Bryson vaguely recollected Professor Farrell and vague accounts of his discovery of perfectly preserved fossils and the news coverage, and the Exploration Association’s involvement with the alien encounter on the Pacific island, and as he recalled the world event and all the coverage the media had given he paid attention to Selenski far more, intrigued.
“Conventional technology used mainly in archaeology and by geologist, mineralogists and oil surveyors, has techniques such as geophysical prospecting and seismic reflection ...
“A multitude of electrical methods applied in mineral exploration depend on electrochemical activity, permittivity, and resistivity effects.
“Degrees of electrical conductivity exist in soil, and many materials act as natural batteries, with vague effects that can be measured ...
“Magnetic methods of prospecting detect buried features by locating the magnetic disturbances that they cause!
“Surveying done with gravimeters on airplanes and helicopters have accelerations and movements that can affect and ruin readings, which are very inaccurate anyhow, and they normally can only detect such things as salt domes, which trap oil, and are used in oil exploration, as well as to detect high-density minerals.
“Forms of radar detection can be used, but also with inaccurate results ...
“The new surveying equipment David Parker has can scan more accurately, deeper and faster, from airplanes and helicopter many times more powerfully than anything invented, and has been vastly improved since its use at the Pacific island discovery! The detection components are highly confidential again, as well as its uses by the military ...
“It produces the most detailed mapping of beneath the ground ever seen, to a far greater depth, making it possible to observe small and large objects – of the dimensions we are interested in!
“It’s in military satellites ... It can detect underground missile bases and things far below the ground, even hidden away in mountains, which are normally undetectable.
“Parker has been redoing his project in Greenland searching the depths of ice, and targeting locations in the oldest regions of ice recorded, where there could be rare sites where some of the dinosaurs existed! Can we be entirely certain some dinosaurs, like mammoths, have been fully extinct for millions of years?
“Extinct species, some remaining dinosaurs, might have somehow reached the Antarctic too, and could have been frozen in avalanches or snowstorms.
“They have fully equipped planes, technicians and pilots, to carry out their work.
“This technology is a scientific breakthrough and it would be a mistake not to use it for science!
“They’ve also been redoing scanning and doing underground maps of miles of rural Britain, the coast, and expertly examining archeological sites, and potential regions below forests, hills, lakes in distinct detail, and have revealed much of what they were searching for ...
“They also discovered signals of something believed to be of unknown origins, which, or course, is what this is about!”
Bryson accidentally gasped loudly, knowing they had detected something incredibly, and from Mortimer’s reactions, and he recalled more about their discovery in Cornwall and realized that they could have used their technology at the castle investigations, and wondered how much Merton and Mortimer had known of its existence. But could they have persuaded them and David Parker to use it there?
“Tell us of the strange magnetic phenomenon you found!” a scientist nearby asked.
“Some form of powerful magnetic influence, or something of that nature, was detected!”
“Whatever it is, it has incredible power! At what location was it discovered?”
“They were flying near where Rudolf Hess crashed during the Second World War when it was detected!”
“The magnetic field of the globe has been found at other zones than at the top of the globe ...”
“Even so it would beneficial to check this disturbance and record it for science! Incidentally, the scientists and technicians on the flight told us that the scanning equipment started to blank out and react like it had at the Pacific island discovery and at Cornwall, with fluctuations of energy overpowering it, and the equipment barely functioned!”
Chapter 2
The Lost Chamber
Bryson rhythmically released the rope edging him down into the deep endless tunnel, gasping for air, eagerly seeking to grasp what was hidden at the bottom.
He yearned to explore and grasp what was buried away down there in the abyss below, and he could not figure out what could be there! There was not suggestion of anything! He had always wanted to explore and discover new things of value and greatness, and be remembered for it.
He recalled watching the archeologists at work at the top constructing the tunnel for days, and him exploring the surrounding fields, and, away in the distance, where Hess had parachuted down.
Even though nobody there had been sure what would be accomplished, it was mysterious and fascinating!
Bryson groaned as the rope dug deep into his side and he dangled about trying to loosen it, and he grabbed part of a boulder embedded in solid mud, while he glimpsed parts of the shaft below, wondering if it was a disappointment. The farm field that it was in looked all wrong and empty of anything, and even Merton, Mortimer, and leading Exploration Association members above had doubts! Yet why would it or anything like it be situated in a particular situated and featured site?
By the frantic reactions of the archeologists below he sensed that they actually were discovering things buried beneath him. Although the descriptions that they had called up, when the discovery had been found were too vague and said little. Though they had suggested a lost chamber was there, and his mind had conjured up vague visions of strange treasures below and he had persuaded them to allow a third person to go down.
The archeologists had worked for days digging firmly and accurately into the dirt, gigging the tunnel straight down into the field, which was at the precise location given to them by David Parker’s scientists and technicians, accumulated from their equipment, and gave the exact center of the disturbance.
Bryson had been standing glaring down the hole, going down well over eighty feet, when one of the two archeologists had hollered up as he had broken through into something below.
Bryson had also been on the plane when it had redetected the site and exact location, and he had been incredibly surprised and amazed, as well as the other scientists there, at the power and accuracy of the equipment and the discovery located there.
There definitely was something there in the field, located near where Hess had come down, which remained unexplained, and he repeatedly wondered if the disturbance had caused Hess’s crash, and how and why? Even though it could clearly affect the equipment they had used to find it there was no indication if it could do anything else. They had people and people in the media search for accounts of anything being affected and crashing and they had found nothing except someone had claimed to have seen something shooting through the sky at the time of Hess’s appearance, and later thought it had been Hess’s arrival.
Bryson’s eyes strained to see through the darkness and down into the hole below, but he still saw no distinct features at the bottom, and only saw the vague shape of the two archeologists resting over something.
As he rushed down faster he saw that they were resting and staring into a hole, between them, and mentioning things about it.
The hole was not large enough to allow one person properly down, and he spotted chunks of wood in the buckets of dirt that were to be hoisted up and he realized that whatever was there was man-made as the rotted wood belonged to planks of wood, which had been placed over something.
Chapter 3
The Discovery
Bryson searched the black abyss below as he was being lowered down through the hole in the planks of wood.
He gripped the rope firmly, and looked up to the top of the tunnel through the hole above, listening to
the two archeologists over him still conferring on what was below.
As far as he was concerned they had found little other than the tunnel chamber. They could not see anything in their dim lights and had been unable to proceed further as he had been using the rope, and since he had it attached to him he had found it easy to persuade them that he should go through the hole first.
A deep thud echoed down from above as all the scientists at the top gathered around to look down and he wondered why they were lowering him so slowly down when they could easily have lowered him at the same speed.
It was their discovery and expedition and he wished it to be done right, and as one of his adventure expeditions and to give the full discovery everything that it deserved. Yet he was mainly confused as to what had been discovered, especially after being surprised at so much in the past with such things, and being given such little and muddled facts.
The ebbing radiance of the torches of the two archeologists clearly was not enough to allow them to see much!
A gold radiance had flashed down from a reflection from the sun above and with his dreamy sight he observed it probing its way amidst the abyss below, scattering beams through clouds of silky dust floating about.
Some of it entered his throat giving him faint sensations and thoughts of coughing, but he speeded up unleashing the rope from himself allowing him to move down and to inhale a proper amount of air, even though it was stale.
Hazy echoes from his heavier breathing appeared in an extraordinary silence and he examined the stone wall around him of the second tunnel as he shifted downwards, and he started to find the stale air harder to inhale and he frequently gasped for air, while he dangling over obscurity, with hideous expectations of plunging into deep water accumulated below.
It was far different that the archaeologists were not below, and the light was not there. There could be anything there!
The scientists and archaeologists appeared vaguely against the changing shades of the blue sky far above, and he vigorously checked through debris on the surrounding stone foundations, like an ancient well, which he started to consider it to be. What if it had not been the precise spot of the disturbance and that they had chosen it as they had detected the lower part of a well or some ancient homemade sewage system, from some farm?
He just accepted the frantic reactions of the two archeologists to increase his speed, and that there was something actually buried beneath him.
The haunting descriptions that some of the Exploration Association had given him still made it almost unacceptable to believe fully! What had they been suggesting the chamber contained! In vivid detail he had heard some suggest that the location was a resting place of something! His mind conjured up visions of medieval ghosts roaming an ancient burial site!
Ancient people could have gone to great lengths to bury people!
A distant rumble above released debris and bits of plants and he realized that the area the two archeologists were on might not be able to support their weight! It had been damaged with age, water, rot, and the damage that they had done to it smashing a hole through it, to see and get down.
He fantasized it and them crashing down on top of him and considered how much damage would be done!
In an instant the rope jerked and wildly oscillated and he spun uncontrollably around and a surge of blackness engulfed him as he dropped his light below.
It became a spot of light embedded in something below, which gave little light to him, but he saw where he was going and speeded up his descent.
It slightly mystified him! The actual depth by far exceeded all their comprehension of what anyone would use! There was not just one compartment level, it went down and down into the depths of the ground and he thought of some ancient devil and black magic worshippers concealing something there, beyond their comprehension, of infinite danger, indestructible and hidden away from mankind!
Sounds took stranger tones and he strained his eyes more trying to see further down, about where the light rested, but there were no features of anything. Its tunnel shape was in darkness!
He heard distant movements from above and he looked up to see what was happening and saw that they were still there resting, and seeing what was happening.
A surge of water splashed across his face and poured down in streams as he finally hit the ground not fully realizing where it was, and in the turmoil he fell over sideways into some water.
He got up while releasing the rope’s tightened grip from his body, and shivered from the intense coldness and realized for some reason it was far colder there.
With the pain away he cleaned away some water off his face and grabbed the light, partly in dirt and water, and he examined it carefully for damage and cleaned it, removing the dirt over where the bulb was and fixed it at his side and fumbled through his pocket and removed a handkerchief and cleaned the water and muck away from his face, and rested.
He illuminated the stone wall going around him in the shape of a large well, and its brightness beamed out lighting up a large long black tomb shape structure, and he sat on a boulder and examined it in detail.
Eventually clouds of dust sprayed down through the stale air and he cleaned it from his tired eyes and saw the two archeologists starting to come down.
He was staggered for an instance when he realized that there was nothing other than long black box structure there, and he realized it had to be what was causing the disturbances.
When he went over to it he shone the torch closely over it and was surprised that all of the mud and debris covering its surface had been falling away from it and it even looked new and polished, and that it was not of ancient workmanship!
As the others came downwards he continued wandering around it examining its clean surface, and he examined it trying to see why there was not any notable way of entering it.
When the two archeologists arrived the three of them stood around it in a circle, wondering what the hell they had found! It was perfectly symmetrical and far more advanced than it should have been, and Bryson realized the coldness there was coming off it and then he realized that it was absorbing heat from him.
Chapter 4
The Artifact’s Removal
From the edge of a large tent, constructed around the tunnel by the archeologists, Bryson examined equipment and people about the tunnel and the work that they had done while he had been away.
Dreamily he observed surrounding fields across his front and the twilight sun rising up from below the horizon, diverging its rays amongst tree shadows.
Golden light stretched over the surface of the world, and he heard distant voices from the archaeologists still at work down the tunnel removing the artifact, and he acknowledged a sweet pipe tobacco aroma lingering in the air from one of the scientists from the Exploration Association.
They were finally going to hoist the large heavy artifact out of there and give everyone a good look at it in the daylight, and he felt much excitement at the thought of it and realized again how much he had missed such action, explorations and discoveries!
He vaguely watched Merton and Mortimer stroll over to him at the tent from the nearby road, where they had left their vehicle, where they had traveled to from their city hotel, where Bryson was located nearby.
He perceived a certain inner satisfaction that they had that indicated that they actually were accomplishing something for real once again! Even though nobody was fully sure what they had or were accomplishing! The artifact was mysterious and out of their current reach of understanding, and nobody grasped its function!
Paranormal scientists rarely found anything worthwhile!
Merton marched happily over and sat on a boulder next to him and the tent, and examined the tunnel and equipment about it that was going to be used to hoist the artifact.
It amused Bryson that they actually thought they might damage the thing hoisting it out and had gone to such elaborate lengths! He considered that if they dropped it at the top and it fell s
traight down onto a sharp boulder that it would not even be scratched!
Merton examined him next after he had completed checking everything for changes and signs of progression, and considered his thoughts and turned towards him.
“We found some evidence that this thing might have been found by one of the soldiers in the Second World War, when they were here getting Hess. He’s believed to have found it and discovered its incredible properties – which he was going to use for something or sell it to someone, but something happened and he had it buried away! It could be dangerous! It could have dangerous paranormal powers, and be buried away for a reason!”
“That’d explain why he chose this site and tunneled so deep!”
“We believe they used an ancient well construction built here, which had gone deep to get water!”
“Yet there is plenty of water here, and there are streams ...”
“Therefore there could have been another use for it not stated!”
“The artifact looks as though it were new and had little contact with the outside world?”
“They clearly would have had trouble realizing just what it was and its properties were – even after carrying out careful experimentations of it.”
Bryson rubbed his weary eyes vaguely observing the remains of a fire the archaeologists had built, and they stood next to it considering it.
“Its origins may become clear once the scientists of the Exploration Association get hold of it!” Mortimer announced. “If they don’t explain what it is, nobody will!”
“They could run into some problem ...”
“Why?”
“That artifact must be made of the strongest material known! All their attempts to take samples off it have failed so far ...”
Bryson stared into smoldering red ashes of the fire and at a black shape within it and saw images of the artifact.
The Lost Treasure Map Series Page 41