National Treasure

Into the West

Chapter 29: The Last Full Measure of Devotion Part II

Struggling to keep a hold of her grip on the roots, Abigail tried desperately to pull herself closer to the edge of the river without losing her grip on the child in her arms. Josephine had her arms clamped around Abigail's neck in the water, looking out for her brother and sister and the others. She saw nothing but the waves from the waterfall rolling downstream.

"Josie, sweetie." Abigail asked in a calm tone in order to soothe the frightened girl. "I need you to try to reach those branches above us, we need to get you out of this cold water."

"Al-Alright." Josephine said shakily. Abigail did her best to anchor herself against the rock so she could lift Josephine out of the water far enough to reach the twisted branches above them. Josephine reached up as high as she could, her slippery fingers able to clasp the lowest branch. Hanging from the branch, Josephine inched her way along towards the trunk of the tree until she was able to rest herself on the rock ledge. With Josephine out of the water, Abigail mustered all her strength to pull herself out of the water. Her first thoughts were for Josephine, as the child was now curled up on the ground and staring out at the dark water.

"Josie, are you hurt?" Abigail asked worriedly.

"I don't think so." Josephine said, wiping the water from her face with her hand. Putting her arm around Josephine briefly, Abigail had barely sat down for two seconds before she spotted a cluster of heads floating in the water and coming towards them.

"Oh God." Abigail muttered under her breath. Standing up, she got as close to the water's edge as she could without falling in to see who it was. Within two or three seconds, the cluster of heads became three figures moving towards her.

"Tyler!" Abigail cried, noticing the color of his leather jacket right away. He was swimming in the water up to his throat trying to support the two people he had with him. In his left arm, Anita had her arms wrapped around his neck while with his right hand, he was pulling Emily towards shore.

"Emily!" Abigail cried. "Anita!"

"Here, take her!" Tyler groaned painfully. Abigail crouched down and reached out her hand to grab Anita's outstretched hand.

"Are you alright?" Abigail asked as she pulled Anita from Tyler's arm and helped her onto the rocky ledge.

"I'm fine." Anita said softly. "It just knocked the wind out of me." Anita's thoughts and answers were interrupted by her little sister's cry.

"Josephine!" Anita cried as Josephine practically leapt into her arms. "Oh, thank goodness you're safe."

Making sure the two sisters were safe on the ledge, Abigail rushed to help Emily out of the water.

"Ooh!" Emily cried in pain when she tried to reach for Abigail's hand. "Abigail, I think my wrist is broken."

"Oh, God." Abigail gasped. "Don't worry, we'll get you out." Taking her by the other hand, Abigail did her best to pull her from the water, while Tyler struggled to lift her up out of the water. She managed to crawl onto the rocky shore, wheezing in pain from the shock of the cold.

"Emily, let me see your wrist." Abigail insisted. She carefully helped Emily roll up her sleeve to examine her wrist. Finding a dark purple bruise, she knew there it was probably broken, or at least badly sprained.

"I swear to God." Emily cussed, thinking of Ian. "If he lays one finger on my boy, I'll have his skull full of pencils on my desk." Emily had barely closed her eyes for two seconds to rest before opening them again. It was a good thing she did, or else she wouldn't have seen an arm reaching out of the water in the middle of the river.

"Patrick!" Emily shouted. Abigail's head shot in the opposite direction, towards the river. There she could see Patrick flailing in the current. Before she could even speak, Tyler kicked himself away from the ledge and frantically swam towards Patrick. Emily's heart leapt into her throat when she saw Patrick's arm vanish beneath the waves. Ignoring her wrist, Emily sprang to her feet and to Abigail's side. The two women stood in silence, staring at the water. Abigail took Emily's hand in hers and said a silent prayer, and before she even finished, she saw Tyler break the surface, with Patrick in tow.

"Patrick!" Emily shouted, kneeling down by the water and reaching out her hand. Patrick had a large bruise on his forehead and his glasses were gone, but he appeared to be alright.

"Thank God, Em!" Patrick cried in joy at the sight of his wife safe and sound. "Are you alright? You're not hurt, are you?"

'Just my wrist." Emily said, wincing as she held her wrist. As she and Abigail tried frantically to drag him from the water, they soon came to see that he wasn't as alright as he had appeared. His knee was badly twisted and bleeding, appearing to be dislocated. As soon as he'd left the water, the pain hit him harder than the explosion had.

"Hold on, Patrick!" Tyler said as he swiftly crawled out of the water. The three of them struggled to pull him away from the water, while Tyler took off his leather jacket, ringed it out over the water and wrapped it around Anita and Josephine, who were huddled together nearby. As Tyler kneeled down next to Patrick, he took his hand and gave it a firm squeeze of reassurance.

"Patrick, I'm going to pop your leg back in, alright?"

"Do you know how to do that properly?" Patrick asked nervously, while groaning under the pressure of his knee.

"You need not to worry." Tyler said, breathing heavily as water ran down his face from his hair. "Alright, now this is going to hurt, so I'm gonna need you to hold on for me."

Emily took his hand tightly as Tyler took Patrick's injured leg and with one quick shove, popped it right back into its socket. Patrick gasped deeply in pain, but for the most part tried to keep silent, as not to attract attention from the activity going on above them. Just then as Tyler was seeing to Patrick, she realized they were still missing two people.

"Where's Riley?" Abigail asked, rising to her feet. Her eyes darted along the rippling waves, looking for any sign of life. She saw nothing, until she saw the figure of a teenage boy staggering along the stone ledge.

"Armando!" Anita cried, leaping to her feet and racing towards her brother. "You're okay!"

"You all need to come here quickly!" Armand said under heavy breaths. "Riley's down here, he's hurt bad."

Abigail's heart leapt into her throat once more as she scrambled to follow Armando along the ledge, down a rocky path and out to the edge of the wide river which ran through the gorge, deep beneath the city. Scrambling over the rocks and hollow logs which littered the shoreline, Armando led Abigail to a calm pool by the river's edge, where she came across a still figure, leaning against a tall stone in the water. It was Riley.

"Oh, God." Abigail cussed as she sped past Armando and scrambled to Riley's side.

"Riley, are you alright?" Abigail asked. She could already see he was hurt badly. The left side of his face was bleeding from a deep gash along his hairline, and it looked from his breathing and his arms around his right side that he'd broken a rib or two.

"I-I think I hit something in the water." Riley groaned with a wince. "Something really hard."

Abigail could also see that his clothing was singed, and there was a dark burn on his chin. Abigail thought back to the bomb exploding, how close he'd been to it. She could see that he was in a lot of pain, but it didn't seem to phase him, as she looked on, he pointed shakily to his left, seeming to grin widely. "Well, it looks like Ian unknowingly helped us again."

Abigail looked curiously towards the direction in which he was pointing, and saw there, carved into the cliff, something extraordinary. Slowly rising to her feet, she found herself facing another tunnel that had been carved into the rock, in the same shape as the hole in the well above them which they had been washed down in; the Eagle of the Navajo.

"It's down there, Abigail." Armando said in a shaky tone. "It has to be."

"Abigail." Riley said, drawing back her attention. "We've got to go back for him."

"I know, but how do we get back up there?"

"We've got to find some way!" Riley said with a groan. "He'll surely be dead by the time the FBI finds their way all the way out here."

Nodding, Armando agreed. "Well, then I guess that's that."

"Wait a minute." Abigail said, interrupting Armando. "You've got other matters to attend to."

Abigail looked down at Riley. "This is the way Ben wanted it." She said to Riley, him understanding before she even finished her sentence. "He had his chance to dignify his family name, now they should have theirs."

Nodding, Riley winced again as he slowly began to stand up. "I just hope he can hold on long enough."

With that, Abigail remembered something that she and Ben had come up with together once on a camping trip to Manitoba, if they ever got separated.


Ben had been dragged up across the dusty ground, his feet limply caressing the ground. Every now and then he'd caught with his feet a piece of broken pottery or even a bone fragment. He was dragged across piles of debris and around tight corners, his arms practically being wrenched from their sockets. All of this, however, he couldn't see. The black strip of cloth which had been tied tightly around his eyes only permitted him to see if he was in a lighted or dark space. For a while, he could see dim light through the blindfold, but in one instant he was plunged into a chilling darkness. The two men who were dragging him by the arms dropped him hard on his stomach, painfully knocking the wind out of him and kicking dust in the air. Little did he know that Ian had been a step in front of him the whole time. Leaving him briefly to choke on the dust-ridden air, Ian stepped outside to speak with his men.

"Gather everybody up and start moving people out of here."

"We've already done that, sir." One of them answered hesitantly.

"Have the explosives been set?"

"Yes." The other man answered. "They'll never be found."

"Excellent." Ian said with a cold breath, looking back at Ben's sluggishly moving figure on the ground. He would get his revenge, ending the Gates family legacy right then and there.


"It's up to you three now." Riley said to Armando, his sisters by his sides. He stood before the children, with Abigail's help, all of them in front of the large triangle-shaped tunnel. Armando and Anita both looked into the darkness, Josephine nervously tightening her grip on her brother's hand.

"He helped us so much." Anita said softly, looking up towards the buildings of the lost city which were in their view. "All of you did."

Abigail nodded. "Now we need to help him."

Armando, still holding the golden dagger of the Dutch East India Company in his hand, looked precariously into the tunnel, shining his flashlight into the darkness. At the same time, he looked and saw Tyler fidgeting with his cell phone as he frantically tried to contact Sadusky. After several moments, he growled in frustration and threw the phone to the ground.

"It's broken." He sighed in an irritated tone. "We'll just have to hope that they get here soon."

"How much hope can we have?" Riley asked, breathing heavily from the pain. "After all, it's a really big canyon."

"I told them exactly where the entrance to the city was." Tyler responded, wiping the sweat and water from his brow. "I just hope they can find it in time."

"Right." Riley said. "Now, how do we get all the way up there?"

They all looked up at the steep cliff which ascended up towards the city above them. It was very jagged and rough, but not rough enough to climb all the way up to the city. Abigail's eyes darted around frantically as she looked for a way up, for she knew time was running out.

"Alright, now the three of you need to get going." Abigail instructed to the children. "Stay down there and wait for one of us to come and find you."

Armando nodded, tightening his grip on his sister's hands. "Okay."

Taking a deep breath, Armando stepped slowly into the cave, his sisters trailing behind him closely. Abigail and Riley stood and watched them disappear into the darkness, then turned their attention back to the cliff. At that moment, Riley noticed Abigail was frantically clicking in and out the button on the side of her watch. "Abigail, what are you doing?"

"I'm contacting Ben." Abigail snapped eagerly. Riley glared at her with a raised eyebrow for about five seconds before expressing his profound confusion.

"Alright, I know our circumstances aren't all that swell but I can't have you going all fruit loopy on me now!"

In response, Abigail smacked him in the forehead. "I'm not crazy, dumbass. I'm really sending a message to him."

Scratching his nose, Riley continued to suspend his eyebrow. "Question, How?"

"Morse Code."

"Through your Watch?"

"Yep."

"Again, How?"

"We've got these little two-way transmitters built into our watches, so that when I tap this button, he can feel it on his watch."

"Feel it?" Riley asked in an even more puzzled tone. "How?"

"It shocks his wrist through the battery attached to the back plate."

"What?" Riley said. "Like one of those freaky dog collars."

"Hey, you know how he gets when he's preoccupied." Abigail said. Riley nodded in agreement, remembering the times whereas he practically had to set his hair on fire to get him out of his puzzle-solving mode.

"Well, that's a bit odd, but kind of cool." Riley said nodding. "Now what do we do about getting up there?"

Abigail looked around for a few more moments, until she noticed something further down the river.

"Look there." Abigail said, pointing to a large vertical recess in the rock. Pulling Riley behind her, she looked closer and saw that it was a narrow, circular well about four or five feet in diameter, descending from the city above down to the waters of the river. "I think I've found the way."


"Armando, slow down!" Anita hissed as she gripped her brother's arm. Armando led his sisters deeper into the cavern, A small flashlight their only source of light. The air was damp, droplets of water dripping down from the ceiling. Josephine whimpered in the darkness while still trying to see anything in front of them. It wasn't too long before they started hearing running water again.

"What's that?" Anita asked. Armando shined his flashlight onto the stretch of tunnel in front of them, and was surprised to see light up ahead.

"Look here." Armando said, leading his sisters out of the tunnel and into a larger cavern. At the center of the circular cavern, there was a stream of water running down from above, accompanied by a faint beam of sunlight

Barely strong enough to illuminate the room enough for the three of them to see what was in the cavern. Looking towards the other side of the room, the three of them froze in astonishment at what they saw. Armando shined his light across the room to reveal with his light a large cave painting, with writing inscribed across the wall. Grinning widely, Armando rushed towards it, Anita and Josephine following close behind.

"Is this it?" Anita asked eagerly.

"We're about to find out." Armando said, looking at the overall structure of the writing on the wall. Squinting to see clearly in the darkness, he began to recognize some of the symbols.

"From-from the east." Armando said, stuttering as he tried to translate the writings. "Came spirits of the sun."

"With the bounty of the earth heavy laden in their arms." Anita continued to read.

"Taken from the grasp of spirits of evil doings, the gift of the gods was taken to the heart of mother earth." Armando said, reading on. "Shall all who cross be graced by the giver of life and use wisdom and power for good beneath her eyes."

Then he saw it.

Directly in the center of the rounded and smoothed rock wall was a symbol he knew very well. It was a symbol that their mother had told them about when they were little. Before them, etched into the rock was the symbol of life's choices. Directly in the center of the symbol was a vertical slit cut into the rock, almost the exact same width as the knife. Taking it in his hands, Armando took a deep breath and stepped close to the rock. Anita pulled Josephine to her side as Armando examined the slit with his flashlight. Taking it by the handle and holding it so the blade was pointed downwards, Armando gently slid the knife into the slit along the top edge until he heard a small click from inside the stone. He then realized the operating mechanism of the door required the knife to be pushed down. He tried to push it himself, but it wouldn't budge.

"Anita, Josephine, I need your help." He called to his sisters. Scrambling to each of his sides, Armando worked out a plan for the three of them.

"Josie, I'm going to pick you up, and I want you to hold onto it." Josephine nodded as he picked her up. She grabbed a hold of the handle and dangled from it, her feet about a foot off the ground. Anita then stepped to the left of Josephine and took the handle in her hands, putting her entire body weight on the makeshift lever. Finally, Armando took hold, and with a count to three, took a hold of the knife and forced his entire body weight down onto it. Slowly but surely, the knife began to budge, and after a few seconds, slid clear down the slit, the blade now pointing upwards. Suddenly, a burst of hot air swept across the children, blowing dust from cracks in the rock. Armando and his sisters fell backwards with this, and once the dust cleared, could see that a rectangular piece of the wall was now moving backwards by itself, creating a doorway in the wall.

'Come on." Armando said, helping his sisters to their feet. "We've got a treasure to find."


Ian and his men walked away for a few moments, leaving Ben behind in the silence of his own thoughts. He was trapped in a maelstrom of horrifying images, repeating in his memory.

"Abigail, what have I done?" He said silently to himself, breathing heavily and trying not to throw himself into an anxiety attack equivalent to the San Francisco Earthquake of 1906. His head throbbing worse than it had since this entire ordeal had started, Ben gently rested his forehead against the stone floor of the area in which he had been concealed. In his mind, he kept repeating everything that had happened since he had first laid his eyes on the diary, and everything he should have done differently. Should he have headed west alone at first? Could he have tried to escape Ian and his thugs? Or even still, could he have ignored the diary altogether and simply kept it as an addition to his collection. Shaking his head, he knew that would have been even worse. Laughing at that thought, he remembered that he'd followed his instincts as best he could, and it still resulted in everything blowing up in his face. Now, everybody he cared about all lied in dark, watery graves for all he knew, and he was not far behind them. Before he could ponder over anything more, a gunshot rang through the air, causing his blood to run cold and his heart and mind to freeze for a brief second. He waited for the searing pain of a gunshot would to his back, his throat, or even his head, but nothing ever came, no pain that wasn't already there.

"Do you honestly think I would let you off that easily?" A voice with a British accent asked him in a low tone, followed by a deep, evil chuckle. Slowly but surely, Ben could hear footsteps in the darkness, getting closer and closer with each passing second, right up until Ian must have been standing directly over him. Trying his hardest not to move, Ben waited in the silence for his end to come, not knowing what to expect. At that moment, three more gunshots rang out in the darkness of Ben's prison, him clenching his teeth together tighter with every shot. Again, he waited for that searing pain to begin, but once again, it never came.

"That's what it feels like, Ben." Ian said coldly, continuing to circle the treasure hunter's still figure. "To be so close to losing it all that you can practically taste it."

Ben said nothing. He slowed his breathing to a near stand still, hoping Ian wouldn't hear his desperation, as it seemed that was exactly what Ian was looking for. If he was going to die, he sure as hell wasn't going to die a coward. He wanted to ask Ian to put him out of his misery and get it over with, but doing that would only please Ian further in his madness. The best he could think of to do is just to remain silent.

"Well, Ben," Ian remarked inquisitively. "Any last requests? Maybe your last rights read to you, or perhaps even a prayer?"

Swallowing his nerves, Ben clenched his teeth together tightly, choking over the thoughts drowning him in his own mind. He listened for Ian to say more, but his captor said nothing. Instead, Ben suddenly felt Ian tugging at the back of his jacket, and for one terrifying moment, he felt the tip of the blade of a knife pressing into his back. He waited for Ian to press the blade clear through his body, but he didn't. Instead, he began cutting away at the back of Ben's clothes. First, he sliced away at the denim from Ben's jacket, then cut through his shirt until his bare back was exposed. Ben paused in confusion until he suddenly felt his arms wrenched up off of his back, followed a few minutes later by something long and thin striking his back hard. He snapped his eyes shut and clenched his teeth together, the feeling as if he'd been struck with a whip like a horse or something. A few seconds later, it struck again with even more force, causing him to bow his neck in an attempt to lower his head in reflex. Breathing as gently as he could in between his teeth, Ben braced himself for more blows from whatever he was being struck with. He began to wonder if Ian was the only person in the room, as he could feel someone holding his arms up in a very painful position. As he was being held, he began to feel a strange tingling in his arm, causing his index finger on his left hand to twitch suddenly. As he struggled to hold himself still, he began to feel rhythmic pulses of electricity sweeping along his arm. His breath tightened and his eyes closed, his hope restored. She was alive!

HOLD…ON……..HELP..IS…COMING…

Ben clenched his fists together, still clamped in the handcuffs, trying to focus on his memory of the Morse code system.

PETE…COMING……..FBI…GETTING…CLOSER…

Ben could hear Ian bickering angrily under his breath as he continued to strike him with whatever it was he had. Before long, he began to feel drips of blood running down his sides and splattering about every time he was struck. The pain was intensifying as the strikes were getting closer together.

RILEY…SAFE……..PARENTS…SAFE……..TYLER…SAFE……..CHILDREN…SAFE…

Ian struck hard against a set of nerves in Ben's back with the whip, causing him to grind his teeth together harder.

HOLD…ON……..WE…ARE…COMING……..CHILDREN…GOING…ON…TOWARDS…TREASURE…

With that message ending, Ben felt the whip strike his wrist hard, breaking the band on his watch and sending it flying off into the darkness. He now felt blood running around his neck and down his shoulders. Ian struck him one last time across the shoulder blades, forcing a painful gasp out of Ben's mouth. Breathing heavily between his grinding teeth and his eyes snapped shut, Ben struggled to keep from shaking, his body trying to recoil violently from the slashes to his back. He felt his arms fall onto his back as they were released, cringing as his arms came in contact with the open wounds. He could feel at least a dozen deep gashes in his back, and blood was now beginning to pool around his body. Sweat and tears stinging his eyes, he struggled to stay awake.

"That's hardly what I call compensation, but it should be enough to show you the ways of the world." Ian said slyly, dropping the whip and once again circling around Ben. "There are those destined for happiness and prosperity, and there are those who are not. Right now, I'm hoping you understand our two positions on that spectrum."

Ben didn't respond to Ian's remark, because he tried to drown them out as best as he could. He thought desperately for a way to stall Ian, as he knew his time was running out. He felt his limbs growing tired and limp, and he was starting to feel lightheaded. Between his deep, painful breaths, he prayed in his own silence.

"Keep them safe…help them find it….please keep them safe…"

To Be Continued…

Coming Soon:

Chapter 30: The Last Full Measure of Devotion Part III