Sidepodcast - All for F1 and F1 for all

Indianapolis Allen and the Chariot of Amon - Archaeology is the search for fact

Published by Jordan F1

Scene 1 - A Lecture Hall at Sidepodcastland University a lecture is being taught by Indy, and a impatient Stefen Von Rot is knocking at the door.

Indy: And so when L'Orient blew up during the Battle of the Nile, a French 36 pound cannonball was launched skyward, travelled a distance of one mile and still had enough force to smash a wall that was buried beneath the seabed some forty feet below the surface...

Interesting, the Head of the School is at the door, this looks like this is going to be a while so your homework is going to be how to determine the Torres Strait shipwreck is actually the HMS Pandora. Class dismissed.

Stefen, you know that I hate to be disturbed while doing my lectures. I was just coming to the point where Jacquie and I were able to dive into the Aboukir Bay Egyptian temple and then determined from the hieroglyphs found of the Scarabs to be Cleopatra VII's personal shrine.

Stefen: Sorry, Indy but I have two people from Naval Intelligence demanding to see you this instant. Come with me.

Indy: Naval Intelligence but what would they want with me?

Stefen: Well, here they are, Dr. Allen, Acting Sub-Lieutenant Aussiekiwi, Naval Intelligence, Gibraltar.

Indy: Lieutenant.

Stefen: And this gentleman is the Chief of the SIS, his name is...

Mr C: C just C.

Indy: Mr C.

Stefen: Everyone, please be seated.

Mr C: Please understand that the following information you are about hear is strictly classified. We have picked up an incoming signal from Cairo to Stuttgart:

"Tennis development proceeding. Acquire cog-piece Staff of Williams. Mrs C south-east England."

Stefen: My God, the Germans have discovered Tennis, do you know what this means?

Aussiekiwi: Either Steffi Graff come out of retirement or... Noooo! Roger's never going to win another match?

Indy: No Tennis is one of the presumed locations of where the Chariot of Amon is hidden.

Mr C: And what is a Chariot of Amon?

Indy: You know the Chariot of Amon the golden Chariot that the Egyptian Sun God Amon, Amun, Ammun, Ammun-Ra however you want to pronounce his name used to pull the sun from the east to west each day, if you believe that sort of thing.

Mr C: Wait a minute you mean to say that this chariot is as fast as the earth spins?

Stefen: Yes, roughly 900 miles per hour or 1450 km/h, with no latitudinal or longitudinal G Forces applied to the rider. Considering that Button barely broke 400 km at the Bonneville speed flats, and easily suffered G loads in excess of 4 G's in acceleration and deceleration, it should be clear why any racing team would love to get a hold of this chariot.

Mr C: Sounds a little far fetched don't you think.

Indy: It would be but there's this unexplainable event at the Circus Maximus in the year 32 AD. So remarkable that it made all the government reports of the period back then. Here's Greek text, Latin and Hebrew Bear in mind that the races where only 8 laps in length.

Mr C: Good God! Look at those Lap times!

Stefen: Yes, that's just what the race commentators thought.

Mr C: But the lap times! This Judah Ben-Hur could not have lapped the field six times in an eight lap race.

Indy: Specially when the red chariot team was being pulled by four black horses to Ben-Hur's two but then it was the blacks that where blown, and the other odd thing is that this Ben-Hur was an absolute rookie. Sort of like showing up at Spa at the F1 level without any racing experience and lapping the field a few times in the wet.

Mr C: I am beginning to see Schuie's interest in this Chariot.

Stefen: Yes, Autosport speaks of the race team driving the chariot before it being unstoppable. The way Schuie's handling Rosberg in qualifying and the racs, Schuie needs all the help he can get.

Mr C: Frankly I am suspicious of finding Mrs C's name being mentioned so highly in a top secret Mercedes document.

Stefen: "Rubbish! Mrs C and her husband are not Schuie supporters..."

Aussiekiwi: C, sir we found Mrs C at the front of her premises with her husband missing. She seems groggy and we can not make much sense of her. Every third and fourth word seems to be 'you know'. We also found this inside the charred remains of her apartment.

Stefen: The cog-piece of the staff of Williams! They have not swipped it! But what happened to you Mrs C?

Mrs C: Well, you know, I was robbed by, you know, I think it was Tony or Robby or Dale, you know it could have been one of the Bushes but I can't tell. You know, everyone was wearing these grey overalls expect their boss who was dressed in a turquoise suit.

Indy: She seems to be using an awful lot of 'you knows', right, Stefen?

Mrs C: Then there was like, you know, this fire and I you know - crawled out of my apartment and I saw the turquoise suited guy grab that gear in your hand and it burnt and imprinted itself onto his palm.

Stefen: Tell me what your name is, lass.

Mrs C: You know, Danica Patrick.

Mr C: Poor girl, the shock of getting robbed must have jarred her into thinking she's Danica Patrick!

Stefen: We better send her to the hospital, but I fear the only Doctor we have available is the veterinarian Dr. Kaj.

Indy: Ah yes the world-famous expert on Shetland Ponies. Don't worry Stefen, the worst that can happen is that Mrs C ends up a little horse. I better take the cog-piece along.

Scene 2: Sidepodcastland University Hospital

Indy: Doctor Kaj, this poor person has been suffering from a personality disorder for a few days. She thinks she is Danica Patrick. Is there any way you can treat her?

Kaj: Well, remember I am just a vet. However, I am reading a book on how to hypnotize people, so that might help her until some Human Doctor returns. But the example given in the book is a Chinese open-cockpit racing car driver.

Indy: Well, here's ho-pin it.

Kaj: Bite your Tung, Dr. Allen.

Stefen: Well, Indy you will be happy to hear that British Intelligence is prepared to fund this operation to make sure Mercedes does not get the Chariot of Amon. c just can not picture the thought of Schuie winning every single race until the end of days.

Indy: Stefen, do not these inscriptions on the cog-piece look Andronovian to you?

Stefen: That's because it is Andronovian. The symbol that looks like a giggling emotion is the giveaway. Grammatically, it is like a period.

Indy: Great, where in Egypt am I going to find someone who can read Andronovian?

Stefen: There that Gigglesander of Gigglesandria guy. He is supposed to be fluent in Andronovian.

Indy: Thanks Stefen. Can you call up Jacquie at the Jolly Rogers bar in Gigglesandria and arrange for this Giggles chap to meet me there? I still have to buy a pistol after that blonde dropped it in Shanghai.

Scene 3: The Jolly Rogers Bar, Gigglesandria, Egypt.

Indy: Hello Jacquie, you haven't changed a bit.

Jacquie: You...! You left me here with your friend BC for a month and he drank the place dry and now the bar's 10,000 in the hole.

Indy: Dollars?

Jacquie: Gallons!

Indy: Jez, I'll have Dr. Kaj look after him. A Horse Doctor is the best type of doctor for a person who can drink like a horse... Anyway we are being paid nicely by the British Government to stop an artifact from falling into the wrong hands so do not worry about BC's tab. Is Giggles around?

Jacquie: That's him table five, mind if I join you?

Indy: Hello I am Dr. Allen, are you Gigglesander of Gigglesandria, master of the ancient Andronovian language?

Giggles: Yes, I am and that I take it is the real cog-piece that you wish me to translate. Anything in particular or a full translation?

Indy: Just lengths and other measurements. What did you mean by real?

Giggles: There was a bunch of grey suited men before you. They had a crude copy of this head piece with inscriptions on one side only. They where told by their cog piece to attach it to a staff of four berris.

Jacquie: Four berris?

Indy: A berri was the old Andronovian form of measurement equal to about three cubits. Okay, I guess that's all we need to know. Where are they digging?

Giggles: I will show you. But first, on the other side, this inscription says remove one Barri to honour the God of Victory whose chariot this is.

Jacquie: They are digging at the wrong place!

Indy: Boy, Frank really had that one planned far in advance. But just to be sure, we better head to the dig site.

Scene 4: The Tennis Dig Site.

Jacquie: Strange that the Grey suits should just stop at night.

Indy: They think they won already. They are just waiting for the sun to come up to make it easier to see and for dramatic effect.

Giggles: Indy, why does the floor move?

Indy: Hand me the torch... worms, of all the stupid things, why does it have to be worms?

Giggles: Giant Earthworms. Not sure if they are dangerous, just to be sure, you go first.

Jacquie: Not your day Indy, not only does some joker figure out the only thing you are afraid of but imports tons of the biggest possible worms all the way here from Australia.

Giggles: Strange. That more looks like a modern day F1 car than any chariot I have seen.

Indy: Not sure, but this whole idea of finding a chariot for the highest god in Egypt in a tomb outside a working class city like Tennis is bugging me. You would think it would be in a tomb outside a capital city like Tanis, Memphis, Thebes or Gigglesandria.

Light another torch and throw it closer to the chariot I want to have enough light to have a closer look though these binoculars.

That thing's not a chariot at all! It's an modern F1 car, why it's Amon's AF101! You need to have both sides of the cog-piece for the translation to be accurate. That's not a chariot of an the Egyptian Sun God Amun, It's slang for the car belong to Chris Amon! (Coda to the Raider March starts here) Well, that is that everyone. I want travel to Sharm el Sheikh.

Jacquie: Wait - you are not going to leave that car to Mercedes are you?

Indy: They are welcome to it. Its total results come to three DNQ's, one DNF and a retirement due to brakes failure, in all of four races! That thing is more cursed than the Flying Dutchman.

Jacquie: You take that back! I had a crush on Jos Verstappen!

Indy: Well, when we get to Sharm el Sheikh we can do one two F1 related things, go to gamble at the Luxor in Las Vegas or go diving in the Red Sea.

Giggles: How can either one of those options be F1 related?

Indy: Well the Luxor was built on the old Caesar's Palace parking lot, where they held Grand Prix races in 1981 and 1982.

Jacquie: And the second?

Indy: We'll say we are looking for Schuie's 2012 WDC hopes?