“The Americans,” she said. “They are strange.”
“Ohhh yeah!” Cass said, laughing with relief. “They believe the Seven Wonders came from outer space! Haaa-ha-ha-ha—”
Farouk swallowed her bread. “They did.”
Cass fell silent. My heart thumped. Torquin’s face was turning pink and I could hear a few random squeaks coming from him, which meant that he was on the verge of laughter.
Ask a few questions, I told myself, and if she’s a total wacko, cut your losses and move on. “We hear you are a diver, and we’re searching for—”
“The Lighthouse of Alexandria, of course,” she said. “And, like everyone else, you are looking in the wrong place.”
“But . . . this is Alexandria,” Cass said. “And we were just at the island of Pharos—or what was the island. That’s where the Lighthouse used to be, right? So where else would we look?”
Farouk gave me a deep, appraising glance. Then she quickly stood. “I have work to do. Please feel free to finish the bread. It is my gift to you.”
As she turned to go, I called out, “Wait! Does this mean anything to you?”
I was wearing a baseball cap, which I now took off, and then turned around, fluffing my hair to be sure she saw the Λ.
She cocked her head, then grabbed my hair with her fist and yanked hard. “Yeow!” I cried out.
“Hey!” Torquin said, reaching for her arm.
“It’s real!” Cass said. “Not sprayed on or anything. We all have it!”
Farouk let go. “I left a very good job in banking to pursue my dream. To learn about the Seven Wonders of the World. I put all my money into diving and excavation and archaeological digs. I took a vow of simple living. It took years to find more believers, to form SEESAW. If you are here to mock me, to write about me in sarcastic terms—”
“We are descendants of the royal family of Atlantis!” I shouted. “We have been searching for the Seven Wonders ourselves. We think you may have some clues left by a prince named Massarym. Please. Work with us. We need to find the remains of the Lighthouse!”
“Massarym . . .” Farouk thought for a moment and then threw her head back. “Atlantis?” She burst out laughing, an obnoxious jackhammer-like sound that echoed up the alleyway.
“What’s so funny?” Marco said.
“You’re just as crazy as I am!” she retorted.
“Farouk, please,” I said. “We’re not here to mock SEESAW. But we’ve seen a lot. We’ve been in contact with some ancient scholars. And if we don’t have your help, we’ll die. All four of us were taken to a remote island. We are part of a mission to solve this ancient, deadly problem. We all have this gene called G7W—it causes the white lambda on the back of our heads. What it does is—”
Farouk abruptly held up her hand. “This gene . . . I would like you not to talk about it right now.”
“But it means everything to us,” I said. “It will—”
“Kill you. I know this.” Farouk’s face was darkening. From a tattered pocket she pulled a cell phone, tapped something out, and held it to us. The screen showed a faded image of a grinning, black-haired boy. “My son, also Farouk, had the mark.”
Had. Past tense.
“I’m sorry,” I said softly.
Farouk pocketed the phone. “We have different theories. But I know what is in store for you. And I would never forgive myself for denying you the chance to realize your quest.”
She turned and began walking toward her ramshackle tent. “Are the relics . . . there?” Marco asked.
She laughed. “No, my boy. If you would like to see the remains of the Lighthouse, we must go by ship. I will get some equipment. It is a long journey. And I warn you, you may not like what you see.”
“Wait. So the Lighthouse was taken from the island?” Eloise asked.
Farouk began crossing the street, her flippers slapping the pavement. “Not exactly,” she said. “The island took the Lighthouse.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
OUT OF THE OORT CLOUD
THE ALEXANDRIA HARBOR faded into the distance, then completely disappeared. As we motored farther into the Mediterranean, the water became a deep blue, almost purple. It was nice to see the crew on each fishing boat wave to Farouk as we approached.
It wasn’t so nice to see them cracking up as soon as we passed.
“Massarym,” she said, “was, I believe, a survivor from the Oort cloud.”
“The who?” Marco said.
“The vast belt of shattered planets and space debris at the outer edges of the sun’s gravitational reach,” Farouk replied.
“Um . . .” Eloise said, looking at me nervously.
“Maybe you can tell us exactly what you discovered,” I said carefully. “If Massarym left writings, wouldn’t they be in a language you didn’t understand?”
“I cannot decipher all of his writings,” Farouk continued, “but there are similarities to Greek and Arabic and ancient Egyptian. After many years, I have figured out that he flew to these parts through the air—that much I’m sure of.”
“You got that part right,” Marco mumbled. But he got there on a Loculus, he didn’t say.
“I also discerned that there was a large green vessel,” Farouk continued. “From what I can make out, the vessel was called Mu’ankh.”
“It . . . wasn’t a vessel,” Cass said.
“And it didn’t come from outer space,” Eloise added.
Farouk sighed. “I know, I know, most people cannot wrap their minds around something like this. Crazy is the word most often used. But I think it is crazy to assume that the Seven Wonders were built by coincidence—all around the same area, all with concepts in architecture far advanced for their time. Having studied other options, I can only conclude Massarym was from a civilization that simply does not exist on earth—”
“Atlantis does not exist now,” I said. “But it did, trust me. Atlantis sank. Its language had elements of Greek, Arabic, and ancient Egyptian. Massarym was an Atlantean prince. All of what you’re describing can be explained by those things.”
Farouk cut the throttle. She looked from Cass to Marco to Eloise to Torquin to me. “All right,” she said. “I vowed I would be respectful. Do tell.”
I took a deep breath. The fishing boats were far behind us. There was no sight of land, and she controlled the boat. I figured we were stuck together, like it or not.
“Well,” I said, “it began with these two brothers. . . .”
By the time I finished telling the story, it felt like even my eyeballs were sunburned. Farouk had taken some fishy-smelling sheets out of her ship’s hold, soaked them in water, and had us put them over our heads for coolness and protection. She hung on every word.
“Extraordinary,” she said. “But I must say, it absolutely defies rational belief.”
“Oort cloud is more rational?” Torquin said.
Farouk smiled and pulled out a cell phone from her pocket. “Have you been keeping up with the news?”
“Not really,” I said.
“A giant found dashed on the rocks in a beach in Rhodes,” she said. “Sightings of floating two-headed beings in the streets of New York City. A statue coming to life in a small Greek village. Eight-legged creatures flying through the air. The Sphinx of Egypt disappearing overnight.”
“Wait,” I said. “The Sphinx? Are you sure that wasn’t just a rumor?”
“All corroborated on the internet!” Farouk said.
“Yeah, we know about some of those,” Cass said. “But not the Sphinx. You can’t believe everything you read on the web.”
“Ah, you accept those bizarre occurrences, but you doubt my theories?” Farouk’s eyes drifted out to the water, and she began to pull hard to the left on the tiller. The boat was puttering slowly now. “There,” she said, pointing out to sea. “About seven kilometers out. That is where the island is—the one on which the Lighthouse was really built, that is.”
Cass, Eloise, Marco, Torqu
in, and I bunched together at the railing. Or rather, Torquin grabbed the railing and the rest of us hung on and hoped the boat didn’t tilt into the sea under his weight. “Which island?” Torquin asked. “See nothing but water, water, water.”
“Exactly,” Farouk replied. “It is submerged.”
“So . . . you’re saying the Lighthouse wasn’t built on Pharos?” Cass asked. “And the ruins are out there somewhere?”
Farouk nodded. “You see, long before the Lighthouse was built, the island you visited was a treacherous place. For centuries ships were pulled to its rocky shoals by the currents and the trade winds. Leaders believed the land itself was accursed. Torches were set up on the island to warn the ships, but the great winds made a mockery of this. Alexandrian engineers wanted to build a structure, atop which would sit a mighty torch protected from the elements. But no one could conceive of a way to do this that would not be destroyed by nature. The technology to do this was too advanced for the time. Until one visitor arrived. A visitor who could not conceivably have come from this planet.”
“I’m guessing you mean old Massarym-o,” Marco said.
Farouk nodded. “Dressed unlike anyone in Egypt. Speaking a strange tongue. The technology he brought was so beyond the engineers’ capability, so sophisticated, that they thought him a god. Massarym saw that the harbor would be safer if the Lighthouse were farther out—on another island. By placing it just a few meters farther out, the water would be deeper, safer. The ships would be diverted long before they even caught the strong current. ‘Another island? But there is none!’ the wise men noted. I am certain women noted this, too, but in these stories it is always men. . . .”
“I hear you, sister,” Eloise said with a sigh.
“Massarym said he would conjure an island himself,” Farouk went on. “A movable island.”
“Seriously? Like a gigantic float?” Marco said.
Farouk smiled. “With enough mass to support a lighthouse the size of a forty-story building! Well, he said he needed time for this. He left plans for the architects to build the Lighthouse while he traveled to gather the necessary magic. Many doubted Massarym, but he assured them that he would leave a powerful protective talisman of great magic inside the Lighthouse. Well, the workers created a base massive enough to support such a structure. And as they were building up the walls of the Lighthouse, Massarym returned. Imagine the astonishment as the people woke up one day to see in the harbor exactly what he had promised—another island! Eventually the Lighthouse base was rolled on massive logs to its new home. This new island was given the Greek word for lighthouse—Pharos. Most of the time this new island stayed close, so it seemed like an extension of the bigger island. During storms it traveled. Before long both islands were known by this name.”
“So why is this movable island all way out to sea now, stuck here at the bottom?” I asked.
Farouk shrugged. “There is much we do not know. We can only assume Massarym was trying to impress the people of Egypt. This would make sense. World domination by aliens is not an easy sell to humans. And clearly, he failed. I believe his people could not survive our atmosphere. The drifting of Massarym’s island, its sinking—these happened long after he died. Perhaps they were the result of the powerful earthquakes.”
I didn’t want to argue about the alien stuff. But the rest of the story made a crazy kind of sense. I guess if Massarym could travel through Europe on Loculus Air Express, wrangle the Loch Ness monster, put a curse on his own dad, and create most of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, it stood to reason he could create a movable island. He wanted to create a home for the Loculus, and allow it to be protected by Mu’ankh. If anyone tried to steal the orb, the island itself would come to life.
“The thing is,” Marco said, “creating a whole island? That’s a huge deal. And Alexandria had this crazy library, right? So the place must have been crawling with writers. Wouldn’t someone would have written this down? Why don’t we know about it?”
“Maybe because the last part of Karai’s scrolls was burned in bat guano?” Cass said.
Farouk nodded. “And, of course, the Library of Alexandria was burned three times. Countless records were lost. This is why the writings we found were so valuable.”
“How do we get to the island?” I looked out to sea but still saw nothing but water.
“You don’t,” Farouk replied. “I will not allow it.”
“We have to,” Cass insisted. “That’s why we’re here.”
“There are plenty of relics strewn about for miles around,” Farouk said.
“Farouk, that magical talisman you spoke about—the thing that Massarym promised the people of Alexandria?” I said. “That’s what we need.”
“After what happened three years ago, I have restricted my explorations to a maximum of a half kilometer from the site—about a third of a mile,” Farouk said. “And that is what I will permit you to do. I am used to crews of up to six people, so there is enough diving equipment. But I must insist—my boat, my rules.”
“What happened three years ago?” Marco asked.
“Four divers went down to the site,” Farouk said. “When they came back up, they were in pieces.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
ROCK CYCLONE
I HAVE BEEN grateful for Torquin’s size many times since arriving at the island. Unfortunately, this day was not one of them.
When we already out to sea, Farouk discovered that she didn’t have scuba gear that was big enough for No-Longer-Red Beard. Which meant that during the dive, he would be the one staying on the boat. Which also meant Farouk would be going with us.
I was hoping it would just be us and Torquin on the dive. If there was any chance we could sneak away from Farouk’s safety zone and actually explore the submerged island, those plans would be much easier with Torquin on our side. “Remember, all of you,” Farouk said, helping Eloise with her wet suit, “you descend very slowly, and you rise even more slowly.”
“H-h-how slowly is slowly?” Cass asked. “Do we have a speedometer?”
I elbowed him, and he gave me a sharp look, mouthing the words “I’m a terrible swimmer, you know that!”
“Diving is easier than swimming,” I whispered to him. “Besides, you took the KI training course, right?”
We all had. For me, it had been sandwiched between learning to be a chef and a mechanic. I was terrible at both. And I barely remembered the diving rules.
But Farouk’s nagging brought it all back.
“If you need to, you can jettison your belt in an emergency,” she continued. “It contains lead weights, and dropping it will help you rise. But you must be careful. At the high pressure deep underwater, your body collects excess nitrogen. If you rise too fast, that nitrogen will get into your blood system and your joints, which causes decompression sickness.”
Marco nodded. “Otherwise known as the bends.”
“Exactly,” Farouk said. “You must check your depth and pressure gauges regularly. And don’t forget, you have an alternate air source, and it’s called the . . . ?”
“Octopus,” I answered as I adjusted my mask, snorkel, air tank, fins, buoyancy vest, and the little emergency-air knob.
“Ready!” Eloise shouted, stepping up to the railing. “I call first!”
Farouk looked very reluctant. “You know, it is highly irregular to let a nine-year-old do this.”
“I trained her,” Marco said. “Long story. She’s little, but she’s a fish. If she does anything wrong, I’ll reel her in.”
Eloise kicked him with her flipper. “All right then,” Farouk called out, looking at her watch. “Keep your eyes on me. I found Massarym’s writings in an area safely far away from the sunken island, and I hope to find more with your help. Be careful not to go farther than that spot, for your own safety. And remember, the underwater currents can be strong, so stay close together. We will return in a half hour. You will not have enough oxygen for any more than that.” She took
off the watch and handed it to me. “This is waterproof. Rely on it.”
“Roger,” I said. As I slipped it on my wrist, I noticed the time—2:49. We would have to be back by 3:19.
“’Bye, Tork, don’t be too jealous!” Marco said. “Geronimo!”
He leaped over the side, sending up a wave of water that hit Torquin squarely in the face.
“Raaamphh,” Torquin grumbled.
“That’s not fair!” Eloise shouted, jumping in after Marco.
The tank and gear were weighing me down, and I was already sweating. I rolled onto the railing of the boat and pitched myself over. In the water, I made sure to wet the inside of my mask, to prevent fogging up. Then I slipped it on. Cass finally let himself in last.
Farouk took the lead. We sank slowly, then began kicking out with our flippers, away from the boat. Marco pulled off a few somersaults and caught a fish in his bare hands, but that made Farouk stop cold, so he gave it up.
Show-off.
The sea was murky, but our masks contained headlamps. I had to hold my nose and breathe out, to equalize the pressure. I knew this could be dangerous. I looked over to Cass, Marco, and Eloise. I couldn’t see their faces. Could we find signs of the Loculus far from the sunken island? If we didn’t, how could we persuade Farouk to let us go there? I could hear my own breathing . . . too fast . . . a buzzing noise from inside my own ears . . .
Calm down, I told myself.
Before long I caught glimpse of the bottom of the sea. A couple of long, thick-bodied fish undulated lazily. A huge lump of sand came to life and swam away, which scared me until I realized it was just a squid.
Farouk had stopped moving and was pointing downward. I caught a flash of excitement in her eyes through her mask. Below us was a mound of oddly shaped debris. She was pointing to it excitedly. I guess she hadn’t seen it before.
We all dived closer. In the center of the pile was a thick, broken, drumlike cylinder. Even covered with sea grunge, it was obviously part of an ancient column. Farouk began pulling away some of the seaweed, trying to get to the surface. Marco planted his feet and lifted another piece of wreckage clear off the sea bottom, releasing a stingray. As Marco jumped away, his legs made the sand churn, and I saw a knife-shaped sliver rise into the muck, turning end over end. It caught the light of my headlamp. Somehow it had escaped being covered with barnacles and seaweed. It glowed back a golden color.