Hope & Fury (Heroes & Demons Book 2)

Andrew stood in the hollow central chamber of Atlantis, gazing around in wonder. Already two hours within the confines of the pyramid’s walls and he learnt more than they had in the two years spent excavating the first Temple. Perhaps without the influence of the New Order, everything was as it had been when they left, perhaps without their interference, they were closer to the truth.

So far Ruth’s influence had held – the Maltese government and military managed to keep the entire area cordoned and secure – their efforts mainly focused on helping those trapped in the collapsed building and rubble outside. He was afforded complete privacy and autonomy.

Two hours in and he knew he had to call for the others. They arrived within ten minutes, having no problem with the outside perimeter. He turned to them,

“This place…” he couldn’t even finish his sentence.

“You know last time I saw you like this, you were bitching about how the Temple must have been a hoax,” Rick reminded him, “Please, you cannot tell me this damn thing is a hoax.”

“Granted, it’s not something I’m going to be able to write about in academic journals,” he admitted, “Maybe more like the Most Haunted tabloids. Right next to lizard people and Danny DeVito owing his acting career to Venusians.”

“Is Danny DeVito honestly his most recent pop culture reference?” Rick enquired of Sandy. She shrugged.

“You’re one to talk, you spent months telling people it was Paula Abdul shitting in the sheet during the London Marathon,” she retorted. “It was Paula Radcliffe.”

“I didn’t say it was during the London marathon.”

He regarded both of them with his impatient look which rarely worked but on this occasion seemed to bring them around.

“We are standing in the middle of the lost city of Atlantis, which forty-eight hours ago we didn’t know existed, and this is what you’re concerned about?” he asked.

“Your surprise is noted but a little worn out.”

“Well, instead would you like to hear a story?” he asked of them, indicating to the walls around them – adorned with the ancient Latin writing. He didn’t wait for them to assent before he began, “Well, firstly it seems the story of this place begins before the Temple we found in London. The writing on the wall seems an even earlier precursor to the language on the walls of the London Temple, which seemed closer to more modern forms of Latin.”

“Modern and Latin in the same sentence? There’s an archaeologist for you…”

“The Temple Builders don’t give themselves a name,” he ignored Rick and continued, “Strange given our almost impetuous necessity to categorise everything we see, but anyway. The story begins very much as it did in the London Temple – very much in the beginning. A story of creation that follows roughly the same pattern as most of the world’s stories of creation – a supreme being, separation of light and dark, matter and thought.”

“That story ended though, some fables about early man and a paradise lost to sinister forces, then that was it – just like Genesis the story of the London Temple stopped, done. Here though, it continues.”

“A second chapter?” Rick asked, before answering his own question, “Let me guess, a Flood?”

“The flood was in the book of Genesis,” Sandy pointed out, adding off of their strange looks, “Well since we were attacked by the First Horseman of the Apocalypse, I thought I’d do some light background reading.”

“Sandy’s right,” he agreed, “But seeing as we’re predating the Bible by a good few hundred thousand years then perhaps they don’t denote chapters in the same way as the scholars of Rome.” It was hard to keep further irritation from his voice, “Either way, the Flood in this instance appears to be the primary motivation behind the Exodus that occurred.”

“What? No Prince of Egypt? No Whitney-Mariah frenemies?”

“Perhaps it was a story passed down through generations which early Abrahamic religions have adapted in their different ways,” Andrew suggested. “In this instance, it seems the city was intentionally buried to preserve what was down here from the coming Flood. The majority of the people abandoned it and by the sounds of it scattered to the four corners of the Earth, a mass exodus. In time this place seems to have become just legend.”

“What do you mean by ‘intentionally buried’?” Sandy asked. He had been waiting for that, waiting apprehensively for being able to take them into the next room. He grinned and indicated they follow him.

One corridor was the one Rick and he had come through hours earlier, the one which led basically to the equivalent of the pyramid’s stairwell – to the apex. The second had been the one which Ben had taken to the outside world – leading to the entrance which when the pyramid had been on the surface was probably the main way in or out.

The final corridor was the one he’d been the first to explore – the one from which Ben had emerged. It was down this short slope that he’d uncovered more, a hell of a lot more. It led briefly down, perhaps only a few feet or so, to another room.

Unlike the others, the walls were smooth save for one, adorned with images and text that made it look far closer to Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphic or pictographic descriptions than a straight forward story. The pyramid stood out clear, eerily similar to the carved wall in the Lost Library – only this contained far more information.

In the centre of the room was the large stone chamber.

“Welcome to the Tomb of Atlas,” he called out as he introduced them to this strange new room.

“As in…”

“As in the Greek Titan holding up the Earth,” Andrew finished for him. “And from what I can tell from the writing on the wall, if you forgive the expression, he was the ruler of Atlantis. Well, the city was built for him after all. It seemed the structure of their society was in some way hierarchical. There appeared to have been a few people, with abilities that seem similar to ours.”

He pointed at some of the figures standing at the base of the pyramid, male and female, many of whom appeared to have glowing balls of fire or jagged lightning bolts coming from them. It was either what he said, or perhaps some type of album cover for an ageing rock band. One that would give the Rolling Stones a run for their money.

“No doubt they were Elites amongst the society,” he continued, “Keeping the masses in check. One, a being of supreme power over the Earth, he was in charge and was worshipped almost as a God. When the Flood came, he decided to bury the city – and supposedly himself along with it. Obviously, the rest of the story was never written – but given the state we found it in – and the manner in which it arose…”

“Don’t need a wall to tell us how it ended,” Rick agreed. Sandy had become distracted by the stone tomb, moving over to it and peering inside. “Let me guess, empty? Or have we broken into the hammer horror genre?”

“There’s something in here but it’s not a body,” Sandy explained. The two of them joined her to see an unmistakably organic-looking mass of…well, stuff for lack of a better word, on the inside of the chamber. She reached down with one gloved hand and ran her finger through it.

“You realise you might be putting your hand in millennia-old liquefied god remains?” Rick pointed out. She shrugged, looking up instead at Andrew,

“Was there an ETA on backup? I could do with a sample of this.” He nodded,

“Should be any time now.”

“Did anyone else just look up at the door then in anticipation?” Rick joked. Neither of the others admitted it, but they had. “There’s just one thing I don’t understand, this place doesn’t seem like a city. At best it’s a pyramid, I don’t see how anyone could have lived here.”

“They didn’t live in the pyramid,” Andrew countered, indicating they follow him over to the vertigo-inducing edge of the opening. When they peered down they could finally see why. It dropped away hundreds of feet into a gargantuan cavernous expanse none of them could see the end of. Peaks of buildings and smaller pyramids could faintly be seen, hulking great shapes of constructions that were filled only now with ghosts.

“As you can see, the pyramid’s only the beginning...”