Ark Found, page 17
part #2 of Omega Files Adventures Series
Carter eyed the document ravenously, drinking in its details as if it could be snatched away from him again at any moment. Which is not far from the truth, he thought, taking his phone from his pocket and powering it on in order to use the camera. He placed the map on the ground and snapped off a few close-up photographs of it. After checking to see that the resulting images were in fact readable, he then powered his phone off and pocketed it.
He glanced over toward the edge of the slope and saw Jayden hunched down low, monitoring the lake divers, his back to him. Carter put the rest of the items back in the backpack, and did his best to organize it the way it was, minus the gun and the map, of course, and then to leave the pack in the same position on the snow-packed ground as he had found it. He had a major decision to make now: should he steal the original map back from Daedalus or put it back in his pack so that he never knew they were here. If he put the map back, though, he’d really need to put the gun back, too. Unless….perhaps he would blame the missing items on one of his own expedition mates and think they did it? That could cause a nice row between them, Carter mused. But on the other hand, the map itself was valuable and technically belonged to his client. He saw himself as duty-bound to bring it to her.
There was something else, too, he was aware as he stood. The lake. What was down there? Treasure, Inc. had obviously gone to great lengths to probe its depths, with an extensive, tricky dive operation. They must have either seen something compelling down there or else the map told them where to look…
The map! He held it up again and began to study it, but then realized he hadn’t even told Jayden the news yet. He should let him know, before—but wait, what’s that? His gaze bored into the map where a solid black “X” seemed to indicate something important. Literally an X-marks-the-spot? Carter wondered. He mentally pictured the satellite photos and modern maps of the Mt. Ararat region he had briefly perused before beginning the trek. As far as he could tell from his hurried examination of the map, which indicated clearly the mountains of Ararat, though not the country of Turkey or any nation by name, it could be their current location. So this map is what led them here, Carter thought. And so close to the known ark site. Then he had the same thought process as Daedalus had, that maybe the old map pointed to the timber wreckage that had been discovered in the latter 20th century…
But wait, what’s this? It happened by accident, a trick of the light. Carter was holding the map with two hands, turning to orient it to the sunlight that was filtering through a stand of sparsely-leaved trees, when a shaft of light reflected off of a small pool of melted snow directly beneath the map. The effect was to light the map from beneath, which revealed faint lines he hadn’t noticed before. They led from the X to another part of the map. To make sure he wasn’t imagining things, Carter stepped away from the reflecting light, still eyeing the map. No more lines. He then turned away from the sunlight filtering through the trees, viewing the map in solid shade, and still no lines appeared. Then he positioned the map back over the light reflecting up from the ground, and there they were again: hidden lines on the map revealed.
Carter furrowed his brow as he inspected the map further. One interesting thing about it was that it was oriented vertically rather than horizontally, as most maps are. By tracing the lines from where they were—at the X—to where they went…which seemed to be…some part of Africa?…his finger went from the top down towards the bottom of the map. And yet, there was no X or similar marking there. Again, he moved the map so that it was not bottom lit, and scrutinized it again. The X was definitely there, but the lines were gone, and the spot to which they led—somewhere in east Africa, Carter guessed—was otherwise unmarked or designated in any special way. Or was it?
Eyeing the map even more closely while a few birds chirped and squawked around him in the otherwise quiet mountain ecosystem, Carter could see that the region of east Africa where the invisible lines led was extremely detailed. He hadn’t noticed it before, but the Ararat region of the map had a similar level of pronounced detail, while the rest of the map, depicting part of Europe, the Middle East, some of Asia and almost all of Africa, had reasonable detailing but not as much as those two areas. That in itself was a clue of sorts, wasn’t it, Carter reasoned.
He wondered if Daedalus and his team had picked up on that yet. No doubt he had archaeological and antiquities experts inspecting and analyzing copies of the map at this very moment to try and elucidate its secrets. Ah, but that was his mistake, Carter now realized. For no digital copy or even physical reproduction or facsimile of any kind would be able to duplicate the hidden physical content in this document. That was Daedalus’ mistake, his fatal flaw, if you will, Carter thought. He kept the best of everything for himself, relying only upon himself, thinking that others could do what they needed to with less.
And that will be your downfall, Daedalus, Carter decided. But the puzzle the map presented tugged at his intellect. Why the two parts? The X—that was clear enough. But why the lines that led to Africa? Was it saying the ark was in Africa? Was Daedalus and his team diving the lake for nothing?
His thought train was interrupted by a yell from far below, and then, much closer, he heard Jayden’s footfalls, running toward him.
Chapter 21
“Are they done with the dive already?” Carter asked Jayden as he came running up.
“Yeah! They got something out of the water—a timber, it looks like. Small enough for one person to carry.”
“Probably for analysis.”
“Yeah, but listen: the lookout guy is running up here right now! They’ve got the log on shore and they’re rigging it up to the rope system they set up, but I guess something needs to be done up here to pull it up, so he’s on his way.” Jayden now noticed the map in Carter’s hands.
“Is that…?
“Yes, I found it in Daedalus’ pack there.”
“Holy crap! That’s the map, we got it back!”
Carter glanced toward the slope where the team could be heard preparing to climb back up from the lake. “For now, anyway.”
“We’ve got to get out of here. Even with one gun, it’s still two against four and who knows what other tricks Daedalus has up his long, dirty sleeves. But wait—is that it?” He looked back toward the lake. “Is that where it says Noah’s Ark is?”
Carter glanced at the map. “I think so, but it’s more complicated than that. I’ll tell you later. But you said they brought up a timber?”
“Yeah, two of them, actually, but they’re just loading one of them right now.”
Carter looked down at the map.
“So is this it—this is Noah’s Ark?” Jayden asked again. Carter had no choice but to explain about the hidden lines leading to east Africa, even though time was extremely short. Jayden had to know what was going on.
“Africa?” Jayden pondered. “But there’s no mention of what’s there?”
“Not a single notation, other than it looks like the region is more detailed than usual. We’ll have to check it out in more detail when we have time.”
“Which is not now,” Jayden agreed. “Should we hightail it out of here?”
Carter considered this for a moment while they listened to the sounds of the expedition beginning to ascend the slope.
“I think we should take a page from Treasure Inc.’s own book, and let them do the dirty work of finding and bringing up the artifact…”
“Then we take it?” Jayden guessed. “But how?”
“I don’t know, but what would you rather do, grab a piece of the timbers they already brought up, or come back again with SCUBA gear, hope they don’t find out what we’re up to…”
“I see your point, but Carter, c’mon! There’s no way they won’t see us.”
“Let’s take a look. We should see where they are now, anyway.”
They jogged back over to the slope, sliding into crouch positions as they neared the edge. The rope and pulley system was in motion now. Carter raised his head just enough to be able to see down to the lake, to see if one or both logs was coming up yet, but he was stunned and shocked to see the lookout man nearly three-quarters of the way to them.
He shrunk back down, shivering with the sudden, massive jolt of adrenaline at almost being seen.
“The rest of the team is on the way up too,” Jayden said, also having seen the lookout.
“We have to do something,” Carter said, looking around. “We need to not be seen, but we also need those logs.”
“We could leave and come back with our own dive gear and dive in peace,” Jayden suggested. But Carter shook his head.
“What, and risk our every move being tracked, and if Treasure, Inc. doesn’t kill us when we’re sleeping, the Turkish government will throw us prison for not obtaining a permit? We just need a small sample of what they already brought up. Break off a chip, and then we’re out of here.”
“How the hell are we going to do that?” Jayden hissed. He sounded uncharacteristically strained. “That guy is almost to us, and the rest of them are not far behind!”
Carter’s gaze was already roving around their immediate surroundings. He spotted a SCUBA rig at the very top of the drop-off to the lake, beneath the rope rig. Then he belly-crawled to the edge and looked down. A smile crept across his face as he looked back to Jayden and waved him over. “I have an idea.”
“Uh-oh.”
“Hey, sometimes they work.”
“No, I mean uh-oh, my pack is over there.” He pointed to a spot about a hundred feet away, where his backpack lay out in the open on a rock.
“Get it!” Carter whispered. “Then come back here and we should be ready.”
Jayden didn’t ask for details, just backed up and set himself into motion to go get his backpack.
Carter slinked forward on the ground to a spare SCUBA tank that was already rigged with a regulator, complete with “octopus” or second breathing mouthpiece in case of emergencies where the primary regulator failed. He looked down the lake slope and saw the lookout thankfully facing the other way down toward the lake, watching his three dive team members hook one of the timbers up to the pulley and rope system. He shouted something down to them in Greek, while pointing up to the top of the pulley system that Carter now lay directly underneath. He didn’t think he’d been seen, but that the non-diver of the group who was almost to the top of the lake basin was telling his team that he was going to operate the pulley system to pull up the logs, Carter guessed. He sure hoped so, anyway.
He knew the next minute or so was critical to the success of his hastily formed plan. He reached out and swiped an arm around the SCUBA tank, knocking it over. Then he dragged it toward him by the regulator hose. He knew this wasn’t a good thing to do as it could possibly break the regulator or dislodge the seal where the regulator attaches to the tank’s valve. With seconds to act, he had to take that chance; there was no time to employ proper tank carry methods. He also had to try and be as quiet as possible with the Treasure, Inc. man almost to the top of the lake basin, but hopefully his own footsteps and labored breathing as he hiked up the steep grade, near-vertical at the top, would prevent him from noticing the dragging noise.
Carter dragged the tank until it was close enough to him to get his hand around the K-valve and then pull it by that. When he had it next to his body he looked back down the slope from his prone position, hunched into a copse of weed-like brambles. What if he comes straight up this way? The drop-off at the lip of the lake basin was steep here, almost vertical for about six feet, so Carter had assumed he’d take a different way up. But he was almost to it and still heading straight for it. What if they’d rigged a rope ladder or something like that? But then he heard footsteps leading away from him, out of sight and below, and he knew that the lookout was going to walk laterally along the lip of the lake basin for some distance, probably until he was beneath the rope rig, and then climb out.
Jayden jogged over, wearing his backpack with both straps on, and slid on the ground up to Carter, pulling himself along on his elbows to make sure he stayed low. Carter tapped him on the shoulder, mouthed the words, “He’s right down there,” and pointed toward the rope rig setup at the top of the slope. Jayden turned his head that way and nodded that he understood. Carter pointed down over the edge of the lip, meaning, Let’s go. He started worming his way over there, belly on the ground, dragging the SCUBA tank with him.
Jayden tugged on his leg. The lookout was scrabbling up the final few feet of lip now, just beneath the rope rig.
Carter snapped his head around and repeated his gesture, pointing down below the lip. It was apparent to him that Jayden was confused. Why would they drop over the side into the lake basin when the other three Treasure, Inc. divers were about halfway up now, and would be able to see them. But Carter had a plan, and he had to trust that. He’d done it before and had lived to tell the tale.
But this was not looking good. The lookout man appeared up on the top of the slope, only about twenty feet to their right as they slid as silently as possible, while dragging a SCUB A rig, over the side of the precipice, sort of a cornice at the very top. In Carter’s mind, this was the riskiest part of his whole plan. There was no cover to be found on this vertical section, and meanwhile the other three members of the dive team, including Daedalus himself, were about halfway up from the lake. Carter could see them as a blurry rush as he fell down the cornice, dragged even faster by the weight of the SCUBA apparatus, Jayden close behind.
He also registered in that blurry rush his immediate objective. A comforting flash of white, comforting because he hoped it would be their cover. A thick snow bank that persisted in a groove or ravine all the way down to the lake. He hoped it was well-packed and wasn’t only a superficial layer that would collapse too much on contact. But other aggregations of snow he’d seen, such as in the much larger ravine they’d worked their way up in order to reach the top of the slope where the rope rig was set up, had snow banks he’d walked though and found them to be tightly packed. The kind that you wouldn’t want to fall into if they were very deep, because it was impossible to breathe inside them for long. People have been known to die of asphyxia after being covered in snow, not only children in collapsing snow forts, but also seasoned skiers after an avalanche where they survived the initial impact, but later suffocated because the snow wouldn’t support their weight enough to reach the air, nor was it sparse enough to have sufficient air spaces.
Carter wasn’t sure exactly how deep this snow bank was. It could be deeper than they would easily be able to get out of before they suffocated, he knew. But that’s why he’d brought along the SCUBA rig. He dragged it into position now and tapped Jayden on the ankle to get his attention. Then he handed him the “octopus,” the extra second stage regulator, or breathing mouthpiece, with an extra-long hose that was used in out-of-air emergencies to share air with another diver, or as a backup to the diver’s primary regulator. If Jayden had questions, he wisely refrained from asking them as he shoved the octopus between his teeth and plowed straight ahead and down next to Carter into the snowbank. From this place of concealment, they would be hidden from line-of-sight to Daedalus and his associates.
Carter took his first breath beneath the snow. He hadn’t had time to test the regulator. He tried to take a breath but nothing happened. Meanwhile, he and Jayden began sliding down the lake basin, deeper into the snow as they went. He tried pulling a breath again but with the same lack of results. He pictured the SCUBA rig standing there, already set up at the basin. Could it be an empty tank they’d already used and that’s why it was up there? The thought chilled him to the bone more thoroughly than did the snow that surrounded him. He stuck his feet down and could feel the rocky surface. It was there within reach, but he and Jayden were bouncing along too fast to be able to get purchase long enough to stop in one place and assess the situation. Or possibly to break their heads through the surface of the snow to snatch a quick breath if need be, risk of being spotted aside.
He pulled the regulator out of his mouth and tried a test breath in the snow itself, using his hands to clear away a pocket of air right in front of his mouth. It didn’t work. He got maybe the barest gulp of air, but that was followed by a slushee of ice down his throat that made him choke and cough as gravity jostled him along. He knew Jayden must be going through the same thing next to him, probably wondering why he had put them in this situation.
He forced his mind to think through the problem of why the tank wasn’t delivering air rather than on the risks and hopelessness of their predicament. He went back to his previous line of reasoning on the matter: what if the tank he’d grabbed was used and therefore empty? But as an experienced diver he knew that it was highly unusual for a diver—especially an experienced one, as this group must be in order to successfully recover heavy objects from the bottom of a semi-frozen high altitude lake—to breathe a tank completely dry. Leaving a reserve was a cardinal rule imprinted into every diver from their Basic Certification class onward. When the air pressure gauge reads 500 PSI (out of an initial 3,000), it was definitely time to begin your ascent, sometimes closer to 1,000 PSI if it was a deep dive or if a decompression stop was needed to avoid the dreaded “bends.”
The answer hit him with blinding suddenness. Of course! He flashed on snagging the tank up under the pulley rig. In his haste to get it, put it on and then get over the precipice without being detected, he’d neglected to do the most basic of SCUBA pre-dive tasks: turn the air on! A simple turn of the K-valve—the black knob at the top of the tank to which the regulator was attached—was something he hadn’t done. If the valve was already open, well then. It was game over. He knew that. But at least they now had a real chance.
