‘Maybe,’ Hellerman, ‘but you have to remember that this temple is thousands of years older than any comparable site, already far more ancient than anything in the common historical record, and yet it’s as if it was built by a civilization on a technological par with ancient Egypt, Rome or Greece. I’m willing to bet that the reason they went to the trouble of building an entire temple with this symbol in the middle was of far greater importance to them than merely a battle site or place of worship.’
Ethan frowned as he stared at the symbol on the screen.
‘Why would they be doing this at all?’ he asked. ‘What would be the point of making all of these cryptic images and symbols. If they were indicating the location of Atlantis then why wouldn’t they just write or indicate that? Wouldn’t they have viewed the city as just another trading partner or enemy state or something?’
Hellerman smiled up at Ethan. ‘You’re a genius.’
Lopez coughed in amazement and shook her head. ‘There’s something you don’t hear every day.’
Ethan was equally confused. ‘I’ll defer to your judgement and agree with you, even though I don’t know why.’
Hellerman gestured to the symbol of Krishna again.
‘They must have viewed any such site with great reverence, enough so that it would be singled out against all others. I was just saying that the great mystery of how the world’s ancient civilizations could have sprung up across the world was one that modern archaeology could not solve. Well, we just solved it.’
‘How?’ Jarvis asked.
Hellerman switched screens, and with a rattle of the keys brought up a series of images of ancient Egypt’s pyramids, the famous monoliths of Giza.
‘Check these out,’ he said as he pointed at them one after the other. ‘These are the greatest known pyramids of Egypt, from the three largest at the Giza Plateau through the older step pyramids and on into the ancient past where there can be found pyramids deep in the desert built from broken and irregular blocks, many of them half buried by the desert sands. What do you notice about them all?’
Garrett replied first, voicing what they were all thinking.
‘They get bigger and better as time moves on.’
‘Exactly,’ Hellerman agreed as he gestured to the images. ‘The earliest pyramids are small and simple in their construction and have not stood up well to the elements over thousands of years. The largest and most impressive pyramids are the latest and last, huge monuments that still stand to this day and are built from blocks that even today’s engineers would have trouble manipulating.’
‘So?’ Jarvis asked. ‘That’s just common sense. The Egyptians got better at building pyramids as they went along.’
‘And that’s the problem,’ Hellerman replied. ‘What if we assume that’s what happened, because it’s common sense, but in fact things happened the other way around?’
‘What do you mean?’ Lopez asked.
‘What if the ancient Egyptians really didn’t build the pyramids on their own, but in fact tried to copy them and got progressively worse as some kind of ancient knowledge was lost?’
‘You’re kidding?’ Lopez uttered.
‘I’m not,’ Hellerman replied as he pulled up a chronology of pyramid building in ancient Egypt and showed it to them on the laptop’s screen. ‘It’s one of the least known facts about ancient Egypt and one that conventional archaeologists bend over backwards to try to explain away but have consistently failed to do so. The giant pyramids on the Giza Plateua which were built some four and a half thousand years ago were not the last pyramids to be built by the Egyptians – they were some of the first.’
Ethan stared in amazement at the screen as he looked at an image of the three immense pyramids at Giza and more images of newer pyramid built in the deserts around ancient Memphis.
‘The Egyptians didn’t invent pyramid building,’ Hellerman said. ‘They copied already existing structures, but were unable to match the originals.’
***
XIX
‘I take it that you have some corroborating evidence to support this?’ Jarvis asked Hellerman. ‘Walking in here and telling us that the most iconic monuments in Egypt were not in fact Egyptian isn’t a small step to take.’
‘I’m not the first to bring it up,’ Hellerman said. ‘A number of archeologists and meteorologists have studied patterns of weather erosion around the monuments of the Giza Plateau and have confirmed that all of them show evidence of being affected by torrential rain.’
That got everybody’s attention real quick. Even the least travelled people on the planet would likely have known the location of the Egyptian pyramids and the lack of rainfall in that part of the world.
‘They’re smack dab in the middle of a desert,’ Lopez pointed out.
‘They are now,’ Hellerman countered, ‘and they were when the ancient Egytians ruled the region, but that area has not been desert for its entire existence and that’s where the real mystery begins. The ancient Egyptians referred to the pyramids only occasionally in their texts, and when they did so their writings consider the monuments to have been ancient even to them. ‘Think about it: the greatest monuments they had ever built and they barely mention them, and consider them to be ancient?’
‘I thought that the Great pyramid was built as a tomb for the pharaoh Khufu,’ Ethan said.
‘That’s what most archaeologists believe,’ Hellerman agreed, ‘and they reference various hieroglyphic records to support the notion. However, recent studies have revealed that most of those records refer to repair work done on the pyramids by the Egyptians rather than the actual construction of the monuments. It is even recorded in an artefact known as the Inventory Stella that the pharaoh Khufu engaged in a restoration project on the Sphinx, known as the Hwran to the ancient Egyptians, confirming that the entire site was already in existence at the time and could not have been built by the pharaoh’s people.’
‘So how does this tie in with the supposed location of Atlantis?’ Lopez asked.
Hellerman’s eyes were alive with excitement now as he replied.
‘It’s all about the ages,’ he said. ‘The records show that the last time the region of the Gaza Plateau would have seen torrential rain for prolonged periods would have been around the end of the last Glacial Maximum. That’s around ten thousand years ago.’
Ethan let that sink in for a moment. Ten thousand years was close to the age of the submerged site at Dwarka and also tied in with a number of similarly aged sites around the world that they had visited on past expeditions. The Yonaguni site off the coast of Japan had been one of the most striking, its geometric city streets and steps clear in their arrangement. The site itself had been underwater for perhaps as long as the Giza Plateau had been enveloped in the sands of the Sahara Desert. Other sites in Turkmenistan and the Gobi Desert hinted at advanced civilization existing in regions of the world that were now unable to support such cities, and had not possessed a climate capable of doing so for many thousands of years.
‘Most of the archaeological finds relating to the pyramids in Egypt show considerable links to astronomical locations,’ Hellerman went on, ‘which is understandable given most ancient cultures’ interest in all things heavenly. The Pyramids of Giza and associated structures further out in the deserts show the entire construction to be a stellar map depicting the constellation of Orion. Many archaeologists have dismissed this as coincidence, despite the fact that the builders of these monuments had to both level the entire Giza plateau to build them, and that other major monumental structures around the world also are maps of the same constellation.’
‘There are others?’ Garrett asked.
‘Many others,’ Hellerman confirmed. ‘The Giza plateau is postioned at the center of the geographical earth, the center of the planet’s landmass. Teotihuacan, the ancient home of the Aztec people of central Mexico, occupies a similar location but we know that the Aztecs did not build the city itself, which predates the ci
vilization by centuries at the very least. Their name for the city meant “Place of the Gods” although its original name and builders remain unknown. Those original builders constructed the city in very similar ways to the methods used to build the Egyptian pyramids, and the layout of the site once again mimics the constellation of Orion, with two larger pyramids and one smaller one marking the belt of Orion, precisely the same arrangement as seen at Giza. The Hopi tribe of Native Americans made their home in what is now Arizona, using three mesas that happened to match the constellation of Orion’s belt. The villages they have inhabited for thousands of years are arranged in locations matching the corner stars of Orion.’
Ethan felt that he suddenly had a sense of where Hellerman was coming from. The ancient tribes of countless civilizations both large and small shared the same obsessions with cosmology and astronomy and had sprung up in wildly different locations around the globe, with their cities apparently built on similar foundations of technical and architectural prowess and yet separated by entire oceans.
‘They were all working off the same instructions,’ he said finally.
‘That’s what I think,’ Hellerman agreed. ‘Although modern archaeology rejects the notion out of hand, it stands up to scrutiny when we look at the evidence. These civilizations knew nothing of each other and yet they occupied areas around massive monolithic constructions that shared the same building techniques, the same mathematical precision, the same astronomical knowledge and the same legends.’
‘The same legends?’ Lopez asked.
‘Precisely the same,’ Hellerman agreed, ‘with minor variations based on differences in dialect and the passing of time and word of mouth repetition. They all speak of gods who descended from the skies or from across the seas, who bore great knowledge and wisdom that they shared with the people, which allowed them to build immense structures and draw mankind out of his hunter gatherer lifestyle and begin the process of technological advancement at a tremendous pace. Their technologies were believed by our ancestors to have been little different from magic. Those legends have since metamorphosized into the great religions of today, our ancestors’ mysterious benefactors likewise transforming into gods in the minds of those who witnessed them.’
‘And those people would have had to have had an origin,’ Lopez said as she caught on to Ethan’s train of thought. ‘They would have had to have come from somewhere, and these symbols and icons may point to that location.’
‘As preserved by the retelling of ancient legends for millennia,’ Hellerman agreed, ‘and later in the symbols and carvings embedded in Neolithic sites now buried beneath the waves that have advanced since the last Glacial Maximum. The end of the last Ice Age began some twelve thousand years ago and continues to this day. At times, the rising seas would have in some locations been like a deluge, entire cities and regions flooded in very short timescales in the geological sense. The Black Sea is believed to have formed in this way some seven thousand years ago in what is termed by geologists as an Outbreak Flood, when the Aegean Sea broke through, a catastrophic regional deluge that would have eradicated countless towns and coastlines.’
‘The origin of the flood legends,’ Jarvis acknowledged.
‘It makes sense,’ Hellerman agreed, ‘and Lucy may be back–tracking toward the most ancient victim of such a deluge, the mythical Atlantis. These icons that she has found in such ancient locations are a sort of codex, a means of finding the origin of the city. The further back in time Lucy goes, the closer to the origin of the symbols she will presumably get.’
‘If the Russians don’t get to her first,’ Lopez said. ‘They have access to all the same information that we do and they could get the jump on us at any time.’
‘They don’t have this icon,’ Hellerman pointed out. ‘Although when they locate the temple where their colleagues met their demise at Dwarka, it won’t take them long to catch up.’
Ethan nodded as they all silently looked at the image of the Krishna pointing toward the south east, and then Lopez pointed at the top of the screen.
‘Wait a minute, you said that all these ancient folks were obsessed with the stars, right?’
‘Sure,’ Hellerman replied.
‘And the stars move over time,’ she went on.
‘Yeah, but only over thousands of years and…’ Hellerman stared at her for a moment and then his eyes lit up. ‘And we have the age of this temple down to an accuracy of a thousand years!’
‘Y’see?’ Lopez said as she nudged Ethan with her elbow. ‘We’re not just pretty faces.’
Hellerman grabbed some images of the stellar constellations from the pictures and then a star map from a website on the Internet.
‘So, if we figure the temple was built some nine thousand years ago, and we wind back the star map here so it matches how the sky would have looked around that time…’
Ethan saw the star map shift slightly, and then Hellerman began manipulating an icon over a three–dimensional image of planet earth until the stars matched the position of those in the temple, and he saw a longitude and latitude appear on the screen and a glowing icon flashing.
‘Bingo,’ Hellerman said as he zoomed in on the map. ‘The Krishna is pointing us toward a location in Indonesia, and it’s flagged here as the location of a remote Neolithic site known as Gunung Padang, one of the oldest human settlements ever discovered.’
‘That was where she must have been when she recorded the video of the idol,’ Hellerman said as he looked at the map. ‘But why didn’t she let us know where she was?’
Ethan smiled ruefully as he imaged Dr Lucy Morgan, once again on the verge of perhaps one of the most explosive discoveries in the history of mankind. Both of her previous major discoveries in Israel and then Peru had been concealed either by Majestic Twelve or their own government as being too controversial to risk exposing to the general public. Ethan knew well that she had been twice robbed of tremendous acclaim and professional success and that right now she would be hoping for “third time lucky” and would not want Jarvis, the government, Majestic Twelve or anyone else to interfere.
‘She’s not in danger,’ Lopez said, ‘she’s chasing her fortune and glory.’
Ethan nodded as he took one last look at the screen.
‘The Russians won’t be far behind us,’ he said. ‘We’d better move, fast.’
Lopez was about to follow him when Hellerman’s laptop pinged and a new window appeared. Upon it was Aaron Mitchell, his dark eyes filled with foreboding as his video connection was established and he saw the team watching him.
‘The program’s changed,’ Mitchell reported simply. ‘Ethan, Nicola; I have some bad news.’
***
XX
Maryland, USA
Allison Pierce sat alone in a hospital ward, staring at the opposite wall and wondering how her life had gone entirely to hell in less than twenty–four hours. A brief check by paramedics and a handful of pain killers upon arrival had ensured that her accident had only briefly slowed her down, and now she was keen to get the hell out of the ward and back to DC.
She had no idea why she had been targeted and shot at by the gang bangers. She had assumed in the instant that the kid with whom she had met had been followed and that his snitching had provoked a death sentence, carried out with typical brutality by his former comrades. However, she could not shake the sense that there was a second possibility, one that haunted her now as she waited in the silent ward. She felt exposed, nervous, far from the familiar surroundings of DC.
At the far end of the hall, through an open door, she could see a nurse walking toward her flanked by two uniformed officers and one detective. The three men were led to the ward entrance by the nurse, and the two uniformed officers took up positions either side of the door as the detective walked in.
She figured him to be maybe fifty, short and overweight with beady, glistening eyes that bored into hers with something approaching malice. He smiled at her as he approached, but
there was no warmth in his expression.
‘Allison Pierce, my name is Detective Jason Cleaves, how are you feeling?’
Allison smiled and feigned relief as the detective sat down alongside her bed.
‘I’m good now,’ she said as Cleaves folded his hands together, his elbows resting on his knees as he looked at her.
‘That’s good to know,’ he replied in a manner that suggested anything but concern for her welfare. ‘I have a few questions for you. Can you tell me from the beginning what happened? Why were you in Maryland?’
Allison had already explained her story to uniformed officers at the scene, but she knew why she was being asked again: the detective would be seeking any holes in her story, anything to hint that she was lying or concealing evidence. Allison took great pride in telling her story once more, knowing that there was nothing to hide and that Cleaver would leave empty handed.
Cleaver listened intently as she explained how she had been investigating a possible story and had travelled into Maryland to interview a street kid who may have had information about a conspiracy. After the interview, the kid had been shot and she had been attacked and pursued out of the area by the same gunmen before crashing. The police had arrived just in time and the gunmen had fled before they could finish her off.
When she had finished, Cleaver watched her for a long moment before he pulled out a notepad and scanned a few details on it.
‘You say that you’re following up on a story lead, right?’
‘That’s right.’
‘I called your office and was told that you were dropped yesterday,’ Cleaver informed her. ‘Why would you be working on a story?’
‘Freelance,’ Allison replied. ‘I was already working the story before my boss and I had a little falling out.’
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