Tesseract

“A toast,” Jannings announced. “To the Tesseract! To the granting of any with I desire!”

Browne paused, eyeing the professor as he drained the flute of champagne. With a shrug he turned his attention to his tankard of Akkadian beer. “What should we wish for?”

The archaeologist grinned and leaned back so far his chair squawked out in warning. Jannings ignored it and planted his dust-caked boots squarely on the cluttered desk. Caressing the champagne glass with weather-worn hands, he absently catalogued the uncountable artifacts in the cramped room. Cast-iron shelving reached right to the high ceiling, a moderately alphabetized storage system for over a hundred crates of all sizes, each in turn storing bones, relics, clay pottery, metal tools centuries old, scrolls and cuneiform tablets. Game trophies mounted whenever a patch of bare wall exposed itself. Tools stacked and piled beneath the dead animals, mud-caked from the digs: picks, shovels, brushes, axes, torches, rope, even a shotgun. But then one object caught his eye.

A carving of Ra-Phaneron made out of ivory, circa 2100 BC. Second rack directly above Dr. Browne’s seated bulk. Of itself, worthless. Perhaps a few shekels from a gullible tourist. But – and this is important, he thought – but what it could represent! What if they found such a statue, only of solid gold. Such priceless objects had been found, and not only just according to legend. Indeed, it was the driving impetus for many in the valley, and it preyed on his particular human weakness.

Regardless, he had the Tesseract, and that turned his weakness to strength.

“My dear Doctor Browne, I should think of nothing less than complete and total wealth. The only question is, in what form is it to be most desired?”

“Jannings, you’re absolutely decadent,” Browne chortled, pouring himself a second mug from the cask of ale, Jannings last remark no doubt swimming through his head as the alcohol swam through his bloodstream.

The lanky archaeologist giggled, imagining lifting the old fat man’s eyelids and finding only pound signs, and polished off his glass. “I’m dead serious, Reginald. This is my ticket. I want to be wealthy beyond my wildest dreams.”

Browne’s flushed cheeks fell into an odd, uncertain sort of smile, “You mean, we want to be wealthy. The Tesseract will grant only one wish, and we made a pact we’d be in full agreement on that wish.”

“You don’t want wealth? What else is there? Women? Wealth will get you that, Reg. Knowledge? This type of money would buy you lots of free leisure time to study anything.”

Browne paused, dancing about the bait, then bit. The booze made him do that; why else would he of such lineage be sweating out a daily existence here in the desert? He cleared his throat and asked, softly, “How about salvation, Dennis?”

“Salvation?” Jannings snorted. “Listen to you. Must I tell you again? You did nothing wrong.” His vibrant blue eyes icily evaluated his companion. “Did you hit your head on a brick in the tunnel, or something?” He leaned over the desk and poured Browne a – third? fourth? – tankard of ale. “Drink up. I’m not used to a sober Doctor Browne, and I don’t think I like what I hear.”

Browne fidgeted and fished out some meat snagged about his canine tooth. “Well, it’s all nonsense, anyway. Isn’t it, Dennis? Let’s just sell it to Hoskins in Baghdad. He’d give us, what, two, three hundred pounds for it?”

Jannings sat silent, his stare now on something that was not in the room with the two.

“Doctor Jannings, it’s all nonsense, anyway. Of course – ”

The archaeologist snapped to. “What’s that you’re jabbering about, Browne?”

“The Tesseract. Nonsense. The myths, that is.”

“Oh, yes. The myths.” Jannings leapt to his feet. “Now? Now, Browne? We’re having this talk, now?”

“Surely you don’t take the myths seriously!”

“Shadrick did. As did you. Certainly last night in the tunnels – ”

Browne’s rosy jowls purpled. “But Shadrick’s dead! And his death had nothing to do whatsoever with the Tesseract!”

Jannings cocked an eyebrow. “Indeed?”

The old fat man said nothing. Any trace of smile disappeared, and beneath those heavy cheeks Jannings thought he saw – surprisingly – a clenched jaw. Then, Browne’s rheumy eyes widened, that fat mouth flopped open, and his big bulk began heaving up and down.

“So you don’t take the myths seriously, do you, Reg?” Jannings hovered over the older man, who was now clutching his chest and audibly wheezing. “Well I want you to remember something, and quickly while you still have time.”

Browne tried to speak but failed.

“Shadrick didn’t believe the myths either.”

“Jannings …”

The skinny archaeologist wandered over to a certain metal rack and rummaged through a boxed-in crate. Moments later he withdrew a small, fist-sized object wrapped in yellowed gauze. He slowly and unselfconsciously embraced it, then kissed it.

Browne fell to the floor, squeezing his left shoulder and hyperventilating. He watched Janning, incredulous, and thought: the Tesseract!

Jannings turned and fell to his haunches. “Oh, there were myths, all right. But the most important one was wrong. Do you know what that one was?”

The old fat man merely winced in pain.

“You don’t get one wish – you get three!” Jannings laughed. “So, I still get my fabulous wealth. And we no longer have to worry about Shadrick’s crude extortion plots.” The archaeologist sprawled forward on his belly on the floor, put his face right up to Browne’s as if examining a new cuneiform find or the mummified remains of a grave robber trapped by its own greed.

“Can you guess my third wish?” Jannings whispered.

Browne’s eyes widened in realization.