The Chaos Code (29 page)

Matt shook his head. He looked at Aunt Jane, and saw that she was watching him.

‘This is important,' she said quietly. ‘Robina knows what she's talking about.

‘Robina?'

‘Please,' Robin insisted. ‘Questions later. Even questions about my name. OK?'

‘OK. Sorry.'

‘I'm sorry too. Of course you've never been to Angkor. But I have. It's magnificent. And its whole construction echoes and defines the passage of time – right down to taking precession into account. The wobble of the earth on its axis, remember?'

‘One degree every 72 years, wasn't it?' Matt said. ‘I remember.'

‘That's right. Which is, incidentally – or rather, not incidentally at all because it's quite deliberate – a component of the ratio between the dimensions of the Great Pyramid and the earth. You see,
everything
interconnects. It's all part of a whole. These aren't isolated coincidental
sites, they're all part of an overall model – like a blueprint of the world. Angkor Wat, for example, is incredibly impressive. It's made up of 72 small temples brought together in a single structure. And, like the Pyramids, it mirrors a constellation – in this case the Northern Constellation of Draco. But because of precession, the earth moves in relation to the constellations as it wobbles. Angkor was built some time between 800 and 1200 AD, but it maps the constellation exactly as it appeared in 10,500 BC. At the point in history that the ancient Egyptians call “The First Time”.'

‘In fact,' Robin went on, ‘
all
the models are correct as at 10,500 BC – that's the date when each of them is perfectly aligned, or would have been if they were there. It's like a baseline date. And that is true whether you examine a mirror of Leo or Orion at Giza in Egypt, or Draco in Cambodia. To give you just one example, in 10,500 BC the Great Sphinx would have been looking directly at the constellation of Leo at the Spring Equinox. It doesn't matter whether you look for a shadow resembling a feathered serpent at Chichen Itza in Mexico, or the point where the sun sets relative to the Way of the Dead. They are all exactly aligned as they should be 12,500 years ago. Because, each was built to a design created in 10,500 BC, even though many – most – of them were actually constructed long after the original purpose had been forgotten. But they were built to plans and using techniques and methods that were remembered
and passed on. Passed on by the last few survivors of an ancient civilisation.'

Robin paused. She glanced at Aunt Jane, then said: ‘The last few survivors of Atlantis.'

Matt couldn't stop himself. ‘According to some theory or other,' he blurted out. ‘I mean, yes, you've got some impressive facts and figures and an incredible memory for the detail. But I keep telling you, Atlantis is just a myth. It was never
real
.'

He was surprised at the vehemence behind her reply. ‘It's not just a myth,' she shouted at him. ‘How many times? You think I'm making all this up? Do you? It isn't theory, it's fact.'

Robin paused, breathing heavily. Matt didn't dare say anything. He waited until she had calmed down enough to continue, albeit in a rather more terse and abrupt tone.

‘The whole ancient system is a giant simulation of the world,' Robin said. ‘I assume that you can understand
that
much. You said yourself, it's like a computer model. A representation, a copy if you like of time and space. An attempt to map out the chaos of the world. And with his knowledge of how to manipulate the elements – like the golems from the earth and fire demons and water creatures – Harper can use that model not only to predict apparently chaotic events and the passage of time, but to manipulate them. All he needs is the key – the knowledge of how to control that model
rather than just read it. Like the difference between running computer code and being able to change it to do something else. Looking at data in a spreadsheet or a document is easy enough – he can do that. But with the knowledge he's after now, he hopes to be able to change that data – to recalculate the spreadsheet with his own numbers, or rewrite the document so it says what he wants it to say. And his document is the whole world.'

‘That's crazy,' Matt said.

‘You think so? He can already make small changes. Insignificant in global terms. But you've seen it.'

‘Well, yes. A bit of it. But are you saying he can predict what we're going to do, or who's going to win the FA Cup or what the winning numbers are in next week's lottery? Or even pick a winner he chooses at random and then make that prediction come true?'

‘No, not yet. But,' Robin said, ‘that
is
what he is after. That's the level of control – of power – he thinks he can achieve when he knows what is written on that disc. It will tell him, or it will guide him to something else that will. Unless we can stop him.'

‘So, is that what the people of Atlantis were aiming for?' Aunt Jane asked. Matt was surprised she was accepting it all so easily, despite what she had seen the night before. ‘They were striving for a world over which they had total influence and control?'

‘That's right,' Robin said. ‘Control even over nature. How perfect would that be? But they allowed their ambition
and greed to take over from their earlier peaceful, altruistic notions as their empire and their influence grew. They had mastery over their environment, they understood the deeper mysteries of the universe. They knew things that people are only just rediscovering today. The important thing for us now is that they had a different way of thinking, a different way of reasoning.'

‘And they could predict the future?' Matt asked. ‘Is that what you're telling us – they actually foresaw future events? Like some sort of fortune telling?'

Robin sighed. ‘I'm saying they were getting there. That was their aim. That was a skill they wanted to add to their repertoire, if you like. And they were close, so very close, when the catastrophe came. It was the remnants of those predictive skills that saved the people of Akrotiri when Thira was destroyed by the eruptions. That's why no bodies have ever been found in the ruins. Not like Pompeii, for example, where no one warned them what was about to happen. But thousands of years before that, in 10,500 BC, the Atlanteans could not save themselves …' She gave a short laugh. ‘Some said it was nature's revenge.'

She stood in silence, staring at the table, suddenly lost in her thoughts. Matt glanced round, and saw the surviving piece of the burned painting lying by the computer.

‘The other thing you need to know about,' Aunt Jane said slowly, as if she was not sure she should tell him, ‘is
their longevity. That the people of Atlantis lived incredibly long lives.' She picked up the piece of canvas, holding it so Matt could see the faces of the two girls looking back at him. ‘Do you understand what I'm saying?'

Matt just stared. He felt cold inside, out of breath. Not sure of anything any more. Just staring, at the blue-eyed, black-haired girl in the old painting. ‘That's you?' he said at last, turning to look at Robin on the other side of the room. ‘It can't be you. Can it?'

‘With my sister Lisa,' she said, her voice completely level. No tone, no emotion. ‘Poor Lisa. I inherited the curse, but she didn't.'

‘What curse?' Matt said, hardly daring to think what she might mean.

‘Longevity.'

Matt's head was reeling, and he felt like the room was spinning round him. ‘But then – just how old
are
you?' he managed to ask.

Her mouth twitched as she suppressed a smile. ‘Oh, compared to Dad I'm a youngster. Robina Jane Venture, born August 12, 1835.'

It was a joke. They were having him on. But it wasn't like Aunt Jane to joke, and Robin looked so sad. She was fourteen, Matt told himself. Fifteen at the most. Had to be.

‘I tried to warn you,' Aunt Jane was saying. She sighed, like she was upset with
him
. ‘You are so like your father though. You just won't be told.'

‘Told what?' Matt demanded. He was angry now. He didn't know why, or who with. He just was. ‘Don't hang out with her, she's old enough to be your great-great-great-great-grandmother several times over? What? Didn't stop you and Dad, did it? I saw your pictures.
You
can have fun, but I should keep well away – is that it?'

Jane shook her head. ‘No, that isn't what I meant. Just …' She sighed again and turned away. ‘It's true,' she said, more quietly, more sadly. ‘Just that. Just believe it.'

‘I don't even know what you're asking me to believe. I don't know if you're lying to me now, or if you've been lying to me all along.'

‘I never wanted to deceive you,' Robin said gently. ‘I didn't know what was going to happen. I didn't know we …' She stopped, closed her eyes for a moment, then went on: ‘I can't just tell everyone I meet that I'm getting on for two-hundred-years old, can I? They'd either lock me up or cut me open. Maybe both.'

‘That picture you went back for?' Matt said. His mouth was dry and his tongue felt like it didn't fit. ‘Elizabeth Venture, in 1833.'

‘My mother. Dad loved her so much. There was never anyone else, not before and not since. But she grew old and died. And so did my sister Lisa. You've seen her in the pictures. With me.' She swallowed a sob and blinked away a tear.

Matt remembered the old woman he had thought was a grandmother, with the dark-haired girl he had thought was an ancestor of Robin's. He thought of the pictures in Aunt Jane's scrapbook – the children playing. The man who looked like Julius Venture. The girl who looked like Robin.

‘I don't get old,' Robin said. ‘At least, not quickly. Another hundred years and I'll look like I'm all grown up, and then I'll stay like that for centuries. Getting older, but oh so slowly like Dad. Not like everyone else. Everyone gets old. Everyone except Dad and me. Yes, it's us in the pictures and portraits. There are so many of Dad, so many things he's collected down the years. The lonely boring years. Like the metal disc.' She fixed
her startling blue eyes on Matt. ‘He was there,' she said. ‘He saw it happen. The eruptions and the floods. The end of Atlantis.'

‘And you're really over a hundred and seventy years old?'

Robin smiled. It was a thin, sad smile, but there was some warmth in it. Some friendship. ‘I was flying helicopters before you were born,' she said. ‘I played with Jane and your Dad when they were children. I've watched them grow up. But I stay the same. It's difficult to understand, I know.'

‘Your father never understood,' Jane said. ‘Not really. But then …' She suddenly turned to Robin, like a small girl might turn to her older sister for comfort.

Robin held her close as she cried quietly, and finished the sentence for her: ‘But then, he was in love. And he did try. He tried so hard to understand, to work it all out. That's why he got interested in archaeology.'

‘Dad?' That sounded harder to believe than anything else. Matt couldn't imagine Dad loving anyone. Except Mum. And that was all over and done with. Dad was a loner, he didn't
do
relationships. ‘He couldn't have been at your christening,' Matt realised, his mind setting off at a tangent rather than following the thoughts through.

‘He was giving us a clue,' Robin agreed.

‘Telling us that Harper wasn't to be trusted.'

‘That too.'

Aunt Jane had pulled away from Robin and was dabbing her eyes with a tissue from her sleeve. ‘What else?' she asked. And Matt realised what was odd about the way Aunt Jane was with Robin – she treated her not as a child, not even as an equal, but more like an older, wiser friend.

‘What happens at a christening?' Robin asked.

‘You get your Christian name,' Matt said.

‘What else?' Robin prompted.

‘Well, water. The …' He hesitated. Had she seen that back then? Was this how her father had worked out the truth about the churches of Valdeholm? ‘The sign of the cross,' he said.

‘That's right. Arnold wanted us to find the Treasure of St John. And he wanted to warn us about Harper. He knew we'd work it out from his clue, just as he left clues for you on that website.'

‘My clues were a bit easier.'

‘Different, maybe,' she corrected him. ‘You have a way of looking at the world, of analysing it and working things out. Dad and me …' She shrugged. ‘We just know. Our minds make different connections, see different patterns in things. That's all.'

‘We used to hunt for treasure when we were kids,' Aunt Jane said. She had recovered most of her composure now and was leaning against the side of the table. ‘You father loved it. We'd leave clues for each other to work out. It was so funny how Robin would work out
some things just like that.' She clicked her fingers. ‘But others, which I thought were so easy, she couldn't get at all. I imagine she thought the same about us.'

Robin nodded. ‘
Let's find treasure
,' she said. ‘You said that, Matt. I assume you and Arnie did the same.'

Matt nodded. ‘He's still hunting for treasure now. Poor Dad. He never grew up either. Just grew old.'

‘Not
that
old,' Aunt Jane said sternly. Then she smiled. ‘And we have treasure to find too, don't forget.'

‘Yes,' Robin agreed. ‘Time to get back to work.'

It was difficult to concentrate. Matt was copying the symbols from the other side of the clay disc, while Robin and Jane went through books and papers and manuscripts comparing old script with the symbols Matt had already copied.

His mind kept wandering. He thought of what Robin must have seen, what she must have done. Had she really lived through two world wars? He remembered her describing the Russians tipping their gold into a deep lake – how she'd sounded like she'd been there and seen it. He felt somehow cheated that she could be so much older than him. He'd thought she was a friend.