Chapter 3: A Cute Man From Hitler Land
The beeping of the computer woke Jennifer from her reverie. They stopped and everyone got out, taking a metal detector with them to search for the ship buried somewhere in the ice. Riley, Shippen and Jennifer all walked in the same direction, sweeping their metal detectors from side to side in an effort to find the ship.
"Look... this is a waste of time. How could a ship wind up way out here?" Shippen asks Riley.
"Well, I'm no expert, but... it could be that the hydrothermic properties of this region produce hurricane-force ice storms that cause the ocean to freeze and then melt and then refreeze, resulting in a semisolid migrating land mass that would land a ship right around here." Riley answers causing Jennifer to laugh. Minutes later Ben's metal detector starts going off causing Jennifer to run up to him.
"Ben! You found it!" she exclaims excitedly.
"Hello, beautiful." Ben whispers once he wipes the snow off of the cannon with the ship's name on it. Eventually the ship is dug up using the machines they rode in, no thanks to Jennifer who made twelve snow angels and two snowmen while everyone else worked. "Okay, let's go!" Ben shouts.
Riley hands Jennifer a flashlight and she mutters a thanks before everyone descends into the ship. After only two steps Jennifer slips and falls right onto Ian. After apologizing profusely, and him just laughing it off, they start off again. Not even a minute later she hears Riley freaking out on the other side of the room so she hurries over.
"You handled that well." Ben says dully. Everyone makes it into the ships' cargo hold and Riley suggests looking in the barrels. She eventually pries one open and inside is gunpowder. Ben wanders to the other side of the room and we follow. He searches through a barrel and finds a package. He unwraps it to reveal a polished, wooden black box with strange symbols on it. The symbols look almost Egyptian, the center is a bird, and on either side of it are people. Inside of it lays a ivory white pipe.
Ben, of course, immediately recognizes it as a Miashawn pipe, and Riley jokes about how much it might be worth. Jennifer is trying to see it in between all of the guys. She eventually pushes Riley out of the way to get a better look.
"It's a clue." Ben says dramatically, motioning for Ian to hand it back. He slices his thumb open, causing Riley and her to both visibly flinch, and spreads his blood over the stem of the pipe and scrolls the stem over a piece of paper printing the next clue with Templar symbols. The bloody clue reads:"The legend writ,The stain affected,The key in Silence -five in iron pen,Mr. Matlack can't offend."
"Yay, another riddle." Jennifer said sarcastically.
"Sh, I need to think." Ben says, before going off on some tangent about legends and keys both being on maps. The key in silence means that the map must be invisible, according to Ben. "The stain affected must refer to the dye or agent used to bring about some result making what was previously undetectable detectable. But what does Iron pen mean"
"Prison." Shippen states, somewhat randomly.
"Albuquerque. See I can do it too. Snorkel." Riley jokes.
"Wait!" Jennifer shouts. "Mr. Matlack was the scribe of the Declaration of Independence. Wait, that can't mean."
"Come on. There can't be an invisible map on the back of the Declaration of Independence." Riley states, quickly figuring out what she was proposes that they "borrow" the Declaration of Independence. Ben turns him down immediately of course, it's the Declaration of Independence after all!
Shaw immediately pulls out a gun and points it at Ben when he disagrees. Ben tells Ian that there is more to the riddle, so they can't shoot him. Shaw points the gun at Jennifer. "Tell me what I need to know or I will shoot your friend." Ian threatens.
"Hey, that's not necessary." Jennifer says, holding her hands up.
"What's more important to you Ben?" Ian asks smugly.
Riley, meanwhile, is right behind Jennifer freaking out. "Who brings a gun on an Artic adventure? Honestly." Jennifer can't help laugh, before she remembers the gun pointed at her. Shaw pulls down the hammer on the back of the gun.
"What do I need to know Ben?"
Ben grabs a flare and lights it up against a barrel. He threatens to drop it, burning the place up because of all the gunpowder.
"What you need to know, is if Shaw can catch." Ben throws it, Ian grabs for it but because of the gunpowder on his glove from earlier, his glove bursts into flame and causes him to drop it.
Ian and his lackeys run out of the only exit, and lock the door behind them.
"Oh my gosh, oh my gosh." Jennifer says, pacing. Riley grabs her arm and drags her over to Ben.
"What are we gonna do Ben?" He asks, freaking out. Luckily enough, Ben found something called a smugglers hold and dragged us into it with him. They barely make it far enough away before the fire reaches the barrels, causing a huge explosion. They all end up covered in snow and soot. Panting for breath, Jennifer tries and sits up, but a sharp pain shoots through her hand. When she pulls off her glove, she sees a huge cut bleeding pretty badly going from the middle of the back of her hand down, a little past her wrist. She tries to quickly cover it up so that Riley and Ben don't worry but it's too late.
"What happened?" Riley asks, grabbing her hand and pulling the glove back off.
"Oh, I'm not sure." She says, faking thoughtfulness. "Maybe it's because of the ship that just exploded around us."
"It's pretty deep." Ben says, turning her hand to the side and making her wince in pain. "There's an Inuit village about nine miles east of here. We'll get you some help when we get there." Ben says, pulling the glove back over her hand.
"Wow, it cut right through." Riley states, looking at the hole in her glove.
"Keep pressure on it." Ben says, handing Jennifer a handkerchief. She pushes it against her arm, biting back a cry of pain. They start the journey back; Riley and Ben start talking about stuff.
"So, what's your story?" Riley asks after an hour of walking.
"What do you mean?"
"How did you get into this business?" Riley asks, clearing up her confusion.
"Ah, nothing out of the ordinary really. I always loved History, probably because Ben brainwashed me when we were little." Jennifer said, sticking her tongue out playfully at Ben. "We're bestest friends." She adds cheerily. Riley goes back to talking to Ben about something or other when a wave of nausea hits her. She glances down at her hand and realizes it was bleeding out of the handkerchief and she didn't even notice. A small trail of blood was left behind them, next to their footsteps.
"So how long have you guys known each other anyway?" Riley asks randomly. She is still trying to cover up her hand, putting more pressure on it to try and stop the bleeding.
"Since I was seven." Jennifer answered, a huge headache coming on.
"Wait, so why did you guys stop talking"
"We moved when I was seventeen, and we called each other once in a while but then I went to college and I didn't have much time. We just kind of went our separate ways." Ben announces they're almost there so she tries to push herself a little further. It seems her body is at it's limit though because her vision goes black, and she sinks into darkness.
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"Jenny, Jenny, wake up." a deep voice says, giving her a gentle nudge in the shoulder.
"Huh?" She yawns, sleepily. "Where are we?"
"We made it to the village." Riley answers. "They patched up your hand and now we're on a plane back home."
"Oh, cool." She yawns. She rolls over and snuggles back into what she thought was her pillow. It turns out to be Riley's lap.
"Wake me up when we get there." She sighs. She wakes up to the feeling of someone's hand running through her hair. She moans sleepily. "Wakey-wakey Jen." Riley says cutely. She opens her eyes and realizes how close his face is to hers and how easy it would be to lean up and kiss him. What am I thinking? She shakes her head, a blush spreading across her cheeks. "I'm awake." She says, backing up slightly.
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She looks so adorable lying there, snuggled into my lap. That thought makes Riley chuckle. "Ah, my leg's asleep." He whines. Leaning over, he runs his hand through Jennifer's soft hair. He leans over and presses a soft kiss on her forehead before he realizes what he's doing. Why did I do that? She moans in her sleep and Riley says, "wakey-wakey Jen." She opens her eyes and Riley realizes he's still leaning over her, she starts shaking her head and backs up.
"I'm awake"
"What were you dreaming about anyway?" Riley asks, her blue eyes locking with his.
"Nothing much, why do you ask?" She nervously asks.
"You were kind of mumbling in your sleep." He smirks slightly at her when she blushes in embarrassment and asks Riley what he heard. The only thing she said clearly was the name Derek so he tells her that.
"Yeah he was my best friend in college." she explains.
"Was?"
"Yeah, he passed away a couple years back." she says, becoming oddly interested in her hands. She looked sad so Riley reached over and grasped her hand in his. She quickly glanced up at him and Riley started playing with her fingers making her smile. "Thumb war." she challenges. "1, 2, 3, 4; I declare a thumb war. 5, 6, 7, 8; hope you can keep your thumb straight." She immediately attacks his thumb with hers, trying to push it over, but Riley's hand was quite a bit larger than hers so his thumb was longer. She was biting her lip in concentration, and he wasn't really paying attention until she started cheating.
"I had no choice, you weren't even moving your thumb!" she answers to Riley's amused accusation. He couldn't help but chuckle. A little while later she receives a call on her cell phone and he can't help but listen in on her conversation.
"Hey Charles, you'd never guess where I was." After a couple second pause, she responds, "Nope I'm in a plane, above." she pauses, glancing out the window, "somewhere." She starts giggling, making Riley smile.
"Silly. I'm probably not going to be able to see you for a while yet." she says playing with her hair. She sighs dramatically before saying, "I know. Life without me must be terrible. I miss you too." she smiles sweetly, laughing loudly. "I love you too. Adios, me amigo." she finishes. "Yeah, well it's not very easy getting a signal in the Artic. Yeah, I promise to call you next time I go to some obscure continent." she says, pausing to listen to him between each phrase. "Right." she says, stretching out the word. "I'll call you later. Say hi to Claire for me. Bye!"
"Charles is my friend" she says, smiling over at RIley.
"I didn't ask." He responds quickly.
"I know, but you wanted to know." she smiled.
"We're here." Ben says, saving Riley from having to respond.
The return to Ben's house was relatively simple. Jennifer's hand didn't even need stitches and they quickly returned to their mission.
Unfortunately, they weren't having much luck in this leg of the race. They had called and had meetings with four different establishments in an effort to protect the Declaration from Ian. But no one would believe they're warnings.
Riley, Ben, and Jennifer were just walking out of the J. Edgar Hoover FBI Building, all of them bummed out. They had been all over the city trying to find someone who could help them with their problem and this was Ben's last idea.
"Is it really so hard to believe that someone is going to steal the Declaration of Independence?" Riley asks, frustrated.
"They get ten thousand tips a week, they're not going to worry about something they know is safe." Ben answers glumly.
"Anyone that can help us will think we're crazy and anyone crazy enough to believe us isn't going to want to help." Riley says.
"We don't need someone crazy, but one step short of crazy and what do you get?" asks Ben. "Obsessed." laughs Riley.
"I have to go with Riley on this one." Jennifer answers when Ben looks to her for help.
"Passionate." Ben corrects us.
"Hey you guys, I have an idea!" Jennifer shouts, excited at her epiphany.
"What now?" Riley asked, sounding tired.
"I have connections in the National Archives. I know someone very passionate, borderline obsessed in my opinion." Jennifer smiles.
They headed there, Jennifer skipping excitedly at the thought of seeing an old friend. They eventually got in. "Dr. Chase can see you now Mr. Brown." the receptionist calls. After receiving odd looks from Riley and Jennifer, he explains that his name isn't exactly respected in the academic community."Being kept down by the man." Riley jokes. "A very cute man." he finishes, causing a twinge of jealousy to sting Jennifer unexpectedly.
"Abby!" Jenny shouts, pointing her right hand up in the air, reminiscent of a Hitler greeting.
"Jennifer, how many times do I have to tell you to stop that?" she asks in a voice meant for reprimanding a toddler. "I was on the phone."
"One more I guess." Jennifer says, lazily putting her feet up on the lady's desk. "What can I say, it's the cult of personality." Abby comes around the desk and pushes Jennifer's feet off of it.
"Don't touch those!" Abby reprimands Ben for touching her George Washington campaign buttons.
"Sorry. Your missing the 1789 inaugural though, I found one once"
"How very fortunate for you"
"Your accent... Pennsylvania Dutch"
"No, Saxony German"
"Your not American?" Riley asks rudely causing Jennifer to smile and reply,"Hitler land!"
"Jennifer I swear to gosh!" She yells back, quickly quieting down.
"Oh no not to gosh!" Jennifer responds smiling.
"Anyways what are you here for gentleman?" she asks, turning her back to Jennifer.
"Someone's going to steal the Declaration of Independence." Ben states.
"It's true." Riley confirms after a moment of silence.
"I think I better put you gentleman in touch with the FBI." She responds after another pause.
"We've been to the FBI and they assured us that the Declaration could not possibly be stolen." Riley responds. She agrees with the FBI's statement and Ben goes on to explain that he wants to look at the back of the document himself to make sure it was in no danger. He tells her, in a few words, that there is an invisible treasure map on the back of the Declaration of Independence. He came to that conclusion from the fact that there was an engraving on a two hundred year old pipe owned by Free Masons. When he couldn't show it to her she mockingly asks, "What, did Big foot take it?" making Ben a little mad.
"Come on Abby, it's not that unbelievable." Jennifer whines.
"Jenny, are you on drugs?"
"Abby, come on. You know me! Why would I lie about something like this?"
"The joke has gone on long enough Jennifer, get out of my office"
"But Abby, I…"
"Out!" she yells at Jennifer, before turning to the guys. "It was nice meeting you"
"You know, that really is a nice collection. Must have taken you a long time to hunt down all that history." Ben said, before walking out the door.
"Sorry guys, I thought she would understand." Jennifer sighs dejectedly as they walk out of the office and into the display room of the National Archives building.
"Ben, if it's any consolation you had me convinced." Riley says helpfully, and Jennifer agrees with him.
"It's not" Ben says. "180 years of searching and I am 3 feet away. Of all the ideas that became the United States, there is a line here that is at the heart of all the others." Ben starts quoting the Declaration of Independence "But when a long train of abuses and years of patience perusing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism"
"It is their right, it is their duty to throw off such government and provide new guards for their future security." Jennifer cuts him off.
"You have it memorized too, huh?" Ben sends a smile to Jennifer and she shrugs. He turns back to the case. "I'm going to steal it"
"What?" Riley and Jennifer ask in unison.
"I'm going to steal the declaration of independence." Ben says resolutely before calmly walking away from them.
"Uh... Ben?!" Riley chases Ben and Jennifer follow after. "This is huge. Prison huge. You are going to go to prison. You know that?" Riley asks, sitting on the steps of the National Archives Building.
Jennifer shows up and sits next to him when Ben says "Yeah probably"
"That would bother most people." Riley responds.
"Ian's going to try and steal it and if he succeeds, he will destroy the declaration. The fact is the only way to protect the declaration is to steal it. It's upside-down. I don't think there's a choice." Ben says, sitting down next to me on the steps.
"Ben, for god-sakes it's like stealing a national monument. It's like stealing him. It can't be done. Not that it shouldn't be done, it can't be done. Let me prove it to you." Riley says, standing up anxiously. Riley leads us to the Library of Congress and while there, Jennifer get, a phone call.
"I'll be in, in a minute guys." Jennifer says, while answering her cell phone. It's Abigail! "What do you want?" Jennifer asks dully.
"I'm sorry Jennifer, but come on! An invisible map on the back of the Declaration of Independence? It's nonsense."
"Abby, if you called to yell at me again then you wasted your time"
"No, I wanted to apologize and invite you to a party."
"A party?"
"Yeah, there's a Gala this weekend at the National Archives and I have an extra ticket." She says excitedly.
"You just want an excuse to go shopping." Jennifer laughed.
"Please, Jenny all the people are so... stuffy"
"Stuffy?" Jennifer giggles.
"You know what I mean. Now come on, we can go shopping tomorrow. I know the perfect place." She says.
"Ok, sounds good." Jennifer quickly comes up with a plan that might help Ben. They agree to meet at three the next day to go shopping. When Jennifer walks into the building she sees Riley grabbing books and she heads over to Ben to tell him her idea. "Ben! There's a gala at the National Archives next week, we can try and steal it then!" She says excitedly.
He holds up a gala pamphlet. "I had the same idea." he said, smiling. "Wait, how did you find out about it?" he asks her.
"Abigail just asked me to go with her." She responds while sitting down next to Ben.
Riley returns with arms full of papers and books. "Okay Ben and Jenny pay attention. I brought you to the Library of Congress. Why? Because it's the biggest library in the world. Over 20 million books. And they are all saying the same exact thing. Listen to Riley." He says making her giggle. He smiles at her before continuing with a long winded explanation about how impossible it was to steal the Declaration because of how securely it was guarded.
"You know Thomas Edison tried and failed nearly 2000 times to develop the carbonized cotton thread filament for the incandescent light bulb." Ben points out, in what seems to be a random fashion.
"Edison?" Riley asks.
"And when asked about it he said 'I didn't fail, I found out 2000 ways how not to make a light bulb', but he only needed to find one way to make it work. The preservation room. Do you know what the preservation room is for?" Ben asks
"Delicious jams and jellies?" Riley responds making Jennifer laugh again.
"No, that's where they clean, repair, and maintain all the documents and storage housings when they aren't on display or in the vault. Now when the case needs work, they take it out of the vault and directly across the hall and into the preservation room. The best time for us or Ian to steal it would be during the Gala this weekend, when the guards are distracted by the V.I.P's upstairs. But we'll make our way to the preservation room where there is much less security." Ben says.
"Well…." Riley seems to chew it over as he looks at the pamphlet for the gala. "This might be possible." Riley finishes.
"It might." Ben says.
"All right!" Jennifer cheers, quieting down once she remembered that she was in a library. They head back to Ben's and come up with a plan. Riley will hack into the video feed of the Archives, Ben will get Abigail's fingerprints using chemicals, and Jennifer will try and be a decoy, or at least keep Abigail off of their trail.
Her shopping trip with Abigail was fun. Jennifer ended up getting a beautiful fairy tale dress. It was a white halter top dress with small blue designs sprinkled across it. There was a bow across the waist and under the bow it poofed out a little and draped down to the floor. She felt like a princess wearing it but the price nearly killed her.
"It's more than $200!" Jennifer whispers frantically.
"That's cheap! Oh my gosh Jennifer, you have to buy it it's only $225, for a dress like that. It's a bargain"
"What are you wearing?" Jennifer asks, after the poor cashier had to pry the money out of her hands.
"It's this beautiful dark blue dress I bought from here last week." She said excitedly. They head back to her house and she tells Jennifer to meet her there an hour early so that they can get ready. Jennifer leaves the dress at her place and heads over to Ben's house.
"Ok, so the plan is to get Abigail's fingerprints, sneak into the preservation room, and get out... What do I do?" Jennifer asks.
"You just get to try and make sure no one notices Ben leaving." Riley answers.
"I can totally handle that." Jennifer says smiling. Before she leaves to Abigail's, Riley gives her a small microphone thing to put in her ear so that she can hear what they say and they can hear what she says. When she arrives at Abigail's house, they both get ready and she does Jennifer's makeup, because she was never very good at it. They both leave and go to the gala. When they arrive she introduces Jennifer to all her "friends."
Eventually, Jennifer hears Riley telling her that it's time to go help Ben. She walks over to the men's bathroom. Ben walks out and he smiles when he sees her.
"You look beautiful." he smiles, giving Jennifer a hug.
Jennifer hugs back and says "You look pretty snazzy yourself."
"Focus you guys." Riley says, sounding annoyed. She walks back towards Abigail and Ben follows after a couple minutes.
"Oh Mr. Brown." Abigail says confused, glaring at Jennifer.
"Dr. Chase." Ben greets her.
"What are you doing here?" she asks looking at Jennifer.
"I had no clue, I swear!" Jennifer says, shaking her head.
"Is that that hot girl? How does she look?" Riley asks making Jennifer frown.
"She's telling the truth, I made a last minute donation without telling her. A pretty big one." Ben explains, handing her a glass of champagne.
"Well on that subject thank you for your wonderful gift." Abigail says.
"Oh you did get it?" Ben asks.
"I really couldn't accept something like that normally, but I really want it"
"Well you needed it." Ben said.
"Come on Romeo, get out of there." Riley says.
"I have been wondering though, what the engraving indicated on the pipe that Big Foot took." Abigail asks curiously.
"Hi. Here you go." Dr. Herbert says, offering Abigail another glass of champagne.
"Oh Dr. Herbert, you already know Jennifer but this is Mr. Brown." Abigail introduces.
"Hi" Dr. Herbert offers a forced smile.
"Hi there"
"Who's the stiff?" Riley asks in their ears making Jennifer smile.
"Here, why don't you let me take that, so you can take that off his hands." Ben offers, grabbing the glass of champagne he gave to her earlier.
"Thank you"
"A toast yeah? To high treason. That's what these men were committing when they signed the Declaration. Had we lost the war, they would have been hanged, beheaded, drawn and quartered, and oh my personal favorite, had their entrails cut out and burned. So here's to the men who did what was considered wrong in order to do what they knew was right. What they knew was right." Ben toasts, drinking the whole glass in one gulp.
"I'll drink to that." Jennifer said with a smile, raising her glass and taking a drink.
"Well, good night." Ben finishes, walking away.
"Good night." Dr. Herbert, Abigail, and Jennifer say in unison.