The Heaven of Hell

23 July 2022

“So…it's 0900 hours…day-78 of the Site-3A expedition.” The soft and aged voice of the doctor ran throughout the shed…being recorded by his laptop. Dr. Viju Brijesh’s old and tired sound was accompanied by the electronic buzz over the other computers.

“Finally, the laptop has enough juice to run…the computers went nuts yesterday after having the last contact with the VSAT. By standard procedures, screens are to be kept on for 8 hours for a successful reboot…until then, we are isolated from the rest of the world.”

Exhaling, he continued, “Unesco’s program to explore the uninhabited sites described under various mythologies, now seems to have lost interest…the idea was absurd… I too feel it now…”.

“Feels like, we won’t get anything from here as well…Mansarovar was a failure and Innaarsuit was a disaster…there won’t be anyone this time to save us, not even shore team…well death is what you can expect between these winds and frost…and our comms are down for the next 8 hours or so. The South Pole is a mistake of mine…” Stopping for a moment, then in a sudden realisation he speaks, “Although this place checks out all…all by the books. Books believe the mountain to be somewhere at the end of the Capricorn constellation…the night never ends here… it's a frozen sea with white lands stretching beyond. It checks for all points for where the ruins of mount Mandra must have fallen after the Samudra Manthan…the place where at its core exists the Heaven. What am I doing!” Viju speaks with tremendous stress, with his palm on his face “…this is important for me, this is the only reason why I have been here…if nothing happens, I don’t know–”

CLANG…A sudden bang on the door interrupted the doctor. Rupert, the youngest member, stood outside the door breathing heavily from the sprint with over kilograms of clothing.

“Doctor, you’d really like to see this one…the rock we found…ain’t local…” In a hurry…catching his breath, he pointed towards the place where the dig team encircled near the crater they dug beside one of the lampstands. Viju gathered his tools, got dressed in a thick layer of winter land outfit and both of them rushed towards the rock.

The Antarctic lands, wide white stretch to horizons, and the glowing rivers in the sky across the starry dark banks. Only if there hadn’t been colourful jackets and auroras, the place might have seemed to be a 60s film.

“Huh, if the oldie’s correct…I'd surely get to spend some time with the angels…” Brandy, one of the crewmates, spilled just another stupid feeling of his…“Well yeah, only if he’s said anything like angels…” Collard interrupted. “Or if that archaeologist said anything like a proper city. C’mon, guys it's the ruins we are talking about.'' Benton, the alpha of the dig team, pointed out. “Angels and cities would have been a good idea…” Rupert intervened, walking towards the group with the doctor…

“Would you guys mind…” the only calm voice amongst the guys was the doctor’s. The doctor went closer to the chunk… “Hmm, definitely not granite…not local…it's, laterite or maybe red soil…” as Viju said this, his heart rate was elevated…joy was seen on his face.

“Well, it took a long time to shovel 5 feet of snow and dig 3 feet of ice…it better be good news,” Collard said. Viju broke a small chunk out and crushed it between his hands. He replied, “This is red and laterite soil fusions, not Antarctica's part…Samudra Manthan is expected to occur 3.9 million years from now. Indian-Subcontinent provided perfect conditions for this type of soil to exist. The mount used in Manthan was from India's northern region…”

“You mean to say, this chunk that we are referring to is your that 200 feet mountain down below, and we stand at its peak?” Rupert asked. “Well, yeah, that’s how long I'd expect the leftovers of Mandra to be…” Doctor in a voice reflecting his joy. “Wait…” Brandy jumped in, “How can a 200 feet mountain be here? I mean…this place is miles of ice below and if your churning was done 3.9 million years back, definitely the chunk must have made a deeper scar than just 200 feet”. “Yes,” Benton interrupted in the most serious tone he could, “The place in the south where we are standing can have roughly 2 miles deep ice sheet…coz if it's true…doctor, your mountain is a load longer than just 200 feet…”.

“I ain't digging a mile! I am not paid so much either!” Collard spoke out in a sudden worry, “Besides, I guess the locket’s enough for a relic...” “What locket?” Viju asked. Collard, handing over a hand bracelet to Viju, “Here you go…it's pure gold”. The bracelet was made of a silver chain and a small gold plate with a character inscribed on it. The doctor took a much closer look at the characters, “Hmm…Modern Chinese…how'd you find it?” “Our metal detector beeped quite strongly, more than it has in the past few weeks…we had nothing to do basically…so Rupert and I worked here on the digging site, Brandy-Collard found this bracelet.” Benton replied.

“Well, humans haven’t touched this place in years…and the depth we found the bracelet, it must be buried for almost seven hundred or maybe even eight…” Collard informed. Viju in quiet amusement replies, “The book does make sense now”. “You mean that Bhagwat Puran?” Rupert asked. “Umm, no…well, there’s another book…more like books. C’mon, Unesco won’t send me thousands of miles on just one book…but greatly, 5 more worked.” Doctor replied. “What books?” Benton asked.

The group moved back into the shed…everyone sat on their respective bunker beds. The doctor took his seat on the extreme side of the shed in front of the computers.

“We found the books 3 years back, near an old structure on the bank of the Yangtze river…the books belonged to a group of Chinese youth, who we are predicting to have existed almost 900 years back. The group used to study at Nalanda university…after leaving India, they made a trail of finding heaven on earth after referring to a few books related to this topic in the library. So, there were 5 of them, each possessing one book, and records like a diary being maintained. The group broke, each following their paths. By the records…3 of them stopped logging in after a year of starting exploration…2 in Mansarovar and one in the arctic. One of them, maybe the smartest…has his last records in his home place…from where he departed to a place in the south or as he refers - where Capricorn was no more visible and white and darkness took over the land and skies. We earlier thought the 5th guy died just months after start…but then, we found a similar style of handwriting on each book on the last page which was a similar style to that 5th guy…7 years after start…and just one line which translated from modern Chinese- The one with no sins shall pass…” Viju replied.

“Uhh, okay…so we are close…finding heaven…like a literal heaven coz, every block just perfectly fits,” Benton in his most excited tone. “Are the comms working?” Brandy asked. “Still no response…” Viju replied. “Umm…I guess we should start digging…after all, we are barely left with options…the weather might worsen in no time…it’s better we gather up some proof…and who knows, maybe some rich…” Collard suggested and the group agreed. After a short nap, the team moved to the digging site, and with new energy, they started scarring the ground. Astonishingly, the doctor worked with them…for the first time ever.

2-hours in…team made a nearly perfect circular crater around the seemingly different piece of land…roughly 12 feet below the surface. The doctor stood on the surface…he didn’t sweat but surely was exhausted. Brandy hit hard with his shovel at a certain part where the mountain was possibly weaker, which didn’t make a big deep hole…but it seemed to have disturbed the mountain. No sooner had the land been hit by a very strong earthquake, which initially made a deeper crater around the dig site. The group held the best position they could…confused and trembling with fear. The crater turned into a sinkhole, causing the land to fall at its centre. The landslide around caused the team and later on the doctor to follow the fall into the sinkhole.

“Doctor!”…patting Viju’s cheeks, Rupert brought him back to his consciousness…The doctor stood up. They finally were at the core. It was a dome down below…with a large hole due to the sinkhole on the roof, connecting the surface…which was initially the only source of light. Viju took out his torch and lit it up…and voilà- The entire place just lit up…pure white crystal bricks on the inner of the dome and the surface were designed such that one single source of strong light.

Distant Buildings…white-crytals and mesmerizing structures…Eden-like-gardens…and at the farthest at the centre stood a building…touching the surface of top…made of glass and crystal…which emitted the rays from the top. The most magnificent scene.

“It's a high drop…did we survive?”. “Yep, we did…”, Brandy replied. “Someone wanted us to…This is Heaven!!” Benton cried out loud and chuckled…so did the entire team. Viju started taking photos. Brandy, maybe searching for angels…while the rest three exploring. The team gathered back to the doctor to see the pictures, except Brandy.

Viju opened the captures...and, It was not what they were seeing. The dome was fleshy…imperfect. Human veins like ivy drooling downwards and across the dome…the buildings were big blobs and balls of meat connected by the veins from the top…Central building, it was like a beating-heart…felt as if it was inhabited by the damned. “The hell is this…” Collard in worry. “I don’t know, I took the pics of this…” doctor pointing…realizing it's all illusion.

“Oi! I told you there would be angels.” Brandy cried. The team looked at him. He pointed towards the big building. A silhouette of a woman floating in the air. The group ran towards Brandy...but he in his lust was running towards the figure. Benton almost made it, and as he was about to get hold of brandy, a spear shot out from the direction of silhouette…piercing Brandy’s head…and then along with his entire body, it sunk deep into the ground. The Group was shocked…within a blink of an eye, they lost a member. That demon disappeared. Benton looked back at the remaining team in certain demise when Collard shouted, “look behind Benton”…not even a moment passed…the woman figure…With no face, just a fleshy-blood-ridden body. was behind him. She made a scream like a hungry animal and strangled him along his neck and then the head was squeezed, his remaining body set free to fall to the floor. Blood flowed on white-crystal ground. Collard fell to the floor…unable to take in the situation, when the drooling veins started to appear only to him…that started covering his body. Viju and Rupert tried to pull him…from this invisible object for them that was pulling Collard up in the air…The veins started entering Collard’s body through his mouth and nostrils…stuffing him from inside…and eventually bursting him open from inside-out. Splatters of blood flew across the face of Viju and Rupert. Viju faced Rupert, both with mixed feelings, whether to survive, mourn or understand what is going on. Very soon Rupert blacked-out.

27th July 2022

“Ahh!” With a sudden gasp, Rupert woke up, in a bunker-like environment.

“You okay Sargent?” Asked the supervising doctor, “Who…who are you?” Rupert questioned in extreme confusion.

“We are the shore team, they found you near the expedition-site-3A, buried in ice” Informed the doctor pointing towards the soldiers in the bunker. “Where’s the rest team, we looked for them for three days…” a soldier tried to interrogate. “Crater!” Rupert panicked, breathing hastily... “What crater mate?...there was nothing there…” The soldiers looked at him in confusion. “Anyways, we found this bracelet in your pocket…why does it say Hell in Chinese?” Asked the doctor…in an effort to calm him down.

Rupert, the only survivor…the one who passed…amongst many who drowned.