Crypt Quest: Warrior's Rapture
Cathartical Conquest
The piercing shriek of fuel-injected engines inflamed the sky as Flight 302 from Emirates Airlines burrowed its way deep into the annals of a hard blue atmosphere on a stable path to the Indian subcontinent.
Reese and Malik manned passenger seats in a half-filled upper cabin, while their elaborately-dressed South Asian mourner hung out, alone at the bar further ahead.
"How did that guy get us Business Class seats?" Reese blinked, perplexed. "He didn't even have a Visa?"
Malik was busy tearing apart a bag of munchies. "Clearly, there is something up and you should go talk to him. In the meantime, I will be investigating this delicious bag of aloo bhujia."
"Please stop crinkling things near me," Reese snapped. "And, we have to talk to Anish because we need to know why his people were harassing Professor Lanstien at Ravenwood University." He hesitated. "It's just awkward because it's only been a few hours since the cremation for his friend."
Malik shrugged. "Maybe he's over it?"
Offering a look before leaving Malik and approaching the bar, Reese noticed the stoic warrior nursing a plastic bottle of water.
"Your actions are honourable, so I welcome you to India and its culture. Try the food and meet my people. Find your Professor and ensure absolution. But that is all you are to do," Anish relayed while staring forward through the walls of the plane. "Set your heart upon your work, but never on its reward."
Reese opened his arms in protest. "What is going on? Are yours and my people seeking the same thing? I just did a whole seven-arc hulabaloo about one of those and the resulting undead were not as pleasant as one would appetize."
"They were appetizing us," Malik corrected, surprise-revealing to both that he was now sitting on a stool behind Reese.
As the shorter man signaled for a drink, Reese turned his attention back in time to see Anish walking forward in escape toward the First Class section. "The more we meddle with the ancients, the closer we all are to knowing far too much," Anish announced before disappearing behind the curtain.
"Damn one-liners sucking all the substance," Reese cursed before slouching back into the bar in defeat.
- - -
Upon the exodus into the over-crowded interior Indira Gandhi International Airport, the carry-on travelers Reese and Malik briefly caught sight of the hasty and mysterious Anish and his funeral vase before he trickled back into the chaotic horde never to be seen again.
A three-and-a-half-hour connecting flight to Anuradhapura Airport later, their rusty, brown, hired micro-car sputtered through a small market into just outside of the noon sun at Kanniya Hot Water Springs. The South Asian driver, satisfied with his money, drove off, leaving the two adventurers to awe.
"I present to you, the holy springs near Gokarna Bay," announced Malik. "That's a call back to what was inscribed on the small statue artifact we found back at the University."
The cloth-wrapped-sword-backpacked Reese nodded. "Not even being sarcastic, I'm actually glad you made that reference. Also, since the contact Lanstien and I share isn't responding, the best thing we can do right now is find this weapon and hope we run into the Professor along the way to get his side of the story."
"Dude. There's a certain level of snarkiness I've come to expect from you, and you switching it up every now and then disrupts consistency," the offended Malik replied seconds before a woman stepped out of a nearby car and approached them.
The auburn-mained, light-brown skinned half-Caucasian, half-South Asian woman in a long Kandyan-style saree held up several papers.
"Speaking of expectations, gentlemen, I'm Achala, your tour guide with the tickets to the springs. So, why don't you come with me?" she suggested by-way of walking passed them through the entrance.
A perplexed Reese and Malik glanced at each other before following her in.
- - -
"Sorry. Actually, we didn't ask for a tour guide. Just the permission to visit the springs," Reese established while the three strolled through towards an open stone structure. "Apparently, we can't be trusted."
Achala stopped and addressed them. "This is a sacred site, built upon the actions of the great Ravana himself to serve his mother Kaikasi. If we cannot respect these lands, we cannot properly attribute the worship necessary to him."
"Yeah, but Ravana was a torturer, abuser and cannibal?" Malik offered. "Oh, my sources are the Ramayana and Mahabharata."
Reese squinted at his partner. "Ugh. How long did it take you to read those?"
"It's light to people that appreciate contradictory epics," Malik suggested. "Also, according to the Ramayana, Ravana and his mother worshipped Shiva until she got sick. It was then he turned on everything and attempted to destroy the very temple they prayed in."
Achala nodded. "Indeed and, when Shiva stopped him, his mother died in sorrow and he showed humility by creating the springs. A trait we could all appreciate."
"Appreciation is a fickle thing," Reese surmised. "But people actually do do it and, in this case, seek out pilgrimages."
The woman latched onto his cryptic, well-timed segway. "Right! In fact, in this very one, people bathe in the springs to heal themselves and cure what ails them."
"So, we bathe ourselves?" A seriously reluctant Malik present-tensed as he approached several buckets near one of the square spring openings. "This is not the archaeology I signed up for. In fact, sometimes our kind go without a shower for weeks."
Also somewhat reluctant, but driven, Reese approached another square opening of spring water and peered into it in search of something. Anything.
"Not anymore. Start bathing," he stated seconds before grabbing a bucket, taking out water, and dumping it on the ground.
After an initial shock, Malik walked over to Reese's spring and begun to see an object underneath the receding water. "What is that? A cranium?"
"Not just any random, bulbous scalp. It's a statue of Ravana's head!" Reese excited as it came into view.
Malik snapped his fingers. "Didn't that guy have, like, a bunch of heads?"
"What in the name of Shiva do you think you're doing??" A near-delayed Achala erupted in a simultaneous yet failed attempt at holding Malik back while he began emptying the next spring. "This is a holy site and these purification waters are what keeps Ravana's evil at bay!"
Reese was near done emptying his next one. "Would it help to know I did not know my own mother? You see, we're only proceeding with the same exaltations as your people would, while revealing previously unwatered historical artifacts. Two-for-one, lady."
"Whatever comes of this, we'd better move, fast, because these water-holes are slowly filling up again," Malik appreciated as he completed another one. "As, water-holes do."
Unable to bide her own curiosity to herself, Achala remained unceremoniously paused while Reese and Malik emptied all the springs, revealing a Ravana head at the bottom of each one.
"I'm counting seven springs, but Ravana had ten heads," Reese stopped, unsure of himself.
He reached in and rotated one of the heads, causing the stone floor of that pool to open, temporarily block the stone tubes from feeding spring water, and the Ravana heads to invert and descend with stone supports into an underground chamber. Malik and Achala did the same for the rest and everyone jumped underground.
"Ten heads," Reese observed as the apparent crypt showed three additional undropped protrusions to what would amount to a total of ten spring openings, but were seemingly unmined.
The group walked around the already upside-down eight Ravana heads to what appeared as a mud-bricked coffin. Achala erupted, "We don't—"
"—Bury your dead," Reese finished before examining all the engravings on his coffin. "I know. But there are rare cases, and this unnamed guy appears to be the stone maker of this place. These pictographs show Ravana overseeing his work."
Malik took it in. "He must've really believed in his connection to that wild, unkempt misfit, but this I don't believe," he added pointing to the last pictograph, showing the very mini statue Reese had acquired at Ravenwood. "Our Kanniya Idol. All the heads in the carving are pointing to it, embedded within a shrine of some kind. It must be a key?"
"It's always a key," Reese caught on as he took the Kanniya Idol out from his satchel in still-amazement before looking up at all the upside-down Ravana heads. "And keys need doors. Look. The heads are all turned to Koneswaram Temple!"
But before Malik could celebrate, Achala had already taken out her own gnarly sword and pointed it at them with renewed optimism. "That's everything I wanted to know, gentlemen. Thank you."
"You're not with the touring company," Reese deadpanned, stating the obvious for traditions' sakes.
She laughed. "You're smart when it comes to crypts, but it's clear you can't tell when a woman is deceiving you. Take my advice: When you waste your time with the work, you always miss what's happening right in front of you."
"Who are you?" Malik cut. "And how many double-crosses does this make, now?"
Reese checked his journal. "Well, there was a rando with a gun and terrible planning, and that one kid with spunk who we were never to speak of again. But even then, they were obvious. I have no idea who this is."
"All you need to know is that what you seek does not belong to you, nor your compatriots. If you don't go home, I have no compunctions about stopping you by any means necessary," she explained.
Malik's jaw dropped before launching a pre-emptive jump kick. "Hey! That's bad guy language! Get her!"
"Yeah, but, get her? What goon squad were you a part of?" Reese squinted, judgmentally, as he, next, third-wheel joined the adrenalin-driven wrist-to-wrist exchanges between Achala and Malik.
Both men dodged sword swipe after sword swipe until Reese was able to kick an angry tour guide back a few feet for some breathing room. "If you must know, it was a teacher's union," Malik answered.
"Ew," Reese replied.
The shorter man then took Reese's queue. "It was there I learned the effect of mentors and parents have on us, whether they are present or not." He then readied his stance for another attack. "I'll hold her off while you take the idol to Koneswaram. Just don't do the thing that she said. The asking too many questions at the worst time thing. She had a point, is all I'm saying." He watched Reese nod and sprint off toward the exit before Malik turned himself back to face a smirking double-crosser.
"I was hoping you'd stay to entertain me," she readied while clutching her sword, apparently unconcerned for the other man's progress.
- - -
Sometime later, Reese, in the South Asian’s taxi’s barely-operational micro car, sputtered through a local market until stopping, just outside the walkway to Koneswaram Temple. Before it drove off, Reese got out in front of a shoe storage section, manned by a local.
"Hmm. Should I be questioning why I just left my partner to fight that Achala woman all on his own?" Reese hesitated as he took off his shoes and put them on one of the many shelves.
The other middle-aged South Asian man in a t-shirt deadpanned him. "To focus on the work is not a waste of time, but familiarity provides a short-cut to your decisions. Your friend is capable. He will take care of himself."
"Yeah! Thanks, tropey stranger with transcendent wisdom," Reese rebounded with renewed confidence.
- - -
In bare feet, the cloth-wrapped-sword-backpacked Reese ran up the wide stoned steps of the raised jagati-platform, toward the Dravidian temple and stopped before the massive 15-foot high, multi-armed Shiva shrine.
"Are you on the Pilgrimage of Arunagirinathar, traveler?" came the sudden appearance of a blonde-haired, bare-footed white guy with a backpack and Swiss accent. "You carry his statue. If so, the Mahabhrata states one should fast for three days at this temple."
Reese followed the man's gaze to the Kanniya Idol in Reese's hands, before Reese looked back up to the man. "Ah, a foreigner steeped in Hindu tradition isn't contemporary at all."
"We exist. That's a thing that can happen without apology," the unfazed, chiseled blond replied with keen, perpetual interest.
After a quick and subtle examination of the giant Shiva statue, Reese was left to no avail and forced to continue walking to the inside of the temple.
Inside were several large, elaborately decorated colourful prayer shrines for several different Hindu deities. He passed a few wandering families and the odd praying South Asian individual before stopping upon a sectioned-off, ignored and faded, nondescript tower.
"The dark one exists to balance the good," the blond said, revealing himself to have followed Reese. "They tell people it's under construction, but it hasn't been touched in years."
Reese stared at it, identifying an empty section at the top. "Bro. If you've got some actual reason for this Clingy McClingface, then you should know it's immaterial."
"I'm not your bro. The name's Ulrik, and what you consider immaterial is in fact the most material, Artifact Hunter," he smirked. "You're the offensive foreigner, coming into other people's countries to steal and claim fortune and glory for your own."
Turning slightly for a moment, the two exchanged untrusting glances between each other and the empty section at the top of the shrine. "Ugh. Is this what Achala is all about? You guys are the anti-us?"
Reese moved first, with lightning speed, stepping off a nearby raised shrine-edge to propel his-self into the air in an effort to fly-place the Kanniya Idol, of which, Ulrik's attempt and an intercepting jump kick was impacted into Reese's chest. "Like I said, the dark balances the good," Ulrik condemned upon landing.
"Dark or not, uncovering the history of the world is only bad if we make it bad," Reese added as he landed in a backward-momentum-skid. He nearly placed his hand onto the hilt of the cloth-wrapped sword before the sudden self-grinding of the shrine threw him off.
They both watched as the shrine suddenly began to mechanically transform in all areas, in a slow progression until it began spitting out and pulling in various sizes of Indian maces in a deadly, external defense. "Don't you motherless choders realize unchecked impulse breeds self-serving compensation?" Ulrik countered, in awe and distraction before one of the maces punched him in the side. "Ugh! Meaning, you perpetuate a cutthroat competition that appropriates and upturns foreign culture."
"Yeah, you don't need a parental unit to understand restraint. We might as well bury our heads in the sand if we don't want to know anything," argued Reese as he dodged Indian mace after mace in an attempt at getting near the shrine. As one hit him in the head and sent him back, he added, "Aggh! The chase is just a head-rushing byproduct of academic pursuits."
Two more Caucasians, a male named Tumeric and a woman named Isabelle, stepped out in full attack posture to flank Reese amongst the chaos of the shrine. They all took in the threat of the violently-thrusting Ravana shrine, reluctant but determined to proceed anyway.
"As Ravana said: Standing in war, I can even put Death to death," Isabelle added before all three of them began launching fist after fist after kick while maces punctured the space all around them. "Like yourselves, he was a greedy, egotistical villain."
Reese gritted from all the chaos and for being unable to escape it. "Ahh!" No one's deflection was enough to divert hit after hit from both ancient and human sources until Ulrik's incoming wrist was intercepted by Yuri's.
"Maybe we're a little greedy," the brown-skinned South Asian with a British accent smirked as she kicked down Isabelle and knocked Tumeric into an attacking Ravana mace.
Knowing his chance when he's seen it, Reese step-jumped himself off Ulrik's back, then off a Ravana mace, dodging another, until he was high enough to lock the Arunagirinathar Kanniya idol to the top of the shrine.
"What the hell? It doubles as a Ravana head?" Reese questioned as nine more heads popped up beside the idol and the chaotic shrine configuration morphed into a stop so that it displayed artwork centralized on Ravana.
Yuri checked to see that the others were knocked out and in too much pain on the floor to be focused on them. She turned back to Reese. "He was subversive and, despite already owning many, he sought after more weapons, specifically the one you're looking for."
"According to the Ramayana, Ravana was a king of an army with visions of increasing their power," Reese connected. "Greed, but with a purpose. All this to learn that?"
The woman stepped forward to examine the new Ravana fresco behind the heads. "Ravana used the methodology he knew and, in time, his rewards went from personal to altruistic. It's why they worship him here." She nodded to the designs. "His weapons have something to do with that Shiva temple. I recognize it."
After a vibration, Reese picked up his phone. "Malik!"
"Wrong. It's your mission-giver, idiot," came the snarky voice over the phone. "Don't be shocked by my cavalierity. You crossed me first by not delivering the Veena of Vishnu. But I still have an expedition for you."
Reese gritted his teeth. "I know you know Lanstien. Where did you send him?"
"You've demonstrated, over and over again, dynamic problem-solving, fantastical wit and, yet, you still don't know who I am, do you, Landscaper?"
At that, Yuri watched Reese's eyes go into full consternation. In mid-process, his dropped jaw sputtered, "Martin Groves!?" before he snapped his cellphone off, reactively.
"Ugh. That guy," Yuri recalled of the events under Colchester. "Whatever he wants, we want it more. He's an expedition funder. We're artifact hunters. And these random people from who-knows-where are the anti-us. It's as questionably simple as that. So, shall we go find out what we're looking for?"
Reese faded out of his trauma to the warmth of the rational woman's clarity. He looked around the unconscious bodies before nodding to her. Finally at home, Yuri smirked in genuine comfort, nodded back in natural sync and the two ran off, out of the elaborately architectural Hindu temple, into the unknown.