It made Talaric feel better knowing that she was up there covering them, but she wouldn’t be able to help them once they were underground. Talaric had never been to their destination before and he hadn’t really ever wanted to risk venturing there, but now he had no choice. It was a race now to the finish line, if what the self-styled Orlandian Medusa woman, had said was true.
There would be others better equipped than him and far more numerous in number on the trail of solving an ancient pre-flood mystery. Hopefully they hadn’t come upon this place yet. He had learned of it through his own research over the past several years, as he had dug into the possible remnants of history of his people’s time on Earth.
His research had focused specifically on whether there was a way back home. When he had heard of this place he had decided not to go there unless he absolutely had to and now was that time.
On the lowest level there was a place that dated back practically to the founding of the city over two thousand years before. It was a collection or library if you will of ancient knowledge. It was even rumored that some of the scrolls had been saved from the fires that had consumed the library of Alexandria one of the seven great wonders of the ancient past.
There was an underground collective of priests that guarded their ancient treasures of knowledge. The order of priests were an offshoot cult of a much larger network of cults primarily, Masonic in nature.
Some in the greater network of worldwide darkness knew of this place and helped to keep its secrets. They thrived on having knowledge unknown to others at their fingertips, as it helped to lend an aura of credibility and mystical power to their cultic orders.
The sense of credibility helped to draw in often, hurting people, who were looking for something to believe in and fill the emptiness of their lives. These cults like their ancient forbearers the Orlandian’s at their heart held that knowledge equaled power, even if it was just the power to deceive.
Their thirst for new knowledge or even older knowledge could never be quenched. They believed that the further attainment of knowledge could give them a godlike status. It is not a new frailty of humanity, but can be dated back to the Garden of Eden when both Adam and Eve chose to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil so that they might know the things of God and be like Him instead of eating of the tree of life, which was freely open and available to them.
Thus man from the beginning destined himself to be at enmity with God, in the thirst to be as God, in place of a relationship with Him by which God imparts everlasting life and even the revealing of mysteries from the foundation of the world.
The cult at its most central element is a self replicating body of believers that denies the false pretences of its own existence by distorting the truth into a lie in order to gain a future of their own making that can only lead to their everlasting destruction in exchange for a momentary power and position of elevated status.
One of the reasons that Talaric had avoided the place for so long was that he didn’t want to potentially expose the truths and existence of galaxy travel not to mention the existence of other worlds should he be caught and the information taken from him.
Such a revealing tale could lead to an explosion in the growth of cults worldwide armed with such knowledge and the temptation that such opportunities offered. A thing he feared would happen anyway.
Now it was up to him to stop the Orlandian inspired movement before the bad seeds of discontentment and rebellion could bear any more bad fruit than they already had on other worlds, namely his own.
His thoughts came to a halt as they reached the small courtyard like plaza that he had been told of. Both he and Ronan scarcely even breathed, as they scanned the still moonlight scene of the plaza.
“Can’t see anything amiss Captain. It would appear that the coast is clear for our little rum run Sir.” Eleanor’s voice came through the little transmitter in Talaric’s ear.
Talaric stepped out into the ancient little courtyard toward the central well in the courtyard’s center. The feeling of walking across the deserted plaza was the very essence of the meaning of the word exposure. At any moment he expected to feel the impact of bullets through his flesh or the onrush of a sword wielding mob. Nothing happened though.
Talaric reached out and tested the strength of the well rope. It wasn’t the greatest but it would have to do. He got up on the edge of the well followed by Ronan and grabbed a hold of the rope.
Before he disappeared into the well he heard a hushed, “Good luck!” From Eleanor in his ear and then he was descending into the darkness followed closely by Ronan.
Down, down, down they went into the well. This access point to his knowledge wasn’t used or at least it hadn’t been in a very long time and he hoped that it wasn’t because the underground tunnels were caved in or something. Commonly used or not, it still might be guarded.
Talaric’s foot touched water and he clamped the rope between his knees and feet as he reached back and pulled a small oxygen tank and goggle breathing mask from his pack, which he then put on. He snapped the small tank to his belt.
He had enough air for twenty minutes, which wasn’t going to be enough if the underground passageways were completely flooded in this sector. He eased down into the water, not liking the cold dark feel of it. When he was completely submerged he turned his head lamp on, which brought the ancient stonework of the well into sharp relief.
All he could say was that he was grateful that he didn’t have to live here and drink this water. It was hard to say how many sewers this well was openly connected with.
Down they went, both of them searching the sides of the well shaft for some sign of an entrance off of it. Talaric felt it before he saw it. The stone archway of a door.
The door was made of wood and surprisingly it still appeared solid and whole, which was odd given its submerged location. There was no door handle and it didn’t budge, when he shoved against it. Ronan tapped his shoulder and he glanced up at what Ronan was pointing to.
In the keystone of the arch above the door was the image of a grinning human skull with a broad forehead. There were several deep interlaced cracks on the forehead that looked carved rather than natural. Talaric reached out and touch them. Pushing slightly he felt the center of the forehead depress slightly into the head of the skull and then he discovered that it could turn.
He swiveled the stone upside down and saw that the interlaced cracks formed the branches and trunk of a solitary and barren looking tree. There was an audible click and the doorway abruptly slid into the one side wall revealing a dark passage beyond. Talaric let go of the rope and swam through the opening followed by Ronan.
They were in a water filled room with an elevated doorway on the other side of it. There was an abrupt slam of stone and both men wheeled around to see that the door they had just come through had slammed shut. After hurriedly searching neither man could find a way of opening it from the inside and there probably wasn’t. All they could do was go on.
Swimming across the room Talaric saw Ronan point down and glancing down he saw a gruesome pile of skeletons. The last remains of those who no doubt had come down here in search of the secrets that this underworld held, only to find themselves in this watery room with no way out. It left one with an eerie feeling.
They swam up to the door the pile of skeletons was congregated under. It was also made of wood, but it was hinged and there was the face of a big lock on it that had six keyholes no doubt made for special keys that they did not have.
It was probably a combination lock that needed to be unlocked in a certain sequence of some kind. There could be thousands perhaps even millions of six key type configurations to go through before the right one was stumbled upon.
They didn’t have the oxygen for that lengthy ordeal. Thankfully they had been prepared for something like this. Talaric glanced at his watch as Ronan worked on the door. They had less than ten minutes left of air.
Ronan moved back some from
the door and pushed a small keypad in his hand. The water gurgled and bubbled around the hinges and the lock, where small amounts of acid escaped the seals. The gurgling stopped and Ronan pushed the button again and there was a slight percussion that rippled through the water around them.
The door shook off its remaining supports and started to tip over and then fell toward the floor and the grisly remains littered on it. Talaric quickly went through the vacant doorway. He felt around with his hand, but all he could feel was the sides of the tunnel.
The light on his head did no good because of all the stirred up sediment in the water. It was as he had feared, the tunnels were flooded and they were running out of air. Feeling with their hands to find direction in the swirling darkness Talaric and Ronan swam with all they had through the darkness in a desperate fight against time.
The water started getting lighter and Talaric knew that there must be a pocket of light from somewhere above them. Light meant air and both men rose toward the surface quickly, but abruptly stopped as their training took over.
Half choking on what little remained of their oxygen each man slowly broke the surface of the water to peer above its surface for danger. It was one of the hardest things that either man had ever done. It was like drowning only without water and what was needed for life was freely available.
The light was reflecting down a hallway and there appeared to be nobody in this immediate room. Both men tore off their masks and gasped for air, as quietly as they could, which wasn’t very quiet. They treaded water, as they waited for their breathing to slow down.
Ronan grabbed a hold of Talaric’s shoulder and brought his face near and in an angry whisper the man with an Irish name, but a French accent said heatedly, “Never again monsieur! Never again! If you try to lead me down into a dark pit like this again, I quit! I don’t care what it is you do for me!”
Talaric grinned big still gasping for breath, “Ronan, if I lead myself into another godforsaken hole like this I quit!”
Together they made their way to an elevated walkway and pulled themselves up onto it. Each man pulled several components out of his pack and within moments each had assembled a small one armed crossbow. Cautiously they began to make their way into the subterranean world that of all things was illuminated here and there along the way by incandescent light bulbs.
They saw no one, heard no one, but the echoes of their own feet sounded loud. Hopefully everyone was at home in their beds sleeping. Talaric couldn’t believe though that they hadn’t seen any guards yet.
What was down here certainly merited around the clock guards. Coming in the way they had, even though it had almost killed them had been a stroke of genius. They had no doubt given up on thinking of that as an access point and stationed guards up higher in the ruins than this level. That was one theory to explain the absence of guards anyway.
They increased their pace and made their way down through the layers of the distant past. An archaeologist would have gone crazy down here at what lay around each bend of the path that they followed. They slipped by the hieroglyphics and finer architecture of the past more concerned with staying alive than enjoying the walk through history.
Talaric stopped abruptly. Something in the mood of the place did not feel right. Their progress had been too easy by far. By his calculations they were already on the lowest level and they hadn’t seen a soul yet. Ronan pointed at something on the ground up ahead and Talaric nodded as he saw it to. Someone was lying on the path ahead and from the looks of it they were dead.
They made their way to the fallen man trying to be as invisible as they could, but the dim light bulbs that lit the scene couldn’t be adequately hid from. Talaric kneeled beside the man. The man had Egyptian features and was wearing a lupus blue silk robe. This must have been one of the priests. His chest was stained red from where he’d been shot at close range.
He had also been shot between the eyes, which must have occurred sometime after death, because it hadn’t bled much.
“He was shot!” Ronan asked skeptically before glancing around.
Talaric nodded standing up.
“But by who?” Ronan asked.
“The competition, that’s who! They beat us here!”
They continued on and they kept finding more and more of the blue robed priests dead along the way. The cavern seemed to open up and they left the architecture of the past behind in favor of the natural rock strata of the land. Peering around a corner Talaric saw what they’d come for, the temple of the serpent queen.
The temple was built into the end of the cavern and it was a sight to behold! The front of the temple was dominated by two gigantic pillars that rose all the way to the ceiling of the cavern.
They were painted a bright Crimson red and reflected the light of the many brazen torch settings across the front of the temple. More disturbing than the choice of the color was what was on them. Huge giant cobras, one on each pillar coiled sinuously up the columns to a height of thirty feet or more.
The snakes had to be made of solid gold, because of the way that they glittered in the torchlight. A giant brazen stature of a woman naked, except for a brief half sarong around her waist stood between the pillars. Her skin was painted red and the sarong was a lupus Azure blue, as was the color of her bronze cast hair. Her hands rested about the necks of the two cobras, which were flattened out in aggression with fangs bared, as they faced out at the cavern.
The woman’s face was posed in an openly erotic look of invitation. Her teeth sparkled, as if they were faceted with diamonds and perhaps they were. Her eyes appeared as gigantic blue sapphires and her eyebrows nose and ears were studded with giant amethysts.
To walk into the temple one would have to walk beneath her and in between her legs, which were splayed apart wide in obvious symbolism.
It was the most gaudy sight either man had ever encountered in life.
Ronan looked at Talaric concern written all over his face, “We should not be here! This place is steeped in evil!”
“Your right there my friend, but we have to find what we came here for or perhaps destroy it depending on how fast we have to get out of here. Come on.” Talaric said.
Ronan groaned and looked for a moment as if he wouldn’t follow. The stairs leading in and out of the temple beneath the self ascribed goddess were covered in people moving to and fro quickly.
It appeared, as if they were stripping the temple of its artifacts and documents, while in active search for their ultimate prize. Talaric saw several of the blue clad priests being tortured, no doubt to give up the temple’s secrets.
The woman goddess had unmistakable Orlandian markings that did not even look Egyptian and then there was the whole snake thing going on.
Ronan caught up, “I do not feel good about this Talaric!”
Talaric paused and laid a hand on his friend’s chest, “Just remember that He who resides in you is greater than anything you see before you.”
Talaric working on a hunch started climbing the cavern wall followed along by a nervous Ronan. The temple appeared to have two different stories to it and as Talaric had expected there was a construction terrace that ran along the length of the cavern that connected with the second story of the temple. It didn’t seem to have been discovered yet.
There had to be over two hundred people below working like ants emptying the contents of the temple to be packed up and shipped out. They were European in appearance and identified as such by the scattered languages being echoed around the cavern. It didn’t look like they’d been here long either and they were moving fast, as if in fear of being caught by someone.
The two men made their way to the temple’s second story and cautiously eased through the second tier of smaller pillars. More dead priests.
At present there was no one else in the room that had been stripped of everything it seemed, but the painted hedonistic artwork adorning the walls. Talaric was about to leave the room and go deeper into the temple, when Ronan
tapped him on the shoulder and pointed.
One of the priests wasn’t dead. He was crawling slowly toward a wall, when he reached it he reached out a hand and touched an artwork scene, which briefly lit up. The wall shimmered.
Ronan and Talaric exchanged a look and then leaped into a unison of action. Dragging the priest, who had succumbed to his wounds back into the room a bit both men then approached the flickering wall and stepped through it into the space beyond. They were in a narrow solid walled corridor that led across the front of the temple.
There was a vague looking light at the end of the hall about thirty feet away. Talaric stepped into the small alcove that the narrow hallway opened up into. The room was lit up by the glow of light emanating from two elliptical windows on the wall to their left. It dawned on both men where they were. They were in the head of the statue standing over the stair entrance way into the temple.
Ronan hurriedly mumbled a prayer and looked around nervously, but it was hard to see anything in the semi darkness. Talaric about fell over an obstacle in the middle the small room and caught himself against it to keep from falling.
Using a pen light he could see that the object was a sarcophagus of sorts. He started to push hard on what appeared to be the lid of it and was rewarded by the protesting creak of stone on stone. He could hear Ronan moaning slightly in the background. This entire mission had seemed to unnerve the normally silent and enigmatic Ronan.
The lid gave quickly and suddenly pushed wide. Using the pen light Talaric looked inside. These were no doubt the remains of the self crowned serpent queen of antiquities past.
An attempt at mummification had been made, but it hadn’t succeeded very well. There were even the skeletons of several snakes coiled up laying beside her. She had no doubt wanted her pets to accompany her on her short voyage to hell.
This place was entirely disturbing on many levels. Underneath an ancient scrap of cloth Talaric could see something that glowed. Cautiously he reached inside the sarcophagus.
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