The Viral Epiphany (43 page)

           
Long after the last glimmer of sunlight had disappeared from the western sky a deep darkness covered the grassy clearing.
 
The night sky was now starkly clear and cold in spite of the silent, iridescent shimmers of thousands of stars. Dan opened his eyes slowly and saw that the red embers from the fire had also faded into the blackness of the night, yet, after a minute or two he found he could see Sheila kneeling beside him in the white starlight.
 
She kissed him lightly on the forehead.

           
“Sheila!” he said and then he remembered.
 
“Oh, my God, Sheila!”

           
“Shhh!” she said, putting her finger to his lips. “This is your first secret. Don’t tell anyone.”
 
Dan nodded but said nothing else.
 
“Come and help me now,” she said, “I have something else I want to show you.” She took his hand and led him towards the front of the cave.
 
“Over there,” she said pointing to one of the walls, “we need to move that large stone away from the wall. It should just slide outward.”

           
They both grasped the stone by the edges and pulled it away from the wall. Immediately water began rushing into the cave from behind the stone.
           
“What?” Dan said in surprise and alarm.

           
“It’s OK. We’ll just let it flow until it fills that depression in the floor behind us.”
 
Dan turned around and saw a shallow, bowl-shaped area of the floor that he hadn’t noticed before. It looked to be about six feet across.
 
They watched as the clear water from the mountain stream rose and eventually filled the bowl and then they pushed the stone back against the wall.
 
“Now we have to watch,” Sheila said, “Let’s grab a couple of blankets and get comfortable!”

           
“What are we watching?” Dan asked as he sat beside her further inside the cave, about ten feet back from the now mirror-like bowl of water.

           
“We’re waiting for the Moon,” she said, “It’ll rise behind that tall rock on the edge of the grass.”

           
Dan peered into the night and he could see, in the bright starlight, the outline of a stone column about six feet high.
 
“Is that a standing stone, like they have at Newgrange and other Neolithic sites?” he asked.

           
“Sort of,” she said, “but remember, this column is a natural rock formation, no one put it here. All of the rocks you see here around the edge of the grass are natural outcroppings, although some look like they were placed there by men.
 
I know that it is true because I didn’t believe it at first myself.
 
I dug down deep underground and checked. They’re all completely attached to the underlying rock.”

           
“Oh,” Dan said, “is that significant?”

           
Sheila smiled.
 
“Yes, Dan.
 
It’s very significant. For one thing, this site is the model for all the other Neolithic sites. Those stone-age men recognized the significance of all this and tried to duplicate it in lots of other places. Wait!
 
Look! See around the edges of the column? The moon is rising directly behind it. Now watch what happens when it gets to the top.”
 
They sat very quietly and waited. The night was almost soundless with only the slightest of breezes.
 
Dan could see the Hawthorn tree in the middle of the grass ring clearly now in the moonlight. He could even see the shadow of the tree on the grass as the moon climbed higher up the length of the rock column.

           
A minute later the full moon rose over the rounded top of the stone column and its light poured directly into the cave, reflecting off the large pool of still water, and then bouncing upward to the ceiling where thousands of bright white lights now appeared to twinkle and shimmer as the light breeze lightly wafted across the surface of the reflecting pool.

         
“It looks like the night sky, Sheila!” Dan said, completely entranced. “I wonder what is the ceiling made of,”

“It’s natural Irish
quartzite,” Sheila said, “the tiny bits of quartz that are embedded in the stone make it sparkle, but take a closer look, and see if you see anything else.”

           
Dan walked back to the deeper recess of the cave and began to study the roof of the cave more carefully. Suddenly he shouted, “Sheila, I see swirls! It looks like swirling spirals of stars back here!”

           
Sheila walked back and put her hand on his shoulder.
 
“Run your fingers over the spirals, Dan.” He slowly rubbed the spirals with his fingertips and then turned back to her in amazement.

           
“There are carved spirals in the roof, Sheila. Look at them. They’re everywhere. They’re like the ones at Newgrange, aren’t they?”
 
Sheila looked at him and nodded, but didn’t answer.
 
Then as the moon continued to rise, the angle of reflection from the pool changed and the ceiling “stars” dimmed and then they were gone. “Sheila, those people, the ones who carved these spirals.
 
How long ago was that?”

           
“No one knows for sure.
 
I would guess that most experts would say about six thousand years ago.”

           
“They couldn’t have known then could they?”

           
“About galaxies?” she asked.

           
“Yes. These carvings look like galaxies in the sky, but they didn’t have telescopes, so they couldn’t have known, right? These spirals were probably just random designs, weren’t they?” Sheila said nothing but only looked at Dan with compassion and a broad smile.

           
“Dan, there’s more to see.
 
We need to see the sun rise in the morning. Then we’ll talk about it.
 
OK?”
 
Sheila’s hair shone like reddish sparks in the dim starlight, and her green eyes sparkled brightly.
 
She was a vision from another time or place.

“OK,” he said, still trying to make sense of what he had seen. “When do we get up?”

           
“At the very first light,” she replied.
 
“The sunrise is the real reason we’re here. It’s the solstice, remember? Let’s get some sleep while we can.”
 
They made their way to the back of the cave and were soon sound asleep.

It seemed to Dan that he had barely closed his eyes when he was awakened by the sound of birds chirping outside the cave entrance. “Wake up, Dan!” Sheila said excitedly. “It’s almost time!”
 
They rose and walked to the cave entrance, and Sheila pointed towards the brightening sky in the east. “OK, now stand right here,” she said. “See those two stones on the lip of the clearing?
 
The ones that look like they’re leaning on each other?”

           
“Right, I see them,” Dan replied.

           
“Good. Keep looking; it won’t be much longer.” The morning was dawning as clear as the night had been and within a few minutes the first rays of the rising sun lit up the sky above eastern horizon in a burst of glorious orange, yellow, and red streaks. A minute later Dan gasped.
 
From where they stood in the cave entrance, it appeared that this winter solstice sun was rising directly inside the small triangle formed by the two stones that appeared to be leaning on each other. “Now, look over there,” Sheila said, “over at that large flat rock.
 
The one that looks like it’s standing straight up.”

           
Dan turned and looked at the rock.
 
He hadn’t noticed it before, although it must have been at least six feet tall and appeared perfectly flat. The bright yellow-white rays from the sun beamed through the stone triangle and illuminated the flat surface of the stone directly across on the other side of the clearing. Then, immediately, a previously invisible pattern began to sparkle on the stone’s surface, it was a bright spiraling swirl of glinting quartz lights. The figure sparkled in the sun for a few minutes and then, as the sun rose higher, the spiral faded away and was soon invisible.

           
Dan felt a sudden chill, then a sense of awe and perhaps fear too.
 
He turned to Sheila and said, “Sheila, all these things, the standing stones, the moon monolith, the cave, everything – it’s all natural. Right?”

           
Sheila looked at him and saw the growing amazement in his eyes.
 
“Yes, it is.”

           
“It’s a natural sort of calendar or observatory! It tells when the solstice occurs and when the full moon will illuminate the cave!”

           
“Yes.”

           
“There’s a Hawthorn tree over there.”

           
“I know. It just grew there. No one planted it.”

           
“OK, Sheila. You have to tell me now. What does this all mean?
 
Are the spirals symbols of something or are they depictions of reality? Does anyone know?”

           
She looked at Dan with love in her eyes.
 
They had crossed a threshold last night in the cave. They would never be the same individuals again, either of them. “It’s very complicated. I don’t think anyone can really explain what we are seeing here.
 
But here is some secret information I’ll share with you.
 
You are the first man to hear this in almost a thousand years. This is because the signs show that you have been chosen to play a role and you will need this if you are to succeed.”

           
“Sheila,” Dan said taking a step backward, “what are you talking about? What role do I have? And who was the last man to learn any of this?”

           
“Your role will be revealed in due time, Dan. Don’t wish for it sooner than it comes. As for the last man to learn any of the secrets, that was Brian Boru, shortly before the battle of Clontarf.”

           
“Brian Boru?
 
The last High King of Ireland? But wasn’t he killed at Clontarf?” he said with a trace of alarm in his voice.
 
“Sheila, I don’t understand this.”
    

“Perhaps not,” she said seriously, “these secrets are not intended for the minds of men.
 
They are too difficult.
 
But I will tell you this: the spirals are symbols and at the same time they are also accurate representations of reality. This is very ancient knowledge.
 
The lone spiral is the symbol of the Sun god, while the three joined spirals are the symbol of the Goddess of Ireland, Eire.”

           
“Really?” Dan said, suddenly interested in these interpretations. “Is that what the archeologists say?”

           
Sheila smiled. “I have no idea what the archeologists say.
 
Besides, how could they know the secrets? The secrets are kept to a very small number of chosen women, remember?
 
And, believe me, none of them are archeologists.”

           
“Then what about the reality of the spirals? You said they are also depictions of reality too.”

           
“Yes. They represent the galaxies of the universe, as you thought.”

           
“They do? But how? Those people lived so long ago. It was a different time. They had no information then.”

           
“Look around you Dan.
 
Let yourself feel this place for a moment. Do you feel something strange?”

           
“Yes, you know I do,” he said.

           
Sheila smiled. “Dan, there’s something different about this place. It feels like time and space are different here sometimes.
 
I don’t know if that’s a good way to explain it.
 
There are times when I am here that I sense some strange energy in the very rocks around me.
 
There is knowledge here, knowledge of things past and yet to come.
 
The people who first discovered this place felt it too. There are possibilities here that are sensed by some people.
 
Some of us can feel them come and go. This little depression in the ground, high up in these hills; it’s almost like it is able to concentrate and reorganize time and energy.
 
I don’t think those people long ago could explain it either. The best they could do was to make those spirals.”