The venetian code, p.15
The Venetian Code, page 15
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
The Vatican Knights and the two monsignors reached a stone wall at the tunnel’s end. The water level was just below their hips.
Kimball looked behind them to see the level rising quickly, the water swirling and agitated.
“Now what?” asked Monsignor Calidonna. Though he had preached earlier that his faith was firm, and that death did not worry him, the nervous quiver of his tone was unmistakable.
Kimball turned to the wall and passed his beam of light over it. What clued him immediately that there was an exit point was the absence of Job and Novikov. “Beneath the water,” he said, “there has to be another corridor, a subterranean hallway. Job must have taken it; otherwise, he’d still be here.”
Kimball, taking a few steps forward, hesitated a moment before he dove into the inky-black water and disappeared.
He did not resurface.
* * *
The water continued to rise inside the channel as the monsignors started to tremble against the cold. Isaiah and Jeremiah, who had trained to last in such elements, faired better.
“What if he doesn’t come back up?” asked Monsignor Russo.
“He will,” Isaiah answered.
“But what if he doesn’t?”
“Then we’ll find another way.”
Monsignor Russo, shining his light over the wall, which appeared to be an impenetrable obstacle, said, “What way? There’s nowhere else to go.”
Isaiah remained quiet.
* * *
The water, in the beam of Kimball’s lamp, had the color of pea soup that was filled with debris-type motes that floated lazily about. Whether they were organic or not, Kimball didn’t dwell on it too much as he swam as quickly as he could by using the wall as his guide.
With visibility minimal at a foot or two, Kimball was startled when he came upon a limp hand that floated gently before him. His first thought was Job, the big man from Germany perhaps drowning while trying to transport Roman, the swim too long and too taxing.
Grabbing the hand and pulling the body close, a bloated face with its eyes filming over appeared before Kimball. It was neither Job nor Roman, and it wasn’t Novikov, either. By the lividity lines that marked the face like a roadmap, Kimball assumed it to be one of Novikov’s mercenaries who had died and been subjected to the water’s elements before he reached the Monolith Chamber. Though the merc was unable to complete the trek, it did relay to Kimball that there had to be an entry point that Novikov’s team used to reach the chamber. Pushing the body back into the depths where it floated away at a slow and gradual pace, Kimball swam ahead knowing that escape was nearby.
As his lungs began to burn and ache, he finally broke the surface, his lungs drawing air with raspy pulls. Climbing the steps, he found himself ankle-deep in water. Moreso, the channel led in a westerly direction toward the Tomb of St. Mark, this he was sure of. But there was a problem that weighed on him as he looked to the point where he emerged, where the steps were hidden beneath the surface. The swim would be problematic for the monsignors, they would not have the lung endurance to make the swim.
Taking in a deep breath to fill his lungs, Kimball once again dove into the water and disappeared.
* * *
The water continued to rise as Isaiah and Jeremiah, along with the monsignors, realized that they had, at most, minutes since the water was at hip level and rising.
“This is it,” said Monsignor Calidonna. “It’s odd.”
Isaiah turned to him. “What is?”
“This,” he said, indicating the water. “I always thought that I would live to be an old man in my eighties who would die peacefully in his sleep. I guess we all think that, don’t we? But the truth of our end is far bleaker.” Putting his hands together, he began to pray with his lips mouthing the words.
Monsignor Russo followed Calidonna’s lead and began to pray as well.
When the level of water reached mid-abdomen, Kimball broke the surface.
“There’s a way out,” he said. “About thirty meters in. The water’s murky, so stay close to the wall. Use it as a guide to get through.” Kimball noted the level of rising water. Once the tunnel filled to capacity, then the pressure would force the water into the subterranean corridor and up through the other side to fill that channel; therefore, time was limited.
“All right, people, let’s go. Thirty meters, about one hundred feet. We can do it.” Then to Isaiah and Jeremiah, he added, “Help the monsignors.” And then to the group, though the advice was mainly for the monsignors, he said, “And take . . . deep . . . breaths, all right?”
The water was racing at them at an exponential rate, the level now reaching their lower chests and rising quickly.
“All right. Deep breaths,” said Kimball.
Monsignor Calidonna, who was aided by Isaiah, together took three deep breaths and dove beneath the surface. Monsignor Russo, with Jeremiah by his side, in unison, mimicked Isaiah and Calidonna by taking three deep breaths before diving into the subterranean pass.
Kimball, the water now rising to mid-chest, turned to see the froth and churning water filling the channel. Taking a deep breath to fill his lungs, Kimball quickly disappeared into the underground pass.
CHAPTER FORTY
Job was the largest member of the team who hailed from Germany. Carrying Roman upon his shoulders in a fireman’s carry did little to weigh him down or slow his progress, swimming through the subterranean tunnel, however, proved to be a challenge. Even though Roman appeared almost weightless in the water, the swim was unknown to him since he did not know the length of the channel or if he could meet the demands of an overly long swim. When he came to the opposing wall that appeared more as an obstacle than a means of escape, he realized that Novikov had taken the same route; therefore, and through deductive reasoning, he realized that the hidden channel was below the surface of ankle-deep water. The swim did prove to be a challenge for a man his size when his lungs immediately seized oxygen with a deep pull from his lungs the moment he surfaced on the other side.
Once again placing Roman upon his shoulders, the big man from Germany maneuvered through the tunnels until he reached the missing wall plate that led to St. Mark’s Tomb. After working his way through the opening with Roman an attachment, he found himself inside St. Mark’s Basilica. That was when he realized that it was still early morning as the windows appeared purple beyond their stained-glass colors. With Ivan Novikov nowhere to be seen, Job spotted a pair of wet tracks that marked the oligarch’s trail when he escaped the church. Then looking into the opening to the channels below, Job wondered how the Vatican Knights were fairing against an oncoming tide that promised death.
In this passionate and disturbing moment where Job hoped for the best, he began to pray to God for their welfare.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
As expected, the monsignors were having difficulty holding their breath. In Monsignor Russo’s mind, his lungs began to expand to the point—he was sure—of detonating inside his chest. They burned and ached and craved for oxygen, his mind becoming a maelstrom of confusing thoughts and nonsensical images. Then a hand covered Russo’s mouth to hold the bubbles that started to burst from his lips. Even though the measure was meant for the monsignor to preserve what was left of his oxygen, the confused cleric considered it to be a means to keep him below the surface of the water, to drown him, which called upon self-preservation to kick in, a struggle ensued. Jeremiah, trying his best to keep Russo on track, grappled to keep the panicky monsignor in line. But breaking away twice from the Vatican Knight’s hold, he was also drawing them away from the wall that, when grazing your fingertips against them as you swam, kept the two-man team on course. But as soon as contact with the wall had been broken, swimming with zero visibility was dangerous with every direction suddenly being no direction at all. The line you think you might be swimming could be nothing less than a continuous circle until your lungs became too exhausted to care. When Monsignor Russo broke away with bubbles bursting madly from his mouth, the monsignor drifted away from Jeremiah and disappeared inside the pea-green-colored water. Immediately, Jeremiah turned his head from side to side in search of the symbologist, but Monsignor Russo was gone, the man forever lost.
Kicking away until he struck the subterranean wall, his lungs were beginning to ache. As he began to trace his fingertips along the stones, he prayed that he had not been turned around inside the submerged corridor. Emerging at the wrong end, now completely flooded, would sentence him to an afterlife he wasn’t quite prepared for since his lungs would not have the durability to allow him to correct his direction; this was going to be a one-way trip.
As he kicked through the green water with his fingertips continuing to graze the wall of the subterranean level, he came to a stone staircase. With his lungs on fire and with a final burst of upward speed, Jeremiah broke the surface where he was met with glorious and wonderful air.
He had never known anything to be so sweet or refreshing.
* * *
Isaiah was more than half the way through the subterranean channel when Monsignor Calidonna began to swim awkwardly. His lungs felt leaden and on fire. To alleviate the pressure, the monsignor jettisoned twin streams of bubbles from his nostrils, something he could no longer hold back. When Isaiah cupped a hand over his nose and mouth to stonewall further spending of necessary air, the monsignor’s instinct of self-preservation started to fight back. He kicked, he clawed, he scratched, the heat of his lungs climbing to intolerable levels to hold back, a dam about to burst. But Isaiah was too strong, his hand having the grip of a vise.
Inside this pea-green soup of water, the monsignor could see the edges of his sight pinch inward with the darkest shade of purple he had ever seen, and then black, with these edges closing into a pinprick hole.
As his limbs became weightless and his arms began to drift lazily in the water, he gave himself over to the effects. In a cosmic time of lucidity, he found himself disappointed that the afterlife was a place of Darkness, not Light. Had I not lived a good life? Had I not lived by Your rules? Then his mind began to fade and sink away.
Then came a wonderful coolness as the heat inside his lungs subsided to luscious air. With a long and natural pull that sounded like a heavy rattle, his chest ballooned. Then it began to rise and fall in even rhythms.
Aided to a sitting position by blurred shapes, he quickly realized that he was sitting in ankle-deep water. When his mind and sight came into focus, he noticed Jeremiah sitting against the wall with his elbows on his knees and his eyes cast downward. The man looked utterly dejected.
When he did not see Monsignor Russo, he became alarmed. “The monsignor,” he said to anyone who would hear him. “Where’s Monsignor Russo?”
Isaiah hunkered down close to Monsignor Calidonna and placed a hand on his shoulder. “He didn’t make it.”
Monsignor Calidonna regarded Jeremiah with a sidelong glance and understood the Vatican Knight’s mournful feeling; he had failed to keep the monsignor alive.
At the location where the steps began to descend to the channel below, bubbles began to burst on the surface to create a green foamy froth. The pressure was building from the other side with the force of the coming flood about to breach the westside tunnel. If they remained hesitant, a sweeping tide would eventually rise to eclipse them.
“Let’s go, people,” Kimball goaded. “We need to move.”
The frothy bubbles were bursting with more frequency, a revealing sign that the floodwater was forcing its way into their warren. Soon, the level—still ankle high—would begin to rise and, eventually, if they weren’t quick enough, overtake them. And they had a long stretch to go.
Isaiah and Monsignor Calidonna got to their feet with Isaiah ushering the aged man in a westbound direction. Jeremiah, however, remained seated.
Kimball, bending down and placing a gentle hand on Jeremiah’s arm, said, “It hurts, I know. But we all knew that this could happen, and it did. You tried your best, Jeremiah. That’s all anyone could ask of you. When everyone else is giving one hundred and ten percent to everyone else’s one hundred percent, you’re always giving a hundred and twenty-five percent to those who give the one hundred ten percent. So, don’t sell yourself short. You did your best. This is not a failure, Jeremiah. It was fate.”
When Jeremiah looked at Kimball, their eyes locked. In that passing of time, they shared umbilically the thoughts of compassion, understanding, and brotherhood. This was not a failure, but something that was meant to be—a calling from God that Monsignor Russo’s time was up and that an eternal reward awaited him.
Jeremiah, getting to his feet and festooning his assault rifle over his back, turned to see the bubbles and swirling froth becoming more agitated. Soon, the tunnel would fill with water and their run to freedom would be measured in seconds rather than minutes.
Together, Jeremiah and Kimball Hayden raced down the corridor knowing that they had no time to waste.
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
The flood water that had been forced by the downward flow from the canal continued to push the water through the open channels beneath the city, causing pressure to build from the side of the Monolith and Templar Chambers.
As the water flooded, the applied force was pressing waters into any open spaces which included the westside corridor that led to St. Mark’s Tomb. With the surface bubbling as if the soupy water was boiling, the top eventually exploded upward in a pillar of water. And then the level of the tunnel not only started to rise, but it also gave chase to those who were still trapped inside the warren.
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
Monsignor Calidonna tried his best to keep pace with the Vatican Knights, though his age clearly diminished his ability to do so. Moving in the opposite direction of the scored walls made by Novikov’s team when they headed east in search of the treasure, Kimball’s team moved west against the directional arrows. The scores in the stone indicated their eastward trail from St. Mark’s Tomb, meaning that in reverse, it would also be their return trail to the basilica. As the monsignor pushed his endurance to the limit, the Vatican Knights were hardly winded as they meandered through the marked corridors.
Then the world began to tremble and shake.
Behind them, they could hear the thunderous sound of a floodtide as it crashed its way down the corridors. It was loud and forceful, and it was beginning to press down on their location.
“Move it!” Kimball yelled.
The sound of the flood’s rush heightened with the promise of a crushing death.
Monsignor Calidonna, slowing because his heart was racing inside his chest to the point of receiving a sharp pain, waved his hand in surrender as he leaned against the wall gasping for air. It was as though he had run a marathon, the man succumbing to absolute exhaustion.
The roar of the flood was closing on them with the sound of a freight train.
“Monsignor,” Kimball said.
But the cleric was too fatigued to answer, his breathing coming in quick gasps and hitches. He simply waved them on.
Kimball told Jeremiah and Isaiah to make their way to St. Mark’s Tomb.
“What about you?” Isaiah asked him.
“Don’t worry about me! Get to the basilica!”
The tide was moving closer with the force of crushing speed.
“Now!” Kimball ordered.
Without hesitation, the Vatican Knights were on the move.
Kimball, returning to the monsignor’s side, said, “I’m not leaving you behind.”
“I’m too old, Kimball. I’m surprised I made it as far as I have. Like Monsignor Russo, perhaps it’s my time.”
Kimball shook his head. “No. I don’t think so.” Kimball then hoisted the man onto his shoulders into a fireman’s carry, the action catching the monsignor off guard.
“What do you think you’re doing?” the monsignor asked him.
“I’m getting you out of here.”
“I’ll weigh you down. You’ll never make it.”
Behind them, the sound of the oncoming wave was reaching its upsurge height of volume and intensity.
As Kimball ran for the outlet with the monsignor’s added weight on his shoulder, the water level was rising—now at mid-shin, making his strides slower.
“Kimball, please, there’s no need that the two of us should die. Your life is far more valuable than mine. If you sacrifice yourself, all you do is take away any future ability to save the lives of others.”
Kimball ignored him as he continued to fight the rising level.
“Please, Kimball, I beg you. You have so much to accomplish.”
Fighting his way through the water which retarded the speed of his pace, Kimball could see the stairwell that led to the Tomb of St. Mark.
“We’re almost home, Padre. Hang on.”
The water was rising with the crippling blow of a fast-moving tide on their heels. The monsignor, while riding Kimball’s shoulders, turned and focused his helmet lamp on the direction of the incoming tide. It was like a hand, he thought, something with the force of crushing them like insects with its approach moving through the mouth of the tunnel.
We’re not going to make it, the monsignor thought.
When Kimball reached the stairway and looked up at the opening, he saw his teammates goading him on, though their words sounded muted and nonsensical against the thundering rush of the oncoming tide.
Lowering the monsignor to the steps, he gave the cleric a slight directional push to motivate the man to climb the stone stairway. Needing no motivation, Monsignor climbed the steps with renewed vigor. Kimball was right behind him.
And then the floodtide struck with a bone-crushing crash against the steps with water spraying everywhere—against the subterranean ceiling and walls, into the basilica—until the wave finally settled. Since the basilica was above sea level, the water could rise no further as Kimball and the monsignor crawled swiftly through the opening and laid against the floor of St. Mark’s Tomb with their chests heaving and pitching to draw air.
