The venetian code, p.14
The Venetian Code, page 14
Turning, he saw two shapes moving to his position. In the beam of his shoulder lamp, he saw a large man, one with broad shoulders and angular features, and with steely blue eyes that were filled with focused determination. It was the look of an animal who had his sights set on his prey. The other was a child by comparison, lithe but elegant in his movements, the traits of an athlete who might have been in his late teens to early twenties.
Novikov, who was fast on the draw, raised his weapon and, being a tournament winner in marksmanship, set off a volley of shots in quick succession, the muted bursts sounding like low coughs.
. . . Phffft . . . Phffft . . . Phffft . . . Phffft . . .
Two rounds caught the larger of the two Vatican Knights in the chest and brought him to a knee, though the slugs, both striking center mass with pinpoint accuracy, were stopped by his vest. The other two rounds struck the younger of the two with one slicing through the left side of his neck, and the other hitting center mass. Out of the three shots, only one missed the mark as far as Novikov was concerned, though the off-center shot would prove otherwise.
As soon as the Vatican Knight was struck alongside his neck, he brought a hand to his wound and went to both knees. From Novikov’s position within the thin illumination of light, he could see fluid as black as tar bleeding through the gaps of the Vatican Knight’s fingers while he regarded Novikov with astonishment.
Falling back a few steps with his suppressed sidearm still aimed and with the Cup of Miracles still in his grasp, he said, “Today, I win. The cup belongs to me.” And then he slipped inside the shadows of the archway that originally led the Spetsnaz mercenaries into the Monolith Chamber, the oligarch going ‘out’ through the ‘in’ door.
Running down the corridor, a man cried out in rage from the Monolith Chamber. It was the savage cry of a madman bent on murderous rage, his words echoing undecipherably throughout the channel.
As his shoulder light began to dim and as the battery power began to wane, a massive shadow rose before him, something that seemed to rise up from the depths that was both impossibly tall and gargantuan. It stood and lingered, an impassable obstacle for sure, dark and looming with its breathing heavy and labored.
Novikov, after taking a few steps back and narrowing his eyes, felt bone-numbing dread as the shape came forward and into the weakening beam of light.
Keeping a neutral appearance and tone, Novikov stated, “Get me out of here, and I promise to make your life something that one could only dream about.”
After a pause as though trapped within a moment of indecision, the massive shape led Novikov away from the Monolith Chamber and towards the Tomb of St. Mark.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
The moment Kimball Hayden took a pair of hammerlike blows to center mass, the impacts immediately dropped him to a knee. The precision shooting was surgical, the rounds meant to kill. But his Kevlar vest, though it saved his life, knocked the wind from his chest, leaving the man to gasp for air with raspy pulls of his lungs. In the succeeding moments, Roman, after proffering a stunned groan, fell to both knees with a hand to his throat.
Kimball, with a hand to the impact point on his chest, as he continued to heave and pitch for air, could see that Roman was struggling to maintain himself as he weaved from side to side as though he was fading from consciousness and was gearing himself for the final fall.
“Roman,” Kimball whispered as he went to the Vatican Knight’s side and caught Roman as he fell into Kimball’s arms. “Roman,” Kimball whispered, this time gravely when he realized that Roman’s carotid had been nicked, which was enough to send blood in spitting jets along the floor. Kimball placed a hand over the wound to staunch the bleeding, knowing that his effort was pointless. And then on the verge of stinging tears, Kimball said, “I’m so sorry.”
Roman’s eyes widened and looked at Kimball as though he saw something that was both wonderful and magnificent at the same time. The cerulean blue eyes were shining with a light that was all-consuming and as bright as a thousand suns, both warm and inviting. Then with a dreamy smile, he looked into the extreme brightness of Kimball Hayden’s beaming eyes and whispered, “I see you.” Then his line of sight detoured to look at something beyond Kimball and close to the ceiling, something only he could see. Then his bloodied and clawed hand reached out to whatever phantom he imagined so that he could be swept away.
Kimball, having no idea of the lights Roman saw in his eyes during his trial of succumbing, said, “That’s right, kid. You reach for that Light. You’ve earned it.”
With a sweet smile and a final breath, Roman’s hand slowly lowered until his life force abandoned him. Kimball, pressing Roman close, craned his head upward and with the cords of his neck straining, he shouted, “Novikooooov! Novikooooov! No matter where you go! I will find you!”
Inside the Monolith Chamber and throughout the exiting tunnels, his words echoed with haunting cadence.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
The seepage above Jeremiah was beginning to rain down in sheets in some areas as the ceiling was weakening. Looking at his feet within the beam of his helmet lamp, he could see that the level of water had reached his ankles and was rising. Hemmed in by stone walls, he was becoming fairly alarmed at the possibility of drowning once the ceiling caved.
Then from beyond the wall, Kimball broke the protocol of maintaining absolute silence. “Call out!”
From different points inside the Monolith Chamber Job and Isaiah responded. Jeremiah, funneling his hands around his mouth, said, “Kimball, the ceiling has been compromised. The channel is flooding.” Then Jeremiah placed his palms against the wall and tested its sturdiness, the wall being, of course, immovable. And then: “Kimball, we haven’t much time.”
“All we can do is wait for the next shift, maybe six or seven minutes.”
Jeremiah looked at the fracture that ran across the ceiling of his channel and the cascading water. Six or seven minutes, he thought. And then what? We run through the darkness as the tunnels fill in our wake. Would it even be possible to outrun the deluge filling the tunnels?
And then: “Roman’s gone.” Jeremiah could hear the pain in Kimball’s voice, the wobble in his tone.
“And the hostiles?” Jeremiah cried out.
“Neutralized or gone.”
“The Cup of Miracles?”
“Novikov has it.”
And for a long time thereafter, nothing could be heard except for the water raining from the ceiling to the chamber below.
* * *
Kimball continued to hold Roman in the same way that Mother Mary held Jesus after His crucifixion that was so aptly captured in Michelangelo’s creation of the Pietà. Kimball had felt agony before, had lived through a lifetime of it, but Roman’s death seemed to have hit deep to his core with his anguish a wound that was far more painful than anything corporal.
Though Roman’s lifeless eyes continued to stare upward with pinpoint focus, Kimball did not close them. He allowed Roman his continuing moment to see the wondrous sight of whatever afterlife had claimed him, even in death.
Did you see the Light? Kimball asked knowing that he would not receive an answer. I know you did. You deserve it. And then: I wish I could say the same.
Collecting himself by swallowing back the sour lump that was cropping up in his throat and straightening his broad shoulders, Kimball brought up his stoic side. He would carry Roman out of the channels, he told himself, since a Vatican Knight never leaves a man behind. As soon as he got to his feet to stand over Roman’s body, the floor began to shake.
The Chamber was coming alive.
* * *
When the walls started to lower so that others could rise, as the pulleys and weights beneath the floor began to move and tumble, it allowed a moment for the Vatican Knights to race for the opening close to where the monolith once stood.
Isaiah was on the move, the man fleeting. But the monsignors were aged and slow, their best years long behind them. Once Isaiah hurdled one wall, he would remain to help aid the monsignors over the rising blocks of stone. Monsignor Calidonna barely made it over the obstacle, the wall rising slowly. Russo had a far more difficult time as he rode the top of the stone upward to the point of nearly being pinched between the top of the wall and the ceiling until he fell to his left and into Isaiah’s arms. As they ambled and labored to the exit passageway, a wall had risen up to block their escape, once again trapping them.
Isaiah, dropping his shoulders, felt defeated.
* * *
Job, who had taken position close to the monolith when the monument slid into the floor to activate the pulley-and-weight system, had made his way to Kimball’s position. Lying at his feet was Roman. When Job sidled next to Kimball, Kimball never looked at him. Instead, his eyes remained fixed on Roman as he lay at his feet in gentle repose.
“He was a good kid,” Kimball finally said. “Being a Vatican Knight . . . he never had a chance.”
Job could hear the pain in Kimball’s voice, which at times threatened to crack. “Are you going to be all right?” Job asked him with his German clip.
“It’s never easy losing one of your own,” Kimball answered. “It’s even worse when that one is a kid whose head and heart are in the right place.” And then: “Did you know that he was only nineteen? A kid. Nineteen years on this planet is not a life at all.”
Above them, they could hear fissures and cracks racing across the ceiling.
Then from Kimball: “The ceiling’s going to collapse. And Isaiah, Jeremiah, and the monsignors are still trapped behind the walls.”
As if on cue, the ceiling above them sounded like the moaning timbers of an ancient ship, which was the telltale sound that the ceiling was being heavily compromised by the minute.
Kimball, looking at the ceiling and then at the walls, then once again at the ceiling, thought that the others would be lost—Jeremiah, Isaiah, and the two monsignors—as the world collapsed on top of them. Then he reached down to grab Roman and lifted his body into a sitting position. To Job, he said, “Get Roman out of here. Get him topside.”
“What about you?”
“I’m staying behind with my team.”
Job didn’t try to make Kimball see the reason to save himself. Kimball was the leader of the Vatican Knights and the absolute tip of the unit’s spear. Remaining with his team both in life and death was commendable with Kimball’s loyalty to his teammates above all else except honor.
Hoisting Roman onto Job’s massive shoulders into a fireman’s carry, Job, a man who was much larger than Roman, turned to Kimball with a look of deep concern.
Kimball, reaching out and grabbing Job’s arm and giving it a mild squeeze, said, “It’s going to be all right.”
Nodding, Job turned and entered the archway that led to the St. Mark’s Tomb.
Kimball, watching until Job and Roman disappeared, refocused his attention on the failing ceiling as it groaned with a heavy and horrible sound.
* * *
The ceiling was giving beneath the weight of the water above it. Isaiah, along with the monsignors, were beginning to realize the gravity of their situation, which wasn’t good since the odds appeared to be supremely against them. Time was not a luxury—it never was—as the walls that enclosed them would soon fill the channels with rushing water.
Monsignor Russo leaned against the wall. For the first time, he seemed to notice the water that was rising around his feet. “We’re going to drown,” he stated pitifully. “It’s inevitable.”
Isaiah, always one to throw optimistic words of wisdom, remained silent.
Monsignor Calidonna, after waving his hand, said to Isaiah, “We’re slowing you down. You could have made it on the last alignment, but you stayed behind to see us through. And for what? So that we can all die together?”
“I won’t leave you behind,” said Isaiah.
“I know you’re duty bound to be in service to those who cannot protect themselves—to maintain a sense of loyalty to those you aid as long as it does not malign your sense of honor. What I’m saying to you, Isaiah, is that I and Monsignor Russo do not expect you to sacrifice your life when the odds against us are insurmountable. We have lived a long life whereas you have so much more to accomplish. What you do as a Vatican Knight in relationship to our accomplishments as members of the church pale in comparison. You save lives, Isaiah, and you need to continue to do so. Monsignor Russo and I possess a faith that’s indomitable to fear. We both know that we will be received by the Light. So, don’t sacrifice yourself trying to save the lives of two old men.” Here, Monsignor Calidonna proffered Isaiah with an artificial smile, one that said, ‘It’s going to be all right, us passing.’
But Isaiah would have none of it. “I’m not leaving you behind, especially when the archway is within reach beyond this wall. It might take one or two more reconfigurations, but we’ll make it.”
Monsignor Russo shook his head and pointed a finger at the ceiling. “Do you hear that?” The ceiling was moaning under the stress of the water’s weight. “It’s not going to last too much longer.”
There were more sounds like ancient timber that was beginning to bend and fold against the pressure.
Isaiah, looking down to see the water rising, questioned himself if the walls would lower and rise in time before the ceiling’s collapse. Perhaps, he considered, talking about leaving the monsignors behind was a rather moot point of discussion. Given the rapid flow of water and the continuous cracking of a weakening ceiling, this corridor, he thought, was about to become their tomb.
The Templars Knights had planned well to protect their treasure.
* * *
Jeremiah was pacing back and forth in water that had elevated to mid-shin. By his watch, the system was about to mobilize once again. But the ceiling above him was under terrible stress, the fissure widening so that the water above was cascading downward. To Jeremiah, it was like looking through the thin veil of a waterfall.
As the cascade became heavier, as the water started to dump, the floor and the walls began to tremor, the labyrinth once again in the process of shifting.
As the walls began to descend slowly to the floor, the overhead creaking sounded as though the ceiling was coming to a breaking point.
And then the walls, having lowered to the five-foot level, a height that was tall enough to look over, lodged in place. The cranking sound of the pulley-and-wheel system beneath his feet suddenly disappeared, meaning that the method of the blocks’ movement had been saturated from the flooding waters to the point of locking up the entire network. With the agility of a primate, Jeremiah scaled the wall and made his way to the opening.
Behind him the ceiling opened, a loud crescendo of noise, which allowed water to rush into the chamber that was quickly filling up.
Jeremiah, suddenly finding himself in knee-high water, found it difficult to move at a quick pace. It was like running in quicksand, he considered, with his means of escape not too far but not too close, either.
* * *
Isaiah helped the monsignors over the wall that had been locked in place. After laboring to get from one side to the other, Isaiah climbed the barrier with ease, reestablished himself, and once again aided the monsignors over the five-foot wall.
The noise of the water rushing into the chamber sounded thunderous as the level rose over one wall to fill the adjacent channel, which then filled until the water level overflowed that wall to fill the next channel, and so on, with the water spreading out to fill the four corners of the Monolith Chamber.
Isaiah, plodding along with the monsignors in the rapidly rising water, saw Kimball standing close to the archway beckoning Isaiah to move faster, and that their run to safety was on a timer as the level continued to rise.
From another angle, Jeremiah was trudging through knee-high water, his pace dramatically slow. When they reached Kimball’s position with neither seeing Job nor Roman, Isaiah asked, “Job and Roman?”
Kimball nodded. “Roman’s been neutralized, so Job took on the task of getting him topside.”
As the water continued to pool and rise around them, Kimball then waved his team to move on by using the tunnel Novikov used to gain access into the chamber. The course, since it was different from the route the Vatican Knights had taken, would prove to be both alien and difficult to navigate.
Behind them, as they struggled through the rising level of water, they heard the ceiling give with the roar of its collapse allowing a torrent of water to pour heavily into the Monolith Chamber that would forever bury and seal the Templar treasure.
With the Vatican Knights pressing forward, the monsignors struggled through the agitated and swirling water as their age clearly showed.
Isaiah and Jeremiah helped them along, but their movements were proving to be too slow, too cumbersome, causing the entire team to lag behind.
The water level continued to rise.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
In the center of the canal that was located between the Bridge of Sighs and the Venice Diocese, a vortex suddenly appeared. The water began to spin wildly in a counter-clockwise motion, moving faster and faster until its center dropped into a funnel-shaped. Within moments, as the funnel became more obvious in its shape, the water continued to spin in blinding revolutions as water from the canal drained into an unknown space below.
