Charles Brokaw - The Lucifer Code

‘Lessons were learned after the deaths of the Elders.’ Joachim shoved the bar into a gap between the stones. He leaned on it and mortar cracked. One of the polished stones lifted from the floor. ‘An escape route was added from this room when there had not been one before. No longer has the Brotherhood depended solely on secrecy.’

Thank God for that, Lourds thought.

He and two of the monks helped clear stones as Joachim freed them. They clacked and skidded across the floor. Some of them ricocheted against the loose stones clattering down the stairway. Cleena and Olympia held flashlights on the enlarging hole taking shape in the floor. In seconds they had cleared enough stones to reveal a plain wooden coffin beneath the floor. The stench of mould and mildew invaded the room and warred against the encroaching dust cloud.

‘Brother, forgive me for disturbing your rest,’ Joachim said quietly. Then he reached for a rope handle attached to the coffin. Lourds grasped another while the other two monks grabbed handles as well.

‘Together,’ Joachim said. ‘Set and lift.’

The weight surprised Lourds. He knew the body within hadn’t been preserved and probably only desiccated skin and bones remained. But his position was awkward and he wasn’t able to properly set himself. His back and shoulder muscles burned with effort. The coffin came free of the hole awkwardly and slammed against the sides on its way up. It was only a foot deep under the stone floor. Nothing marked the coffin, no name and no indication of what happened to the man within.

Once it reached the level of the floor, Joachim pulled it towards him and set it down. At his direction, they shoved the coffin against the wall. He asked Olympia for her flashlight, then shone it down into the hole.

The tunnel opening looked incredibly small. There wasn’t room to stand and Lourds wondered if there was even room to crawl.

‘That doesn’t look big enough,’ he said.

A fresh cascade of rock tumbled down the stairway and drew their attention to the threat of the men coming from above.

‘We don’t have a choice,’ Olympia said.

Joachim helped his sister down into the hole. He returned the flashlight to her. She hesitated, then lay on her stomach and slithered into the hole.

‘The tunnel wasn’t made for comfort,’ Joachim said. ‘There’s room enough but it will be tight.’

‘You do realize that the average size for a person has increased,’ Lourds said.

‘We don’t exactly have time to enlarge the tunnel,’ Cleena said.

‘Someone could get stuck.’

‘That’s why you’re going to go last.’

‘Me?’ Lourds looked round.

‘You’re the biggest person here,’ Cleena said. ‘If anyone’s going to get stuck, it’s going to be you.’

Lourds quickly realized what she said was true. He was the tallest and the broadest across. He looked to the others for support or at least sympathy. None was forthcoming.

‘Absolutely delightful,’ he muttered.

Cleena followed Olympia into the tunnel. At Joachim’s instruction, the other monks quickly dropped into place and began the journey.

‘How long is the tunnel?’ Lourds asked.

‘About five hundred yards,’ Joachim answered.

‘I don’t suppose anyone has used it in the last eight centuries?’

Joachim dropped into the grave. ‘No. We haven’t had cause to flee from this room before.’

And knowing the way is clear is too much to ask, Lourds thought sourly. ‘You realize, of course, that earthquakes could have collapsed the tunnel anywhere along the way.’

‘I certainly hope that isn’t the case.’ Joachim looked towards the staircase as more rock tumbled into the room. ‘Professor, my sister has always maintained you’re an intelligent man. If you think your chances here are greater, you may stay.’ He dropped to his stomach and crawled into the tunnel.

‘They could seal the tunnel after us,’ Lourds pointed out. ‘If it’s blocked ahead, we’ll be entombed.’

Evidently Joachim was saving his breath for crawling.

Cursing, realizing he was more afraid of losing touch with the puzzle than he was of getting trapped underground, Lourds dropped into the grave, fell to his stomach, and entered the tunnel.

Stone Goose Apartments

Zeytinburnu District

Istanbul, Turkey

19 March 2010

Sevki sat on the edge of his chair and captured images of the men waiting round the Hagia Sophia. When he had them all, he turned to another monitor and cropped the images into headshots of the individuals, choosing full frontal and profile shots where he could find them. His software was exotic, a blend of high-tech government imaging programs equipped with a special code he added. When he didn’t have a full frontal or profile shot, he resampled the image, corrected the angle and had the program fill in the blank spots. It wasn’t perfect, but he’d found over the years that it was good enough.

Employers often hired him to cover payoffs and exchanges so they wouldn’t be surprised who was there. Or to get a record of who was there so they could exact revenge if necessary.

Once he had the images in the shape he wanted, he ran them through international identification systems he had hacked into. He knew he was probably going to burn one of the back doors he’d built into the system because he was dumping eight faces in at once. Someone was going to catch him this time. He only hoped he could get in and out with the information he needed before that happened.

While the programs ran, and he surveyed the connections to know when a protective firewall discovered his false identification, he stared at the church grounds. His thoughts ran rampant.

A scroll. Buried and lost for hundreds of years. How much is something like that worth? The question buzzed inside his mind, but he already knew the answer: enough to get killed over.

The communication he had with Cleena over the earwig was intermittent; it was interrupted by the surrounding rock and the other shielded communications within the area used by the men chasing her. The rasp of her breathing and the infrequent curses and yelps of pain let Sevki know she was still alive and still running.

The first face froze on the monitor as identification was made. In neat lines of script beneath the face, Sevki learned that the man was Corliss Baker, a Marine sergeant killed in action in Iraq six years ago. Baker had been recognized for several acts of bravery. Then the second man was identified. His name was Zachary Stillson. He’d also died in Iraq six years ago. Strangely enough, he had been killed in the same engagement that had taken the life of Corliss Baker. A third man, Henry Marstars, also a Marine, had died in that same battle.

A warning icon flashed onto the screen to let Sevki know he had alerted the gatekeepers at the other end of the hacked connection. He dumped a potpourri of foolies and false trails into the mix in case they had managed to tag him – which he considered doubtful – and fled the site.

When he settled back into his chair, he wasn’t surprised to learn he was drenched in sweat. Digging around in American military or corporate databases always left him like that. Those entities had a habit of hiring people as gifted as he was. No matter how curious or financially rewarding a cyber score could be, Sevki didn’t want to lose his home. He had worked hard to buy the building and he was happy there. But he was also a game player. A gauntlet had been thrown down by the ‘ghosts’ currently haunting the Hagia Sophia.

He continued monitoring the situation on the ground at the church, but he opened up a new window on another screen and began tracking down what he could about this military engagement in Iraq. He did love a conspiracy.