The Map had lain in the bottom of an urn along with Turin's Shroud for more than a century, and when the Holy Shroud was discovered, the map was moved to another safer location and was lost entirely to the rest of the world. It was kept by several monks, sworn to silence and secrecy, in Saint Stephan's Catacomb in Vienna, Austria. Finally when it was rediscovered by an excavation team, it was confiscated by the Vatican. With extreme care, the map was sent to the university of Harvard for authentication and analysis.
Though the university kept it quiet for Political reasons, it was authenticated as genuine. It was sent back to the Vatican and the whole ordeal was kept hushed.
The Vatican had already believed they had the "Holy Lance" in their possession. Krakow, Poland was certain they had at least a shard of the "Holy Lance"
Everything was kept so tightly under wrap, that hardly anyone knew of the map except a few. Most believed that the Holy Lance had been lost at the end of World War II, when Hitler had ravaged Holy sites and taken priceless artifacts for his own. Most assumed that Adolf Hitler had taken the Lance and had hidden it himself.
Now, evidence was beginning to surface, that the Lance had never been taken at all, that the True Holy Lance was at this moment hidden away, shrouded in secrecy as it had been for centuries. Whatever the answer was... it lay at the end of that map.
The Map is Parchment the original material of the map is assumed to have been deteriorating and it was recopied by the monks whom kept it safe. The original material and remnants of the map are tucked deep inside the copy.
The Copy is a map within the binding of a book. It is merely opened and unfolded, bound to the spine of the book. It then folds over back into it's leather and wood shell. There are parts of the map that are so faint that it is almost impossible to discern, water and wear has worn down the clear markings.
However the map could quite possibly lead to one of the most sought after Holy Relics of Catholicism.
Lawrence Preston is a thirty-two-year-old Archeologist graduated from Harvard University a few years after the authentication of an ancient map. Lawrence trained himself in the languages, theology, and philosophy as well as performing in the sciences. He graduated there with several of his closest friends. William Harkman, Sophia Illantra, and Jacob Simmons. The three organized an Archeological excavation team to recover and preserve priceless artifacts for America and for the world to which they belong.
Lawrence is as tall as his father, standing at 6' 2' and most often seen tramping about and under tents with his box of tools, usually followed closely by Sophia Illantra the group organizer. His heritage is a mingling of German and Polish like his mother, and Italian like his father. He has dark hair and even darker eyes, usually hidden by large sunglasses in the hot excavation camps where he works.
Besides his Father, mother, and sister he has a few cousins living out in New Jersey, the cousin he regularly keeps in contact with is Michael Sterling, a rather eccentric but oddly like-able type. His fellow graduates have worked with him every step of the way, since the moment they left their college behind.
Lawrence and Sophia spent a good deal of effort groveling for sponsorship from The Smithsonian Institute, and recently got enough funding to organize a daunting trip to northern most reaches of Russia following the artifact that they once authenticated for the Vatican over four years previous.
There was nothing that would give Lawrence more joy then to prove the existence of the Sacred Lance and testify to the world the Truth of Christ.
The location in which the map was hidden was Saint Stephan's Catacomb in Vienna, Austria. Since then it has been kept under lock and key by the Vatican in Rome. Behind the doors of this Historical structure, there are chambers and halls lines and adorned in sacred and beautiful works of art and sculpture. Passed the gilded structures and deeper beneath the heart of Rome, lies the most precious of its historical treasures. Pieces of the Holy Cross, The Remains of Saints, The Holy Nails, and The Shroud of Turin are but a few among the collection.
Archeological and theological wonders have been kept safe by the Church in times of great trial throughout history. There are a few relics missing from the vaults, however. The Holy Lance, the Ark of the Covenant, and the Holy Grail are three of the most sought after.
The map itself is kept deep in a steel vault, beneath the many floors of the magnificent building of Rome. It is removed only for upkeep and monthly cleaning.
Sophia Illantra is thirty-one years old, and graduated from Harvard at the same time that Lawrence, William, and Jacob did. She is a linguist, often tutoring Lawrence and the others during long excavations. She is a master at recognizing most hieroglyphics, and is well studied in History and ancient art.
Traveling with three men is often difficult for Sophia because she finds herself in the position of authority most of the time. Like a team of good friends they are comfortable with each other and therefore leave a mess about the campsites, which she tries to keep under control.
She stands at 5' 9" yet is constantly stooped over a book, or an artifact so it is hard to notice. She wears reading glasses when she needs them, but otherwise she keeps them about her neck on a chain. She has deep brown hair and light brown eyes.
Jacob Simmons is an American citizen born of Italian parents, he has brilliantly curly black hair and very Italian features. His skin is often tanned dark brown by the heat of the sun during their long excavations. He reads brail, and translates sign language, though he does not often use that knowledge on their trips.
Jacob is a burly man, standing at only 5' 7" he makes up for his stature in sheer brute strength. He is a botanist, and studies rocks and minerals profusely, often able to name the very type of soil that lies around the remains of the artifacts they uncover.
William Harkmen is the youngest in the group, a boy genius of his time, he is a mathematician and an astronomer. He turned to archeology when he began to grow fascinated with ancient people's theories of space and time. He wished to better understand their measurements of it and therefore finds himself all around the world helping Jacob pick dirt out of old Egyptian flowerpots.
He is 6' 1" blond haired and blue eyed. He was once very taken with Sophia and tried to impress her with his knowledge of mathematics, but when she simply didn't get it. He fell into being a bit of a wacky jokester to amuse her.
Lawrence wiped the sweat from his brow with the dark cloth on the desk, leaning over the map of the dig site. He was trying to determine the exact whereabouts of the next house they were about to uncover. It had been four weeks of back-breaking labor, digging in the sun, brushing ancient dust off of crumbling pottery. Exhaustion leached away his attentiveness for the task at hand, and the compass slipped in his hands a few times.
He paused a moment running his fingers through his dark hair so that it was now an erect mess, and propped his elbow on the creaking wooden table. A long sigh escaped his lungs. He could hear Jacob snoring loudly in the tent next door. He sank forward resting his chin one arm as he blinked at the paper in front of him, twiddling the compass in his left hand, watching it spin with an infinite slowness that made him drowsier still.
The compass quivered through its mechanics and began to fold inward on itself tugging out of his grasp toward the table. Lawrence frowned groggily. Since when did a compass quiver or tug? There was a snapping sound as the metal broke in half, both sides of the compass folding up into a tiny compact square in the palm of his hand. The peculiarity of this was so startlingly odd that Lawrence could have no real reaction to it except one of general wonder.
He watched with an intense interest now, then dropped the compass with a start as an entirely different shape exploded from the confines of the square and gave rest to a completely incompatible frame. A cylinder had emerged from within the square, only it was far bigger than the square had been. Inside its spatial skeleton clear, and fluid was a velvet night sky.
Lawrence froze, listening, checking if Jacob had stirred. When he was convinced that his friend still slept soundly, he sank back into his chair. Curiously, he leaned forward to further examine this bizarre object. Stars dappled the black night, white dust in a field of achromatic eternity. Cautiously he reached towards it, but quickly drew his hand back as an amber vein shot down the center of the cylinder and it suddenly broke into two parts. Its wingspan seemed to give birth to a screen, some navigational device. Fleeting information spread across its screen, filling him in on all the specifics of fluxes, and some sort of wormhole or porthole collapses.
Having studied quantum physics and the superstring theories, this information seemed to make some sense to Lawrence, though it was still baffling for him to grasp the exact method that this device was able to measure all that. Proceeding these thoughts, a sudden warp of perception sprang up before the map, adjacent to himself at the table. It whirled like a maelstrom in midair distorting the world behind it in a blur of movement. Information began to run down the screen of the device before him, flashing pictures of worlds, places he had never seen before...
"Lawrence for the love of heaven!"
His eyes snapped open quite suddenly and he found that he was starring at the side of his tent, the evidence of sunlight streaming through the thin skin. He blinked once or twice and shook his head, throwing a glance at the table where the compass.... still very much, nothing more than a piece of measuring metal lay where it had fallen on the paper.
"It's almost 7 am. We were supposed to meet Thorton down at site eleven by now!"
Lawrence looked up into the light of the tent entrance. The dark but unmistakable outline of Sophia was framed there, a messenger bag slung over her shoulder. For a moment he was reminded the blackness of the sleek cylinder upon the white parchment, how alien it was, and yet how very ancient it seemed.
With a flourish, Sophia disappeared, stepping out into the fractioned light and into the heat of the Egyptian sun.