by JC Ryan
“I can surmise, but I don’t know if we’ll ever be able to prove it.” Carter said, answering Sean’s unspoken question. “I can say one thing. If I’m right, then Bashar may also have been right that the back of that cave is hiding a passage to the surface. We’re going to have to go back and search.”
“You’re the boss. Want to go ahead and do that while we’re here?” Sean asked.
“Might as well. But I’m eager to get this back home and find out how it was done.”
“I’m up for another swim today. Shall we?” Sean grinned.
Carter understood. He hadn’t felt this energized in years, either, if ever. “Let’s go!”
They took water and food this time, in case the search and exploration of the passage took longer. They asked the baffled boat crew, who couldn’t understand how their charges could stay so long underwater, to take them once again to the bay.
Climbing up through the boulders that concealed the remainder of the skeleton, Carter looked ahead rather than at the alcove where the skeleton lay. Sean was right behind him. By unspoken agreement, Carter went left, and Sean went right. The cave was narrower back here than at the underground river’s shoreline. If a passage was here, it wouldn’t take long to find it, and it didn’t.
Carter spotted the opening first and called Sean over. It was narrow, but tall enough that Sean could enter it standing up. He deferred to Carter but cautioned him to watch out for unstable rubble. Carter moved forward cautiously. He slipped sideways through a pair of stalactites that drooped almost to the floor of the cave, and into a larger room that had been partially sealed off by the formations.
“This may not be as quick as we thought,” he called to Sean, who had been forced to crawl at the bottom of the stalactites to fit his larger body through.
Another hour passed while they divided and conquered the larger room. This time, Sean found the way through. They had walked in a tunnel-like passage that led steadily upward for another half hour, when it opened again into a larger room. There, Sean called a halt and insisted they eat some of their provisions. They sat and discussed whether it was practical to keep going, when the route they’d been following could lead anywhere and take days to fully explore.
Carter pointed out that there was little chance of getting lost, as they hadn’t found more than one passage in any cave room they’d passed. He argued that they could reasonably expect to go for hours more before tiring, thanks to their respirocytes. Sean agreed to explore for two more hours, but he pointed out they still had to return the way they came if they didn’t find an opening to the surface soon, not to mention an arduous swim. And they hadn’t explored the limits of their abilities. Carter agreed to the restriction, knowing there was nothing to keep them from returning on another day if they didn’t reach the limit of the cave system on this trip.
“Do you have a sense of how long, total, we’ve exerted ourselves today?” he asked.
Sean replied that he thought they’d been on the move for at least twelve hours, with a couple of periods of rest of at least an hour during that period. He promised to keep track from then on. “This time, since leaving the boat, it’s been about six hours,” he estimated.
“Okay. That’s important to know,” Carter answered. “Are you ready to continue?”
“Go for it.”
Carter was beginning to feel discouraged that they weren’t going to find the answer before he had promised to turn back, when he noticed something on his hand while reaching for a handhold to pull himself up a six-foot shelf with a void beyond it. He stared at the spot for a while, before it dawned on him what he was seeing.
“Sean! There’s a beam of sun on my hand!”
“Impossible. It’s only about four a.m.,” Sean said. Then he looked at his watch. “Damn, it’s nearly eight! How did I miscalculate that badly?”
“Time flies when you’re having fun,” Sean quipped. “That’s sunlight. There’s an opening somewhere above!” He kept climbing, but when he found the opening, it was a mere crack between big rocks. There was no way to climb out. While he and Sean searched for an exit, their time to turn back came and went. An hour after that, Carter conceded temporary defeat.
“What if we could mark this spot on the surface?” he suggested. “How would you do it, with the resources we have?”
“It may not do any good, because it would be hard to spot from the air,” Sean answered, “But that ridiculous red bandana in your go-bag might be the way to go. Can you poke it up through the opening you found?”
“I guess I could sacrifice it,” Carter said. “But you’re right. I doubt if it would do any good.” He opened the bag that was suspended from his dive belt and took out the red bandana, a relic of his desert archaeological digs. It had traveled many miles with him. He extended his arm as far as he could through the opening, bandana in hand, and suddenly felt it snatched out of his fist. He gave a startled yelp.
“Who is that? Where are you?” a familiar voice demanded.
“Connery? Is that you?” Carter couldn’t believe his ears.
“Yes. Who… Devereux?” Connery replied. “What are you doing down there, man?”
“Long story. Do you think you could help us widen this hole?” Carter asked. “Otherwise we have a long journey back. And we’d like to know where we ended up.”
“You’re safe?” Connery asked.
“Yes.”
“Hold tight, then,” Connery said. “I’ll get some help.”
Carter and Sean retreated from the hole, in case the help consisted of heavy machinery. While they waited, they found perches and took turns sleeping. Three hours later, the rumble of machinery told them Connery was back. A wider swath of sunlight attested to one of the larger rocks blocking the exit being removed. The roar of the engine shut off, and Connery’s voice floated down to them. “Is that big enough? I don’t want to disturb more of the area than I have to.”
Carter climbed back up and found he could get his head and shoulders through the newly-widened hole. “It’s big enough for me. Pull me out, and we’ll see if Sean can get through.” He took Connery’s hand, and with a boost from Sean from below, popped out through the hole like a groundhog. Then he turned and helped Connery pull Sean up.
Connery stepped back and put his hands on his hips. “Want to tell me how you got down there?”
“It’s a long story,” Carter said. “But yes, I think you deserve an answer. Where are we, by the way?”
“After you came around asking about the Labyrinth,” Connery answered, “I decided to poke around a bit after my dig shut down.”
“But we must be miles from Knossos,” Carter objected.
“No. About fifty yards from the Palace, give or take,” Connery said. “It’s right through those trees there.” He pointed.
Carter gave Sean a significant look. There was no other way to account for the distance than that they’d traveled about sixty miles as calculated in a straight line from the cave where they’d started. Considering the passage hadn’t been straight, and that they’d been underground for a little more than nine hours, one of them spent combing the immediate area for an opening, it was a feat only possible because of their respirocytes. That meant they couldn’t tell Connery how they’d gotten there, without obfuscating the details.
“We were spelunking,” Carter said carefully. “I guess we lost our bearings. It was damn lucky you were there at the right time.”
“Remarkable,” Connery answered. “Well, I’m glad I was. And I’m glad the local authorities let me remove this rock. Now I have to put it back, or we’ll all be in trouble.”
“No problem, Alan,” Carter responded. “I hope you won’t mind if we hail a taxi to get back where we started.”
“Oh, no need for that. I’ll give you a lift.”
“Really, we couldn’t impose,” Sean said. It wouldn’t do for Connery to know how far they’d come. That would create questions they couldn’t legally answer.
&n
bsp; “Suit yourself, then,” Connery said cheerfully. “I’ll just finish up here. But you’ll have to hike about three miles to Heraklion, unless you can persuade a tour operator to let you tag along. Tours should just be starting.”
“Thanks, we’ll manage,” Carter said, suppressing a grin.
46
BACK AT FREYDIS, Carter and Sean landed with little fanfare. They weren’t expected for another few days, but they’d done what they went to Crete to do. So, there was no need to linger there. Carter was anxious to have the partial skeleton he’d brought back examined by Mackie’s team.
To avoid startling Mackenzie by walking unannounced into her office, Carter called her from the runway. “Hi, honey, I’m home!” he said, in a singsong voice.
“Carter! What are you doing home so soon? Where are you, at the house? I’ll be there in five minutes…”
Carter laughed. She sounded as excited to see him as she had been when they were newly in love, and he was just as excited to see her after only a few days’ absence. He was a lucky man. “No, we just landed. Listen, stay there. I’m bringing something for your team to examine. It’s beyond my expertise.”
“You found it? The Minotaur?” she asked.
“I found something. Darned if I know exactly what it is, but I have a theory. But I don’t want to influence your team – specifically your doctor and veterinarian. I’ll just bring it and see what they have to say.”
“Okay, I’ll see you in a few minutes then?”
“Give me half an hour.”
Carter was so anxious to get the partial skeleton in the hands of the scientists that he barely took the time to shower and change clothes after the long flight. Twenty-nine minutes after his call to Mackenzie, he wheeled a small crate on a dolly through the front door of the lab building. Mackenzie met him at her office door.
“Where shall I take this?” he asked.
Mackenzie led him to one of the examining cubicles in the clinician’s lab, where she and the veterinarian were waiting.
The clinician greeted him. “Good to see you again, Carter. As soon as we’re done here, I’ll want to examine you and Sean and debrief you on what you did in Crete.”
“Sure,” he said. “But this is going to take you a while, I think.” He slipped the dolly’s lift plate out from under the crate, opened the crate’s lid, and gestured for everyone to have a look inside.
Mackenzie peeked in, but left room for the veterinarian and clinician to get closer. A full ten seconds passed before anyone said anything. Then the veterinarian whispered, “What the hell is that?”
Carter chuckled. “I was hoping you could tell me. This is only part of it. I left the rest of what looked like a human skeleton in place, but I have pictures.”
“This can’t possibly be one, er, individual,” the clinician said.
“I also have some interesting x-rays, if you want them. But I figured you’d have more sophisticated equipment.”
“What do they show?” the clinician asked.
“I’m going to let you tell me,” Carter said again. “I don’t want to influence your examination. I will say this. The upper part of the spine is fused to the skull.”
“Impossible,” the doctor said again, shaking her head. “Let’s get it on the table. Carter, your examination and debriefing will have to wait. I’ll see you at eight a.m. tomorrow. Bring Sean with you.”
Carter felt like he’d been dismissed, but he was happy that the two scientists were as eager to get to the bottom of the mystery as he was.
“Mackie, can you leave work early today? I’d like some time with you before the kids get home.”
Mackenzie blushed and nodded. She sneaked a look at the two scientists who were carefully lifting the partial skeleton from the crate onto the table. Neither was paying any attention to Carter’s words.
“I have an item or two to clear off my desk, and then I’ll be home. See you in half an hour?” she said.
“Make it twenty-nine minutes,” Carter deadpanned. He walked out of the lab, confident his mystery would be solved by the next morning.
CARTER AND SEAN presented themselves at the clinician’s lab promptly at eight a.m., with Mackenzie tagging along. She wouldn’t stay for their examination, but like Carter, she expected a report from the clinician on the unusual skeleton Carter had left there the afternoon before.
To everyone’s surprise, the doctor said nothing about it. Instead, she had Carter and Sean sit down in chairs she’d arranged in front of her desk and told Mackenzie she’d be awhile and not to wait. Mackenzie threw Carter a puzzled look as she left. He responded with a shrug.
For the next half hour, the doctor questioned Carter and Sean about their physical exertion inside the cave system, asking about the time they spent there, distance traveled, and what they’d consumed. She seemed satisfied with their answers, even though most of them were vague because neither man had thought to keep precise notes at the time.
She seemed most interested in the distance they’d managed to travel in the ten or so hours they thought they’d been in the cave, and what they’d eaten when they got to town. After notating their answers in both files, she lifted the phone and spoke to someone else, asking them to come in and join them.
Carter recognized the psychologist who’d been brought on board just a month ago. What’s he doing here?” he wondered. It soon became apparent.
Carter and Sean both stood, accustomed to talking with the psychologist alone, but he asked them to sit down. “This won’t take long,” he said. His first question was whether they were comfortable talking about Bashar’s death together. He’d talked to each of them separately about it, and this wasn’t the first time he’d circled back to that fight.
Carter didn’t have an objection. After all, Sean was there. And he didn’t think Sean would have an objection either. He hadn’t killed Bashar, Carter had. The psychologist asked a few questions that Sean had answered before, and then the conversation took an unexpected turn.
He began to ask about how they’d found the skeleton, when they’d first seen it, and why they’d brought out only part of it. Sean seemed content to let Carter answer the questions, finally answering when the psychologist asked him directly if Carter’s answers were accurate according to his recollection.
“Of course,” he said.
“They’re telling the truth,” the psychologist said to the doctor. Then he left with no further comment.
Carter was astounded. “You thought we’d lie about this?” he asked the doctor. “If you did, then that shrink should have talked to us separately.”
She answered in a calm voice. “No, I didn’t think you would, but I had to have documentation for when the media gets hold of this story.”
“What do you mean, the media? The media isn’t going to hear anything about it,” Sean said, jumping to his feet. “This is top-secret.”
Carter nodded. “What story? What did you find?”
“I think it’s time to call your wife back in, Carter. And my colleague. We have some disturbing conclusions.”
Carter waited impatiently while Mackie and the vet were summoned. Sean seemed calmer, but he never seemed to get ruffled. When they were all assembled, the doctor led the way back to the cubicle where the skeleton still lay on the examining table.
“We worked all night on this, and we’re prepared to offer our conclusions, though we have a few tests still running that should confirm them,” the doctor began. “First, these bones are not fossilized, though some mineralization has begun. We didn’t want to subject them to strong X-rays, because the literature we were able to find on examining sub-fossilized bone indicates that it damages the DNA in the marrow. And the… unusual… nature of this specimen dictated that we run DNA tests on the skull and the other portion of it to confirm that they don’t match. That is the test we’re waiting for.” She paused and gestured for the veterinarian to continue.
“Our hypothesis was that this was some cleve
r hoax. However, the apparent age of the bone led us to believe that the hoax was manufactured at some time in the past. We’re also waiting for carbon-dating of the bone to determine how long ago. But once we had the DNA and bone samples for those tests, we ran the skeleton through the CT-scanner.”
He stopped for breath, and it was the doctor’s turn to take up the narrative again. Carter was about to jump out of his skin, waiting for the punch line. What had they seen in that scan? He made an impatient noise, and Mackenzie put her hand on his arm to calm him. The doctor suddenly smiled at him.
“I’m sorry this seems so dramatic, Carter. But you can’t imagine what we found with the CT-scan.” Her expression darkened. “What was done to this man was monstrous, and hardly believable. What we found inside the bull’s skull was a partial skull of a human being. Several of the facial bones, to be exact.” She crossed the room to another cubicle, where she drew out an articulated plastic skeleton and rolled it across to the open cubicle where they were gathered. There, she pointed out the lower portion of the skull’s front, naming the bones as she touched each of them. “The mandible, maxilla, and zygomatics are all visible inside the bovine skull.” She turned the skeleton, so they could see the back, and pointed out the cervical axis, the spinal bone that connects directly with the skull. “This bone, the cervical axis, connects directly with the skull in both humans and cattle.” She pushed the plastic skeleton aside and turned the bovine skull on the table slightly. “You can see that the same bone here is oriented in a different direction. In a human, it’s only slightly off parallel with the ground. This supports our skulls with their heavy brains on top of the column of the spine. Now, in cattle, it’s perpendicular to the ground, as the spine itself is more or less parallel to the ground, with the exception of the neck, which rises only slightly. Does that make sense?”
Carter, Sean and Mackenzie all nodded. The doctor continued.