“I'll start with what I remember. There was a war—a war that spanned across most of the known world. I fought in that war, many of us did. Many of us died. It was the greatest war to end all wars. So we fought like hell itself against what felt like a never-ending enemy.

  “My name is Benjamin Francis Edward, and I started my fight against evil in 1942. I remember many of us guys enlisted the day after high school. It just felt like the right thing to do at the time. I was the first New York fighter pilot in my family. My ma was so proud.

  “After completing boot camp and training, I was in my first pair of wings. Alongside me were some of the bravest men I've ever had the pleasure of working with. Two names stuck out in my mind, though—Steven and Sam. They were like brothers to me. We stood by each other through it all. In the end, they learned how to fly, too. But the real reward was learning to fly in the P-40 Kittyhawk.

  “Being up in the sky with them was one of the most beautiful experiences of my life. I know it was all fun and games, but there was something completely freeing when you're right next to the people you trust the most in this world. Finally, our orders came, and we were deployed. We sailed across the Atlantic, past the Mediterranean, to fight in the North African theater. We were stationed near the Suez Canal.

  “The posting was pretty clear-cut: help the Allies fight for valuable resources against the Nazi regime. So my brothers took to the skies and fought like mad dogs. For every one of their planes we took down, we left a little mark on the outside of our plane, signifying how many enemy combatants we shot down.

  “We fought for every inch of that valuable land and oil, tore at that face of evil tooth and nail some days, knowing that any day could be our last.

  “This was the lifeblood for the Nazi regime. The number one place to obtain new resources to fuel their war machines. The Suez Canal provided a key route for the transportation of raw materials. Until one day, my brothers and I, as well as so many others, rained down on them like angry and pissed off ants. The Allies gained control of the Canal. It was one of the final punctures to the arteries of this monster. Now we just had to make sure it bled out. This victory and the many after it allowed our Allies to move quickly against the Nazis.

  “Like so many others, I knew this war was ending, but my superior officers intercepted a coded German message. They believed they’d found an ancient, infinite energy source. The only problem with this was that the location was in a blank spot on the map. Aerial surveillance showed a few dugout monuments. Nearby was a river that fed into what appeared to be some sort of disheveled pyramid.

  “In the past, we had stopped the Jerries a few times from defiling, butchering cultures, and pillaging magnificent art. So, we chalked it up to them doing something similar with this piece of history. The only problem was that the primary leader who controlled a large part of the Nazi forces in that region was going there as well. Apparently, his idea was to pull infinite energy resources through ancient culture. You know, run of the mill eccentric, crazy, Nazi shi—sorry, stuff. Steven, Sam, and I were selected for this task. Our mission was as follows: to capture or kill the Nazi commander and obtain or destroy the ancient power. So we mobilized. Never in our wildest dreams would we have expected what would happen next.

  “We took off under the cover of night, hoping to gain the element of surprise. But with this being northern Africa, the plains were flat and the open sky full of stars. Fortunately, all focus was on the location. Our intel was spot on. Only the sight of it twisted my guts. I heard Sam and Steven curse and swear.

  “I still feel the ache in my eyes. The image seemed to be burned into my retinas. Looking down from the cockpit, I saw the dugout pyramid. It was partially submerged in an underground reservoir. A flood of white light was cast onto the pyramid. Instead of reflecting back, it changed into an eerie dark blue, drenching the surrounding landscape.

  “With our mission in mind, we landed a few klicks off to the east. Radio silent, we headed on foot toward the pyramid to capture or assassinate the Nazi general. We also wanted to see if we could acquire whatever hidden technology, art, what-have-you was uncovered; if not, then we definitely didn’t want it in the hands of the enemy. We brought some bombs as insurance.

  “Sam’s job was to cut their power source, and Steven had the fun job: demolitions. We had a small window of time before we figured our planes would be spotted, so we marked down the time for two hours. We headed toward the dig site.

  “Over the span of the first hour, we snuck in behind the enemy lines and broke into their information tents to see a map of the area and really get a lay of the land. From what we could gather, it looked like the Nazis had already entered the structure.

  “‘All right, boys,’ I said, addressing my men. ‘Just like we planned, we do it quick-like.’ I started for the back of the tent. ‘Oh, and Sam?’ I said, turning toward my blond-headed friend.

  “‘Yeah?’ he replied, a questioning look on his face.

  “‘Try not to fraternize with any Germans this time.’ Steven and I shared a silent smirk at Sam's expense, breaking the tension around us. After a moment, I nodded one final time and headed out the back. It was time to shut whatever this was down.

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  “The directions I gathered from the information tent had led me to a hidden entrance near the east side of the pyramid. The wall there was partly an optical illusion. Thankfully, some of the Germans had left arrows with clear chalk on the ground. Making my way inside, I let my eyes wander around the halls, noticing hieroglyphs and dictations of an ancient civilization lining the walls.

  “It smelled like sulfur and something sweet. My nose couldn't help but catch scents that reminded me of home, like the flowers and herbs from my mother’s raised garden bed, the smell of fresh tomatoes in the summer, and my father’s aftershave on a Sunday morning. I shook my head, trying to focus on the present.

  “It was so dark inside that the only source of light was my handheld flashlight. The map didn’t cover the existence of this place; it was a maze. I must have taken a wrong turn because I accidentally found myself in the mouth of the tunnel. The light emanating from that direction was the same eerie dark blue. My head was killing me, but I had the wherewithal to flick off the light in my hand before approaching the mouth any further.

  “There couldn't have been a more perfect position. I was above some sort of tomb. The flood lights were trying to illuminate the space, but the stone drank in the light, flooding my eyes with that blotted color outline. Nearly blind and with a splitting headache, I moved my fighter pilot goggles over my eyes and forced my eyes open. There were four pillars in each corner holding the ceiling up. All around, depictions of creatures ascending the pillars. Some had humanoid faces, others were animal hybrids. But there was a sort of pattern. And as the pain increased in my head, so did the clarity of the pattern. I knew I needed to focus, but I couldn't help but feel sad. Looking at it more closely, I noticed it showed the same woman reaching upward, face contorted in pain. It was a story of someone being left behind. It could have been a minute or an hour; it didn't occur to me that I was staring until I realized someone had already walked into the tomb. I willed my eyes to scan the targets.

  “There, on the lower ground, approaching the tomb was that Nazi scumbag. I knew it was him because of his stupid walk. Every bad guy always has a stupid walk. That, and I'd seen his picture in the reports. He walked up those steps, arms outstretched toward the tomb, chanting. I don’t speak a lot of German, but I knew the garbled nonsense coming out of his mouth wasn’t any kind of tongue I'd ever heard at church. The Jerry’s tongue too decided to play along, and with everything else in this room, increased my headache into a full-blown migraine. I never felt anything like it.

  “In between the swirling nausea and blinding white pain behind my eyes, his words, foreign but now familiar, tried to make sense in my mind. Images of hieroglyphs flashed between blinks like afterimages from a camera flash. They flashed in front of my eyes one after another. Their story tried to reach out to my mind, trying to make me, force me, to understand. I like to think my catholic background and general need for survival kicked in right when I needed to. Sister Glenna Catherine always said, ‘The Lord provides,’ and I always figured she kind of needed that to be the case, what with her being a nun, but, man, did He ever. He, God, the Universe, whatever it was, it screamed at me to stop this man, and quickly.

  “My eyes refused to refocus, but I did see my target reach his hands forward as the tomb began to glow and shake violently. I’d had enough of it. I pulled out my gun and tried to line up my shot, but with my head throbbing, I knew I wasn't going to get it. I holstered the weapon and instead decided to go with plan B. Demolitions. My choice cut will always be a grenade. In fact, I was so scared I threw two! This wasn't the most spacious room, so I turned tail and ran as fast as I could, stumbling over every step and trying to push through the vertigo and fear.

  “Unfortunately, this made my head hurt even worse. I vomited at some point. It was like something was crawling inside my mind—chittering voices of the same language, chanting that exact phrase. The hieroglyphs appeared to move, trying to reveal to me more of the messages of a history long forgotten. And, in my opinion, it should stay forgotten. A loud concussive force knocked me onto my hands and knees.

  “At some point, I exited the pyramid, but that haunting glow only intensified. Now the creepy light spilled out of the pyramid’s crevices, causing the whole place to light up like a blue Christmas tree. It was so beautiful and terrifying, I remember falling and landing on my back, the impact shocking my vision. More explosives went off. I scrambled to my feet and ran as fast as I could back to the rendezvous.

  “Once I got back to my jet, I spared a glance down at my timer. Somehow, I was right on time. The rest of my boys showed up too, a little banged up with their own stories, but we wasted no time. With explosives going off all around the Nazi camp, our job was done, so we loaded up and hit the skies.

  “In the air, I tried not to look down, but my eyes couldn’t stop the light reflecting off my cockpit. A moment later, that mysterious, creepy, glowing pyramid pierced the glass shell, and the excruciating headache came rushing back.

  “I had the worst luck that day, I guess, because that bright light also exposed our jets to the enemy. Apparently, word had gotten out faster than we thought, and some German Acers were already en route. We all knew the dogfight was unavoidable.

  “Fighting in the afterglow of that pyramid for a few minutes felt like a few hours. Between the gunfire, flight maneuvers, and the pounding of my head, I knew I was at the end of my line.

  “I don't know if you've ever heard of a German Acer, but they had us dead to rights. I remember my vision getting blurry from the head pain and the sound of my plane getting hit. The pounding of my blood in my ears hurt so bad. My mouth moved on its own, tasting blood. The images of the temple fluttered across my vision. I couldn't stop myself from repeating the words that I heard in that temple. I couldn't help it.

  “I tried to steady my wrist and pull up, but knew I was going down. As I was graying out, all I could think to do was keep repeating that same phrase over and over again. Right before I hit the ground, the glow of the pyramid was shining all around me. I remember the fire in my cockpit. I angled my P-40 into the remains of that pyramid, closing my eyes.

  “I braced for impact.

  “Then I woke up here, next to her, standing in front of a black door.”