CARTER [P3C1] – Sacrifice
The Chronicles of Samuel Carter – Part III: Chapter One
This is Part Three of the Chronicles of Samuel Carter. If you would like to start at the beginning, please find Part One linked below.
And now for the continuation…
Part III – Chapter One: Sacrifice
How much more can this vessel take before I break? How much of me is left in me? The things I have done in the name of the light, with these hands that once were mine. Time has no meaning in the sea of eternity.
—Doctor Samuel C. Carter
“Beaumont… he got away,” said Thorne, limping towards Samuel. His tall, rugged, handsome features darkened by the life flowing from him in streaks of crimson through fingers pressed against his chest. He collapsed next to Samuel and coughed, a weak smile on his lips.
“Here, take it. Save yourself.” Thorne pressed something into Samuel’s palm. It felt smooth and cold and powerful.
“Why didn’t you wait for me, you fool?”
“Didn’t wanna jinx it,” Thorne smirked.
Samuel’s gaze wandered from his friend’s weathered face to the jagged dagger in his chest to the dark green artefact with its exquisite gold wire chain, shimmering in the moonlight, falling through the windows in the Dendur wing of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
“Hatnefer’s Heart Scarab,” Samuel breathed.
“It never was hers. But you know that. Promise me, you end that bastard,” Thorne grinned as the light left his eyes.
“I will, my friend. I will.”
Samuel put the amulet away, gently lifted the lifeless body, and stepped up to the temple entrance. Police sirens howled, dancing beams of light tore through the nocturnal dry heat of the museum, and a voice shouted from behind.
“Freeze!”
Samuel’s eyes narrowed as he stepped forward between the pillars, his silhouette an entropy of liquid silver in the moonlight, a low magnetic hum, a static whisper, and he was gone.
* * *
Seven years earlier, two men, one dishevelled and in tattered clothes and the other wearing a woman’s dress, entered the excavation site at Gunung Padang under cover of the night on their search for a man named Theodore Thorne, adventurer, treasure hunter and thief, well-travelled and well-read, hater of guns, lover of sushi, who could kill a man in nine ways, pacifist, collector of shiny things, and convinced to be cursed, harbinger of bad luck, the jinx.
Eyes as silent as the stars, hidden in the thicket of the trees, watched them appear out of nowhere, and when they entered the tunnel, the eyes followed close behind, flowing in and out of the shadows, unseen, unheard.
“And you’re sure Thorne is here?” said Samuel, adjusting his taut dress.
“Positive. My contact saw him enter a few months ago,” said Adrian.
“A few months? He’s long gone then!”
“He never came back out.”
“Then he’s dead. Why didn’t your contact go after him and retrieve whatever we’re looking for?”
“Not a what, a who. You are familiar with the claims that this site dates back more than 25,000 years, making it the oldest and biggest pyramid in the world.”
“A highly debated speculation. No traces of any culture were ever found. The most plausible explanation is that it’s an old extinct volcano.”
“Says the vessel containing an alien life form.”
“Wearing my neighbour’s polka dot dress, yes, quite disturbing.”
“We made sure no traces were found, a monumental and important task, protecting the truth.”
“So that’s it? Keep everyone ignorant and exploit whatever this is for your own twisted goals. How pathetic.” Samuel felt drained by the spatial displacement, more so since he had transported Adrian with him from Egypt in what can only be described as one uncomfortably long man hug. “Tell me then, this being another one of your X-Points, why didn’t we teleport directly to Thorne? Why hike down damp, dark, narrow, neck-breaking steep tunnels? I hate tunnels.”
“Your guess is as good as mine. It’s an extensive electromagnetic field. Maybe there’s no specific entry and exit point?” Thorne shrugged, lit a torch he took from the wall and led them deeper into the pyramid.
“What traces did you find?” Samuel inquired.
“Curious, are we? I suppose it’s time you knew.”
Adrian Beaumont, filthy and in rags, eyes as intense as the flame in his hand, recounted in rapid bursts his family’s involvement throughout the centuries, secret societies, cults, conspiracies, genetic experiments, alien-human hybrids, Carter and others like him, and mystical powers beyond belief bestowed upon select few throughout the ages, and most if not all sounded like the ravings of a lunatic, were it not for the tormented passenger raging inside him, trying to rip free of its cage.
“We found an energy signature deep beneath these monolithic ruins, much smaller but similar to the one my father keeps locked away in our catacombs, similar to the one inside you, and we sent Thorne to retrieve it. The deal went south, and we lost contact,” Adrian concluded.
“Smaller? What are you saying?”
“We think this may be the final piece of the puzzle, a third, smaller energy source, yet more powerful than both combined, hence the gargantuan pyramid prison.”
“You’re saying these three energy signatures are related? This feeling—I, I felt it in the catacombs—just more so now, down here, to be reunited with… ” Samuel stopped. A wave of joy suddenly swept over him.
“Yes, this being here appears to be their—”
Samuel grabbed Adrian by the shoulders, his fingers dug into his flesh, his eyes wide.
Where is my child?
The words echoed in his mind, straining against its prison, trying to break free, then receding, leaving Samuel gasping for air.
“I…it knows. What have we done?” Samuel let go of Adrian.
“We didn’t know they were sentient until you returned from the dead, Doctor Carter. We always suspected, but this… it’s uncharted territory. There’s no handbook on how to deal with alien lifeforms powerful enough to destroy worlds, buried by our ancestors some 50,000 years ago.”
“Why are you so sure they mean us harm? Why has no one else noticed this energy?”
“Fanatics. No one believes them and their crazy talk. They are easy to discredit. And whenever someone gets too close to the truth, they conveniently disappear. We scrubbed the whole site clean and painstakingly removed all traces of ancient civilisation. My father ensured everything went into his vault, except for that last piece. And, well, you don’t go to all these lengths to lock someone away for thousands of years with alien technology beyond anything we could hope to comprehend if you’re cool with them crashing your garden party.”
“All the more reason to leave things well alone.”
“Ah, but have you met my father?”
“Your father… Why would he leave you to rot in that dungeon?”
“Because—it’s complicated. Some fathers have no love for their children, and some children may realise much later that it’s through no fault of their own. For others, this realisation may come too late, and they succumb to perpetuating this cycle ad infinitum. I can only hope it’s not too late for me. I can’t undo what he has done, but what he is about to do… I need to stop him.”
They looked at each other, their eyes locked, and Samuel felt the energy inside him relent. In that moment of calm, he saw the truth. Who was the evil? The jailer or the jailed? Kept apart for millennia, imprisoned on an alien planet, buried alive for all eternity. Who was the monster?
“I believe you,” Samuel said.
Adrian nodded. “Let’s find Thorne before my father does.”
They descended deeper into the earth, and Samuel contemplated all he had learned. Anticipation arose in him. Compelled by an irrational surge of hope, he pushed forward, following the man whose father had put them on this path of pain and suffering.
“I’m going to kill him,” he said aloud.
Adrian glanced at him sideways. “Get in line. Even if you do kill him, it wouldn’t change anything. There’s always another Beaumont.”
“You think, no matter what we do, we only exist because we were made for this? Every choice an illusion?” said Samuel.
“Oh, sure, you’re free to choose. You want to break the cycle? You have to break the mould. Sacrifice everything.”
The narrow tunnel they had followed opened up to a large chamber made of basalt stone, and they were standing at the edge, peering down into endless darkness.
“Oh, my goodness. These angles, they are too smooth, too precise…” Samuel began.
“To be of natural origin? Yes, Doctor, it took quite some convincing for the experts to believe otherwise.”
“This is… Who built this?”
“Come on, now. You know who. You have access to the source.”
“It’s… beautiful.”
“Follow me.” Adrian stepped over the edge and vanished, then his torchlight reappeared on the other side, flickering in the air like some sprite.
“Step across. It’s safe,” his voice sounded far away.
Samuel crossed on a narrow path spanning the chasm, invisible from above, a clever optical illusion, no doubt created by someone, irrefutable proof of an ancient civilisation far older than anything they had ever seen.
Adrian leaned in and whispered, “Don’t look back. We’re being followed.”
I was going to add a little blurb about what will happen next on Carter, but seeing as I haven’t written it yet, I will skip to the part where we talk about tent poles and how things will unfold going forward. For the next six weeks, you’ll be in the passenger seat next to me while I write each chapter week by week.
I have certain story blocks (the tent poles) in mind to get where I want to go, but as for the rest, I let myself be surprised. All of my writing happens like that. I prefer it that way.
Who’s following them, though? Why is Thorne still down there? What has he been doing all those months? He dead? Let me know what you think in the comments below.
And about that Heart Scarab…
The amulet exists and was originally not meant for Hatnefer (her name was inscribed over another name). What might Carter want with it?
Heart scarabs were very popular amulets. For the ancient Egyptians the heart was not only the center of life, but also of thinking, memory, and moral values. In the final judgement the heart was thought to be weighed against maat – the principle of order and justice. Only if the deceased had lived a righteous life was he or she allowed to live on in the afterlife. Understandably, the Egyptians feared a negative outcome and special amulets were used to ensure a positive judgment. The flat underside of a heart scarab is usually inscribed with chapter 30B of the Book of the Dead, the so-called heart scarab spell, or with its less common version, chapter 30A, which was used here.
I, too, have one, a little souvenir bought in 1996 on my trip to Egypt, which was scary as hell, with soldiers and roadblocks everywhere, checking vehicles and busses on our way to the Hatshepsut temple in Luxor. Had I been standing on those temple stairs a year later… but no, I didn’t. Everything was fine.
It was on our Nile cruise to the Valley of Kings and Queens that I had one of my many close encounters with Death. At least it felt that way. Shouldn’t have eaten that salad. It was touch and go for a few days, but I got better.
I keep it on my desk while writing Carter.
That’s it for today. Tune in next week when Carter finally meets Thorne for the first time.
You may also like “The Deal,” mentioned in this chapter, linked below.
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Hooray to be back to Carter and all his adventures!!
A thrilling instalment. Lots of info.
But remind me (because it has been a while, and I know I could go back and check), what happened to Jackie? She's gone, right? Somewhere...?
Also, I got distinct Herr Jones vibes here: Samuel crossed on a narrow path spanning the chasm, invisible from above, a clever optical illusion. 😄
“An entropy of liquid silver in the moonlight”
That’s a great line in a great story, Alexander
Great that Carter is back and like Nathan I certainly got the Last Crusade vibes with the bridge
I’ve only been to Egypt once. We were holidaying in Cyprus and flew over. Did Cairo, the pyramids and then a Nile cruise. Think that was early 2000’s. Absolutely fascinating place and need to go back one of these days
Looking forward to the next chapter already so you better get it written 😁 👍🏼