The Lost Ark

by J. R. Rain

  “I can’t move him,” he cried out. “He’s pinned to the floor.”

  I did the only thing that I could. As Wally screamed, I pulled the shaft from his chest and blood gushed up like a geyser, quickly spreading over the ice floor, steaming. I put my hand to his chest to staunch the bleeding. Blood oozed between my fingers. Wally’s eyes rolled up into his head. He instantly passed out.

  I picked him up. We moved aft down the length of the ark, dodging the humming shards of ice. Caesar followed the trail of blood. And there, just ahead, was the same small hole in the ship that Wally had found earlier.

  “The hole is filled with ice,” shouted Caesar.

  I removed the handgun from my waist, and fired into the hole. Three shots later I had blasted through the ice. Caesar scrambled in first, and I hoisted Wally up to him.

  The ship shuddered violently, separating completely from the ice wall. Howling wind blew in through the massive opening in the ice wall once occupied by the ark. I jumped up and caught hold of the opening just as the ship spilled over the ledge and headed down the steep incline to the narrow canyon nine hundred feet below.

  Chapter Forty-nine

  Wind thundered over me. Bleak canyon walls swept past as the ship plummeted. I lay flat against the hull. I could have been riding the back of a killer whale, without the benefit of a dorsal fin. The vessel bucked—perhaps hitting an upthrust of rock—and I was tossed briefly into the air, only to land hard on my elbows and face.

  I rapidly slid down the hull.

  My fingernails raked the moss-covered wood, clawing desperately at the finely hued beams. But the fossilized wood was impossibly smooth, the ancient ship-builders remarkably precise in their construction. If I fell, I would by sucked under the ship and crushed into a bloody swath along the steep incline.

  And then I saw the small dark hole, the only blemish on her smooth starboard side.

  I reached desperately with my left hand—

  And my fingers hooked into the jagged opening. My momentum swung me around like a compass needle. For the moment I was safe, and I hung by one hand and caught my breath as the canyon walls sped by with increasing speed. In that position, I had a brief glimpse of a lone mountain goat watching me curiously in mid-chew, grass hanging from its furry muzzle.

  I pulled myself up into the hole and slipped down inside.

  * * *

  I fell through complete blackness until I slammed into something unmovable. A flash of light erupted in my head. I groaned, wondering if that piercing in my chest was a cracked rib or two.

  As we continued to slide, the ancient timbers groaning in protest, we hit another bump, flipping me like a penny into the air again. I landed on my tail, and bounced like a pinball off unknown objects, until I hit my head on something very hard.

  The explosion of light within my skull was very brief and bright, and I felt no pain, only the peaceful bliss of unconsciousness.

  Tilt.

  * * *

  Like tiny, cold pin-pricks, I awoke to the stinging sensation of snow falling on my face. I opened my eyes and blinked. The world around me was blurred and amorphous. My head pulsed like a metronome.

  I took inventory. Although breathing was difficult, my ribs didn’t appear cracked. My wrist hurt like hell, but I could still move my fingers enough to know it wasn’t broken—just a very bad sprain. Nothing else appeared damaged or missing. But then again, this was just a preliminary report.

  I lifted my head (thus increasing the tempo of the metronome), and saw that I was partially covered in a thin blanket of snow, which continued to fall around me through a fresh rent in the ark’s roof. Above, purple storm clouds hung low in the sky.

  As I sat up, a number of sharp pains shot through me, most notably my injured shoulder. I grunted like a very old man emerging from a day in his recliner. Instantly, a wave of dizziness swept over me. Nauseous, I turned my head to throw up what little food I had eaten, but nothing emerged. When the queasiness passed, I stood on wobbly legs.

  Before me, as seen through the sifting snow, was a broad, and heavily damaged staircase made of wood so dark it appeared black. The staircase was pushed up through the floor, pulverized. The damage looked fresh and complete, the stairs useless.

  I stood in a hallway on the upper deck. The professor had said the smaller animals would have been here. The rodents, smaller mammals, reptiles and probably even birds.

  Unbelievable.

  Lined on either side of the hallway were what appeared to be narrow compartments. I shook my head and grinned. “Stables,” I whispered.

  I stepped carefully over the loose snow, and moved toward the small compartments. They were narrow, perhaps four feet by six feet, and some were slightly larger than others. Cramped quarters indeed, and if there had been doors on the stalls they were long gone by now. The walls of the stables rose fifteen feet, stopping three or four feet below the arched ceiling, which was crisscrossed with massive rafters.

  I shook my head. Unbelievable.

  An icy wind moved down the hallway, stirring the snow like silt along an ocean floor. I suddenly cocked my head, listening. There was more than just snow on the wind. Shortly, it came again: a long, wavering moan, muffled and faint, and distinctively human.

  I moved in the direction of the sound.

  * * *

  I found Caesar Roberts holding Wally Krispin in his arms. Frozen tears beaded his cheeks and icicles hung from his gray beard. Wally’s face was the color of the pallid sky above. Blood caked his jacket. The kid had bled to death.

  I touched Caesar’s shoulder. He didn’t respond, as if my touch lacked substance, like a ghost returning to haunt the ship. Snowflakes swirled around us. I watched the flakes and listened to the sobs and didn’t know who to blame more for the kid’s death. Omar, for his madness. Caesar, for his obsession. Myself, for allowing it to happen. A kid shouldn’t be dead. It was wrong, and I felt a part of it.

  I stood for a while behind the old man, who held the lanky body in his arms. The snow continued to swirl in an ancient dance and I closed my eyes and thought of the irony: a ship to save mankind, when mankind can’t save itself.

  * * *

  We laid Wally’s stiffening body in one of the narrow stables. A fine, wooden tomb.

  I needed a cigarette.

  Caesar’s nose was broken and would need to be set, although the cold of Ararat should keep the swelling down. Still, it looked like a red water balloon, forcing him to breathe loudly through his mouth. Together, we stood quietly a few stalls down from Wally’s tomb. Through the damaged roof above, the sky was darkening, and the snow was coming down with more determination.

  I said, “We need to get out of here and get your daughter, professor.”

  He said nothing. The only indication that he even heard me was that fresh tears appeared in the corners of his eyes. He made no attempt to wipe them away, and stood motionless, arms hanging down at his sides. I leaned against a stable wall. The wall was sturdy, even after all these years. Above, the wind whistled over the damaged roof. Some of the wind found my exposed skin, freezing me to the bone. My foul weather gear, ripped in numerous places, did little to keep the foul weather out. Purple clouds the size of small Balkan countries accumulated above. The clouds looked ready for business. The ark shifted its weight, settling deeper into the canyon.

  Finally, the professor said, “Yes, Sam, let’s go get my daughter.”

  I couldn’t have agreed more.

  * * *

  “Where’s the front door, professor?” I asked.

  “The boarding ramp, or, as you put it, front door, would be on the bottom deck. But as you can see the stairs have been destroyed.”

  “Any other ideas?”

  Caesar frowned, and touched his broken nose. He winced immediately, realizing too late that it wasn’t a good idea to touch his broken nose. “How about the roof?”

  “The roof’s inaccessible,” I said looking up. “And I don’t see a ladder.�
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  To the left, the hallway disappeared into total blackness. To the right, thirty feet away, the tunnel dead-ended into a shadowy wall.

  “I propose we go left,” I said.

  He raked his thick beard with his fingernails. Probably had a hell of an inch. “You’re the guide, Sam. And if we get lost, we eat you first.”

  Chapter Fifty

  We moved past dozens of stables of varying sizes. Most were too small for anything larger than a medium-sized pooch. And even they would have been miserable. I pointed this out.

  “The ark was built for survival,” he said weakly. “Not for pleasure.”

  “Any reason why there’s no doors on the stalls, professor?” I asked, more to draw Caesar out of the oppressive silence that had engulfed him. The old man seemed to have retreated within himself.

  We moved silently forward. Our boots whispered over the smooth floor. Finally, he answered, his voice quiet and withdrawn. “Perhaps the ancient shipbuilders used thick reeds or a bamboo-like material to compose the doors. It would have reduced the ship’s weight and would have saved time and money.” As he spoke, as his mind shifted away from Wally’s death, I saw a flicker of his old self. “The lighter material would have rotted away by now. Of course, the stables on the lower decks, housing the bigger creatures, would have utilized wooden doors.”

  I grinned. “Of course.”

  The ship continued to make settling noises, the mighty timbers moaning in a sort of death song, as if we were trapped inside the belly of a dying whale.

  We moved deeper into the ark, quickly losing what little light we had, the dark wood blended with the deepening shadows. There were no sounds other than our footfalls, which seemed to echo forever. If I wasn’t such a fearless explorer, I’d be nervous.

  Finally, I stopped and removed the burned-out torch from inside my jacket and removed the 9mm Luger from my waistband and checked the clip. Three bullets left. I removed one and studied it, a brass 9mm 124 grain, jacket bullet.

  “Don’t try this at home,” I said.

  I used my pocket knife and carefully removed the bullet’s casing, somehow managing to keep my fingers from getting blown off. I tapped out a small pile of gunpowder.

  “You must have driven your mother crazy,” said Caesar, standing a safe distance away as if I were a carrier of the Plague, “with stunts like this.”

  “Who do you think taught me this one?” I positioned the Luger above the gunpowder and aimed it back down the hallway. “Stand back.”

  “Trust me, I’m back.”

  I pulled the trigger. The muzzle flashed and the powder burst into a small ball of fire. I held the torch over the flame until it was lit, then stamped the fire out.

  “Do you always go around defacing priceless artifacts?” asked Caesar.

  “This is my first,” I said, and shoved the Luger under my waistband. It was warm against the small of my back.

  My ears still ringing from the gunshot, I held the torch before us and led the way forward. “Let’s get out of here, professor. I would guess that Omar will make a run for it, perhaps back home to Riyadh to re-access the situation here.”

  “And taking my daughter with him.”

  I grabbed his jacket sleeve. “C’mon, old man.”

  * * *

  The hallway with the stables ended in a low, wooden archway. Through the archway were a series of small rooms, three in total, all connected. The professor proclaimed these to be the sleeping quarters for the ancient mariners. The rooms were ten feet by ten feet. Or, in the spirit of things, about six cubits by six cubits. Caesar and I moved from room to room, ducking through the low archways.

  “The ancients were a small race,” said the professor. “In all likelihood, Noah stood no taller than five feet.”

  “Cute,” I said.

  “I suppose so.”

  I pointed to the interconnecting doorways. “Doesn’t leave much room for privacy.”

  “They were too busy for any privacy, Sam. From sick and injured animals, to battling the volatile rising waters. Indeed, they would have needed quick access to all crew members.”

  The fourth room, however, was massive. According to the professor, it was the captain’s cabin. Like the others, it was empty, save for an ornately carved pole in the center of the room. Rounded and domed at the top, it could have been a phallic symbol. Perhaps, I mused, to express their suppressed sexuality over the long stay on the ship. I kept the theory to myself.

  The pole was covered in intricate carvings of entertwined serpents, culminating in a single massive head. Caesar walked around the pole. “Eight bodies and one head,” he reported

  “Perhaps symbolic of the eight crew members and their ship,” I suggested.

  “Perhaps.”

  The serpent’s eyes gleamed black. The head was unusually worn and polished, like the newel of a staircase. The base disappeared straight down into the floorboards. I had an idea.

  I touched the serpent’s head. It was cold and smooth. I pulled it toward me, like shifting a gear into second, minus the clutch. Caesar gasped. Immediately, a door swung silently open in the far corner of the room, a door that had been concealed until now. Faint green light issued out.

  “Appears Noah had a secret room,” I said.

  Chapter Fifty-one

  It wasn’t quite a room.

  Instead, we stared silently down a long, breath-taking hallway. We could have been two Viking warriors standing at the threshold to Valhalla. An arched cove ceiling gave the corridor visual and physical height. Dark wooden columns, spaced evenly along either side of the hallway like rows of alert sentries, were capped with saucer-shaped capitals, reminiscent of the Greek Doric pilasters. Between the columns were massive floor-to-ceiling murals that emitted a green, phantasmagoric luminance. The soft light cast our shadows behind us, and for the moment, the torch was unnecessary, although I was reluctant to extinguish it.

  “What do you think, Sam?” said Caesar. I could hear his tongue scrape over his dry lips.

  “I think this is some weird shit.”

  “Shall we go in?”

  I was reluctant. The flickering torch seemed to lap the air with renewed enthusiasm, like an eager puppy. “How did Noah feel about trespassers?” I asked.

  Caesar looked at me, arching an eyebrow. “You think it might be booby-trapped?”

  I shrugged. The walls continued to glow, as they had done for a long, long time. The torch whipped crazily in my hand, although I didn’t feel much of a draft. Black smoke billowed up from the flame, smelling vaguely of burnt hamburgers at a Fourth of July picnic. I think I was hungry.

  “It may be our only way out,” urged Caesar.

  “A valid point.”

  “And soon the snow will cover the ark entirely, including us, just as Omar had hoped.”

  I thought again of Liz Cayman. I thought of my life here in Turkey, the years wasted in mourning. Omar had stolen much from me. I gripped the torch until it shook in my hand, knuckles white. It was time to end his madness.

  “C’mon, professor,” I said, stepping into the glowing hallway.

  “What about booby-traps?”

  “We’ll take our chances.”

  * * *

  There were no poison darts or trap doors. At least not yet.

  Our footsteps stirred the ancient dust into billowing clouds, ghosts awakening from a deep slumber. The green light refracted off the dust motes and exploded into something surreal and dreamlike, shifting and churning, surrounding us in a sort of green aurora borealis. The color touched everything, bathing us completely, transforming our clothing and skin. We looked like two giant tree frogs. Even the professor’s teeth glowed green. I’m sure mine were no different.

  As the dust settled, we stood before the first mural, which rose from floor to ceiling, perhaps ten feet tall. It depicted a lush landscape. Rolling green hills. Long green grass blowing in the wind. Even the sky had a blue-green glow. On the hills were scrawny cattl
e, vastly different from our scientifically bred and genetically enhanced beasts. Some of the paint had flaked away, revealing the dark wood beneath. To my untrained eye, the painting seemed to have been done simply, although expertly contrasting light and shadow. A sort of harbinger to the late Nineteenth Century impressionists. The brush strokes were short, quick and bold. I sensed it had been created in a burst of inspiration, with little forethought.

  I rubbed my grizzled jaw. “What do you think, old man?”

  “Rather well done,” he said.

  “Rather,” I said.

  “The artist was before his time,” said Caesar. “It belongs in a museum, or at least on my living room wall.”

  “I think Noah would have something to say about that.”

  The columns were spaced evenly, framing each mural, and sculpted in bas relief by a master craftsman. The scene on the first column was one of a mighty river surging over boulders, wending its way through the countryside. Large trees, perhaps cypress trees, crowded the banks. Birds sat on the branches of the trees. Gargantuan ferns hung out over the water, as predators, such as wolves and jackals, patrolled the undergrowth. A boy stood knee deep in the river and washed what appeared to be earthen pots. Another fished along the river bank, pole held loosely in his hands; he could have been asleep.

  “Somebody had a lot of spare time on his hands,” I said.

  “Good point,” said Caesar. “Taking the biblical story of the Flood at face value, the crew was on board the ark for over a year. With that said, I would suggest these masterworks were created while on the sea voyage, as I note a sense of longing for what was lost.”

  I sensed it too. The painting on the opposite wall was of an old woman amidst a flower garden, wearing a patchwork collection of tattered clothing. She was hunched over a row of purple chrysanthemums. Rather than rendering the old lady in minute detail, her chubby form was merely implied; the artist chose instead to concentrate on the effects of light and shadow, contrasting the primary colors of red, yellow, and blue, with the complements of green, purple and orange. The brush strokes were side by side, rather than overlapping. The result was pure, verdant energy—the colors exploding across the wall in a visual orgasm.