The Lost Treasure Map Series (80 page)

Nonetheless,
how could they check it? Where could the entrance to it be? It had
to be sealed!

Bryson
considered it for a moment realizing what Merton was considering,
and he wondered if he would just knock a hole in the floor at the
center of where it was marked on the map? Their faces still showed
some puzzlement though, indicating that they had a problem and had
not realized how best to deal with it.

Bryson started
banging the floor at the spot and about it listening to see how
hollow it sounded in different places.

They decided
to do more, suddenly looking more energetic!

“
It
would be a shame to ruin such a floor for nothing,” Bryson
explained, considering the hole that they had made in the floor to
enter the chamber beneath the floor. “It would make a
mess!”

One of the
archeologists who had found the chamber suddenly decided to use the
opportunity to show them what they were missing and went over to
the spot at the center of the room and started brushing away dirt
around the perimeter of it, showing them that there was in fact a
gap going around it, which looked like a large crack and was
deliberately concealed.

“
What do
you think it is then?” Bryson asked him, confused.

“
We’ll
need to find a way to tug it out from the side!” he explained, and
Bryson shrugged and decided to wait for him to show him what he was
talking about.

The
archeologists had them go to different places around the spot,
examining the crack, and gave them each a tool to insert into the
crack, which allowed them to grip the concealed slab there, and
they yanked it slightly outwards, proving nothing was holding it,
and Bryson recalled a similar entrance that they had found at the
last castle, and realized that it was really a large trapdoor
concealing something below, and he helped them pull it out, and
soon realized that it then opened out freely on hinges at one
side.

It opened out
revealing a dark hidden chamber beneath them, and the archeologist
left to get a light!

Chapter 14

The Hidden
Tunnel

Once the archeologist returned Parker arrived
back there with him, after resting and having a meal, and he
realized that they had found something and he saw Merton and them
standing around the large hole in the floor.

T
he archeologist shone his light around the
large hole and deep into the chamber, which went deep below
somewhere.

“
What do you reckon
’
s down
there?
”
Bryson asked, trying to see in it as far as he could with the
light, but all he saw were stone steps vanishing below.

Bryson entered the tunnel when Merton
entered it, with the light showing the ancient steps going straight
down, and Bryson followed him, surprised that they could make a
tunnel and stairs fit into such a confined space, and he examined
it in detail as he crept down.

Bryson
allowed Merton to gain some distance and watched
him going down without a light, using Bryson’s light to see the
steeply declining steps, and he wondered how much danger there was
there as he continued following him down.

He moved
down
making sure that he never slipped after watching
Merton nearly do it, and a deep thud echoed down from behind and he
swiftly turned and saw Parker following him, for the Exploration
Association, and he realized that it was a good idea only having
three of them as the ancient derelict steps might not be able to
support more weight.

The ebbing radiance of his light was not
enough to fully cover the three of them at the distance they were
apart, and neither of the other two attempted to move nearer to
him, or had lights hidden away that he thought they might have, by
their distancing, and when he speeded up to catch up with Merton
Parker fell behind him and he had to slow down, and he was amazed
when Merton even entered a region below where his light never fully
reached, or allowed him to see Merton.

They were strange sometimes in such
circumstances and he realized that he was now going down without
checking his footing, and safety too, and he tried to grasp the
concept of these tunnels and thought of the last tunnels that he
had entered and what they had been for, and he imagined his
position in the castle, from the floors, and on the map, and tried
to recall the place where they were at and what was behind the
walls, and where they were going. He was sure that it might have
been part of its defense against invaders, with it being a castle!
Unless the castle design had been used just for looks, which he had
suspected? Why else should such a structure with such technology
need a castle design? Yet it was aliens that had built it and they
might have had another use for it!

Sounds from his front and behind altered and
echoed and muddled in strange tones, which he imagined were other
things, like the stairs collapsing, and at times he expected to go
plummeting into a dark abyss, and he strained his eyes more and
more to see what he was doing, where Merton was, and occasionally
looked back at Parker and what looked like his slow casual
approach, even though he stayed at the same distance away, and he
wondered why he was so keen to find what was there, which made him
believe that there could be something there.

Yet Bryson started to see that it might be
guesses and that there could be anything there, from some ancient
map that was not connected to anything that had been fully
proven!

He saw little below and saw little
above, and that there were no new features of anything, and that
the tunnel
’s
small shape (less than a meter all around him) vanished into
the dark, where Merton had vanished into.

The steps seemed to descend more sharply and
hazardously and he had to climb down more, rather than walk down
like with normal stairs, and he had to hold himself upright and
lean backwards, and its drop seemed perpendicular at times.

Once he thought he heard distant movements
from below, surrounded by their surges of strange sounds, as though
sounds from the future were appearing, and he imagined it something
like was a warning of something from himself, foreseeing the
future, perhaps from something like particles from some future
event leaving space and time and reappearing there with it being
detected by his mind, with some hidden detection system that had
been built up through millions of years, and he reacted by watching
out for anything ahead! He believed his body was capable of far
more at many different levels!

What was Merton up to? Why was Parker not
reacting, and he considered calling down to him or waiting for
Parker, and he decided to wait for Parker, and he stopped and
watched him, with his light oscillating irregularly. Its light
swayed over the stone, and the narrow shaft seemed to vanish into a
point below.

A feeble glow from something below caught
his attention and he wondered what was there to reflect it, and his
eyes altered to the light there and he saw Merton struggling to do
something on the steps and he rushed down towards him, and wondered
why he was not shouting for help as he saw him hanging from
something at the steps.

It was as though sound was vanishing
somewhere there and that he could not hear anything!

When he got close to him he stood shocked as
he saw that the steps had collapsed, and he wondered why it had not
been loud or why he had not felt the shock.

He swiftly placed the light down and watched
Merton virtually hanging by his fingertips from the lowest
remaining step, and he realized it had collapsed a long time ago
and that he had walked over the edge and had just caught the step,
and Bryson lifted him onto the dangerous steps above, and he
realized how crazy Merton had become!

Chapter 15

The Thing in the
Spacesuit

Bryson felt happy to be back at the front of
the castle again, and in their meeting room, resting in one of the
seats, which the others had made while they had been exploring the
center of the castle.

“
I know these rooms like the back of
my hand!
”
one of the scientists claimed, and Bryson realized that he
was working his way up to asking them what they had explored and
found on their trip, and he wondered why nobody had said anything
and he realized that they were too tired too.

Suddenly, the scientist jumped, and
Bryson
’
s
heart leapt, when a figure entered the room in a spacesuit, which
shifted out from the darkness in the corridor, and one of the
archeologists reached for his gun and found that the weapon was
gone!

They all moved away from the figure and some
moved near the door, and they all stared at the figure of the
spacesuit, and Bryson relaxed and wondered who the hell was there
and where he had got the spacesuit.

Bryson watched the strange figure move in
close and bang his glove hard against a table near him, and he
watched shocked!

There was something strange there that he
could not grasp about it, and he moved and did things far
differently than any of them, and Bryson watched Merton and his
shocked reactions. It was like there was something there that
should not be there!

He could not place the man and put it down
to memory loss from his lack of sleep and all the work that they
had carried out, and the strange environment.

Parker studied his faceplate and could not
see through the dark shiny material, and the figure never reacted
and sat in a seat.

“
We
’
ll have to check him!
”
Mortimer stated, after
minutes of silence, to the unsaid questions.

“
Who could it be?
” one of the archeologists asked
confused.

“
He
’
s not one of us!
”
another archeologist finally
stated.
“
And all the guns are gone!
”

“
That
’
s a good question!
”
Parker replied
first.
“
Who
or what else could be here in this hellhole
place!
”

“
He must have something to say if he
traveled here!
”
one of the scientists replied quickly.

“
It might be the killer of your
scientist friend?
”
an archeologist stated firmly.

Bryson watched them all become aware of the
danger, and start to think of ways of protecting themselves.

“
And what does it
want?
”
the
scientist replied first.
“
That is the question! And why did it want to
meet us here? It could easily have kept itself hidden
away!
”

“
This could be a first contact
situation?
”
Parker replied.

Bryson studied the figure of the spacesuit
and realized that it had not moved or done anything since it had
sat down.

“
If they monitored us and traced us
back here ...
”

“
What do they want?
”

Bryson sensed someone could do something
stupid and it was not going to say anything so he walked over to it
and slowly lifted the faceplate of the spacesuit, and stood back
shocked!

It was the scientist that had been killed,
and they stood staggered, and the others that could not see its
face rushed to areas where they could see what was there.

The dead scientist removed his spacesuit and
sat back into his seat, and they examined him in every detail and
saw that his clothes were identical, and one of the archeologists
rushed off and returned and told them that the body of the
scientist was not there!

“
We cannot leave
this!
” Parker
announced.

Bryson sat down confused, trying to work out
what they should do, and what it might do, and watched the figure
alter and vanish!

Chapter 16

The Next Death

Bryson felt happy as the scientists finished
work constructing a small vehicle, using parts that they had got
from one of the wall machines. It was a simple but effective means
of transport, and moved them and their things about the way that
they wanted!

Though they were still to test it properly
by using it to travel back into the central region of the
castle!

Bryson started to realize that more of them
were excepting their fate and that they would have to live on the
island and would not be able to return to the Earth, or over a long
time! There was, of course, the chance that people back on the
Earth realized something had happened and copied what they had done
to trace where they ended up or find the treasures that they had
been looking for. All they needed was an airplane with the
surveillance technology and to copy their scanning where they had
been!

Yet even if the world appeared back on the
Earth they would have to get in the air and leave the place!

When they used the vehicle to return to the
central region and continued their explorations there they decided
to build more vehicles with more power and velocity, and they found
more items of use on them, and returned satisfied later that day
and received to two major surprises from the others on what had
happened while they had been away.