Teddy and Joshua had walked and jogged off and on for over six hours and nothing had changed. The tunnel was about eight feet wide and ten feet high, level, heading east according to their compasses and monotonous.
In one sense, even the monotony was awe inspiring, from an engineering standpoint—mining a perfectly straight tunnel for fifteen plus miles was a technological feat that simply should not have been possible for ancient man.
Teddy began to wonder if they would ever find an end to the tunnel, although he didn't share his concerns with his son beside him. Originally, he had assumed that the passageway would be no more than ten miles long given that they had been diving about fifteen miles off the western tip of Cuba, but that may have been a faulty assumption.
What if the tunnel continues underneath the island of Cuba?
"Do you believe in aliens?" Joshua had been asking questions whenever they slowed to a walk. It passed the time, but it also displayed a mind that never stopped working.
"Merriam-Webster's defines the term "alien" as: not familiar or like other things you have known; too different from something to be acceptable or suitable." Teddy was proud of the boy's agile mind and inquisitive nature, in some senses, he was better suited to this work than Teddy.
Joshua had been a driving force, throwing himself fully into the quest for truth. Caleb had also shown himself adept at finding and identifying objects and solving the tough questions they had encountered at Tiwanaku. Teddy suspected that some of the passion and fervor was simply the magical affect of youth, he knew quite a bit of it was the compulsion to find meaning in the face of their mother's recent death.
"I mean little three foot high grey beings with big eyes that try to probe you." Joshua was having him on a bit, but his question was also sincere at some level.
"Fallen angels mating with human women, Greek titans, giants, demi-gods, half-man, half-animal hybrids, even three foot high grey creatures probing you for genetic material—all sort of sounds the same to me—and, yes, I find it very, very alien."
"What about ancient alien technology? Do you really think they could move hundred ton stones using sound waves or shape and melt rock in place?" Joshua was very familiar with Teddy's research.
"I don't believe the archeology supports the story we've been told--slow methodic progression of primitive stone chipping hunter-gatherers into sophisticated agricultural civilizations—we find out of place artifacts of surprising technological sophistication in very old strata all the time. Are these technologies possibly antediluvian?" Teddy was lost in his thoughts. "How many people existed on the earth at the time of the Flood? How sophisticated were their technologies?"
"I think I saw the rock glow from the inside." Joshua hesitated, but the memory was vivid.
"I think you did too." Teddy looked over at his son.
"You do?"
"Yes. I've been thinking about it and I think I know why the door didn't open…"
Teddy stopped mid-sentence and shined his flashlight beam far down the tunnel. They had been walking so long that neither of them were really paying much attention to what was ahead. The light beam just bounced up and down rhythmically with their steps and they kept going. Something had caught Teddy's eye as the beam passed across the end of the tunnel: reflected light.
"Is that a door? What a coincidence." Joshua and Teddy were looking at a door in the distance, one that looked just like the two at the other end of the tunnel.
"I don't believe in coincidences." Teddy jogged forward to examine the massive stone door. In every way, it matched its twins at the other end of the tunnel. Doorposts made of stone blocks weighing at least 200-400 pounds each, a solid lintel crossing the top and… Teddy's flashlight went involuntarily to the spot…
"Now we have the chance to test your theory!" Joshua had his spotlight out and was highlighting the fan shaped depression at just about sixteen feet off the floor.
"Let's take a moment to think this through. Now that we are here, I am wishing we had brought the tanks." Teddy plopped down with his back against the door. He was clearly tired.
"It's too far to go back and get them." Joshua flopped down next to him.
"I know. I don't think I could have carried mine this far anyway. I'm pooped. I just don't want us to drown after having come so far." Teddy was trying to make the smart move, but the smart move might have been staying at his corporate job back in Virginia. "I wish we had brought the tanks."
"I don't think we would be here now if we'd tried to carry the tanks. I am exhausted." Triumph was quickly evaporating from Joshua's voice.
They both leaned their heads back against the cool stone. It felt strangely soft and comfortable in their exhaustion. Teddy began to drift off when he forced himself awake. Joshua was snoring next to him. Teddy told himself that he had to keep them awake. They had to…
Teddy awoke suddenly. Joshua was startled next to him. They peered down the tunnel expectantly. Teddy looked at his watch. They had been asleep for half an hour and with both flashlights on the whole time.
"Shhh! Stop moving!" Joshua was emphatic, turning his ear to the stone. Teddy pressed his own ear against the stone and froze. At one and a half feet thick, assuming it resembled the others, he didn't know what they expected to hear.
They didn't hear anything.
They felt it—a tiny but consistent vibration in a quick rising and falling wave pattern. Their ears zeroed in on the sound. It continued until there was a sharp sound like metal striking rock followed by silence.
"Put my glove on!" Teddy jumped up, pulled his dive glove out of his pocket and handed it to Joshua who was still sitting on the floor trying to listen through the rock. "Get up! Put my dive glove on and let's open this thing!" Teddy positioned himself as a ladder once more against the doorpost that contained the fan shaped depression.
"I'm not following." Joshua rose and put the glove on but it was clear he was confused.
"Sound doesn't travel through water like that—somebody is working on the other side of this door—that means air!" Teddy was ecstatic.
"What do I do with the glove? It didn't work for you last time." Joshua stood behind him looking up at their goal.
"It's the gold, Joshua! The doors open to hands covered in gold dust—it was a common practice for ancient South American priests to be entirely covered in gold—where did they get that idea from?" Teddy was grinning from ear to ear.
"Nephilim!" Joshua climbed onto his father's back.