Chapter 12 — Turning the Key
Instead of an earthquake this morning, Rick awoke to voices, “Don’t they look soooo cute together?”
“Yes, they do, we should fix that. Whipped cream should work.”
Rick’s eyes immediately flipped wide open, staring at the clock: 7:08. Christy and Jessica were hovering overhead. “I really don’t think whipped cream is a good idea,” he growled.
They giggled.
“You girls got breakfast ready?”
They looked at him stupefied. “Breakfast? We were hoping you would go get donuts so we can go back early to explore the caves some more,” Jessica said.
“You two still need baths,” he said, sitting up.
“Awwww!” they sighed.
“You should be able to get done before I get back with donuts though.”
“Yay!” their attitudes changed as they raced out of the room.
As Rick came out of his bedroom, he noticed Anna sprawled face down, sideways across her bed. She had obviously fallen asleep directly out of the shower. He closed her door and went to the garage.
He started the Viper and smiled at the rumble of the massive V-12 engine. He put it in gear and eased out of the garage. It’s a shame for this car to be driving down a residential street so slowly, he thought, and it’s an even bigger shame that I get to drive it so seldom. Fatherhood and the minivan seem to be taking over more and more of my life, he sighed.
When he walked back into the kitchen, Abby was slumped at the kitchen counter with a cup of coffee. Christy, Jessica and Alex swarmed when they heard the kitchen door shut and immediately relieved him of the donut boxes.
“Hold on! Jess, go get Anna up; Alex, go get Kaylie.”
“Why don’t you get her up?” Jessica asked as she stuffed half a fritter in her mouth.
“Because I told you to.”
“So?”
“GO!”
“Where’s Kaylie, Dad?” Alex asked.
“She should be downstairs on the couch.”
“I was down there earlier; I didn’t see her.”
“Check again. Did you actually look on the couch?”
“Uh, no, I got on the computer.”
“Whew,” Rick sighed, “don’t scare me like that. Go get her, please.”
Jessica returned from her task, snickering, “I took a sandal and swatted Anna’s big fat booty!”
Seconds later, Anna emerged in her nightshirt, steaming mad. She stomped over to the counter and whacked Jessica on the back of the head.
“Anna!” Rick yelled.
“She hit me with a shoe!” Anna griped.
“It was a sandal!” Jessica corrected.
Anna smacked her on the back of the head again.
“Dad!” Jessica cried.
“I’m not sure you didn’t deserve that,” he said.
“She shouldn’t have had her big fat butt sticking up in the air saying ‘spank me’,” Jessica explained as if it were a valid excuse.
Anna cocked her arm back to swat her cousin once again; Rick caught her hand, spinning her around and into a seat at the opposite end of the counter. “Hit her again and you’ll be grounded.”
“Well, my butt is not fat!”
“It jiggles like jello when you hit it with a sandal!”
“Stop!” Rick ordered.
Alex and Kaylie came up the stairs. “So, when are we going?” Kaylie asked as soon as she was in sight.
“After we eat and get ready,” Rick told her.
“Cool! I can’t wait to see that time machine!”
Anna smirked, “What makes you think we’ll find anything but dead-end tunnels again today?”
“Well,” Rick laughed, “while you were face down on the bed…”
“Big fat bu—” Jessica started, but Rick swatted the back of her head, cutting off the rest of her remark.
“…we were finding the secret path hidden in the wall,” he completed.
“Whoa!” Christy said.
“Wow!” Anna added, surprised.
“Ow!” Jessica cried, rubbing her head.
Rick smiled at Abby, who sat in the passenger seat holding two boxes of donuts. When the girls had heard the news of the secret passage, they demanded an immediate return to the cave. Anna was so excited that she ran to her room and came back carrying her shoes, still in her nightshirt. Rick assured her she had plenty of time to get dressed, turned her around, and pushed her back toward her room. Christy and Jessica galloped straight to the van, forgetting their shoes. Only Alex and Kaylie had the presence of mind to calmly walk to their room, change clothes, use the bathroom, and even brush their hair. They were actually in the van and fully prepared before anyone else.
Abby passed out donuts, including half-eaten ones Christy and Jessica had left on the table. The trip to the path was a short one, taking two to three minutes. Rick popped the hatch as the girls opened the sliding door and started to run down the path. “Girls!” he yelled, they all stopped in their tracks. “Get back here. Now!”
They all slowly walked back.
“You will sit here and eat your donuts while we get ready,” he said.
“I’m not hungry,” Anna told him defiantly.
“Me either,” the others agreed.
“Right. We’ll just stay here until you are, then,” he told them all.
Each reluctantly picked up their donut as Rick and Abby packed their bags a bit lighter than the previous day.
He handed out the same assignments as the previous day, distributed the same clothes, then sat down on the bumper and proceeded to eat a donut, agonizingly slowly. When the last bite disappeared into his mouth, the girls jumped up expectantly. Rick smiled wickedly and reached for another. A chorus of gripes and complaints ensued.
“You need to learn to be patient and behave!” was his stoic reply.
“I think you should eat all the donuts before he takes another one,” Abby advised.
All the girls suddenly realized they were hungry and complied. And settled down.
Christy asked, “Why do we need these clothes again? The path is clear now and it wasn’t that cold in the tunnels,”
“I have a feeling we’re going deeper this time. You don’t have to wear them, but tie them around you or something in case you do need them,” Rick recommended.
“It was sixty degrees at the end yesterday, you would probably have been cold without them,” Abby added.
The girls had opted for shorts and tank-tops, except Anna, who wore a halter-top. She pulled her extra shirt on while the rest tied theirs around their waists, and everyone put on the pants when Abby mentioned there were still bugs out there.
Abby again coated everyone with bug repellent and when Rick declared the journey was about to begin, he was treated to a collective sigh of relief. He locked up the van and unsheathed the machete.
“Bout time,” Anna grumbled.
“You like having a place to put your earrings?” Rick smiled, waving the blade at her.
He and Abby led the party down the trail. They arrived at the cave and climbed right in. Anna automatically wielded her chalk, Jessica prepared the camera and Alex and Christy illuminated the room. Rick led the way down the slope, carrying the cube now instead of the machete in one hand, flashlight in the other.
It was 9:00 AM when they reached the intersection in question. Rick held his light at an angle to the wall, which immediately made the impression visible. The square was only about 1/16th of an inch deep and was, as expected, the exact size of the cube. The swirl pattern matched perfectly with that in the inset area.
Jessica traced the swirl with her finger, expecting to get lucky again. It did nothing. “Worth a try,” she shrugged, not even slightly disappointed.
Rick lined the box up with the square, making sure the swirl matched as well, and gently pressed it into the indentation, holding it there a brief moment.
A seam immediately appeared in the wall and everyone took
a cautious step back. The massive stone rumbled as it effortlessly slid back and up into the ceiling, exposing a more natural-looking cave.
The air expelled from this new path smelled old and damp and was a stark contrast to the relatively warm and dry corridors preceding it. Goosebumps raised instantly on their arms. Almost choreographed, they each untied their shirts from their waists and slipped them on.
This cave also had support beams, unlike the rest of the tunnels they had seen thus far, and had traces of rubble which had fallen from the ceiling, as well as stalactites and stalagmites. The roof was carved squarely, instead of arched like the others.
Rick, concealing his sudden apprehension, motioned for everyone to continue their jobs and asked Abby to detail the new path ahead on her map. This tunnel was as wide as ten feet in some places, narrow as three feet in others. As the last person walked through the doorway, the stone slid back into place with a perfect seal once again. Alex noted this side of the door had an identical ‘keyhole’ as the other, although it was more apparent with the rocky background inside.
Abby explained there were no branches or forks in this cave and they walked forward for nearly fifteen minutes in what was a gradually tightening spiral, winding down until they reached the center, which simply cut to the west to a point which Abby approximated to be fifty feet below the dead-end that halted their exploration the previous day.
Rick came to an abrupt stop as the narrow tunnel suddenly opened up into an obviously man-made and unnatural, but very beautiful scene of magnificent construction. He felt six impacts as each of his companions slammed into the previous one when he halted.
The walls were once again glossy and uniform, now extending nearly thirty feet to the top. The floor sloped gently and extended roughly fifty feet in a crescent shape around a thirty-foot wide pool of clear liquid fed by a waterfall flowing from a rounded chute in the center of the ceiling. The lights danced and reflected off the water with an impressive glow that entranced the entire party.
Christy broke the spell, “Wow, it’s so pretty!”
Rick snapped out of his trance and walked around the pool as far as he could to one side, checking the walls for some type of exit besides the one through which they had entered. There were none. As he returned, he focused the beam of his light down into the water. It was crystal clear and it looked like the bottom dropped sharply before flattening out at about eight feet deep across the middle.
He rejoined his clan; they had gradually crept toward the water and were also admiring the clarity and beauty.
“It’s warmer in here. A lot,” Anna commented, taking off her shirt.
“What do you think?” Rick asked Abby as he slid his arm around her shoulder and cinched her up against him.
“It’s amazing,” she replied softly. The girls all nodded reverently in agreement.
“No, I mean what do we do now?”
Six puzzled expressions shot back at him. Jessica finally spoke up, “I guess I’ll take pictures of every inch of the place.”
Soon, every pair of eyes and hands were caressing the walls and inspecting the ceilings. Anna decided that was too boring and sat on the edge of the pool, removed her shoes and socks, and soaked her feet in the water.
“How’s it feel?” Alex asked when she noticed.
“Not bad, about like our pool in early summer…”
Rick stuck his hand in it to get his own opinion, as did the others. “Not bad at all, about 72 degrees...”
“It’s no hot-tub!” Kaylie observed.
“The hot tub is 92 degrees,” Jessica stated factually as she continued to document every bit of the place. She was at the far end of the pathway.
“Rick, there’s more to this map. This can’t be another dead—” Abby’s analysis was broken by a screech and gasp.
“Daddy!” Jessica yelped.
“What?”
Alex, who had gasped, was now tugging at his arm as well. “And what is so important that you have to remove my arm from my body, Alex?” His irritation halted Jessica’s reply.
So Alex answered, “The water. It has to go someplace!”
“That’s what I was gonna show you!” Jessica protested, wanting credit for the discovery she had made. “Come here and turn out your lights!” she ordered.
There was a rapid pitter-patter of feet as everyone clustered around her, then turned out their lights until it was completely dark.
“Wait a minute,” Jessica instructed.
Each of them patiently waited for their eyes to adjust. Faintly a dim light faded into view directly behind the waterfall. After a few more seconds, a square tube, about five feet across, was clearly visible through the ripples along the bottom of the wall.
“There’s an exit!” Abby declared.
“Uh, where does it go, though?” Alex pondered out loud.
“To our time machine!” Kaylie proclaimed as she sat down to take off her shoes and socks.
“What do you think you’re doing, Kay?” Rick demanded.
“What do you think? I’m gonna swim through to our time machine!”
In the dim light, he noticed the others doing the same. “Hold on,” he switched his light back on, “none of you are going in there.”
“Why not?” Kaylie questioned.
“See all that water coming out of the ceiling?” he pointed.
“Uh, yeah…”
“That same amount of water is going out that hole. That would make quite a current,” he explained.
“Oh,” she said, despondently.
“You wouldn’t be able to get back very easily, would you?” he asked.
She shook her head, eyes wide with the realization of her possibly near fatal mistake. “What are we supposed to do then?”
“Where’s that rope?” he asked.
“I left it at the entrance,” she said, pointing at her bag.
Rick walked back to the tunnel where most of them had discarded their gear, picked up the rope, and started to undo the knot as the others gathered around. He laid the rope in a coil on the ground and took one end of it, entering the tunnel. He stopped at the first support beam and studied it. He determined it was no good — he couldn’t fasten the rope to it in any way. So he went to the next. Perfect. He could easily fit the rope around it, between the beam and the rock, and tied and checked his knot, then tied a couple more to be sure and returned to the indoor lake.
“Well, the rope’s 125 feet and we just lost 25 of it and it’s at least thirty feet to the hole; that gives me seventy feet...”
“Rick,” Abby’s concerned voice cracked, “are you going in there?”
“My dad can hold his breath for like three minutes,” Alex bragged.
Rick ignored the concern, “You got any plastic bags?”
“Yeah, sure. I have lots of sample bags — what size?”
“This size,” he held up his flashlight.
Abby rummaged through her bag and handed him a clear baggie perfect for the job. He placed the light in the bag and sealed it, then stripped to his shorts. He tossed the rope in the water just above the hole and watched the current suck it in, hoping it didn’t knot up.
“Here,” he picked up the rope and handed it to Kaylie, “You’re my lifeline, if I tug on it three times, tell everyone to pull.”
Kaylie gulped.
“Don’t panic yet; I’m gonna go down like ten feet to test it out first. Alex, I want you to time me; you know when I’m in danger.”
He waded into the water, holding the rope, letting it slide through his hands as he went deeper.
“How’s the water, Dad?” Jessica asked.
“Feels good, be right back. Don’t worry,” he assured them.
He tucked the bag into his shorts pocket so the light hung outside and immersed himself the rest of the way. As he breast-stroked around the waterfall, Abby called, “Be careful!”
“Of course!” he shot back casually, “I’d hate for you to lose me before you fin
ally admit you love me!” He winked at Kaylie, who returned the wink.
Abby glared at him as he went under, and then turned to Kaylie, “What did that mean?” she asked suspiciously.
“Oh, just something we discussed last night,” Kaylie replied with an ounce, maybe a ton, of implication, leaving her to wonder.
The lights sparkled and flashed as the bag flapped at his side, not exactly the best arrangement, but it was working. He could clearly see the uniform tunnel ahead until it turned sharply at about fifteen feet. He grabbed the rope and allowed the current to drag him in. Not too strong, he thought.
He drifted around the corner weightlessly then propped his feet against each side to stop his progress and look down the next corridor. There, he thought, not even ten feet away, was what appeared to be the light source they had seen so dimly from the pool, dozens of times brighter now. He considered making the trip to the junction from which it came, a branch in the tunnel to the right, but the rope had followed the current the other way. He opted to go back and explain what he was going to do instead.
He decided to try to swim out of the hole against the current and found he could overpower it fairly easily, and made his way back to the opening where he pulled himself out.
“There he is!” an obviously tense, and now relieved, Jessica exclaimed.
“It’s not bad, really, but I’m not sure you can all make it. There’s a turn fifteen feet down, then a fork another eight to ten feet to the right where I could see a light,” he paused for a breath. “I’m going to go down to that path. If I’m safe, I’ll tug on the rope four times, OK?”
Kaylie nodded.
Rick pulled in a few more deep breaths then angled into a dive right at the hole, going directly into the aqueduct and maneuvering swiftly around the first corner to the spot where he had previously stopped. He balanced himself against the current at the split in order to pull up slack in the rope, and took the right path toward the light.
He quickly learned this path was not a long one. In fact, it sloped directly up at a twenty-degree angle and he could see the surface already. He half walked, half swam the four or five feet to the surface, dragging the slack rope with him, breaking the surface to a surreal world that his wildest fantasies could never have conjured.
“What’s taking so long?” Abby said, pacing.
“Why? You miss him already?” Kaylie smiled.
“Seriously, he hasn’t tugged on the rope?”
“Not at all, there’s been no tension on it at all since he went in.”
“One minute, 45 seconds,” Alex called, looking at her watch.
Kaylie decided to check the rope, just to make sure. She only pulled it a couple feet when she felt pressure on the other end. She tugged once.
The slight jerk of the rope snapped Rick out of his trance. How long had it been? Five seconds? Five minutes? He didn’t know, but was sure someone on the other end of this rope did. He slowly pulled back four times to let them know he was OK. He then untied the rope from his waist and tied it off to a column before pulling himself back to the pool.
As his head broke the surface, an angry voice assaulted him, “Richard Williamson! How dare you scare us all like that!”
He held back his smile as he swam back, “How long was I gone?” he asked Alex.
“Two minutes, 45 seconds,” said the timekeeper.
“I had fifteen seconds left, why the panic?” he joked. Abby was not amused. He climbed up the steep slope and dried his hands on the pants he had left behind.
“You don’t even care if we were worried?” Abby scolded.
He asked her for another plastic bag and she provided it. “There are easier ways to tell me how you feel,” he said slyly, winking at Kaylie again. He then took the camera from Jessica and sealed it up in the bag, purposely avoiding eye contact.
Abby fumed at Kaylie, “What is this? A conspiracy? Are you helping him play some kind of joke on me?”
Kaylie was giggling, but shook her head, assuring Abby there was no evil plot against her.
“What are you doing, Rick?” Abby finally asked him.
He glanced at her, “You have to see this. Seriously. And I’m in absolutely no danger at all; I merely lost track of time. Don’t worry.” He stood and pecked her lightly on the forehead, then squeezed the camera into his pocket and started back into the water. “I might misunderstand your concern and think it’s some other emotion,” he hinted.
Kaylie fought to control her expression as he smiled at her while going under.
“What?” A frustrated Abby demanded of the girl.
Rick walked up the slope inside the secret room seconds later. The scene was still stunning and he had to pause a second, totally forgetting to wipe the water from his face. He slowly pulled the camera from his pocket and opened the baggie. He turned on the power and raised the camera to his face. Then lowered it. “Holy cow! What to shoot?” he asked nobody. He finally decided: Everything!
The room was the shape of a dome: twenty feet high, thirty wide. The entire ceiling, from about six feet up, was coated with what looked like dark blue crystals; the rest appeared to be gold, with uncountable amounts of inlaid gems. The patterns of the gems formed copies of ancient works: pharaohs, mummies, depictions of Ra, Odin, Thor, Jesus, even famous paintings such as the Mona Lisa. There were ancient caveman drawings completely replicated with thousands of gems, and many images of battles, armor, weapons. The floor looked and felt like it was constructed of the same strange metallic substance as the cube, except for an eight-foot circle of stone around the entrance and a twelve-foot circle of red crystal in the center.
Along the far wall appeared to be a slanted desk full of large papers. To the right was what looked like eight storage containers, each six feet high and three feet wide, like large lockers, lined up side by side and made of the same mysterious metal. To the left was a bank of glowing buttons and switches, and in the very center of the room, a podium seemed to grow out of the red crystals like a tree. The trunk of this tree was round and completely illuminated the room. This was nearly the entire source of light in the room, but it wasn’t bright to look at. The top of the podium was flat and black. This device was obviously the center of attention for some reason, a reason Rick wholly expected: it had a single, faceted hole in the center, just the right shape and size for the time stone.
Could it be? Could it really be a... time machine? As he approached he had to remind himself for the tenth time why he was here...
“Pictures!” he reprimanded himself.
Twenty minutes and probably 150 pictures later, he decided he should get back to show everyone.
Walking back to the exit, he sighed, not wanting to leave, reluctantly resealing the camera in the bag and pressing it into his pocket.