Chapter 44

Twenty-eight dives in Italy and Piertro, Antonia's instructor from when she learned, was satisfied that I would not get myself killed, ruining his reputation. How he thought I might give him a bad name by doing everything right the first time mystified me until Antonia explained he was superstitious believing that anyone who did not make mistakes would be overconfident and die. I could see the logic in his thinking but after I had completed twice the number of dives I was told I would need, he relented signing off on my certification.

Arriving back on Atokos, we had a couple of options as to what we would do the following day as it was too late to dive that day unless we wanted a night dive which Antonia rejected. The other option was to explore the tunnel as the report on the liquid came back saying the material was biological but inert, (whatever that meant) other than the smell we would be safe. I of course had an idea what we would find behind the door and I was fine with the possibility. What I was not okay with was not having enough time afterwards to process what I would be seeing, leaving Antonia to hold me night after night again like she had after my trip to Lebanon. Talking to her about what I was thinking and feeling she agreed though she did say that she had no problem holding on to me through the night.

Day seventeen of our honeymoon had Antonia up before me though her moving around did wake me up. Asking why she was up so early she stated wanted an early start on what she had found. I was to get up, have breakfast and join her on her ship. I did as I was told, but took my time heading down to the dock. Walking down the hill to the dock, I could see her working hard putting everything aboard the dive boat we were taking out. By the time the sun started to climb into the sky, we were on our way to the spot she had fixated on; she still had not told me what we were going to see but she was determined that we would see it together.

Rounding the southern tip of the island, I was glad we had put our wet suits on while we were still tied up at the dock. The gentle breeze on the one side of the island was not nearly as mild or gentle once we rounded the southern tip, the water having been churned, small waves were slowing our progress with the water getting rougher for the dive boat. By the time we were at Antonia's spot, we were soaked making the fact that we were wearing wetsuits worth the time we took to put them on at the dock. Arriving in the small alcove on the western side of the island I was questioning how good of an idea it was to dive there as the underwater maps I had seen when I bought the island showed steep sides leading all the way to the bottom. Sure, the water was calm in the alcove but without someone on the boat, things could change in a hurry. Antonia though was determined to dive offering several spots for our anchors. After several attempts on spots that did not hold, she had what she wanted along with a line to the shore lassoed around a rock we could reach. Considering how we had to lasso the rock I was wondering if we would get the rope back.

Once the anchors were set and we were comfortable with their placement, it was time to dive and Antonia wasted no time getting into her gear. With the speed she got into her gear, I was starting to worry what she had planned for our dive. Donning my gear, I got my answer as Antonia went over the side as soon as I stated I was ready to go. Whatever it was she was after I figured it had to be near the rock/ landslide as she followed it down staying near the wall face. For my part I was content to make a slower decent looking at the rocks as I followed. I even had to rap on my tanks a couple of times to get Antonia to slow down as I fell behind enjoying the dive.

When I had to warn her a third time we were getting too far apart, I was becoming concerned there was a problem as Antonia had never seen her as focused on anything before as she was now. Not wanting to lose sight of her, I followed, though I did go slower checking my gauge as I went. What she was after I had no idea as the sun was still on the other side of the island and there was one big hill between the sun and us.

I was still trying to catch up with her when she stopped and waited for me. I was right behind her at that point and the reason she stopped there I had no idea as there was a huge boulder blocking my view of the wall. I did not know it at the time but that was part of her plan and as we looked at each other she motioned for me to close my eyes, which I did but opened them once she started pulling me where she wanted me. After two more attempts, I understood what she wanted. I let her lead me to where she wanted me, holding my hand the whole time.

When we stopped moving, she had me open my eyes and I nearly lost my regulator out of my mouth, as the cave opening in front of us was larger and blacker than anything I had seen underwater before. Staring at the opening, I realized this cave was not just some shallow depression; instead, it went in farther than the light we had could penetrate. If the thought of the depth of the cave was impressive I also had to add to the idea of the opening itself being nearly sixty feet high and twice that in width though the rocks that had tumbled down blocked part of the entrance. Having no idea what might be inside the cave, I reached out with my senses trying to get a feeling if anything was in there. Feeling nothing with my senses, I decided to get closer to figure out what this cave had been as the opening edges were what I would call too regular to be naturally occurring.

The time I had remaining was not nearly enough and I knew it but I tried to make the best of it before Antonia let me know it was time to return to the surface. I nodded and followed her as she made her ascent. Looking back, I could see yet another spot I wanted to investigate but was out of time currently. The ascent took a lot longer as we had to stop several times on the way up to decompress. The final leg of our ascent went easier as the current at the surface was not nearly as strong as it had been deeper. The swim to the boat was fast and easy.

Climbing into the boat, I asked Antonia how long she had known about the cave. She stated that during our dives around the island, she had seen the shadow that was the cave mouth when she followed the landslide down. As she got closer, she realized the darkness was a cave mouth and was tempted to explore it but did not want to do so without me, hence the side trip to Italy to get my certification. She continued saying she had no idea how large the cave was as she could not see the bottom edge on her first dive. Then there was the problem of not having a partner to dive with, since it was our honeymoon Antonia wanted me to dive with her even though I did not have the certification to be safe, so it was either get someone else or get me certified to dive deeper. My next question as to why she did not tell me about what she suspected in keeping the cave secret, kissing me, she smiled, before stating my surprise in seeing the cave was her payback to me about how I had never told her about what we would be doing on our honeymoon and saying nothing before we got here.

She was right of course, but now there was yet a second mystery on our hands. I wanted to do a second dive right then. Antonia put a stop to that explaining how we needed time to let our bodies decompress. There was no hard fast rule on how long but overnight was considered enough time between dives.

Day eighteen of our honeymoon had us back on the launch with cameras and lighting in addition to our diving gear. The ride over was easy enough as the wind had died down the day before and the water was very smooth with the occasional wave wetting the shoreline. I got to watch all the action along the shore as Antonia was driving the launch to our dive spot of the previous day. Once we were there, I got the chance to go ashore and fix the rope that we had left the day before, rigging the rope so that it could be pulled free once we were done. After picking me up from the shore, we set out our anchors and after checking our equipment, we loaded up, stepping into the water carrying lights and cameras.

The decent went quickly with Antonia swimming beside me. Visibility was good as the sun was high overhead reducing the shadows we were plagued by the day before. Making my way to the last place that piqued my curiosity the day before, I was grateful for the sun there as I could honestly see a track embedded in the wall extending well past the sides of the opening. I was thinking that the track could easily support doors if that was what it was but the obvious question I asked myself was if there were doors here at one time where were they now. Spotting Antonia taking pictures of whatever she had found, I started taking pictures myself focusing on the track as well as the cave opening. Using the lights we brought with us, I even managed to take a number of them focusing on the opening and was amazed as the light failed to illuminate the interior the far wall. After I finished with taking pictures of the darkness of the cave I started using the light to look closer to the edges and the conclusion that I drew was whatever the cave had been it was not natural. Thinking those thoughts, I added more pictures of the edges, this time concentrating on why I was thinking those thoughts.

When Antonia tapped me on my shoulder to let me know it was time to head up, I was disappointed we could not stay longer. Checking my gauge, I could see that we had spent more time down here today than the day before and we would be cutting our time close.

Ascending I was wondering who could have built such an underwater structure and why as well as did this have anything to do with what we had found in the caves. At our first stop on the way up, I was still thinking these thoughts when I noticed Antonia had picked something up. Looking at it in her collection bag I could tell it was metal but looked like the track I examined at the top of the cave.

Following Antonia, we finished out ascent climbing into the launch, Antonia was aboard first, saying as I climbed in, "I hate to say it but our honeymoon is over."

I was still not all the way into the launch and I paused at her statement. Buying time to think about what she was saying I finished my climb into the launch, dropping my gear. Taking a seat next to her, I asked, "Why?"

Not replying verbally, she handed the piece of metal she had in her bag during our ascent. The piece looked exactly like the rail I had seen the day before, when we first went down today mounted above the opening. Examining the metal, I was confused at her statement as the piece looked like a normal piece of metal that someone could have dropped overboard at any time.

Looking at her, I asked, "What's special about this that we need to cancel our time together?"

Nodding at the piece, she asked, "You notice anything special about it?"

After looking at it again, I shrugged my shoulders at it was shiny on the bottom and one outside edge but I had seen that before and on two other edges there was a camouflage pattern, and I had seen similar patterns on a couple of shotguns my friends had. The piece did not look special to me.

Taking the piece back, Antonia pointed to a spot, saying, "This piece was buried in the sand to this point while the rest was out in the ocean, exposed. After yesterday's dive I took a look at some old records and do you know when that slide happened?"

I shook my head no.

"There was an earthquake in Sparta in 464 and it was not until a couple of years later a ship captain made an observation Atokos had suffered a landslide exposing the granite underneath. If this is the spot of that landslide then this piece has been buried for close to twenty-five hundred years." Rotating the piece in her hands, Antonia added, "If this has been there the whole time, why is there no corrosion or any plant growth on it. This piece looks like it just went in the water yesterday."

Studying the piece, Antonia added, "I want to know what is going on with this piece of metal."

"Send it to your father and let him have it analyzed," I offered.

She declined saying at the university there were too many people looking out for themselves. She did not want to take a chance on this piece. I did agree the piece was strange in not having any corrosion after twenty-five hundred years, but not trusting her own father and the people who worked with him a bit strange. Then again, we were talking about a university, where the watchword is, publish or perish, maybe she was not being as paranoid as I first imagined.

On our way back to the dock, we talked some more about the metal and whom we could get to do the analysis. The only people I could offer were Sven and Thor as they were my go to people when I wanted something done. Antonia agreed saying everyone she knew worked around the university or other foundations that sponsored her expeditions and she did not want anyone to steal what she thought was scientifically important.

I was not going to say anything that went against Antonia's opinion as to what we found but later that night she made me a believer suggesting something bigger going on. The first evidence we had was the metal we had already examined. What made me believe our honeymoon was over were the pictures we took while we were down there. The first pictures we looked at were the ones I took and they were showing the same lack of corrosion and plant growth on the metal similar to the one sitting on my desk right then. The pictures of the cave only deepened the mystery as it was obvious as we sat there looking at them the cave walls were not natural as they were too regular to be naturally occurring. Finally, the last couple of pictures just made everything worse as they were the ones I had taken shining my light as far into the cave as possible. At the time with the flash going off I had seen nothing but now looking at the pictures it was actually easy to see something was there though the gloom was bad enough I could not tell what besides it had the appearance of something man-made.

Antonia's pictures solved part of the mystery, as she had gone deeper than I had and in the debris of the slide, she had found one door that was obviously buried under the rocks but was also no longer usable. She even managed to get a couple of pictures of the second door though it was farther down the slide, cast in shadows just like images I had captured from inside the cave.

Looking at the image on the screen in my office, I was thinking of the line from Jaws, saying it loud enough for Antonia to hear, I quoted, "We're going to need a bigger boat."

We both laughed but there was no denying we were going to need a bigger boat with a large crane to recover the deeper door to say nothing about moving the rocks burying the second door in the landslide. We talked for a while and we both started making calls to people we knew who if they could not help directly at least they could point out people we should talk to.

My first call was to Sven who had returned from his vacation but was staying at the Italian island for a couple of days dealing with my business affairs. I laughed after I told him I needed him here and that we needed more troops, he asked, "What did you do now?"

I protested my innocence, which got another laugh. I let his comment go saying I needed him here ASAP as he would be buying lots of equipment starting with encrypted phones and radios. Stating what he would be purchasing, changed his demeanor making him serious enough to state he would join me in the morning. I told him that would be good enough and I would see him then.

Antonia's first call was to her father, telling him that she needed a crew for the dive ship plus a ROV (remote operated vehicle) and crew to operate it. If her request did not pique his interest as she was on her honeymoon, she added to the mystery by asking if he knew of any salvage ships available on short notice. For his part of the conversation, I heard him saying that he would find a crew as quickly as possible.

Day nineteen and our honeymoon was over. Sven was not the only person on the plane as he had picked up a couple of hitchhikers. Two crew members who by their selves could not crew the ship but they could get things working again as the ship had sat idle for nearly three weeks with the only activity done being the our air tanks being filled. Antonia talked to them since they were her crew and they assured her they would have the ship ready before sunset when the rest of the crew would arrive.

Sven, who had deplaned while the rest of us were talking, waited until we were walking to the house before I started to explain what I thought I was going to need as far as an enhanced security force. As short as my explanation was we had time to talk heading to the house, it was the first time we had had a chance to talk since his return. Talking about his family he said that they had gone on holiday and the parents enjoying the shock on the faces of the kids when they realized they were too far from any cell towers for them to use their electronic devices. I of course offered to come along next time and drain everything the first day, but he declined saying the fun was watching them realize one at a time there was also no place to charge a battery so they had nothing to do but explore the outdoors.

We talked a while longer about what he had done, before he got serious, stating he had also been approached by a number of representatives from countries, the United States among them, asking Sven to act as their go between to arrange meetings. Most of those were for various business purposes and he started to describe some of the opportunities being presented. Smiling I stated he would want to wait until we had time to talk before pitching anybody's plan.