The Unhappy Medium 3: Wretched Things: A Supernatural Comedy, page 23
‘Oh, dear,’ sighed Vasilakis. ‘I fear already, we see too much.’
‘I’m no expert,’ confirmed Bennet. ‘But that’s Minoan, isn’t it?’
‘Same style as what we saw at Knossos,’ agreed Viv.
‘Wow,’ exclaimed Gabby. ‘We’re literally tomb raiding.’
‘Is this a tomb?’ Bennet asked, looking around. ‘Doesn’t feel like a tomb.’
‘We shouldn’t be here,’ wailed Vasilakis, as they revealed more and more around them. ‘These things are not for us to see.’
‘We won’t tell anyone,’ soothed Bennet, trying to sound reassuring. ‘Promise. We are fully trained in issues of protocol. We will explain everything to Eric the Greek once it’s over.’
‘I … am a dead man,’ muttered Vasilakis, totally unconvinced.
*****
Alarms had been sounding in Purgatory all day. With three Necromancer’s handbooks on the loose, inevitably, there had instantly been several high-profile escapes. Firstly, a fourth-century Chinese warlord with a taste for human flesh bolted, followed an hour later by an American cult leader with his four hundred Kool-Aid-guzzling followers. That had been bad enough, but then someone had used one of the Necromancer’s handbooks to release a brace of Borgias back into the wild, who’d then shut down an episode of The Great British Bake Off by poisoning a flapjack. It had taken almost a whole day for them to be caught, processed, and then sent back to their family suite in Purgatory without anyone raising any awkward questions.
Finally, there had been General von Kraakenhausen.
With so much going on, the old Nazi had slipped his shackles before anyone competent could lift a finger.
Eric the Greek was probably the most bureaucratic and jobsworthy man to have ever lived, died and milked the crisis for all it was worth as he was doing now.
‘Disaster!’ he bleated to Dr Alex Sixsmith for the fifth time in as many minutes. ‘So many books on the loose. Such incompetence! It is simply shocking! And this is after just one week! Imagine what will happen when these necromancing villains get up a head of steam. My job is hard enough, as you well know, Dr Sixsmith, but this … this is a disaster.’
‘I’m sure we’ll get them all back soon enough,’ offered Dr Sixsmith, grinning hopefully and shrugging doubtfully.
‘I don’t see how,’ grumped Eric. ‘We are stretched so thin these days. We have so many enemies, but so few resources. I always said getting Dr Barlow on the payroll would be a mistake. Well, here we are … now we have more troubles than we ever had before.’
‘I’m sure Newton couldn’t have prevented what happened in Wales,’ said Alex. ‘He was rather outgunned, even with Bennet there.’
‘Bennet? Hummmppphh,’ sneered Eric. ‘Don’t get me started on the Reverend Bennet. Another one who has made it his personal mission to make my life harder. Speaking of which, what are our employees of the month doing now?’
Sixsmith went to answer, but his jaw had barely opened before Eric cut him short.
‘I’ll tell you what,’ raged the Greek. ‘Bennet is on gardening leave in Rome while Dr Barlow is sunning himself in Crete. Very nice, I’m sure. Meanwhile, I’m stuck here, working myself thin cleaning up the mess … as per usual.’
‘Well, I don’t want to add to your woes, obviously,’ said Alex, jamming a word in edgeways. ‘But, there’s been an … incident.’
Eric’s face, already a mass of worry lines and eye bags, sagged still further.
‘Oh sweet heavens, no, … what?’
‘He’s gone missing,’ continued Alex.
‘Who … Barlow?’
‘I’m afraid so,’ confirmed Alex. ‘Jameson gave him a job to keep him busy. A little local thing. Sadly, it seems to have turned into a big local thing.’
‘Oooohhhhh,’ whimpered Eric, closing his eyes in despair. ‘What fresh hell is this?’
‘Well,’ continued Sixsmith, ‘Newton was asked to track down some Nazi relics for the local team, then snuff them out. Routine stuff. But ….’
‘But?’
‘But something happened,’ replied Alex.
‘Quelle surprise,’ snorted Eric. ‘What kind of something?’
‘Well, he got the relics, ok,’ Alex went on. ‘But then, he took them up into the mountains, you know … to dispose of them … and he hasn’t been seen since.’
‘Well, he’s not dead, is he?’ said Eric. ‘Or he’d be here annoying me in person, wouldn’t he?’
‘He would,’ agreed Alex. ‘Look. People are on the case. Jameson had Bennet fly in from Rome, and the Bonetaker flew into Crete to meet up with them. He’s with Viv, Gabby and Bennet now, I gather.’
Eric’s already crumpled face imploded, his lower jaw dropping like a broken fire curtain to reveal a set of tiny yellow teeth.
‘CRETE?! You’ve let the Bonetaker go … to CRETE!? Are you stark raving mad?’ Eric raised his hands to heaven despite it not being in that direction. ‘Oh, Gods of Olympus, must you torment me?’
‘Well, he is the best tracker we’ve got,’ offered Alex.
‘Precisely,’ wailed Eric. ‘Someone … something that sensitive is going to open up a huge can of worms. A can of worms so big that ….’ The Greek paused, eyes closing, thinking of several unthinkables all at the same time, skull wobbling with the effort. ‘No, no … we must stop them. Where are they now?’
‘Last message had them somewhere in the south,’ answered Alex, taken aback by the ferocity of Eric’s response. ‘On the coast. Last thing I heard was they’d found out where Newton had been attacked.’
‘Well, you message them right away,’ demanded Eric. ‘It is vital that they do NOT go underground. You hear me? On no account must any of them go underground.’
‘Oh. That’s a pity.’
‘Why?’ asked Eric, already guessing the answer.
‘Because they’ve just gone underground,’ explained Alex, smiling weakly.
‘Why do I bloody bother?’ whinged Eric, throwing his arms up and down in frustration like a goose. ‘Barlow … always with Dr Barlow, it is trouble. Well, then, I have no option. We go to a full alert.’
‘Fab!’ exclaimed Alex. ‘And what would that involve?’
‘There is a protocol.’
‘There’s always a protocol.’
‘Yes, but this a special one,’ said Eric, ‘We have many, many assets in Crete. Specialist teams. They are there because Crete has to be protected … protected at all costs.’
‘It does?’
‘Yes, it does, Dr Sixsmith,’ insisted Eric, as if it were obvious. ‘In fact, I’ll do that right away.’
‘Sounds like a plan,’ muttered Alex, rolling his eyes.
‘I hope that’s not sarcasm, Dr Sixsmith,’ said the Greek, narrowing his own eyes. ‘Because I don’t take sarcasm very well. This is a very serious matter, and it demands your full respect. My goodness, we need to come down hard and fast on this and limit the damage … before Barlow pulls the roof down.’
‘A serious matter,’ replied Alex, suitably chided. ‘Right.’
‘Tell me, Dr Sixsmith, these Nazi relics … they wouldn’t happen to be anything to do with a certain General Kraakenhausen by any chance?’ asked the Greek.
Alex consulted his notebook.
‘As it happens, they do.’
‘Brilliant,’ flounced Eric, flapping his arms again. ‘Just brilliant. Well, that really puts some sand in the Vaseline.’
‘It does?’ asked Alex.
‘Damn right, it does,’ answered Eric. ‘Because General Kraakenhausen escaped yesterday afternoon.’
*****
The passageway before Newton and the hermit had suddenly widened. It had caught him entirely off guard, the long, smooth tunnel abruptly bearing a sharp left before exploding into a large cavern full of simple stone buildings. In the light from Newton’s Maglite, they reared up ghostly and pale, sharp lines against a ragged ceiling two hundred feet or so above their rooftops. From each of these ancient buildings, Newton could see a radiating mass of ropes and wires, looking for all the world as if some colossal spider had been busy laying a trap for them in the blackness. To add to the vibe, many were draped with real cobwebs, huge ones, hinting at the sort of arachnids you’d need to deter with a flamethrower.
‘Well,’ remarked Newton. ‘What have we here?’
‘Clever people, da Minoans,’ said Enrico. ‘In my time, we could barely builda da outside toilet.’
‘Clever? Absolutely,’ agreed Newton, hugely impressed. ‘But why? That’s the question. It must have been a massive undertaking.’
‘Well, I can’t elaborate on dat. I’ve told you far too much already.’
‘Oh, go on,’ urged Newton, winking mischievously.
‘Nope,’ Enrico refused firmly.
‘Yeah? Well, I’m sure I can work it out,’ declared Newton. ‘In fact, let’s start that now. Time to explore.’
‘Oh, no, you don’t!’ the hermit pleaded at Newton’s vanishing back. ‘Come back! I have to get you home.’
‘Catch me!’ shouted Newton, dashing purposefully through the door of the nearest building.
Inside, he had been expecting to find some kind of domestic space; instead, Newton stumbled into a long room lined with enormous clay jars, each around five feet tall. Though several were cracked or shattered into shards, most were attached to each other by still more ropes, some ragged enough to reveal bare metal wires within. Shining his torch back and forth, Newton counted forty-five of these jars stretching away down the room, their connecting cables spiralling away to end in a vast knot that sagged heavily beside a distant window. Curiosity at his usual cat-killing levels, Newton stepped up to the nearest jar, then tilted his head. Leaning in, he began shining his pocket torch into the jar’s liquid interior.
The flash of electricity picked up Newton like a fist. Illuminating him like a vast blue firework, the spark projected him back out of the open door, where he landed in a cloud of swirling antiquity.
Dazed and not a little baffled, Newton lay there in the dust, dimly aware that his ghostly companion was standing over him, shaking his head in reproach.
‘Ouch?’ whimpered Newton.
‘Ouch, indeed,’ laughed Enrico. ‘Dat’ll teach you. I told you to be careful down here. All sorts of da nasty surprises.’
‘No kidding,’ said Newton, standing and dusting himself off. ‘What are those? Baghdad batteries?’
‘Don’t ask me. I’m from da Middle Ages.’
‘They are, you know, those are flippin’ Baghdad batteries,’ repleated Newton. ‘Lots of ’em. And … they’re live.’
‘Live?’ asked Enrico.
‘Live as in electricity,’ explained Newton. ‘Like lightning, you know, in a storm.’
‘Don’t patronise me,’ said Enrico. ‘I know what electricity is. I may be from the 1100s, but I keep up widda da developments. Hell, I wanted to get electricity inna ma cave.’
‘You did?’ asked Newton.
‘Yeah, but I’d need a bank account anna da credit history,’ sighed the hermit. ‘Da paperwork would have given me away.’
‘Yeah, well,’ continued Newton, ‘these are definitely Baghdad batteries. I’d heard about them; I just didn’t believe in ’em. Wrote them off as that Graham Hancock “God is an astronaut” bollocks you see all the time on the History Channel.’
‘And dey come from Baghdad?’ asked Enrico.
‘Well, they found one there on a dig,’ answered Newton. ‘Hence the name. It was pretty controversial; people were queuing up to rubbish it. Essentially, you have these copper elements at the top of a clay jar. The believers claimed it could generate a volt of electricity if you added the right liquid. Vinegar could do it, at a push, maybe, ah … don’t tell me … lemon juice. … Of course,’ he muttered, ‘Crete is awash with bloody lemons. And they’re as acidic as hell. And they’re here in horrifying overabundance. Wouldn’t surprise me if they’re Crete’s national fruit.’
‘Dis is all way over ma head,’ declared Enrico. ‘What’s a volt? Isn’t dat a type offa da mouse?’
‘That’s a vole,’ sighed Newton, rolling his eyes. ‘A V.O.L.T., volt, is a measurement of electricity. One volt would be a mere tingle, a lightning flash would be more like three hundred million. What just happened to me was way more than a tingle.’
‘I had a sailor hit by lightning once,’ said Enrico. ‘All we found werra hissa teeth anda hissa fruita knife.’
‘The hypothesis,’ continued Newton, ‘Wwas that the ancient Iraqis used these Baghdad batteries to electroplate metal.’
‘Electrowhat?’ asked Enrico.
‘It’s a way of covering something cheap, like lead, with something expensive,’ explained Newton. ‘Like gold. The gold or silver is in solution in a liquid, and by running the current through the object, you get this thin layer of gold attaching itself to the outside.’
‘Yes, of course, it’s good, especially if you’re a bit of a crook. You can con people into paying top whack for one thing, thinking it’s another.’
‘Cunning,’ exclaimed Enrico, looking suitably impressed.
‘Very,’ agreed Newton. ‘But those examples in there are way too big for a bit of electroplating. That was a shit load of volts that hit me then. Look at my hair! And that was just one jar. There were hundreds in there, and that’s just one of the buildings. Judging by the wires, there are batteries in all of those.’
‘Maybe it’s something to do with dis, then,’ suggested Enrico, walking over to a large handle attached to the building’s rough wall.
‘Wait!’ yelled Newton, finally becoming cautious.
The hermit threw the switch anyway.
A burst of brilliant light.
Like a swarm of fireflies, pinpoints of light began to cover the uneven ceiling far above them, first in the tens and then … in the hundreds.
‘Oh … my …. God,’ gasped Newton. ‘Well, … what do you bloody well know? It’s a frigging power station!’
*****
Lights were switching on for more than just Newton and Enrico. The entwined cords had the energy surging down the smooth tunnels, sending a pulse of illumination through the interior of the White Mountains.
Equally astonished, the Kraakenhausens, Nahrapov’s team and the Purgatorian rescue party all stopped in their tracks, gawping upwards as the eerie lights threw the underworld into a blinding synthetic daylight.
‘Mein Gott!’ gasped Dr Kraakenhausen, clapping his hands in delight. ‘Is ein Wunderland’
To the south, the Purgatorians were equally dumbfounded.
Momentarily blinded, the Bonetaker had tripped over his enormous boots, sending both him and Father Bennet flying.
‘Wow,’ said Gabby, stepping over the vicar. ‘It’s all lit up!’
‘Oh, no!’ wailed Vasilakis. ‘We should definitely not be seeing this.’
Bathed in the sudden glare of a thousand snow-white orbs, Nahrapov and his men were equally stupefied.
‘Shit!’ exclaimed Nahrapov, a word he admittedly used for most situations. ‘It’s beautiful!’
‘Oooh baaaaby,’ exclaimed Astrid, shrieking gleefully. ‘It’s like a preeeety weety Christmas tree!’
*****
The moment had also been noted by one Father Papadraylou, abbot at the remote monastery of Chrysoskalitissa.
As the lights rippled on through the cave systems below him, an alarm sounded furiously in his study, a bulb turning danger red above his desk. The abbot took a long, deep breath, crossed himself, then dialled a twelve-digit number he’d committed to memory some twenty years earlier.
‘Father Vardakis,’ came the reply.
‘It’s me, Papadraylou,’ said the bearded abbot, voice lead-heavy with the gravity of the moment. ‘Activate your squads … we have the code red.’
Chapter 20
Treasury
Dr Kraakenhausen was in awe. The one thing he had not expected … was lighting. Astonished, the archaeologist looked on in fascination as the volts charged along the old cables, illuminating the orbs peppering the tunnel wall.
‘How vos this never discovered in meine time?’ exclaimed General von Kraakenhausen. ‘It’s astonishing.’
‘Because they vent to a huge effort to ensure it vasn’t,’ answered Dr Kraakenhausen. ‘It appears that the ancients ver every bit as clever as the History Channel claims they ver.’
‘What kind of witchcraft be this?’ proclaimed Raynald de Châtillon. ‘Truly … the black arts dwell in this infernal place!’
‘Relax,’ suggested Helena. ‘Not magic, just technology. Papa … vot powers this light? Electricity?’
‘Ya, daughter,’ answered her father. ‘It vould appear so. It seems to run along these cables. You see …, here.’ He ran his hand along a nearby cord, tracing its course along the rock until it entered a glowing orb embedded in the wall beside them.
‘What? These ropes?’ said Raynald, leaning down to pick up a length of cable so deteriorated the metal was exposed.
Instantly, a flash. A blue pulse threw the Crusader violently back down the corridor.
‘’Zounds!’ he squealed. ‘I have been smited!’
‘Ve should be careful,’ warned the general belatedly. ‘These vires are thousands of years old. Ve could get hurt.’
‘I did just get hurt!’ barked the crusader. ‘My limbs are afire.’
‘If they had this kind of technology, then vot else is down here?’ said Dr Kraakenhausen gleefully. ‘I am so very excited. Such discoveries avait us.’
‘Excitement is one thing; booby traps are another,’ cautioned Helena. ‘Staying alive is going to slow us to a crawl. Now, at least, ve can see vhere ve are going.’
‘Not going to make much difference to you, eh? You blind old bastard,’ laughed Dr Kraakenhausen, snorting at the old man.
‘You don’t always need eyes to see,’ said the blind man.
‘Yes, you do,’ snorted the archaeologist. ‘Dummkofp! Don’t you ever tire of being enigmatic? Mein Gott, it never stops! Vell, it might verk on the tourists, but it doesn’t verk on me. Just tell me vot you actually know. Vhy all die lights? Vot does it mean?’
‘I’m no expert,’ confirmed Bennet. ‘But that’s Minoan, isn’t it?’
‘Same style as what we saw at Knossos,’ agreed Viv.
‘Wow,’ exclaimed Gabby. ‘We’re literally tomb raiding.’
‘Is this a tomb?’ Bennet asked, looking around. ‘Doesn’t feel like a tomb.’
‘We shouldn’t be here,’ wailed Vasilakis, as they revealed more and more around them. ‘These things are not for us to see.’
‘We won’t tell anyone,’ soothed Bennet, trying to sound reassuring. ‘Promise. We are fully trained in issues of protocol. We will explain everything to Eric the Greek once it’s over.’
‘I … am a dead man,’ muttered Vasilakis, totally unconvinced.
*****
Alarms had been sounding in Purgatory all day. With three Necromancer’s handbooks on the loose, inevitably, there had instantly been several high-profile escapes. Firstly, a fourth-century Chinese warlord with a taste for human flesh bolted, followed an hour later by an American cult leader with his four hundred Kool-Aid-guzzling followers. That had been bad enough, but then someone had used one of the Necromancer’s handbooks to release a brace of Borgias back into the wild, who’d then shut down an episode of The Great British Bake Off by poisoning a flapjack. It had taken almost a whole day for them to be caught, processed, and then sent back to their family suite in Purgatory without anyone raising any awkward questions.
Finally, there had been General von Kraakenhausen.
With so much going on, the old Nazi had slipped his shackles before anyone competent could lift a finger.
Eric the Greek was probably the most bureaucratic and jobsworthy man to have ever lived, died and milked the crisis for all it was worth as he was doing now.
‘Disaster!’ he bleated to Dr Alex Sixsmith for the fifth time in as many minutes. ‘So many books on the loose. Such incompetence! It is simply shocking! And this is after just one week! Imagine what will happen when these necromancing villains get up a head of steam. My job is hard enough, as you well know, Dr Sixsmith, but this … this is a disaster.’
‘I’m sure we’ll get them all back soon enough,’ offered Dr Sixsmith, grinning hopefully and shrugging doubtfully.
‘I don’t see how,’ grumped Eric. ‘We are stretched so thin these days. We have so many enemies, but so few resources. I always said getting Dr Barlow on the payroll would be a mistake. Well, here we are … now we have more troubles than we ever had before.’
‘I’m sure Newton couldn’t have prevented what happened in Wales,’ said Alex. ‘He was rather outgunned, even with Bennet there.’
‘Bennet? Hummmppphh,’ sneered Eric. ‘Don’t get me started on the Reverend Bennet. Another one who has made it his personal mission to make my life harder. Speaking of which, what are our employees of the month doing now?’
Sixsmith went to answer, but his jaw had barely opened before Eric cut him short.
‘I’ll tell you what,’ raged the Greek. ‘Bennet is on gardening leave in Rome while Dr Barlow is sunning himself in Crete. Very nice, I’m sure. Meanwhile, I’m stuck here, working myself thin cleaning up the mess … as per usual.’
‘Well, I don’t want to add to your woes, obviously,’ said Alex, jamming a word in edgeways. ‘But, there’s been an … incident.’
Eric’s face, already a mass of worry lines and eye bags, sagged still further.
‘Oh sweet heavens, no, … what?’
‘He’s gone missing,’ continued Alex.
‘Who … Barlow?’
‘I’m afraid so,’ confirmed Alex. ‘Jameson gave him a job to keep him busy. A little local thing. Sadly, it seems to have turned into a big local thing.’
‘Oooohhhhh,’ whimpered Eric, closing his eyes in despair. ‘What fresh hell is this?’
‘Well,’ continued Sixsmith, ‘Newton was asked to track down some Nazi relics for the local team, then snuff them out. Routine stuff. But ….’
‘But?’
‘But something happened,’ replied Alex.
‘Quelle surprise,’ snorted Eric. ‘What kind of something?’
‘Well, he got the relics, ok,’ Alex went on. ‘But then, he took them up into the mountains, you know … to dispose of them … and he hasn’t been seen since.’
‘Well, he’s not dead, is he?’ said Eric. ‘Or he’d be here annoying me in person, wouldn’t he?’
‘He would,’ agreed Alex. ‘Look. People are on the case. Jameson had Bennet fly in from Rome, and the Bonetaker flew into Crete to meet up with them. He’s with Viv, Gabby and Bennet now, I gather.’
Eric’s already crumpled face imploded, his lower jaw dropping like a broken fire curtain to reveal a set of tiny yellow teeth.
‘CRETE?! You’ve let the Bonetaker go … to CRETE!? Are you stark raving mad?’ Eric raised his hands to heaven despite it not being in that direction. ‘Oh, Gods of Olympus, must you torment me?’
‘Well, he is the best tracker we’ve got,’ offered Alex.
‘Precisely,’ wailed Eric. ‘Someone … something that sensitive is going to open up a huge can of worms. A can of worms so big that ….’ The Greek paused, eyes closing, thinking of several unthinkables all at the same time, skull wobbling with the effort. ‘No, no … we must stop them. Where are they now?’
‘Last message had them somewhere in the south,’ answered Alex, taken aback by the ferocity of Eric’s response. ‘On the coast. Last thing I heard was they’d found out where Newton had been attacked.’
‘Well, you message them right away,’ demanded Eric. ‘It is vital that they do NOT go underground. You hear me? On no account must any of them go underground.’
‘Oh. That’s a pity.’
‘Why?’ asked Eric, already guessing the answer.
‘Because they’ve just gone underground,’ explained Alex, smiling weakly.
‘Why do I bloody bother?’ whinged Eric, throwing his arms up and down in frustration like a goose. ‘Barlow … always with Dr Barlow, it is trouble. Well, then, I have no option. We go to a full alert.’
‘Fab!’ exclaimed Alex. ‘And what would that involve?’
‘There is a protocol.’
‘There’s always a protocol.’
‘Yes, but this a special one,’ said Eric, ‘We have many, many assets in Crete. Specialist teams. They are there because Crete has to be protected … protected at all costs.’
‘It does?’
‘Yes, it does, Dr Sixsmith,’ insisted Eric, as if it were obvious. ‘In fact, I’ll do that right away.’
‘Sounds like a plan,’ muttered Alex, rolling his eyes.
‘I hope that’s not sarcasm, Dr Sixsmith,’ said the Greek, narrowing his own eyes. ‘Because I don’t take sarcasm very well. This is a very serious matter, and it demands your full respect. My goodness, we need to come down hard and fast on this and limit the damage … before Barlow pulls the roof down.’
‘A serious matter,’ replied Alex, suitably chided. ‘Right.’
‘Tell me, Dr Sixsmith, these Nazi relics … they wouldn’t happen to be anything to do with a certain General Kraakenhausen by any chance?’ asked the Greek.
Alex consulted his notebook.
‘As it happens, they do.’
‘Brilliant,’ flounced Eric, flapping his arms again. ‘Just brilliant. Well, that really puts some sand in the Vaseline.’
‘It does?’ asked Alex.
‘Damn right, it does,’ answered Eric. ‘Because General Kraakenhausen escaped yesterday afternoon.’
*****
The passageway before Newton and the hermit had suddenly widened. It had caught him entirely off guard, the long, smooth tunnel abruptly bearing a sharp left before exploding into a large cavern full of simple stone buildings. In the light from Newton’s Maglite, they reared up ghostly and pale, sharp lines against a ragged ceiling two hundred feet or so above their rooftops. From each of these ancient buildings, Newton could see a radiating mass of ropes and wires, looking for all the world as if some colossal spider had been busy laying a trap for them in the blackness. To add to the vibe, many were draped with real cobwebs, huge ones, hinting at the sort of arachnids you’d need to deter with a flamethrower.
‘Well,’ remarked Newton. ‘What have we here?’
‘Clever people, da Minoans,’ said Enrico. ‘In my time, we could barely builda da outside toilet.’
‘Clever? Absolutely,’ agreed Newton, hugely impressed. ‘But why? That’s the question. It must have been a massive undertaking.’
‘Well, I can’t elaborate on dat. I’ve told you far too much already.’
‘Oh, go on,’ urged Newton, winking mischievously.
‘Nope,’ Enrico refused firmly.
‘Yeah? Well, I’m sure I can work it out,’ declared Newton. ‘In fact, let’s start that now. Time to explore.’
‘Oh, no, you don’t!’ the hermit pleaded at Newton’s vanishing back. ‘Come back! I have to get you home.’
‘Catch me!’ shouted Newton, dashing purposefully through the door of the nearest building.
Inside, he had been expecting to find some kind of domestic space; instead, Newton stumbled into a long room lined with enormous clay jars, each around five feet tall. Though several were cracked or shattered into shards, most were attached to each other by still more ropes, some ragged enough to reveal bare metal wires within. Shining his torch back and forth, Newton counted forty-five of these jars stretching away down the room, their connecting cables spiralling away to end in a vast knot that sagged heavily beside a distant window. Curiosity at his usual cat-killing levels, Newton stepped up to the nearest jar, then tilted his head. Leaning in, he began shining his pocket torch into the jar’s liquid interior.
The flash of electricity picked up Newton like a fist. Illuminating him like a vast blue firework, the spark projected him back out of the open door, where he landed in a cloud of swirling antiquity.
Dazed and not a little baffled, Newton lay there in the dust, dimly aware that his ghostly companion was standing over him, shaking his head in reproach.
‘Ouch?’ whimpered Newton.
‘Ouch, indeed,’ laughed Enrico. ‘Dat’ll teach you. I told you to be careful down here. All sorts of da nasty surprises.’
‘No kidding,’ said Newton, standing and dusting himself off. ‘What are those? Baghdad batteries?’
‘Don’t ask me. I’m from da Middle Ages.’
‘They are, you know, those are flippin’ Baghdad batteries,’ repleated Newton. ‘Lots of ’em. And … they’re live.’
‘Live?’ asked Enrico.
‘Live as in electricity,’ explained Newton. ‘Like lightning, you know, in a storm.’
‘Don’t patronise me,’ said Enrico. ‘I know what electricity is. I may be from the 1100s, but I keep up widda da developments. Hell, I wanted to get electricity inna ma cave.’
‘You did?’ asked Newton.
‘Yeah, but I’d need a bank account anna da credit history,’ sighed the hermit. ‘Da paperwork would have given me away.’
‘Yeah, well,’ continued Newton, ‘these are definitely Baghdad batteries. I’d heard about them; I just didn’t believe in ’em. Wrote them off as that Graham Hancock “God is an astronaut” bollocks you see all the time on the History Channel.’
‘And dey come from Baghdad?’ asked Enrico.
‘Well, they found one there on a dig,’ answered Newton. ‘Hence the name. It was pretty controversial; people were queuing up to rubbish it. Essentially, you have these copper elements at the top of a clay jar. The believers claimed it could generate a volt of electricity if you added the right liquid. Vinegar could do it, at a push, maybe, ah … don’t tell me … lemon juice. … Of course,’ he muttered, ‘Crete is awash with bloody lemons. And they’re as acidic as hell. And they’re here in horrifying overabundance. Wouldn’t surprise me if they’re Crete’s national fruit.’
‘Dis is all way over ma head,’ declared Enrico. ‘What’s a volt? Isn’t dat a type offa da mouse?’
‘That’s a vole,’ sighed Newton, rolling his eyes. ‘A V.O.L.T., volt, is a measurement of electricity. One volt would be a mere tingle, a lightning flash would be more like three hundred million. What just happened to me was way more than a tingle.’
‘I had a sailor hit by lightning once,’ said Enrico. ‘All we found werra hissa teeth anda hissa fruita knife.’
‘The hypothesis,’ continued Newton, ‘Wwas that the ancient Iraqis used these Baghdad batteries to electroplate metal.’
‘Electrowhat?’ asked Enrico.
‘It’s a way of covering something cheap, like lead, with something expensive,’ explained Newton. ‘Like gold. The gold or silver is in solution in a liquid, and by running the current through the object, you get this thin layer of gold attaching itself to the outside.’
‘Yes, of course, it’s good, especially if you’re a bit of a crook. You can con people into paying top whack for one thing, thinking it’s another.’
‘Cunning,’ exclaimed Enrico, looking suitably impressed.
‘Very,’ agreed Newton. ‘But those examples in there are way too big for a bit of electroplating. That was a shit load of volts that hit me then. Look at my hair! And that was just one jar. There were hundreds in there, and that’s just one of the buildings. Judging by the wires, there are batteries in all of those.’
‘Maybe it’s something to do with dis, then,’ suggested Enrico, walking over to a large handle attached to the building’s rough wall.
‘Wait!’ yelled Newton, finally becoming cautious.
The hermit threw the switch anyway.
A burst of brilliant light.
Like a swarm of fireflies, pinpoints of light began to cover the uneven ceiling far above them, first in the tens and then … in the hundreds.
‘Oh … my …. God,’ gasped Newton. ‘Well, … what do you bloody well know? It’s a frigging power station!’
*****
Lights were switching on for more than just Newton and Enrico. The entwined cords had the energy surging down the smooth tunnels, sending a pulse of illumination through the interior of the White Mountains.
Equally astonished, the Kraakenhausens, Nahrapov’s team and the Purgatorian rescue party all stopped in their tracks, gawping upwards as the eerie lights threw the underworld into a blinding synthetic daylight.
‘Mein Gott!’ gasped Dr Kraakenhausen, clapping his hands in delight. ‘Is ein Wunderland’
To the south, the Purgatorians were equally dumbfounded.
Momentarily blinded, the Bonetaker had tripped over his enormous boots, sending both him and Father Bennet flying.
‘Wow,’ said Gabby, stepping over the vicar. ‘It’s all lit up!’
‘Oh, no!’ wailed Vasilakis. ‘We should definitely not be seeing this.’
Bathed in the sudden glare of a thousand snow-white orbs, Nahrapov and his men were equally stupefied.
‘Shit!’ exclaimed Nahrapov, a word he admittedly used for most situations. ‘It’s beautiful!’
‘Oooh baaaaby,’ exclaimed Astrid, shrieking gleefully. ‘It’s like a preeeety weety Christmas tree!’
*****
The moment had also been noted by one Father Papadraylou, abbot at the remote monastery of Chrysoskalitissa.
As the lights rippled on through the cave systems below him, an alarm sounded furiously in his study, a bulb turning danger red above his desk. The abbot took a long, deep breath, crossed himself, then dialled a twelve-digit number he’d committed to memory some twenty years earlier.
‘Father Vardakis,’ came the reply.
‘It’s me, Papadraylou,’ said the bearded abbot, voice lead-heavy with the gravity of the moment. ‘Activate your squads … we have the code red.’
Chapter 20
Treasury
Dr Kraakenhausen was in awe. The one thing he had not expected … was lighting. Astonished, the archaeologist looked on in fascination as the volts charged along the old cables, illuminating the orbs peppering the tunnel wall.
‘How vos this never discovered in meine time?’ exclaimed General von Kraakenhausen. ‘It’s astonishing.’
‘Because they vent to a huge effort to ensure it vasn’t,’ answered Dr Kraakenhausen. ‘It appears that the ancients ver every bit as clever as the History Channel claims they ver.’
‘What kind of witchcraft be this?’ proclaimed Raynald de Châtillon. ‘Truly … the black arts dwell in this infernal place!’
‘Relax,’ suggested Helena. ‘Not magic, just technology. Papa … vot powers this light? Electricity?’
‘Ya, daughter,’ answered her father. ‘It vould appear so. It seems to run along these cables. You see …, here.’ He ran his hand along a nearby cord, tracing its course along the rock until it entered a glowing orb embedded in the wall beside them.
‘What? These ropes?’ said Raynald, leaning down to pick up a length of cable so deteriorated the metal was exposed.
Instantly, a flash. A blue pulse threw the Crusader violently back down the corridor.
‘’Zounds!’ he squealed. ‘I have been smited!’
‘Ve should be careful,’ warned the general belatedly. ‘These vires are thousands of years old. Ve could get hurt.’
‘I did just get hurt!’ barked the crusader. ‘My limbs are afire.’
‘If they had this kind of technology, then vot else is down here?’ said Dr Kraakenhausen gleefully. ‘I am so very excited. Such discoveries avait us.’
‘Excitement is one thing; booby traps are another,’ cautioned Helena. ‘Staying alive is going to slow us to a crawl. Now, at least, ve can see vhere ve are going.’
‘Not going to make much difference to you, eh? You blind old bastard,’ laughed Dr Kraakenhausen, snorting at the old man.
‘You don’t always need eyes to see,’ said the blind man.
‘Yes, you do,’ snorted the archaeologist. ‘Dummkofp! Don’t you ever tire of being enigmatic? Mein Gott, it never stops! Vell, it might verk on the tourists, but it doesn’t verk on me. Just tell me vot you actually know. Vhy all die lights? Vot does it mean?’
