F.B.I HQ, Washington DC, 9:45 pm (3:45 am Local time)
Agent Eisenhower shut his Sony Vaio as the audio file ended. He looked at the two college students who had brought him one of the biggest twists related to the recent attacks that took place. He gave himself a light laugh, "this has got to be one of the craziest days of my life!"
Gabriel and Mavis exchanged glances. Our professor is kidnapped and this guy is laughing his head off? The building was eerily silent, mostly because it was three forty five in the morning. The only reason Eisenhower was here because it was a 'twist that would shock the world'.
"It sure as hell is going to shock the world!" he exclaimed, agreeing with their statement. "The Islamic State hasn't released a statement, nor have Al-Qaida. It seems pretty convincing to me" he said.
He now got serious, "If this isn't related to Islamic extremism, what is it?" No one the room knew the exact answer to that question.
Mavis spoke up, "In the file, the other guy asks 'what do you know? Like he's demanding information" she informed. Gabriel let out a sigh, "The file goes blank after that."
"This information has to be shared with the Swiss, they're gonna need our assistance, our citizen is in danger and who knows what these people are up to next." Eisenhower's tone was dead serious.
This was matter of international security.
* * *
Gold Horizon Hotel, Vienna, 10:06 pm
"Have a seat" Subramanian said to Sadowsky, who just looked in confusion. Does this guy have a double identity or is he plain crazy? He had rough day, he was kidnapped, shot at, tortured, stuffed in a bag and drugged all because of that man, Subramanian.
Now, he was offering him a seat in a five star hotel suite and an exotic vegetarian meal. "Perhaps we got off the wrong foot." Got off the wrong foot?!
"I think you should live your life while you can." Oh here he is.
Sadowsky sat down and began having his meal. His kidnapper joined him. "You have a family, professor?" He stopped cold; he hadn't seen his family in years. He really didn't feel like talking about it but he finally managed to do it, "My wife passed away, my son was kidnapped." He said with his voice shaking, he had no one to call his own.
Subramanian's stone cold heart made Sadowsky feel worse, "Don't worry, once we get our hands on that pen drive you'll join them."
"Join them?" Sadowsky growled. He was furious inside, so much rage. He wanted to tear him into pieces, crack his skull. Gradually, his anger cooled down, he managed to calm himself down. "There is no joining anybody. Death is death."
Subramanian laughed at the professor's remark, the man who taught ancient history at prestigious colleges in the United States didn't know anything about the scientific advancements of the ancient world, "You are so naive, my friend." He continued laughing.
"Death," he said, "is only the beginning."
Sadowsky couldn't believe what he was hearing. It seems that even Subramanian had the joined the club of incompetent science fiction fans.
"Okay, so we go to heaven?" he asked sarcastically. Now, he had forgotten everything about his family and focused his attention on his captor.
Subramanian nodded, answering Sadowsky's sarcastically asked question with one simple action.
"I'd like you to elaborate." He requested. What is this guy going to come up with now?
"We have something called consciousness; our body is powered by something, something that allows us to think, visualize, recall, and dream." Subramanian was getting onto something here.
"The Aryans called it atman."
Sadowsky enquiringly raised his eyebrow.
"In Latin it's called anima." He immediately got to know what he was referring to. It was one of the most well known theories of the ancient world.
"The human soul," Sadowsky answered for him, completing Subramanian's point.
He continued, "One of the laws of thermodynamics states that energy can neither be created nor destroyed." Sadowsky nodded, this was a basic concept in science.
"This energy or to be more precise the soul, powers our brains, once somebody dies their soul cannot be destroyed, it has to depart, leave for someplace in the sky. Perhaps an extra dimension or a parallel universe. It joins the ultimate soul, a collection of all the souls. Which we call-"
"God," Sadowsky interjected helpfully for him. Subramanian smiled, "you catch up very well," he commented and then continued.
"This 'ultimate soul' can be also interpreted as heaven or hell. The good soul and bad soul theory was just created by people to prevent any wrongdoing and crimes. In reality-"
"As above, so below." Sadowsky cut in once again, this slightly annoyed Subramanian but he tried his best to ignore it.
"Yes, so when they say in heaven you join God or in hell you join Satan they mean it, literally. Heaven and hell, God and the Devil are just two sides of the same coin," he explained. He was beaming with excitement.
This topic had intrigued him ever since he had been a child, especially ever since his mother had left this world; he was desperate to see her face one last time.
All of a sudden Sadowsky was hooked, no matter how hard he tried not to believe it, he couldn't resist the feeling of just wondering about it. Then he just shook his head.
"How would they know about this but not us, a scientifically advanced species?" He inquired.
Subramanian looked into Sadowsky's eyes, as if he knew that Sadowsky knew the answer to that question. "You know, don't you?"
He recalled a lecture on ancient philosophy he had attended when he was in college.
A young man rushed into the lecture hall, he was relieved to find out that the lecturer had not arrived yet. The hall was stuffed; the only seat he saw was available was in the last row. "Great," he muttered to himself.
Moments later after plumping onto his seat, Ben Sadowsky jolted up, as the professor entered the lecture hall, he was greeted with respect.
The professor waved his hands to the crowd as if he were a celebrity. The crowd sat down, allowing him to start his speech.
He began with a few examples of knowledge which the ancients had possessed, star systems, surgery, ayurvedic medicines and whatnot.
Then came the interesting part, "Did you know what Albert Einstein, Erwin Schrödinger and Verner Heisenberg all have in common, besides being German and theoretical physicists?" He asked, hoping that someone would answer.
No one raised their hands except for Ben Sadowsky in the back.
He stood up and straightened his shirt, looking to make a good impression. "Both of them studied the Bhagvad Gita for their theories," he answered.
"Exactly!" he exclaimed, "The Bhagvad Gita is an ancient book sacred to the Hindus, according to myth, their Lord Krishna came from the skies and taught the humans with the help of a book he wrote, which is the Bhagvad Gita. They didn't understand the scientific importance for thousands of years until Einstein and Schrödinger. And that was just them, who knows what the ancient books have in store for us. Also there's an epic of the Mahabharata, which was an ancient war of the gods fought thousands of years ago, it spoke of weapons of unimaginable power, flying wingless aircraft, technology even too advanced for us to comprehend!" He exclaimed.
"But," he said, "you have to ask yourself one question," raising one finger. "Thousands of years old, 21st century technology, how did they achieve this?"
No one raised their hands up, mainly because they didn't want to make themselves look stupid by saying something like 'aliens' , 'time travel' or anything else that sounded illogical.
"Aliens!" shouted an anonymous voice in the back. The class roared with laughter.
The professor chuckled, "you're not wrong, whatever you think, be it aliens or time travel, whatever. It is something that's extraordinary, mind-blowing." His voice beaming with excitement.
"I'm Professor Langley and thank you for being with me today." He concluded.
Sadowsky came back to the present day as if he had just woken up from a dream. "You can't be serious," said Sadowsky, like he was a bit angry at Subramanian's incompetence.
"I'm an academic, I don't believe in fairytales,"
Subramanian was irked by his opinion; he took it as an insult. "You obviously choose to believe what your fellow employees do, but not what you want to."
"We are not friends" said Sadowsky firmly; he had no intentions of becoming best friends with this monster.
"And," he said, "I am not buying your shit." He leaned back against his chair.
Subramanian ignored Sadowsky's remark and got up and looked at him, "we've a big day tomorrow, better get some sleep," and left the room, leaving him speechless.
* * *