The Temple in the Sky, Fernando Herrera Jr [the rosie project .txt] 📗

By Fernando Herrera Jr.


First of all: thank you for opening this book.
Second of all: Know that this is only the first half of the story. Thank you.


The Temple in the Sky
And the Misinterpreted Foreign Pirates

Z
The Secret Aviator and His Riddle


A young boy climbed up the dangling vines that hung high by the walls of his chateau. At 1: 30 AM, he crept through the window of his princely bedroom and fell upon his bed to a lovely dream. He awoke from at 10:28AM, wrapped by his luxurious, silky bedcovers. The morning sunlight flickered through the curtains upon his freckled face, and as he stood up to close them, he heard a speedy knock on the door…
“Master Jasper, breakfast is ready…”

13326 Chesapeake St. was once the setting of an extravagant mansion that might as well have been ripped out from the pages of a book of fantasy. It was a magnum opus of a residence inspired by the British architectural concoction from the late Victorian era, which fuses the styles of the old European villages from the medieval period. A château of a scale and a diamond in the rough of an address, it presented a novel, white wrap-around front porch, which exhibited its warm, soft brick walls that proportioned some square, terra-cotta panels, with an arched side passage leading to an inner court and a back house. Its detailing was largely confined to the treatment of its picturesquely-disposed windows, with small-paned upper sashes and plate glass lower ones, monumental chimneys, many white painted balustrades and slate roofs; and at the finale—a lush, beautiful garden of wonderfully amalgamated florid-plants. This “Queen-Anne-Style” mansion was located in the wealthy coal town of Bramwell, West Virginia—a cute caricature of the “matter of fact” (please excuse my language), “boring” late-twentieth-century-architecture of “perfect function” and “neo-expressionism.”
Here was the setting of the holiday home of Jasper Wilbur Covington, a boy the age of ten—three months from eleven, to be precise—a freckled boy with jumbled up red hair: the result of a Caucasian concoction of very much Anglo and a bunch of bits of northwestern, European cistrons. Average of height for his age (“but a bit too skinny,” said the girls), he was “awkwardly cute:” awkward bone structure that was too much like a square, a cute nose like a button linked to a thick bridge, pretty but beady eyes that were as blue as gems sheltered by long orange-lashes, long ginger squiggles for hair that hid his scruffy brows, and insipidly pink lips that didn’t pout. He was that type of child one couldn’t help but notice for his unique appearance.
On a blustery weekend of the gloomy October, 1921, Jasper secretly escaped his holiday residence at 11:45 PM to his humongous “secret-playground of forking runways:” “The Covington Private Airport and Aviation Academy,” which was, quite opportunely, about a twenty minute bicycle ride from his temporary domicile. Inside the pilot’s cabin of one of his father’s small airplanes, he played a game which he had ingeniously titled, “The Aviator.”
You see, Jasper was a boy of luxury, casually accustomed to the fine commodities of the high-class society (the bourgeoisie or the crème de la crème, if I may) who therefore held endless of gratis entrées to any fountains of fun his frivolous spirit would often pine for. At his tender age he had experienced more than the plebeian people of our society probably will in their entire lives of mediocrity.
All of which was possible because of his father, James Covington, a filthy-rich billionaire-banker and aviator who had inherited his fortunes from his “forgotten” father, Jasper Covington Senior, a self made billionaire-banker and Doctor of anthropology.
Being a gentleman who was raised by strong family principles, James would see to it that his only son would be exposed to the marvelous wonders of the world. As pundit as his refined icon personified to appear, he still held the rare and otherwise impossible luxury of superfluous leisure-time to accede; so in a sense of false virtue, he became a “pseudo family-man.” Allow me to elucidate: Like many privileged men who jock the erudite do or did, he bore a deficiency in sapience and therefore misinterpreted the true concept of pedagogy and family ethics: he would see to it that this unmerited boy of his would be vilely granted with most of the family’s surplus cornucopia (note, without merit): thus, blemishing his son profusely. He turned him into a spoiled brat, is what I mean to say.
Young Jasper traveled around the world in company of his father and by the age of ten, had practically, in his own aplomb terms: “been there, done that.” James even taught him how to fly an airplane. After all, he did posses his own private airfield. It became Jasper’s portico playground of soaring control towers to the world; his to explore as he wished. Yet, with the immeasurable possibilities granted by his billionaire status of sheer opulence, still, for an unclear rationale, he remained a bored little boy. A possible origin for such enigma might have been that his little heart happened to beat continuously steady with rebellion; and perhaps even more so, that it was stuffed with a sort of vapid mischief; not to mention another underlying fact, that he happened to possess a rare and insatiably crude appetite for adventure. Due to his opulent but boring status, to him, the rest of the world became as dull as his own life; and for this grim-some of reasons, he preferred to dwell in his own little world: a world crafted by his thoughts and sculpted furthermore by his flamboyant imagination. He wanted more of that which to explore, more of that which the world was oblivious to, and more of that which people could not explain with sane logic. Indeed, explore the world further he would; beyond his own expectancies, rather; in his own aplomb terms: “seek the unknown, find the impossible, and prove it genuine.”
During holidays, his imagination flourished upon the notion of flight by the assistance of an authentic airdrome. After dark was when he would secretly make his wild escapades and play for as long as his perky heart desired. That particular night, he would exhaust his perky heart at precisely 12:52 AM, once coming to the glum realization that he was too slaphappy to continue on his pretend flight to Nepal. So, he took off the aviator headphones, along with the aviator goggles, put on his fine trench coat, and grabbed his brown leather backpack that contained the following exploration devices: a magnifying glass, a pair of fine binoculars, a compass, a small black radio, exactly three dollars and ten cents in various coins, a “Swiss” army-knife he stole from his father’s cupboard, a small black and white photograph of his beautiful mother, a paper bag containing his uneaten lunch, and his two favorite books: The Count of Monte Cristo and Alice in Wonderland (those books could thoroughly sum up his character). He escaped the lonely airport by shriveling his little body through a small rupture on the western lateral fence of the airport limits where his bicycle awaited.

Twenty minutes later, he climbed up the dangling vines that hung high by the walls of his chateau. At 1: 30 AM, he crept through the window of his princely bedroom and fell upon his bed to a lovely dream. He awoke from at 10:28AM, wrapped by his luxurious, silky bedcovers. The morning sunlight flickered through the curtains upon his freckled face, and as he stood up to close them, he heard a speedy knock on the door…
“Master Jasper, breakfast is ready…” It was the family butler, announcing with the utmost cliché accent of a proper English man.
“Oh, alright Jeffery, thank you. I’ll be right down.” I wonder what’s for breakfast, he wondered, as he swiftly pulled up his brown, checkered trousers and buttoned up his white, French-style, casual shirt; after which he ran into the bathroom to splash a whisk of cold water onto his face; but only before he sprinkled some of that water onto his jumbled hair; and all of that, just before taking a sharp comb and swiping it firmly through the dampness of his long, red curls. Once his face presented the necessary buff to join his refined family in early banquet, he tumbled down an elegant spiral stairway and into the vast dinning room, where his mother, father, and two little sisters (and Jeffery the butler, of course) waited impatiently for his arrival…
“Eggs Benedict? Again!? Gees. I shoulda known. It was Lucille’s suggestion again, wasn’t it?” he stated with a whippersnapper’s tone.
“No,” little Lucille humbly responded.
“Yes it was. They’re your favorite, you little twerp. Every Saturday morning you beg for the Eggs Benedict. You know I hate them! I hate that starchy glop! But you don’t care what I like, do you?” Jasper’s irritation was irrational. For unknown reasons, he utilized every opportunity that emerged to annoy his little sisters.
“Now Jasper, dear, where are your good manners? No need to get so rowdy at such early hours. Be nice to your sister and sit down and eat your breakfast,” spoke his mother.
Jasper’s father usually excused his wife’s rambling literacy with these words of his own improvise: “she’s only a blonde.” At which point, James gently set down his fork and spoke firmly while masticating, “Jeffery can prepare you whatever you want, Jasper.” To what his mother responded with a glare of annoyance.
“Spinach omelet—extra cheese, extra mushrooms… please,” he instructed to Jeffery.
“As you wish, young master—spinach omelet coming your way… Two eggs… three eggs… perhaps four?” Jeffery asked while picking eggs from a heaping basket.
“Three will be fine. Thank you, Jeffery.”
“You’re quite welcome, young sire.”
Five minutes later, a sizzling half-moon omelet was set atop the beige, sateen napery in front of him. He inhaled its volaille aroma and poked at it with a silver fork. When he did, a clock from rooms away knocked loudly announcing 11:00 AM.
“That clock is always so loud. Why don’t we get rid of it?” Jasper asked his parents.
“What? Bloody no! That grandfather clock belonged to your grandfather. It has sentimental value,” his father responded.
Jasper shrugged and went back to his omelet.

After breakfast, Jasper played in the vast garden of azonic plants at the mansion’s finale. He played a game which he ingeniously titled: “Edmond Dantès and the Pirates and their Quest for the Cristo Treasure.” He dug a deep hole into the loose soil of the garden, and unexpectedly hit something—hard. Although the Cristo treasure never was actually buried, nor was it necessary to use such wooden shovel, Jasper didn’t really have an undersea cave to play in, so that delightful garden would have to suffice. He struck metal to unknown metal with the metal spoon of the wooden shovel (cling!) and hunched to uncover the unknown thing with his hands. He spaded the dirt away excitedly (like a mischievous hound might burrow for a fleeing rabbit), until he uncovered a small metallic chest about the size of a shoe box. He took it and wiped the crusted dirt off with his sleeve, rubbing the top facet to reveal these neatly encrypted words: “OPEN ME: WILBUR” Well, that’s definitely the plan, he thought. “Hey, that’s me!” he yelled. But however will I unlock your little lock? he wondered. Oh boy. Real treasure! The box was locked with a silver lock that was also encrypted, except