired, not in the traditional black of the Haredi, but a normal suit and tie for the Sabbath, he prepared to make his way to the Wailing Wall and then to the Sephardic Synagogue nearby. He had shaved his beard and would speak only Ladino as he walked across the city. It was not lost to him that Emilio Segre, one of the physicists involved in the Trinity detonation, was a Sephardic Jew, his new disguise.
Joshua planned to visit the Struthion Pool and verify that the forbidden tunnel entrance, now carefully sealed and hidden, was undisturbed. He knew the other end of this tunnel would open into the Well of Souls when the last foot of rubble was broken away from beside the altar of Abraham. He would then be able, for the first time, to stand beneath the Foundation Stone, the true Holy of Holies of the Second Temple.
For centuries this resting place for the Ark of the Covenant had been defiled by unholy visitors. Only the anointed Levites were granted access to this part of the temple, and now God’s wrath would be felt in the final judgment.
Benton Spencer had already assumed he was being hunted and had changed his appearance by dying his hair a dark brown and changing his clothes to appear like a typical American tourist seeing the Middle East for the first time. Joining a tour bus of Christians, he had made his way from Jordan into Israel, carrying his lethal luggage. He had checked into a hotel in Jerusalem near the Western Wall to wait until sundown on the Jewish Sabbath. All access to the Western Wall tunnels would have been closed, but Joshua would have cut the lock to a small service entrance near the south end of the Wall.
From this location the three would be able to access the tunnel to the Struthion Pool. They would have to carry out some excavation and removal of rubble before gaining access to the Well of Souls. Once there the assembly of the device would take the remainder of the night. They would be ready for the final judgment on Trinity Sunday Morning.
Ibrahim Gilani had been able to make his way into Jerusalem through Palestine with little trouble but had also taken precautions to change his appearance. By careful application of make-up, he was now an elderly Palestinian who would soon be on his way into the Jewish section of the city through one of many undiscovered tunnels. The three, each carrying his part of the device, would find one another at the unlocked entrance at eight o’clock that evening.
Before leaving Iran Ibrahim had copied the computer virus and had also obtained a miniaturized nuclear weapon. When he finally reached Damascus, he had carefully disassembled it at his apartment into its components, splitting the plutonium shell into three equal pieces. The plan to smuggle each part of this weapon into Jerusalem in pieces small enough that the radioactivity would be undetectable had now been carried out.
Ibrahim had not yet met Joshua Cohen, the third member of this force against evil, but he knew he was a devout member of the Haredi sect of Judaism, the only Jews Ibrahim thought of as “People of the Book”, as devout in their worship as he was in his. He knew it was Joshua who had examined the radiation detection system at the airports and other points of entry into Israel, and had assured Spencer that their final mission could be carried out. Joshua had been the commander of a Special Forces platoon within the Netzah Yehuda Battalion, now disbanded. He had a pair of specially trained fighters who had already begun the first phase and were probably now carrying out the next and final attack on the “Dark Sector Lab.”
The details of each of these three attacks had been carefully worked out during the past year by the three of them, but the overall pattern was carefully set by Reverend Spencer to follow a specific apocalyptic pattern to insure that it would be consistent with prophecy. Ibrahim was unaware of the outcomes of the attacks on CERN and the Dark Sector Lab, but was certain the three would prevail against evil and bring about the “New Jerusalem.”
Benton Spencer had indicated he would provide coveralls and gloves for the heavy work of clearing the tunnel. Excavation tools had earlier been placed inside the hidden tunnel. The overnight work would be dirty and difficult before they even got to the Well of Souls. They would then have to overcome their fatigue in order to assemble carefully the nuclear device he had disassembled weeks before.
As Oliver and Maxine left the G450 at the Jerusalem airport, carrying only that part of their luggage needed here in this hot climate, they were met by Robert Swift. “Agent Phillips, it’s good to see you again. Your good training has shown itself in the defense of the LC-130 and in stopping those two terrorists. As for you, Oliver, I warned you that you are not a field agent. You are lucky you had Miss Phillips by your side and were just winged in that deadly shoot-out.”
“Well,” said Oliver, “no amount of small arms training will be sufficient to protect me from the kind of weapon we face here this Sunday, so I will have to be a field agent armed with only my knowledge of these mad men and their final plans.”
Robert Swift raised his eyebrows in reaction to this reply, but did not comment. “I’ll take you to the hotel where you already have rooms, and I’ll bring
the international team together later this afternoon so we can begin to lay out a plan to find and capture these three conspirators. I must inform you, however, that Director Clark does not want either of you to be directly involved in this final arrest of the three conspirators. He considers you to be walking wounded and says you should contribute only in an advisory role.”
Maxine replied with sudden anger. ”We’ve come this far, and we damned well will see this fight through to the end!”
“I’m sorry, but those are the boss’s orders.”
Oliver then said, “Max, we can only do what we’re capable of. I think the director’s right; we are walking wounded.” He had made eye contact with Maxine and winked as he said this. He sensed she got his message, and she said no more, but displayed a convincing pout.
After settling into their rooms, Oliver and Maxine met in the lobby. Oliver approached Max with a wry smile. “You didn’t think for a moment I’d back down at this final stage of our search. We may be bloodied, but we’re certainly not beaten. We’ll find a way. But for now, let’s go shopping.”
They made their way into the shopping area of this tourist section of Jerusalem. They window shopped near the Prima Royale until Maxine found the women’s shop that suited her needs. She told Oliver to check out the men’s store they had just passed while she looked for light-weight clothes here. After some time carefully searching the racks, Maxine purchased light-weight slacks and an over-blouse that would be inconspicuous and allow her to properly conceal her pistol. As she was paying for her purchases, Oliver entered the store already dressed in his new clothes purchased at the men’s shop next door.
“Good grief, Oliver!” she exclaimed. “With your scruffy beard you look like Bogie in ‘African Queen!’” Oliver had purchased loose-fitting white linen pants and a loose-fitting white shirt, oversized so as to cover his arm bandage. He truly looked like a tourist from the twenties. “All you need’s a floppy white bill cap,” she said, shaking her head.
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