Chapter 200: Putting Parts in the Cavern

Monday, July 5, 1971

The sun was coming in when I woke up. I was alone, and that in itself was an odd feeling. However, I still had Rachael on my mind. Something was missing. Putting that feeling aside for the moment, I scanned everyone and they were all still asleep, except for Anna. She wasn’t feeling well.

“I’m pregnant, Michael!” she snapped when I inquired.

“Then get your pregnant butt in gear and meet me down in the Dining Hall for coffee,” I told her.

The Dining Hall was mostly empty when Anna stumbled in about twenty minutes later.

“I’ll get your coffee,” I told her. After the first cup, she became almost civil. That’s when Sandy joined us.

“I call this meeting to order,” I said playfully. “Does anyone have any idea on how we’re going to load the wagon?”

“What are you talking about, Michael?” Sandy asked.

I then began to explain the situation the way Anna and I had reviewed it yesterday.

“Oh, is that all?” she asked nonchalantly.

“I suppose you want to load and unload all that stuff by yourself,” I shot back.

“I can, although I had assumed you would want to. You know ... boys and their toys and all that.”

Sandy was having just a little too much fun with this, so I decided to step carefully before I made an even bigger fool of myself.

“Sandy? Do you already know the best way to handle this without involving your employees and the Army?” I asked.

“It’s simple, really. We’ll just put the lift forks on the front of the tractor. I’m sure the stuff is in crates or on pallets.”

It was too simple. I should have thought of it.

“C’mon. Let’s get down there,” I told her.

“But, Michael. I haven’t had breakfast yet,” she teased.

So I waited almost patiently while she ate. Anna said she didn’t feel like going if we didn’t need her. I told her that Sandy and I could handle it. If Sandy ever finished eating breakfast!

Finally Sandy finished and I hurried her out the door.

It turned out to be almost as easy as she had said. When we broke the seal and opened the doors, we saw that Dawn’s people had packed everything in large crates, stacked them on two pallets, and tied them down. We dismissed the deputy before I began unloading the trailer. We did struggle with getting the fork lift attachment on the front of the big tractor, but other than that, we were able to get it all on the flatbed trailer.

Sandy drove and I rode standing on the axle as I leaned against the fender, stopping momentarily at the Lodge to get my sword. Then we slowly made our way up the mountain, passing the place where we had held the ceremony and continuing on up to the cavern’s entrance.

I plunged the sword in the same place I had before and the opening appeared. It was larger than last time, large enough for the tractor to drive through. I wondered if the mountain could somehow read my mind.

Once inside, the entrance disappeared. The lights were as we had left them and when we reached the main cave, Sandy asked where I wanted the cargo.

“Let’s look around,” I told her. I wanted to see if I could find the room I had seen in my dream. But try as I might, I couldn’t find anything. I began to work my way systematically around the cave, inserting my sword into every place it looked like it would fit. We turned on the waterfall, slid out the alien waterbed, and even turned up the lights and did something to the ventilation. But no hidden passages were revealed.

Sandy watched patiently as I did this. Finally I sat down beside her on the steps to the fire pit.

“I give up. I know that I dreamed it, but I’m beginning to think it was just wishful thinking,” I told her.

“Are you able to recall the dream and share it with me?” she asked.

“I don’t know. I’ve never tried to do it with a dream,” I told her. But it worked and I shared my dream with Sandy.

“Again,” she said when it finished. Since I didn’t have anything better to do, I did.

“Stop!” she cried as if I could stop my dream anytime I wanted, so I was more surprised than she was when my dream stopped. “How did she know that? She’s never even seen a DVR,” I thought to myself.

“There. See that?” she asked. “Doesn’t that look like the hilt of a sword? There, sticking out of the wall.”

She was right. I had inserted the sword in that slot earlier, but I hadn’t pushed it in that far. I walked across the cavern and shoved the point in the slot, pushing it all the way to the hilt. Then I stood there, watching.

Nothing happened.

I slipped it out and inserted it back in all the way again.

Again, nothing.

“Try turning it to the left, counterclockwise,” she suggested.

“That’s absurd...” I started to think as a twisted the sword and a grinding sound reached our ears as a doorway appeared about ten feet to my left.

“Oh, Michael!” Sandy shouted as she danced in glee. Then she ran to me, and holding hands we entered the new chamber. It was lit the same way the main chamber was, with the unknown indirect lighting, so we could see.

The problem was ... there was nothing to see. It was just an empty room. We stood near the center of the small room, no more than twenty-four feet in diameter. It was roughly square with rounded corners. While the walls were smooth, the domed ceiling was rough and apparently untouched.

To one side, next to the far wall, was a pedestal or possibly an altar, about waist high. The top and sides were smooth, and from what I could see, made of one piece of stone.

I slumped to the ground beside the altar, as the disappointment coursed through me. I had been so sure that the codex would have been here. While I just sat there, Sandy walked over to study the opening.

“I think that the crates will fit, but I don’t think the tractor will,” she said. “But if we set the first one in as far as we can, then use the second one to push it farther inside, then we can use the forks to push the second one all the way in. What do you think?” she asked.

“Whatever,” I mumbled.

“Mi-chael. Please. Get a grip!” Sandy sighed. “If that codex thingy is here, and it wants you to find it, you will. Isn’t that the way everything has worked when it comes to that sword and your rings?”

I jumped to my feet, excited by what she had said. She was right. I don’t know how I could have missed it. If the codex was here, the sword would find it.

Drawing my sword from the slot, I held my breath to see if the chamber door would close. It didn’t. Then, holding it aloft in both hands, I walked slowly around the perimeter of the room.

Nothing!

Undaunted, I made a second circuit. Still nothing. So I made a third round, this time in the other direction.

Still nothing!

The whole time I was doing this, there hadn’t been a peep from the rings or the sword. Finally, after over an hour of trying, I had to give up. While I had been pursuing the codex, Sandy had unloaded the surplus spacecraft parts and pushed them into the small room.

“How am I supposed to get out?” I cried.

“Can you climb over?” she asked. It took a moment, but I finally made it into the main cave. Then using the forks on the tractor, Sandy pushed the pallets further into the small cave. I turned the sword back to its original position and removed it from the slot as the entrance to the small room sealed shut.

As we headed back out of the cave, I sighed in disappointment. I had been sure that I was supposed to come back here, but now it seemed that I had been wrong. The whole way back I kept running everything through my mind, trying to figure out what I missed. I was focused so intently, I didn’t realize that we had arrived back at the Lodge.