Bursting out of the door, Samuel fired at the two mercenaries just as they began turning their weapons on him. With the guards now dead, Samuel quickly grabbed an AK-47 from the floor and then ran down the corridor to the stairwell that led to the lower level.
As he bounded down the stairs, he prayed he wasn’t too late to help Josh. He was going to find his friend, and God help anyone who got in his way.
Samuel assumed the guards that preceded him went down the access hatch in the supply room to aid in repelling Captain Saune and his men. He quickly looked into the room as he heard the firefight raging below. Seeing no one, he moved across the hall to the next room. Looking into the room through the small glass pane, he saw a strange looking weapon with a red tracer laser that emitted a reddish glow from the barrel. He slowly opened the door, 45-automatic at the ready and the AK-47 strapped over his shoulder. Slowly stepping inside, he was stunned to see Turner strapped to the far wall by leather restraints. He hung suspended and motionless; his eyes staring wide as though he was in pain and afraid. The laser tracer centered on his forehead.
Samuel quickly ran up to the weapon and, using the full force of his powerful arm, ripped the entire unit off its mounts. The force of the blow sent the gun and its equipment crashing to the floor with a loud hissing sound. He ran back to Turner who now, with his eyes shut, slumped lifelessly in his leather confines. Samuel feverishly removed the bindings and carefully lowered Turner’s limp body to the floor. As he did, he heard the excited voice of Yashiro shouting over the VHF radio.
“It’s working! It’s working!”
29
As Yashiro celebrated his successful attempt at reversing the effects of the exothermic waves from the Scalar weapon, Eli Turner, Maria Santiago, and Alton Burr were on La Palma moving deep within the bowels of an ancient lava tube under the monolithic, hand-shaped rock formation.
Using the rope, the trio managed to descend into the tube through the skylight that opened as a result of the earlier seismic tremor. Once inside, they discovered the lava tube had collapsed centuries ago in the direction leading up to the caldera. The solid basalt barrier had effectively sealed the chamber, allowing them only to proceed on a downward trek. They now traversed the slope with the aid of a single flashlight.
Eli felt the seismic shocks increasing in frequency and in strength, but after traveling over one hundred fifty feet inside the lava tube, the heat was much worse than the tremors. It was becoming unbearable as the three, drenched in sweat and eyes burning, continued slowly forward in the darkness.
Eli grabbed on to Maria as another violent tremor shook the earth beneath their feet for the duration of ten seconds. This caused Burr to lose his footing and crash headlong onto the floor of the chamber.
“This is a fool’s errand, Turner,” Burr yelled in painful anger after his knee smashed into the tunnel’s floor. “We need to get out of here before we’re all killed.”
“As I recall, this was your idea, Burr. There’s nothing stopping you from going back and waiting for us,” Eli yelled in response, steadying himself now that the tremor had subsided.
“He may be right, Eli,” Maria said, agreeing with the lawyer. “This is becoming too dangerous. The tremors are getting worse by the minute, and I’m worried about poisonous gases in here.”
Pausing in thought for a moment, Eli finally said, “You may be right, Maria. I don’t have the right to endanger your lives looking for something that may not even exist. It’s a shame that we have come so close to discovering something amazing, but now it may be lost forever because of this damned volcanic activity. Let’s get the hell out of here,” he said in frustration as he turned and started retracing his steps toward the opening.
Burr, now elated and relieved that nature was about to do his dirty work for him, led the way back through the tunnel. He was thrilled that any religious artifacts, if here, would be entombed for all time. His future plans could go on unimpeded.
The three had covered the first thirty feet back when a bone-jarring seismic quake hit them without warning. It sent them cascading to the floor as ancient fissures in the walls on either side of them began fracturing. The black basalt crumbled away from the wall, allowing jets of super-heated steam to escape through newly-formed fissures.
Eli looked nervously at the others as he noticed that the path ahead of them had partially collapsed, threatening to seal them all in a permanent tomb. All that remained was a narrow opening just large enough for one person at a time to squeeze through. The scattered basalt dust settled all around them as Eli heard the ominous hissing sound of steam being released in the dark recesses of the lava tube behind them. He projected the beam from the flashlight around the tunnel to survey the damage, but stopped when the light reflected off something glimmering on the wall.
“Maria! Look!” he yelled in excitement, pointing the beam at a large section of basalt that had fallen away from the side of the tube. A natural ledge was revealed, and sitting on the ledge was a small rectangular box.
“Oh my God, do you think we’ve found it?” Maria asked as the two made their way over to the narrow, waist-high ledge.
“It must have been buried by past eruptions, sealing the ledge with loose basalt rock and protecting it,” Eli said as he gently grasped the object. He pulled it free from the crumbling rock that entombed it for almost twenty centuries.
The ancient wooden box was encased in copper sheathing. Oval shaped handles, forged from bronze, were what reflected the light from Eli’s flashlight. It measured approximately eight inches high by fourteen inches long. One of the wooden knobs at its base had broken off.
Eli brushed the dust off the top of the small chest. The structure of the chest was still intact, but its copper exterior was dulled by the centuries of dirt and debris lying atop of it.
“Leave it,” Burr protested from the narrow opening that led to the entrance. “We have to get out now, before it’s too late.”
“Let’s take a look,” Eli said, in childlike amazement, oblivious to their present danger. He ignored Burr, who had moved to the other side of the tunnel.
“I just wish Josh were here to see this,” Eli whispered, smiling at Maria, who was now soaked with perspiration from the intensifying heat in the lava tube. He slowly lifted the lid to the small ancient chest and placed it at the side of the box.
Shining the light inside, the two saw an ancient woven fabric covering something. Maria, ever so carefully, lifted the woven material off its contents and gasped in awe. They looked at each other for a moment and Eli could see tears mixed with sweat running down Maria’s face.
There, on the left side of the chest lying on its side was a wooden cup made of olive wood. The cup was simple in design and measured barely five inches high, with a deeply carved bowl that had no stem; its base was the same diameter as its top. Delicately hand painted designs inscribed on its side were still discernible after almost two thousand years. In the center of the chest was a roll of copper sheathing, which Eli identified immediately as a copper scroll. “Look, Maria,” he said excitedly. “It’s just like the ones found in 1952 in the cave at Khirbet Qumran on the shore of the Dead Sea. The copper scrolls found there were scribed to preserve religious text.”
“Look at this,” Maria said, pointing to the opposite end of the box. “That's the remains of euphorbia milli, a thick, thorny brush plant that grows throughout the Dead Sea region, and was common to the vicinity of Jerusalem.”
Eli marveled at the remains of the thorn brush. Although fragmented through the centuries, the interweaving of the thorny brush could be clearly discerned.