The Mummies of Blogspace9 (16 page)

So today I’m taking it easy. I’m sitting here in the pyramid, hanging out with my favorite imp. I’ve been throwing corn chips at him all morning, and by now he can catch them in his mouth. I suspect he’s grateful because he throws me presents in return. A breastplate just landed by my feet. I also have two greaves and a gauntlet. If I keep this up, by the end of the week I’ll have a full set of conquistador armor.

July 7, 2011
Segovia, Peru
Michelle Cavalcante

First of all, Leon and I are not lovers. I don’t know why he says things like that at a time like this, but rest assured, that day will never come.

Leon has made a mess of things, archaeologically speaking. He did a lot of digging before I got back, and he didn’t record any of it. He didn’t even take notes. This isn’t archaeology, it’s just random digging.

So yesterday, he and I spent the whole day trying to repair his damage while looking for this tumi thing, this shaman’s tumi. But we didn’t find anything. We looked exactly where Sebastiano’s journal said it should be – under the little shed behind his house.

The problem is, like every other frigging building here, even that little adobe shed was rebuilt six or seven times, so it’s hard to know where the original walls were. And then of course Leon tore through half of it before I got back, so it’s a mess. And we’ve dug through three floors already, so I don’t know where to look next.

And I can’t believe I’m even writing this sentence, but could you please discourage this friendship Leon has cultivated with the thing inside the pyramid, whatever it is. It’s not healthy. He named it Clyde.

July 11, 2011
Rota, Spain
Bruce Wheeler

The girl…how I can still refer to her as that I don’t fully understand. But she was at some level still a girl, though her humanity was only porously intact.

There was, of course, no tunnel, just a shallow pit under the floor. Naya’s words were for the benefit of our attackers who came swiftly, crashing through the doors and windows as she tucked me into a crawlspace under the flooring. And from that meager damp prison, I watched in horror through the cracks and warps and wormholes.

The girl, Naya, mummy though she was, smiled coyly at first, flirting as the first men came into the room. She has an extraordinary appeal, as I mentioned, and I nearly called out with desire. The first two men didn’t do so well when they approached her, their weapons falling to the ground in afterthought.

The men who entered through the back door (and mind you, the wormholes in the floorboards were so comprehensive, that I could even now faithfully diagram each person’s movement) did somewhat better. They were older, wiser perhaps, and they had the good sense to look away when she locked eyes with them. Unfortunately, they were still looking away when she smashed their heads together with enough force to fill my mouth with dust.

Five more came poking around, but they didn’t dare enter the house. My protector sat cross-legged on the floor, mere inches above my face, gnawing on the long bones of my assailants. And when one or another of those gangsters, or whoever they were, set their minds to entering the house, she had only to toss an ear or a lung his way, and their resolve softened.

“How long will you keep me here?” I asked, as she sucked the marrow from a tibia, cooing with delight.

She laughed, and her laugh did not fill me with hope. I waited another six hours under the floor, dying of thirst, until I dared ask again.

From somewhere she produced a heavy jar, which she tipped over, letting the wine trickle through the floorboards. Having no cup, I did my best to capture each drop, to drink deeply. “If you’re hungry,” she said, “I’ve plenty to share.”

“No.” I said it louder than I intended. And she laughed. She laughed like a girl, like a carefree girl, and it unnerved me. “Let me out,” I called. “You’ve no right to keep me imprisoned.”

She spent another hour working on her meal, and she twice tipped that wine jug, sending a respectable stream through a respectable wormhole. “The book,” she said finally.

“Say again?”

“The book, you said. I asked you to choose between the gold and the book, and you said the book.”

I didn’t know what to say, half mad with thirst, half drunk from dry wine. “The book, yes; the Malleus Momias.”

She was licking her fingers when I looked up through the cracks in the floor.

“The last time a man asked these questions, he chose the gold. Almost two hundred years ago as I mentioned, he was a beautiful man, a kind man, a pistolero who promised me the world, heaven even, if I would help him.”

“And did you help him?”I called up from under the floor.

“I told him the same thing I told you. I told him there was time only to answer one of his questions. And he asked about the gold. I told him I’d help him if he made magnificent love to me, a sorrowful kind. I told him it would mean nothing to me if he came to me willingly, if he had nothing to lose, no remorse.”

“You wanted him to regret it?”

She nodded. “I wanted only to recapture something of what I’d lost. I wanted once again to know the love of a man who tried in vain to hold onto his virtue, his promises, his assurances, his very soul, but who in the end could not. You see, it’s the only love I’ve ever known.”

“Sebastiano.”

She pried up a floorboard, the nails screeching as she pulled them free. “Yes. Padre Sebastiano, my only love.” She held out a hand, and I climbed up onto that floor, littered with bodies, body parts, viscera, and hair; the horrors of ruined worlds. But I had no eyes for that. Only for her. She was beyond compare.

“That pistolero did his best. He took me with some heartfelt measure of abandon, for which I gave him credit. And in return, I promised him I’d reunite him with that gold hoard one day. Bolivar was his name; he loved the feel of silk.”

“Bolivar,” I repeated.

She turned to me as she retrieved a short rib from the floor, discarding it only when she found it to be already clean. “And yet when I put the same question to you, you asked not for the gold, but for the book. That was unexpected.”

“I want to help Sebastiano,” I told her. “I want to help him finish what he started.”

She drew me into her arms and kissed me deeply. “I’ll offer you the same thing,” she said, when I could do nothing but quiver and yearn. “I’ll offer you what I offered the pistolero. I’ll promise you the book if you make the same kind of love to me.”

“But I have...I’m engaged to...”

The finger she pressed to my lips was neither mine nor hers, just one of many strewn about the floor. “Promise me,” she said, as she tore at my belt, “promise me you’ll regret this until your dying day.”

I promised her, Michelle. I’m sorry, but I knew even as I kissed her that I was lying.

July 20, 2011
Seville, Spain
Vasco Cuellar

Are we not damned, Duran? God has no love for the damned. He has precious little love as it is. All my life I’ve called out to him, begging to be saved, and not a whisper in any of the world’s winds have I heard in response. And I am a priest.

That being said, I take some pleasure in learning that young Bruce has found enduring love with one of our kind – Sebastiano’s old consort at that. The precious young priest wasn’t perfect after all, was he? Always so pious. He’d leave my home riding that stupid mule and I’d feel such shame about my behavior, my heresy, my gluttony, my lust, my fornications, my murders, my cannibalism, my apostasy. And all along, Sebastiano was breaking his own vow of celibacy. Well, none of us are perfect, are we?

But I’d dearly love to meet this girl. Many a poet has opined that a woman becomes lovelier with each passing year. But so few poets pen sonnets to the lines of beauty that the centuries etch onto her face.

A unique social networking startup venture, Blogspace9 unites a core group of nine peers across an integrated series of platforms.

Blogspace9 provides funding and equipment for a select number of archaeological, historical, and scientific explorations.

For investment opportunities, contact your broker today.

July 20, 2011
Cupertino, CA
Administrator

Although we are committed to providing an exemplary level of service, and a platform of communication beyond compare, we at
Blogspace9
pride ourselves on our commitment to user privacy. That being said, our economic analysts from time to time uncover information items that may be useful to our clients.

While based in the United States, we have users in 180 countries, so we pay close attention to international market fluctuations. And we were as surprised as everyone else with the recent free-fall of the Bolsa de Madrid, the Spanish stock exchange. Where we differ with other analysts is that we think this is your fault.

This Peru/Spain archaeology/history project has admittedly become more complex than we anticipated, and while we understand you are not directly responsible for some of the issues, deaths, and international manhunts that have resulted, we nonetheless find ourselves in a difficult legal position.

To be blunt, we cannot continue to be involved with a project that threatens to bring the Spanish economy to its knees. Last night, after meticulous inspection, it became clear to our chief economist that much of the economic turbulence could be traced to a single Spanish company, the privately-held, but immensely-powerful
Grupo Yapos Iberia
(GYI).

Within the last week, this company has withdrawn its support from two major international business mergers, leaving Santander Aeronautics without the financing to commit to a major defense contract, and causing FerroSpain to lose a railroad building contract in Mongolia.

In short, though no company spokesperson will respond to inquiry,
Grupo Yapos Iberia
seems to have not only the ability, but also the inclination to pummel the Spanish economy.

Only by way of highly-confidential and anonymous information provided by one of our partners were we able to get as sense as to why. Apparently
Grupo Yapos Iberia
sent only a single line of text to the CEOs and administrators of the multinational firms with which it does business: “When the book is delivered to us, we can all go back to making money.”

Nobody seems to know what this means. However, we feel that we are in a position to hazard a guess. GYI is wholly owned by reclusive Mallorca-based banking magnate Alonzo Victor Quiroga, but is administered by an unnamed proxy in Seville.

In sum, it is apparent to us that until this company gets its hands on Bruce Wheeler and the Malleus Momias book that is presumably in his possession, the Spanish economy will continue to suffer. As a small internet startup company, we feel that we cannot be party to the possible dissolution of a sovereign economy, so we believe the time has come to part ways. You have seven days to conclude your business, after which time we will be withdrawing our support and our services, and our equipment.

July 20, 2011 Seville, Spain
Bruce Wheeler

July 21, 2011
Frankfurt, Germany
Michelle Cavalcante

I’m not sure what you want me to say, Bruce. We’re supposed to be engaged, but that doesn’t keep you out of other girls’ beds? I’m sure she is extraordinary, but it doesn’t matter. If you’re mine, you’re mine.

I’ve had some time to think. I know we’ve been through a lot, but it’s important that we meet. I’m coming to see you, Bruce. We need to talk, but I know we can’t just come out and pick a meeting place. You are, after all, the most wanted man in Europe.

We spent last Christmas in Boston. I’ll never forget it; the snow, the eggnog at your Aunt Ruth’s. The dinner cruise on the bay – it all seems like another life, doesn’t it? But we almost didn’t go to Boston, if you recall. In fact we were going to go someplace else. Your old buddy from college, we were going to visit him. I’m not going to say too much because I don’t want to give it away. But the name of that city, where your friend lives, references a locale in Seville.