Deity (41 page)

“I
can’t,” Lori snapped. “I’m not a contortionist.”

Dr.
Peet hesitated and for a moment Lori thought he’d given up. “Lori,” he said. “I’m
sorry if I betrayed you, but I need you to trust me now.”

Lori
had trusted him before. She wanted to trust him again. In fact, she did trust
him. She felt his warm hands tighten around her left wrist.

“Are
you ready?”

Ready for
what
?

“Wait.
Dr. Peet!”

* * * *

Peet
grimaced as he braced himself. He had a firm grip on Lori’s wrist. Before Lori
could react, and before he was honestly ready
himself
,
he pulled at her arm with all his strength. He felt her back jam against the
pillar, and then there was the give he’d hoped for.

Lori
released a painful screech but immediately suppressed it beneath the humming of
the chamber. Peet nervously glanced at Abe who didn’t seem to have heard
anything.

Lori
groaned in pain. “You dirty son-of-a-bitch! You broke my arm!”

“It’s
just a dislocated shoulder,” Peet said, working faster now and hoping he could
pull her around the pillar fast enough when the bullets started flying. But as
he lifted her arms over the top of the pillar he suddenly noticed a deep hole
where the pillar-ball had been seated. Lori whimpered with relief as her arms
dropped at her back. She prepared to move but Peet pulled her back against the
pillar.

“Wait.
Don’t move,” he ordered.

“What?”
Lori barked. “I thought—”

“Not
yet. We can’t let Abe suspect anything.”

“You’re
not making any sense,” Lori gruffed.

Peet
leaned over the top of the pillar to inspect the dark hole more closely. It
wasn’t like the gear-shaped impression that had awaited the Kin piece in the
Izapa pillar. This hole was round and deep and to his surprise, it contained a
Kin piece of its own. But this stone gear rested upon a metal rod centered
within the hole. There was space between the teeth of the Kin piece and the
inner wall of the hole. Space enough for more gears.

“Planetary
gears,” he gasped.

“Planetary what?”
Lori asked over her
shoulder.

Just
like the turbo in KC’s plane. However, the Kin piece was missing its planetary
gears.
No wonder the pillar ball didn’t turn the pillar.
It wasn’t meant to. Instead, it was something inside the pillar that needed to
be moved.

“Where
are the planetary gears?”

“What
are you talking about? The ancient Maya didn’t have gear technology.”

“They
didn’t even have wheels,” Peet agreed. None of it added up. The dynamited
tunnel, the mechanical hum—he’d long
come
to the
conclusion that the calendar wheel was not the invention of pre-Columbian
people, but the stunt of modern hands.
But why?
Was
the calendar wheel just some magnificent hoax? Was Abe too blinded by his
illusions to see it?

A
bullet suddenly clipped the very edge of the pillar and ricocheted into the
chamber behind the booming echo of the gun blast. Peet’s heart stopped. Lori
was noticeably trembling now, but to her credit, she remained standing as
though still tied to the pillar.

“My
aim will get better if I don’t see this wheel turning soon!” Abe hollered from
across the chamber.

Peet
swallowed hard. His mind raced frantically. What step had he missed? Where was
he supposed to find the planetary gears?

“The
cross,” Lori suddenly called over her shoulder. “If its gears you need, the
arms of the Talking Cross might work.”

Peet
kneeled down at the crucifix protruding from the top of the pillar ball at his
feet. The three gear-shaped arms did appear to be the right size. In fact, upon
closer inspection, Peet noticed a small symbol etched into the top end of the
cross. It was the Mayan Uinal symbol, and it was repeated on each end of the
cross-arms.

“Brilliant,
Lori!” he gasped with excitement. “You found the Uinal pieces!”

Quickly,
he grabbed one of the arms and yanked. It broke free at a joint clearly
intended for such action. The other two arms broke away just as easily, leaving
only a stub of the cross’ shaft sticking out of the pillar ball.

Father
Ruiz wasn’t going to like this, but he would have to be dealt with later. Excitedly,
Peet slipped the Uinal shafts around the Kin piece. They fit perfectly, their
teeth joining those of the Kin piece and the inner wall of the hole.

“Hurry,”
Lori mumbled. “They’re making me nervous!”

As Peet reached for the pillar ball, more
gunshots echoed through the chamber.
Lori whimpered, but these shots didn’t come
from Abe or his men. Instead, they were distant, penetrating the chamber from
the tunnel. Someone was shooting outside, and there were a lot of them.

“
Get that wheel
moving!” Abe ordered over the haunting echoes
of battle.

Quickly,
Peet returned the ball to the top of the pillar. It just had to work this time.

“Brace
yourself
, Lori!” he warned. He grabbed onto the pillar
himself, preparing for the wheel to suddenly shift beneath him.

He
spun the pillar ball.

Nothing
happened.

From The Ravine

Chac
Bacab threw himself against the ravine pillar the instant he heard the first
AK47 tear through the jungle. He’d been ready, waiting for the shots. They were
his call to action when only moments before he’d been sitting so docile and patient.

If
there was one thing Chac was good at it was maintaining patience. He also had a
strong inclination to trust people which made it easier to wait on those whom
he held faith in. And in situations like this, reliability was priceless.

The
shots came straight up the ravine, just as expected. Abdullah’s men sprang into
motion, firing back upon their hidden assailants.

Father
Ruiz caught a glimpse of the masked rebels, circling along the rim of the
ravine. “Dear God, we’re trapped!” the priest panted, falling at Chac’s feet
for what little cover the pillar offered. Panic had taken root in his eyes. “The
Zapatistas are surrounding us!”

Chac
would have smacked him if his hands weren’t tied behind him. “Don’t you get
it?” he barked over the gunplay. “They’re the good guys!”

As
if to prove his point, Abdullah’s guard who’d been standing over them at the
pillar suddenly fell right on top of the priest, blood draining from the bullet
hole in his head. As Father Ruiz frantically squirmed to get out from beneath
the dead
mujahid
, Chac took the
opportunity to lift the handcuff keys off the body.

“If
your Zapatistas are the good guys, then why did they shoot down our plane?” Father
Ruiz argued, still wiggling to get free.

“Mistaken identity.”

With
a bit of fumbling Chac managed to unlock his cuffs and immediately reached for
the pillar ball.

“Get
down!” the priest snapped. “Are you trying to get shot?”

“We
have to find the Calendar Room.”

“Abe
already found it, in that cave.”

Chac
grabbed the pillar ball. A bullet zinged off the stone, just missing his face
by centimeters. “The cave’s a decoy,” he said, turning the ball
counter-clockwise.

“What
do you
mean,
a decoy?”

“I
mean exactly that. We created a decoy to keep Abdullah from locating the
original. Problem is
,
I don’t know the exact location
of the original myself.”

“I
don’t understand.”

The
pillar ball clinked to a stop and the pillar immediately sank two feet into the
ground, locked. The Calendar Deity now faced away from the cave, up the side of
the ravine where three fellow Zapatistas were waiting to cover him.

“The
ancient Maya had nothing to do with this place,” Chac explained bluntly. “That’s
all you need to know.” And with that he started in the new direction given by
the pillar.

“What
about me?” Father Ruiz called after him. Chac looked back. The little priest
looked pitiful, crouched and trembling behind the pillar, the guard’s blood
smeared over his collar. “A good guy wouldn’t leave a defenseless priest to die
on the battlefield, would he?”

Chac
hesitated, and then irritably relented. The last thing he needed was a
tag-along to slow him down, but the priest was right. He couldn’t just leave
him helplessly exposed on a field of flying bullets. Quickly, he released
Father Ruiz’ handcuffs and together they raced up the slope of the ravine, dodging
bullets and hoping like hell the Zapatistas cover fire was sufficient for their
escape.

It
was.

They
topped the ravine without so much as a scratch, but Chac didn’t stop there. In
fact, he didn’t even pause to acknowledge his masked companions and they didn’t
stop firing down upon the
mujahedin
trapped within the ravine. They all had their tasks to do. Chac’s duty had just
begun. To his credit, Father Ruiz didn’t fall behind.

“How
will we get the Talking Cross back?” the priest asked as they dodged into the
trees.

“You
needn’t worry about that cross,” Chac said, his eyes searching straight ahead.

“I
suppose you’re going to tell me it was a decoy as well?”

“It’s
a long story.”

“I
can walk and chew gum at the same time. Imagine what my ears can do while I’m
running.”

Chac
slowed his pace as they reached a small outcropping of rock. He searched,
noting its location directly beneath the volcano’s cleft peak. This had to be
the place.

“You
can’t possibly convince me that the reliquary crucifix is just another
Zapatista decoy intended to confuse Abe,” the priest said. “General Bravo
captured the Talking Cross himself when he defeated the Cruzob in 1901. It was
safe in our chapel long before the Zapatistas ever banded together.”

“You’re
right,” Chac admitted. “The cross isn’t a Zapatista hoax. The Cruzob came up
with that one
themselves
.”

“What?”

“They
successfully pulled the wool over General Bravo’s eyes, not to mention the
Mexican government and the Catholic Church. They wanted you to believe you’d
captured the Talking Cross.”

“Impossible.”

“But
it worked. The real Talking Cross has never been out of Maya hands.”

Chac
searched the rock wall, looking for any inconsistencies in the stone. The
sounds of war echoed from the ravine behind them, prompting him to hurry. He
rapped his knuckles along the stone wall like legend instructed until finally,
he struck a bulging rock that sounded hollow. He felt Father Ruiz watching him
closely as he pried his fingers against the rock, pulling it away from the wall
to reveal a security panel imbedded into the natural stone.

Chac
reached down into the front of his shirt and found the small pocket sewn
discretely over his left breast. There he found his security card,
intentionally placed there so that if the
mujahedin
ever shot him in the heart, they’d also destroy the one item he could never
afford to lose to them.

With
Father Ruiz curiously waiting nearby, Chac swiped his card through the security
panel. There was a click and a sheet of stone suddenly shifted in front of him.
Chac pushed against it and it swung open—a door to a dark interior.

Chac
led the way inside.

* * * *

“What
is this?” Father Ruiz asked as the light from Chac’s LED flashlight glowed off
the walls, ceiling and steps of a steep, boxy stairway.

“We’re
going down to the Calendar Room,” Chac explained over the echo of his boots
thumping down the steps.

“You
mean the original Long Count Calendar is down here?”

“The
original doesn’t exist.”

Down,
down, down they went, like explorers penetrating an ancient tomb. Father Ruiz
didn’t like feeling so enclosed, so trapped. Any minute Abe’s men could come
pouring down the stairway and their only escape was forever downward.

“What
do you mean it doesn’t exist? Why call it the Calendar Room if there’s no
calendar at all?”

Chac
dropped off the last step and paused to flick a switch on the wall. Light
flooded the small room before them.

“It’s
just a name someone came up with,” Chac said. “The moniker stuck. All it
amounts to is an elaborate time capsule really.”

Father
Ruiz immediately understood. The room they’d stepped into was small, like a
bomb shelter. Inside however, was a diverse collection of Mayan treasure. Ancient
stone stelae lined the far wall while stacks of sacred codices from all across Mexico
cluttered the near corner, the Popol Vuh and the Chilam Balam visibly among
them. Frescoes of Kukulkan and every other Mesoamerican deity imaginable
guarded the tomb from their places on the walls while central to it all was a
cache of archaeological treasure—jade, obsidian and turquoise wielded into
masks, jewelry and even pottery. There was even a collection of near petrified
maize that Father Ruiz doubted even existed today. The room truly represented a
timeline spanning nearly every region of Mayan history.