“Remember what Lailoken said,” Tam Nok was standing over the two of them. “He said the shortest distance would not a be straight line.”
“But going all the way around in almost a circle is certainly not the shortest distance either,” Ragnarok said.
Bjarni had picked up the metal plate and was studying it.
“He also said something about a short cut,” Tam Nok said.
“How can there be a short-cut?” Ragnarok argued. “We know where we are and we know where we wish to go. We cannot go in a straight line and any other route would take too much time.”
“There is a tunnel,” Tam Nok said. She took the map from Bjarni and pointed to a spot off the northern coast of Iceland.
“A what?” Ragnarok looked where she was pointing.
“It says here, these runes, that there is a tunnel,” Tam Nok said.
“You can read the markings?” Ragnarok asked.
“It is a language from the Greeks,” the priestess replied. “I learned some in my travels. I do not understand much, but this word here, it is the word for tunnel. And this thin line goes from there to here, which is where I wish to go. I believe the line is the tunnel.”
“This place,” Ragnarok said, “off the coast of Iceland, is where Ginnungagap, the great chasm ice and fire that separates the Gods is reported to be. I have heard stories of the sea opening up, of monsters climbing out of the depths. A tunnel in the great chasm would not be strange. The legends say the gods can travel through the underworld.”
Hrolf had been hovering in the background and now he added his opinion. “I do not wish to travel through the underworld.”
“We do not even know for sure if there is a tunnel there,” Ragnarok said.
“Monsters and demonesses who fly--” Hrolf spit. “We are intruding in things beyond us.”
“It may be beyond us,” Tam Nok agreed, “but it affects us.”
“How?” Hrolf demanded. “All we have heard are your stories. You talk of a threat to the world, but I see no threat except when we stick our noses where they should not be.”
“My people were--” Tam Nok began, but Hrolf interrupted.
“Your people. Not my people.”
“All people have been affected by the Shadow,” Tam Nok said. “Where do you think you come from?”
“Not from the same place as you,” Hrolf said. He held out his arm and placed it next to her’s. “We are very different.”
Tam Nok shook her head. “That is just skin color. I live in a hot, sunny place. My people have been there for many generations just as yours have lived in a cold, dark place for many generations. We adapt to where we live. In my journey here I have seen many different types of people. The ones who built the Great Wall that I passed through. With eyes like mine but their skin was more yellow. The riders of the steppes. All different but all the same. Not here--” she rubbed her hand along her arm-- “but here.” Tam Nok pressed her hand against her chest over her heart. “And here.” She pointed at her head.
“The stories, the legends, are different in detail but the same in meaning and depth. All speak of a great flood long ago. They give different reasons for it, but all knew of it. Even those who live in the very high mountains far from the ocean, who would not have even seen the flood. How do they know of it? Because their ancestors came on the flood. All our ancestors did.
“The battles between gods-- all have different names for their gods, but there is much that is the same in the way the gods act, the way they fight. Even this tunnel under the Earth-- every culture I have passed through speaks of an underworld.”
Tam Nok reached out and placed her hands on Hrolf’s chest. “This Shadow destroyed our ancestors and scattered them so far around the world that you stand here now and don’t believe we are kin. But we are. And it will happen again, except this time there will be no one left. Unless we stop it.”
All activity had ceased on the ship. Other than Tam Nok speaking there was only the sound of the sail snapping in the wind and the water passing by the hull. Every Viking was staring at the small, brown woman, listening to her words.
Hrolf looked down at her hands on his chest, then reached up and placed his old, worn ones over her’s. “I do not know of these things you speak. I would like to believe we are all one people. Then maybe we would stop killing each other and hating so much.” The old man’s eyes lifted to Ragnarok’s. “I will go where my captain commands.”
“We have to go northwest anyway,” Ragnarok said.
Tam Nok nodded. “We will go that way. I know it is the right way.”
Bjarni stood and relieved the man on the rudder. He pushed on the tiller and the dragon’s head swung around to the northwest.
THE PRESENT
Chapter 21
1999 AD
“This can’t be right,” DeAngelo said. “I’m reading normal atmospheric pressure out there.”
“Why can’t that be right?” Dane asked.
“Because the muonic circle of activity was at twenty-eight thousand feet depth,” DeAngelo said. “Which means we’re still that deep.”
Dane was still staring at the video monitors, taking in the variety of craft lying on the metal shore. “The large door must be a pressure lock. This whole thing is pressurized.”
“But--” DeAngelo was at a loss for words. “Do you know what it would take to build such a-- something this big? Something that strong?”
“Technology we don’t possess,” Sin Fen said from the rear sphere. She was on her feet, reaching toward the hatch.
“What are you doing?” DeAngelo was startled.
“Going outside.”
“That’s a good idea,” Dane stood and reached up, grabbing the hatch handle. “Unlock the hatches,” he told DeAngelo.
“I--” DeAngelo gave up and turned to his controls.
The light flashed red and the automatic warning sounded as DeAngelo released the locks. Dane turned the handle and with a slight hiss, the hatch swung open. He climbed up the ladder and stood on the small metal grating on the top of the forward sphere. Sin Fen was on top of the rear sphere, fifteen feet behind him.
“There’s no one here,” Dane said.
“I know,” Sin Fen concurred.
The air was thick, almost oily, just like the air inside the Angkor gate. But Dane didn’t feel the sense of danger he had had the two times he’d gone inside that gate.
“Where do you think all the crews went?” Dane asked.
“Into the gate,” Sin Fen said. “This is a holding area for the ships and planes.”
“Some of them look like they’ve been held here for thousands of years,” Dane noted. He yelled down into the sphere to DeAngelo. “Can you take us close to the beach?”
In reply, Deepflight began moving through the water, producing the only disturbance in the mirror-like surface.
When they were ten meters from the shore, DeAngelo yelled up to them that they were as close as he could get without grounding the submersible.
“Ready to take a dip?” Dane asked.
In reply, Sin Fen climbed down off the sphere and slid into the water. She began swimming for the shore. “The water is not cold,” she yelled over her shoulder. “That’s strange.”
Given that the water on the other side of the door was 36 degrees that was indeed strange Dane though, but no stranger than the cavern itself and the craft that surrounded them.
Dane jumped into the water and swam after Sin Fen. The water was not only reasonably warm, it felt different, as the air did. Thicker and slimy. Dane was glad when his feet hit something solid beneath them. He stood and walked onto the beach, water slowly dripping off him. The first thing he noted was that the beach wasn’t of sand, but rather was a strange material-- almost a metal but with a slight yield to it. It also was almost warm to the touch and seamless, extending to the smooth rock wall a half mile away. “Hell of an engineering job,” Dane said.
They walked up to the pod, not su
rprised to see the hatch was open. Dane stuck his head briefly.
“Empty?” Sin Fen asked.
“You know it is,” Dane said.
Sin Fen was looking about at the craft closest to them. “Where do you want to start?”
“I don’t even know what we’re looking for,” Dane said.
“There should be captain’s logs in most of these ships,” Sin Fen said. “That’s a maritime tradition almost as long as there has been writing.”
“Let’s go clock-wise,” Dane suggested.
They walked around the pleasure yacht. There were a group of a dozen large rafts, long logs tied together with vines. A long rudder made of a single log carefully carved extended back. There was pole in the center of each which held a drooping sail.
“Who do you think was on the ocean using those?” Dane asked as they went past them.
Sin Fen picked up a piece of cloth off one of the rafts. It was stained red, with stick like figures drawn on it. “Looks Central American. But very old.”
Beyond the rafts was a freighter. Something about it struck Dane. He angled toward it so he could see the faded name painted on the bow. “The USS Cyclops.” He looked up at the ship. “A manganese ore freighter. Disappeared in March of 1918 with all hands while sailing near the Bermuda Triangle. The best guess of the naval investigative board is that she turned turtle in heavy seas, trapping all hands, before eventually sinking. The Poseidon Adventure was based on that finding.”
“Well, now we know they were wrong,” Sin Fen said as they walked around the bow of the ship.
A row of five Spanish galleons lay in front of them, evenly spaced from the edge of the water to the rock wall to their left. “A historian would give his right arm to be here,” Dane said as the walked between two of the ships.
“A treasure convey from the New World that never made it back to Spain,” Sin Fen said. “There’s probably billions of dollars worth of treasure here.”
“Probably,” Dane agreed. He paused. “Look at that.”
A small, single-masted ship was in front of them. It was less than fifty feet long by ten wide. There were holes in the upper sides where oars poked through. Dane walked up and placed his hand on the wood.
“This is very old.”
There were some marking carved into the prow that Sin Fen was studying. “Phoenician,” she finally said. “I don’t know what it says, but I recognize the writing.”
“And how do you know that?” Dane asked. “Seems strange that a woman from the slums of PhnomPhen would recognize Phoenician writing.”
“I spent many years in school after meeting Mister Foreman,” Sin Fen said. “Because we knew the gates were very old, one of my areas of study was ancient cultures.”
“How would a Phoenician ship got caught in the Bermuda Triangle?” Dane asked. “I thought they didn’t navigate outside of the Mediterranean.”
“Actually, it’s speculated the Phoenicians sailed out of the Mediterranean and all the way around Africa. Remember we’ve determined that something came out of the gate-- we have no idea how far that thing might have gone to grab these craft.”
Dane was already looking past the Phoenician ship. “Flight 19.”
Five TBM Avengers were lined up wingtip to wingtip. Dane climbed up the wing of one and looked in the cockpit. The windshield was pulled back. The name LT PRESSON was stenciled on the side, just below the cockpit.
“Foreman saw these planes disappear on radar in 1945,” Sin Fen joined him, standing on the wing.
“You can tell him where they went,” Dane said. He reached into the cockpit and pulled out a map. It was folded open showing southern Florida. Radio frequencies were written in pencil on it. He looked at the compass. It pointed north. Reaching further in, he flipped a switch on the control panel. There was a crackle of static.
“The radio works,” he said. “That means the batteries still have juice. Normally that would mean either someone’s recharging the battery or this plane has been flown recently. Neither of which I think has happened.”
He straightened and looked about. He felt no sense of danger like he had when he went into the Angkor gate. The absolute silence, the size of the cavern and all these abandoned planes and ships filled him with a sense of awe, not fear. He looked out onto the water. Deepflight was sitting still, DeAngelo on the top of the forward sphere, a pair of binoculars in hand, taking in all the ships.
“We’ve solved the mystery of all the disappearances around the Bermuda Triangle,” Sin Fen said as they climbed down of the wing of the Avenger.
“We solved one mystery by uncovering another,” Dane said. Two freighters, probably from the early age of steam were side by side in front of them. They walked around.
“These look like craft that were lost in the Atlantic,” Dane said. “What about the ships and planes lost in the Devil’s Triangle gate? And in the other gates?”
“Perhaps there is a place like this near all the gates,” Sin Fen said.
“Then the Shadow has been studying us for a long time,” Dane said.
“We already knew that,” Sin Fen said.
“We didn’t know they were doing this much studying,” Dane waved his hand, taking in the cavern.
“What makes you so sure it’s the Shadow that’s behind all this?” Sin Fen said. “I don’t sense any danger here, do you?”
“Not immediate danger. But there was fear on these ships and planes when they were taken and brought here.” He turned toward the center and scanned. “I see several submarines but no Ohio Class-- you couldn’t miss one of those if it was here. That means the Wyoming is still missing.”
“Let’s keep looking,” Sin Fen said. “Maybe a more modern ship will have a recording or even video of what happened to it.”
“I wouldn’t count on it given the electro-magnetic interference around the gates,” Dane said. “That looks pretty modern,” he added, indicating a black hulled catamaran whose decks were completely encased in flat planed sections, joined at angles. It looked like a stealth fighter attached to twin hulls, about eighty feet long by thirty wide.
“The Nightfarer,” Sin Fen said.
“You know that ship?”
“A prototype for a stealth ship the navy was considering.”
“Let me guess,” Dane said. “Foreman sent it into the Bermuda Triangle gate on a recon mission.”
“Send is too strong of a word-- that is what Foreman would say,” Sin Fen said. “Let’s say he gave it a nudge in the direction of the gate when the navy was doing some testing.”
“How long ago was that?” Dane asked.
“Two years.”
“And it went into the gate and just disappeared?”
“Yes.”
“So he learned the same thing he learned with the Scorpion three decades earlier,” Dane said. “Great logic.”
“I believe Mister Foreman was hoping the stealth capability of the ship might help it evade detection.”
“Wrong guess,” Dane said, “and the crew paid for it.”
They were at the side of the Nightfarer. The skin of the ship was not metal, but rather some sort of hard rubber.
“Special radar absorbing material,” Sin Fen saw him feeling the hull. “Even when at full speed, this ship only gave off the radar signature of a sea-gull.”
“It didn’t help them.” As Dane climbed up the side of the ship, he halted and looked down at Sin Fen. “Anything else you’ve forgotten to mention to me? Any other craft Foreman sent in here we might come across?”
“Not that I know of.” Sin Fen said.
“How much of what Foreman knows do you know?” Dane asked.
“Whatever he has let me know,” Sin Fen answered evasively.
“Does Foreman know all that you know?”
Sin Fen paused. “What do you mean?”
Instead of answering, Dane opened a hatch on the side of the ship. Sin Fen followed him. They made their way to the bridge. It was a small, hig
h-tech operations center. A red emergency light activated as he opened the hatch, giving off a muted glow. Dane sat in what must have been the captain’s seat, while Sin Fen took a seat just in front of him and to the right. There were no windows to the outside world. Like the Deepflight, a number of video screens lined the front wall.
“If that Avenger still had power,” Dane said, “let’s see what we have here. The light says there’s a good chance we can power some of this stuff up.” He swung an arm that had a laptop computer attached to it in front of him. He hit the power button. The screen glowed.
“So why are the batteries still fresh?” Dane asked as the computer booted.
“Maybe they’re held in the same statis the ships and planes seem to be in,” Sin Fen said. “If you’ll note, there’s no rust-- at least no more than they had when they came here-- on any of the metal hulls.”
“Does that mean we’re not growing any older, being in here?” Dane asked as slid his finger across the touchpad.
Sin Fen looked startled. “I hadn’t thought of that.”
Dane shifted his attention from the computer screen to his female partner. “I think you’re lying.”
“Why would I lie?”
“That’s something I’m going to have to figure out,” Dane typed into the keyboard. “I’ve got the captain’s log.” He scrolled down. “Just like Deeplab-- it goes off-line before we get any useful information about what happened to the ship.”
Dane leaned back in the captain’s chair and looked about the control room. He turned the chair to the right and dialed in a frequency on the FM radio transmitter.
“What are you doing?” Sin Fen asked.
“Worked once before,” Dane said. He keyed the mike. “Big Red this is Dane. Big Red this is Dane. Over.”
“Last time you did that, you almost got blasted to bits,” Sin Fen said.
“I’m not set up for Morse,” Dane said, “and we’re not next to a gate.” He waited, then resent the message. There was nothing but static coming out of the speakers. Dane tried several more times, but after five minutes he realized that his former teammate, Flaherty, who had gone over to the other side with the Ones Before, wasn’t listening.
Atlantis: Bermuda Triangle Page 21