There were reports that the President had been whisked away by car, through a tunnel, to a secret location near Washington, D.C.

This was after everyone at Andrews Air Force Base—the home of Air Force One—had been struck down by the ringing of the Siren bell in D.C. earlier. Unable to get to his plane, the President had had to go to his secure location by car.

The consensus among those who knew about such things was that the President had gone to the massive underground facility close to Camp David known as Raven Rock.

Iolanthe, Nobody and Bertie

The Papal Palace of Castel Gandolfo

20 km outside Rome, Italy

26 December, 1745 hours

Mounted on a lush tree-covered hill overlooking a gorgeous crater lake, the Papal Palace of Castel Gandolfo is one of the most luxurious, splendid and beautiful palaces in the world.

‘Wow, nice,’ Professor David ‘Nobody’ Black said as he flew Iolanthe and Bertie over the palace in a jet they had taken from Cairo International Airport.

While Jack had dashed off to enter the Supreme Labyrinth, Nobody, Iolanthe and Bertie had come here in search of the Blue Bell, or the Orphean Bell as some called it: the lone Siren bell that awoke people from the coma-like sleep caused by the other bells.

They all knew how important this was.

While they might’ve been able to wake up a few individuals one at a time with Dr Tracy Smith’s serum, they knew that whoever found the Blue Bell could use it to wake entire populations from the Siren sleep. It was vital to foiling Sphinx’s plan to let millions of people die in their comas before he stepped forward to rule the world.

They had to find the Blue Bell before his people did.

Already Sphinx had put a bunch of cities to sleep with the Siren bells, and even as they flew here, more cities around the world were falling by the hour.

With this in mind, they were following up on a clue to the Blue Bell’s location, something Zoe had found at the Vatican among the Pope’s personal papers.

Before he had been murdered by Sphinx, the Pope had ordered that the Church’s notes regarding the location of the Blue Bell be taken to ‘Albano’s emissary’.

Referencing those words, Bertie had suggested they come here.

It was just after sunset, but the sky still shone with a lingering orange glow. As they banked low over Castel Gandolfo, Bertie recounted its history.

‘Honestly, this palace is remarkably interesting and for several reasons.

‘First, for the last five hundred years, it has been the summer residence and vacation home of the Pope, although this practice ended with Pope Francis who didn’t like such ostentatious displays of wealth by the Church.

‘Secondly, legally speaking, it actually resembles a national embassy. The palace and its grounds are the sovereign territory of the Vatican State.