The Chamber

There is complete silence as we all take in the gold in Lou's hand. What is it about gold that holds a man's gaze like the flame of a campfire? With Antonelli's last donation all three of us are set for life... so who needs more? It is a question that we will not be able to answer, not now, not here.

"We don't have much time."
Lou's voice snaps me out of the precious metal transe.
"You think?" I take the nugget out of his palm and hold it between me and Chris.
"That would make a nice necklace." Chris reaches for the gold... just for a closer look.
"You fucking pimp. A necklace? Are you serious?" I snatch it back. Lou's iron grip closes over my wrist and I relinquish the gold to his care.

"Look, you two idiots, there is enough gold in there to sink KOZANOSTRA a second time. But we have to hurry."
He does a quick scan of the jungle with the eyepiece.
"Those little Yanomami are probably walking in our footsteps as we speak. Even though the trail will be harder to follow once we stopped cutting our way through, they will be on us pretty quick."

We all take pause and listen to the jungle. The drums are silent. No sound of rushing warriors. The usual audible panorama of sound seems muffled and distant.
"Even though they are moving silently... the jungle knows they are there."
"What the fuck does that mean?"
"Just like walking up on a croaking frog or a chirping cricket... they stop as you pass."
Now that makes sense. What doesn't make sense is that we are standing out here in the open debating the limited time we have to take gold that we don't really need.

We move into the opening and pull the headgear flashlights out of our packs.
He takes the nightvision eyepiece off of his head and holds it out. Chris snaps it up.
"You put that on and watch the jungle. If you see any of them, you give us a shout."
"But... "
"Jake and I are going in and we will grab a couple of handfuls of these. That is the best we can do."

There is limited protest from Antonelli. He isn't too fond of enclosed places, but really wants to see the inside of the treasure cave. As soon as he locks the nightvision to his head we go inside, leaving him in the entrance. He stands there like an immovable oak tree. He takes my MP5 and still has the Kimbers. We leave our packs behind as well in the cave opening.

The inside of the cave is damp, almost misty. Our lights reveal the cold chiseled interior of the main tunnel. It is a stark, cold stone hole that has been hacked and most likely blown into the side of the mountain. The first thing I notice is the absence of the booby traps Lou has mentioned.
"Booby traps?"
"Not in this tunnel... in the chamber." Lou's voice is muffled as he moves ahead of me.
We go about twenty feet in, the passage narrowing as we go. By the time we are at the end of it, wear are bent over and the top of the shaft is at our backs. It seems like we are at a dead end... no chamber, and certainly no gold.
"This is it?"

Lou says nothing. He moves aside and looks down at his feet. His light casts on a hole, one that looks as though it would barely fit the Yanomami. I look down at it, and then to Lou.
"We go down there?"
He nods.
"Well, Chris sure as hell won't fit down there."
"That's why he is standing guard."

I watch him sink down into the hole. When he drops to his feet his light illuminates the chamber below. He waves me down and I dangle my feet in the opening and then struggle downward until I also drop down to the chamber floor some eight feet below.
"Don't move." Lou grabs me and makes it clear that we are not to step off of the small patch of ground beneath our feet.

The walls of this chamber do not look man made. It stretches beyond the beam of our lights. At our feet I see a web of thin cord that encompasses the spot below the hole that we stand in.
"What is that? Looks like a spider web." I go to reach out with my foot but Lou stops me.
"It's some kind of animal product... like cat gut. Trip wires."
"For what?"
"I don't know and I don't want to know. Just step over them and we won't have to find out."

We step up and over the web of trip wire and then start into this lower chamber. The walls and floor of the chamber are damp, the air heavy heavy with cool water vapor.
"It feels like there should be a waterfall or something." I look at the rockface to our left and it seems to be weeping.
"The gold is up further." Lou steps very carefully, stopping... pointing out more of the web like strings that would be impossible to see in torchlight. Whatever device they would trigger remains hidden.

We move on, slowly. Ahead of us the chamber descends just slightly. There are spaces dug out of the rock and in these spaces are nuggets... some the size that Lou had shown us... others smaller, some larger. These are placed here for a reason next to bits of plant, a couple of shrivelled remains of small frogs, what looks like some kind of dried grain. Next to a fist sized nugget is a shrunken head... the eyes and mouth sewn shut with crude stitches.

"Are these... offerings?" I look at each one in turn.
"Looks that way. This might be some kind of temple for them." He looks down the chamber, his light reflecting off of countless gold offerings in unending alcoves.
We continue into the chamber, each of us scanning the walls, looking at each offering and what it was with.

"They are praying, or worshipping, or something." I pick up what looks to be a fresh little frog carcass. You can still see the bright red stripe of color on its dried up back.

Lou picks up his own frog and turns it over in his hand. He looks back toward the hole we dropped through.
"This doesn't make sense. That entrance, the cave entrance, that is man made. You can see where it was hacked out of the rock. These Yanomami, they don't possess the tools or knowledge to make an opening like that."

"Okay, so they found the cave after the hole was made." I offer my explanation with doubt as I look around this second chamber.
"No, this is too old." He lets the beam of his headlight cast down the chamber. The path down the center is shiney, as though a thousand bare feet had walked it for centuries. "No, this chamber has been used for a long,long time."

Silence settles between us as we pan our lights down the chamber. After a beat, the silence is shattered by gunfire coming from above. Our attention cuts to the hole from above as we run to the opening.
"Give me a boost."
I interlace my fingers and Lou steps up. I lift with my knees and help him up throught the ceiling of the chamber. I wait for a moment, expecting Lou to reach down through to help me up through the hole, but he doesn't come. Instead I can hear the Kimbers joining in the gunfire from the MP5.

I leap and catch an edge of the hole with both hands and try to pull myself up. The adrenaline rush helps alot and I am able to get both of arms up through the hole to the point where I can pull my head up. Lou is in the entrance, firing the Kimbers. Antonelli is not in sight, outside of the entrance firing away with the MP5. Then Lou stops and tries to yell something to Chris.

There is a huge explosion, one that knocks me out of the hole and back into the chamber. I struggle to my feet, the cave above me choking gravelly dust down the hole and onto my position. The MP5 resumes firing, and after a moment to change out his clips, Lou lets the Kimbers loose again as well. After a few beats, I can hear Lou yelling at the top of his lungs. Next, one of our packs is hurled into the cave and lands at the edge of the hole above me. Before I can move out of the way it comes down on my head and I am once again knocked to the ground.

"Well son of a BITCH." I struggle to regain my footing.
Above me in the cave, the firing stops and all that can be heard is what I suspect are the Yanomami war cries. There must be too many for the boys to contend with. I am with that thought for a fraction of a second before the next blast. This one is enough to slam me to the floor of the chamber. I shield my head as the cave above crumbles down on top of me. It is a hurrendous explosion. The flash of light and massive concussion, coupled with the deafness that follows makes everything around me seem surreal.

I lay there in a timeless fog that only clears when I can feel myself choking on the dust and debris. Struggling I lift myself to my hands and knees, coughing until I puke. The dust from the explosion hangs in the air. I pull my shirt over my nose and mouth and then straighten out my head light to survey the scene around me.

Antonelli is face down beneath what had been the hole at the top of this chamber. It is now a ragged opening three times bigger than it had been. I make it over to him and push him over. He moans and then chokes a bit, opening his eyes. I yell his name but hear nothing, not even my own voice. He is alive, and aside from a little blood from cuts and slashes, he seems okay.

As I look around, my light reveals the destruction of the explosion. Rubble and rock are thick on the floor of the chamber. Antonelli is now sitting up. I look around the chamber, then up to the gaping maw that leads into the cave above. One thing for sure... nothing remaining above could have survived that explosion.