Eetoo

by Robby Charters

  The shadows were lengthening. Heptosh reduced the magnification so he could search over a wider area. The pyramid would be easier to spot in daylight, than using the night viewer at night.

  They made their way along the river. The shadows had disappeared on the ground, but they could still see the sun setting from their elevation. There was still sufficient daylight. They hurried on.

  Then they saw it. It was just as the map showed it. Near it was the statue of the cat with the head of a man. There were other smaller pyramids also in the vicinity, though not as fine as the one near the cat statue.

  Heptosh carefully positioned the ship over the apex of the pyramid. It had a flat top that looked ideal for landing -- probably designed for it. Surely there would be a door there as well.

  He began to descend carefully. The full moon was rising in the East. It was too dark to see if there were people on the ground.

  He turned on the landing lights. Half way to touchdown, Heptosh turned on the night viewer.

  There they were. People were running towards the pyramid from tents and buildings. He could see various encampments here and there, one right next to the cat statue. Farther off, there were buildings.

  At the base of the pyramid, some people had started to bow down in worship, as though their ship were the chariot of a god.

  They landed. They had attracted too much attention. If there wasn't a door on the apex of this pyramid, Heptosh decided he'd better abort the attempt and come back later. Maybe if he landed farther off in the dead of night he could come and make a search.

  Heptosh and Shan made a hurried search. They could hear voices of the crowd below.

  There was no door to be found so they got back in and made their ascent. Then they returned to Nephtesh.

  It was still daylight there, so they landed in front of the pyramid and went in, following the passages until they reached the tele-gate chamber.

  No one was there. The tele-gate was on. Obviously, someone had turned it on from the other side and Eetoo and Tsaphar had gone through.

  Heptosh decided to leave it at that.

  Part 3 -- The Adventurer

  1

  Tsaphar held tightly to Eetoo's hand as they stepped into the unknown. Eetoo hadn't turned on his metzig torch, expecting to see by the light of Heptosh's on the other side.

  Instead, they found themselves standing face to face with a man holding a fire torch. They couldn't make any features in the dim dancing light.

  'Heptosh?' Tsaphar whispered.

  The figure stood still a moment, and then spoke: 'Shalom...' He said some more that Tsaphar could barely make out. It was Akkadi, but even farther from her own native tongue than Tasha's, of Thevsos.

  Eetoo simply stood silent, as he usually did in moments of indecision.

  Tsaphar attempted an answer: 'Al ekem shalem.'

  There was a pause. Then, the man began speaking in a dialect Tsaphar understood a little bit better, but from the way he was speaking, wasn't his native tongue.

  'I am Hyrcanah, the son of Mattai ben Tsaddok. Are you the children of Ham?'

  Eetoo said, 'I am Eetoo, a son of Kham-tep'

  'I welcome you. Please come with me.'

  Tsaphar wondered if she should ask about Heptosh and Shan.

  They followed Hyrcanah down a corridor, up another, and proceeded through a network every bit as intricate as the one on Nephtesh. They came up steps into what appeared to be a large tent. There was a slab of rock standing behind them.

  'I cover this entrance with a tent, so people don't see it. I will close this door.'

  Hyrcanah pulled the slab towards the square hole from which they had emerged. It came down easily. Tsaphar could see that on the two sides of the slab, at the bottom, parts of the rock went down slots on either side. Apparently, they were attached to a counterweight that enabled easy opening and closing of the door. After the door shut, Tsaphar couldn't even see the seam.

  They went out of the tent and noticed that it was pitched against a large structure. They were too close to it to see what it was. There were other tents about. It was night.

  Some men sitting about a fire immediately stood up and looked at them expectantly.

  'They have come!' Tsaphar thought he heard Hyrcanah say. 'These are my pupils,' he said to the two.

  'How did you know we were coming?' Tsaphar asked.

  'The time was right. Then, this very night, not an hour ago, we received the sign that was spoken of: a star descended from heaven and rested on that pyramid. It remained a short time and went up again into heaven.'

  Hyrcanah pointed. They could see a large white pyramid, just like the one they had entered. It was bathed with a white light.

  Tsaphar turned to Eetoo and whispered, 'Heptosh's ship!'

  She wondered where the light was coming from. So, apparently, did Eetoo. They looked up.

  There was a large white thing -- it looked like a planet -- up in the sky.

  'What is that?' said Eetoo.

  'Do you come from a land that sees not the moon?' asked Hyrcanah.

  'I know that in the planet where my fathers came from, they had such an object in the sky. Does it become a small curved line at certain times in the month?'

  'Yes,' he answered. Then he motioned towards the biggest tent. 'You have come a long way. You should rest yourselves. Join us in this tent.'

  They followed him in. There were rugs spread out with a short table in the middle set with food. Hyrcanah motioned for them to sit down. They did.

  He took a flask, said some words over it like a prayer, that Tsaphar didn't catch at first, and poured three glasses of red wine. They drank it together.

  One of his pupils brought a basin for them to wash their hand in.

  Hyrcanah, again, recited a prayer over the food in his own language. This time, Tsaphar caught some of it: 'Blessed be the Lord, our god, (something - something) fruit of the ground.' He broke a loaf of bread into three and gave them each a piece.

  Then he said, 'I am surprised that I can understand your speech. I had expected that I would have to use one of the ancient languages of the Egyptians. How is it that you know the ancient form of our language, being the sons of Ham?'

  Tsaphar answered: 'Eetoo, my fiancé, is of the sons of Ham, the son of Noach. He speaks the language of the Nephteshi. I also speak it. I am an Akkadi, and we speak the language we are speaking now. I taught him to speak Akkadi. He can understand me, but I don't know if he can, you.'

  'Just a little bit,' said Eetoo.

  'Nephteshi?' pondered Hyrcanah. 'I've only found one reference to Nephtesh in the ancient writings of the Egyptians. Was that a city?'

  'It's a nation that used to be on this planet,' said Tsaphar. 'They moved themselves to a different planet, and became a great empire. They used this gate that you opened to go back and forth from the planet of Adam, but Imhotep closed the gate. He also removed the record of the location from the planet of Nephtesh, so no one could travel back and forth.'

  'Imhotep. That would be our Patriarch, Yoseph. He knew of the Golden Tablets of Shem, and that a son of one of the clans of Ham that had removed from these lands would one day return to seek for them. Not many people know this. I have studied the ancient texts, some of which I have had to search for in caves and underground chambers.

  'I also learned that Shem, the son of Noach, was revered as both a king and a priest in the ancient city that later became known as Yerushalayim. Then, it was simply known as Shalem. They gave him the title "King of Righteousness", and to some, that became his name: Melekhi Tsedekh. It's said that he hid the golden plates in an underground chamber under the city of Shalem, which later became Yerushalayim after King David conquered it. Now, there are many underground passages under the city. I have explored some of them. It is said that the prophet Eliyahu once descended into the passages, and discovered the golden plates. After he read them he returned them, knowing they were intended for the son of Ham. Eliyahu is said to have quoted
this from the tablets:

  'Six thousand years have been determined for the world to exist: two thousand without the Torah, two thousand with Torah, and two thousand will be the years of Messiah. If Messiah doesn't come, the final two thousand will be lost.

  'Those who keep track of the times and seasons tell us that the third period of two thousand years is about to begin. Therefore, it must be the time of Messiah. Your arrival through the gate is further confirmation.

  'Now, I wish we had more food and wine for the occasion, which is a special occasion indeed, but we are in a far place, where good food is scarce.'

  Eetoo told him he thought the meal was very sumptuous. Tsaphar thought so too.

  As they left the tent where they ate, they noticed that the giant structure before them was, indeed, the cat statue. The tent across from them was pitched so that it covered a portion along the side.

  He showed them to another large tent where they found sleeping areas, one separated by a curtain.

  'Sleep now,' said Hyrcanah. 'Tomorrow we have a long way to travel. We must stay in Alexandria until the time comes to go to Yerushalayim. Meanwhile, it may be wise if I close the door to your land for now until you have completed your sojourn.'

  He left them with that and walked back to the cat statue holding the torch.

  We've already travelled a long way, though Tsaphar. How much further could we possibly go if what we're looking for is right on this planet?

  2

  the river winds on endlessly in the hot sun

  the waterway flows forever forward

  the stillness of the water occasionally broken by a boat

  a wooden craft driven by its sail upstream

  on the bank, farmers till the dry earth

  houses, villages and groves of palm trees dot the landscape

  on board, a crowd of passengers view the endless moving scene

  some gazing, some dozing, some engaged in small talk

  This is the second day we've been travelling. I thought this planet, being the birthplace of humans, would have everything the other planets have, carriers and spaceships and all. To Hyrcanah, a ship is only a thing that goes in water. This is hardly more developed than the Fa-tzi-zhi villages. I'm sure that in a carrier, we'd have got there long ago.

  Some of Hyrcanah's men men have stayed at the camp by the cat statue to guard it. I guess we'll need them there to help us when it's time to go back.

  We rode on donkeys until our bottoms were absolutely sore, and reached the river. Then we had to wait until a boat came by.

  There was enough room for us -- only just. It's so crowded we can only sit here, or stand -- no room to walk about, only to squeeze past if we need to crap over the edge. The rest of the time we have to sit and watch other people doing it.

  The only other thing to see is endless fields and clay houses, and people either working in the fields or going places on donkeys or camels.

  Hyrcanah says we should be there later today. Every time Tsaphar says she's tired I remind her of that.

  It'll be an even longer journey to that city where the golden tablets are hidden.

  Hyrcanah helps keep our minds off our problems by talking to us. No one else understands the language we speak, even the Jews (as he calls them). He says that's good as we don't have to worry about people listening in.

  The language they speak now is Akkadi, but it's changed over a thousand years or so. Tsaphar's Akkadi is almost the same as the ancient language Hyrcanah knows. It hardly changed at all because Tsaphar's people lost 1000 years by travelling close to the speed of light.

  Anyway, Hyrcanah has spent his whole life studying all the ancient languages and digging up stuff from long time ago, so he can read them. That's how he found out we were supposed to come, and found the way to the tele-gate.

  He definitely knows a lot, but doesn't know anything at all about space travel, nor any kind of technology beyond building a fire, or using a pulley and a lever. He thinks the tele-gate is some sort of magic. He knows his maths, though.

  I haven't seen a single metzig torch, nor even anything that takes a power cell. I wonder what he'd think if I showed him mine? What about my computer?

  He looks confused every time we talk about other planets, such as having moons or not having moons. He probably thinks we come from some other part of the same planet or something. He even talked yesterday as though he thought this planet were really one big plane that goes forever in every direction. But he seems to know a lot about other things, though. He's studied a lot.

  I could sure use a drink of coourzt right now.

  3

  Tsaphar felt much better now they were settled into Hyrcanah's home. The only thing that bothered her was that they would have to make that long horrible journey again before they could go home -- not to mention an even longer one to find the Tablets. Maybe she could stay here while Eetoo went on his own?

  She finished washing herself and returned to the main room. Hyrcanah and Eetoo were seated on some cushions at a small table. There were writing instruments set out.

  The pupils were at the house of study, transcribing manuscripts, so the three of them had this house to themselves. Eetoo was attempting to write some Akkadi letters with a long stick dipped in ink on papyrus.

  'She can do it better,' he said, as soon as Tsaphar arrived.

  Tsaphar sat down and wrote out the Akkadi phonetic letters for Hyrcanah. He picked it up and examined it.

  'I've seen clay tablets with this form of writing. They used a stylus to make wedge shaped imprints in the clay.'

  'We do that with computers,' said Eetoo.

  'Pardon me?'

  'Very much like a clay tablet,' said Tsaphar, hurriedly. She gave Eetoo a warning look.

  He blushed.

  'Ah,' responded Hyrcanah. 'Now, my understanding is that our father, Avraham wrote in this way. Now, let me fetch a manuscript I have, in which the language may be similar, but the writing is different.' He got up.

  He went to a clay vessel and pulled a large roll of papyrus and unrolled it on the table. Wrapped inside was something that looked like old animal hide.

  'I found this in one of the underground chambers in the city of Yerushalayim. It's an example of writing that we used before Ezra the Scribe re-wrote all of our holy texts in the new Babylonian text. Not much of this has survived.'

  Tsaphar wasn't familiar with the alphabet, so Hyrcanah read it to them. She could understand it better than the form of Akkadi he spoke with his pupils. It was still not the same as Hyrcanah had been using with them.

  She even recognised the story.

  'Eetoo!' she said when he had paused. 'It's the song of the seven ages you recited for me!'

  'Remarkable! So you your version of the tablets contained the passage from the book of Beginning! Let me fetch another document.'

  He went to a chest which he unlocked with a key and brought out another roll. This one contained linen cloth -- not old looking at all, but it was marked up as though it had been rubbed evenly about with a stick of charcoal, except for what looked like Hieroglyphics that were left white.

  'I made this rubbing from an inscription I found. Don't read it out loud, particularly this word here.'

  Tsaphar and Eetoo read it.

  'Wow! It's in Akkadi, but it uses the old Nephteshi phonetic letters!' observed Eetoo.

  'It was the writing system used by the Egyptians.'

  It was a set of rules directly quoting the person who's name Hyrcanah told them not to say out loud: 'I am ---- your God...'

  'My grandmother used a name close to that for the one god she worshipped,' Tsaphar said.

  Hyrcanah gave a look of interest and went on.

  'This inscription was made only a few hundred years after the time of Yoseph, whom you know as Imhotep, by a leader named Moshe.

  'Before he became our leader, Moshe had grown up in Pharaoh's court and was educated in the wisdom and writing of Egypt. Among other things, he p
robably read the stone tablets of Ham, of which your people have a copy, which would have been stored in the library in Memphis. He put all the existing oral traditions to writing along with commandments that he received from the Most High -- blessed be He -- the one Who's Name I told you not to pronounce. Those are the books we have here. Also he inscribed the Ten Words, which I have made this rubbing of.

  'Now,' he went on, 'concerning this rubbing, hardly anyone, not even my pupils, knows I have it -- perhaps one or two trusted friends. The tablets containing the inscription were lost, along with the sacred box, the Ark of the Covenant, that contained them. I was alone when I found them. Because they are so sacred, and central to the worship of the Most High -- blessed be He -- revealing their location would cause political chaos. Were I not rightfully a priest, I would not have dared touch them, they are so holy. I only did so after much prayer and ceremonial cleansing. But their location must remain a secret until Messiah has restored the kingdom and ascended the throne of His Father, King David. He will bring peace to the world and solve the turmoil the nation of Yisrael is now in.

  ‘Again, no one knows but me, a few close friends, and now, you two, but the location is known only to me.'

  Eetoo had been examining the rubbings.

  'These are almost like the laws we have,' he said.

  'What laws?' said Tsaphar.

  'Elkhem gave them to Old Man Noka after the flood. They are: everyone who murders without just cause must be put to death, there must be trial and punishment for the wrongdoer, do not eat a limb severed from a live animal, do not have relations with someone who isn't your own wife, do not take what is not yours, and do not pray to sculpted images.'