Recipe for Adventure Pt. 04

"I don't expect to find anything that amazing. I am more interested in the village buried here." I told him and he seemed oblivious to any people that dwelt here in ancient times. "We are here for history not treasure. We will take nothing away from your country. Anything we dig up will go to Cairo and the First Minister will take it into his possession. I just want to learn how they lived and who they were."

"I hope you find what you are looking for." He said stroking his chin. "I hope the demons don't eat you and yours."

"Thank you," I said watching him carefully.

The soldier left and I noticed that he fastened the leather strap over his sidearm as he departed my tent. Well that was too fucking close I thought as I sent a message to Felicia. Instead of replying to my message she appeared in person. She looked alarmed and I told her I was okay. I got to my feet and shared the conversation I had with the soldier. Her hackles were up and she was in protective mode now. I loved that about her. I pulled her close and she snuggled despite her desire to go after the soldier. I asked her about the former Ranger and she smiled.

"He's a nice guy and all but he's not you," she said simply. "We have things in common and can talk for hours about guns and bad guys. He is a little jealous that I got the chance to fire off that gauss rifle. I heard you talked to him before he died. Did you learn anything?"

"Yeah, now that I think about it I did," I said as I thought came to mind. "Neko contact the satellite. I want another scan of the area please."

"Yes Professor," Neko purred.

"She sounds awful sexy," Felicia said pressing closer still. "Did someone inspire her?"

"Two someones," I admitted as Neko's avatar appeared.

"Satellite is coming online," she said cheerfully. "Your heart rate and arousal level are elevated."

"MMMMM I bet it is," Felicia moaned in my ear. "I bet Carol likes her to bunches. The cat girl thing is right up her alley. What are you looking for Professor?"

"A crater," I said. "I think we are dealing with two separate things."

"Huh, I don't get it," the former detective replied.

I had Neko display the image that had revealed the sniper. I had her bring up the anomaly beneath the worm bed. Felicia stared at it and nodded. Once the satellite was up and ready I had it perform a surface scan of a wider area looking for topical details. We had at least thirty minutes before it would be available. I whispered in her ear about a quickie and she giggled as she undid her shorts. I kissed her and I was soon lost in her touch and the pleasure it provided. We were locked deep in an intimate embrace when Neko vibrated my wrist. I laughed as I continued hammering Felicia from behind. She giggled and thrust her hips back pushing us both passed the point of no return. Somehow I managed to grit my teeth as I fired my load deep inside of Felicia. I held her by her hips as she shook from her own climax.

"That was amazing," she said between gasps of breath.

"I love you," I whispered in her ear.

"I love you too."

I slid out of her and she dropped down to lick me clean. I waited for her to finish before I called up the satellite image. Felicia pulled her shorts back on and stared at the hologram of the desert landscape. I pointed out the deformation that was North West of us. When she asked what it was I told her it was a meteorite crater. She looked at me with a puzzled expression. I had Neko overlay the two images and I pointed out the anomaly beneath the worm bed. There appeared to be two meteor strikes in this area. One was still visible on the features of the desert while the other was buried a hundred feet below the surface and there were no signs of an actual impact. I found that odd. Unless it hit the earth so far back that all signs had been erased by erosion and time.

"That's all very interesting but what can I do?" Felicia asked.

"The soldier that visited me has a strange patch on his right wrist." I told her.

"You think he had a tattoo removed," she said and I nodded. "I'll look into it and speak to the captain if I have to."

She kissed me and left. I sat on my cot and stared at the images separately and together. My thoughts turned to an unusual train of thought. What if the anomaly isn't a meteorite? What if it is a buried structure? If that were the case it would mean there had been sentient life on the earth millions of years ago. Many of the tomes I had read mentioned the Great Old Ones who had come to earth long before the rise of man. They never say exactly how long ago but they hint at remote ages or even epochs of time had passed since their arrival. Could a biological entity survive that kind of time? What sort of lifespan are we talking about? The earth had undergone extinction level events since these things had supposedly arrived. Did they have a hand in those events? Were these Old Ones responsible for the eradication of life upon the surface of the Earth? I shook my head and discounted that line of thought. There was no proof of Old Ones and I was just overreacting.

I was about to lie down when the sound of the single gunshot echoed over the campsite. I raced out of the tent and followed the soldiers that were heading to the worm bed. Felicia and Carol were by my side as I reached the circle of people surrounding the worm bed. We pressed forward and peered at the sight of the corpse.

"Dear god," Carol cursed as the worms rose to the surface and engulfed the body.

"He was a cultist," I said when the captain arrived to see what had happened.

"How do you know that," the captain asked.

"He had a patch on his right wrist where he had a tattoo removed by laser."

"You have keen eyes," the captain replied and looked down at the wriggling mass of worms. "Get the flamethrower."

"He came to visit me earlier tonight," I offered. "He asked me why we were here. I told him and he seemed satisfied."

Two soldiers arrived and we all backed away as they burnt the corpse and the worms to ash. The popping sound as the worms were devoured by the flame reminded me of popcorn. Blast after blast of liquid fire consumed everything in its path. He had offered up his body to the worms only to have them destroyed by his fellow soldiers. I wasn't sure how to feel about that. Did he think he was discovered and figured a noble death was better than that of a military court-martial? He could have simply been keeping the secrets of the cult and if that meant death then so be it.

"I just don't get it," I said as I turned to return to my tent.

"Pity, I wanted to have a member of this cult to interrogate." The captain said frowning and looking at his lieutenant. "We will make sure there are no more moles in our ranks. I suggest you do the same."

"I'll let my security leader take care of that," I replied glancing at Felicia who smiled brilliantly. "I doubt there are any in our midst though. They were randomly chosen with very few volunteering for this dig. Besides this cult was unknown to me until the sniper was discovered and brought in."

The captain nodded and proceeded to round up his entire squad to inspect and speak with them. The cultist did give me a huge clue though. What was the image of Osiris and how could it heal an immortal? If there was some kind of icon or statue buried nearby it had huge implications upon the origin of the Egyptian people. I let out a flustered noise and walked back to my tent with Carol in tow. Felicia and the Ranger did their job while I cuddled with Carol and closed my eyes until dawn. My mind went over not just the current events but every last thing I could remember about the Burrower Beneath and the other Great Old Ones. Those supposedly prehumen gods were legends of titanic figures that carved a path of destruction across the surface of the young Earth. They are even connected to the sinking of mythic continents like Mu, Lemuria and famed Atlantis. Did the spiral village below have connections to these lost places? I hoped so. It would illuminate a patch of prehistory that desperately needed a light shined upon it.

Two days had passed without incident and the dig was progressing well. About noon the team hit the layer of volcanic sediment. It was Chicago that recognized the material. She called my attention to it and I climbed down to take a look. She took her trowel and scraped away the loose earth above the pumice and other materials. I tapped the layer with the tip of my finger and it appeared pretty damn sturdy. Chicago drove the tip of her tool into the material and it gave way. She drove the blade deeper and that's when we caught the odor of rotten eggs. She pulled the trowel free and a trickle of yellow smoke drifted up from the crack.

"Sulfur dioxide, it's the same stuff they put in natural gas to give it that smell," she said.

"Is this place still active?" I asked and she shrugged.

"There might still be pockets of activity but we won't know until we actually pierce this layer and see for ourselves. Any suggestions boss man?"

"Give me your trowel for a second," I said and she handed it over. "Here goes nothing..."

I drove the trowel into the material and gave it a good twist. A larger plume of gas erupted and we had to move back. Chicago was about to make a wise crack when I held up my hand. I listened and when I was sure I ordered every up and out of the pit. Chicago shrugged a second time but did as she was told. I guided the other three teams up the rope ladder and was the last one up. By the time I was halfway up the others heard what I had just a minute or so earlier.

"Look, the layer is cracking," Chicago called down. "Hurry up professor... move it!"

I reached the top and by that time I could feel the vibration in the ground. I ordered everyone back and away from the edge of the pit. The sound grew louder by the second and the retreat became a full fledge race back to camp. The ground roared as it spit open and geysers of sulfur dioxide rocketed into the air. The stench was overwhelming and the edge of the pit disappeared as the volcanic layer shattered and fell into the crater. I was too scared to curse but that's what I wanted to do. Another fucking set back and there was nothing I could do about it. The cloud of dust and gas slowly dissipated but the damage was already done.

I was the first to brave the edge of the pit. What had once been a gentle slope downward was now an irregular cliff thirty feet high. There in the center of the pit was the temple and surrounding the building were the bodies. It reminded me of images of Pompeii. I counted the bodies and there were fifteen that I could easily see through the light ground fog. The temple and the entire landscape were covered in a layer of yellow dust. The dust was sulfur and now we had a brand new hurdle to overcome. Without respirators or cleaning the pit somehow we could only look at the building. The others joined me and stared out over the new landscape. It was Carol that spotted the cave. She tugged on my sleeve and pointed. I looked over and realized the entrance had been smoothed out by human hands. It was some sort of entrance but to where was anyone's guess.

I was open to any and all suggestions. I told everyone that we were going to have a meeting and discus our new problem. The sulfur presented a clear and present danger to anyone digging in the pit. Those with chemist backgrounds made suggestions but it was clear from the beginning we were out of our depths. Terry made an appearance and told us he had made a few phone calls. A clean up team was on the way. I was about to ask him how we could pay for it but he shook his head. He told everyone that he was happy to help us anyway he can. There was a roar of cheers for Terry and I was one of his loudest supporters. I just wanted to get down there so we could get to the meat of the work. So now we had to wait yet again but hopefully this time it wouldn't take an entire week. The crew would arrive within twenty four hours and until they arrived the pit was off limits to everyone.

I wondered if the universe was trying to teach me patience at this point. I heard a commotion in the back of the tent and a young man stood up and was hopping up and down. I asked him what was going on. He came to the front and stood facing me and said one word, drone. He told me he had brought a remote control drone with a video set up on it. We could fly it over the temple and the bodies for a closer look. Beau became our hero of the hour. He got the suitcase containing the drone and we all watched eagerly as he set it up. We linked the drone's video feed to that of Tessa's editing equipment. It had the largest screen available in the camp. By the time he was ready it was late in the afternoon. We watched as the propellers spun up to speed and the drone took to the air. There was a crowd behind Tessa as Beau guided the drone into the pit. The images came in crystal clear and the devastation was as bad as I expected. The only building not buried by the collapse of the volcanic layer was the temple. If there was a positive aspect to this whole thing it was the ramp like formation of the northern end of the pit. We could easily walk into the pit now to access the bodies and the temple.

The drone flew over the top of the temple and we could see that the angled roof was in fact tiled. What the tiles were made of was unknown since the entire exterior of the temple was covered in sulfur and volcanic ash. The layer obliterated most of the details and left us with quite the mystery. I was unaware of any kind of past activity but I would be looking into it after the sun went down. This was definitely not turning out to be a normal dig by anyone's stretch of the imagination. The drone's path took it in a downward spiral ending as it hovered in front of a massive thirty foot door. There was obviously some sort of stylized design on the door but the ash completely obfuscated it. We could also see that there were no stairs leading up to the front entrance but instead was a gentle sloping ramp. The more I saw the more I knew we had a jewel at our fingertips. The next course for the drone was a flyby of the petrified bodies surrounding the temple. There were a total of twenty five of them. It was hard to watch seeing them having died in midstride or curled up in a fetal position. Beau pulled the drone back so that it could be recharged.

The second flight of the drone was near the opening of what we believed was a cave. It was in fact a manmade tunnel. The shape and smoothness of the walls was clear evidence that this was an artificial creation. We couldn't send the drone into the tunnel itself without fear of losing it. So we spent the rest of the time remaining examining the temple. There were hints of details where the layer of volcanic dust was thinner. It was a lovely construction but who had made it? It was definitely not Egyptian and the design of the temple removed it from any known African culture that I was aware of. The drone returned and we had another brainstorming session as we reviewed the footage over and over again. I wasn't the only one that was stumped over the origin of the temple. It appeared as if the corner edifices were columns of some kind. That kind of structure couldn't have been developed by a Stone Age people. The engineering required was simply beyond them but there it was. Everything about the temple made little sense. Again I ached to be down there examining the damn thing with my own hands but we would simply have to wait.

Two days had passed and since that time we had been banned from approaching the dig site. The cleanup crew had arrived at noon of the first day and they immediately went to work. They wore hazmat suits with respirators and special containers to hold the volatile sulfur. They went down and inspected the area to see what they were dealing with. Once they knew the lay of the land they began cleaning. There were twenty of them and worked in five man teams. Due to the heat they could only function two hours at a time. Each man worked two shifts and with remarkable speed they cleared the area. After only two short days they finished the last portion of the pit and declared it free of contaminants. I thanked them and as they packed up the sun began to set. I walked with my crew down the earthen ramp and soon stood before the temple. The queer yellow pawl was gone from the environment so why did I still feel uneasy? Terry walked up and clapped me on the back.

"Tomorrow you can set up the scaffolding," he said.

"Scaffolding... you really do think of everything," I replied and he smiled.

"I had it brought in with the cleanup crew. I can't wait to see what's beneath all that soot and crap."

"You aren't the only one," I said. "Okay everybody let's call it a night and get a full night's sleep. We got a big day tomorrow."

I ate with my crew and Carol sat next to me telling me how well things were going. I guess my patience finally paid off. Felicia took a seat next to me and appeared to be in a great mood. She leaned close and whispered in my ear.

"Wanna wash my back?"

"You need to ask," I said and she smiled brilliantly.

"I love you," she said a little too loud but I didn't care.

"I love you," I replied and Carol blushed knowing that I meant both of them. "I am so damn lucky."

After dinner the three of us wandered around the camp enjoying the cool night air. Tomorrow the scaffolding would go up and we would see what we were dealing with. I guess I shouldn't have surprised me that we ended up at the foot of the temple. We walked around the building and I saw a faint glint of light from the roof. The crescent moon hung bright and cloudless in the heavens. Something was catching that faint illumination and glinted darkly. Was it a polished piece of metal or perhaps some kind of pristine piece of ceramic? Tessa appeared with her cameraman for yet another interview. We used the temple as the backdrop and I think it was my best interview to date. The five of us walked to the nearest cluster of mummified bodies. I knelt down and wondered who they were and what they were like. This entire area would soon become a grid of wooden stakes and twine so that the excavation could be done with accuracy. Who knew what treasures we would find?

Carol and Felicia followed me to the solar shower. Part of the water rations was access to a shower once every three days. We decided some much needed love play was required before we took our shower together. We returned to my tent and I was tempted to place a do not disturb sign on the outer flap. It all began with a single kiss. Felicia was hungry for my embrace and Carol wasn't going to sit this one out. The three of us played for nearly an hour nonstop. We ended up on the floor of the tent gasping and panting after our epic exertions. We took our turn in the shower and cleaned up. The longer the elixir worked upon us the hardier and stronger we became. We ate and drank but we didn't really require more than time out in the sun for our nourishment now. Despite the blistering heat we didn't sweat. If anyone noticed they didn't say anything. We dressed, pushed three cots together and lay next to each other until dawn. I missed the simple touch of their hands upon me and I told them so. They felt the same and it strengthened our bond.

The sound of the C-130 landing tore me away from my meditation. We got up to meet the plane and help offload our supplies. We hopped into the back of a jeep as it drove to the slowing aircraft. It parked and the back ramp lowered. The jeep pulled up and we greeted it. The captain strode forward and checked his uniform and I wondered why until I saw the First Minister stride down the ramp. He was all smiles and greeted me with a handshake and a hug. That spoke volumes to the captain and all the soldiers around us. The minister gestured to the interior of the plane and told me everything I required was inside. We got back into the jeep and drove directly to the dig site. Felicia stayed behind to coordinate the offloading of the cargo. The First Minister praised my work but I told him it was a team effort.