No Romance Chapter 17

Chapter 17, “No Treasure Nearby. Search Elsewhere.”

Now, Jack wasn’t quite sure if this would work. That is to say, he wasn’t quite sure what “this” was. He just knew that a rope bridge presented possibilities.

            As they neared the actual bridge, palm trees all around them, they saw the full extent of the turquoise pool of water that lay beneath it. It wasn’t just a pool of water at all, but a large-sized lagoon (as Jack had hypothesized), almost a lake. The bridge led across the lagoon, a good eighty or ninety feet below, and to a black igneous island covered in thick growths of trees. The island wasn’t quite an island, however; on the left the vertical cliffside of Mt. Diabolo shot up out of the water like a wall, making Mt. Diabolo the connecting land between the two sides. A circle of cliffs surrounded the lagoon (which in turn surrounded the island), making it seemingly impossible to escape if one were to fall in. A small, black, rocky shore at the base of the island was the only land accessible from the bright water.
            Annie stood in awe of the contrasting black and turquoise colors on display.
A sign very similar to the other signs Jack had encountered on this island was posted right next to the bridge. Written in black arial lettering against a white metal board were the words,

No treasure nearby. Search elsewhere.

Three Seas said, “It looks like we should search elsewhere. Maybe we should try going south.”

Jack stared at him, gaping. And everybody stared at each other. It wasn’t a very comfortable silence.

“You know,” Jack started, “Probably a lot of people were deterred by that sign. People believe the written word so much in this story. Paula didn’t think to bring up my last name to Golbez because it had a single letter different. One letter that didn’t even make a difference in the pronunciation. Golbez noticed it too, and lectured me on it. Even that roller-skating eagle got offended when I accidentally forgot it was spelled with a Y! People will believe anything if it’s written down. Like all of this, right now. All of us, this whole story, this whole situation. So yeah, I guess it’s no wonder that this sign is successful. Now we could either obey it and go somewhere else, or rip it down and pretend we never saw it. I’m going to go ahead and rip it down. Everybody okay with that? Yeah, like I care.”

He grabbed the sign and tried to tear it off. It didn’t budge. He tugged at it again, but no luck. It was there permanently. After a few more tries, Jack, somewhat embarrassed and breathing heavily, said, “Okay, looks like we’re just going to ignore it. Can you trust me? Me, the one who communes with the gods regularly? Let’s just go across this bridge.”

He made to step onto the bridge, but Three Seas stopped him.

“Wait. You want us to follow you across there? Going to a place where there’s obviously no treasure? How do we know this isn’t just one of your traps?”

Jack groaned. “Here, I’ll show you. Carl Sagan, cross this bridge.”

The Super Tiger got up from his haunches and trotted over to the bridge. When he noticeably saw how high the bridge was from the water, he looked back to Jack with a look that could have only been pleading. Jack, just as he had with Annie all those chapters ago, bid him continue, saying, “Go on. You’ll be fine.”

Annie, meanwhile, started getting suspicious. “Hey,” she said slowly, recognizing the scenario and moving over to Jack. “But...there’s no vine here. What are you doing, Jack McDowell?”

“My mind isn’t its usual thing today,” Jack said quietly. The plan I had wasn’t much of a plan. But it should work anyway. I’m trusting the gods.”

Carl Sagan then padded very carefully across the bridge, placing each paw carefully on the wooden slats. But he made it safely to the other side, where he found a comfortable place and sat down once more on his haunches in a cute little stance where his paws were farther apart than normal.

“See, it’s safe,” Jack said to the Johnsons and to Mortimer. “Who’s next?”

            “I volunteer,” Mortimer said. “I want to figure out this whole treasure thing.”
            Then Jack remembered his---admittedly meager---plan and stopped Mortimer quickly.
            “Mortimer, were you not ever told about the treasure?”
            “Never,” he said, shaking his head.
            “Really? What were you getting paid with?”
            He shrugged. “Just room and board. Having a family, that kind of thing. Also the job gave me a lot of mysteries to solve.”
            “Yeah, right, weird, anyway---”
            “But I never thought to solve the mystery of why we were sent out there...hm...I just did what I was told when it came to that.”
            “Well, if you ever see him again, ask Amon Dem. He was pretty open with me about it. But no! I will cross this bridge next. Annie, I want you to follow me.” Jack started out before Annie could finish her second word of protest (after “But---!”). “You’re better than that, Annie!” Jack called out over his shoulder.
            She frowned and sniffed. Then she thought about it. Something went through her mind at that moment, and she gave a confirming nod and followed Jack onto the bridge, just a few seconds behind.
            The Johnsons all looked each other in the eye, as eye contact was really their only method of communication with each other. Mortimer did not tarry with them as they conferred in silence but waited a good ten seconds or so and stepped onto the bridge behind Annie. He seemed to be driven by his own motives, apart from anyone else there. The Johnsons finally made up their telepathetic minds upon seeing the bridge being crossed safely and followed the whole crowd.
            Jack stepped on the last wooden slat as the ropes connecting the bridge to the mainland snapped.
            He had been expecting it.
            As it swung down against the black island he grabbed onto the top slat his feet had once been standing on and secured his feet against a slat further down. He yelled for Annie to do the same. And it seemed she heard him over the sound of her own screams, as she hearkened to his command and held on. Both retained their grip as the bridge impacted against the cliff wall.
            When he had for sure gotten his footing, Jack hoisted himself up onto the island and turned in time to see the three Johnsons falling into the turquoise water below, a drop of almost a hundred feet. Their cries were distant and grew fainter until the succession of splashes. They were alive, and very much out of the way.
            Jack grinned in triumph. “Now THAT’S what I’m talking about!”
            Annie stared up at him in confusion. “That’s what you’re talking about?”
            “I am talking about this.”
            Jack lowered himself to his belly so he could reach down to help Annie. He had to coax her up, one slat at a time, which was difficult because he couldn’t read her face, and so he didn’t know quite how to treat her. She was either traumatized at having to go through that kind of ordeal again or totally accepting of it as pretty much routine now. She was shaking, but also climbing up at a good pace.
            “What are you feeling?” Jack said as he gripped her wrists and pulled her up the rest of the way. He didn’t notice the stony glare she shot at him. Securely on the ground again, she shook herself free from Jack’s grip and rolled over on her back, breathing heavily and staring straight up at the sky.
            “I...don’t know,” she said between heaving breaths. “Nothing, I think. Or everything.” She seemed to be shifting between two different realities, but Jack didn’t take too much notice. He was remembering Mortimer.
            Carl Sagan went over and started batting at her hair.

Jack leaned over the edge to look for Mortimer. He was still clinging to the bridge, but very close to the bottom. And he seemed desperate.

            “Help!” he cried, seeing Jack’s face.
            “I can’t!” Jack called down. “I need you to go with the Johnsons! They need someone with your kind of detective abilities to find a way out of there! The mystery of the black rock lagoon! Just let go of the bridge! You’ll be okay!”

Jack flashed the thumbs up signal.

Mortimer’s mouth curled down in dread. It was about as exaggerated as a horseshoe.

Then Jack, changing tracks, gave him a salute.

And Mortimer’s face turned into a steely resolve. He knew what that salute meant. He would give himself to the cause. He could do this. As he let go of the bridge his mind tried to determine what the cause actually was. He hit the water too soon, though.

Jack stayed at the edge to make sure Mortimer was okay, and of course he was. He surfaced soon enough and started swimming toward the Johnsons on the other side of the lagoon.

Jack stood and slapped his hands together to shed the dust and dirt. “Well that’s cleaned up all nice and tidy!” he said. “Now the question is, where do we go next?”

Annie was rolling back over onto her hands and knees, rising slowly to her feet. “You know, you didn’t have to coddle me like that. You didn’t have to help me up.”

Jack didn’t register what she said at first. “Think of the mystery we have now!” he said, spreading his arms open wide and taking in the sight of the black island. “I don’t know what happens next! I’ve finally reached a point where I don’t know what to do. Isn’t it wonderful? Isn’t it...exciting?”

            Annie stared at him coldly. “I’m a grown woman. Perfectly capable of getting myself up a simple ladder.”
            The childlike wonder and excitement in Jack’s eyes faded and with a sober look he appraised her carefully. He thought he knew what was going on. But he didn’t want to light the fuse. Not yet. So he would have to allay the situation for now. Cool things down.
            “I’m sorry,” he said, something like hesitation in his voice. In reality it was deliberation. Precision. Choosing both his words and his pauses carefully. “But I...didn’t want to lose you.”
            Again he saw a liminal conflict in those flashing eyes, those big brown eyes that had seemed so helpless and afraid in so many circumstances, yet so cold and capable now. They started blinking, faster and faster, and the icy look on Annie’s face melted back into a watery smile. “Really?” she said, hopeful.
            “Really,” sighed Jack and he turned away. “So...now what?”
            They heard angry shouts of the Johnsons faintly in the background. They ignored them.
            “Well I think it’s obvious,” Annie said. “Take out the map.”
            “What?”
            “We’re alone now. No one to steal it or abuse it now, right? Where is it, anyway?”
            I thought about it and realized what the gods had been intending by collapsing the bridge. And damb it, I thought I was breaking free.
            Whoa, sorry, technical malfunction there. Jack should not have been speaking to you. Please ignore it. He’s feeling fine. We’re in control. Let’s move along.
            Jack sighed and frowned. He closed his eyes and shook his head vigorously. “Augh, no, damb it, okay, okay, there’s nothing else to do, nowhere else to go. Fine. Here’s the map.”
            With that, he unsheathed himself from his jacket and threw it on the ground.
            Annie joined him in frowning, but for different reasons. “The jacket?”
            “Take a gander,” he said, walking a few steps away before putting his hands on his hips and sighing again. “Go on, look.”
            Annie knelt down by the jacket and took it in her hands. She examined every inch of the thing but found no tracings or symbols or anything maps usually had. She had just opened her mouth to tell Jack there wasn’t anything there when she saw the slightest loose stitching on the inside. Her fingers followed the thread up to the top of the jacket, obviously hand-sewn by someone with little experience in stitching. She carefully took the loose flap of cloth in her fingers and started pulling on it. The thread popped out easily, one stitch after another, until a dirty brown map was revealed, about one foot square.
            “It’s...here!” she breathed, gingerly taking the sweat-soaked piece of cloth in hand. “What everyone’s looking for, here in my hand. A long lost secret to an ancient treasure...”
            Jack, observing her silently, saw the tiniest hint of a darkened expression in her visage.
            “No,” she said, very quietly, only to herself. Jack could barely hear, and even then it was because he was the hero and he needed to. “I have to do the right thing.” She looked up suddenly. “But how did you know where it was?”
            “It was the only place that made sense,” Jack said, still more focused on her than on the map. “Eli Noyce said some things, Hilti said some things, things about an X on a map, and Noyce giving his life for it, and Noyce passing on the jacket as his most treasured possession, all that stuff. But I didn’t get it fully until we were at the Cardaccians. The fool Vanasmas was after a map, one that Noyce was going to give him for some reason or other. But I didn’t know why. Then that other fool Djetta said that to find their precious treasure one would need a map. Golbez had connected these earlier for me, but it was an offhand comment so I didn’t think of it right away. He said that he had a treasure he was keeping hid from Vanasmas, but also that his map had been stolen thirty years ago and he was worried about someone coming along and taking it. But he was crazy, so, again, I didn’t think much of it. I kind of put all these facts together a while ago.”
            “But why didn’t you tell anyone? Why wait till now to reveal it?”
            Jack shrugged. “Just a whim. I wasn’t even sure it was in the jacket. Just a lucky guess.”
            “So that means...that means that we’re going to find it, right? We get to---!”
            “No,” Jack said, utter finality in his voice. “We’re not. We’re not going to find it. We’re not going to look for it. No. No. No. Hell no. We’re not looking for any treasure, and we sure as hell aren’t looking for one that was once possessed by the gods. No. No no no no no. No.”
            “But look!” Annie protested, standing and going over to him. “Just look at it!”
            She forced it into his hand. He gave it less than a second’s glance, only noticing one thing about it---a bright red X in the dead center---before crumpling it up and throwing it in her face.
            She gaped at him, hurt and astonished. He muttered a curse at the predictability of the reaction and spun on his heel before walking away.
            “We’re not looking for any dambed treasure and that’s bleepin’ it!” he shouted over his shoulder. He wasn’t aware of where he was going, just that it was away from her, away from that bloody map.

But even if he wasn’t aware, we were. He was heading further into the island.

            “Uh, Jack? Jack?” Annie said. She had recovered quickly from the offense after taking note of something on the map, which had fallen to the ground. After picking it up she had taken note of some of its more prominent details. Particularly the big red X right next to another X-shape, but one that looked more like an intersection of pathways than an actual X. There was also the big turquoise spot curled around the red X. “Jack!” she said again.
            Jack, meanwhile, had just passed through a wall of trees.
            “Aw, damb it all,” he said upon taking in the shiny, spectacular, gloriously golden sight.
            Then came Annie’s voice from behind.
            “Jack, I think we’re right at the treasure site!”
            “I know,” he said barely loud enough for her to hear, pinching his nose between the eyes. He sighed, the most epic and discouraged sigh of his entire life.
            Annie, map and jacket in hand, came running through the trees and stopped at Jack’s side. The intense shine glued her eyes to the sparkling gold. There were piles of it, massive piles, some of them twenty feet high, of gold coins, only gold coins. A path wove in and out and around the piles, interspersed with jungle trees that had somehow grown up in between them over the years. We say “somehow” because bounding them on all sides were tiny mountains of black rock, only slightly higher than the gold piles. But against the blackness the gold shone all the brighter.
            “Mnhjuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu” was the sound that came out of Annie’s lips.

The pair walked amongst the gold, Jack saying nothing in response to Annie’s malfunctioning mouth. Her eyes traced across the treasure; she unconsciously reached out to take one of the coins, but Jack grabbed her forearm as quick as a cobra. Annie’s eyes instantly went to Jack’s.

“Wait,” he said harshly. “Have you considered that this gold might be...cursed?”

Annie stared at him, wide-eyed, open-mouthed.

Jack laughed and let go. “I have, and it isn’t. Look at this.” He took one of the coins in hand, gave it a quick glance, then showed it to Annie. “British imperial gold. Golden guineas from the 18th or 19th century. King George the third was kind enough to show his ugly profile to everyone in the empire. What we’re seeing here is beyond what any one people or even tribe could have. Bought with blood. The blood of innocents. Taken by a murderous cult hiding in the mountains. Gathered and offered as tribute to the gods. The same gods that are writing this story. This is their gold now. And they wanted it back. That’s why I’m here. That’s why I was sent. That’s why this whole thing is happening. So no, it’s not cursed. If it is, it’s cursed against our enemies, not us. The treasure of the gods, indeed. The question is...why would they care about coinage?”

            Jack’s eyes thinned as he once more turned to examine the piles of gold all around them and the black igneous rock that made up the island.
            “There’s something more than this. There has to be. Something that Vanasmas is after. I don’t think he’s being entirely honest with his tribe. He wants something more out of this than the Johnsons do. And that’s what we have to find. So the gods are telling me, in any case. There’s something more here, deeper in.”
            Indeed, the path continued on, past the piles of coins. Jack grinned, motioning to it with his head, and said, “Let’s go.” He took Annie’s hand. She remained speechless still. Just the way Jack liked her.
            They wandered around a few more mountains of gold coins and found that something more. Statues made out of pure gold deposited here and there, some upright, some lying on the ground in haphazard positions. Statues of monkeys, of women, of warriors. Jewels of all varieties took the place of their eyes. Emeralds, rubies, pearls, diamonds (though no sapphires). Open treasure chests full of bangles, necklaces, bracelets, earrings. It seemed endless.
            “No,” Jack said, brow creased and fists clenched. “There has to be something more.”
            “More?” Annie said with incredulity. “You want more?”
            “There’s gotta be,” said Jack as he moved purposefully ahead, stepping over a fallen statue of a female monkey warrior. He passed around, across, and between the various golden displays, looking for something and clearly not finding it. He did this for several minutes as Annie continued taking in the shine of the riches surrounding her, not breathing a word as if in a trance.
            “Okay, idiot me,” Jack said finally, emerging from a circle of statues of angelic beings that seemed to have been frozen in the middle of something sinister. The looks on their faces were frightening, but Jack wasn’t afraid of anything. “Annie, hand me my jacket, please.”
            “Oh, yes,” she said, breaking off her stare and giving the jacket back to Jack.
            “Stupid solution to everything,” Jack muttered as he put it on. “Isn’t there ever anything clever I have to do?”
            When it was snugly around his shoulders once more, he saw the area with new eyes. “Over there,” he said with a quick point toward a wall-like line of statues all doing the can-can. He maneuvered past the statues; behind them was a twisting passageway through a split in the black rock. Jack was about to venture in when Annie cried out his name.
            “Jack!”
            Irritated, he poked his head over the wall of statues. “What?”
            “What is...that?”
            “What is what?”
            “This!”
            Jack, grumbling, maneuvered back through the statues and looked at what Annie was pointing at.
            It was a brown safari hat. Sitting on the ground in the midst of all the gold, plain as day.
            “It is a hat,” Jack said.
            “But where did it come from?”
            “It’s Eli Noyce’s. I threw it out of the plane, remember? We could have just jumped out right then and saved all the trouble of this stupid adventure.”
            “Yeah...that feels like a lifetime ago,” Annie said, her eyes having lost focus as she continued staring at the hat.”
            “We’ve died a few times, admittedly,” said Jack with a sigh. “Man. It’s hard to believe that we’re the first to find this, other than Golbez. And that Archie Leach character and...Scot MacDowell.”

“So were they all only deterred by that sign?” Annie said, not noticing Jack’s hesitation at the mention of his presumed grandfather. “It might fool a lot of people on this isle, but not all, surely?”

            “No, no,” said Jack. “Remember, some of the Johnsons encountered a monster.”
            He reached down and picked up the hat. He did not put it on.
            Annie froze. “Jack...what’s that?” She pointed again at exactly the same place. But this time the hat wasn’t there. It had been covering the real story up.

It was a footprint. Not a human footprint. Something big. Something huge. Something with claws. Like...the footprint of a gigantic two-ton chicken.

            Jack looked down, then back up. “Probably the monster,” he said, grinning. “Hoo boy, this is going to be fun.” He withdrew his revolver out of the back of his waistband. “Come with me. We’re going exploring.”
            “You think you’re going to hurt the thing that made these tracks with a gun?”
            Jack frowned. “This isn’t a gun. This is Wrench. Shut up and come on.” He placed the hat on the head of a statue of an animal trainer with a whip in its hand and started moving away.
            It was then that Annie started noticing all the other footprints around her. Every sighting evoked a new high-pitched syllable from her. None of the syllables, however, would have made actual words.
            “Come on!” Jack repeated with a groan.
            Upon seeing that he was going ahead without her, Annie ran to catch up with him. She tried to grab his free hand, but he shook her off.

“None of that. You know my policy,” he said.

But when she tried again, he let her.

She didn’t say a word at this, but followed him behind the wall of statues and into the passage through the black rock. The near-dusk sky above them was at certain times covered by rock, making it a sometime tunnel, snaking back and forth, ultimately leading them in a leftward arc.

Annie’s nerves sparked at the slightest shadowy movement, which was always either Jack’s or her own, but she never once jumped or screamed, nor did she make any sudden movements. She was able to keep herself under control. And Jack knew this because of the steady grip of her hand in his. Sweaty, yes, but only because of the heat. He would have found himself impressed at her development, but he knew its reasons. This was why he let her hold his hand: not because he was getting softer, but because he was getting shrewder. He wanted to know who Annie was at any given time. This was the subtlest way of deciphering it.

The passageway ended in complete darkness.

“A cave?” Annie whispered.

“I don’t think so,” Jack whispered back as they crept forward into it. They could see a slight sliver of light in the otherwise pitch blackness. “This looks man-made---”

“Jack, watch out!”

Another shadowy movement. This one real, and not either of them. Jack broke his grip on Annie’s hand and raised his revolver, training it on the four-legged shape that had passed across the sliver of light. He fired. The report echoed immediately, revealing that they were in a tightly constructed chamber.

They heard a kind of animalistic groan. It sounded moody. Whatever was in there had been unaffected by the bullet. Jack was about to fire again when his eyes adjusted to the darkness enough to see who it really was.

“Oh!” Jack said, feeling stupid. “It’s just Carl Sagan.”

Jack stuffed Wrench back into his waistband and quietly handled Annie’s wrist. Not her hand, her wrist. To check her pulse. It was high, but she had otherwise remained perfectly calm. Her state had started shifting more rapidly, but never delving completely into the other. Like a slowly rising tide that gets higher and higher on the beach with each wave. Jack knew that at some point soon it would have to be confronted. But for now everything was okay.

“What are you doing here?” he said to Carl Sagan, ruffling the top of his head and scratching behind the ears.

“Jack, we should see what this place is first, don’t you think?” she said, taking her wrist back and moving forward into the darkness.

They couldn’t see him properly in the darkness, so Jack wouldn’t be able to interpret based on eye contact with the animal, but he guessed that Carl Sagan had just gone exploring after they had left him to discover the treasure. Which meant...

“Yes,” he said to Annie. “We should explore this place. I don’t think it’s a cave.”

“What then?”

“Among other possibilities, a back way. Carl Sagan got in here somehow without us noticing him.”

“Wait...I think this is...wood.”

And wood it was.

            “Is this...is this the ship?” Annie said. “The one the Indies crashed all those years ago?”
            “Probably,” said Jack. “Pity we don’t have a lantern. Let’s move out into the light. Be very careful where you step.”
            “Why?”
            “You never know in places like these.”
            They felt their way through the belly of the ship in almost total darkness. Their hands found not just rotting wood, but vines and roots of trees and climbing ivy, as well as other slimy things that could have been anything. They stepped in puddles as they made their way through the wreck, seeking the light outside. It was not a pleasant experience, but neither of them complained and before long they had passed safely through it, crawling through a splintery hole that had been bored at some point in the wreckage.
            And what they saw upon exiting the ship made them both gasp in awe.
            Before their eyes stood not more piles of treasure, but what could have been a treasure house: a grand stone temple built into the side of Mt. Diabolo itself. Obsidian stone steps led up to patio at the feet of a massive arched entranceway, a gaping maw with only darkness visible therein. The same parasitic plant life that had enveloped the shipwreck also covered the exterior of the temple, like cascades of a waterfall. The mountain walls on either side of the temple were covered in green trees and shrubbery, ferns, palms, and flowering plants. The igneous portion of the little treasure island they had found did not reach the temple.
            Between the two adventurers and the temple was a dusty brown clearing that looked too big to be natural, so expansive it could have fit the entire fleet of jeeps at Golbez Industries side by side. Jack noticed this; Annie did not. She stepped closer to the temple as he turned around to get a look at the shipwreck.
            What remained of the ship was nearly invisible from the outside, so absorbed had it been by the jungle flora. But close as he was to it, Jack saw that it had clearly smashed against the huge black rock the island consisted of. He also noticed some black lettering underneath a few strands of ivy, and he pushed them aside. Only part of the christening remained: “Guffin.”
            Jack snorted, then rejoined Annie in the middle of the clearing.
            “What is this?” she said, craning her neck to take in the full breadth and height of the temple.
            “A place we’re not going to venture into,” said Jack. “Whatever’s in there isn’t worth our time. Though to be fair, none of what we’re doing here is worth my time.”
            “It’s a temple, though. An ancient temple!”
            “Ancient? I’m not so sure about that. Who built it, and how? And more importantly, why? That’s the question none of my peers are ever able to answer, or even ask. The question is all the more relevant because the dambed treasure isn’t even in here. It’s back there. So what was the point of building a temple if you’re not even going to hide the treasure of the gods in it? We’re not going in there. I’m not much of a puzzle-solver, anyway.”
            “Then what do we do now?” Annie said, slightly disappointed.
            “We find the things that Vanasmas wants. Whatever it is.”
            “And that wouldn’t be in this big ancient temple so conspicuously placed right next to a hoard of gold and jewels and precious things?”
            Jack paused. “Yes,” he said after a moment. “I think you do have a point. Damb.”
            “But hey, what’s that? What’re those?” she said, pointing towards the temple.
            Four short plinths stood on the temple patio, each giving off a distinct colored glow at the top. One was red, one was blue, one was orange, and one was green. Jack did not comprehend how he could have missed these when first examining the temple, even if it was from a distance. He ran up the steps two at a time to study the plinths more closely. Annie followed more hesitantly and kept a short distance from Jack on the steps.
            The glows could have been fire, but they gave off no heat. Jack passed his hand through, feeling nothing.
            But no. He definitely felt something. A kind of pulsating power emanating from each plinth. And as he looked he found something more. Images, carved symbols in the tops of the plinths.

On the red plinth was the image of a book.

The Great Big Book of Everything.

On the blue plinth, a majestic sword.

The Elder Weapon.

On the orange plinth, a crystal.

The Source of Unlimited Clean Energy.

He was just about to check the green plinth when they heard a bloodcurdling sound from the jungle that shattered the eerie silence. The sound of screams, and of the earth shaking.

Then a terrible, terrible roar.