The Negev Desert-Day 2
A dusty yellow ring that seemed painted around the sun provided a hazy backdrop over the awakening camp. As the day wore on, the pastel horizon of the dawn gave way to a brilliant clear-blue sky, and the unrelenting heat began to make itself felt across the desert. Breakfast in the camp had ended an hour earlier, and people scurried about, finishing projects they had started the night before.
Out in the desert, the sound of gunfire echoed against the surrounding mountains as Alon introduced John to military weapons. The big Israeli commando had taken John under his wing, becoming a surrogate big brother to him. Much to John’s relief, Alon had pointed out that the Hawaiian print shirts John and Leo were wearing were glaringly inadequate for the harsh desert environment, so he had furnished them both with some long-sleeved white cotton shirts, khaki shorts, and olive-colored hats that had soft wide brims that hung loosely down around the sides.
“What kind of backpack is that, John?” Alon asked, peering at a small hole beginning to form around the bottom.
“A cheap one. I bought it a few months ago, before I came to Europe. Didn’t have much money.”
“I think what you’re carrying deserves better.” Alon walked over to a truck and pulled out a general issue military backpack like those used by the Israeli army. “Here, John. Put the brick in this. It’s made of Kevlar. This material will even stop a bullet.”
John had given Alon and the others a chance to examine the brick the day before at the villa. They were all full of curiosity at the strange painting of a jet hitting one of two tall towers and the obvious reference to the disastrous 9/11 terrorist attacks on New York City. The same question was on everyone’s mind: how did that image get painted two thousand years ago on a stone brick found under the Vatican? Most puzzling of course was the question of why. Lev and his team had still been unable to find any clue to the brick’s significance or its relation to what they were looking for in the desert.
The stray dog was already gaining weight as John continued to make sure he had plenty of food. He had decided to name him Camp, since he was now recognized by everyone as the official mascot of the entire camp.
Returning from a scouting mission of the region, the turbine engines of one of the helicopters drowned out any conversation as Leo and Lev emerged from the dust created by the spinning rotors and called for everyone to gather in the mess tent.
Lev stood up first. “Shalom, everyone. This morning we scouted the area around our campsite, taking pictures and looking for signs of life or anything out of the ordinary. There’s probably no one around us for at least fifty miles. Because of the sensitive nature of our work here, that’s probably a good thing. I want to turn this meeting over to my daughter, Ariella, so she can explain the archaeological aspects of the mission and also go over any hazards we might encounter out at the excavation site just to the south of our camp.”
Ariella brushed the hair back from her face and stood up next to her father. “This morning we used ground-penetrating radar and took some infrared pictures of an area revealed to us by the code in the Bible. The images from these two sources reveal some unusual anomalies in the substructure of the earth beneath the sand. There also appear to be remains of several man-made objects close-by. This is the area where we will begin our excavation, so be very careful in your digging. We have learned from the Bible code that something very old lies in this area of the desert, and many of you have heard that this object is connected to none other than Satan himself. Be that as it may, this is where we will begin our search. If anyone here decides they want to leave, please raise your hand, and we’ll make sure you have a seat on a truck leaving for Jerusalem within the hour.”
Predictably, everyone in the tent looked to their right and their left, but no one raised their hand.
“Good. Any questions before we get going?”
One of the young female staff members from the villa spoke up. “I’ve never been on an archaeological dig or anything like this before. What do we do?”
“There are several archaeologists here who will guide you out at the excavation site. Just follow their instructions and work at your own pace. Drink plenty of water, and see the medic if you start to feel weak or dizzy from the heat.”
Lev pulled an unlit cigar from his mouth and stepped forward. “Also, a lot of you have asked me who the leader of this expedition is. We discussed this subject among ourselves this morning and decided the leadership will be shared equally between Father Leo Amodeo and myself. If you have any needs or concerns, feel free to ask either one of us. If we disagree on anything, we’ll put it to a vote in front of the whole camp.”
“We really should get moving, Father,” Ariella said. “Are there any more questions?”
No one spoke. They were all deep in thought as they lifted themselves away from the tables and began to file out of the tent to the waiting vehicles. Climbing up next to Lev in the back of one of the trucks, Leo glanced at Ariella sitting in another vehicle and wondered what it would have been like to have a child like her. “That’s some daughter you have, Lev. She’s smart and takes charge when things need to be done.”
“Believe me, I know. Since she was a little girl, she’s been very independent and headstrong. My wife died when Ariella was only ten, so I’ve had to raise her pretty much by myself.”
“Maybe we should have made her one of the leaders,” Leo said, causing both men to chuckle. He looked at Lev and studied the furrowed lines around his eyes, remembering their conversation of the night before. Was it possible that he was sitting next to a prophet; one that people would be talking and reading about a thousand years from now?
The truck lurched forward, and the small line of vehicles drove the short distance to a spot in the desert pinpointed by Daniel from the coordinates he had discovered in the code.
As soon as the trucks stopped, Ariella jumped out and began taking GPS readings of the site. Lev followed her with a bundle of wooden stakes with small white flags attached and directed the staff to pound them into the ground around the perimeter. Daniel then used a surveyor’s instrument to take laser sightings over the surface, marking an area where the group began placing more stakes, this time with yellow flags, inside the perimeter. In the very center, all the flags were red and formed a large circle.
By nine in the morning, the sun beat down on the site with a fiery stillness as Ariella instructed the others to start digging along the perimeter by the white flags. They were assisted in their digging by a small backhoe that had just arrived from Jerusalem. In an effort to provide some shade, reinforcements from camp, including the cooks, had been called in to help erect an enormous canopy with open sides over the area where they would be digging. A much smaller open-sided tent was erected close by for use as an onsite archeological headquarters for the excavation.
Under the cover of the smaller tent, laptop computers and photographic equipment filled half the space. In the other half, several members of the team were busy sketching detailed drawings of the site on two portable drafting tables that had been mounted atop a wooden floor hastily assembled to keep the sand at bay.
Several staff members were assigned to pass out water to everyone on a regular basis in the oppressive heat as the team continued to dig, reaching the five-foot level along one section of the perimeter by midmorning.
John removed his cap and shook the sweat from his hair before stepping into the shade of the site headquarters tent. Looking up from his computer, Daniel noticed John’s crimson face. He reached into a nearby ice chest and handed him a bottle of ice-cold water. “John, do you have that brick with you?”
“It never leaves my side.” He hefted his new backpack up onto the table next to Daniel’s computer and removed it for him to examine. “What are you looking for?”
“I’ve been searching through the Bible looking for anything in the code that mentioned that brick. I’m pretty sure I’ve just found what we’ve been looking for.”
“Have you told Leo yet?”
“I just called him on the radio. He’s on his way over.”
John watched the pages scrolling on the computer screen while Daniel picked up the brick and held it in his hands, turning it over as he inspected it. He saw right away that there were no inscriptions that could be seen with the naked eye.
The anticipation John felt was nerve-wracking. “Can you show me what you’ve found?”
Daniel put the brick down and motioned for John to join him in front of the computer just as Leo’s jeep came roaring up to the tent and slid to a stop.
“Thanks for getting here so quickly, Leo,” Daniel said. “I was about to show John the section that mentions the stone brick you found in the chapel.”
Leo could barely contain his excitement. “We’ve been dying to know more about that brick ever since we laid eyes on it.”
Daniel pointed to a page on the screen containing a section from the Bible. Several words and phrases written in Hebrew were interconnected and circled in red. “This is the grid where I found the reference to the stone brick. The words terrorist attacks were the first ones that jumped out at me. Next to that are the words New York, followed by the date September 11, 2001. Now, if you look down at the bottom of the page, you will see the words stone brick and wall of the chapel located between two phrases. The first phrase reads it is the key. The second one says, the attack is painted on the key.”
Leo felt his heart race. “So what this is saying is that the brick is a key of some sort?”
“Exactly, and it goes even further. Cross over to the edge of the page, and you will see the words the key will unlock that which belongs to Satan.”
Leo picked up the brick and studied the painting. “I believe this image was painted on the brick with the intention of getting our attention. Morelli told me that the code is like a time lock revealed only to the right people at the right time. This brick was not meant to be found or even understood until this exact time in history. Before 9/11, the painting would have been interesting, but meaningless.”
“At least now we know it’s a key of some sort,” John said.
Leo handed the brick to John. “John, you need to watch this brick like a snake in the room until we need it, whenever that may be. I think Lev will be overjoyed with this new information. Have you told him yet, Daniel?”
“No, he drove back into camp to get some more supplies. I thought you might like to surprise him with the news.”
The three men sat in the shade of the tent, drinking cold water and taking turns examining the ancient brick, while, at the excavation site, Ariella was in her element, digging in the dirt. A female staff member by the name of Maya was working next to her in the trench and paused to take a drink from her canteen. “You know, Ariella, Satan’s not going to let us dig something out of the ground that belongs to him, load it on a truck, and just drive out of the desert with it. What do you think we’re really looking for?”
“In archaeology, you just keep digging until something is slowly revealed. You can’t rush it. We’re going to have to take our time and be patient. That’s what makes the experience so exciting. It’s like unwrapping a present and you can’t wait to see what’s inside.”
Maya removed a pale blue baseball cap and poured water over her head, letting it drip off the ends of her short black hair. “There are all kinds of rumors going around camp. Some of the staff are really spooked. One of them even decided he’d had enough and quit. He rode back into town with the truck that brought the backhoe out here this morning.”
“You know as well as I do, Maya, that some people are just not cut out to … hello?” Ariella’s spade had just struck something hard in the sand. “What’s this?”
“It looks like metal,” Maya said. “Should I call Lev on the radio?”
“Good idea. Ask him to bring my camera.”
Ariella produced a brush from her pocket and began brushing away the sand from the object while Maya grabbed her radio and called Lev who was still back in camp. The excited chatter on everyone’s radios alerted Leo and the others to rush out to the site to see what Ariella had found.
Arriving at the freshly dug trench, they saw that Ariella and Maya had just finished removing most of the sand from around the top of a buried object. “It’s metal alright,” Ariella said. “It looks like the paint’s been burned off by something really hot.”
News of the discovery was spreading. Everyone stopped what they were doing and began to crowd around as Ariella and Maya continued to reveal more metal, making it obvious that they had uncovered only part of a much larger object buried below.
Lev had finally arrived with Ariella’s camera and began shouting orders. “Everyone grab a shovel. We need to enlarge this trench, but be very careful. We’ll take a reading with the metal detector to get an idea of its size and dig around it, then work our way in.”
The enthusiastic group began to dig without thought to the heat, and within an hour, the burned remains of a vintage World War II era military truck began to materialize.
Ariella jumped up on the edge of the widening excavation and began taking pictures. “This is probably one of the man-made objects we spotted with the infrared pictures we took earlier.”
Farther away from the truck, one of the workers pushed a shovel into the ground, and a definite crunch could be heard.
“Stop!” Ariella shouted. She ran over to the area where the worker was standing and jumped down into a newly excavated area where a second object had been discovered. Once again, she began to methodically brush away the dirt, gradually revealing something that caused those around her to gasp. She had just uncovered the unmistakable face of a blackened skull. As some of the workers unconsciously began to back away, Leo made the sign of the cross and uttered a silent prayer.
As the significance of their discovery began to sink in, Lev knelt down to assist his daughter, slowly revealing a complete skeleton next to the remains of the truck. Burned bits of clothing, along with leather boots and metal buttons with insignia, were all that remained of what obviously had once been a military uniform.
Ariella wiped some dirt off her forehead and looked up at Lev. “What do you think this is, Father?”
Lev peered down at the skeleton. “I’m not sure. I think the better question would be who is this? These remains could be from the fighting during the 1940’s. It looks like this vehicle took a direct hit from a bomb of some sort. Let’s take some pictures of the buttons and the insignia and e-mail them to the university in Jerusalem. We should have some sort of identification of the uniform within a few hours.”
Daniel, working on a hunch, grabbed a metal detector and began walking in a straight line away from the perimeter. The needle on the meter spiked, and he heard a loud tone in his earphones. The sound faded before increasing in intensity again as he approached an area where the detector registered another large metal object. He made some notes and walked back to the excavation to confer with Lev and Ariella.
“I think what we have here is an entire convoy of trucks,” Daniel said. “The readings go on in a straight line, and the objects are roughly the same size as the one we just uncovered. There is one object smaller than the rest at the end of the line. It’s about the size of a car.”
Lev looked out over the site. “Let’s dig that one up first. It’s probably the commander’s vehicle.”
One of the men jumped into the backhoe and they struck out for the end of the line along with several workers. Within twenty minutes, they began to uncover the burned remains of a jeep. Some of the drab olive paint was still evident, but nothing else remained to give any hint at the country of origin.
Digging more carefully now, Ariella began to use a small spade. She worked the soil around the jeep until she began to see bones. They were the blackened bones of a hand. Replacing the spade with a brush, she gently spread the soil away from around the bones until she spotted the edge of a small white piece of paper lying close-by in the sand. Reaching down with her fingers, she gently lifted up what appeared to be a partially burned photograph and held it in her hand. Tears began to form in her eyes. The scorched but well-preserved picture was that of a young woman and a baby, and somehow, Ariella knew that she had just uncovered someone’s husband and father.
It was past noon, and the sun was directly above the site, turning the desert floor into a furnace and prompting the medic to call for a halt to any further work until the temperature fell to safe levels. Lev lifted his daughter from the site as everyone gathered around and Father Leo blessed the body of the soldier. With a sense of overwhelming sadness, they all climbed into the back of a truck and rode back to camp in silence.
While lunch was being prepared, the group recovered in the refrigerated air of the communications tent. Pictures of the items Ariella had found were e-mailed to the university and within the hour, the team had received confirmation that the military convoy they had just uncovered was British. In a strange twist, they were informed that, coincidentally, a thirty-man patrol had vanished in this desert in 1948 when the British had been in the process of pulling out of Palestine after the U.N. partition of the Holy Land. All efforts by the British government to locate the patrol had failed due to strange weather phenomenon that hampered the search until they were forced to quit. The final report read, “Loss of unit in presumed military action with unknown aggressors.”
“They never knew for sure what happened to those men,” Lev said. “At least their families can have some closure now.”
“Do you think it has anything to do with what we’re looking for?” Leo asked, hoping Lev had some sort of picture in his mind of what had happened out there in the desert.
“Probably just a coincidence.” Lev seemed lost in thought, as though something else was troubling him.
Moshe was at the communications console, finishing a conversation on his satellite phone, when he looked up at the two leaders. “We have a political issue to worry about now. We’ve uncovered a military grave site, and it’s already getting attention in Jerusalem and in England. We need to step up our operations.”
Leo glanced over at Lev. “What do you think about going to a twenty-four-hour schedule? It will be cooler at night, and we still have a lot of ground to cover.”
The sweat was beginning to dry on Lev’s head in the coolness of the tent as he ran his hands through his hair. “I’ll have another generator and some more floodlights flown out tonight. One of my staff got heat exhaustion today and had to be flown to the hospital in Jerusalem. Some more of my top people are flying out here in a few hours to help.”
“We also have another problem,” Moshe said. “The young man who quit this morning and hitched a ride into Jerusalem on one of our trucks has vanished.”
“What do you mean vanished?” Leo asked.
“He jumped out of the truck when it came to a stop at a red light and ran away down a side street.”
Alon entered the tent, catching the last part of the discussion. “He must have been pretty freaked out about something.”
“No, there’s more. We checked his name against our database and couldn’t find him. He’s not one of ours.”
“How the hell did that happen?” Alon practically shouted.
Moshe twirled one end of his moustache. “He must have found his way onto one of our trucks on the way out here last night. He never would have made it through security onto the grounds at the villa, so it probably happened when the trucks stopped for gas in Jerusalem. We have a lot of new students living at the villa now, and many are still new to each other. He probably just kind of blended in after everyone was getting back into the trucks from the restrooms. He was smart enough to know that we would be on to him today, so he pretended he’d had enough and hitched a ride out of camp.”
“Great security.” Alon was beside himself. Although Moshe was the security chief for the entire organization, Alon had been given direct command over camp security, and it had been breached.
Alon spoke through clenched teeth. “Have we found out who he is or what he was looking for?”
Moshe watched Alon continue to seethe. “We don’t have a clue at this time. He could have been one of those Vatican security people who have been following Leo and John.”
“That thought had crossed my mind,” Leo said.
Moshe wanted to help calm Alon. “Well, it’s too late to do anything about it now. We’ve run a security sweep of the camp to check for bugs and explosives. Nothing’s turned up. Why don’t we all go over to the mess tent and have lunch? We can’t resume work on the dig anyway until it gets cooler.”
“That sounds good to me,” John said, feeling hungry as usual. “I think I’ll go check on Ariella and see if she’s hungry too.”
Lev winked at Leo. “Good idea, John.”
The men walked toward the mess tent, discussing the day’s events and planning for the work ahead that night. Alon was so angry about the security breach he was unable to talk. His face was red, and he brushed off any attempt to make him feel better. The others decided it was better to leave him alone for a while.
For the next few hours, the camp came to a virtual standstill courtesy of the blazing afternoon heat. Alon’s fiancee, Nava, entered the mess tent and sat next to Ariella. She leaned in close and spoke in a soft voice. “I need to get Alon out of here for a while before he drives me and everyone else crazy with his security precautions. We’ve been engaged to be married for a little over a year now, and I can count the times we’ve been together on one hand. My schedule as a military helicopter pilot is so demanding that I’m afraid we’re going to drift apart. Do you have any ideas?”
Ariella thought for a moment before answering. “Why don’t I get John, and we’ll all go on a little picnic to a place I know close-by?”
“That’s a nice idea, Ariella, but don’t you think it’s a little too hot for a picnic? Where is this place?”
“There’s an oasis I’ve been to that’s like a little paradise in the middle of the desert. It’s surrounded by palm trees and has a clear freshwater pool. There’s even a spring-fed waterfall. The problem is, it’s about seventy miles to the west of here, and it would take hours to get there by land.” Ariella gave Nava an exaggerated wink, hoping she would catch the hint.
“Not if you have a helicopter.” Nava smiled. “I’ll have Gabriella fire up the chopper while I go find Alon. You and John grab the food and wine and jump onboard.”
“Who’s Gabriella?”
“My new copilot. You should see the looks on the other soldier’s faces when we land and they realize two girls are providing their air cover.”
After obtaining a basket full of fruit, cheese, and wine from the mobile kitchen, the group of happy campers climbed onboard the helicopter and lifted off across the desert toward the oasis. Alon had initially balked at the idea of leaving the camp in the wake of a security breech, but one look from Nava alerted him to the fact that this outing with her had a higher priority.
John decided against taking the backpack containing the ancient brick and asked Leo to keep an eye on it until he returned. Sitting by the open door of the Blackhawk next to Ariella, he looked down and watched the desert rush by below. “How do you know about this place, Ariella?”
“I did some research for a college project there one summer. We were looking for a species of fish that lives in the spring. They live only in this one spot on earth and are highly endangered. That’s why we try to keep the location a secret from everyone except the Bedouins who’ve used the oasis for hundreds of years. Its thirty degrees cooler next to the waterfall, and I always wanted to go back there with someone special to share it with.” Ariella stared into John’s eyes when she said this, giving him a clue to her hidden meaning.
Soon, the helicopter was circling low over a lush green dot in the middle of the stark landscape. They landed at the edge of the oasis and trekked under the palm trees to a large pool of crystal-clear water. A tall rock formation towered above, where a pristine spring at the summit created a waterfall that fell twenty feet into the turquoise pool beside them. Without hesitation, the group stripped off their shoes and ran for the water, diving fully clothed into the cool depths.
Rising to the surface and floating on their backs, they frolicked in the water while the tension of the day slowly faded away. John backstroked toward Ariella, squirting a mouth-full of water up into the air before turning over to face her. “I’ve been wondering, Ariella, how did you become so interested in history?”
“I used to go with my father on all his archaeological digs around the world. I grew up digging down into exotic ancient cities and discovering beautiful objects of art that had been hidden for thousands of years. I never thought of doing anything else with my life after that. How did you end up becoming a priest?”
“I’m only a candidate for the priesthood. I haven’t taken any vows yet. I’m still not sure if that’s what God’s calling me to do or if He has something else in mind for me. I truly believe God leads us to where we need to go if we listen. Sometimes, I think about having a wife and children someday.”
Ariella studied his face before diving down to the bottom of the pool and surfacing next to him.
“Maybe someday you will.” She grinned through the water streaming down her face. “What was your major?” Ariella winced. “I can’t believe I just asked you that.”
John laughed and pushed the wet hair out of his eyes. “History and anthropology.”
“Really? Most guys I know hate history. Once they find out my passion is all about the past, they lose interest and want to talk about other things. But you… you’re different. You love history, you love animals, and you love God.” Ariella became serious. She gazed into his eyes and grabbed him around the neck, bringing his face against hers and kissing him slowly. She trembled at his touch while he took her in his arms. They kissed again. She had never trembled at anyone’s touch before. They paused with their noses touching, staring into each other’s eyes before she smiled and pulled away. She continued to watch his reaction before plunging her head underwater and swimming back down to the bottom of the pool.
John was in a state of shock as he treaded water, but he knew at that moment that things had changed. Here in the middle of the Negev Desert, halfway around the world from where he was born, John had just made a life-changing connection. He knew beyond any shadow of a doubt that he had found the one girl he wanted to spend the rest of his life with. Life really was strange and wonderful.
Ariella returned to the surface and took him by the hand. Together, they swam to the bottom of the pool, where she showed him the small fish that lived under the waterfall. They popped up under the pounding water from above and swam to the bank at the edge of the pool before climbing out and lying on the warm sand while the sun dried their bodies. They lay there, drinking wine and eating fruit and cheese, talking together as though time would run out before they had the chance to say everything they wanted to say.
Alon and Nava had quietly slipped away from the others for some time alone. They had climbed to a shallow pool on top of the falls and were sipping wine in the cool water while peering down on the others below. Nava’s name meant beautiful in Hebrew, and Alon was having a hard time keeping his eyes off of her.
Since the Israeli military required its pilots to maintain a high level of physical fitness, Gabriella had decided to swim laps by herself in an effort to stay in shape and avoid looking at the love-struck couples around her. Her boyfriend was a fighter pilot stationed in Tel Aviv, and she felt a twinge of jealousy that he wasn’t with her now in this beautiful spot. She spotted Nava above the waterfall with a glass of wine in her hand and made a mental note. No more flying for her today. Finished with her laps, she left the coolness of the pool and grabbed a bottle of water before joining Ariella and John on the shore.
John pulled a bottle of wine from the basket. “Would you like a glass, Gabriella?”
“Only if you want two impaired pilots flying you back to base.” She cast a glance up at Nava laughing loudly and playing in the water with Alon.
“Good call,” John said. “Have you two seen much action fighting the terrorists lately?”
Gabriella shook the water from her short blonde hair and fixed him with cool blue eyes. “We’re always on alert here in Israel. Sometimes we have to take out their leaders when we get intelligence that they’re traveling somewhere down a road in a car. They never see us. The first hint they have that we are in the area is when the car they’re riding in blows up after we’ve fired a missile at it from several miles away. I think we’re a pretty good deterrent to the ones who want to live to see their grandchildren.”
“What scares you the most about fighting the radicals?”
“It’s usually no contest in a firefight, at least, not with us anyway. But you can’t defend against a brainwashed nut job strapping on explosives and walking into a restaurant or mall. With better intel and advanced technology, we’re getting more adept at picking those people out. What really scares me is the possibility of one of those morons getting their hands on a nuclear bomb. I only hope they realize that, if they ever attack us with a nuke, we’ll turn their country of origin into a sheet of melted glass.”
“The problem today is trying to figure out who the bad guys are,” Ariella said, wringing the water from her hair. “We have the usual suspects all around us, but they don’t always represent a country in the traditional sense. The days of huge enemy armies marching across our borders are over. I’m afraid that one day a small group in a cave somewhere will get their hands on a bomb and we’ll have no one to retaliate against, giving them free reign to do it again.”
“Ariella’s probably right,” Gabriella said. “Attacking their country of origin could be counterproductive, especially if you’re dealing with someone like Bin Ladin who even hates his own country. I think the real problem is the hatred and evil that exists in the world today, and it would take an act of God to change that.”
Gabriella looked down at her watch and sighed as she noticed the time. “I guess we need to think about heading back to camp."
Amid the groans and child-like pleas for “just a few more minutes,” the group slowly made their way back to the aircraft. The magical time spent at the oasis had ended, and soon, they were flying back to their hot, dusty camp in the middle of the Negev Desert. The break had allowed Alon and Nava to reconnect and pushed Ariella and John into the realization that they were now more than just friends.
The sun was setting as the chopper set down outside the camp perimeter. Lev cast a slightly disapproving glance at the group as they emerged in their damp clothes, but nothing was ever mentioned about the outing. He was glad to see that his daughter had finally found someone she was interested in. It was time for her to begin to find her own way in the world and not feel obligated to watch after him all the time. He turned back toward the camp and uttered a silent prayer for the safety of everyone who had willingly come to this place in the desert to unearth a mysterious object in God’s name.
The night was much like the night before, except that the young people had built a tall bonfire and were singing and dancing out in the cool dry air of the desert. Two more generators and extra floodlights had arrived, and the new crew members would be working throughout the night at the excavation site. Alon was going from person to person, checking IDs, running laser fingerprint scans, and reporting back to Moshe. He wasn’t going to be burned twice.
After dinner, Ariella took a brief nap and was up again at midnight. She drove alone in a jeep to the dig and found her father checking on the staff’s progress. Lev was standing next to Leo and Daniel at the edge of one of the trenches, looking at a diagram of the site, and work around the excavation was now at a fever pitch. The floodlights created an oasis of light in the middle of a sea of sand as the sound of the generators and the backhoe working nearby made it impossible to speak in a normal tone and the staff had to shout to be heard.
“Where’s John?”
Lev cupped a hand over one ear. “What?”
Ariella raised her voice a few degrees. “I said, where’s John?”
“Oh. He’s asleep back at the camp. We didn’t want to wake him. Some of us need to be fresh for the next shift.”
In the darkness of his tent, John awoke and fumbled for his shirt and pants. He stretched, laced up his boots, and grabbed his backpack. Standing outside, he paused to breathe in the cool desert air while gazing up into the black sky overhead. He marveled at the sheer numbers of brilliant stars above. The night seemed especially full of stars in this part of the world. He looked around the camp at the remaining embers from the bonfire and thought of coffee. The mess tent was dark, so he decided to head out on foot in the direction of the lights at the excavation site in the distance.
Walking out into the desert, John stumbled along in the darkness, mindful of the numerous holes and crevices he had seen during the day and wishing he had remembered to bring a flashlight. He was halfway to his destination when he first heard the sound. Was that an animal?
A low, guttural growl flashed from out of the darkness. Raised on a ranch, John knew the sound was not the usual snarl of any carnivore he had ever heard before. He quickened his pace. The growling seemed to follow him. It was almost directly behind him as he looked over his shoulder and began to run toward the floodlights. He could see nothing in the darkness around him as he ran as fast as he could over the uneven terrain, but the growling was louder and getting closer. He could almost feel the warm breath of exhalation on his neck as his boot caught on a rock and he stumbled forward.
He landed in a shallow rock-strewn hole and lay motionless in the sand as the snarling seemed to come from all directions. John lifted up to his knees and spun around in a circle in a frantic attempt to locate the predator. His heart was pounding, and his breathing was coming in short shallow gasps. Calm down!
He picked up a rock and clenched it in his hand. Peering in the direction of the lights in the distance, he realized no one knew he was out here in the dark all alone.
The snarling and growling grew even louder as he raised his head a few inches above the edge of the crevice. The distant lights of the camp were suddenly blotted out by something in the darkness. A shape. Something was definitely there.
He ducked back down into the shallow depression and lay on his back, staring at the stars. The brick in the backpack dug into his skin as he fought to control his fear. Any moment now, the thing out there would be on him. A bright light suddenly flashed in his face.
“What are you doing down there in that hole with that rock?” It was Alon, his flashlight shining in John’s face. “And where’s your security escort?”
“I didn’t know I needed one.”
“You do now. New rule. We had a security breech yesterday, and if you leave camp, you have to have an escort for your own safety.”
John stood up and brushed the sand from his shirt. “Did you hear an animal growling out here?”
“No. I still want to know what you were doing in that hole.”
“I tripped. How did you know I was out here?”
“The security post back in camp saw you leave and radioed me you were on your way to the excavation site.”
John was starting to wonder if he had imagined it all. “I’m sure I heard an animal growling.”
“I don’t know of any big animals out here in the desert. Nothing for them to eat. Come on. I’ll take you to the dig. We’ll have some coffee. Our guys brought some Starbucks. I love that stuff, especially the Italian roast.”
They were walking toward the lights when a geyser of dust shot up into the air from the center of the excavation. Alon and John could hear shouting and see people running toward the cloud of dust hanging over the site while their radios came to life with a constant stream of excited chatter. The lights of the camp behind them began coming on one by one, providing even more evidence that something big had happened. Alon and John began to run.
John was trying to keep up with the former Special Forces soldier who was shouting into his radio and rapidly leaving him behind. “What is it Alon? What’s happened?”
“The backhoe just disappeared into the ground. Come on. We need to hurry. Someone might be hurt.”
Arriving at the dig, they saw a large group of people standing back from a huge hole in the ground that had just opened up and completely swallowed the backhoe and its operator. The piercing lights of the backhoe could be seen shooting skyward, resembling searchlights at a grand opening, while the sound of the diesel motor could still be heard revving wildly below.
Lev was shouting commands to the staff as he moved to the edge of the hole and stared down in horror at the wreckage of the backhoe. “We need to get down there. Now!”
Daniel grabbed his arm. “Careful, Professor. The sides of that crater are still unstable and might cave in.”
Lev stepped back from the rim and motioned to Alon. “Call the chopper. Tell them to hover overhead and lower someone down there. We’ve got to see if that man is still alive and get him out.”
“Yes, sir, I’m calling them now.”
The group stood by helplessly as they heard the sound of the helicopter’s turbines in the distance run from a whine to a full-throttled chop before lifting into the air. Within seconds, the chopper was overhead, and a staff paramedic was rappelling down a rope into the void. Leo could feel nothing but overwhelming admiration at the efficiency of the Israeli-trained men and women as they pulled together when danger presented itself.
Although they could see the lights from the backhoe, they could not get close enough to the edge to see if the driver was moving.
A yellow rescue stretcher was lowered into the large pit, and after several tense minutes, they saw the backhoe operator being winched into the chopper along with the paramedic. When they were safely onboard, the helicopter tilted sideways in an arc and flew the short distance back to camp where the man would be taken to the medical tent.
Alon walked over and stood next to Lev. “I just heard over the radio that the operator of the backhoe had some deep cuts and a few broken bones, but they think he’ll live. They’re going to stabilize him and then fly him to Jerusalem.”
“Thanks, Alon. Praise God the man is alive.”
John stood back from the rim and peered down at the twisted shape of the now-silent backhoe, its lights still pointing eerily skyward. “That’s one big hole in the ground.”
Ariella stood beside him. “This is probably the subsurface anomaly we saw with the ground-penetrating radar yesterday. There’s probably some sort of cavern under us.”
“Let’s get everyone back away from this area right now,” Lev said. “This whole region is obviously unstable. We’re going to have to approach our excavation in a whole new way. We’ll have to wait for daylight to resume operations.”
Two hours later, a small pool of light framed a patch of desert sand outside the entrance to the communications tent, where the group had gathered back in camp. Everything had been moved away from the gaping hole in the ground, and the exhausted group was sitting quietly inside, contemplating sleep, when one of the sentries ran into the room. “Look outside!”
Leo jumped to his feet. “What is it?”
“You’ve got to see this for yourselves.”
The group hurried outside, where they beheld a sight in the distance that would remain with them for the rest of their lives. Coming from the center of the excavation was a brilliant red glow emanating from the newly formed hole in the ground. It lit up the sky above them. A sound resembling the cries of a wounded prehistoric beast filled the air as everyone edged toward the camp’s perimeter to witness the surreal sight before them.
“I think we’ve awakened something,” Lev said.
No one would sleep tonight.