The Lost Symbol (Robert Langdon) (34 page)

Andros was still a man, but he sensed he was evolving into something else. Something greater.
Something sacred
. His massive physique had emerged from dormancy, more powerful now than ever before. He finally understood its true purpose.
My body is but a vessel for my most potent treasure . . . my mind.

Andros knew his true potential had not yet been realized, and he delved deeper.
What is my destiny?
All the ancient texts spoke of good and
evil . . . and of man’s need to choose between them.
I made my choice long ago,
he knew, and yet he felt no remorse.
What is evil, if not a natural law?
Darkness followed light. Chaos followed order. Entropy was fundamental. Everything decayed. The perfectly ordered crystal eventually turned into random particles of dust.

There are those who create . . . and those who destroy.

It was not until Andros read John Milton’s
Paradise Lost
that he saw his destiny materialize before him. He read of the great fallen angel . . . the warrior demon who fought against the light . . . the valiant one . . . the angel called Moloch.

Moloch walked the earth as a god
. The angel’s name, Andros later learned, when translated to the ancient tongue, became Mal’akh.

And so shall I.

Like all great transformations, this one had to begin with a sacrifice . . . but not of rats, nor birds. No, this transformation required a
true
sacrifice.

There is but one worthy sacrifice.

Suddenly he had a sense of clarity unlike anything he had ever experienced in his life. His entire destiny had materialized. For three straight days he sketched on an enormous sheet of paper. When he was done, he had created a blueprint of what he would become.

He hung the life-size sketch on his wall and gazed into it as if into a mirror.

I am a masterpiece.

The next day, he took his drawing to the tattoo parlor.

He was ready.

CHAPTER
78

The George Washington
Masonic Memorial stands atop Shuter’s Hill in Alexandria, Virginia. Built in three distinct tiers of increasing architectural complexity from bottom to top—Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian—the structure stands as a physical symbol of man’s intellectual ascent. Inspired by the ancient Pharos lighthouse of Alexandria, Egypt, this soaring tower is capped by an Egyptian pyramid with a flamelike finial.

Inside the spectacular marble foyer sits a massive bronze of George Washington in full Masonic regalia, along with the actual trowel he used to lay the cornerstone of the Capitol Building. Above the foyer, nine different levels bear names like the Grotto, the Crypt Room, and the Knights Templar Chapel. Among the treasures housed within these spaces are over twenty thousand volumes of Masonic writings, a dazzling replica of the Ark of the Covenant, and even a scale model of the throne room in King Solomon’s Temple.

CIA agent Simkins checked his watch as the modified UH-60 chopper skimmed in low over the Potomac.
Six minutes until their train arrives.
He exhaled and gazed out the window at the shining Masonic Memorial on the horizon. He had to admit, the brilliantly shining tower was as impressive as any building on the National Mall. Simkins had never been inside the memorial, and tonight would be no different. If all went according to plan, Robert Langdon and Katherine Solomon would never make it out of the subway station.

“Over there!” Simkins shouted to the pilot, pointing down at the King Street subway station across from the memorial. The pilot banked the helicopter and set it down on a grassy area at the foot of Shuter’s Hill.

Pedestrians looked up in surprise as Simkins and his team piled out, dashed across the street, and ran down into King Street Station. In the stairwell, several departing passengers leaped out of the way, plastering themselves to the walls as the phalanx of armed men in black thundered past them.

The King Street Station was larger than Simkins had anticipated,
apparently serving several different lines—Blue, Yellow, and Amtrak. He raced over to the Metro map on the wall, found Freedom Plaza and the direct line to this location.

“Blue Line, southbound platform!” Simkins shouted. “Get down there and clear everyone out!” His team dashed off.

Simkins rushed over to the ticket booth, flashed his identification, and shouted to the woman inside. “The next train from Metro Center—what time is it due?!”

The woman inside looked frightened. “I’m not sure. Blue Line arrives every eleven minutes. There’s no set schedule.”

“How long since the last train?”

“Five . . . six minutes, maybe? No more than that.”

Turner did the math.
Perfect
. The next train had to be Langdon’s.

Inside a fast-moving subway car, Katherine Solomon shifted uncomfortably on the hard plastic seat. The bright fluorescent lights overhead hurt her eyes, and she fought the impulse to let her eyelids close, even for a second. Langdon sat beside her in the empty car, staring blankly down at the leather bag at his feet. His eyelids looked heavy, too, as if the rhythmic sway of the moving car were lulling him into a trance.

Katherine pictured the strange contents of Langdon’s bag.
Why does the CIA want this pyramid?
Bellamy had said that Sato might be pursuing the pyramid because she knew its true potential. But even if this pyramid somehow
did
reveal the hiding place of ancient secrets, Katherine found it hard to believe that its promise of primeval mystical wisdom would interest the CIA.

Then again, she reminded herself, the CIA had been caught several times running parapsychological or psi programs that bordered on ancient magic and mysticism. In 1995, the “Stargate/Scannate” scandal had exposed a classified CIA technology called remote viewing—a kind of telepathic mind travel that enabled a “viewer” to transport his mind’s eye to any location on earth and spy there, without being physically present. Of course, the technology was nothing new. Mystics called it astral projection, and yogis called it out-of-body experience. Unfortunately, horrified American taxpayers called it
absurd,
and the program had been scuttled. At least publicly.

Ironically, Katherine saw remarkable connections between the CIA’s failed programs and her own breakthroughs in Noetic Science.

Katherine felt eager to call the police and find out if they had discovered anything in Kalorama Heights, but she and Langdon were phoneless
now, and making contact with the authorities would probably be a mistake anyway; there was no telling how far Sato’s reach extended.

Patience, Katherine.
Within minutes, they would be in a safe hiding place, guests of a man who had assured them he could provide answers. Katherine hoped his answers, whatever they might be, would help her save her brother.

“Robert?” she whispered, glancing up at the subway map. “Next stop is ours.”

Langdon emerged slowly from his daydream. “Right, thanks.” As the train rumbled toward the station, he collected his daybag and gave Katherine an uncertain glance. “Let’s just hope our arrival is uneventful.”

By the time Turner Simkins dashed down to join his men, the subway platform had been entirely cleared, and his team was fanning out, taking up positions behind the support pillars that ran the length of the platform. A distant rumble echoed in the tunnel at the other end of the platform, and as it grew louder, Simkins felt the push of stale warm air billowing around him.

No escape, Mr. Langdon.

Simkins turned to the two agents he had told to join him on the platform. “Identification and weapons out. These trains are automated, but they all have a conductor who opens the doors. Find him.”

The train’s headlamp now appeared down the tunnel, and the sound of squealing brakes pierced the air. As the train burst into the station and began slowing down, Simkins and his two agents leaned out over the track, waving CIA identification badges and straining to make eye contact with the conductor before he could open the doors.

The train was closing fast. In the third car, Simkins finally saw the startled face of the conductor, who was apparently trying to figure out why three men in black were all waving identification badges at him. Simkins jogged toward the train, which was now nearing a full stop.

“CIA!” Simkins shouted, holding up his ID. “Do NOT open the doors!” As the train glided slowly past him, he went toward the conductor’s car, shouting in at him. “Do not open your doors! Do you understand?! Do NOT open your doors!”

The train came to a full stop, its wide-eyed conductor nodding repeatedly. “What’s wrong?!” the man demanded through his side window.

“Don’t let this train move,” Simkins said. “And don’t open the doors.”

“Okay.”

“Can you let us into the first car?”

The conductor nodded. Looking fearful, he stepped out of the train, closing the door behind him. He escorted Simkins and his men to the first car, where he manually opened the door.

“Lock it behind us,” Simkins said, pulling his weapon. Simkins and his men stepped quickly into the stark light of the first car. The conductor locked the door behind them.

The first car contained only four passengers—three teenage boys and an old woman—all of whom looked understandably startled to see three armed men entering. Simkins held up his ID. “Everything’s fine. Just stay seated.”

Simkins and his men now began their sweep, pushing toward the back of the sealed train one car at a time—“squeezing toothpaste,” as it was called during his training at the Farm. Very few passengers were on this train, and halfway to the back, the agents still had seen nobody even remotely resembling the description of Robert Langdon and Katherine Solomon. Nonetheless, Simkins remained confident. There was absolutely no place to hide on a subway car. No bathrooms, no storage, and no alternative exits. Even if the targets had seen them board the train and fled to the back, there was no way out. Prying open a door was almost impossible, and Simkins had men watching the platform and both sides of the train anyway.

Patience.

By the time Simkins reached the second-to-last car, however, he was feeling edgy. This penultimate car had only one passenger—a Chinese man. Simkins and his agents moved through, scanning for any place to hide. There was none.

“Last car,” Simkins said, raising his weapon as the threesome moved toward the threshold of the train’s final section. As they stepped into the last car, all three of them immediately stopped and stared.

What the . . . ?!
Simkins raced to the rear of the deserted cabin, searching behind all the seats. He spun back to his men, blood boiling. “Where the hell did they go?!”

CHAPTER
79

Eight miles
due north of Alexandria, Virginia, Robert Langdon and Katherine Solomon strode calmly across a wide expanse of frost-covered lawn.

“You should be an actress,” Langdon said, still impressed by Katherine’s quick thinking and improvisational skills.

“You weren’t half bad yourself.” She gave him a smile.

At first, Langdon had been mystified by Katherine’s abrupt antics in the taxi. Without warning, she had suddenly demanded they go to Freedom Plaza based on some revelation about a Jewish star and the Great Seal of the United States. She drew a well-known conspiracy-theory image on a dollar bill and then insisted Langdon look closely where she was
pointing
.

Finally, Langdon realized that Katherine was pointing
not
at the dollar bill but at a tiny indicator bulb on the back of the driver’s seat. The bulb was so covered with grime that he had not even noticed it. As he leaned forward, however, he could see that the bulb was illuminated, emitting a dull red glow. He could also see the two faint words directly beneath the lit bulb.

—
INTERCOM ON
—

Startled, Langdon glanced back at Katherine, whose frantic eyes were urging him to look into the front seat. He obeyed, stealing a discreet glance through the divider. The cabby’s cell phone was on the dash, wide open, illuminated, facing the intercom speaker. An instant later, Langdon understood Katherine’s actions.

They know we’re in this cab . . . they’ve been listening to us.

Langdon had no idea how much time he and Katherine had until their taxi was stopped and surrounded, but he knew they had to act fast. Instantly, he’d begun playing along, realizing that Katherine’s desire to go to Freedom Plaza had nothing to do with the pyramid but rather with its being a large subway station—Metro Center—from which they could take the Red, Blue, or Orange lines in any of six different directions.

They jumped out of the taxi at Freedom Plaza, and Langdon took over, doing some improvising of his own, leaving a trail to the Masonic Memorial in Alexandria before he and Katherine ran down into the subway station, dashing past the Blue Line platforms and continuing on to the Red Line, where they caught a train in the opposite direction.

Traveling six stops northbound to Tenleytown, they emerged all alone into a quiet, upscale neighborhood. Their destination, the tallest structure for miles, was immediately visible on the horizon, just off Massachusetts Avenue on a vast expanse of manicured lawn.

Now “off the grid,” as Katherine called it, the two of them walked across the damp grass. On their right was a medieval-style garden, famous for its ancient rosebushes and Shadow House gazebo. They moved past the garden, directly toward the magnificent building to which they had been summoned.
A refuge containing ten stones from Mount Sinai, one from heaven itself, and one with the visage of Luke’s dark father
.

“I’ve never been here at night,” Katherine said, gazing up at the brightly lit towers. “It’s spectacular.”

Langdon agreed, having forgotten how impressive this place truly was. This neo-Gothic masterpiece stood at the north end of Embassy Row. He hadn’t been here for years, not since writing a piece about it for a kids’ magazine in hopes of generating some excitement among young Americans to come see this amazing landmark. His article—“Moses, Moon Rocks, and
Star Wars
”—had been part of the tourist literature for years.

Washington National Cathedral,
Langdon thought, feeling an unexpected anticipation at being back after all these years.
Where better to ask about One True God?

“This cathedral
really
has ten stones from Mount Sinai?” Katherine asked, gazing up at the twin bell towers.

Langdon nodded. “Near the main altar. They symbolize the Ten Commandments given to Moses on Mount Sinai.”

“And there’s a lunar rock?”

A rock from heaven itself.
“Yes. One of the stained-glass windows is called the Space Window and has a fragment of moon rock embedded in it.”

“Okay, but you can’t be serious about the last thing.” Katherine glanced over, her pretty eyes flashing skepticism. “A statue of . . . Darth Vader?”

Langdon chuckled. “Luke Skywalker’s dark father? Absolutely. Vader is one of the National Cathedral’s most popular grotesques.” He pointed high into the west towers. “Tough to see him at night, but he’s there.”

“What in the world is Darth Vader doing on Washington National Cathedral?”

“A contest for kids to carve a gargoyle that depicted the face of evil. Darth won.”

They reached the grand staircase to the main entrance, which was set back in an eighty-foot archway beneath a breathtaking rose window. As they began climbing, Langdon’s mind shifted to the mysterious stranger who had called him.
No names, please . . . Tell me, have you successfully protected the map that was entrusted to you?
Langdon’s shoulder ached from carrying the heavy stone pyramid, and he was looking forward to setting it down.
Sanctuary and answers.

As they approached the top of the stairs, they were met with an imposing pair of wooden doors. “Do we just knock?” Katherine asked.

Langdon had been wondering the same thing, except that now one of the doors was creaking open.

“Who’s there?” a frail voice said. The face of a withered old man appeared in the doorway. He wore priest’s robes and a blank stare. His eyes were opaque and white, clouded with cataracts.

“My name is Robert Langdon,” he replied. “Katherine Solomon and I are seeking sanctuary.”

The blind man exhaled in relief. “Thank God. I’ve been expecting you.”