“And well that it is…” I said as I shoveled the last bit of earth over the fragments of that shattered stone.
I gazed at Jones. His lip was aquiver. It was odd to see such a tall man so contorted by fear.
“Take courage…what can they do…they have no flesh.”
Jones gulped.
“Is there something you want to tell me Fred?”
He stared into the middle distance for an inordinate period.
“It’s not true.” He said so faintly that I could barely discern the words among the woodland noises.
“What’s not true?”
“That they do not have flesh.”
I laughed heartily and slapped him on the back.
“You take that Crowley fellow far too seriously. The man is a charlatan… a con artist. Thrilling conversationalist when he’s in a pleasant mood… but damn it man! He’s as unemployed as I and utterly lacking in inheritance. Charms and perversions have long been the trade of loafers the world over.”
Jones shook his head. “No…no…I saw them..”
I laughed again. This was a welcome break from the monotony of musing on my failures. “My man we have spent too many nights on the moors. I myself have had strange nauseas and fancies and I was born here. This desolate house is no place for an opium hound like yourself.”
“I have not touched the stuff in three years. I’m quite sane Roderick…a bit too sane really…a certain sleep has left me. I must say…I do not fancy the light of dawn.”
His words had a certain poetic quality that made them settle in my brain most oddly. I was momentarily dumbfounded.
“Look! Opium or no opium all this hullabaloo with spirits and orders and the like. These are fantasies. I mean we entered into this for the fun of it for the distraction…to rid ourselves of moneyed dissipation and now…it’s gone too far…we must quit this place Freddy. Let’s go to Spain …Italy even.”
“He is in Italy.”
“Who?”
“Perdurabo and his chief…”
I had no idea what he was talking about nor did I have time to question him because just then I turned round to glance back towards the house. A figure was dashing towards us across the moors.
“What on earth…!”
I took out my binoculars. It was Beatrice! Her red locks all akilter my revolver in her hand…I’d never seen her run so fast.
I lowered the glass and just stood and stared while Jones leaned against a tree.
In the span of a quarter hour the diminutive figure reached us. To my great surprise I saw that she was barefoot.
I stared as she collapsed a few steps in front of me breathing heavily.
I leaned down and placed a hand on her shoulder.
“Betty…betty what is it?”
And odd sort of half groan half whimper came from the quivering nightgown that lay before me.
“Roderick…” She hissed…. “Roderick…the house…the singing…”
“Beg your pardon?”
“It…IT HUMS…Roderick…”
I felt a hand on my shoulder. Wheeling round I saw Jones face wear a somber tight lipped expression that sent shivers throughout my frame.
“Zo..d…e..c..ah”
It was unbearably hot and humid. The grim face that the hand on my shoulder possessed belonged to Graham Hoyt. His words were quite at odds with his bearing. “Are you coming to dinner?”
I rose from my folding chair and followed Hoyt to the mess tent.
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I found it amusing that only a few of even my own group understood my reference. There is something of inevitability in the unfolding of history. I do not believe in predestination and in fact count it as a blasphemy. There are however instances of such incredible confluence that a defacto form of predestination can be said to exist.
One such phenomenon is the global power of English. How is it that a small island nation surrounded by a frozen sea informed and continues to inform the whole Earth. How small the number of her sons, how great in number the adversaries and perils that beset her, yet she sat as regent of the world. While power proper has inarguably waned… for good or ill the world is still so very English.
Did Dee’s designs so many centuries ago help seal Britannia’s destiny as sovereign? Given the nature of our research, the heritage of the United States, and our current relationship to that jilted forbearer I could not but help feel that we were continuing Dee’s work.
So I knew that we would soon head north and east. I knew that we would be successful. What I did not know was the nature of that success. Even now I can not fully grasp the enormity of the implications that we uncovered for the sake of civilization. But I get ahead of myself.
Our training ground was actually just west of the true location of Dead Horse Camp. I have already described the first week of the second round of training. A lot of calisthenics, hygiene, and packing drills, basically what one would expect.
Week two was a lot more of the same. Except that it was tinged throughout with dire warnings of death.
“I will leave you, which means they will leave you, once we are more than a hundred miles in the depths, if the equipment fails or the helicopters aren’t avaialable, you will die. So don’t get hurt.”
One thing that I didn’t understand throughout all of this is why exactly we had to do it on foot. I mean…we had the coordinate why not just airdrop our way in? Of course the answer was a mixture of pride and ambition.
Cook had long wanted an excuse to risk his life and the lives of whoever was mad enough to accompany him to mount an on the ground expedition. An expedition where he could travel slowly and take in the terrain, the locals, what artifacts he may find. It did make sense from a scientific standpoint. The closer you can get to your subject the better.
I was relieved that upon hearing of all the random shootings, robberies, and deaths Anna was no longer keen on joining us. Honestly I wasn’t too keen to get a lung full of birdshot from the Amazon’s version of Johnny Cash. Some folk shoot you just to see what its like to watch a man die. Lobo had made sure to recount a recent case of a kayaker’s narrow survival after multiple shotgun blasts.
“He was lucky he was close to a village. We are not going to be close to a village.”
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The Berber sat as silent as the grave. He raised his turbaned head and regarded me with a detached curiosity.
Our guest had gotten the best accommodation. Death was reluctantly indebted to the Mohammedans. It was the galley of some Suleiman fellow that had pulled him from the English channel. It seems the Ottomans still had designs on Rome and there were yet parties in England to accommodate them despite the wane of the Hapsburgs.
“Ah! Halstead, a most peculiar matter…one I trust you’ll find very much to your liking…”
“I’ve seen my share of slavers…”
“Why do you implicate him in this sin…besides do we not ourselves trade in lives…”
“I am not speaking from a pulpit Harris…I’ve seen my share of Berbers…”
“Yes, well this fellow is a scholar…a wiseman…you see and he had something on him when we pulled him from that Spaniards grip…”
“Oh?”
“Yes, I know that you are most keen on all those Indian tales and dusty tapestries…”
My eye had already found the object he was about to reveal. There on the oaken desk, beside the captains log sat an odd powder blue box, with oriental patterns inscribed along the sides, and a great pearl sat atop.
I cocked my head. “My Mary would likely never raise her voice if I were to bring her such a gaudy trinket.”
“You’re the fool that married the prettiest girl in Norwich…Jane is just happy that she has a husband at all, which is why I am so well-kept!” He said petting his paunchy gut.
It was true…Harris was probably right…his wife was plain but I’d never known a warmer woman or a better cook. We both laughed.
“Well, anyway there is more than jewels to that little wonder.”
I cocked an eyebrow.
“Why don’t you bring it to me?” Harris said in an odd sort of way.
I shook my head in confusion but complied. I walked over in two strides and grasped the thing in my right hand.
I couldn’t move it. It wasn’t much bigger than a midsize snuffbox and I couldn’t so much as budge it.
I chuckled. “What manner of trick is this?”
“Frankly, I haven’t the faintest idea and was hoping you could supply the answer.”
“Me?”
“Well, yes you are the foremost expert on such things…you and your little club in Boston…”
“Hmm…well I’d love to help but a heavy box is just a heavy box…”
“You still don’t see…I suppose I am a terrible presenter…look…”
He strode beside me and tried to move the box. Nothing in his attempts seemed like an act. He was as limited as I in his capacity to budge the pretty little thing.
“Now..Timurhan…” He said motioning with his head for the Turk to join us.
Our guest wordlessly complied picking up the box with ease. He showed us a strange flowing scrip inscribed all on the bottom in neat rows of paragraphs.
“It’s a trick of some sort…”
“I thought you’d say that…” Harris replied and whistled.
The whole ship trooped through the Captain included. Each earnestly trying and failing to lift the box from where Timurhan had place it on the floor.
I stared in wonder.
To be continued .
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I was throbbing. Absolutely throbbing as a billion points of grain pressed into the exposed skin of my arm and face. Slowly the blinding light receded. It was replaced by a voice.
A gruff reeking voice. “Git up…eh…you git!”
I groaned.
“Halstead! retch’d derelict…up wit ya!”
I stirred. The sound of surf met my ears.
I raised myself up on an elbow as my eyes adjusted to the dimmer light of the sun.
“Dis right… up with ye, noaw..”
I stumbled up and immediately started to laugh.
“Who…who…who the hell are you?”
“Poor layd wuts that damned merchants sold to ya….”
“What…” I really couldn’t contain my laughter…”What the fuck are you wearing…”
“Ewd tink the crown ken clad us better…” Now the stranger was laughing with me.
I examined him. This had to be some kind of joke. Buckled shoes, some kinda capris, and an oversized tunic covered in thick cascades of unkempt ginger beard.
“Who the fuck are you man…seriously..jokes is good and all but where’s Danny?”
“Yir wits gon! Is no danny mong us nor in town. Ir! Trink dis…”
He shoved a dirty bottle of clear liquid in my hand. I smelled it. Seemed like water. I was painfully thirsty and my body hurt something fierce.
Who the hell was this guy. ‘Oh shit.’ I looked down and realized I wasn’t shirtless…and where the hell were my trunks. I had some kind of coarse tunic and bedraggled leggings that itched and oppressed with coarseness. The thought of being disrobed by the likes of this guy didn’t sit well with me.
All right I yelled standing fully upright. “That’s a great prank and all but really who the hell are you where’s Danny…why did ya leave me here at night…I coulda drown…”
Danny’s bearded cohort shook his head. “Mi lord but wut were in diz ween! Names Yost…remember..I pulled ew from the waves diz how thenk me ken no remember me…Yost..Van Yost ye trink addled boi. Rememver you your own name o?!”
Something about all those vowels. Van Yost…
“Where’s Harris!”
“Gadverdamme…woke now r ya? Guid…Harris iz profound buzzi wit dayt geitenneuker Timurhan!”
“The artillery…!”
“Powder iz secure…Kapeetan Deaf vaunted to teech lesson to you.”
“I may well have drowned! And the powder!”
“Iz safe you fool boy…dat Castillian dogs run off when we a fired…why you let em drunk ya?”
“I had to enter into a confidence…I did…get the key to Harris…I MAY WELL HAVE DROWNED! LEAVE ME PON THE SHORE!”
I launched with fists. But the old salt was strong and large. I hadn’t realized how tall he was till his long arm held me at bay like a tantrauming child.
“Noaw I say to forgit me title iz pardonable but what gratitude iz this ye soaked rat…shoulda left you to the sharks…” He spit on me.
More and more I recollected things. I apologized profusely.
“Well…allz well noaw but do no take evrey chance for poison..ye liar…INTO A CONFIDENCE…INTO A CONFIDENCE…klerelijer!
“You say the Turk has loosed his tongue?”
“Aye.”
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It was possible to get used to it to some degree. But you could never get fully comfortable. I feel that everyone save perhaps the indigenous peoples felt it. That near constant fatigue that always hummed in the background.
It was the heat, the rain, the damp. Even though the scenery and the sheer vitality of the surroundings was exhilarating the constant onslaught of heat was nonetheless oppressive. It slowly drained you from sun up to sun down.
Lobo was determined to not only make us have second thoughts but to feel them. From the dim of 0500 to the setting of the sun we were driven like sled dogs. Cook couldn’t protect Anna from Lobo’s discipline. Not that she wanted to be protected.
Unfortunately she needed to be. It happened on a run down a black earth path. We were all encumbered by sixty pounds of gear. Save for Anna who had on forty. I suppose that’s what they call benevolent sexism. It didn’t help.
At the end of the run as we were returning to camp she began to complain of a constant dull pain that worsened the faster she walked. Once we’d actually arrived and removed her boots she found a telltale swelling.
“Stress fracture.” Lucas said.
Lobo was grinning like a wolf.
Cook sighed.
“It’s fine. I’ll be ok after some sleep.”
“No.” I said.
She looked pissed.
“Look, you don’t want to put anymore pressure on that. Especially at the pace we’re going.”
“Well, then I’ll just stay off it for a day.”
“It’s hard to diagnose the extent of the damage out here. It would be best for you to discontinue training. I honestly don’t know why you gave in to his bullying. It’s not like you’re going any further than Fawcett’s last camp.”
“I’m doing it because you’re all a bunch of macho retards.”
Lobo chuckled. “They may be retards but I have a hard time calling them macho.”
I really wasn’t bothered by this. I never considered myself macho. Except for boxing I’d always hated sports, was shit with cars, and rarely womanized.
“Dem’s fightin words!” Sam quipped rolling up his sleeves. His biceps had gotten substantially larger. We were all far stronger than we had been at the lodge. While age dampened the effect I felt almost as invincible as I had after my first boot camp.
“These are true words. Two of you idiots almost broke your ankles.”
It was true. We weren’t doing very well. But I felt that he was overestimating our short comings. He was fucking us on purpose. He wanted to sabotage this trip. Anna was his first victim. He hoped that we’d all follow suit. I don’t think he knew that ‘The Fibonacci Five’ didn’t have a choice.
Ever since John Dee…the cosmos didn’t have a choice.
“Rule, Britannia…! Britannia, rule the waves!” I burst forth into song.
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I was breathless. I was ecstatic. The soft sand propelled me forward with a rhythmic dampened crunch. I was a little tipsy. My friend seven years my senior lagged far behind. Not only was he older, but the call center hadn’t exactly improved his stamina. I had run track in highschool and never stopped running.
My legs were thick and strong and the exhilaration of the liquid liberty of a 21st birthday had rendered my companion a distant spec barely visible on the horizon. I jumped into the foaming waves.
It was dark. There weren’t many hotels here just a few snooty residential houses. The water was warm beneath a pallid moon and a billion brilliant stars. I sloshed about taking in all the sensations of dr
ink and the unparalleled joy of a young disciplined body.
“Listen you ocean…you great salty fuck…you’re mine…you don’t scare me! I’ll swim you. I’ll drown you with my motion.”
I treaded water as I watched the shore. It was so still so calm. I’d been high a couple of times more than a couple…but I had never felt this good. I’d fucked and it had never felt this good.
The combination of alkaline numbness, runners high, and the balmy air of an oceanside evening was the sublimest birthday gift that I could have received.
O but there was more!
I saw somebody else as my gaze fell to my left.
A girl. It was dark but I knew it was a girl. I could tell by the hips even though she was wearing a hoody. It was three twenty AM. What was she doing out here. Maybe she’d come from one of those rich dudes house. Rich girls always had the best grass.
…and the best ass…
I sprang to my feet and jogged in her direction.
I’d made quiet a lot of sound on the approach and she had doubtless heard my commotion in the waves. Yet I was within a foot and she stood perfectly still. In fact as I got closer I realized that she hadn’t moved at all.
‘Did someone lose their real doll?’ I laughed out loud. A boisterous laugh fed by the virility of young adulthood and the lingering whimsy of adolescence.
Despite my laughing she did not move.
“Hey girl…hey!” I said leaping in front of her.
Stock still.
I was beginning to feel odd.
“Hey are you alright…” I was facing her now. Her head was cast down the hoodie obscuring her features beneath the feeble aid of a waning moon.
Nothing. No motion. No sound.
Except…was…was she sobbing? If she was. It was the faintest sob that I had ever heard.
“Hey…” I said reaching out my hand…”it’s going to be ok…what is it bitchy friends…dick boyfriend…” just as my fingertips made contact with her shoulder…she fucking screamed.
I mean really screamed. It wasn’t just any scream it was a shriek.
“Great…” I muttered sarcastically as I nursed my ears. “It’s going to be even more annoying hearing the cops ask stupid questions and suggest rapey intentions now that I’m deaf.”
It had really hurt. It had hurt in more than one way. It took it a while to fully take hold. But I was suddenly…sad…just really really sad. I felt hot tears streak like lightning down my face…they were salty…so salty and so hot…I was choking on them. I let out a long low wail.
I felt an oppressive blackness. I could see nothing. And hear nothing…and feel nothing except grief…grief that dragged me further and further down down till it gave way to sympathy an overwhleming sense of sympathy and I opened my arms…
The blackness receded. She was no longer wearing a hood. My friend was nowhere in sight. She was beautiful…her hair a jetty shimmering black…her skin pale and smooth as porcelain…the eyes were such a deep pale blue. She regarded me with so much understanding in those depths and her arms outstretched.
We embraced and I felt the world begin to whirl. Her skin was soft, silky, warm…her breath was sweet…but I could feel the sadness return…I could feel it increase with every thump I felt emerge from beneath her breast. Our heartbeats were syncing…like my heart was slowly being taught to keep rhythm with hers…with each pulse…I felt strange primordial pain…and it increased…till all was bright…blindingly bright and bare and reeling.
To be continued.
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Lobo’s duffel dropped onto the damp earth with a dull thud.
He was late.
The second bout of preparations had been set to begin half a week ago. We’d spent the last four days drilling methods of keeping the perpetual damp off our gear and food. When Cook ran out of lessons we’d grapple with Fabre and talk history with the boffins as we loafed around the camp.
“Nice of you to join us.”
Lobo shook his head.
“You’re taking a girl? On top of it all…you are taking a girl…”
“Only as far as dead horse camp, she wants to use every opportunity to get some exposure to Kuikuro chatter.”
I breathed a sigh of relief. Though I couldn’t help but worry that once we reached the camp she’d just keep going…you know…for science…
The big spec ops guy psychically mirrored my internal concern.
“That better be so…cause this is not Scandinavia.”
Anna looked exasperated. “Holy shit, I know that. I’m thirty fucking two years old and my dad is a cop.”
‘O no.’ Nirvana’s ‘Been a Son’ started playing in my head.
“Do you know why I am late?”
She bugged her eyes out and shook her head in annoyed dismissal.
“I’m late because anaconda and Indians aren’t the most dangerous thing in this Jungle.”
“So what. Yeah, it’s a jungle smugglers, drug runners, whatever…they don’t wanna run into a small army…”
“Everybody out here is a small army, prospectors, drug lords, human traffickers, you think the Amazon is easily policed…there are resources here so many….the trees are thick…they hide a lot more armies than you could imagine. Armies with methods that you wouldn’t want to imagine…”
“Gotta die someday.”
“I don’t intend to die but I’m gonna be real fucking pissed if I die cause one of you bichanos does something stupid. Which is guaranteed…”
“O come on…” Cook began protesting.
Lobo held up his hand.
“I do not trust the guides, I am familiar with only a few of the security detail, and the rest are typical desperate looking underfed mercs, there are people out here guaranteed to offer a better deal…”
“Well what?!” Cook got mad. “I can get someone else if you don’t want to…”
Lobo laughed.
“You will not find such fools…there is not even one…in all of Brazil…in the whole continent….”
“You take yourself too seriously…João will be arriving with the guides in a week…we are going with or without you.”
“Either way is equally stupid..I will go…I will go for the history of my people…for my loyalty to you…but do not insult me by bringing this baggage.”
Cook softened. “It’s out of my hands…”
I guess Thornton had sort of forced us onto Cook…but I wondered what drove him to take Anna…I noticed that Lobo was talking in English so we’d all understand. I understood but I also felt insulted…I’m a United States sailor…sure we’re a bit soft these days but Jesus Christ.
Sam piped up giving voice to my frustration. “Yea that’s real fucking great for morale there guys!”
“Depends, but I’d say somewhere around a 856 kilometers.”
“What’s that in miles?”
“I think something like three hundred, three hundred and fifty.”
“That’s wildly inaccurate…” Graham chimed in.
“O?” Fabre seemed annoyed.
“Based on the number you mentioned we’re looking at a 533 mile hike.”
“Fuck!” I very nearly screamed.
“Hey, I’m just a good ol boy from Kentucky conversion factors ain’t my bread and butter…”
“Wellp…looks like some of the mystery of how I’ll die ‘s cleared…” Chuck mused darkly.
I looked over at Anna’s long smooth legs glistening in the light of the fire. They were strong but…
“Take a picture it’ll last longer!” She must have noticed.
“Hey…lady…it’s a compliment…you have nice legs ya know…I mean I know you know…otherwise there’s just no reason for those shorts.” Sam jumped in on my behalf.
I raised my hand.
“Eh, your sisters legs are better.”
“My sisters legs are probably wrapped around another tourist by now.” Anna smirked.
“Sailors aren’t known for jealousy. Otherwise every port would be a harem.”
“You know,” she said, “there’s lots of places here to hide a body…I mean…lots…”
Cook smiled bemused as he shook his head and took a laconic drag of his cigar.
“I’m a lot more afraid of having to drag your Suomi ass outta here and running outta supplies than I am of your feisty attitude.”
“Perkele!” She exclaimed sticking out her tongue.
“Huora!”
She sprang from her seat and twisted the ever-loving fuck out of my ear…again…
“VITTU VITTU VITTU VITTU VITTU!” I kept shouting defiantly.
I thought my ear was going to come off.
Looping a finger into her jean shorts belt loop I pulled her to the ground and put her in an arm bar.
“Children…” Cook said rising to his feet.
“You know you’re lucky I’m a gentleman…I could really hurt you right now…”
She giggled, “Gentleman is just a euphemism for pussy…pillu…”
She squealed as I motioned her joints in contrary directions.
“Seriously,” I said taking the opportunity to bring the point home, “I have a hundred plus pounds of muscle on you, and I didn’t spend the last decade in a faculty lounge, drop the GI jane shit.”
With this I released her.
She seemed to have calmed down and to her credit regained her composure rather quickly. There was no crying, no protesting, she knew she’d been a brat. Brushing the dirt off her legs she sat back into the camp chair with a lady like grace.
I chuckled, “You have brothers don’t you?”
She pouted as she nursed her elbow and nodded.
“Do me a favor.” Bohm said with amusement in his voice. “Don’t cripple the foremost authority on indigenous languages…”
I paused cocking my head. “I thought she was just a Ph.D. chaser?”
“Sure, her third Ph.D.”
Was this supposed to make a difference…
“So fucking what, this is still a terrible idea, this is not a fucking campus…”
Anna was going with us. That’s what I learned from Aada on our final night in Cuiaba. This was a bad idea. No amount of neo-progressive gibberish could change basic biology.
The female frame is not built for war. Neither is the male for that matter but the female is really not built for war. We were going to war. We were going to war against weakness, parasites, heat stroke, and possible smugglers and unfriendly natives.
Though she hovered somewhere around six feet and was athletic. There were physical limitations that no amount of gym ratting could surmount. Sure maybe if she was a UFC fighter. But she wasn’t. In fact, most women that are in the armed forces are far from being Ronda Rousey. Anna wasn’t in the armed forces. She was a leggy academic and nearsighted to boot. God, it was so stupid.
Women’s martial struggles were not due to a lack of dedication but due to the fact that women like Rhonda are outliers. And I doubt that even she could sustain the weight of a combat load. Women that served in Afghanistan had suffered skeletal fractures for precisely this reason.
The officer corps always wanted to cover their ass and promote their careers. They went along with whatever corporate shit dropped in their pond. Pulling it out would cause ripples. So men died and women got hurt. If I hadn’t been transferred to a highly specialized op like PLATO I’d have been consulting for international shipping years ago. By the time I’d enlisted in 08 we were already a petticoat flotilla and the only thing that kept my Scotch candor from sinking my career was my ability to find dirt on my superiors. The latter skill actually being the reason Thornton had plucked me into spooky land. My nickname was bloodhound.
Nature doesn’t care about politics. And the nature that I was afraid of wasn’t just physiological. A dozen men and one attractive woman is not good for morale. What the hell was Cook thinking?
I mean he was a professor but this wasn’t fucking Berkley. He didn’t know that I knew. And I knew for a fact that Lobo didn’t know.
I leaned on the bar and studied my reflection as it was blurred by the frosting. Should I tell Lobo? Would Lobo be able to do anything? If I did wouldn’t this just cause more in group strife? A strife arguably more dangerous than a cute geekess in a platoon of libidinous baboons trekking through hell?
“When you were training did you notice any stones in the jungle?”
Everything had been a blur.
“No.”
“Hmm…” Cook said furrowing his brow.
“Isn’t the rainforest famously rockless?”
“Si…yes…for the most part but…you are telling me that you did not see the huacas?”
“Huaca… WAKA?” Sam quipped.
“Yes, you can also say waka. It is a Quechuan word.”
Sam laughed. “Holy shit I’m a fucking shaman. And you guys think I’m the dumb one. None of you had sudden god damned blessed burst of halleluiah glossolalia. I’m Quetzalcoatl bitch!”
“Wrong country…”
Sam waved dismissively.
“As I was saying,” Cook continued. “All roads lead to Cusco.”
“Do they?”
“Yes, you have no doubt heard the saying: ‘All roads lead to Rome?’”
“We’re familiar with the concept.”
“So haucas are all over South America but mostly concentrated in Peru.”
“And you’re saying that we should have seen some, that they’re rocks?” The doctor responded by placing a glossy picture book of various Andean glyphs on the table. I passed it to my right.
“Well…a Huaca can generally be anything but is often a stone or stones sort of like Menhir in England.”
Menhir
“Anybody see anything?” I asked scanning the faces of my comrades. Every expression was blank.
“Huacas are shrines, that served various purposes, many of which had to do with pilgrimage. They are sort of politico/religious outposts of the Inca civilization leading to its center in Cusco.”
“Do you think we should have seen some?”
“O certainly, yes….they were right beside your camp. I was going to give you a lecture on them when I returned but of course, you know I was interrupted..and…actually…about that interruption…”
There was a long silence.
“Apparently that uncontacted tribe wasn’t ever supposed to be there. They were from deep deep in the jungle to the East. Coming from the direction that we were heading. The Kuikuro chief told me that these strangers had chased some very strange looking folk who they had describes as enemies and thieves…”
Kuikuro Man
None of us were sure what this had to do with rocks. Despite several days of airconditioning and rest, we were too tired to make even the most basic deductions.
“Lot’s of weird stuff going on lately.” Anna chimed in. “Doc thinks these ‘enemies’ have been stealing sacred items.”
“Yes, which is very strange because most of these things aren’t worth much and even less when moved from their original location.”
Chuck looked especially lost in thought.
“Say, didn’t Sam’s sketch have a pile of stones in it?”
The doctor paused a bit, obviously trying to recall the subject.
“Si! As a matter of fact, it did.”
“I thought it was ruins but …maybe it’s one of those Waka thingies?”
“Yes, your little drawing there, you said you’d made it under the influence, in a sort of shamanic state?” Dr. Bohm’s urbane voice inquired.
Sam nodded.
“Coupled with the map Hoyt brought along this has all the hallmarks of an authentic vision…which makes me think…that someone out there in the wood has heard…and is destroying what remains of an ancient road.”
“Did a vehicle…land somewhere out there …in the Andes….” Sam sang under his breath.
“Hah, Inca roads!” I exclaimed. This was getting interesting.
“I don’t know what song that is… but yes that is my latest theory…. that Cusco was the epicenter of a far vaster empire than we ever imagined. Though of course, Manco Capac was a rediscoverer of that sacred place. The scion of a remnant who returned and kindled the last flicker of memory before the arrival of Pizzaro.”
“Alonso are you guys familiar with the cosmic bellybutton?” Anna was fond of calling me Alonso…how that arose from Alan I guess only a Suomi would know. I had no idea what she was talking about.
“So South America was the birthplace of all civilization? I mean yeah, I guess the Amazon is far more Eden like than Mesopotamia.” Chuck mused.
“That’s one possible explanation. And explanations are what we have been seeking and why we brought you here as soon as we heard the news about Hoyt’s awakening.”
“So we’re still going…?”
“Si…but…Lobo is really against it now…and I can’t go without him… at some point the native guides and even the mercenaries will abandon us…”
“Why?”
“They are afraid of the Chachapoyas…”
“Huh…”
“Those are the folks that the visitors were chasing. A group of light-skinned savages originating in Peru who till now were nothing but a faint and wispy myth.”
“Are they dangerous?”
“South American empires are renowned for their violence…”
“We theorize that they’re a lost priesthood…and well if the stories are to be believed…Jack the Ripper is a friendlier face in a dark alley…”
I was getting excited again. Maybe I would get to die a beautiful death.
“No bedpans for me…Valhalla here I come…let’s go now!” I yelled to a chorus of eye rolls and giggles.
“To be honest I have no problem dying of an overpowering bowel movement during a Lawrence Welk rerun,” Chuck said.
“You would.” Lucas laughed.
“I am heartened by your enthusiasm but there is still much to prepare. We will begin yet another round of training as soon as I finish up arrangements with Costa and Lobo.”
We all groaned collectively.
After the final banter ceased Anna caught up with me in the institute’s hallway.
“So I heard you made friends with my sister.”
I smirk blushed. “Uh…yeah…actually that’s who I was about to go see.”
“Good…good…hey…” She said pulling a revolver from her purse.
“What the fuuck…”
She aimed it at me…
POP!
A little red flag with the word BANG! Unfurled from the barrel.”
“If you fuck her up…I swear…I swear…the Candiru is more merciful…”
“Jesus…hey…I’m not the marryin sort…ya know…”
“Good you’d make a shitty brother in law…but I swear on my life …I will end you…”
I shook my head. “Hey, I usually don’t respond well to threats but well before right now I really liked you and I’m a sucker for redheads…sooo..fucking relax ok…”
She laughed and tugged on my ear.
3000SL Roadster
“Owww…! Fuck god damn it lady.”
“It’s alright man I’m just fucking with ya…” She said stepping into one of Cook’s mercedes and roaring off.
‘Jesus Christ she didn’t strike me as much of a Tomboy…I guess first impressions are bullshit.’
The Fractal Journal 