Blood of the Sun (working title)

 

As I sit down at my computer to begin writing this tonight, my random wallpaper selector has chosen a photo of the Earth seen from space as my current background, tilted gently to reveal Antarctica peering up from the bottom. There are different ways of looking at the world. Most people never truly do so at all. For those that do, there seems to be two approaches. Some step forward to take in the tiniest details, delving down into the makeup of the world trying to break it down into its smallest constituent parts, only to find successively smaller parts as they continue to zoom in. Others step back in an effort to view the larger picture, see the whole image, and try to understand the universe in its entirety. Most believe that it would be a combination of these approaches that would finally reveal ultimate truth. But I believe that, rather than stepping in or out, to truly gain the necessary perspective and true understanding, someone will have to step sideways. However, everyone that has ever taken a closer, or longer look at the world we live in realizes that what meets the eye is merely the surface, concealing worlds of levels to be discovered on your way to understanding.

 

Max left the lecture hall once the applause had died down. He skipped the meet and greet in the front lobby. He’d always found them a distasteful medley of hangers on and delusional would-be philosophers wanting to espouse their own thoughts while borrowing the audience that the evening’s speaker had earned through the efforts of writing and reputation that had granted him the popularity to have crowds interested in his thoughts. Besides, he wasn’t interested in meeting the speaker. The speech had been interesting, but he wasn’t sure why he was here or what exactly what knowledge he was meant to glean from the night. Max was lost. He’d been a sign reader in his youth. He was able to follow a path prescribed by some unseen hand based on signs given to him throughout his daily life. He’d been lost for a number of years now. At some point he read a sign wrong, made a wrong choice, took a wrong direction, and now it was as if time itself had ground to a halt. He knew it was pointless to retrace his steps in hopes of relocating his lost path, which was made up from a combination of time and space. The space wouldn’t be right unless the time was.

 

“You may want to think that the time’s not right,

You may want to wait for a sign.
Trust me when I say that the world don’t give a damn,

You’re on your own, do what you can”

 

Max was always amused when his subconscious seemed to choose the most appropriate songs to spring upon his consciousness. And the 3-five-7 classic that was in his head now echoed the sentiment that most of his friends and family kept telling him, to remind him how foolish it was to place your fate in the hands of something other than yourself.

But here he was, compelled to attend this lecture on the nature of perception and how it affected our universe, and he wasn’t sure why.

 

“You’re on your own, do what you can” , the song echoed in his mind.

That was part of the problem, he believed. He’d once been surrounded by brilliant, unique minds, capable of  perceiving in unique ways, like he could. Nearly ten years ago, they’d gone their separate ways, spreading out almost evenly throughout the world. Literally scattering to the four winds. He wondered if they’d lost their paths, too. What made it worse was that he hadn’t had a telling dream in years. They’d always been there when he wasn’t sure what to do next, dreams that would stay with him when he awoke, looking at him expectantly as though waiting for him to understand what they were telling him. Eventually their message would become clear.

 

Like the time he was dreaming about lying on a beach, applying sun block. He awoke with the aloe heavy sent of the sun block still fresh in his nostrils. He had then heard a noise outside and looked out the window of his apartment to see his friend Chad exiting the apartment across the way, carrying a chair. “Looks like Chad’s brother is moving” he thought. Chad had moved out of Boone a couple of years prior to move to Wilmington, on the coast. He went down to say hello to his friend, and had immediately been invited to come visit them at their new house, “not far from the beach”. The dreams weren’t always that obvious, of course.

 

Here he was, compelled in that way for the first time in a while. Now was the time to be watching for a sign. The world was about to speak to him, after a long silence. He need only to wait a little while longer.

 

Max spent his days as a graduate researcher at San Diego State University. He kept collecting government grant money to advance a thesis that looked as though it may never arrive. It gave him access to all the state university system’s libraries and data banks. Eventually he believed his strange blend of history, psychology, anthropology and philosophy would congeal itself into a new way of explaining the human condition. But the very nature of his studies encouraged a fluidity of thought and belief. How do you commit fluid beliefs to writing, after all?  

 

He preferred to eschew the bustle of downtown living, opting instead for a moderate commute to the more remote suburb of Ramona, which allowed a quieter existence with fewer distractions. He distracted himself enough, he didn’t need any help. For now, he’d call it a night, and crawled into a bed with a book. Time enough to ponder what message the world may have for him in the morning.

 

His eyes opened.
”I'm a mongoose. I'm not surprised to be a mongoose. I guess I've always been a mongoose. I am surprised, however, to find myself in a cage. I am not alone in this cage. With me is a chipmunk. Not the brightest fellow, but nice enough. Also with me is a little green man with a tall forehead, pointed ears, and short spiky black hair whom we'll call Mescalito. (NOTE: a later interpreter suggested that this figure could represent Mescalito, a figure from Native American folklore who is mentioned as a "plant ally" in the works of Carlos Castaneda. I don't know if this is accurate, but "Mescalito" is much easier to say than "Little green man", so I'll use it). To start out, our motley crew is pondering the plight of our captivity. Our cage is in a modest dwelling of wooden walls with a thatched roof. It must be summer because the windows are swung open, and the door is standing open to let in fresh air. Our captor is a Cyclops. None of us is sure what his plans for us are, but we're not eager to find out. He was currently stoking a small fire in the fireplace, and the smell of burning cedar filled the room. Mescalito was the de facto leader of our strange crew of mammals and gods, and he had formulated a plan for our escape. Every day at a certain time, the Cyclops would open the front of our little cage to feed us. It was decided that the next time he came to feed us, we would force the cage door back open against his strength so we could escape. I pointed out to Mescalito that this plan could never work because even our combined physical strength would do little against that of the Cyclops. "We must use our minds' strength instead, it is there that we have the clear advantage", he replied. Later that day when he opened the front of our cage to bring in our food and water, we were ready. The chipmunk and I stood on either side of Mescalito, with our hands on his shoulders. He assumed the classical "mind powers" position of intense concentration with fingers pressed to temples. We all concentrated and focused our mental energy, and forced the cage door back against the physical strength of the cyclops. The cyclops lost his footing and fell back against some shelving and stumbled backward still, before rolling to the floor, knocking a table over, which caused a burning log, spraying showers of sparks, to tumble out onto the floor. The Cyclops was at least momentarily incapacitated, and hesitated while trying to decide whether to bar our escape or to put out the fire that had started in his house. This was just the window we needed, allowing us to make a break from the cage and out the open door to the fields beyond. Outside the cyclops' cottage, now engulfed in flames,  were a vast expanse of low rolling hills covered in swaying green grass.We ran, the slowed to a walk, and must have covered several miles before coming to a human sized house. Here we went in through a doggie door to seek respite from our flight. We found ourselves in a finished garage, converted into a game room. There was a pool table in the center of the room, with a pool table light hanging down over it from the ceiling. Our hopes for a rest soon disappeared, however, as the room was also occupied by a Cobra, who thought any of us might make a nice lunch. Being a mongoose, I told the others to go on ahead while I held off the snake. I proceeded to do battle with the cobra, and fared quite well. I wrestled it to the ground, plucked out it's fangs one by one, then threw it up into the pool table light where it was electricuted to death. Having completed my task of dealing with the snake I went to catch up with the others, going through another doggie door into the main part of the house. At this time I was transformed into my human self, and the house was my house (although it was only my house in the dream, it didn't resemble my actual house).”

 

At this point max was awakened by a pounding. He regained his bearings and determined the pounding was coming from the front door. Groggily, he stumbled his way through the darkened living room and peered through the peep hole to see who/what was pounding on his door in the middle of the night. He could help but notice that the smell of burning cedar remained in his nostrils. Through the peep hole he was momentarily terrified to see A humanoid creature with one giant, black eye in the center of its face peering back at him through the hole. He quickly realized it was a firefighter, with a black visor mask over his eyes. He opened the door.

“Sir, you’ve got ten minutes to get out of your condo!”

why?

Wildfire. Started just over the ridge but is heading this way, fast.

Shit!

If you’re not out in 15 minutes, tops, we’ll have to remove you by force.

Got it.

 

Max struggled to remember all the times he’d pondered what he’d take with him if he were awakened in the middle of the night to find his house on fire. Now, at least, his house wasn’t on fire, yet, and he had a few minutes to fill up his car. He rummaged for important paperwork, passport, birth certificate, his stack of journals, and photo-album, what else is important paperwork? He wondered. Next was important technology, cell phone, iPod, hard drive (can’t let those thousand half finished thesis’s get lost!). He was starting to gather important/rare books when the fireman returned.

Has it been 15 minutes already?

Sir, this is serious.

I know, but this isn’t easy.

I’m sorry, you must go now!

 

Such was life in California’s major cities. In Los Angeles and San Francisco, you had to fear earthquakes, in San Diego, it was the threat of wildfires.

 

The vague smell of burning cedar was now an even vaguer but stronger smell of many burning things.

Dazed, disoriented, and with no idea where to go. Max drove off in the only direction the firefighters would let him go. It seemed like a microcosm for the last seven years of his life, except his life didn’t have firefighters pointing him which way to go.

 

A wise man had once told Max, “Beware of asking for signs, because you won’t always like them”. He couldn’t argue with that now, but he couldn’t help but feel at least a small amount of hope that his condo would burn to the ground, thus lighting a fire under him and forcing him to find the next path that was destined for him. Another wise man once said, “Be careful what you wish for”.

 

CHAPTER TWO,

 

“Well, I’ve detached him from his living arrangement, finally making him ambulatory. Now, how do I get him to where I need him to be?”

This is what Max imagined God was mumbling to himself. Others were simply confused at how nonchalantly Max had taken the news of the complete destruction of his condo. “I am unfettered, free to go where I need to go. I just don’t know where I need to go.”

 

“Looks to me like you’ve been freed up for your next great adventure. I must admit I’m envious, but I’m afraid I can’t accompany you this time. I can’t leave Tori to tackle fifth grade on her own, with Chris out on tour and all”.

 

Kelley was the one person that  knew Max well enough to appreciate his unique delimmas, and to recognize appropriate responses.

“You can always do what we used to do, you know, go to the library, pick a section that interests you, and choose a book at random. It will tell you where to go.”

 

“Well, I’m going to have a nice insurance check coming, at least. That will be enough to last me for quite some time. But that’s not a bad idea. I’ll head down there tomorrow.”

 

“Where are you staying, any way?”

 

“I’m just over at the evacuation center, Qualcomm Stadium, actually.”

 

“You can’t crash with one of those friends of yours?”

 

“They’re all married, and I hate to be a third wheel. Besides, it’s like a carnival down here, bands have come out to entertain the evacuees, free food, they’re even showing movies on the Jumbo-Tron.”

 

“Jeez. With an evacuation center like that, I’d be worried about a rash of arson in San Diego, just so people have an excuse to evacuate again”.

 

You know SoCal, it’s even laid back about it’s natural disasters”.

 

Max wondered what he’d do about the university. It seemed a shame to abandon his Master’s at the drop of a hat, but it’s not like they grant sabbaticals to grad students.

Max couldn’t help but chuckle at the irony that he was seeking mystical divination inside a library shaped like an upside-down pyramid. He probably seemed like just another of the kooks that seemed to gravitate towards the strange building. He headed towards the archaeology section, which was the best marriage of his primary interests of history and psychology. It also happened to be one of his undergraduate degrees. He had been accused of being a collector of degrees.

 

He hadn’t done this in years.

“Lets see if I remember how this works…”

 

Max realized that literally anything can be used for divination. It didn’t even require belief in any sort of magical ability or ESP. Take Tarot cards for instance. They aren’t magical, and don’t require a psychic for successful use. They are simply a tool for sorting out unconscious thoughts. Some people believe that they will point the way for them, but if you fashion an arrow out of paper and spin it, it will point a way for you as well. The tarot helps you decide on a direction by providing firmament for your own unformed thoughts to alight upon.

He made sure no one was watching. He walked to the middle of the anthropology section, not wanting to exclude living cultures from his range of choices. He closed his eyes, then slowly turned in a circle, until he was certain that he had no idea which direction he was facing. He then walked slowly forward with arems outstretched, like a newly blinded man, until his hand came to rest on a shelf. From that point it was a matter of guessing up or down, unil he chose a specific shelf, then hovered his hand back and forth across the shelf until it seemed appropriate to put his hand down. He did so, coming to rest on a small paperback. He picked it up and opened his eyes. “The Inca” by Garcilasco de la Vega. “Hmm, I’ve actually read this”. So he knew already that althouth the Incan empire covered much of south America at its height, conversations about the Inca started and ended with Cuzco.

The Inca empire was much like the Roman empire of south America at its height. And Cuzco was its very heart, much like the city of rome. And, as in Rome, all roads lead to Cuzco.

 

“This will be easy”, Max thought. “The anthropology department has a student exchange program with the university of Lima. I should be able to get in on that with little trouble.”

For the first time in years, Max could see his path open up before his eyes, as clear as it had once been to him, contrasted with the smoky, hazy, fire polluted air that met him upon exiting the library. Too bad it’s only Friday. Max’s latest destiny would have to wait for Monday morning.

 

Tomas Alvarez was a walking, talking, catharsis of inappropriate humor. His purpose in life seemed to be to offend as many people as he possibly could. The problem was, once you got to know him, you realized he was completely full of shit, all the time. And you began to find even his most tasteless, off color humor funny, despite your conscience’s protestations. It could be said that Tom was Max’s antithesis. Or perhaps his perfect foil. Max shunned social contact, and avoided talking to unfamiliar people, while Tom seemingly couldn’t avoid it. Tom was the loud to Max’s quiet. Tom was also known to be headed for Cuzco at the beginning of the semester for the exchange program. Tom was the kind of guy who could be in the process of beign eaten by an alligator, and would probably look forward tofinding out what it would be like to be feces. It was time to give Tom a call.

 

“Dude, I can DEFINITELY get you a spot on the program. We’re always short anyway. That rules that you’re coming with us. I’m gonna get you so drunk, you’ll be on stage with the Flamenco band before you know it.”

 

Actually Flamenco is Spanish, and the Peruvians quietly shun Spanish traditions. You’re more likely to hear…

 

Yeah, ok, whatever. We’ll have you playing Mariachi shit in no time.

 

Well, Mariachis are Mexican. Peruvian music has similar instrumentation, but...

 

I’ll be drunk. I won’t know the difference. What are you, an ethnomusicologist?

 

Actually, I had considered it…

 

You should. You’d be the rockstar of the anthropology community. You’d get all the geeky anthro girls to drop trowel.

 

Laughs

 

Ok, so no more of this evac center nonsense, you’re staying with me until we leave.

 

You sound like it’s a sure thing.

 

Dude, it’s practically a done deal. I am kind of the one who decides such things, you know.

 

I guess you do have a point.

 

Max spent the remainder of the weekend making sure he had everyting that he would need to take with him to peru. He would only be making a list at this point, but he could afford to be a little frivolous, once he got that big insurance check, which was due  by the end of the weeke.

Laptop

Digital Camera

Gps unit

Binoculars

Surely much more that he was forgetting.

 

Tom: ok, so you need to explain this to me again. You actually rule your life by some sort of arbitrary events that you believe point you in the direction you need to go.

 

Yes.

 

So you believe that everyihing is fated to hapend and there’s hnothing we can do about it, that we don’t control our own lives.

 

That’s not exactly true. To me, my life is like a water particle.

 

Huh?

 

I know its hard, but just shut up and listen for a moment.

 

Tom made a little zipper motion across his lips.

 

After spending thousands, if not millions of years trapped in polar ice cap, a water particle is finally born into the world after it makes it’s way to the foot of a glacier and melts. It then will begin a long journey downhill to the sea. A water particle doesn’t choose it’s route to the sea. It moves with the flow of the other particles and finds the path that will take it around obstacles, eventually finding its way to the sea.

 

So you go with the flow, so to speak.

 

In a sense, but not in the way that most people usually mean that statement. The main difference between a water particle and us is that we actually can choose. The only direction we cannot change or reverse is time. So we are born from the glacier and reach our death at the sea, but we get to wander all over the place along the way. Now, there are forces that pull us to what some call a “final cause”. Some theorize that instead of a single starting point which branches out forward in front of us with infinite possibilities, that instead we are all headed towards an inevitable conclusion, and each choice we makes eliminates possible paths instead of creating them. I don’t know if I buy it, but this philosophy suggests that the universe has something to achieve, and everything is pulled towards its own individual contribution to this universal achievement. That’s not generally an attractive philosophy, but I do know that, with practice, you can start to see the path in front of you that takes you towards the purpose that you were created to serve.

 

You know you think way too much, right?

 

I like thinking. I don’t know why everyone doesn’t. I’ve been known to just sit and think. Once I had a roommate that came home to find me staring at a wall. She asked what I was doing and I said, “Thinking”. Then I kept staring at the wall like she wasn’t even there. She was convinced that I was an axe murderer waiting to happen at that point, I think.

 

As expected, max was accepted into the exchange program through the anthropology department. So he purchased all the things he needed and prepared to depart. Along with he and Tom, they would be accompanied by Nicholas Reich, a socially challenged egg head from the math department.

 

What a motley crew we are, Max thought as they boarded the plane. We run the gamut of the whole scale of social skills from non-existant to over the top.

 

Max: So nick, what brings you along on this journey?

 

Nick: I’m adding archaeo-astronomy as a focus in my anthropology minor.

 

Max: you aren’t supposed to need a focus if it’s only a minor.

 

Nick: I know, but I have some theories I want to check out.

 

Tom: I have some flight attendants I want to check out.

 

Max: heh. What theories, Nick?

 

Nick: are you familiar with the layout of the Giza plateau?

 

Max: Sure, nothing precise, but you can’t be an archaeology buff and not be familiar with it.

Nick: Well, what most people don’t realize is that the structures on the ground correspond to significant features in the night sky. You can super-impose an image of the night sky over the giza plateau, and after a slight rotation, the three main pyramids match up perfectly with the belt of Orion. Haven’t you ever wondered how a series of buildings so painstakingly and perfectly aligned to the cardinal points like the pyramids are could be offline in relation to one-another?

 

Max: That’s always been an oddity about them, the fact that the two largest line up almost perfectly in a diagonal from Khufu’s Northwest corner to Khafre’s southwest corner, but the smaller one is offline from that line, seemingly for no reason.

 

Nick: exactly, but if you look at the Orion constellation in the sky, the belt stars are aligned in exactly the same way, with the dimmer of the three, the southwestern one, being slightly offline.

 

Mark: I never realized that.

 

Nick: No reason you should, it was pretty much an accidental discovery. But upon closer study, after super-imposing the star map over the plateau map, The nile falls almost perfectly in line with the milky way, and guess where the sphinx is.

 

Tom: In Leo?

 

Nick: Exactly.

 

Tom: you gotta be kiddin me.

 

Nick: That’s way too much to be considered coincidental.

 

Max: I don’t believe in coincidences. Especially here. The Egyptians were obsessed with astronomy, and were uncannily precise in everything they did, in regards to monumental construction especially. There’s no way these things would just happen to line up perfectly like that.

 

Nick: well, it’s not perfect, unfortunately.

 

Tom: I knew it! Here’s the catch…

 

Nick: The Egyptians could’ve designed the layout of the plateau so that no rotation of the star map would be necessary to line up the monuments to their respective stars. So why didn’t they?

 

Max: For the same reason that the Sphinx doesn’t perfectly face the sunrise on the summer solstice as it appears to have been designed to do. It really doesn’t make much sense. The Egyptians will wow you with their precision and engineering in one moment, then seemingly blunder on something as significant as the alignment of a significant monument the next.

 

Nick: well, as it turns out, they may not have blundered. There’s an explanation for all of the misalignment.

 

Max: oh?

Tom: (rolling eyes) this oughta be good.

 

Nick: Are you familiar with precession of the equinox’s?

 

Max: I think I heard something about that in my astronomy class.

 

Nick: figures. Precession of the equinox’s is the effect that the tilt of the earth on it’s axis has on the appearance of the night sky on a given day, evolving through the years.

 

Tom: It’s always the same.

 

Nick: not quite. The earth doesn’t spin smoothly on it’s axis. It wobbles. This wobble causes a slight rotation of the orientation of all the stars in the sky. It happens so slowly, however, that it takes 26000 years to complete a cycle. This is why you hear people speak of the “age of Aquarius” or whatnot. An astrological age lasts as long as on the equinox, the sun rises in a particular constellation. So, even though the age of aquarius really hasn’t begun technically yet, it will last around 2167 years when it does begin.

 

Tom: Will you “let the sunshine in”? Because “I can’t see clearly now”.

 

Max: Funny.

 

Tom: I try.

 

Nick: what I’m saying is, if you turn back the procession of the equinox’s back in time, the sky will seemingly slowly rotate. And the giza plateau precisely aligns with its corresponding stars above if you turn the clock back to 10500 BC.

 

Max: Whoa.

 

Tom: are you suggesting that the pyramids were actually built 6000 years earlier than we believe they were?

Nick: Not necessarily. It could be that the planners of the plateau merely wanted to record that date in stone, so to speak, because it has some significance.

 

Max: Well, it does correspond with the approximate end of the last ice age.

 

Nick: yes. And it almost seems as though the Egyptians built a key to deciphering this little puzzle right into the plateau.

 

Tom: and what is that?

Nick: The sphinx. Think about it, it’s a lion, right?

Max: mostly.

 

Nick: well some believe it was all lion originally, until an enterprising pharaoh decided to put his face on it instead, but I digress. So, in 10500 BC, guess what constellation The sun would rise in on the equinox?

 

Max: Surely not Leo.

 

Nick: Leo exactly. Leo the Lion. When the sun last was aligned perfectly with this giant lion statue, it would’ve appeared out of the giant lion constellation, while the milky way was directly over the nile’s path at that time, and the belt of orion would’ve lined up perfectly with the tips of the three great pyramids.

 

Max: That’s an awful lot to dismiss as coincidence.

 

Nick: It is. So I don’t. But there’s one more interesting tidbit of information to add.

 

Tom: You’re crazy nick. Max, you’re crazy for listening to this.

 

Max: You have an amazing capacity for accepting coincidence, Tom.

 

Tom: I know. It’s a gift.

 

Max: Continue, nick.

 

Nick: So some years back, a clever archaeologist wanted to silence some of the more fringe theorists about the age and origin of the monuments on the giza plateau. Since they weren’t buying the archaeologists explanations, he brought in another science altogether. He brought in a group of geologists who specialized in weathering to see if they could estimate when the statue was carved based on the wear it had suffered since it’s creation. Their results did nothing to silence the fringe, and in fact threw a wrench in the neat little package archaeology has been feeding folks for years. They found that the clear age and wear on the monument were caused by heavy rains and wind, and not blown sand as everyone had assumed.

 

Tom: You see? That’s not even possible.

 

Nick: not any time recently, your right. But keep in mind that for the majority of the sphinx’s existence in recorded history, it has been buried up to it’s neck in sand, which actually preserved it, rather than causing more wear. As you may be aware, the sahara wasn’t always desert.

 

Max: Of course not.

 

Nick: Right. But the last time there were sufficient rains to cause the wear the geologists say it caused was shortly after the end of the last ice age, when the sahara was a temperate wetland.

 

Max: 10500 BC, same as the astronomical alignment. Weird.

 

Nick: Yep.

 

Tom: So, if you’re so interested in all this stuff about ancient Egypt, why are you coming to South America?

 

Nick: It has been suggested that the mysterious ancient city of  Tijuanaco may also have astronomical alignments. I hope to find out.

 

Max: I’d love to see Tijuanaco.

 

Tom: Me too.

 

Nick: well, we’ve got an expedition arranged, I’m sure you guys can get in on it. Even if it means getting hired on as a porter.

 

Tom: funny, Nick.

 

The conversation was interrupted by the captain informing the passengers of final descent into Lima airport. From there the team caught a cab from the airport to the Colonial Inn in the upscale Miraflores district, which is where the Lima government prefers to direct foreign visitors, to give a better impression of their sometimes troubled capital city, and also to protect the unprepared from potential con men and just plain thieves. The drive through Lima from the airport gave an interesting cross section of the different levels of life in this third world metropolis. The architecture ranges from mud brick and adobe buildings constructed by hand, often barely fit to live in, to thouroughly modern buildings you would expect to find in any city. The Colonial in was somewhere in between. It was much closer to the latter than the former, the group was happy to find out. Max and Tom were sharing a room with 2 twin beds. All in all it was actually a very nice room, especially for third world standards. The bathroom was unusually arranged, being almost two rooms. There was an alcove for the toilet down a short narrow hallway from the larger alcove shared by the sink and the shower. The two alcoves straddled the buildings central enclosure, which was an open shaft down the center of the building that the vents from both the toilet and shower enclosure opened up to. This served as an archaic ventilation system in the absence of a vent fan.

 

Tom: I’m going to take a dump.

 

Max: Thanks for letting me know.

 

Tom: well, you’re about to hear it all, so I figured I’d warn you.

 

Max slid open one of the many panes that served as a window. He noticed that there was no caulking or batting of any kind to keep out drafts. Just sliding panes. There also didn’t appear to be any way to lock the window. Max was reminded how different even little things can be in other countries. The sound of the traffic outside the second floor window adequately masked the sounds of Tom’s bowel movement eminating from the bathroom. Max felt a since of exhilaration now that his life was in flux once again. There’s a strange excitement being forcibly detached from your life, and heading out into the world with only the future to worry about.

 

By the time Tom was done in the bathroom, Max was already in bed, writing in his journal.

 

Tom: What are you doing? We just arrived in a foreign city, the night is young. We should hit the town.

 

Max: We have a three AM wake-up call.

 

Tom: Three AM? That’s a bed time, not a wake-up time. We can sleep on the plane.

 

Max: It’s only a one hour flight to Cuzco from here. Not much time to sleep. Basically you have to choose between sleeping now, or sleeping in Cuzco once we get there. Personally, I’d rather have the entire day to visit some of the sights in Cuzco  tomorrow and sleep now.

 

Tom: It’s crazy how they taxied us all the way across the city from the airport just for us to sleep, then taxi right back to the airport first thing in the morning. Well, first thing in the middle of the night.

 

Max: You know how it is. They want us foreigners to see the good side of Lima, which the airport district certainly isn’t.

 

Tom: I’m not sure I can get to sleep this early. What time is it, any way?

Max: Peru is in Eastern Standard Time.

 

Tom: Does that mean you know what time it is, or do I need to ask Nick?

 

Max: Its just after Ten.

 

Tom: Ok, I’m going to have to plug in and tune out, then.

 

Tom put on his headphones and got in bed. Max read for a while. He was halfway through “Foucalt’s Pendulum”, the legendary novel by Umberto Eco that dealt with themes of history, secret societies, hidden ancient knowledge, and the stumbling onto of the aforementioned by unsuspecting academics. Max couldn’t help but to daydream about stumbling onto some lost city or ancient knowledge. South America seemed to be littered with lost cities, over run by jungles. And even more lost knowledge, if there was any left to be found, after it was eradicated by overzealous catholic priests that had accompanied the Spanish conquistadors. No student of ancient history, religion, philosophy or anthropology could avoid feeling a twinge of pain at the thought of what was lost forever when the catholic missionaries gathered all fifty thousand Mayan codices, comprising an entire continent’s history and knowledge, and simply burned them in a big pile because it was “heretical”. Even the Spaniards Max had met in his visit to Spain were regretful of the actions of their ancestors.

 

People don’t realize the power of daydreams. Max had often noticed that the opinion held of him by others turned out to be exactly what he had imagined they would think of him. He wasn’t so conceited as to believe that he was actually having an effect on their minds through his imaginings, but he did believe that people’s beliefs and perception had more of a direct effect on their reality than most people realize. It was to these thoughts that Max drifted off to sleep, managing to overcome the mixture of excitement and trepidation that met his thoughts of the sudden uncertainty of his future.

 

Max awoke in 1985. He was 12 again, and he was in New York City for a school field trip.

I was in sixth grade, about 12 years old.  The private school I was attending, New Garden Friends School (NGFS), was on a week-long field trip to New York City. At this time there was a class bully named Kenny that had decided that he didn't like me. I don't know why he hated me so. Perhaps there was some reason, something I had done to him that I don't remember, but I don't remember knowing why he wanted to beat me up at the time. During this field trip, we were staying at a beautiful, large old mansion in Yonkers that belonged to a relative or friend of one of our teachers. One day, we had some down time, and all the kids were out in the very large yard playing soccer, among other things. I was never much of an athlete and always somewhat of an outcast, so I wandered off by myself. I found a nice little path through some woods that led to a clearing, in the middle of which was a tire swing hanging from a huge old oak tree. I hopped up on the swing and just swayed back and forth, enjoying the quiet and solitude. After a few minutes, Kenny came along, apparently quite pleased at the opportunity to find me alone, and isolated from the rest of the kids and teachers. Now, here's where my memory seems off. As I remember it, this tire swing was so high off the ground, that Kenny couldn't even reach me. If it was that high, how did I get up on it? There may have been a ladder or something, I don't remember. But anyway, Kenny says to me, "Come down from there so I can kick your ass." To which my response was, naturally, "ummm....no?" So Kenny says, "You'll have to come down from there some time, and when you do, I'll be waiting." And he went off back down the path to rejoin the other kids playing soccer. This made me angry. I didn't understand why he wouldn't leave me alone and I became filled with rage. Now, rage is something I've only felt a handful of times in my life, and I tend to turn it inwards rather than unleashing it upon the world. This time, however, something altogether different happened. Somehow I knew what to do. As I remained on the tire swing, I closed my eyes. I pressed a tightly clenched fist against my forehead, and felt all the muscles in my body tense up at once. I sat there for several seconds, shaking with rage and tensed muscles. Then, a picture came into my mind. I could clearly see the yard back at the house where the kids were playing soccer. I could see Kenny running and kicking with them. I focused the image in on Kenny's left leg, until my mind's entire field of vision was dominated by his leg, and then I released. I relaxed. My muscles relaxed and I opened my eyes. I don't remember if I felt any different, or if I had some idea that I had done something. At this time, I decided to hop down off the tire swing, and walk back to the yard where the other kids were. What I saw when I got there gave me chills. Kenny was lying on the ground, crying, clutching his left leg. I asked one of the other kids what happened. "I don't know, he just cried out, collapsed, and grabbed his leg", was the response. I was, as you can imagine, somewhat weirded out by this. I had to tell someone what had happened. I picked one of the other kids, John-Chris, almost at random, just to share what I had experienced. I related the whole story, as I just told it, to him. His only response was, "Man, you must be spooked". Thanks, John-Chris, for that insightful comment. I don't think he believed me, and he never spoke of it to me again. Later on that evening, as Kenny was sitting in a chair with his leg propped up on another chair, I asked him what had happened, curiosity overcoming intimidation. In a surprisingly friendly manner, he explained that he didn't know what had happened, and that his leg stopped hurting a few minutes later, and was only propped up now because the teacher's told him to stay off of it. There was, apparently, no injury, nothing wrong with the leg.

 

Max had dreamt of that day so often, that he was no longer sure that it had actually happened. For someone who refused to believe in coincidences, the events of that day posed some really troubling questions. There had only been a few other experiences in Max’s life on a level of inexplicability with that one. And those, too, only seemed to be recalled through Max’s detailed dream life. Also, significant dreams of this nature usually foretold an eventful period upcoming in Max’s life. The last dream, where he’d been a Mongoose, had certainly taken an immediate significance in his waking life. Max shuddered to think what the recurrence of this old dream, and memory, might mean for the immediate future. He decided to tell Tom and Nick about it. Nothing else to do on the flight, after all.

 

Tom: Max, I’m beginning to think you are crazy.

 

Max: That makes 2 of us.

 

Tom: But you know I love crazy people. Is that why you dropped your psychology minor? Because you’re bat-shit crazy?

 

Max: Something like that.

 

Nick: So you are telling us that this actually happened?

Max: As far as I remember it, yeah.

 

Nick: Do people believe this story?

Max: I don’t really tell that to anyone, because I don’t think they will believe it.

 

Tom: I’m not sure I do.

 

Max: That’s ok. I’ve begun to doubt my memory as well.

 

Nick: You mentioned in there somewhere that you’ve had other experiences like this. Have you?

Max: I guess I have.

 

Tom: Should I just stop listening now?

 

Max: Hehe, Like I said, that’s why I don’t talk about it.

 

Nick: I want to hear.

 

Max: Ok, but this one is even more far fetched. And I never dream about it, so the lines to reality are less blurred.

 

It was roughly a year after the previous incident I described. Being a kid, I was throroughly convinced that I had a power. Being a responsible kid, I decided that I shouldn’t abuse it. So I didn’t use it really at all after that, for fear that It’d be taken away if I misused it. So I decided to see if I could still do it, and looked for an opportunity. It was the 1986 world series, and for reasons I don’t remember, I was REALLY pulling for the Mets to win it over the Red Sox. If either of you are Boston fans, they’ve since won 2 championships so don’t hate me.

 

Tom: You’re saying you influenced the world series. Right.

 

Nick: Let him finish.

 

Max: So, everyone remembers Game 6, the Mets are losing, and Boston is one out away from clinching their first championship since 1908 or whatever it was. Now, anyone who’s a baseball fan remembers what happened in that 9^th inning, The Mets had one on and two outs, and two strikes on the batter. Here’s what happened from my point of view. At this point, I closed my eyes and plugged my ears, blotting out all of my ability to perceive what was happening on TV. I tried to recreate the conditions of the incident a year before. I tensed all my bodies muscles, clinched my eyes shut so tight I saw stars, and I called a picture into mind. The image I called was of the Mets, running out on the field, celebrating wildly, as they would if they won the game. After concentrating for a minute or two, I relaxed and released my pent up energy. I then opened my eyes and looked at the TV, and saw exactly what I had pictured in my mind. I didn’t know what had happened, or how they’d won. But they did. I stuck around to watch the post game show, just to know what happened. It was the legendary Bill Buckner error that is still talked about in Boston to this day. In his words, “It bounced, it bounced, and then it didn’t bounce” when asked how it got under his glove.

 

Nick: You’re right, that one is more far-fetched. But I bet it was enough to convince you. Two for two is hard to ignore.

 

Max: True

 

Tom: Have you used your “power” any more since then.

 

Max: No, for 2 reasons. One, because I felt like I shouldn’t use it irresponsibly. And Two, because I’m afraid it wouldn’t work, and I’d be that much closer to ordinary.

 

Nick: As they say, some mysteries are better off as mysteries.

 

Max: Yeah. Besides, it almost certainly wouldn’t work, since I have doubts that it would. The doubts would surely undermine it. It’s one of those things that only has a chance of working if you believe it will. If you doubt you fail.

 

Tom: Thanks, Yoda.

 

Nick: Belief is a powerful thing.

 

Max: True. I believe that belief is the building blocks of reality. Every day that we discover the universe, we are creating it. Most people believe that reality is what their senses are telling them. I think its more of the other way around than you might realize. Your senses will describe a reality to you that you believe is there. Perception and interpretation are not that far apart.

 

Nick: That is sort of what some scholars in the quantum field have begun getting into.

 

Max: I like theoretical/quantum physics/mechanics.

 

Nick: They’re doing their best to cross all sorts of boundaries, into philosophy and religion even.

 

Max: all with mathematics and experimentation, which is exciting.

 

Nick: Yeah, have you heard of the famous dual slit experiment?

 

Max: I’m not sure.

 

Tom: Sounds like Siamese twin prostitutes.

 

Nick: Ew.

 

Tom: Ew what? That would be the bomb!

 

Max: If I’m not mistaken, It was originally devised in the 19th century to try and determine if light were a wave or was made up of particles. It was reworked just recently involving a device, a filter, that counted photons as they passed through the slits. I won't bore you with the intended purpose of  the experiment, but instead will talk of the unexpected effect. They found that the nature of light, as perceived, actually changed when measured. They shone a light through two slits, the wave properties of light caused an interference pattern on the projection surface. This was expected. However, when they activated the device to count the photons as they passed through the filter, the interference pattern vanished. So, when they shone the light expecting an interference pattern, due to the wave nature of light, that is what they got. However, when they tried to measure light as particles, the wave pattern vanished, leaving light behaving as though it is particles rather than waves. But it gets even stranger. There were three ways to run the experiment, photon counter on, photon counter off, and running the experiment, and making the decision whether or not to turn on the photon counter later. I know it doesn't make much sense, but the results are astounding. They got the same results as always when they turned the counter off or on. But, they ran the experiment (Which was analyzed by a computer giving them the results after the fact) without deciding whether to turn the counter on or not, then deciding after running the experiment, to turn on the counter (or off), the result was always as it would've been had they made the decision before running the experiment. How do you explain this? Let me tell this experiment in an analogy. It's like placing a camera in a room with a timer to take a picture at a particular time. Then, either turning the lights on, or off. If the lights were off, you get a picture of a dark room, if they're on, you see the room. Simple? With this experiment it was like they put the camera in the room, let it snap the picture then, after the picture had been taken, deciding to have the lights be off in the room. The camera would have taken a picture of a dark room. If the decision had been made, again after the picture had been taken, to have the lights on in the room, then the picture would reveal a lighted room. It is as if light itself responds to the decisions we make, to reveal what we expect to see. This is evidence that decisions we make actually do affect the world around us. This begins to sound very much like lucid dreaming. In a lucid dream, you can change reality all around you because it is all taking place inside your mind. The only limit is that of your imagination. But now, we begin to see that we have the same effect on waking reality, although the scope may not be the same.

 

Tom: You guys are missing some awesome mountains, have you looked out the window lately?

 

Below them was an expanse of mountains the likes of which none of them had ever seen. The Andes, after all, are the second highest mountain range in the world. Even from forty thousand feet up, they boggle the mind in their scale and expanse. Even on a cloudy day, such as this one, their snow-capped peaks emerged through the cloud cover, refusing to be hidden from view. One in particular caught Max’s eye. It was roughly the shape of a three sided pyramid, and must’ve been the tallest mountain for miles. It dominated the landscape surrounding it, with its permanent white cap.

 

Tom: This makes your Appalachians look like ant hills, huh?

 

Max: Don’t sell the Appalachians short. They’re the oldest mountains in the world, and are still very impressive. At their pinnacle, they would’ve dwarfed the Andes and the Himalayas combined. There’s an energy there you won’t find anywhere else. Truly ancient.

 

Tom: Well, I don’t know anything about “energy”, but I do know that I’m going to get a lot of use out of these hiking boots. These hills should really tone my ass, don’t you think? Tom stood up and turned around so Max could see his rear end.

 

Max: I don’t know, I think it’s alright already. He said with a wily grin.

 

Tom: Busts out laughing. You’re not so bad, for an insane person.

 

Max: I thought you liked crazy people?

Tom: Lucky for you!

 

Nick: Should I leave you two alone?

For the second consecutive day, a conversation was interrupted by a plane’s captain announcing final descent. They’d soon be in Cuzco, land of the Inca, land of the llama…

 

Tom: Land of altitude sickness! Here we come!

 

Cuzco rests at an average altitude of  nearly eleven thousand feet. And the city is in a valley. The mountains above, where many ruins lie, are another thousand feet up.

 

Tom: Denver is up there, but this is the two mile high city!

 

From the airport, they caught a taxi to the main square, where the hostel that the university runs was located. The main square is the place to be for a foreigner in Cuzco. It is the safest part of town, surrounded by comforts that tourists require. Restaurants, internet cafes, shops and even Laundromats were in easy walking distance. IT was a lot like living on campus, Max thought.

 

Max would be sharing a room with Nick. The room was unlike any max had ever stayed in. It had two levels. The lower level featured a wardrobe, small living area and the bathroom, then a staircase led up to a loft which housed twin beds on either side of a small night table. There was a large, shuddered window that opened to the inner courtyard, which had been enclosed by a glass roof sort of like an atrium. The courtyard now featured a series of couches for lounging, and long straight dinner tables, which were constantly stocked with fresh bread and butter, and the inevitable coca tea.

 

“GUYS!”, Tom unworriedly shouted from the balcony outside his room, which also overlooked the atrium. “We have hot water!”. He did a little dance and went back into his room without waiting for a response.

 

Max and nick just laughed. “Is this his first time in a third world country?” asked nick.

 

Max: No, but his previous experiences were mostly Mexico, so he may not have the best cross section of what the countries south of the border have to offer.

 

Nick: Does he have family in Mexico?

Max: He says so, but I think he just goes to Tijuana to party.

 

Nick: Well, this is home for the duration of our stay in Cuzco.

 

Max: it’s not bad, especially when you consider its what we get instead of a dorm room.

 

Nick: and we don’t have to check in with the university until Thursday, we’ve got most of the week to explore on our own.

 

Tom: Tonight, a fine Peruvian meal and some local flavor!

 

Max: Then early to bed, because tomorrow the massive walls of Saqsaywaman await.

 

Tom: ah yes, Sexy Woman!

 

Nick: well, it does sound like that.

 

Chapter 3: Cuzco, Rome of South America

 

The remaining walls of the great fortress of saqsaywaman on the slopes overlooking Cuzco, only remain because they are too massive, too well constructed for the Spanish to have torn down. Not that they didn’t try. The three main walls of the massive fortress are a skeleton of the bastion of engineering and master stonework that once graced the site.

 

Max: The Spaniards believed these walls were the work of the devil.

 

Tom: Those catholic kooks gave the devil credit for a great many things.

 

Max: You can tell why some modern kooks believe these walls were built by aliens.

 

High Inca masonry resembles nothing else made by man on this earth. Unfathomably massive stones are shaped in extremely irregular shapes, and seemingly placed haphazardly together. However, this hodge podge of illogically shaped monoliths are fitted together with an astonishing precision. A sheet of paper cannot be slipped between the stones. According to their tour guide, plaster casts were made of a space needing to be filled. The cast went to the quarry, where stone shapers custom cut a stone to fit the space that needed filling. Further fine detailing of the stone was done on site, prior to placement, then the stone was put in place, with no mortar of any kind. One main reason for this unusual style of masonry is defense against the earthquakes that frequent the region. These oddly arrange, non-linear, non-geometric stones didn’t have the natural fracture lines found in other masonry, where a crack could follow the weak joints in a wall and compromise it’s stability. With this masonry, there were no natural joints, or weak lines that a fracture could follow. This is why, after every major earthquake, the remaining Inca structures still stand, unharmed, but the Spanish structures often collapsed or were severely damaged.

Directly in front of the massive ancient fortress was a central causeway of grand scale. It was wide enough and long enough to fit four football fields, arranged in pairs. On the other side of the causeway was a low hill made of solid rock. Carved out of the hill were several of the Inca's famous terraces. Unlike most Incan terraces, these were more ceremonial than practical. Being carved from a solid stone mountain meant they weren't needed for either of their dual roles, as there was no need for retaining walls to hold back solid stone, and you can't perform agriculture on solid stone, either. On the other side of the stone hill, away from the fortress, there was a round structure sunk into the earth to a  depth of three or four feet. The guide was saying something about it having something to do with burial rituals, but Max thought it strange that a funerary complex would be placed with such proximity to a military installation, especially with the abundance of space that had been available down in the valley of greater Cuzco. When pressed on the issue, the guide admitted that it was only the assumed function of the circular indention, and that it's exact purpose wasn't really known. It wasn't hard to believe it had ceremonial purposes, due to it's shape and the fact that it's design would accomodate a large amount of participants and/or spectators. It has also been explained that it may simply have been a water reservoir. It's shape would also have been very fitting for this purpose, as it would have also doubled as an attractive fountain like feature when filled with water. Neither Max nor Nick who were busy looking around and snapping photos, had noticed Tom slip away from the group. So he startled them a little when he returned.

Tom: Thank you for your valuable information, we'll continue on our own from here", he said to the guide, and offered him a sizeable tip in Peruvian Soles.
The guide graciously accepted the tip and bid us farewell.

Nick : What did you do that for?

Tom: Because, I found something more interesting than what he was showing us, that we're probably kinda not supposed to see.

Max: Uh oh.

Tom: Relax, it's not blocked off or against the rules to go in there...at least not right away.

Max: What are you talking about?

Tom: Follow me.

To the Northeast of the reservoir there is a karstic formation that resembles an ancient petrified lava flow, but is actually caused by the dissolution of calcium carbonate from limestone caused by water over thousands of years. It was a small area of alien landscape that looked like a giant boiling cauldron, only the boiling liquid had suddenly petrified into stone. What Tom had discovered was an extensive tunnel in the landscape known as a Chinkana, litteraly a "spot to get lost", and that appeared to be exactly Tom's intent.

Max: Hold on a minute. Are you trying to get us arrested? If the city of cuzco doesn’t want us down there, it probably means they’d arrest us if they catch us.

Tom: weren’t you saying something about being destined for an adventure or some shit?

Max: I thought you didn’t believe in all that?

Tom: Well, you’re acting like you don’t.

Max: OK…there’s only one way I agree to this.

Nick: What? Are you nuts?

Max: Probably.

Tom: Ok, what’s your conditions?

Max: We come back tomorrow. I’ve heard those tunnels go on for miles, and we should be properly outfitted.

Nick: I can’t believe you’re agreeing to this madness.

 

Max: I can’t either, but call it a hunch.

 

Tom: Where’s your sense of spontenaity? Why wait? It’s right here!

 

Max: For one thing, do you happen to have a flashlight on you?

 

Tom: well…um…no.

 

Max: My point exactly. If we do this, we come prepared to do it right. I’ve read about these tunnels. The locals call them Chinkanas, which means places to get lost in Q’echan. Legend has it that there’s lost Incan treasure down there, but many have died getting lost while searching for it. I’m not too interested in treasure that probably doesn’t exist, but this seems to be the right path to take.

Tom: Huh?

Max: Remember the dream I described? Where I was a mongoose?

 

Tom: Yeah

 

Max: well, it started out with me escaping a burning house, which became instantly prophetic, then followed by a journey, which has also happened, then followed by going through a small passageway, leading to a battle with a snake. Well, Incans believe these tunnels were once a temple and considered the entrance to the underworld, and the Incan underworld is the domain of the snake.

 

Nick: I can see where you’re going with this.

 

Max: Well, the part in my dream where I had to battle the snake may mean surviving the world of the snake, the entrance to which you’ve happened to find. After defeating the snake, if you’ll remember, I went through another small passage where I was transformed into myself and back to my home. Maybe that means at the other end of that tunnel, I’ll find myself where I need to be.

 

Tom: Ok, if we’re living your dream, that means one of us is Mescalito and one of us is a chipmunk. Who’s who?

 

Max: I think that’s obvious.

 

Tom: It is? What do you mean?
<!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]-->
<!--[endif]-->

Max was already walking back towards the road, to catch a taxi back to the hotel.

Tom: Max?

 

Chapter 4, Domain of the Snake

 

Max meant it when he said get prepared. The trio went on a shopping binge as soon as shops opened the next morning. Along with the flashlights they’d already brought with them, which included head mounted miner lights, they bought chalk, for marking their path at intersections, a magnetic compass, plenty of extra batteries, a first aid kit, emergency rations, rope, a machete…

 

Nick: ok, what’s the machete for again? I doubt there will be jungle to clear down there.

 

Max: Just in case the dream battle between me and the snake was more than metaphorical? Also, on the offhand chance that local gangsters see an opportunity to corner some “rich Americans” where no one will see what’s going on.

 

They also asked around for any information on the tunnels they could obtain, figuring the risk of someone alerting the authorities to their plan was worth it to find out what they could. Besides, if worse came to worst, it wouldn’t hurt if the authorities had a clue where to look for them.

 

Nick had managed to find an obscure book on the Chinkanas in a local used book store. One of the clerks noticed his interest in the book, and came over and spoke to him in Spanish. Nick’s Spanish wasn’t great, so he looked over at Tom, who was fluent. Tom spoke with the clerk.

(translated, because my Spanish isn’t good either)

 

Clerk: I see you are interested in the chinkanas.

 

Tom: Well, We’d heard about them and was wanting to know more.

 

Clerk: As a child and as a young man, I explored them extensively, hoping to find the lost treasure.

 

Tom: Well, did you find anything down there?

 

Clerk: No treasure, obviously. But there are things down there that the archaeologists don’t know about, like inscriptions.

 

Tom: Inscriptions? Can you tell us how to get there?

 

Clerk: I tell you what, for a small fee I can guide you as far as I’ve been.

 

Tom: let me consult with my companions. (to nick and max): He found inscriptions down there as a young man, and he’s offered to lead us to them for a small fee.

 

Max: Could be a scam, but I’ve got an idea. (to clerk): I hope you understand that we must be wary of being taken advantage of by locals who may hope to con us out of money. What would your price be for a day’s guide work?

Clerk: 150 soles.

 

Tom: That’s about 50 bucks. I dunno.

 

Max: I’ll give you 100.

Clerk: You have a deal.

 

Max: This will be our arrangement, to make sure you don’t rip us off. We will leave all our money at our hotel in their safe. If you get us through the tunnels, back out, and back to our hotel safely, you will be paid at that time.

 

Clerk: How do I know you won’t rip ME off?

 

Nick: we’ll give you half up front.

 

Tom: sounds fair.

 

Nick: I’ll buy this book, too.

 

Max: We have some final preparations to make, we’ll meet you back here in an hour.

 

Clerk: My name is Cesar, and you will not regret this arrangement.

 

Max: I’m max, this is Tom, and that is Nick. We’ll be right back.

 

Cesar: I’ll be here.

 

The group exited the bookstore, and went back to the hotel to pack their gear.

 

Tom: are you sure we can trust this guy?

 

Max: I can’t think of how he could lead us more astray than we could lead ourselves. Besides, we’ll stick to our original plan to mark our path with chalk, and use all our other navigational equipment, just as we would’ve if he weren’t there. That reminds me, let me show you one of my new gadgets.

 

Max pulled out a small electronic device, about the size of a cell phone, with three inch square lcd screen. It was obviously a GPS unit.

 

Tom: that’s handy, but will it work underground?

 

Max: Probably not, but this is the latest technology, only recently available to the public. This unit can actually function for up to 9 hours without having contact with the satellite.

 

Tom: how is that possible?

 

Max: It has sophisticated movement sensors, as well as an internal compass. When it loses contact with the satellite, it will measure your movement and calculate your present position based on where and how far you’ve traveled since your last satellite contact.

 

Nick: I imagine there’s a degree of error involved.

 

Max: Yes. The longer you go without satellite contact, the greater the percentage of error is going to be. Depending on how fast you’re going, after nine hours the error margin can be up to 30%.

 

Nick: That’s huge!

 

Max: I know, that’s why it stops functioning after 9 hours, because they figure it’s only going to give you incorrect information from that point on, anyway.

 

Tom: well, in a cave diving situation, such as this, especially with manmade tunnels, we may only need to know a general direction to go in.

 

Max: like I said, this is simply plan B, in case we find ourselves lost and our guide is no help.

 

Tom: Looks to me like we’re all set.

 

Max: First, brunch.

 

Tom: ah yes, a last supper.

 

Nick: Somehow, that’s not funny.

 

Max: You seem worried, nick. You don’t have to come with us. We’re not going to think you’re a wimp or anything if you’d rather stay behind.

 

Nick: Well, it just occurred to me that my biggest worry is what my mother would say if she found out I’d gone into a dangerous tunnel system and maybe if I were to get arrested as a result. Then it occurred to me that I’ve been worrying what my mother would say for my entire life, and perhaps it’s time to make a decision without taking my mother’s potential reaction into account.

 

Tom: Atta boy! What’s your decision then?

Nick: Well, It’s either, I can’t wait to find out what you guys found down there, or I can’t wait to tell about what we found down there. I can’t let you guys make some sort of discovery without me.

 

Tom: That’s what I’m talking about!

 

Nick: besides, I figure you guys might have use for a guy who has a knack for finding patterns in chaos, and solving complex mathematical calculations.

 

Max: always.  

 

The group rendesvou'd with Cesar and caught a cab back up to the top of the mountain. Cesar knew a back way into the Saqsaywaman complex that wouldn't draw any unwanted attention. Besides, security is anything but tight up there. Anyone could approach from the back way and not ever encounter a ticket counter, just walk right in. Tom had fun making exaggerated sneaking movements as they approached the cave opening.

Max, stifling a giggle: Tom, that's going to draw more attention than it diverts.

Nick: Tom's whole existence seems to revolve around drawing attention.

Fortunately for their plans, the tunnels' entrance was in a less visited area of the ruins, and was amid some unremarkable rock formations, that they would disappear behind long before they approached the actual entrance.

Cesar chuckled.

Max: What's so funny?

Cesar: I can't believe they haven't changed this gate since the last time I was here.

Cesar walked over to the gate and lifted up on the lower right corner. He was able to pull it far enough out away from the tunnel wall for them to squeeze through.

Nick: Not exactly secure.

Max: I"m glad we didnt' have to break in, it'd suck if we were depending on coming back out this way and our way was blocked by something as simple as a door being re-locked.

They quietly advanced their way into the tunnel far enough that the filtered in sunlight became too dim to see by. They figured they were deep enough to deploy their gear. They put on their headlights, holstered water bottles, Max activated the GPS device, which still had a signal for the moment. He marked their present position as "entrance" and also made a chalk marking on the rock wall in the form of an arrow.

Max: All arrows point back to the entrance. So, there's no confusion. If we want to turn around and leave, simply follow the arrows.

Cesar: Well, there's only one way to go for now, but we'll have choices to make soon enough.

Nick: Take us to those inscriptions you mentioned. I didn't see them mentioned in this book.

Cesar: Like I said, the archaeologists never went as far as me and my friends did. We spent days down here.

Tom: I hope you're not leading us on a wild goose chase?

Cesar, offended: I show you evidence, not blah blah.

The group walked for what seemed like hours and miles, passing several intersections. But Cesar seemed to know where he was going, never hesitating in choosing which turns to make. Meanwhile the guys meticulously chalked every intersection indicating the way back to the entrance.

Tom: Seems like we've been going really far down.

Cesar: It seems that way, but we actually haven't gotten back to the level of the city yet. Some of these tunnels go all the way down to the catacombs under Qorikancha.

Tom: that’s the temple near the square that the Spanish built a monastery on top of?

Cesar: Yes.

 

Nick: what’s that stench? Nick said after what seemed like an eternity.

 

Max: I dunno, but it’s getting stronger.

 

Tom: I farted.

 

Max: I don’t think that’s it, unless something crawled up your ass and died.

 

Nick: Something big.

 

Cesar looked genuinely worried, also, but chose not to speak on it. The group eventually came to what seemed to be a chamber, or at least a larger room in the cave.

 

Nick screamed.

 

Everyone’s attention turned to see what his problem was. A badly desiccated body lay in a corner, leaning halfway upright.

 

Tom: Holy Shit! Cesar, where have you brought us.

 

Cesar: No panicking! Tunnels were once used for many things, even to dispose of bodies by the Shining Path, when they were in power.

 

Nick: I don’t think that one is old enough to have been left here by the Shining Path.

 

Aside; The shining path was a left-wing communist group that seized control of large portions of Peru throughout the eighties and nineties. It only recently became safe for tourists to return there, with the movement having been contained, and control of the entire country has been returned to the elected government.

 

Cesar: also, you read in your book there about how people have died getting lost in these tunnels. Listen, if you haven’t carefully considered the risks involved in what you are doing, and aren’t prepared for these sorts of possibilities, then you are in over your head already.

 

Max: You’re right. We definitely were aware that we may encounter such things, I guess we just didn’t really prepare to encounter a body.

 

Nick: He was American.

 

Tom: What?
<!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]-->
<!--[endif]-->

Nick had covered his face with a handkerchief and used the dead man’s walking stick to fish out his wallet.

 

Nick: Robert Wilson. Looks like he was here on a student visa, from Texas.

 

The tension in the room grew more taught. Max wondered quietly and nervously if Cesar didn’t regularly bring gringos down here to rob and kill them.

 

Cesar: This guy has no belongings, he certainly was doomed to venture down here with no provisions or equipment.

 

Tom: Or his stuff was stolen.

 

Cesar: people disappear down here all the time. Bring his wallet back to town with us when we get out, we will report his discovery to the authorities.

 

Nick: Won’t they arrest us for being down here?

Cesar: we can report it anonymously, if you wish. He must have known about the inscriptions, he was very close to finding them.

 

Max: We’re close then.

 

Cesar: Very.

 

The group walked in silence for what seemed like another eternity. Max Stole a glance at his watch, it was 4 pm. They’d been hiking through these tunnels for nearly 6 hours. He shuddered to think of how lost they might get down here, and at once, the collective weight of the earth and stone above and around him began to sink in, and he was extremely thankful that he wasn’t claustrophobic. The fact that Cesar, also, looked ill at ease since they encountered the body made Max a little bit less nervous. For Cesar’s uneasiness didn’t seem to be a guilty one, more of a genuine sense that he, too, may be in danger.

 

Cesar: We have arrived!

 

The group momentarily forgot about their fear and anxiety, and entered a large chamber that was roughly triangular shaped. The passageway they entered through was in the middle of one of the triangle’s sides. Opposite the entry way was a large, unnaturally round boulder. In the center of the room was a round indention, intricately carved with minute symbols and stylized representations of who knows what. Tom got his larger lantern out of his pack. Nick did the same. In no time, the room was flooded with light, or at least as much as you could expect a room hundreds of feet underground to be flooded with light.

 

Max: These symbols are completely unfamiliar to me. Cesar, do you know what they mean?

Cesar: No. I tried to draw them long ago, but I lack a steady hand. I’m not sure anyone else has seen them. At least not any of the university types.

 

Tom: Lets just take a million pictures, we’ll study them closely when we get the hell out of here.

 

Nick: agreed.

 

Cesar: But first, you are missing the rest.

 

Cesar indicated the large round boulder. Upon close inspection, a series of pictographs became visible. They were seemingly hieroglyphic in nature, like a pictographic language utilizing distinctly meso-american icnography and stylization.

 

Max: Nick, Tom and I will get photos, see if you can make some sense of them.

 

Nick: Math is my specialty, not ancient, previously untranslated pictographs.

 

Max: I know, but you said you could find patterns, repetitions, commonalities.

 

Nick: Ok.

 

Nick: Of course I can’t be sure, but I have a hunch this might be some sort of calendar.

 

Tom: Calendar? Wouldn’t this be a dumb place to put a calendar?

 

Max: That would be strange. The underworld, realm of the snake god. Seems like a calendar would belong to the realm of the Condor, or the heavens, since calendars are born from astronomical observations.

 

Nick: I’m probably wrong. I have nothing to base that hunch on, other than the fact that there does seem to be a mathematical element at work here.

 

Tom: How can you be sure?

Nick: These symbols here, in the corner of the larger pictographs, appear to be some sort of sequential indicators, defining an order that the symbols should be read in. My hunch that it may be calendrical is because of the general shape of the whole thing. It is a generally round shape that seems to be broken up into 13 subsections.

Max: Like a lunar calendar, 13 lunar cycles makes 364 days, or one year.

Nick: Yeah, and this strange round fellow in the center could be some sort of moon diety. What do you think, Cesar?

Cesar: Yes, that is most definitely the moon god, TBD.

Tom: now it makes a little bit more sense. In a cult of the underworld, the moon would rule the skies, and a lunar calendar would be the way to go.

Max: However, there's a distinct absence of anything snake related.

Cesar: You're missing the big picture.

Cesar motioned to the walls around the room, which the group hadn't noticed in their enthusiasm to study the floor indention and inscripted boulder. All along the outer edge of the room was a stylized snake body, culminating in the corner of the boulder. Cesar pointed out how the outer border of the relief area on the front of the boulder was actually the outstretchd mouth of the snake.

Cesar: Here, the snake shares the wisdom of the underworld with us.

Tom: More like he's barfing up the wisdom of the underworld.

Max and Tom thoroughly photographed the room, while Nick sketched the room, which would aid in arranging the photos for context, later on.

 

Cesar: It’s been more than 8 hours since we began our trip. We should rest here before making our way out.

 

Tom: maybe we should press on.

 

Nick: Maybe you are crazy.

 

Max: Cesar is right. We’ll rest here for a while, then we’ll decide whether to explore further, or make our way out. Either way, I think we’ve found something significant, here.

 

The group dined on the provisions they had brought with them, rationing to a small degree to account for the possibility of further exploration before leaving. They also decided they should get some sleep, and made use of the gear they had brought for just such purposes. In the morning, they decided to play it safe, and head back out. They packed up their gear, took some additional photos, and headed back out. In time they past the chamber where the corpse was, and nobody looked in. The smell was enough. Shortly after that Cesar motioned them to stop and be quiet. Noise could be heard in the tunnel up ahead?

 

Tom whispered: Police?

Cesar: that would be one of the better options.

 

Tom: Why?

 

Cesar: if local gang members find us down here, they see it as a free opportunity to rob us with no witnesses.

 

They hurriedly began to backtrack in an effort to find a place to hide. It was best to avoid contact with whoever might be coming. IT was too late, however. Three guys that were devinitely not police stood before them. One had a gun, pointed at them.

 

Thug: Stop right there!

 

Tom: Oh, Hi, we just came down here to…uh…because we thought it was a shortcut back to town. But it isn’t so we’re just headed back out.

 

Thug: you’re very deep in these caves for a gringo.

 

Tom: well, we have a guide…

 

Tom turned to indicate Cesaar, but he was gone. Nick was gripped with panic, but Max shot him a look that said, “hold it in, Nick, panic later”.

 

Tom: Book. We have a guide book.

 

He gestured towards nick who held up the book on the Cuzco Chinkanas he’d bought from Cesar’s bookstore.

 

Max: The authorities know we’re here. They’ll be looking for us.

 

Thug, Laughing: Even if that were true, I could make sure they never find you.

 

Real fear begin to grip the group now. Here they were, defenseless, except for a machete, deep in uncharted tunnels, far from witnesses. Max thought for a moment he may never see daylight again.

 

Thug: Hand over your packs, your wallets, watches, everything.

 

The group slowly began to comply.

 

Tom overheard one thug whisper to another: Why don’t we just go ahead and kill them? He started to reach for the machete. He didn’t want to die without a fight. Just then, the thugs stopped in mid sentence, looking towards the group, with their eyes growing wider and wider. Suddenly one fo the thugs screamed and ran, dropping all the groups things that he’d picked up. Another soon followed suit. The lead thug looked for amoment like he might try and talke them out of it, but decided to join them instead. In their rush, they left all the group’s things, and even dropped some of their own walking sticks. The group stood there puzzled. Wondering what had been the cause of their salvation. That’s when they noticed the smell. An overwhelming stench of decay seemed to eminate from nowhere. Nick turned around, and let out a blood curdling scream of his own. The other two then turned, in time to see the dessicated corpse of Robert Wilson, whom they’d discovered the day before, standing there in a way that no dead body ever should. Before blind panic could descend upon the group, the corpse crumpled to the ground, revealing Cesar, who had been holding up the body while hiding behind it, to create the illusion of the walking dead in these dark, narrow passageways. Panic was transformed into ebullient laughter. Tom gave Cesar a bear hug that nearly cracked ribs.

 

Tom: Man, you….STINK!

 

Tom quickly released his hug and began to brush himself off. Further howls of laughter erupted from Max and Nick, and even Cesar.

 

Max: I have to admit, I was certain you had abandoned us to die.

 

Cesar shrugged, grinning impishly.

 

Nick: what on earth gave you such a ridiculous idea? How did you think that would ever work? Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad it did.

 

Cesar: If those guys were local, and Im guessing they were, then they’ve grown up, just as I did, with legends of these tunnels. We were told as children, as a way to frighten us out of thoughts of coming down here, that these tunnels were used by people to find the underworld once they die. We were told horror stories about how if you came down into the tunnels, you may very well encounter a lost soul, a walking dead, who got lost on their way to the underworld. And, legend has it, that if you encountered such a ghoul, it could trade places with you by touching you, dooming you to an eternity of wandering these passages. I didn’t have my flashlight on, and I could tell they didn’t notice me when they first saw you. They were blinded by greed, seeing foreigners, who were surely rich, down here unprotected. I slipped away and did the only thing I could think to do.

 

Tom: Cesar, you are a crafty, deceptive, stinky genius.

 

Max: You have more than earned your guide fee. Let’s get out of here, and I’ll throw in dinner.

 

Cesar: we shouldn’t go out the way we came.

 

Tom: why not?

Cesar: They will certainly be waiting by the entrance for you to come out. They will have figured out by now that they were tricked, and they will want to save face by catching you again. There’s even a chance they may come back down here, though I doubt it at this point.

 

Nick, looking very nervous: how are we going to get out of here?

 

Cesar: There is another way out. I’m not certain I know the way, but I’m reasonably sure I can find it.

 

Tom: I’m not liking this plan. But I don’t have abeteter one.

 

Cesar: Nick, did you bring a change of clothes?

 

Nick: Yeah, why? You wanna get out of those death smelling ones?

Cesar: No. Change into your clean clothes, and put the ones you’re currently wearing on the corpse. This will be a deterrent if they come back down here. It may appear to them that the legends are true, and that the walking dead touched you and traded places with you. This will also mean that if they follow us, they may be frightened of us, thinking we’ve been possessed by the dead.

 

Tom: You are a crafty one.

 

Cesar: I try.

 

Nick did as Cesar suggested. And the group was on their way.  

 

Tom: So you know this other way out, right?

 

Cesar: Once, when I was a kid, I was running from the cops through here. And I found a way out that opened up near the edge of town.

 

Tom: And you remember this way out?

 

Cesar: I think so.

 

Tom: You think so? Uh oh.

 

Max: It’ll have to do. Besides, this gives us the chance to do some more exploring.

 

Tom: How about your GPS?

 

Max: Like everything else, it really would only help us get back out the way we came in. We should get going.

 

So they headed off in the direction indicated by Cesar. Disturbingly, they were going further down.

 

Cesar: Don’t worry. You remember where we started out? We were very high above the city. WE have to go down a very long way to reach the level of the city.

 

The group made their way along Cesar’s suggested path. Along the way, they would explore the first few meters of each side passage and every chamber, in hopes of making another discovery like the one from the day before. To their delight, they did.

 

Cesar: I can’t believe I had been so close to this before, but never found it.

 

This was an irregularly shaped chamber, probably formed naturally then enhanced by ancient peoples, with passageways opening from each end. In the center of the room was a natural pillar that had been shaped by the hands of humans.

 

Nick: This has more of that strange writing. I know I’m no expert, but I’ve never seen anything like this in the Inca culture. They weren’t known for having a hieroglyphic language of any kind.

 

Cesar: and most of our sculpture was destroyed by the Spanish, so there’s really no point of reference.

 

This particular feature was carved to look somewhat like a stylized tree with a snake coiled around it. The top of the tree, where the pillar met the ceiling of the chamber, was a huge stylized moon, much like the capital of a roman column, seemingly growing out of the tree itself.

 

Cesar: This may be the lost Huaca del (snake) I’ve heard legends of. To the Inca, a Huaca was any great monument, usually an unusual natural stone formation that has been altered by people, half created by a god, half by man, as a representation of the spirit of a god, and the storage place for it’s worldly being.

 

Nick: This is another significant discovery. I wonder if we can take credit for it, since we’re on an unofficial expedition, and could be arrested for admitting we were here?

 

Tom: We’ll show this to the anthro department, and try to get some sort of retroactive official permission, so we can return and study these tunnels further. You think that will work, Max?

 

 

Tom: …Max? You there?

 

Max wasn’t there. He wasn’t sure where he was, but he was no longer in the tunnels, no longer looking at a rock carving. He was standing on a vast plane. More like a desert, actually. Except all of the sand was red, redder than sand should ever be.  Max was aghast at what he saw around him. For as far as he could see, there were bodies. “There must have been a great battle here” he thought to himself. He had other thoughts he could not explain. He saw a path before him. Then he saw a flash of light, originating from somewhere behind him. He turned to look, and in the distance there was a massive explosion. The sound hadn’t reached him yet, but Max could tell by the size of the explosion that the sound waves would be accompanied by a massive shock wave. It looked as though it could be a huge nuclear detonation, a massive volcanic explosion, or even a devastating meteor strike. He turned  and ran. He knew he’d have to find cover or risk being killed by the shockwave. He felt strongly compelled to stay on the path, despite the fact that it wound around, up and down hill, and didn’t lead directly away from the danger. He tried to exit the path once, but it caused an intense pain in his head, so he turned back to the path. “I must be dreaming, but how am I asleep?” Max wondered. He ran for what seemed like a long time, and the explosive shockwave behind him seemed to be moving in slow motion, always threatening to catch up, but never quite catching him. Eventually the path ended in a stone gateway. It looked familiar but max couldn’t quite place it. He stopped and stared at the gate. All of the sudden, the sky turned to black, except for the portion of the landscape and sky that was showing through the gateway. Then Max realized the terrain beyond the gate was Cuzco. He heard voices behind him.

 

Tom: Max! What the hell!?

 

Nick: Holy shit, he found the way out.

 

As Max began to regain his wits, he realized he was still in the chinkana tunnels, and that he was standing before the very exit they had been searching for.

 

Max: What happened, how did I get here?

 

Tom: Dude, you just took off running. You said something like, “It didn’t have to be this way” or something, and you just shot out of there. I was trying to talk to you at the time, but it was like you were already gone.

 

Cesar: I’m amazed you were able to run all the way here through those dark tunnels without your flashlight. Oh, looks like you weren’t completely successful after all.

Max realized he had a splitting headache, and Cesar pointed out a spot on his forehead where he had apparently slammed into a tunnel wall at some point.

 

Max: That must have been what happened when I tried to leave the path.

 

Tom: Huh? Of course, in a cave, if you leave the path, you hit a stone wall. Duh.

 

Max: wait, that’s not what I was seeing though. Listen…

 

Max recounted his experience.

 

Nick: whoa, you must be spooked.

 

Max: Yeah. The weird thing is how I felt before I fled. I had these thoughts: “It didn’t have to be this way” and “They brought this upon themselves”. And, stranger still, I felt responsible somehow, like I could’ve prevented it, but didn’t.

 

Tom: whoa. Remind me not to piss YOU off.

 

Cesar: You mean, in the vision, you had a path to follow, and only when you tried to step off of it, did you actually hit a cave wall?

 

Max: That seems to be the case. Ow. The gate was interesting, too. I’ll draw it, as best I can, when we get back to the hostel. But most importantly, I think we need to get out of Cuzco. I think we’re in danger here. I don’t mean right this second, but soon.

 

Nick: After the events following your last dream. I’m inclined to follow you.

 

Tom: Are you kidding me? You’re going to ditch our exchange placement because of a hallucination? IT wasn’t even a dream!

 

NicK: all the more reason. This vision could be a dream that was so important, it couldn’t wait for him to go to sleep to happen. Besides, it led us out of the tunnels, while Max didn’t even have a flashlight! How do you explain that? Max couldn’t have known the way out.

 

Tom: A lucky guess. Or lucky second guess, judging from his head.

 

Nick: ever the skeptic.

 

All the while Cesar was silent. He seemed to be struggling with some reluctant realization. But he chose not to voice it at this time.

 

Tom: You OK, Big C?

 

Cesar: Huh? Yes, yes. It’s just been a strange and difficult couple of days.

 

Nick: You can say that again.

 

Tom: Well, Cesar. I guess you got more than you bargained for. You’ve been a real bargain as a guide, by the way.

 

Cesar gave an uneasy smile.

 

Cesar: I’ll see you back to your hotel.

 

Nick: Of course, you’ve earned every penny of what we agreed to pay you. And dinner. You must join us.

 

Cesar looked like he was going to say no, but changed his mind and agreed. Upon returning to Cabona Real, Nick insisted on Max drawing the gateway he’d seen, before they could shower and change for dinner. Max obliged.

 

Max: Probably a good idea to get this out while its fresh in my mind, any way.

 

Max made a crude sketch of a large rectangular structure, surrounding a normal looking, if somewhat larger than life, doorway. On either side of the doorway, near the edges of the structure, were rectangular indentions that were around twelve by 6 inches. There was  a division in the structure, along its entire length, that coincided with the top of the door frame. Above the division, max made some crude sketches of figures or inscriptions that really weren’t clear enough to make anything of. The top of the structure curved slightly upwards towards the middle from either end.

 

Max: Probably the most prominent feature was this.

 

Max sketched in a figure framed by an upright rectangle. It was a stylized figure with a square face and what might have been snakes for hair. He was holding long straight objects in either hand which made up the right and left edges of the frame.

 

Nick: Believe it or not, I think I may know what this is.

 

Max: Really? Oh, forgot one thing.

Max added a pronounced crack, running from the upper right corner of the doorway to the top of the structure at a diagonal, ending about a third of the way between the central figure and the outer edge.

 

Nick: Now I’m sure. Max, you just drew the gateway of the sun in Tiwanaku.

 

Max: really? Are you sure?

 

Nick: Yeah. That’s the city I came donw here to study, remember? Wait here, I’ll show you.

 

Nick retreated to his room for a minute, then returned flipping through an archaology text on south America.

 

Nick: Here, is this what you saw?

 

Max was shocked. It was exactly what he’d seen in his vision.

 

Max: we need to go there. Soon.

 

Tom: You know I think this is completely insane. And I’m beginning to think you are completely insane. But I’ve always wanted to go to Tiwanaku. So I’m in.

 

Cesar: I have contacts there, and I’m familiar with the area. I should go with you.

 

Max: Cesar? What about your bookstore? I think we’ve dragged you into enough danger already.

Cesar: What you don’t know about me is that when I was younger, I led expeditions and guided people throughout the Andes and the surrounding areas. I’m not as young as I once was, but I think we were brought together for a reason. You can use my help.

 

Tom: I love you, big C. But what about your shop?

Cesar: The shop is just a hobby. It can stay closed for a while.

 

NicK: I’m not sure what, if anything, we could afford to pay you.

 

Cesar: If you’ll cover my food and board, it’ll cover my needs. Whatever this is that is going on, I feel I’m a part of it now.

 

Max: you’ve earned our trust. But I still can’t help but feel like we’re asking too much of you.

 

Cesar: You would be, if you were asking. But there is no asking involved. Besides, there are some things at tiwanaku that you need to see that I’m sure aren’t included in the standard tour.

 

Tom: Somehow, I’m not surprised.

 

Max: Oh, there’s one other thing about the vision that I forgot to mention. Once it was over, it kind of resolved into a still picture. It seemed familiar but I’m not srue where I’ve seen it before. It was like my view pulled back, outside of myself. I saw myself as a figure in a black cloak, with his head bowed, face red. Obviously upset. The bodies on the ground became chalices, the blood became wine spilled from the chalices. The figure doesn’t notice two unspilled chalices on a stone ledge behind him. IT’s as though it is saying that things look bad, but all is not lost, if I look hard enough.

 

NicK: I know this is becoming a recurring theme, but I think I’ve seen that before also.

 

Max: Are you in my head or something?

 

Nick: No. well, I don’t think so. That image you described reminds me of a tarot card, believe it or not. The five of cups.

 

Max: Do you happen to have a picture of that laying around that you can show us, too?

Nick: No. I didn’t consider tarot cards essential packing for Peru. But there’s an internet café right next door. We can stop there, and look itup online on our way to dinner.

 

Max: I could stand to check my email, anyway.

 

Tom just rolled his eyes.

 

It turned out that the five of cups was exactly the image Max had seen.

Max: This just keeps getting stranger. So what does this card mean, anyway?

Nick: Let’s see… “It means emotional dejection, disappointment and sorrow over past events”. It also suggests that one is failing to appreciate what remains, while mourning his loss.

 

Max: That would make sense in the context of the vision. But it doesn’t really apply to anything that is going on now.

Nick: At least, not yet.

 

Max: That is very reassuring. SHeesh.

 

The next morning, the group met with their advisor, Dr. Duke, the professor in charge of their study program. Needless to say, he was stunned with what they’d found, but equally as furious over how they’d found it.

 

Dr. Duke: While you have made a stunnig discovery, you have also jeopardized our very presence in Peru. The Peruvian government doesn’t take kindly to foreigners trespassing on their sacred sites. Especially when said site is clearly marked for no trespassing.

 

Tom: All we’re asking is that you suppress the findings while applying for an official university permit to explore the tunnels. Then the department can “officially” discover these things. They need to be studied, because they are inconsistent with most known Incan artwork, and may precede the Incan occupation of the site. This is the first such indication that Cuzco may have been inhabited by an Inca predecessor.

 

Dr. Duke: Or it may mean none of that. You wouldn’t be the first to make a discovery and then to try and make it out to be more ground breaking than it actually was. But I get what you’re saying, relax. He said, shooting a glance at Tom, who was starting to get agitated. Look, I’ll see what I can do. In the meantime, you also want me to get you sponsorship for an expedition to Tiwanaku? Would you also like a private jet? How about personal servants.

 

Tom: Yeah, that sounds nice.

 

Max: We’re not asking for funding of any kind, I have that covered, We would just like to travel there with some sort of official capacity, so we can cut through red tape, and get past the tourist barriers.

 

Dr. Duke: I don’t know…

 

Max: Look, we’re going whether or not we have sponsorship. Now, either we can drop ourselves, and our tuition, out of the program here and just hope that we don’t piss off the wrong people and have it come back to reflect poorly on this program, or we can do it as part of the program, and possibly even make the front page of a field journal or two, which would be a decisive victory for this program.

 

Dr. Duke, looking wistful for a moment: Ok, ok. If I may wax idealistic for a moment. When I first came here, my colleagues and I were very passionate about studying this culture and it’s history. We were also passionate about teaching what we found to others. You guys remind me so much of myself and my colleagues when we first founded this program years ago. You guys show more enthusiasm and determination than any students I’ve seen come through this program. If it’s within my power, you’ll have your sponsorship.

 

Nick: YES!!

Dr. Duke: In the meantime, draw up a proposal and I’ll present it to the board tomorrow morning.

 

Max: I hope you are persuasive.

 

Dr. Duke: Why?

Max: Because we have train tickets for the day after tomorrow.

 

Dr. Duke. You are all loony, I think. By the way, this guide of yours will need to be accredited. If he’s not, I can’t include him in the proposal, and the department will expect an accredited guide to be arranged.

 

Max: Actually, he once was. Does that ever expire?

Dr. Duke: I don’t think it does, but you’d better make sure it was never revoked or cancelled.

 

Max: Will do. Now, if you don’t mind, we’ve got planning to do, and supplies to purchase.

 

Nick: Ok, so how are we going to type up a proposal before tomorrow morning, and get all the supplies we need.

 

Max: We’ll split up the tasks. You’re legendary for your ability to type real fast. So guess what you’re doing.

 

Nick: I was afraid of that. Let me jot down a list of specific supplies I’ll need. Oh, and can I borrow that GPS unit of yours? I want to download the data from our adventures yesterday to my laptop so we can map out our discoveries.

 

Max: Good plan. I hadn’t even thought of that.

 

Max handed the unit over.

 

Max: Tom, lets get to shopping.

 

Tom: Yes sir, mr. Moneybags.

 

Max: We’ll start at Cesar’s shop. He said he had some materials that would be useful to our quest. And we need to make sure his credentials are up to date.

 

Tom: It’s a quest now, is it?

Max: Hehe, I thought that would get a rise out of you.

 

Tom: Why you gotta mess with me like that?

 

Max: Because I know you can take it.

 

By the grace of some small miracle, Nick had their proposal prepared by the morning. Tom and Max were reasonably certain they’d packed everything the trio would need for an indefinite period of time.

 

Nick: I think I found a pattern in the layout of those tunnels.

 

Max: We’ll discuss it on the train, we have a proposal presentation to make.

 

Dr. Duke was ready for them when the arrived.

 

Dr. Duke: Ok, the board is ready. Who’s presenting with me?

Max: Tom, you should do it. You’re the talker.

 

Tom: Me?

Max: Yeah, besides, you’re the one who hasn’t had a role yet in our preparations. Nick put the presentation together, I’m financing the expedition, you get to convince the faculty. Ready?

Tom: well…uh…about that…

 

Tom muttered and stuttered as Dr. Duke shepherded him into the presentation room, the doors closing behind them.

 

Nick, laughing: I’m not so sure he’s cut out for this.

 

Max: Nonsense. He’s made a living out of flapping his trap, now he can put his money where his mouth is, literally.

 

The presentation went better than anyone expected. The faculty loved the innovative (and accidental) integration of simple, affordable technology for surveying things like underground passageways. They were predictably stunned by the findings the trio had made. They were definitely interested in continued study and exploration of the tunnels, and would prepare a proposal for the city of Cuzco for just that. In the meantime, they bought the perceived connection the guys had made between the symbology of the finds in the tunnels with the unexplained and truly ancient symbology in the mysterious city of Tiwanaku (which, after all, could be true, they intended to find out).

 

Chapter 4: From the night becomes the day.

 

Before they knew it, they were on a train bound for Lake Titicaca. From there, they’d cross the border into Bolivia to visit the ancient city of Tiwanaku on the southeastern shores of the highest navigable lake in the world. In reality, the city is no longer on the shores of the lake. The lake has receded to such an extent that the water is now a full 65 miles away from the structures believed to have been docks. The Inca, themselves no slouches in the art of megalithic construction, were in total awe at the scale of the edifices and portals hewn from massive stones in this prehistoric city state. Their construction baffled those who’s very own building technology baffles us today. In the midst of these puzzlingly huge constructions, and massive carvings stood the very likeness of Viracocha. Viracocha is the god of everything, who is held in common reverence by nearly every culture to have arisen in South America. And here, before them in all his glory, was the oldest known likeness of the god of gods. Viracocha’s origin as a deity figure confounds to this day. His likeness, clearly that of a bearded man with Caucasian features, would’ve been unknown to pre-Columbian cultures in the western hemisphere. What inspired this visage, which bears a eerie resemblance to European interpretations of the appearance of Christ? IT was something that wasn’t speculated on in scientific circles. Some fringe religious circles suggested that Christ himself had visited South America, perhaps during his lost desert years. Still others believed that Viracocha in the south, and quezequotyl , the snake wearing, bearded Caucasian deity of Mexican cultures, were all survivors of some advance culture who’s heyday came and went during the last ice age, who’s culture was destroyed by some cataclysm, and who’s survivors spread out over the world to bring civilization to the masses. Serious purveyors of the latter theory staunchly avoided directly using the term “Atlantis” in order to avoid ridicule from the rest of academic orthodoxy. IT was the belief of some that pyramid construction was a symptom of the surviving remnants of this precursor society spreading to all the other continents. Everywhere that a bearded caucasion god figure appeared, pyramids were built. There was Osiris, in ancient Egypt, Viracocha in all of the south American cultures, quetzycoatyl in Mexico and central America. How is it that these four-sided man made mountains appeared with such regularity throughout the world?

 

All of this ran through Max’s head as he stood face to face with Viracocha’s likeness. He thought he was beginning to understand something that was far too large for his mind to stretch out and envelope. Something too complex and huge for his mind to hold in contemplation all at once, so he could only touch on pieces of it at a time, dancing from detail to aspect, like juggling thoughts when you can’t quite keep them all up in the air long enough to see what you’re dealing with. Viracocha, like quetzequotyl to the north, wore a robe adorned by snakes. Max wondered why snakes were so important to the ancient world. He also wondered if there weren’t some connection with the snake being so powerful a symbol to these possible ancient precursors also being the reason the serpent was presented as the embodiment of evil itself in the old testament Bible. That thought seemed to click in Max’s mind, but he wasn’t sure what it clicked with.

 

Tom appeared beside Max

Max: Its as though I’m seeing  a lot of puzzle pieces before me, and I can see how they should fit together, but I’m still missing too many pieces to actually fit them together.

 

Tom gave Max a blank look.

 

Max: Where’s nick?

Tom: He’s out surveying the site with yer GPS thingy.

 

Tom: Hey, this guy kinda looks like you. Hahaha.

 

Max got enough Jesus jokes with his flowing brown hair and beard. This was his first Viracocha joke, though. It was worth a chuckle.

 

Max: Do you like to think, Tom?

Tom: If I didn’t, would I be in grad school?

Max: No, I mean about things beyond the scope of your studies. Don’t you ever ponder the universe, and why things are the way they are?

Tom: I suppose so.

 

Max: Have you ever followed a train of thought that led you down an ever expanding thought path and reached a point where you had to stop, because the path had become wider than your mind could encompass?

 

Tom: I think I know what you mean, yeah.

 

Max: You know that feeling? The feeling of your mind stretching?

 

Tom: Maybe, yeah.

 

Max: I love that feeling. That’s why I spend so  much time thinking about all the things that human kind has never understood. That’s why I love trying to piece things together that have never been pieced together before, and perhaps never should be.

 

Tom: You are a sad strange little man, and you have my pity. Are you going to make out with stony here all day, or are we going to check out the rest of the site?

 

Max: Tom, the anti-philosopher.

 

Tom mooned Max.

 

Max: That reminds me, we should check out the gate of the moon…

 

If Max could do one thing, it was interpret the signs around him that pointed his path out, which other people interpreted as nothing more than arbitrary events. Their journey had led them through an ordeal of the underworld, dealing with snakes and moon gods. Now they’d followed their snakes and moon references to this most mysterious of Andean cities, so they may as well begin their overview through the gate of the Moon.

Nick was there when they arrived.

 

Max: How’s the surveying going? Oh, this is no new information, the site has been surveyed hundreds of times, I just wanted to use this things mapping feature to create my own virtual representation of the site, so I could manipulate its relationships with it’s astronomical alignments.

 

Tom: Yeah, what he said.

 

Max: Any revelations?

Nick: Too soon to say. I’ll have to look at the data on the laptop later on, then I’ll let you know. But, certain things have already been noted about this site. As you know, we’re about 12 miles away from the shores of lake Titicaca. However, there have been structures uncovered here that seem to be, of all things, docks. Many researchers believed that this city once rested on the shores of the lake. But, when the geologists got involved, they pointed out that this site is more than 100 feet above the water level of the lake. And, for geological forces to account for that difference, you have to go back a very long time to find a date that places this site on the lake’s shore.

 

Max: Dare I guess?

Nick: If you did, you’d be correct. 10500 years ago, at the minimum.

 

Tom: ok, this is actually starting to spook me out, now.

 

Max: Well, once we input the data for the astronomical alignments of the sighting stones in the observatory, if it agrees with that date, it would be another coincidence too big for me to accept.

 

Nick was engrossed in the surveying process, and the others were content to leave himn to it. They went to check out the massive Alkapana pyramid. This huge construction was made primarily of earth, and was originally covered with fine facing stones, which have since been pilferred by post conquest peoples for use in other buildings. The edifice is more than six hundred feet on a side, the equivalent of more than two football fields.

Max: The interesting, and mysterious, thing about this pyramid is it's innards. There is a vast network of water channels, pipes, shafts, and tunnels. It's almost it's some sort of ancient hydrolic machine. Nobody knows what it's all for. Was it some sort of water treatment facility? Whatever it was, it fed a moat system that surrounded the pyramid, which was also of unknown significance. It almost reminds one of the unexplained shafts and passageways inside the great pyramid at Giza.

The team spent several more hours inspecting the site. Finally, after Nick had finished gathering survey data for archaeo-astronomical calculations and general survey information, they all headed together to the feature that had been the reason they had come. Max was actually somewhat nervous to see confirmed that which he’d seen in his vision. But he was comforted by the fact that the vision suggested that the gateway opened away from danger.

 

The gateway of the sun was precisely the thing Max had seen in his vision. There could be no doubt. The eerie thing is that the incongruous glyphic style of inscriptions they had seen, as well as the seemingly calendrical features were all very consistent with what was carved in relief here on this gateway.

 

Nick: Nobody knows what these symbols mean. There have been no authoritative translations. The best guess anyone has had is that it may be a calendar. You getting anything, Max?

Max: I’m not a psychic, you know. I know as much as you do. I’m not sure what it is that we’re supposed to learn from this site. But, if I had to guess, I’m starting to suspect there is some sort of message encoded into the architecture here, in the language of mathematics, that the Tiwanakan culture wanted later generations to be able to decipher. The inscriptions we found in Cuzco were merely signposts pointing our way to the path that would reveal what they want us to see.

 

Tom: Are you going to put that in the paper we write about this expedition? Because if you do, we can all kiss our degrees goodbye, and say hello to the realm of pseudo-science. We could probably get jobs on the psychic friends network. Well, you could, at least, Max.

 

Nick: There is something significant that happened twelve thousand five hundred years or so ago. The layout of the giza plateau points at that date, the hydraulic systems here in the Alkapana pyramid, along with these docks 12 miles away from the nearest water, suggest the same significance. If the archaeo-astronomical alignments are in agreement, then we’ve got two truly ancient sites on two entirely different continents that are specifically designed out of alignment with the significant astronomy at the time of their supposed design in exactly the same way in such that they would be in perfect alignment if it happened to be around ten thousand five hundred BC. I’m still waiting for you to suggest some other reasons for these inconsistencies. Actually, they are consistent inconsistencies. Well? Do you have a suggestion for a possible explanation for this, Tom?

 

Tom thinks for a moment, stammers a few aborted sentences, then can suggest only…

 

Aliens?

All laugh.

 

Nick: You know, there have been plentyh of crackpot weirdoes over the years that have suggested just that.

 

Max: Yeah, some of the same people that think that this impressive stonework and precise masonry couldn’t have possibly been constructed by the lowly south American indigenous peoples. And the pyramids at Giza couldn’t have been constructed with any technology known to man forty five hundred years ago.

 

Tom: seems to me modern peoples never give ancient peoples enough credit.

Nick: Sometimes it can be difficult to identify the crackpots. There's a growing number of us that are championing this date of significance of ten thousand five hundred BC who are ridiculed by archaeological orthodoxy.

Tom: So, we stand here at the sun gate. Are we going to debate endlessly about orthodoxy this and crackpots that, or are we going to throw our hat in the ring with the crackpots and continue to develope our crazy theories.

Max: What theories are those?

Tom: I don't know, we're still developing them.

Nick: We did get rather tangential there for a minute, didn't we?

Max: Well, I've photographed this monument extensively, and I'm ready to start comparing the inscriptions to those we found in Cuzco. No point in surveying this spot, though.

Nick: Why not?

Max: This isn't the original location of the sun gate. It was moved here during a misguided reconstruction effort by unqualified parties during the 60's. Nobody knows where it originally stood, but I'm guessing it would've lied somewhere either facing the east, or wherever the main roadway into town is.

Nick: we may have to consult the sattelite data. THis site is underexcavated and much of it is covered up by contemporary settlements.

Max: Wait...I think I may be able to figure out where it was.

Nick: How?

Max: In the vision, before I opened my eyes and saw Cuzco in front of me, I saw something else, something that may have been, probably was in fact, Tiwanaku. The only prominent feature in that view is still the main prominet feature of these ruins.

Nick: They pyramid?

Max: the pyramid.

Tom: You think your vision is going to reveal the orginal location of the sun gate?

Max: Worth a shot. Now, it was much smaller in angular size than from our current vantage point, so the gate was obviously farther away. I remember seeing it face-on, which means the gate was in a cardinal direction, since the pyramid is aligned to the cardinal points.

Tom: More or less.

Nick: It isn't precise, which plays to my hypothesis that it was precise at the time the site was layed out, which is why i'm checking the astronomical alignments of the observatory features.

Tom: Yeah, yeah, we know.

Max: So, I think it will be fair to assume that the gate would've aligned perfectly with the pyramid, with the same degree of error to the cardinal directions as the pyramid.

Nick: And, if it truly is the "Sun Gate" as it is popularly known, then the first direction we should check is east. I'll calculate a line of continuate to the east from the north/south faces of the pyramid, which will give us an avenue to begin with.

Tom: I'm so glad we brought the nerd.

Max: Me too.

Nick: Hey, I resemble that remark.

Max: You know, the pyramid is so close to being exactly aligned to the cardinal directions, I think we’ll be alright just to head due east and try to stay within it’s footprint.

 

Nick: Fine, if you want to do it the easy way.

 

Tom: So, how do we know when we’re far enough away for you?

 

Max: I remember in my vision, the pyramid was perfectly framed in the gate, with it’s lower edges seemingly meeting with the lower part of the right and left walls of the doorway.

 

Nick: And the doorway is about seven feet wide.

 

They didn’t have much trouble finding the spot they were looking for.

 

Max: I think this is the spot.

 

Nick: What makes you say that?

 

Max: It looks right, and there’s this strange little clearing where nothing is growing. Could be the remaining hard packed soil from centuries of people walking through this spot.

 

Nick: I”ll take your word for it.

 

Tom: Ok, so we’ve found your spot. What now?

 

Max: Not sure.

 

Max snapped some photos of the spot, and towards the ruins from here.

 

Max: You know what? I think I figured it out.

 

Tom: This ought to be good.

 

Max: You see that cone shaped mountain in the distance, just to the northeast?

 

Tom: Yeah, that’s the Jaravi volcano. It’s been extinct for centuries, though.

 

Max: We’re dealing with much more than centuries, here. It’s almost perfectly in the line of site beyond the pyramid, and it may have been active since the initial settlement here. It just occurred to me that all the strange water works and odd water channels in and around the pyramid. Perhaps it was a simulated volcano that spewed water like a large fountain?

 

Tom: Ok. That’s a little far fetched, but it’s as practical an explanation as I’ve heard for this pyramid’s oddities.

Nick: Come to think of it, if that volcano even thought about being active in the past few dozen centuries or so, it could have created a swelling in the earth which would explain how this city that was once a port came to rest twelve kilometers from the lake sure.

 

Max: That combined with the fact that the lake has lowered over the ceturies.

 

Nick: I’m plotting all this in the GPS’s memory.

 

Tom: Neat.

 

Max: Let’s head back to the villa, before it gets dark. Then we can plot all this stuff in the laptop and see what jumps out at us.

 

That night the team didn’t sleep much. They were stunned by revelation after revelation. First, as they had already suspected, the astronomical orientations and alignments of the site matched up with the observed astronomy during a period that included their already controversial date of ten thousand five hundred BC. Next, they looked at the larger map with all their plotted points. They found they could draw a straight line from their proposed original location for the gateway of the sun, straight through the center of the pyramid, connecting to the gate of the moon on the opposite side of the main ruins. If they followed that northwest line further, it led them straight to Nazca, the legendary site of the mysterious Nazca lines.

 

Nick: that means this site, like Giza, has physical evidence linking it to that time period as well as the archaeo-astronomy pointing there.

 

Max: I’m willing to concede that it lining up with Nazca may be coincidental, but that’s not going to stop me from going there.

 

Tom: I’m in. Always wanted to go there.

 

Nick: Well, before we run off. We have business to finish here. Besides, Cesar arrives tomorrow, and I’ll be wanting to hear what he knows of this place. Not to mention the on-site staff here.

 

The next day, Cesar gave them an overview tour just to fill in any gaps they may have had in their pre-existing knowledge. Cesar had also gotten to know the guys well enough that he was obliged to disclose any less orthodox information and theories on the site as well.

 

Cesar: This site was home to a city of truly astonishing scale and population. Estimates are that up to one and a half million people lived here at it's height. These esetimates are based on the food that this region was capapble of producing at the time of  the cities peak. The Tiwanakans utilized an advanced form of agriculture that employed raised crops, surrounded by irrigation channels that protected the crops from both extreme heat, and killing frosts by storing and dissipating temperature. There are some modern examples of this technique being used just to the north of here. This technique was so effective, that it has been reintroduced to modern local farming, and is quickly replacing traditional methods due to it's significantly higher yeild and greater abiility to survive temperature fluctuations.

This city was the most important location in pre-Inca South America. The stone masonry here exceeded the ability of even the Inca, with joints too tight for even a razor blade to be forced in. Tiwanaku is the likely originator of the irregularly cut stone blocks as an earthquake resistant form of architecture. They also utilized copper double-T clamps to further secure blocks together in some critical areas. One of the biggest mysteries of the construction of this city is exactly how they did it. The stones used here were quarried more than forty kilometers away, and weigh up to 200 tons. How do you move a 200 ton stone block, the largest cut stone block in the world, by the way, over forty kilometers without knowledge of the wheel, or large cargo ships? This question leaves the door open to pseudo-scientists and fringe theorists, who seize on quotes from the Inca that claim the stones "flew through the air" during the construction of the massive monuments here.

After their guided tour of the Tiwanaku ruins, the guys went back to their villa to contemplate the information they had gathered thus far.

Nick: Guys, I was just comparing the inscriptions from the Sun and Moon gates here with what we found in the Chinkanas of Cuzco, and I’ve found some similarities.

 

Max: What kind of similarities?

 

Nick: The imagery, and they style, first of all. You can see here in the Cuzco images how the central figures relate to the borders of the inscription, and how the recurring images of snakes and birds appear in the images.

 

Tom: What do you think they mean? Do you still think it’s a calendar?

 

Nick: Well, it’s long been believed that the carvings of the Sun Gate are a calendar of sorts, but I can’t exactly decipher their meaning, so it’s difficult to say. I have, however, determined that they are sequential.

 

Max: Really? How’s that?

Nick: The numerical system uses animals. We’ll call it “totem numerals”. I haven’t broken it down yet, but the pictures themselves seem to tell a story, in sequence, and the arrangement of animal “totems” present in the inscription would appear to determine it’s place in the sequence. For the most part, the inscriptions that share a location seem to follow a simple top to bottom, then left to right arrangement, kind of like Chinese pictograms.

 

Tom: So the inscriptions under cuzco are a retelling of some ancient tale that is told here at Tiwanaku?

 

Nick: I’m not sure, but they’re not the same. And the sequencing seems different. It’s almost as if the Cuzco inscriptions are a continuation, rather than a retelling. It’s almost like it’s a timeline, rather than a calendar.

 

Max: Some sort of history?

 

Nick: Maybe.

 

Tom: So, we have some sort of tale told across two cities, and as far as we know, several centuries at least, but we don’t know what it says, how they fit together, or even if we’ve found all of it.

 

Nick: That about sums it up.

 

Tom: I hope you guys aren’t planning on going back to the University with just this.

 

Max: Of course not. We’ve got a gigantic arrow out there pointing at Nazca, so we’ll keep looking. And, we know they’ve got some inscriptions at Nazca.

 

Tom: Yeah, but you need an airplane to see them.

 

Cesar: I have a friend in Nazca, we can get a plane for cheap. We just need to know where to fly it.

 

Nick: most of the Nazca lines are already well documented, we can check out maps, photos, and satellite imagery to see where to get a closer, or farther in this case, look. If we need one at all.

 

Tom: what fun would that be? We have to take a plane. Right Max?

Max: I’m up for it.

 

Nick: You guys can go, I’m not  a big fan of heights.

 

Max: Is there anything else we need to see here?

 

Cesar: You’ve seen All that I know of.

 

Max: Aright then, we’ll head out in the morning.

 

The group chartered a small bus which took them on a scenic, if perilous, journery around the southwestern rim of lake Titicaca, where they dangled dangerously near the edge of sheer drops into the lake below, until they eventually made their way back to border town of Desaguadero, where they were able to catch a train to the Nazca region of Peru. Despite their excitement, the group was able to get some sleep on the train.

 

(dream description below to be edited later to fit context and as experiential rather than an after telling)

 

As I join this story, already in progress, I come to inhabit the point of view of the main character, The Squire. Once I begin to see out of his eyes, I immediately understand the history behind the story, and the events leading up to the scene that I now witness. I am The Squire. I was an orphan who was left on the doorstep of a noble Lord's castle. The lady of the castle found me and, being of kind heart, took me in. I did not come alone. With me is a hastily scrawled note which reads "please give this child shelter, and teach him the ways of a knight, for his destiny is to save us all". (Or something like that, I'm paraphrasing to cover for spotty memory). I also arrived with a finely crafted, ornate sword of unknown origin. The Lord of the keep, a knight, was not interested in raising someone else's son, but since his wife had failed to give him a son, he reluctantly agreed. I was raised with all the privileges of one of noble birth, and learned the ways of knighthood. However, The Knight would never accept me as his own, and viewed me as some sort of punishment from god for his sins. He felt that he was not given a son because he had offended god, and that my presence was to be a reminder of that. As a consequence of his never treating me as his own, I grew up never seeing his daughter, who was close to my age, as a sister. As time progressed and The Princess and I grew into our teens, it became clear that there were feelings between us that were not those of siblings. Perhaps she took notice of the way I excelled in all my learning, and how I took to the art of combat with an unnatural ease. Or perhaps she merely took pity on me, as my continued efforts to gain a feeling of acceptance with my adopted family were thwarted time and again by The Knight. The Lady passed away one summer, after taking ill for some time. The void she left behind left me very much ill at ease, as it had been her kindness that had always kept The Knight from sending me away to live as an orphan should. But on her death bed she had made him promise to finish my training, and to accept me as his squire. I didn't understand that his irritation with me also stemmed from the shame of the whispers he heard about how he couldn't bear a son of his own, and how he had "found a bastard" to train as a squire, which was downright scandalous. So it was this set of circumstances that set the table for The Knight's discovery of a budding romance between the bastard he had reluctantly accepted as his squire, and his daughter, the noble Princess. In his rage he banished me to live in the stables, and took away my sword. The one that had been left with me when I was abandoned, and the only tie I had to whoever it was that had abandoned me. If it hadn't been for The Princess's pleas, and reminding The Knight of his promise, this would've been all the excuse he needed to finally be rid of me, once and for all. But The Knight was a busy man, and the keep was large enough where two clever, enterprising young people can have a secret romance without the head of the house finding out. I took to climbing the ivy up the wall to The Princess's room while I was on break from my duties about the keep. It was there, one afternoon, that I, the dreamer, joined with the story already in progress.

Dream Begins

As The Princess and I shared shy glances and shyer conversation, I noticed something.
"Do you hear that?"
"Hear what?"
Then, after a pause, "Horses!"
I sprang up and ran to The Princesses balcony, which overlooked a courtyard and the main gate to the keep which was standing open, as it does in times of peace. I reached the balcony just in time to see a dozen or so horsemen round the corner, weapons drawn. The dreamer doesn't know who these men are, or why they're here, but The Squire seems to have some idea. He/I sprang into action.
"Stay here!"
"What are you doing!?"
"Bar the door behind me, open it for no one. Remember how we used to climb the tresses to get on the roof? If they try to come through the door, go to the roof. I will find you there."
"Wait!"
I was already through the door. I could hear the sound of screaming servants and breaking glass down below on the main floor. It dawned on me that my sword had been taken away, and I had no idea where it was. I would have to do without. The Knight, by now in his late 40's, was caught almost completely by surprise. He hadn't gotten the chance to put on any armor, but he was still holding off a couple of attackers at the main entrance.
"Where is my sword!?", I shouted.
"There's no time! Grab anything, don't let them get The Princess!" (I don't know what these attackers were after, but I didn't think it was The Princess, and neither did The Knight. One can only guess it was the concern of a father for his daughter that made him drop all other concerns.)
So, as I came down the main staircase, I kicked out one of the wooden supports from the railing to use as a makeshift club. Then I proceeded to mop the floor with several well armed attackers using, essentially, a stick. Something awakened in The Squire at that moment. Something that had laid dormant because it had lacked the sense of self one gains from having a family, awakened. The Squire finished off the attackers, and The Knight could do nothing to hide his astonishment at the turn of events. I felt something welling up within The Squire/myself that unlocked a sense of understanding. The Squire was beginning to understand his destiny. This overwhelming sense of understanding was enough that I, the dreamer, was kicked out of The Squire's point of view at that moment, and I woke up...

I don't even know if The Squire and The Princess lived happily ever after.

 

Max woke up. The others were staring at him.

 

Nick: You had another one of those dreams, didn’t you?

 

Max: I don’t know about “Those dreams” but yeah, I had a weird dream.

 

Nick: Well?

Max: I guess I’m obligated to tell, huh?

Nick: Yeah.

 

Max tells the others about his dream.

 

Tom: Ok, first it’s fantasy land where you’re a mongoose, then weird apocalyptic scenes where you didn’t save the world, then a strange medieval dream where you’re an orphan with secret powers. In fact, all of your dreams feature some sort of unusual power or responsibility. I think you may be subconsciously delusional.

 

Max: Since when are you the one with the psychology degree.

 

Nick: Don’t forget he can affect things with his mind.

 

Max: Ok, so I’m delusional. But we’ve made some discoveries while following my delusions, haven’t we? I, for one, am going to keep following them to see where they lead. You can both go home if you want.

 

Tom: Easy there, big guy. I’m with you. I just have to keep making reality checks to make sure that I’m not losing my mind, just you.

 

Max: sorry, didn’t mean to snap at you.

 

Tom: Someone needs a hug.

 

Nick: so anyway, what’s up with that dream?

Max: I dunno. Seems out of place. Not sure what I’m supposed to get from it.

 

Nick: Seems like it’s telling you that you have a gift that was given to you by parents other than your own. Like your parents gave birth to you and raised you, but something higher is your real family, and your gift comes from them. And, the pursuit of that gift may lead to the alienation of those that you consider your family. Or something.

 

Max: Interesting.

 

Tom: See? You’re surrounded by psychologists.

 

Cesar watched and listened, saying nothing.

 

Chapter whatever: Doodles of the Gods

 

Tom: I think the Nazca lines are where God doodled his ideas for Monkeys and birds and people before settling on his final designs. He just forgot to erase this bit.

 

Cesar laughs.

 

They’d spent much of the evening looking at satellite images, and arial photography of the famous, gigantic desert etchings that can only be seen from the air. There is little debate about who made these lines. The Nazca culture that thrived in this area possessed the technology and skill to make them. There is little debate about when they were made. Surveying stakes left at the end of some lines have been carbon dated, putting the lines’ creation in the range of 200 BC and AD 700. There is no debate about who and when. But, there is plenty of debate about why. The theories range from typical: Religious ritualistic reasons, astronomical alignments, etc, to Unusual: Maps of underground water sources, Lines used to aid in the measuring of seismic electric signals, to the just plain strange: Alien landing strips. Other theories are related to an unusual series of total solar eclipses that occurred during the Nazca period, which to many primitives appears to be the “eye of god”, so perhaps the lines and the shapes were meant to be seen by god. No one knows for sure why they were made. Perhaps we never will.

 

The lines spread out over an area of two hundred square miles, and comprise figures up to 900 feet long. The figures are characterized by single lines weaving around and turning to make up the characters. All the figures are single line drawings. Some make odd oblong trapezoidal and triangular features. Some look like stylized animals or insects. One even resembles a human, nicknamed “the astronaut”. The Condor and The hummingbird  were dedicated to birds, while there is also a monkey, a spider, and many others.

 

Nick: It’s hard to make any sense of these. You’ve got all these figures of recognizable things, and you’ve got all these jumbled, seemingly pointless shapes, and some that are just lines stretching from nowhere to nowhere. I don’t see anything that looks like it conveys any specific meaning.

 

Max: There’s got to be something here for us to find. How about we map the location and orientation of all the lines, and then look for patterns in the whole of them.

 

Nick: That sounds like a plan. Fortunately, it’s already done for us. These lines are very well documented.

 

Max: Awesome. You might also try rotating your little precession program backwards to see if that creates any astronomical alignments that are currently non-existent.

 

Nick: Of course.

 

Max: I see two areas that interest me already on these maps. One is at 14 degrees 42’43.72”S by 75 degrees 10’36.54”W.

 

Nick: got it.

 

Max: The other is 14 degrees 41’45.38” S by 75 degrees 07’10.21” W.

 

Nick: OK

 

Tom: The plane is ready, are you guys?

Max: I was born ready.

 

Nick: You guys have fun.

 

Tom: You really ought to come. It’ll be awesome.

 

Nick: No thanks. I can see them all right here, any way.

 

Tom: Not the same, but to each his own.

 

Cesar: The pilot is my friend Gilbert. He’ll take us anywhere we want to go.

 

Max: Excellent.

 

While Tom, Max and Cesar were out seeing the lines from the air, Nick was studying them on his computer, and on the maps given to him by the education center. It was then that he noticed what no one before him had noticed.

 

Meanwhile, in the plane

 

Tom: the scale of these things is incredible.

 

Max: It really is. All this really does make you want to ask why, more than how.

 

Tom: Leave it to anthropology to assign religious significance whenever it doesn’t understand the reasons or uses for things.

 

Max: True. If you believe orthodox archaeology, all ancient peoples were zealous simpletons that were motivated solely by their belief in, and fear of, various gods.

 

Tom: Yeah. Sometimes it’s true, I’m sure. But, I bet a lot of the time they were a lot more sophisticated than we give them credit for. Hell, for all we know, these giant glyphs could’ve been made by mischievous shamans with incredible foresight, who wanted to mess with later generations whom they knew would be able to fly over them.

 

Max: Really, that’s as good of an explanation as any that have been offered thus far.

 

Nick was waiting for them when they returned to their villa.

 

Nick: You’re not going to believe this.

 

Max: Maybe he won’t, but you know I have a large capacity for believing the unbelieavable.

 

Tom: Well…

 

Nick: I can’t believe nobody noticed it before.

 

Max: I always loved explanations that started with that statement.

 

Nick: I”ve been looking at these satellite images, and highlighting the major lines and figures so I could see them as a big picture. There are two distinct types, the curvilinear ones, you know, animals and such, and then the straight ones, the lines, geometric shapes and whatnot. Actually, now that I think about it, it’s obvious why no one noticed it before.

 

Max: Why’s that?

Nick: Because we have the key! Nobody knew how to tie all this together because they didn’t see those inscriptions in cuzco and therefore, couldn’t tie them together to the Tiwanaku carvings.

 

Tom: Nick, calm down, take a deep breath, relax, then tell us what the hell you’re talking about, ok?

 

Nick: Yeah. (breathes). Ok, remember how I said these inscriptions all seem to be sequential?

 

Max: Yeah.

 

Nick: well, as you know, these south American culures never really had a written language, other than a primitive sort of hieroglyphic pictographs. Even less than that, even, in these earlier cultures we’ve been dealing with. What I think I’ve found in this series of inscriptiosn we’ve been studying, which I didn’t want to mention until I was sure, but can’t wait any longer is this: There is definitely some sort of totemic numerical system encoded in them. I haven’t translated it into numbers we can understand yet, but it seems to be a numerical system based on multiples of four, rather than ten. First, you have these recurring animal imagery. These are your basic numbers: Bird (or anything feathered, it seems), snake, mammal, and sea creatures. Actually, now that I think about it, instead of mammals, it could really be any terrestrial creature with legs, monkeys, people, spider, et cetera. Further, the four cardinal directions are added as a multiplier. I think. But they definitely play a role, in other words, in the glyphs we collected in the previous 2 sites, the sequential nature of the glyph involves the orientation of the living figure in the glyph. If it is facing east, west, et cetera.

 

Tom: You mean, kind of like Roman numerals, with the letters beign replaced by Animals, with their orientation being the modifiers?

 

Nick: Yeah, pretty much.

The numbers seem to climb from bottom to top, as they should, with sea creatures being followed by snakes, then terrestrial creatures, then feathered creatures. This is altered by their directional orientation, east or west. It seems that facing forward means no orientation, it may be a primitive representation of zero. They were definitely concerned with the aesthetic appeal of their glyphs, because north and south orientations are harder to detect, since having the main figure oriented upwards or downwards could be awkward. So, it would seem that the whole of the nazca plateau is a jumble of glyphs that seem to suggest  many different numbers and orientations, since you have many figures, all pointed in different directions. Then there are all these lines, pointing in many different directions, seemingly of random length. I was looking at all of this and thinking of the “eye in the sky” theory of why they made the lines when something occurred to me. Although some of their architecture and other structures hint at having a directional orientation, these lines and figures seem to be random, and therefore, perhaps not meant to be viewed with a “north as up” orientation. So I began rotating the images around and that’s when something occurred to me.

 

Nick paused for dramatic effect.

 

Tom: and that was…?

 

Nick: frames of reference.

 

Max: English, please?

 

Nick: The long lines, they are frames of reference. Look, if I rotate this satellite photo this way, these lines here, here, here, and here all seem to form a frame, within that frame, if you block everything else out, this condor appears perpendicular to the frame, and all these glyphs are within the frame. These weird elongated triangles seem to be indications of frames that are adjacent, and meant to be read together.

 

Tom: You’re losing me. What does all this mean?

Nick: Essentially, this entire plateau is a gigantic cipher, almost a computer etched into the earth itself.

 

Max: Can you work it out?

Nick: No. Not yet. We don’t have enough information. I think these inscriptions are the key, if we find more of them, it can fill in the blanks for what I’m looking at. We should keep looking.

 

Max: Well, this is a pretty big development, I think. But what now? Where do we find more pieces of the puzzle?

Cesar: If I may suggest….

 

Tom: Sure, Big C, whatcha got?

Cesar: There is a tradition within some, fringe groups in Peru that the Inca were hiding something from the Spaniards in those tunnels we explored. Tradition has it that it is a treasure, but why would the Inca hide gold when it didn’t have the same value to them as it did to the invaders who were killing them over it? No, some think it was a secret. A secret that they felt couldn’t fall into the hands of the Spaniards, no matter what happened.

 

Tom: What kind of secret, and what does this have to do with anything?

Cesar: I don’t know exactly what it is, but supposedly what they are hiding is only the final piece of a giant puzzle, that Viracocha himself made, and will be reconstructed by Viracocha on his return.

 

Tom: And this is relevant how?

Max: Tom, let him finish.

 

Cesar: It is said that to learn the secrets of the ancients, you have to follow in the footsteps of the gods, from their birth to the present.

 

Max: And we have sort of done that, having started our journey, sort of, at Tiwanaku, the “birthplace of the gods”.

 

Cesar: that’s right. I believe the next step, if we are to follow the legends, is to go to Teotihuacan, in Mexico.

 

Max: If you’re right, shouldn’t there be something about this site that points us to that one? Like there was in Tiwanaku?

 

Cesar: There is. It stood out to me last time I was here. (points at the satellite image) this glyph here-compare it to the main ceremonial portion of Teotihuacan. (cesar shows a photo in a book of downtown teotihuacan). Now, when you orient both so that north is up…

 

Max: Whoa.

 

Nick: a perfect superimposition. Exact same directional orientation.

 

Cesar: That’s not all, this glyph is the exact same length as the avenue of the dead, the main thoroughfare of ancient teotihuacan.

 

Tom: Cesar, why do I get the feeling that you know a lot more than you are letting on?

 

Cesar: Maybe I do, but I let you know as soon as I realize it is relevant.

 

Nick: Well, I think it’s clear where we should head to next.

 

Cesar: One more thing…

 

Max: Yeah?

Cesar: There are people who have been trying to figure out how to find that which we are on the trail of for many years. They will stop at nothing to find it, even if that means using us, or taking our research. There are still others who believe these secrets should never be found. If these people find out what we’re on to, there is no telling what they may do to stop us, or take it from us.

 

Tom: Cesar, I think it’s time for you to come clean. You know more than you are letting on.

 

Cesar: In time, I will. But I cannot yet. You will understand when the time comes.

 

Tom: when the time comes? This is starting to make me uncomfortable.

 

Cesar: Please, do not be uncomfortable. I’m on your side.

 

Tom: Just the notion that there are sides is enough to make me uncomfortable.

 

Cesar: I am just saying that we don’t want to advertise what we are doing, or else the wrong people may take interest in our activities. There are things at work here that are beyond our knowledge.

 

Max: If either of you are uncomfortable with this, I will not blame you if you want to return to Cuzco and wash your hands of this whole thing. There’s no need for you to risk anything on my foolhardy quest.

 

Nick: Your foolhardy quest? You’re not going to crack this puzzle without my help. Admit it.

 

Max: That is true, we’d never have gotten this far without your talents. But still…

 

Nick: Forget it, I’m coming with you. Tom?

Tom: I haven’t contributed anything to this venture. I don’t know why you need me.

 

Max: Every foolhardy quest needs a devil’s advocate. Besides, every good adventure movie has a comic relief.

 

Tom: Oh, I get it. I’m the wise-cracking side kick? That’s just great.

 

Max: More than that. Until you became Captain Reluctant, you were the catalyst for all of this. Going into the Chinkana’s was your idea. You insisted, or else we’d never have even begun. If you get on board with this completely, your motive energy will be what drives us. Like it was in the beginning.

 

Tom: Aw shucks. If you put it like that.

 

Nick: Besides, you’re the only one that speaks Spanish.

 

Chapter Seven: Moving forward through time

Max awakens with a start, sweating.

Max Awoke to find himself in his childhood bedroom. He climbs sleepily out of bed and looks in the mirror. As he ponders combing his unruly hair, the image in the mirror brightens slowly, until it appears to max that his image is on fire. Though max is calm, the image grows more and more agitated, until, in a rage, it reaches out through the mirror and seizes max. Before max can react, the image in the mirror again appears normal, but max finds himself filled with rage, and engulfed in flames. He seizes an old little league trophy and incinerates it, watching the melted brass and plastic drip to the floor. For some reason, max feels a pang of guilt. He looks into the mirror again, and in the place of what should be a reflection of immolated max, there is max, shirtless, standing with his arms just away from the sides of his body, palms forward. His palms are a mess of bloody pulp, from thousands of self-inflicted wounds, representing his many sins. Max turns away to look at his hands. They are bleeding badly, and throbbing with pain. Panic begins to rise in Max’s spine, when he sees a shadow in the corner. Max sees a shadow version of himself, like a reflection in mid-air. He implores the shadow-self to help him, but the shadow cowers, and fades out of view as another cut appears on Max’s hand, causing a spike of searing pain to shoot up his arm. Out of desperation, Max peers into the mirror again. In the doorway behind him, he sees a hooded figure with a mask of bones. Slowly, the figure turns to go down the hallway. Max is paralyzed with fear, unable to move or scream. He hears a scream from his brother’s room and a silent tear rolls down his cheek. The bone-faced assassin returns and holds up his hand, revealing thousands of scars from healed cut marks, and Max realizes that it is himself. Max is still watching all of this through the mirror-glass. The bone faced Max then unsheathes a small sword and stabs Max in the back. Max sees himself crumple to the floor, and looks down at his scarred hands, which are holding a bloody sword. In a Panic, he prepares to run to his brother’s room when he sees a flash of light in the mirror. This time the image he sees is not a reflection in the mirror, but is actually beyond the mirror. He is now seeing through the looking glass. What he sees is himself, in flowing robes, carried by the wind. The figure looks at Max, rears back, and unleashes a bolt of lightning that destroys the room, as max feels the hot, searing pain. All goes blank for a moment, then he sees the destroyed room, with the killed versions of himself littering the floor, and he thinks to himself, “It didn’t have to be this way”, “They brought this on themselves”.

 

Max Awakens with a start, sweating. He was accustomed, by now, to having the others all staring at him whenever he’d wake up from a particularly involved dream.

 

Max: What is it about trains that kicks my REM phase into high gear?

 

Nick: You were dreaming again, weren’t you?

 

Max: Yeah.

 

Nick: Is it relevant?

 

Max: I’m not sure. It’s looking like that weird one about the orphaned squire wasn’t relevant, at least not yet.

 

Nick: so tell us about this one.

 

Max: This one wasn’t very pleasant, at all. But, since you insist…

“Max awakens with a start, sweating.

Max Awoke to find himself in his childhood bedroom. He climbs sleepily out of bed and looks in the mirror. As he ponders combing his unruly hair, the image in the mirror brightens slowly, until it appears to max that his image is on fire. Though max is calm, the image grows more and more agitated, until, in a rage, it reaches out through the mirror and seizes max. Before max can react, the image in the mirror again appears normal, but max finds himself filled with rage, and engulfed in flames. He seizes an old little league trophy and incinerates it, watching the melted brass and plastic drip to the floor. For some reason, max feels a pang of guilt. He looks into the mirror again, and in the place of what should be a reflection of immolated max, there is max, shirtless, standing with his arms just away from the sides of his body, palms forward. His palms are a mess of bloody pulp, from thousands of self-inflicted wounds, representing his many sins. Max turns away to look at his hands. They are bleeding badly, and throbbing with pain. Panic begins to rise in Max’s spine, when he sees a shadow in the corner. Max sees a shadow version of himself, like a reflection in mid-air. He implores the shadow-self to help him, but the shadow cowers, and fades out of view as another cut appears on Max’s hand, causing a spike of searing pain to shoot up his arm. Out of desperation, Max peers into the mirror again. In the doorway behind him, he sees a hooded figure with a mask of bones. Slowly, the figure turns to go down the hallway. Max is paralyzed with fear, unable to move or scream. He hears a scream from his brother’s room and a silent tear rolls down his cheek. The bone-faced assassin returns and holds up his hand, revealing thousands of scars from healed cut marks, and Max realizes that it is himself. Max is still watching all of this through the mirror-glass. The bone faced Max then unsheathes a small sword and stabs Max in the back. Max sees himself crumple to the floor, and looks down at his scarred hands, which are holding a bloody sword. In a Panic, he prepares to run to his brother’s room when he sees a flash of light in the mirror. This time the image he sees is not a reflection in the mirror, but is actually beyond the mirror. He is now seeing through the looking glass. What he sees is himself, in flowing robes, carried by the wind. The figure looks at Max, rears back, and unleashes a bolt of lightning that destroys the room, as max feels the hot, searing pain. All goes blank for a moment, then he sees the destroyed room, with the killed versions of himself littering the floor, and he thinks to himself, “It didn’t have to be this way”, “They brought this on themselves”.

 

Tom: That ended the same way your vision from the tunnels ended.

 

Max: Except I wasn’t running around. Was I? I wasn’t floating or bleeding or anything was I?

 

Tom: alas, no.

 

Nick: That must be very significant, those thoughts at the end there. It’s a recurring theme. It seems to me that you see yourself going through a transformation. Since it starts out in your childhood bedroom, I’d say you started out looking back at how you started, then followed through several statges of who you have been. It also shows fear of who/what you may become, but an ultimate confidence that you can defeat the demons inside you and become that which is your full potential.

 

Tom: Thank you, Dr. Freud.

 

Max: You actually are pretty good at that. I’m starting to believe tom when he says I’m delusional, though.

 

Nick: I was going to ask what Cesar made of it, but…where is Cesar?

Tom: He was here a second ago.

 

Cesar had slipped away to head to the bathroom, until the shivers, chills and shakes subsided. He couldn’t let the others see him like this. It was better if even they didn’t know what they were getting into.

 

Their train deposited them in Lima, where they caught a flight to Mexico City, from where they would have easy access to Teotihuacan.

 

The remaining, excavated portions of the great city of Teotihuacan are truly breathtaking. The city was laid out on a grid, one of the earliest examples of precision civic planning, around a main street called Via Del Muerte (avenue of the dead). The truly ancient city was a majestic ruin long before the rise of the Mayan civilization that ruled the region at the time the Spaniards arrived. Much of the Mayan civilization was born from the cultures that built and lived in this city. It is believed that Teotihuacan was a multicultural metropolis, bringing together Zapotec, Mixtec, Maya and Totonacs. No one knows for sure, but it is believed that the city was built by the Totonacs. At it’s height, ist was the largest pre-columbian city in the Americas, having taken over from Tiwanaku. For a long time, it was thought that the city was destroyed by invaders, since the temples and palaces had all been burned. However, when excavations of the residential areas were undertaken, it was found that they were not burned. Since  only the part of the city that was inhabited by the elite was burned, it seems more likely that an uprising led to its’ downfall. The state of preservation of the city is truly stuning. This is partly because the city has been considered a sacred site throughout its existence. Since it was already ruined an uninhabited by the time the Spaniards arrived, they apparently didn’t see any reason to destroy it further. Also, the very sturdy construction techniques used tin the city were sufficient to stand up to most of what nature could dish out. Minimal reconstruction has been done, and much of the city, outside the magnificent monumental main way of the city, remains to be excavated. Much of the city has been covered up by the growing urban sprawl characteristic of modern mexico in the area, and therefore may never be properly excavated.

 

Cesar: This ruin is truly one of the world’s wonders. However, try not to draw attention to the fact that you have a Peruvian guide here in Mexico. The local guides would probably be offended.

 

Tom: How can they tell you’re not Mexcian? Hell, I can’t even tell you’re not Mexican, and I am one.

 

Cesar: laughs. You have to understand, many locals try to make a living by hiring themselves out as private tour guides for the tourists. They wouldn’t appreciate me coming in on their territory.

 

Max: That’s simple enough to solve. You’ll simply be a member of our expedition, not a guide. Any theories as to what we need to find here?

 

Cesar: None.

 

Max: Tom, it’s your turn to stumble onto something that furthers our quest. I did Cuzco and Tiwanaku and Nick did Nazca.

 

Tom: sure thing, chief. I’ll get right on it. I have no idea what direction to stumble in, though.

 

Cesar: well, we’re in luck. Tomorrow is a very special day. It is August 13^th!

 

Tom: what does that mean? Other than it’s really friggin hot?

Cesar: August 13 is the day that the civilization here believed the earth was created. It was  their most important holiday. It was also one fo the main pieces of reliegion that the Maya took with them from here. It is also part of what currently is the only theory that has been put forward as to why the city is laid out with the orientation that it has.

 

Nick: I was wondering that myself. This is a broad, flat plain. These people were obveiously brilliant planners and builders. IT makes no sense that they would orient their entire city to fifteen point five degrees off of North. They have deliberately made the city crooked, in the scheme of the cardinal points and the planet. What’s this theory, any way?

 

Cesar: Well, on the morning of August 13, the sun rises directly behind the pyramid of the sun, there, casting its rays perpendicularly across the avenue. The shadow of the great pyramid would’ve enveloped a temple complex across from it. The summit of the pyramid of the sun also aligns perfectly with the temple of the moon to true north.

 

Nick: I was really hoping the angle would be around twenty three degrees, which would help make the case for them beign aware of the precession of the equinoxes. That, of course, won’t stop me from seeing if there are any astronomical alignments of any significance to be found here.

 

Cesar: That can wait until tomorrow, for now, we’re running out of daylight.

 

The group found a nice local restaurant near their hostel in nearby San Martin. They heeded the usual warnings not to drink the water, but could not resist sampling the local fare.

 

Cesar: first things first, the way of the dead was named by the Aztecs, who found this city already ruined and ancient. They thought the mounds on either side of the avenue, then covered with dirt and vegetation, were burial mounds. We now know that to not be the case. Also, they were the ones that assigned the pyramids the names of usn and moon, essentially because that’s what all their own pyramids awere named. This information was passed on to the Spanish, and hence, remains with us today. Who knows what these featuers, or hell even the city itself, was called by its builders. Nobody does. There are underground passages here, with inscriptions. We can explore them if you like, but there’s nothing new to find there, I have picture books that show all that was found there. Now, although the pyramid of the sun is much, much larger than the pyramid of the moon, their peaks are actually on the same level, due to the slope of the site. The moon pyramid is quite a bit uphill from the sun pyramid. Other things you may take note of is the heavily aquatic theme of the carvings covering the outer walls of the temple to Quetzalcoatl. These carvings, mostly stylized representations of the feathered serpent himself, each have open mouths which appear as though something might be placed in them. There are 260 of these heads, and it is believed that their ritual calendar was 260 days long, and that a place marker might be placed in one of the open mouths to record what the present day was on the calendar, so the locals would know to gather for rituals when the place holder reached a significant date for rituals. It has also been suggested that the Avenue of the Dead may have actually been a series of long reflecting pools. This hypothesis is supported by the existence of large dividing walls, which divide the street into shorter sections. These walls would have, and still do, make traveling down the “street” very difficult. But they also contain what would appear to be sluices.

 

Max: Presenting the avenue as a waterway opens up a new set of possibiltites. (points at the aerial photo they have with them). This walled roadway directly across from the pyramid of the sun can instead be seen as a spillway. It resembles an aquifer far more than it does a roadway, that is for sure. My question is this, would this entire area from the pyramid of the moon all the way down to the first dividing wall just past the pyramid of the sun also be filled with water?

 

Cesar: I’m guessing no, ssince these countless stairways leading into and out of the avenue in those areas would then become purposeless. Also, this platform in the middle of the main plaza would have become an island, accessible only by boats. However, these underground passages between the pyramids contain extensive water channeling and even stone pipework. Supporters of this notion suggest that water is the main theme at work here, and may have poured forth from the moon pyramid, flowing down the via del muerte, which is downhill from there, all the way down the entire length of the avenue, which is over four kilometers, although the downhill half remains unexcavated. Any way, theres some points to ponder for our tour tomorrow. And remember, tomorrow is the holiest day associated with this site, so be ready for reverence. It’s getting late, and we have a long day ahead of us tomorrow.

 

Tom: I know I’m looking forward to it.

 

When Max awoke, he knew he’d overslept. “Stupid hostel clerks, they never remember to give me my wakeup call. I’m gonna have to break down and buy a watch.” It was already becoming light outside, and it was important for him to reach the Teotihuacan plaza by dawn, to see the ceremony, and the supposed alignment of the pyramid of the sun to that day’s dawn. He dressed quickly and threw on a baseball cap, rather than bothering with any grooming, and rushed out the door. “I can’t believe the others left without me.”

 

By the time Max got to the square, the celebration had already begun. It wasn’t quite what he expected. It was far more traditional than he’d imagined, which was quite a spectacle. And, it seemed they’d banished all signs of the modern world .He hoped his camera wouldn’t draw too much attention, then realized he’d forgotten it. “Dammit! Well, no turning back now.” He looked around for Tom, Nick and Cesar, but couldn’t find them in the crowd. He almost felt out of place in his hiking pants and t-shirt. The sun was almost up, so he made his way to the area of the avenue west of the sun pyramid to witness the alignment. When he reached the steps, he had to step aside quickly to avoid stepping on a leather bag someone had left in the path. At each tier of the pyramid, there were people in traditional garb, carrying very odd staves. These staves were large and wooden, almost the size of a small tree, and at the bottom were carved  massive anthropomorphic feet that looked as though the very roots of the former trees had grown into these foot shapes. Through talk amongst the people, Max learned that this holiday was called “Day of the Ancients” which he thought odd, since Cesar had never mentioned it being called that. Cesar had told him this holiday was all about their perceived date of the creation of the earth. Max kept making his way towards the top of the pyramid. Nobody seemed to pay him any mind. He thought he’d find it more difficult to view the ceremony from the pyramid’s top, since it was the best place to view it, and he was very late in arriving. Just before reaching the top of the platform, he once again almost tripped over a brown leather bag. “What is up with these things?”, he thought to himself. And slid it over towards it’s apparent owner. The owner turned around, and drew back a hood that had been covering his head. Max was surprised to be facing a black man, in flowing white robes. The man looked as though he could be very young, or also very old. His hair was graying around the temples. He spoke:

Man: You haven’t found it yet, have you?

 

Max: What? What are you talking about? Found what?

 

Man: We left it all there for you to find, right out in the open, you just keep making your way around it.

 

Max: I don’t think I am who you think I am. You must have me mistaken for someone else.

 

Man: There has been no mistake on our part. You’d better pay attention, because you won’t have many more chances.

 

Those words, as ominous as they might read, were spoken with great calmness, in an almost soothing manner. Max got the feeling that the man implied no threat, and actually seemed earnestly disappointed in him for some reason.

Max just nodded and backed away, unsure how to react. He made his way up the last flight of stairs to the pyramid platform. As he reached the final step, he once again, had to stumble to a stop. There was a brown leather bag on the ground in front of him, right in his path. Max turned and looked back at the black man, who was just watching him, patiently. He felt he was supposed to see what was in the bag. He crouched over the bag, opened the clasp, and peered inside…

 

Tom: Max!! Wake up, dude! You trying to sleep through the festival?

 

Max rubbed his eyes and looked frantically around him, disoriented.

 

Max: Ohhh no! I missed it! I didn’t have a chance to see it! He yelled.

 

Tom: No man, it’s cool, there’s still time! Relax! You just need to get going now if you want to get a shower. Chill out!

 

Max: No… sorry. It was a dream. Something important was about to be revealed to me when you woke me up.

 

Tom bursts into laughter.

 

Tom: You are beginning to put WAAAY to much stock into those dreams. What was this one about, UFO’s? Bigfoot?

 

Max: No, it was about “Day of the Ancients”.

 

Tom: Day of the what?

 

Max: Day of the Ancients! It’s the festival we’re about to go to.

 

Tom: I don’t know what they celebrate today in dreamland, but today’s festival is about the earth’s birthday.

 

Max: Right, right. I remember now.

 

Tom Sighs.

 

Tom: alright. Go ahead and tell me about the dream. I know you want to.

 

Max could see through Tom’s thin veil of apathy. He was genuinely curious about his dream. Might as well tell him.

 

Max: Well, get nick while I get dressed. I don’t feel like telling it twice.

 

Once they were all gathered, Cesar included. Max told them of the  dream.

 

Max: When Max awoke, he knew he’d overslept. “Stupid hostel clerks, they never remember to give me my wakeup call. I’m gonna have to break down and buy a watch.” It was already becoming light outside, and it was important for him to reach the Teotihuacan plaza by dawn, to see the ceremony, and the supposed alignment of the pyramid of the sun to that day’s dawn. He dressed quickly and threw on a baseball cap, rather than bothering with any grooming, and rushed out the door. “I can’t believe the others left without me.”

 

By the time Max got to the square, the celebration had already begun. It wasn’t quite what he expected. It was far more traditional than he’d imagined, which was quite a spectacle. And, it seemed they’d banished all signs of the modern world .He hoped his camera wouldn’t draw too much attention, then realized he’d forgotten it. “Dammit! Well, no turning back now.” He looked around for Tom, Nick and Cesar, but couldn’t find them in the crowd. He almost felt out of place in his hiking pants and t-shirt. The sun was almost up, so he made his way to the area of the avenue west of the sun pyramid to witness the alignment. When he reached the steps, he had to step aside quickly to avoid stepping on a leather bag someone had left in the path. At each tier of the pyramid, there were people in traditional garb, carrying very odd staves. These staves were large and wooden, almost the size of a small tree, and at the bottom were carved  massive anthropomorphic feet that looked as though the very roots of the former trees had grown into these foot shapes. Through talk amongst the people, Max learned that this holiday was called “Day of the Ancients” which he thought odd, since Cesar had never mentioned it being called that. Cesar had told him this holiday was all about their perceived date of the creation of the earth. Max kept making his way towards the top of the pyramid. Nobody seemed to pay him any mind. He thought he’d find it more difficult to view the ceremony from the pyramid’s top, since it was the best place to view it, and he was very late in arriving. Just before reaching the top of the platform, he once again almost tripped over a brown leather bag. “What is up with these things?”, he thought to himself. And slid it over towards it’s apparent owner. The owner turned around, and drew back a hood that had been covering his head. Max was surprised to be facing a black man, in flowing white robes. The man looked as though he could be very young, or also very old. His hair was graying around the temples. He spoke:

Man: You haven’t found it yet, have you?

 

Max: What? What are you talking about? Found what?

 

Man: We left it all there for you to find, right out in the open, you just keep making your way around it.

 

Max: I don’t think I am who you think I am. You must have me mistaken for someone else.

 

Man: There has been no mistake on our part. You’d better pay attention, because you won’t have many more chances.

 

Those words, as ominous as they might read, were spoken with great calmness, in an almost soothing manner. Max got the feeling that the man implied no threat, and actually seemed earnestly disappointed in him for some reason.

Max just nodded and backed away, unsure how to react. He made his way up the last flight of stairs to the pyramid platform. As he reached the final step, he once again, had to stumble to a stop. There was a brown leather bag on the ground in front of him, right in his path. Max turned and looked back at the black man, who was just watching him, patiently. He felt he was supposed to see what was in the bag. He crouched over the bag, opened the clasp, and peered inside…

 

Then Tom woke me up.

 

Nick: Tom!

 

Tom: what? Like I was supposed to know he was about to have magical ancient wisdom bestowed upon him.

 

Nick: Should you go back to sleep?

 

Max: No! Any way, I think the message of the dream was simple enough. Whatever we’re looking for is in plain site. We’ve practically tripped over it without noticing it.

 

Tom: and that is…

 

Max: I wish I knew!

 

Nick: You woke him up before he could find out.

 

Max: Really, I don’t think he intended to show it to me in the dream, it was only metaphorical.

 

Tom: Who is he?

Max: I don’t know.

 

Tom: well, you’re talking about him as though he was someone communicating with you through your dream, not just a figment of your REM cycle.

 

Max: I’m not an expert at this. Besides, it’s getting late, we should be on our way.

 

Cesar: The olmecs.

 

Max: What?

Cesar: One of the cultural groups that inhabited this valley at or before the time of the founding of teotihuacan were the olmecs. In all their sculpture and art, they are depicted as negroes. If this man was a black man, saying “we” left something for you to find, then we should look for something that could be attributed to the Olmecs.

 

Tom: Like what?

Cesar, smiling: I wish I knew!

 

With That, they made their way towards the main plaza of teotihuacan, to see if today’s celebration had any bearing with Max’s “Day of the Ancients”.

 

The first thing Max noticed was that the actual event bore little resemblance to what he’d seen in his dream. It had been on the pyramid of the sun that he’d opened the bag, so to speak, so the group made their way to the edifice in hopes that they were early enough to secure a vantage point from it’s pinnacle.

 

Max: Come to think of it, this pyramid looked slightly different in my dream.

Cesar: That’s no surprise. The Pyramid was remodeled by a self proclaimed “restorer” hired by Mexico’s corrupt dictator back in nineteen and six. It was really just a thin disguise to loot the pyramid of its artifacts, including some massive sheets of Mica that were imported from as far away as brazil when the pyramid was built. We’ll never know where the mica sheets were situated, or what their purpose was. Anyway, this stooge also took it upon himself to redesign the north, south, and east faces of the pyramid. Only the western face bears any resemblance to the original. And thank god for that, because it is the one that carries out the alignment with the sun on this day, which we will get to witness.

 

This actual festival wasn’t as impressive as the one in Max’s dream. This one gave the impression of being a show put on for the tourists, which easily outnumbered the locals in attendance. In fact, the ceremony seemed to be no more than hired “dancers” cavorting around in approximated period garb, which showed a mixture of Maya, Toltec, and Aztec traditions.

 

“What would the Olmecs do…”, Max wondered aloud.

 

Nick: Well, if its any help, I think I figured out why the city is aligned to fifteen point five degrees.

 

Max: How would that not be any help? Were you just going to keep that to yourself?

 

Nick: It’s so simple, really. I can’t believe I didn’t think of it before. With all this toalk about the theme of this site being aquatic, and how the way of the dead may have actually been filld with water, it reminded me of the layout at Giza, which we had discussed before. “pyramids and water, just like giza,” I thought. Which naturally led me to think that, if the way of the dead was to teotihuacan what the nile is to Giza, then it is a representation of the milky way. Then, I checked the math, and Bam! The milky way runs right along the line of fifteen point five degrees east of north here. The way of the dead should be called “the way of the milk” as in Milky Way.

 

Tom: does it point to ten thousand five hundred BC?

 

Nick: Actually, no. This alignment would’ve started around 1300 BC, and will last until about 3000 AD. Roughly 2 precessional stages.

 

Tom: does that throw a wrench in your theory?

 

Nick: maybe, but I hadn’t postulated that EVERY Mesoamerican culture was holding that date as significant. This just means that this site falls outside of my scope. That’s all.

 

Max: Well, as much as this is an obvious truth that had been staring us in the face, I don’t think it was the thing we were here to find. How does that bit of information fit in with our little puzzle? I don’t think it does.

 

Nick: I think it’s the key to finding what we seek. We now have two maps, one of the site, and one of the stars. If we can figure out what we’re looking for in the stars, we can find it on the ground.

 

Cesar: the teotihuanacans, or whatever you want to call them, probably didn’t pay much attention to the cardinal points that we do. If they were truly that obsessed with the milky way, then their world would look like this (sketching in the back of one of his books): the milky way would  be the middle here, then the top of the world would be here, perpendicular to the milky way, and straight across from the sun pyramid, then the bottom of the world would be here, across from that, beyond the sun pyramid. So, the sun, at least right now, could be represented by this pyramid after all. Maybe the Aztecs knew what they were talking about. Now, another complimentary symbolic representation here is these mountains (Cesar waves his hand around to the encircling mountains in the distance. The closest mountains were thought to be represented by the pyramids that they are closest to.

 

Max: we’ve been in the world of the snake this whole time, figuratively speaking. That has been the key to everything we’ve found. Since the snake is on the bottom of the world, perhaps we need to look to that on the site map.

 

Cesar: The feathered serpent is what he is because he’s a combination of heaven and the underworld, being a cross between a snake and a bird. He dominates this site, as well as all Mexican sites, be it this one, Mayan or Aztec.

 

Max: What are you saying?

Cesar: I think we need to make our way into the world that the feathered serpent, Viracoccha/quetzlcoatl, brought to us.

 

Tom: How do we do that?

 

Max: Find the space between night and day, between the sun and the moon.

 

Nick: Not necessarily between, but influenced by both the sun and the moon. If you know what I’m getting at.

 

Max: I think I do. Out of curiousity, what would we be looking at if we were standing on top of the moon pyramid, in line with the zenith of the sun pyramid, looking beyond it?

 

Cesar, pointing: That mountain. It is the one that this pyramid is meant to emulate.

 

Max: I think we’ll need to go there.

 

Tom: What about the festival?

Max: Looks like a tourist strap to me.

 

Tom: I dunno, I think it looks like a hoot…Ok, I’m coming.

 

Cesar: I will try to hire a car.

 

Max: We should hike it. How far is it?

 

Nick: Can’t be more than a couple of miles.

 

Cesar: Suit yourself!

 

They began to walk. Their hike was a fairly uneventful one wchich took them first throught he southern reaches of the town of San Martin, which practically surrounds the ruins, then into the surrounding farmlands beyond. Eventually the terrain began an upward slope until the reached the foot of the small mountain. Cesar didn’t know what the mountain was called, and figured they could find out later. They ascended to the top of the gently sloping mountain, and contemplated their surroundings.

 

Nick, looking back at the ruins: I think I get it.

 

Tom: That was quick.

 

Max: Whatcha got?

Nick: If you look at the whole site as having the elements of one of the inscriptions, it has everything you’d need. It’s totem indicater would be the serpent, which is the temple at the lower end of the ruin, thus oriented to the south. It includes the sun and the moon, and the diagonal line through the middle, bisecting the glyph into two triangles. I think this is it.

 

Max: Sketch it. I’ll take some photos.

 

Cesar: IT was so important to record this message, whatever it means, they made the glyph the size of a massive city.

 

Nick: and according to the skymap, where this hill is located corresponds with the ancient constellation of the phoenix. That would make a little sense, since the predominant themes we’ve been seeing concern a date that corresponds with what the Maya believed was the birth of the 5^th sun, our current sun. what better way to convey the birth of a sun than the image of the phoenix? The mayan culture was based almost entirely upon the same principles and deities as the mysteriousl builders of this site. Perhaps the maya learned their religeion from here.

 

Max: That reminds me. I read last night that one of the most significant surviving mayan cities actually shares an alignment with Teotihuacan. I guess it shouldn’t be surprising, but it seems to me that if these ancestors were leaving a trail of breadcrumbs, that would be one we’d be expected to follow.

 

Tom: What city is that?

Max: Chichen Itza. The heart of Mayan country. We can get there by train.

 

Nick: Good, the fewer planes, the better.

 

Tom: You’re like Mr. T’s character on the A-Team. They had to knock him out anytime they wanted to fly anywhere.

 

Nick: I’m not that bad.

 

Tom and nick’s bickering was interrupted by Cesar.

 

Cesar: we should get back to civilization. It would not be good for us to be caught unawares out here by the wrong people.

Tom: I don’t know if I should just have a permanent case of the creeps, or if you’re just extremely paranoid.

 

Cesar, chuckles: I would say somewhere in between.

 

Tom: maybe cesar has just gotten me paranoid, but I think we’re being followed.

 

The group was back in the ruins now, making their way up the way of the dead towards the temple of the moon, and the exit that would lead to their hostel in San Martin.

 

Cesar; Don’t look at him.

 

Tom made an eloaborate effort to pretend to look at his watch, while trying to see their pursuant in the reflection of its face.

 

Max: Tom, whatever you’re doing, will you cut it out?

 

Cesar: We should leave town first thing in the morning. We’ll buy tickets at the station, just before departure. IN the meantime, tonight, don’t mention anything about where we’re going and why. Don’t even talk about what we did and saw today.

 

Tom: How about you finally explain to us why we have to do all this, and why we might be followed?

Cesar: when we are safely on the train, I’ll will fill you in.

 

The group had dinner that night at the same restaurant in San Martin. Partly because it was the only reputable restaurant that had been rated highly for tourists, and partly because they didn’t want to appear to have changed their habits for any reason. The dinner topics included American politics, popular music, movies, basically anything but ancient history. IT was difficult to get tom to stop looking around at everoone in an attempt to identify people who might be watching them a little too much.

 

Morning couldn’t come quickly enough for Tom. He was really starting to let this whole hush hush conspiracy thing get  to him.

 

The group was able to get to the train station without notable occurrences the next morning. They followed Cesar’s advice and purchased tickets for the next train to Yucatan just before it was scheduled to leave. Once on the train, they managed to secure a back corner in one of the passenger cards. It was easier than expected, because it was during the tourism off season, and the earler trains were less popular any way.

 

Sensing the others had grown expectant of an explanation. Cesar finally began to spill his knowledge.

 

Cesar: Ok, the reason I’ve been so paranoid is because I was once member of an underground organization dedicated to the study of certain aspects of ancient sites in Mesoamerica. This organization held the belief that there was a sacred knowledge encoded in the sites themselves that would allow its possessor to know what would cause the world to end, and how to prevent it.

 

Max: Does this have anything to do with the Mayan Calendar?

Cesar: Yes. As you are all aware, the mayan calendar has an end date. The mayans built the most accurate calendar in the ancient world. Even more accurate than the Gregorian calendar used by western societies to this day. Knowledge of how the Mayans developed their calendar, or which ancient predecessor passed the knowledge down to them, was lost when the Spanish decided to erase this continent’s cultural heritage. The calendar sets the end of the fifth sun, our current epoch, in other words, at December twenty third, 2012. Naturally, if it were to turn out that the Mayans knew what would cause this epoch to end on that date, it would be useful knowledge to us today. Some have speculated that their astronomers recognized a comet or asteroid who’s orbit would intersect ours on that day. But it is doubtful this could be done withouth the use of a telescope. It is compelling, because they began their calendar after the birth of the fifth sun, which happened after the fourth sun was ended in a great deluge. I’m sure you’re all aware of the common flood mythology that permeates practically every ancient culture, including the bible. There are certain parties that wanted to use this knowledge for their own gain. Some zealous religious groups even feel that preventing such an epoch ending cataclysm would be to defy god.

 

Tom: Whenever religion becomes involved, things just get crazy.

 

Cesar: This is somewhat true. But I’m wanting to be extra careful. Because if one of these groups catches on to what we’re doing. We could be in danger.

 

Tom: What about the group you were involved with. Could they be following us because of you?

 

Max: Tom...

 

Cesar: it’s ok, Max, it’s a valid question considering the circumastances. My group was working to try and protect this knowledge, which is difficult since it ahsn’t been accumulated and no one knows how to or where it all is, from falling into the wrong hands. I must confess, I have been keeping them appraised of our movements and progress.

 

Tom: You backstabbing bastard!

 

Max, restraining an enraged Tom: Tom, lets hear him out before we get ourselves jailed for murder in Mexico.

 

Tom: I”ve heard enough.

 

Cesar: I don’t think you have. All of my “contacts” and “friends” that we’ve utilized on our journey so far are members of my organization. They’ve kept us safe up to this point, but their influence is weak in some areas, including mexico, and even some of the more remote regions of Peru. They are allies to your cause, and intend to help you complete your quest. They want you to trust me….us. That is why they have not directly interfered, and have kept a quiet distance.

 

Max: Why would they be so supportive of a gringo possibly putting together this legacy that is rightfully theirs?

Cesar: That is where my explanation might get a little…far fetched. It concerns a prophecy.

 

Tom: Oh, brother.

 

Cesar: You’ve all heard of the Viracocha legend, I’m sure. Within this legend is concealed a truth. Because my ancestors lacked the writing ability to set things like this down for later generations, it was passed down as an oral tradition. As you know the legend tells of a teacher, with the appearance of a pale, bearded man, who came from the east bringing civilization. Legend has it that he would return some day. The truth is, the prophecy isn’t actually about the same Viracocha returning, it is actually about a new Viracocha, who will be able to uncover the lost teachings of the first Viracocha.

 

Tom: Please tell me that you aren’t suggesting that Max here is the New Viracocha.

 

Cesar: I’m not necessarily saying that, but the tale that has passed down from my ancestors said that this new teacher would be a dreamwalker.

 

Max, befuddled: What’s a dreamwalker?

Cesar: Someone that sees his path in his dreams. Someone to whom god speaks to through sleep. Someone like you, Max.

 

Tom: Max, we can’t get mixed up with religious nut-jobs. Next thing you know, they’re going to want to sacrifice one of us.

 

Cesar: Any volunteers?

 

Everyone was silent for a moment until they realized Cesar was joking, then a wave of laughter eased the tension in the car.

Cesar: Listen, we are a very forward thinking people. We don’t have our heads stuck in the past, we believe that prophecies were never meant to come true word for word. We are prepared to interpret and react to any potential fulfillment events in a thoroughly modern and logical way. All I’m saying is that these sites are speaking their secrets to you. You are able to recognize what has been hidden in plain site, and you manage to find your way to what has been more hidden from view. When you are not sure of your path, your dreams show you what you cannot see.

 

Nick: And if you believe western psychology’s explanation of the matter, you already know everything you’ve dreamed about, it was just buried in your unconscious mind, beyond your consciouness’s abililty to grasp it.

 

Cesar: whether you know it or not, you are following in the same footsteps of civilization itself according to legend. Traditional people believe that people were born at Tiwanaku, and that people became gods at Teotihuacán, and people left messages for the gods on the desert at Nazca. The original civilizers, the original Viracocha, if you will, possessed a means of putting down their knowledge into stone. But, the knowledge of how to read it was lost, and in time, the knowledge of where and how the knowledge was written was lost. Pieces have been found. I found my piece there in the chinkanas below Cuzco. Any anthropology student has seen the pieces at Tiwanaku, but nobody knew they were all a part of the same story until now. I am beginning to see and understand how it all fits together as it occurs to all of you. It makes so much sense, that I’m convinced that this is the thread, that we are on the trail of the secrets left behind by those that brought civilization to this continent, and possibly all continents.

 

Tom: What do you mean all continents?

 

Nick: I think I know what he’s talking about. You know how I’ve been finding alignments and correlations in many ancient sites that seem to scream the date of ten thousand five hundred BC, right? Well, at that time, the last ice age was in its final death throes, the glaciers were receding, and across the entire planet, water levels and the climate were rapidly and drastically changing. I believe that the various flood myths that are so common throughout ancient cultures were tales of actual floods, caused by massive glacial melting, and the occasional catastrophic breaching of glacial lakes. It is known that, although it took fifteen thousand years or more for the glaciers to build up over north America and western Europe, they receded, melted, in under one thousand years. So, ten thousand years worth of rain and snow was unleashed upon these areas in under one thousand years, causing massive flooding and reshaping entire continents.

 

Tom: What do you mean by glacial lakes?

Nick: These were the most catastrophic of all end of ice age floods. When a glacier crosses the path of a river, it creates a natural dam across that river. The river gets backed up behind it just like in Lake Mead or any other reservoir created by a dam. But, this ice dam isn’t capable of holding water forever, no matter how thick it is. Water finds a way. It usually would seep under the ice mass, creating a trickle on the other side. In a remarkably short time, this trickle would grow to a spout, because nothing can bore through and erode ice the way water can. Once the flow has increased to a certain point, the strength of the ice dam is compromised, resulting in a catastrophic structural failure, which causes the dam to completely collapse, and thus release all of the water that has spent years gathering behind it, all at once. It would be like someone blowing up the hoover dam with dynamite. The flood would truly have biblical proportions.

 

Tom: Did that really happen a lot?

Nick: we know of one place, for sure, that it did happen. That’s the scab lands in upper Washington state. It developed a landscape reminiscent of the grand canyon almost over night. There is, however, one similar tale that was the result of glacial melting that may have been the very flood that gave rise to the Noah story.

 

Tom: Really?

 

Nick: Yeah. This happened in Eastern Europe at around two thousand years after our magical date. At the time, what is now called the black sea was actually large freshwater lake that supported many inhabitants. The isthmus bisected by the mighty Bosporus was once an unbroken land bridge, separating the vast plain that used to be where the black sea is from a Mediterranean sea that had been greatly swollen from thousands of years of glacial meltwater pouring into it. Around eight thousand BC, erosion caused a breach of the land bridge, and the eroding ability of rushing water quickly widened this breach into a massive spillway. Today’s Bosporus is the remnant of this spillway. In a matter of weeks, what was once a vast plain became what we now see as the black sea. Marine archaeologists have found the remains of many settlements on the bottom of this sea. I don’t know about you, but ten thousand years ago, if I were living in a village on the shore of a lake, and heavy rains came, followed by a massive flood that filled  a region of that magnitude, I would probably think the whole world was flooded, too. I mean, the flood probably covered everyhthin these people had ever known or seen.

 

Tom: I can buy that. I like any scientific explanation for ancient myths. I think it kind of brings them to life a little bit, you know?

Nick: Yeah. That’s one thing that led me into this field.

 

Max: Me too.

 

Nick: But that’s not all there is to this story surrounding this date. There’s an interesting theory known as “Pole Shift” theory, also known as Earth Crustal Displacement. In a way, it’s an alternative explanation for the last ice age. The theory states that the entire crust of the earth, as a whole, shifted about 7000 miles, north in the western hemisphere, including North American and Western Europe, and south in the eastern hemisphere, including Siberia. As a result, North America and western Europe are thrust into the arctic circle, causing mass glacial buildup in those areas.

 

Tom: Doesn’t that seem like an overly complicated way to explain it?

Nick: at first glance, maybe, but consider these seemingly anomalous facts we know about the last ice age. First, Siberia was temperate. We know this because scientists have found the remains of vast temperate forests frozen in the tundra permafrost, dating to the time of the last ice age. Nobody had been able to explain that, which is what gave rise to the kind of thought that arrives at this theory. Another pole shift occurred around ten thousand, five hundred years ago, which brought the crust and the poles to where they are today. Evidence for this is also in Siberia, where these temperate forests are well preserved because the froze solid almost overnight. They’ve found frozen wooly mammoths that died with fresh fruit in their mouths. That’s one sudden, and permanent, cold snap. Now, there are people that have long considered the possibility that civilization may have existed here on earth long before we believe it to have been born in Mesopotamia. The only problem is, that no one had been able to find any evidence of it, other than the dissemination of ideas that seem to have evolved independently into separate but similar traditions across the many continents. Pyramid building, for example. And, the “encoding” of the date ten thousand five hudred bc into megalithic structures. Now, some of these admittedly pseudoscientists have seized this Pole Shift theory because it provides them with a location for their precursor civilization.

 

Tom:…which is?

Nick: Antarctica. Whether or not you believe any of this, you have to believe the law of polar opposition, which states that on a planet, such as the earth, locations on opposite sides of the globe will have similar climates, varying only according to elevation and weather patterns. In other words, If you are in a tropical zone, there must be tropics on the opposite side of the planet from you, as well.

 

Max: And if Siberia was temperate…

 

Nick: Exactly. A large portion of the sub glacial land mass under the ice in Antarctica is actually on the opposite side of the globe from Siberia. And, since we know Siberia was temperate during the last ice age, some of the southern continent must have been, as well.

 

Tom: And that’s where atlantis is.

 

Nick: We don’t like to use the term atlantis, because of it’s connotations.

 

Tom: But that’s essentially what you’re talking about.

 

Nick: Not really. Perhaps Homer’s tale was referring to this civilization, perhaps not, but I’m not really concerned about the atlantis story. I’m taking this possibility on it’s own merits.

 

Tom: Tlak about this around the university too much, and you’ll get kicked out of the department.

Nick: I know, I know. This is truly a pseudo science, but its such a darn fun one. I’m determined to collect actual evidence to either prove or disprove it. To be honest, I’m surprised that I’ve only found supporting evidence thus far.

 

Max: Is that what got you into archaeo astronomy?

 

Nick: Pretty much.

 

Max: Well, that’s a common thread amongst archaeology students; they all want to be the one to make the next earth shattering discovery. I can’t say that isn’t at least a little bit of my motivation during this whole mess we’ve found ourselves in right now. It’s very exciting when you believe you’ve stumbled onto something ancient and important that no one before you has been able to put together.

 

Tom: Cesar, tell us more about this dreamwalker.

 

Cesar: it all begins with the legend of  Virachocha, which you know already. In addition to this, many of us who have studied such things have come to the conclusion that the legend is probably based on a real person that lived at one time. This is interesting to note, since Viracocha is said to have arrived from a far off land across the sea, and was described as pale skinned and bearded. Now, we’ve also determined that there is a definite relation of our Viracocha myth to that of Quetzalcoatl, his Mexican counterpart. For example, Quetzalcoatl was also said to have come from across the sea, and is described as pale skinned and bearded. Both ‘gods’ reportedly were great teachers who believed in civilization, were law givers, brought knowledge of agriculture, astronomy, mathematics, and other things. Both gods were associated with plumed serpents, which is interesting in Peruvian tradition since he would represent both the underworld and heaven. Also, both gods supposedly promised to return some day, before leaving again via the sea. We don’t believe that they were necessarily the same person, who these legends are based upon, but we do think they may have been associated with one another, perhaps having come from the same place from over the sea.

 

Nick: That is one of the main bits of circumstantial evidence of a precursor civilization. Several ancient civilizations have these legends of advanced, bringers of laws, teachers, et cetera, that came from over the sea. They are almost always described as bearded, pale skinned men wearing robes. The plumed serpent associations appear to be unique to Mesoamerica, however.

 

Cesar: How much of the legends may be based on actual events, and how much was embellished from centuries of passing down through oral tradition we cannot be sure, but the promise to return is most likely an embellishment, since a real person would probably not have considered a return likely.

 

Nick: Even some native American tribes have legends of “Pale Brothers” from the east who brought knowledge and wisdom with them.

 

Tom: I love how white people always think that us brown folks would be uncivilized savages if it weren’t for you.  And here you are, seizing on legends of white people who taught the ignorant brownies how to be civilized.

 

Max: I don’t think it is necessary to consider this a racial issue, Tom. For one, these legends weren’t created by white people, you know that. It is the fact that the conquistadors were mistaken for the returning Viracocha/Quetzalcoatl that was one of the main reasons the Spaniards were able to overcome the peoples of the new world. Besides, it isn’t the color of the skin that makes them interesting, other than the fact that it clearly illustrates that they weren’t from around these parts.  It is the fact that they are clearly not of a racial background that occurs on these continents that makes their appearance noteworthy, not that the racial background in question happens to possibly be Caucasian.

 

Tom: I can accept that, from you guys. But if these notions hit the mainstream, it’ll mess up years of progress in making westerners believe that primitive, “brown”, people were capable of these magnificent achievements on their own.

 

Max: You’re preaching to the choir, brother. Well, the white guy in the choir, at least.

 

Tom: Laughs.

 

Nick: So, what does all this mean? What are we supposed to piece together from what we’ve gathered? Does all this information even tie together at all?

 

Max: Well, the Viracocha legends are definitely interesting. The trail we are following appears to begin at the most ancient sites of Mesoamerica, notably Tiwanaku and Teotihuacan. WE’ve learned of these Peruvian legends about the “Path of knowledge”, but somehow I don’t think we’re on it yet. If it is a physical thing, it wouldn’t be so vastly spread out in a time when feet were the primary mode of transportation. A journey from Tiwanaku to Teotihuacan then Chichen Itza, via Nazca, would take a massively long time on foot. One thing we can gather from what we’ve found so far is that there is something to be found, it is meant to be found, but it won’t be easy to find. Moreover, it is divided up amongst an unknown number of places that we may or may not be aware of. And we, I mean you all, are following a delusional madman who goes where his dreams tell him to go. Does that about sum it up?

Tom: Perfectly.

 

Nick: Yeah, I suppose so.

 

Cesar: I know where the path of knowledge begins, by the way.

 

Their conversation was interrupted by the train’s arrival at Piste, a small Yucatan town near the ruins. They sought out and found an inn for the night, planning on staying no more than one day. Since it was already dark, it would be morning before they could visit the ruins themselves. So they called it an early night and went to bed.  

 

Max awoke and walked out onto the balcony of the suite he was sharing with the others. They were still asleep. It was just before dawn. He gazed out at the mountains off in the idstance. He didn’t remember there beign mountains there. It had just occurred to him that soemtihg didn’t seem right, when he felt a rumbling beneath him. A mild earthquake! How strange. It grew stronger, which was contrary to the behavior earthquakes were supposed to display. Max was getting ready to wake the others, in case it became stronger when he heard something like a windy rumbling. He turned his head to the east and his jaw dropped, as his eyes widened. His heart seemed to stop as an explosion of adrenaline spread an alert warmth throughout his body. In the east, and approaching fast, was a massive wall of water that must have been over a thousand feet tall. IT was coming fast. There was no time or reason to wake the others, better they died peacefully in their sleep, he thought. The last thing that went through Max’s head was wondering whether or not there was any point in holding his breath…

Max awoke with a start. It was early in the morning, the others were still sleeping. He was still shaking, his heart racing. The imagery had been so vivid in his recently ended dream. He walked out on the balcony. The dream had gotten one detail wrong; the mountains were actually much closer than they had been in his dream. Something caught Max’s eye to the west, as the sun glinted off of it. He turned his head to see and knew instantly that he must still be dreaming. There in the distance was a gigantic object. Max wondered if it might be a spaceship. He wasn’t sure what else it could be. It rested on three giant metal columns, which looked more like legs. They were straight from the ground, gradually curving inward towards the object. The object itself looked like an enormous bowl which contained what looked like a futuristic city. A clear glass dome covered the city, rising from the rim of the bowl. There were three immense tube like structures leading from the city, through the glass dome, and extending up into the sky farther than Max could see. “What is this?” Max wondered.

Max awoke. Now more relaxed, his adrenaline having been spent. It was early morning, and the others were still asleep. “So, am I really awake this time?” max said quietly to himself. Begrudgingly, he stepped out on the balcony. The mountains were closer still, the large spaceship was still there. Now, there were immense, long lines of people leading off into the distance to the east, and up to the spaceship in the west. They seemed to be planning on getting aboard. “They’re all leaving”, Tom said. Max hadn’t noticed him standing there on the balcony. “They’ve given up hope. They want to start over”. Tom was casually leaning on the railing in his pajamas, sipping on a glass of orange juice. He turned to max and said, “It didn’t have to be this way, you know. They brought this on themselves”. Max’s eyes widened. Then he awoke. “I don’t believe I’m actually awake”, he said, and closed his eyes again. Now he was in a valley. There were a few stragglers wandering towards one of the immense legs of the spaceship. He hadn’t noticed how truly huge the spaceship was before, but now he could tell that the legs were actually straddling the mountains. He wondered at the sheer size of this thing, then he heard the windy rumble again, and felth the earth shudder. He was now in the mountains, the spaceship was gone, and there was flattened, trampled earth as far as he could see in every direction, as though millions of people had trampled through here. He looked to the east, and saw the wave coming again. This time the wave broke on the mountains themselves. The very last tiny splash of the wave washed up at Max’s feet, like a normal sized wave at any beach, then the vast ocean of displaced water began to draw back towards the east. Max thought to himself, “We’re too late”.

 

Max Awoke with a start, no longer sure when he was asleep or awake. Not knowing what else to do, he went out on the balcony. Tom was there, in his pajamas, casually sipping a glass of orange juice. Max took a deep breath and looked out from the balcony. There were no mountains. There shouldn’t be. They were in the Yucatan, a vast, and very flat, jungle expanse. “

 

Tom: Dude, you look like shit.

 

Max: I just had the weirdest dream.

 

Nick: Ok, do tell.

 

Max hadn’t noticed nick standing there.

 

Max: Well, first of all, I’m not entirely sure that I’m actually awake now.

 

Tom: You want me to pinch you?

 

Max: That’s ok, we’ll see how this plays out.

 

Nick: So what were you dreaming about?

Max: Well, it was just like this. I dreamt I woke up, like 3 times, and came out here on the balcony, then strange things happened.

 

Nick: Like?

Max: It was just before dawn. He gazed out at the mountains off in the idstance. He didn’t remember there beign mountains there. It had just occurred to him that soemtihg didn’t seem right, when he felt a rumbling beneath him. A mild earthquake! How strange. It grew stronger, which was contrary to the behavior earthquakes were supposed to display. Max was getting ready to wake the others, in case it became stronger when he heard something like a windy rumbling. He turned his head to the east and his jaw dropped, as his eyes widened. His heart seemed to stop as an explosion of adrenaline spread an alert warmth throughout his body. In the east, and approaching fast, was a massive wall of water that must have been over a thousand feet tall. IT was coming fast. There was no time or reason to wake the others, better they died peacefully in their sleep, he thought. The last thing that went through Max’s head was wondering whether or not there was any point in holding his breath…

Max awoke with a start. It was early in the morning, the others were still sleeping. He was still shaking, his heart racing. The imagery had been so vivid in his recently ended dream. He walked out on the balcony. The dream had gotten one detail wrong; the mountains were actually much closer than they had been in his dream. Something caught Max’s eye to the west, as the sun glinted off of it. He turned his head to see and knew instantly that he must still be dreaming. There in the distance was a gigantic object. Max wondered if it might be a spaceship. He wasn’t sure what else it could be. It rested on three giant metal columns, which looked more like legs. They were straight from the ground, gradually curving inward towards the object. The object itself looked like an enormous bowl which contained what looked like a futuristic city. A clear glass dome covered the city, rising from the rim of the bowl. There were three immense tube like structures leading from the city, through the glass dome, and extending up into the sky farther than Max could see. “What is this?” Max wondered.

Max awoke. Now more relaxed, his adrenaline having been spent. It was early morning, and the others were still asleep. “So, am I really awake this time?” max said quietly to himself. Begrudgingly, he stepped out on the balcony. The mountains were closer still, the large spaceship was still there. Now, there were immense, long lines of people leading off into the distance to the east, and up to the spaceship in the west. They seemed to be planning on getting aboard. “They’re all leaving”, Tom said. Max hadn’t noticed him standing there on the balcony. “They’ve given up hope. They want to start over”. Tom was casually leaning on the railing in his pajamas, sipping on a glass of orange juice. He turned to max and said, “It didn’t have to be this way, you know. They brought this on themselves”. Max’s eyes widened. Then he awoke. “I don’t believe I’m actually awake”, he said, and closed his eyes again. Now he was in a valley. There were a few stragglers wandering towards one of the immense legs of the spaceship. He hadn’t noticed how truly huge the spaceship was before, but now he could tell that the legs were actually straddling the mountains. He wondered at the sheer size of this thing, then he heard the windy rumble again, and felth the earth shudder. He was now in the mountains, the spaceship was gone, and there was flattened, trampled earth as far as he could see in every direction, as though millions of people had trampled through here. He looked to the east, and saw the wave coming again. This time the wave broke on the mountains themselves. The very last tiny splash of the wave washed up at Max’s feet, like a normal sized wave at any beach, then the vast ocean of displaced water began to draw back towards the east. Max thought to himself, “We’re too late”.

 

 

Nick: Wow, there’s the recurrence of those feelings again, the “didn’t have to be this way” and “brought it on themselves” statements.

 

Cesar looked uneasy.

 

Cesar: I must admit, visions of catastrophe aren’t exactly comforting, coming from you. It seems to me it may have been a vision of the future through the prism of the ancient past.

 

Max, Tom and Nick: Huh?

 

Cesar: He was seeing people loading up for a voyage to escape a catastrophe, much as you believe your precursors did. However, most traditions believe that it was a great deluge that ended the fourth sun. The fifth, and current, sun is supposedly going to end through a great burning.

 

Nick: its almost as if something is going to happen, and we have to find out about it so we can prepare for it, and save our knowledge for posterity like the precursors did.

Tom: You guys are all talking fairy tales, have you listened to yourselves?

 

Nick: I wonder if this has anything to do with 2012?

Max: I hadn’t considered that.

 

Tom: Oh brother.

 

Nick: Think about it. The whole reason these Mesoamerican cultures practiced the dreaded art of human sacrifice was because they were worried that the end of the fifth sun was very soon, and they had to appease the god’s appetite for human blood in order to postpone the end of the world. Only the Aztecs had forgotten what the Mayans had possessed the advanced mathematical skills to predict; the date the fifth sun would end.

 

Cesar: December 23, 2012.

Nick: The reasons why the Mayans, and their predecessors, had set that date as the end of the fifth sun has been lost to history, thanks to zealous catholic missionaries and their bonfires. What has also been lost is the methods they had used to foresee that date.

 

Max: What we do know is that the Maya inherited the most advanced time keeping methodology in pre modern times. Their calendar was the most accurate in the world, maybe still is.

 

Tom: are we gonna sit around yapping all day, or are we going to go look at some ruins?

 

Chichen Itza, as was the reason they had come, was laid out on a plan that was roughly fifteen point five degrees east of north, just like teotihuacan. Like everyone else, the group entered from the east, through the visitor’s center. Chichen Itza’s main pyramid structure, named El Castillo (the castle) by the Spaniards, had, in recent years, been named one of the new seven wonders of the world, which led to a major increase in tourism, hence a large modern visitor’s center and museum. As one entered the complex, one’s view is dominated by the aforementioned Castillo. To the left (north), is one of the largest and most elaborate mayan ballcourts yet found. Here, the ritual ball game was played, often resulting in the ritual sacrifice of the losing team’s players.

 

Tom: you know what I think?

Nick: I know you’re going to tell us whether we know or not.

 

Tom: That’s right. But seriously, what I think is this: (Walks towards the ballcourt, inevitably drawing the rest of the group with him). I don’t think the losing team was sacrificed at all.

 

Nick: How can you say that? These ballcourts are covered with inscriptions depicting the ritual sacrifice and beheading of the losing team.

 

Tom: Go to any professional, or hell, any high school football stadium or basketball gymnasium, what will you find? Slightly more politically correct versions of the same thing, meant to drum up the emotions of the home fans and to intimidate the visiting team’s players.

 

Nick: So you think its part of the whole archaeologists always assigning religious significance to everything fallacy?

 

Tom: Sort of, yeah.

 

Max: “Motel of the Mysteries” effect, huh?

 

Tom: exactly.

 

Cesar: Motel of the mysteries?

Tom: It’s a picture book by David MaCauley  set two thousand years in the future. In this book, future archaeologists, who’s society has achieved a technology level roughly equivalent to early twentieth century industrial, have discovered undisturbed ancient ruins of an American funerary and burial complex. In truth, the reader will recognize from the illustrations, he is actually excavating a motel. It is hilarious to see the religious significance concocted for all of these items by the archaeologists who have never encountered these things before, such as toilet seats, televisions, beds, etc. It parodies the way archaeologists assume that everything they dig up that was left behind by ancient people was significant in some way, and was related to some ignorant religion they practiced.

 

Max: It’s true. Any time an archaeologist doesn’t know the purpose of something, they’ll write down, “Presumably for ritual use” or something to that effect. But, back to the subject at hand. WE do know that the maya were very keen on human sacrifice. So it’s no stretch to imagine that being applied to the ball game, too.

 

Tom: yeah, the “ritual” ball game. I guarantee you when future archaeologists dig up our society, they’ll concoct some grand religious purpose for our football stadiums and baseball fields. After all, why would a society put so much effort and resources into something unless it was very important to them.

 

Nick: Well, we all know how important sports can be, even to impoverished people. I’ve seen tiny villages that didn’t have running water or electricity, but they sure had a regulation soccer field.

 

Cesar: I don’t think we’re going to find what we are looking for here.

 

Max: Yeah. I’ve been wondering what we’re supposed to find here, and where to look for it.

 

Nick: Well, let’s go back to the little site map podium thingy, I have an idea.

 

Max: Ok.

 

Once arriving at the podium which was an aerial depiction of the site, labeled to identify the buildings and monuments, Nick pulled out a brochure that included an overhead drawing of teotihuacan, and placed it on the podium next to the Chichen Itza map for comparison.

 

Nick: That’s interesting.

 

Max: What?

Nick: look at it, what do you see?

 

Max: Well, the angle of alignment does indeed match up, when you line up the north arrows. But I don’t see any of the buildings here corresponding with the buildings at teotihuacan.

 

Nick: That’s because the buildings don’t.

 

Tom: Why don’t you tell us what you’re talking about before I stick my finger in your eye?

 

Nick: Ok, easy. Look here, and here. These Cenote’s in Chichen Itza correspond with the sun and moon pyramids in teotihuacan. 

 

Note to reader: Cenotes are Karstian geographical features related to the dissolution of limestone causing the creation of caverns and sinkholes. This particular feature is a large, round, and very deep hole in the ground, basically a vertical cavern, which is usually filled with water. These “sacred” Cenotes were key features in the location and success of mayan cities, being the primary water source for the civilization.

 

Max: Fascinating. That might be the clue we’re looking for. There are ceremonial walkways leading to both Cenotes. I say we check them out.

 

Cesar: South first.

 

Max:. Ok…why?

 

Cesar: South is the direction of the underworld from whence we are born. After our creation we spend our whole lives trying to reach heaven, which north represents.

 

Nick: Also, it looks like in the totemic numeral system, south comes before north as a modifier.

 

Max: Works for me.

 

They headed south to the cenote there. This also happened to be the closer of the two Cenotes at the site.

 

Cesar: This is called the Xtoloc Cenote. It is the smaller of the two wells.

 

There was a small temple on the edge of the hole, which was partially restored. There were some carvings on the largest columns of the temple.

 

Max: Look at this carvings.

 

Cesar: This shows a man emerging from the underworld, you can tell by all the snakes. This next column shows the man walking the earth, communicating with all the animals and trees, gathering knowledge. You can tell by the fact that his head is depicted much larger in this relief. On the third column, the man goes to heaven. But there is argument about its’ meaning. Some think that he cannot be going to heaven, because he returns to the cenote. It doesn’t make much sense because he is born from the earth, like all things, achieves knowledge and enlightenment, but then returns back to the earth, despite the fact that he is depicted with feathers in the final inscription, denoting his ascended wisdom.

 

Max: I think it makes sense if you change the story it is telling, slightly. Instead of completing his journey in the third inscription, he is merely seeking out where his path should lead from here. I know a thing or two about seeking out paths. It seems that the gateway to his next phase of his journey is the cenote.

 

Nick: that cenote looks different than the one he emerged from on the first column.

 

Cesar: Perhaps it depicts the Sacred Cenote, which is the northern Cenote at this site. It was of immense ritual importance to the inhabitants here. They believed it was a gateway of sorts.

 

Max: Then we should follow the path these carvings lay out for us. Lets go to the Sacred Cenote.

 

Cesar: There is one small problem. In order to follow the path laid out in the carvings exactly, we must climb the Castilla. Unfortunately, it has been closed to tourists since a clumsy American woman fell to her death from there some years ago.

 

Max: Do you have any strings you can pull here to get us access, just for a moment?

 

Cesar: Like I said, our organization has little influence in Mexico.

 

Max: Tom, time to employ that golden tongue of yours.

 

Tom: Why do I always have to talk our way into things?

Max: Well, you are Mexican, and you have a talent. Admit it. Be proud.

 

Tom: Geez. Wish me luck.

 

Max: I would say break a leg, but under the circumstances…

 

Tom; Yeah. I’ll be back.

 

Tom headed off back towards the visitor’s center to try and find someone of authority that he could blabber into permission to ascend the pyramid. Meanwhile, the others followed the path as far as they could, leading up to the foot of the Castilla. The Castilla is an imposing edifice. It consists of 91 steps on each of its four sides, which added up to the number of days in the year when you included the top platform, which counted as one step, representing day number three sixty five. In essence, it was a gigantic stone calendar. It has the additional unique quality of a illusionary effect created by the light of the sun on the equinox’s. On those two days, the shadow illusion of a giant undulating snake appears, slithering down the side of the pyramid, culminating in a large, carved snake head statue at the foot of the stair case, completing the illusion. Unfortunately, the equinox was still more than a month away, so they wouldn’t be able to witness this effect during their visit.

 

Tom returned relatively quickly, accompanied by a uniformed park employee.

 

Tom: Ok guys, I explained how we were here as part of our ongoing study to show how the ancient Maya were more advanced keepers of time than anyone that preceeded them, or followed them up until the atomic clock. And, being as how this monument is the largest mayan expression of their calendar, it was important to us to make some observations in and on it, as well as make surveying calculations for future reference. They were kind enough to send Gilbert, here, to accompany us to the top, and to make sure none of us plummet to our doom. Everyone say hello to Gilbert!

 

The group insisted on ascending on the southern staircase. They made a big show of taking notes, photos and measurements. Tom kept Gilbert engaged and distracted. Cesar remained apart from the group, giving the impression that he wasn’t with the others. Tom figured it was just Cesar being paranoid again. Eventually they agreed they’d gotten all the information they needed, and had made sufficient show to Gilbert and they made their way back down, this time insisting on using the northern staircase, so as to continue their south to north symbolic journey. They loitered at the northern base of the pyramid, while Tom hastily thanked and dismissed Gilbert. Once he was safely back in the visitor’s center, Cesar rejoined the group, and they continued their northward hike towards the Sacred Cenote.
<!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]-->
<!--[endif]-->

This Cenote was of particular fame and importance amongst mayan sites. It was known to contain a great deal of artifacts due to its use in rituals over many centuries. In the early twentieth century, it was dredged resulting in the finding of many gold and jade artifacts, as well as skeletons. The skeletons seemed to confirm that it had been used for sacrificial purposes, which had long been suspected.

 

Nick: You know, those carvings, and this path of knowledge that seems to be modeled here in miniature, gives a whole new meaning to those skeletons found in the cenote when it was dredged.

 

Max: That’s a good point. Perhaps some unwise souls took the illustrations literally, and thought the well was a gateway to heaven, and just jumped in.

 

Nick: We may never know.

 

Tom: Well, you could jump in, and find out for yourself.

 

Max: You know that’s not what he means, dork.

 

The ceremonial walk way led north from the Venus Platform, which stood near the foot of the pyramid. It wound its way through dense, uncleared jungle. It was a less popular tourist destination, due to the small hike that lead to it, and the remote location featuring many mosquitoes and no real excavations to view. But that all worked in the favor of the group, as they had hoped to have the site to themselves. Turns out they’d get their wish.

 

Tom: Nobody home.

 

Cesar: it is good that no one is here. We won’t have to conceal our activities.

 

Max: Now, what are we looking for here.

 

Nick: If we are to believe the carvings, we’ll find what we seek inside the cenote itself.

 

Tom: Well, I know I’m not diving in there. How would you even get me out if you did?

The Cenote was about sixty feet deep to the water level, then another forty to fifty feet deep to a mass of sludge and silt to which there was no known bottom.

 

Nick: Leap of faith? Like in Indiana jones and the last crusade?

Max: Don’t you dare. There has to be something simpler than that.

 

Cesar: There is. On the far rim of the well, there, you can see a series of indentions carved into the cavern wall.

 

Tom: Don’t tell me that’s a ladder.

 

Cesar: It’s a ladder.

Tom: I told you not to tell me that.

 

The Ladder in question was merely a series of hand holds carved into the bare rock wall. There was a small indented ledge about halfway down to the water level that appeared to be where it led.

 

Max: Well, I’m going down. Anyone have rope?

Cesar: No, I wasn’t anticipating needing rope today.

 

Max: How could you? I’ve done some mountain climbing, so I think I’m the best suited for it. You guys will need to keep watch to make sure no one happens upon us while I’m climbing down and back up. Here, take my pack. I’m just taking my camera.

 

They walked around to the far side of the enourmous hole in the ground until they reached the spot where the ladder began. Max, with help from Nick, lowered himself over the edge slowly until his feet found purchase in the indentions.

 

Nick: Just don’t look down.

 

Max: Unfortunately, I kinda have to. It’s ok, though, I don’t have a thing about heights like you do.

 

Nick: Yeah, no way I’m going down there.

 

Max made his way slowly and carefully. It seemed to be an eternity before he reached the alcove. He was not disappointed in having made the climb. The alcove was filled with carvings and reliefs. Max called out to let nick know that he’d arrived safely, and that he’d be a few minutes because he was going to have to take quite a few photographs. Photographs will have to do, Max thought, because I don’t’ want to be down here any longer than I have to. He finished up with his photos, then began to make his way back up the arduous climb. Then, they’re worst fears came to fruition. A tour group emerged from the jungle into the clearing made by the Cenote. Tom froze with fear, at a loss for words. There Max was, dangling from precarious hand holds, halfway between the alcove and the rim, out there in plain site for all to see. The tour guide stopped in mid sentence, his face then contorted into something like an angrily worried grimace. He shouted in Spanish. Max froze, having not noticed their arrival while focusing on the climb.

 

Tom: He says wait there, he’ll throw you a rope.

 

Max relaxed for a moment, realizing the guide simply thought he’d fallen, and was worried about another clumsy American causing another law suit. Begrudgingly, Max allowed himself to be rescued by the panicked guide, who happened to carry rope with him for just such emergencies. Once he was safe and sound on the surface, it became clear to the befuddled guide that max was not the least bit wet, which meant it was unlikely he’d fallen. He began to question Max, translated by Tom. Cesar, meanwhile, had slipped unnoticed into the jungle and disappeared behind some trees. Max decided that it would be counterproductive to be found out as a liar, so he told a version of the truth. The angry guide escorted him, followed by Tom and Nick, back to the visitor’s center, where his superior would deal with the situation. Once they arrived at the visitor’s center, they were sent to the manager’s office like school children needing discipline by the principle. Gilbert was there.

 

The group, through Tom’s silver tongue, explained that their theory had included the possibility of some sort of information being kept in the cenote, and when they’d noticed the handholds, they decided to investigate the alcove, knowing full well that it was illegal to do so without authorization from the Mexican government and accompaniment from a local archaeologist. After much negotiating, Max lost his patience and simply turned on his digital camera, turning the view screen towards the official, revealing his discovery. The room grew silent, as the officials were stunned that something of this nature had been discovered on their watch, and by unauthorized student tourists at that. Max was able to negotiate a settlement for their freedom in exchange for allowing the local staff to claim credit for the discovery. They created a story of the brave tour guide’s harrowing rescue of Max, who’d fallen into the cenote only to have been able to catch himself on the hand holds before plunging into the depths below. The brave tour guide noticed the alcove during the rescue, later deciding to take an archaeologist there with him to investigate later on, therefore making the discovery. This explanation made everyone happy because it also was a plausible explanation to what the tourist group that had been with the guide had seen.

 

After having negotiated their freedom, the group made their way back to the hotel, where they found Cesar waiting for them.

Cesar: I was certain I was going to have to bail you out of jail. How’d you manage to talk your way out of that one?

Max explained their arrangement with the Chichen Itza staff regarding the incident.

 

Cesar laughed: Very clever. There is a culture of corruption here in Mexico that is conducive to such arrangements. So, what did you find?

Max: I’ll show you, but on Nick’s laptop. This tiny screen does it no justice.

 

The inscriptions that Max had photographed were exquisite, and almost shamefully wasted on that nearly inaccessible alcove where almost no one would ever find them. They consisted of several figures in various stages of morphing from serpent to bird, with a human stage in between. On one side, there was a stepped pyramid, clearly meant to represent the Castilla of Chichen Itza. From there the snake figures slowly morphed into the human figures leading up to the centerpiece of the inscription, which was a rounded square cartouche featuring a feathered serpent, the universal symbol of Quetzalcoatl. Following the image further to the left, from the right, the human figures became more and more feathered until they reached the foot of what appeared to be an enormous stepped pyramid, only the front half of which was depicted in the inscription.

 

Nick: That symbol in the center, it’s  a piece, it fits in with the others we collected. We’re definitely on the trail.

 

Max: I thought that too, but what is this huge pyramid that it appears we’re supposed to go to next? That doesn’t look like anything familiar.

 

Tom: Maybe it’s “La Tigre” in guatamala, it’s a mountain sized pyramid that hasn’t been excavated yet. Or maybe Cholula, by mass the largest pyramid in the world.

 

Cesar: It’s not a pyramid at all. It is a stepped mountain.

 

Tom: A stepped mountain? Where is there one of those?

Max: Well, Peru is full of stepped mountains, which were terraced by the Inca.

 

Cesar: I told you before that I thought I knew where the path of knowledge began, now I am sure. It is Pisaq, in the Sacred Valley of the Andes.

 

Max: Back to Peru it is, then.

 

Cesar: And we must hurry. I think we’ve attracted some unwanted attention here, thanks to your climbing escapades this afternoon.

 

Max: discretion is your field. Lead on.

 

Via a seemingly endless series of trains and buses, The four made their way back to Mexico city. They then made their way to the airport to book a flight back to Lima.

 

Max: I need four tickets to Lima, please.

 

Airline employee: passport please.

 

Max handed over the four passports for the party and waited for their tickets to be processed.

 

Airline employee: I’m sorry, but there’s been a problem. I need you to wait right here while I get my manager.

 

Max: Ok.

 

Tom: I have a bad feeling about this.

 

Cesar discreetly slid all of their bags together into one easily accessible pile.

 

Airline Manager: Hello Mr. Walker. I apologize for the inconvenience, but it seems your name has come up as a red flag on the flight lists. It’s nothing to be alarmed about, but I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to report to the security checkpost on the lower level for clarification before you can be cleared to fly.

 

Max: alright. That’s strange.

 

Airline manager: Don’t worry, this sort of thing happens all the time these days.

 

Max: OK

 

Max stepped away from the desk and joined the others.

 

Max: Well, we’re going to need additional security clearance for whatever reason.

 

Cesar: Let’s go downstairs, follow me.

 

They did.

After reaching the bottom of the escalators, Cesar kept on walking right out of the terminal exit.

Tom: uh…Big C? Where you goin?

 

Cesar: We wont’ be cleared to fly. If we report to security, they will present us with an endless series of delays and security problems until they request us to spend a few nights under their supervision, all for our own safety, of course.

 

Max: What do you mean?

Cesar: They’re on to us. This is a roadblock meant to stall us until they come up with a reason to arrest us. They don’t want us to leave the country with our intellectual cargo intact.

 

Tom: Ok, Cesar, you’ve gone off the deep end of paranoia this time.

 

Cesar: I’m not going back in there, do as you like.

 

Max, to the others: I’m going with Cesar.

 

Nick: how will we get to Peru from here if not by plane?

 

Cesar: The long way. The VERY long way, I’m afraid.

 

Tom: Well, I’m going to catch a flight. I’ll meet up with you guys in Cuzco.

 

Cesar: You’ll never make it.

 

Tom, torn: Dammit! Why does this have to be so complicated!?

Max: Imagine making this journey centuries ago, on foot. It would’ve taken months, if not years. Have we become that lazy with all our technology?

 

Nick: I’m in. For some reason.

 

Tom: OK, I’m in. And I’m obviously losing my mind.

 

Max: What’s our next move.

 

Cesar; The land transit system is much less regulated. There will be no red flags for us on buses and trains. We needn’t worry until we get to the Guatemalan border.

 

Tom: What if we head to the coast and charter a boat?

Cesar: Cruise ships are almost as security regulated as plane flights. That wouldn’t be a good idea.

 

Tom: Who needs a cruise ship? When I was in Acapulco with my parents as a kid, there was a place there where you could rent boats, anything from a dingy to a decent sized yacht. The smaller vessels didn’t require much more than collateral and a valid driver’s license.

 

Cesar: That’s too risky. Do you know how long of a voyage it is to Peru from Mexico? Thousands of miles. We’ll have to go overland.

 

(Getting to Peru to be written later, when I figure out how to do it)

 

Chapter Nine: Sacred Valley, Sacred Path

 

After their ordeal, the group was feeling a sense of urgency and were eager to finish their quest. During their journey, they had rendezvous’ed with one of Cesar’s contacts, an expert in pre Columbian Mesoamerican linguistics and writing. Together with Nick and Max’s observations, they had successfully sequenced the inscriptions they had so far collected, including all of them from Tiwanaku, which was a major breakthrough by itself. But there would be time for publishing and glory later.  So far, the hieroglyphs told an alternate tale of Viracocha and his time in South America. Viracocha had arrived on this continent after escaping his dying civilization in the time of the gods. The world of the gods was dying, the tale stated, so Viracocha had taken the opportunity to share their knowledge with the ancestors of the Inca, in order to preserve the knowledge from destruction with the land of the gods. Along with laws, the cultivation of maize, and the knowledge necessary to found a new civilization, Viracocha had brought a far more important secret to guard; the cause for the destruction of his world, which died with the fourth sun, and a way for civilization to survive beyond the death of the fifth sun. With each sequence of hieroglyphs they were able to translate, the more stunning the story read. This last bit of closely guarded knowledge was passed down through the generations by a chosen priesthood. This particular league of shamans maintained their knowledge and practices through the building and management of a series of “Temples of the Moon”. The secrets of Viracocha had been passed on to a peace loving mountain tribe in Peru that had been the ancestors of the Inca. Because they could not reason with the bickering warlords that dominated the andes during their time, their small band migrated south, to Lake Titicaca, where they became the “race of gods” that built that magnificent ancient city.

 

This bit surprised everyone in the group, because they’d never heard of any significance assigned to any moon temples in any of the Andean sites they’d visited in the past. In fact, many sites were not known to possess a temple of the moon at all.

 

At one point, the legend states that the fifth generation carrier of the secret decided to emulate Viracocha, and set out to spread wisdom to the warring tribes of the northern continent. The story loses track of this shaman for a while, but Max presumed he had appeared in the Yucatan, founding the legend of Quetzalcoatl, which led to the founding of Teotihuacan, and later, Chichen Itza. The cult founded by this wandering member of the guarders of knowledge encoded his tale into their monuments, so that only their initiates would know how to interpret the signs left behind and retrace his journey.

 

Once Nick had been able to detect the sequence of symbols, and assemble what appeared to be a functioning totemic numeral system from the inscriptions they had gathered, he was able to program a small computer program that would use the numeric system as a set of parameters in the selection and orientation of a group of glyphs from the Nazca desert, based on their framing. This, he believed would allow them to choose a sort of Keystone, a single glyph that was the starting and ending point of what they needed to know. Nick had worked it out and was pretty certain that a glyph known as the “headless bird” was the keystone. Their translation stated that the keystone revealed the beginning of the path of knowledge.

 

Nick: So, we start with a big bird? A condor? Where are there lots of condors?

 

Max: Who says it’s a condor? Condors were worshipped in the Inca times, not necessarily this early on.

 

Tom: To me, it looks more like a peacock.

 

Cesar, perking up: That’s it!

 

Tom: Peacock?

 

Cesar: In Quechan, the word for peacock is Pisaq.

 

Nick: Isn’t that the name of a site of an Inca city in the Sacred Valley?

Cesar: Yes, it is.  It also features some of the most dramatic terraced mountain sides in all of ancient Peru.

 

Max: Which could be what was being illustrated by that glyph in the Cenote at Chichen Itza.

 

Tom: It’s as good a starting point as any, right?

 

Cesar: It is. It also happens to be the southern entrance to the Sacred valley, and the beginning of the great highway that is now known as the Inca Trail. Some myths tell of an important treasure that was spirited out of Cuzco when the Spaniards arrived, and taken to Pisaq.

 

They embarked from Cuzco north, to Pisaq. By now, they had learned to always be prepared, so even though they’d rented a car, they were still ready with their camping and hiking gear.

 

Cesar: By now, the local counter groups will have learned of our quest. They don’t know the path we are taking, thang heaven, but they will certainly look for us at the places they think we will likely visit, and Pisaq is one of those places.

 

After a pit stop to get a quick lunch and resupply, Cesar noticed they’d picked up a tail.

 

Tom: I don’t like how you keep looking in the rear view mirror like that.

 

Cesar: I think we’re being followed.

 

Nick, perks up: Really? Shit.

 

Max: Should we try to lose them?

Cesar: as long as it’s day light, we stick to main roads, and only stop where there are people around, we should be OK. Don’t turn around and look at them, ok?

 

Nick blacked out the screen of his laptop, and held it up at an angle that would allow him to see behind them. The car was following at more than one hundred yards behind, and he wasn’t sure how Cesar could be so sure it was following them. Max could make out the shadowy shapes of two people inside, possibly three.

 

Cesar: we’re here.

 

Cesar began to wind the car up a steep slope with several cutbacks, and ruins were clearly visible on the hillside. The most obvious feature of the site, as Cesar had mentioned, was a vast and complex range of terraces that encompassed nearly the entire south western face of the mountain. It was easy to see how the cenote inscription may have referred to this site. It took several minutes for them to make the ascent to the parking lot of the visitor’s area.

 

Cesar: This site doesn’t have watchers, so we can roam freely. We can lose our friends there on the paths.

 

The black shadow car had pulled in and parked in the far distant corner of the parking lot from them. It’s occupants made no immediate move to get out.

 

Cesar: Bring all your gear.

 

Nick: Why?

Cesar: Just in case. I can get us through the jungle over the ridge if things get desparate.

 

Nick: Let us hope it does not come to that.

 

The crew made their way from the parking area past a group of lesser ruins at the turn of a bend that brought them around a slight ridge. Then the full scope of the site presented itself to them.

 

Cesar stopped them for a minute.

 

Cesar: Here you can see the grand terracing that is perhaps the finest surviving example of Inca retaining walls and elevated farmland. The reason for this site beign called Pisaq, “the peacock” is this. He showed them an aerial photo form an Inca history book. These are the terraces you are now seeing. As you can see when you turn this photo sideways, they are shaped like a peacock, facing south, with his massive tail feathers raised behind him. We should probably start with the ceremonial center of the city, which is on the front crest of this mountain, above the peacock’s head.

 

Max: What are these ruins here? (pointing at the photo)

Cesar: Those are called the citadel, because of their strategic view of the valley approach. It is unclear if they actually served a military purpose or not.

 

Max: Well, it seems to me that we need to know what the peacock is thinking, and this citadel is inside it’s head. Where else do hold secrets if not inside your head? After all, the inscriptions we found in Cuzco were inside the head of the Puma, in their animal city layout.

 

Cesar: I hadn’t considered that. Good point.

 

Nick: this is starting to really fit together. What we’ve translated so far makes use of the Puma or mammals,  birds including peacock, mountain, turtles and other reptiles and gold as recurring icons. Well, it’s not so specific. For the bird totem, it seems that any bird will do, peacock is as good as any.  Some of these same iconography are used in the numeric system we’re reconstructing.

 

Cesar: the bad news is that the citadel isn’t on any of the standard tourist tours. We’ll have to be nonchalant in our ignorance of all the directional signs.

 

They made their way around the upper rim of the terraces, under an intriguing group of ruined buildings on the very top of the mountain. Then they followed a ledge walkway up some perilous stairs, through a short tunnel, and emerged on the ridge just above the ceremonial city center. Below them were a group of expertly constructed buildings, with fine examples of Inca masonry, showing their trade mark trapezoidal doorways, windows and alcoves. The lone round building in the ceremonial center was the temlple of the sun. The inca typically made their sun temples round, like the heavenly body itself. These temples were often the only round structures to be found in Inca cities, such was the case here. This sun temple featured a “hitch” for the sun, to ensure that it remained on it’s normal course through the sky, returning to warm the ground and make their crops grow. Like all Inca sun temples, it was aligned according to the winter solstice, which is June 21 below the equator. The precision with which these buildings were constructed was truly impressive, especially considering stone was their only building material. The sun temple, as was often the case for Inca sun temples, was built around a natural rock outcropping, which had been shaped to serve the purposes of the priesthood. The precision stonework gave the illusion that the temple was actually a miraculously shaped natural feature of the mountain.

 

After spending some time playing tourists, they made their way down the exit path, which lead to a crossroad that would lead them either back to the upper parking lot, or down to the lower one. First, they would take an early side path that would take them to the citadel section of the site below. They feigned ignorance at the signs that warned not to stray from the designated tourist areas. There were not watchers or guards on duty at this site, so they shouldn’t expect to be bothered.

 

They had these lower ruins to themselves. So, they felt free discussing their search, all while casting glances back towards the main areas where the other tourists were herded. They hadn’t seen their followers since leaving the parking lot.

 

Cesar: our shadow must be waiting in the parking lot. We can lose them easily, but it will required abandoning the car and heading off on foot.

 

Nick: Is that safe?

Cesar: I know a place where we can stay tonight, or even for a couple of days if we need to let our trail get cold. We could make it if we get out of here soon enough. During a quick scan of the area as they approached, Max got the feeling a boulder was smiling at him. He quickly snapped his vision back to where he’d seen the unusual site, and there was just a normal looking rock there. He looked away and again got the sensation that the boulder was smiling at him.

 

Max: Strange…

 

Tom: What?

Max walked over to the boulder and began to closely examine it. It was impercebtible from a distance, and even unnoticeable if you weren’t looking for it, but this boulder had been shaped by human hands. The interesting thing was how subtle it was. It was a work of art meant only to be seen by those that know where to look for it. There were two symmetrical, almost natural looking, indenions serving as eyes, a darkened area in its composition suggested a nose, and a worn fissure suggested an ancient grin. This smiling boulder guarded the entry way of an open area that was strewn with seemingly unused rocks and boulders. Upon close inspection, again very subtle, one could notice that there was, indeed, an entry way, with worn path. There was almost a perfect wall of lined up boulders on the right side, with some randomly piled stones behinid them. The rest of the clearing featured some small standing stones, and other embedded stone features that almost but not quite suggested right angles.

 

Max: Cesar, do you have that book of local flora and fauna on you?

Cesar: Of course. Here you go.

 

Max, reading about the peacock: The peacock is known to have very poor vision, it often has to bend down very close to the ground to identify edible plants and seeds. It isn’t sure what it’s getting until it feels it with it’s beak. I think what were looking for is here, in the eye of the peacock, but it won’t be very clear. We’ll have to look closely.

 

They began to closely examine the boulders in the field, and recognized a barely perceptible series of carvings, which created a sequence along the not quite rows, and nigh right angles of their arrangement. They were too faint to photograph, and not detailed enough for rubbings, so Nick got out his sketch book and began to jot them down.

 

Max: Make sure to get them all, we won’t be able to return. We can try to make sense of them later.

 

Max wondered how strange their group might appear to the tourists up the hill from them in the ceremonial center. Here they were, bending over these seemingly discarded rubble, while ignoring all the exquisitely constructed buildings that nearly surrounded them.

 

Cesar: You guys wait here. While you’re recording what you are seeing, I’m going to see if I can see what our shadows are up to.

 

Tom: Be careful, Big C.

 

Cesar: As you said, discretion is my field.

 

Nick was busy scribbling away. He’d hand his finished sketches to Max, who would record their context and orientation in the site. Tom was photographing all the inscribed stones. Even though the carvings wouldn’t show up in the photos, they’d at least have a record of the stone’s context within the site. He also took a photo of the entire clearing, so they could reconstruct the inscriptions in relation to one another at a later time, like a jigsaw puzzle. As they were finishing up, Cesar returned, out fo breath.

 

Cesar: I’m getting too old for this.

 

Tom: Did you see them?

Cesar: Yes, they are waiting by our car.

 

Nick: they obviously haven’t considered the possibility that we might not return to the car. That’s good.

 

Cesar: That’s good indeed. We’ve got quite a hike ahead of us, though. It’s nearly mid day, we’ll probably not arrive until after dark.

 

Max: Where are we headed?

Cesar: A small mountain village called Ccaccaccollo, I have a friend there that can help us.

 

Tom: kaka..what?

Cesar: Ccaccaccollo. Home of nothing more interesting than some weavers. It is a forgotten village in a forgotten side valley, almost completely self sufficient, nearly completely cut off from the world. A great place to hide, or merely lay low for a day or two.

 

Nick: IT’ll give us a chance to see what we can make of this find.

 

Cesar: IN case they are wathing us, we will make our way back up the hill, here, to the ceremonial center. From there, we’ll climb back on the ridge, which will make it look like we’re headed back toward the parking lot on the high path. Only we’re going to veer off to the west once we are hidden by the ridge. Form there, we’ll have to hike over mountain to the village. It’s a straightforward hike with little danger of getting lost, but it is a difficult hike, going over a ridge like htat. Let’s get on our way.

 

As they walked, Max wondered about this “path of knowledge”. What was it they were seeking? Though it was clearly important to the Inca that went to so much trouble to keep it from the Spanish, and also to their predecessors that guarded it so closely through the centuries, would it have any importance whatsoever to them today? Or were they merely chasing an artifact which will benefit only the museum that manages to wind up with it? Was this worth risking their lives for?

This journey had certainly created more questions than answers.

They headed north from Pisaq through the sparcely popluated winter jungle, following a trail blazed by the Inca many centuries prior, but still in use by locals and hikers to this day. There were still many miles to cover before dark if they wanted to avoid camping in the middle of unpatroled 3rd world semi wilderness, which would have it's own set of dangers.

(insert more about their flight from Pisaq, and their journey to Ccaccaccollo).

Near collapse, the party crested the ridge. Cesar pointed across the valley, to a niche in the elbow of the valley on the opposite side.

Cesar: There is Ccaccaccollo. There we can rest and lay low for as long as we need.

Max, moments earlier, had been sure that he couldn’t go on any farther. But, having his destination in sight in front of him allowed him to overcome, psychologically, the pain in his feet and soreness of his entire body. They pressed on, thankful to be going down hill, at least for the moment. They were thankful that this valley didn’t have a river to cross, at least not during the winter dry season. After making their final push up the hill to the valley wall, they came to a dirt road and had level walking to their destination. To their left, there was an area of loose stone, filled with half finished building blocks. Beyond that there was a large open field that was being leveled by a large bull dozer. Shortly after the boulder field, still looking to their left, they passed a quarry, where fresh stone was cut to order, and including a grinder for the production of gravel, and particulate for cement. To the right was a gorgeous view of the valley below, stretching around bends in both directions. After the quarry, they began to encounter modest, mud brick homes, most with enclosed court yards. Each home had its own herd of animals, be it sheep, goats, cows, Llamas, alpacas, or chickens. People passing by on the road, or seeing these strangers walking up their road looked on with curiousity, but without animosity. Eventually the road reached closer to the elbow in the valley, and the terrain to their right began to level off, providing space for a small school house, with a school yard and a separate kitchen. Max couldn’t help but to wonder at what a peaceful, beautiful and seemingly idyllic place this must be to live. Just past the school yard, the road emptied out into a large central plaza. To their left, westward, was a make shift market place, where local weavers were displaying their wares. The plaza also provided free roam and grazing to another small herd of alpacas. The south side of the plaza featured a long, apparently unfinished mud brick building that appeared that it was designed as a meeting house of some sort. The north end of the plaza was bordered by a retaining wall, above which the hillside climbed to the north west, containing more residences and several paths leading steeply up hill. Cesar was leading them to the eastern side of the plaza, which ended in some simple stables that were currently empty but were presumably there to provide shelter for the free roaming alpacas during the wet season. In the south eastern corner there was a stairway leading straight up the mountain side. That appeared to be where they were headed.

Cesar: My old acquaintance, Victor, lives up this hill. He is a trail porter on the Inca trail, and an associate of my organization. He will likely be able to provide us with shelter. Keep in mind, for these people, hospitality is a point of pride and honor. They will treat you like kings, and feed you the best of their food. If you turn down their food, they will not be offended, that just means their children get a treat. They would never ask or expect it, but we should leave them some money for their trouble when we leave. They have all that they need in this little village, but supporting four guests can be quite taxing on their house hold, as you can probably imagine.  

Climbing the steep stair case that had been carved in to the hill side would have normally been a simple task. But, after their lengthy and hasty hike, any up hill climb was a difficult one. Upon reaching the apex of the stair way, the pathway split in two, They followed Cesar down the one to the right which, thankfully, was the one that did not go up hill. The path way opened up into a little court yard in front of a two storey mud brick house with a small attached corral which was currently filled with sheep, baaing moderately to them selves. Cesar knocked on the door. A middle aged woman who bore more wear than her years answered, dressed in traditional Peruvian garb, complete with the brightly colored woven alpaca sweater, billowing blue skirt, long black hair in two braids, and the ever present derby hat. Max had always wondered where and when the derby hat was introduced to Peru, and how it had become incorporated into their traditional female wardrobe. Cesar spoke in Quechuan with the woman, apparently asking after her husband. She went off in search of him, bidding us to come in and make our selves comfortable in the small lower room while we waited for her return. Cesar explained that Victor had returned not long ago with the sheep, but he had gone back in to the main part of the village to pick up some supplies from the village store. The wife was going to go get him, and make sure they had enough supplies to provide the group with dinner.

Max: I really hope they do not feel obligated to feed us.

Cesar: It is not about feeling obligated, as I told you before. Guests are a rare honor for them, and it is their way to treat them as best they can.

The room they were waiting in was a simple room, with a dirt floor, and mud brick walls. There was a small window in the east wall. One end of the room featured a picnic table, at which they were currently seated. The other side of the room was blocked off by a blue plastic tarp that was hung from the ceiling. The walls were wall papered with newspaper, mostly sports pages featuring news of the Peruvian national soccer team. After a short wait, the door opened and the woman, who’d instructed the group to call her Mami, entered, followed by a small, seemingly subservient man. Cesar introduced the man as Victor, and introduced the group to Victor. Victor was a soft spoken man, with a kind smile. He seemed shy, and rarely looked people in the eye when speaking to them. It was shortly very clear that the wife was the boss of the family, being much more out spoken and assertive. Mami indicated that we should wait here for our meal, then Victor and Cesar stepped out side to talk. Shortly after Mami brought in a soup called Kenoa, Victor and Cesar returned, and sat down to join the others for the meal.

Cesar: We can stay here only for two days. My friend is expecting relatives, and has promised them his hospitality. He is ashamed that he can not offer us more, but I assured him that two days is more than we need.

Max, Nick and Tom made gestures of appreciative thanks to Victor, who smiled and nodded. Then they hungrily consumed their Kenoa soup, to the delight of their hosts. By the time they had finished, Mami was already returning with a plate of baked chicken, some vegetables, and potatoes.

Cesar: Enjoy this meal, especially, guys. The food you are eating is not like the meals you get in America. These people grew or raised everything that you are eating. It is completely natural, organic, and without additives. The chicken was killed since we arrived!

Tom Laughed, Nick looked a little green for a minute, but kept eating. Victor also served them Coca tea. Coca is, of course, a main staple in the daily lives of Peruvians. It has been a part of their daily lives for thousands of years.

Cesar: The United States government wants to come to peru and eradicate all of the Coca plants, because of your war on drugs. But they do not understand the important role it plays in our culture and in our history.

Max: Our government does a lot of things it does not understand. We have had disastrous leadership for years.

Cesar: Yes, I agree. I was consulting with Victor about our journey. I didn’t want to tell you until I had his permission, but the trail we’ve been on is an ancient Inca highway. It leads from Peru, through Pisaq, through here, then on to Ollantaytambo and even all the way to Machu Picchu.  The people that live in the villages along this ancient road don’t wish it to become general knowledge, because they do not want to be overwhelmed by tourists. However, Victor is sympathetic to our cause and can provide us further guidance through the area. His job as an Inca trail porter makes him uniquely qualified.

After gorging them selves on the fantastic home cooked meal, the group was ready to collapse from exhaustion. Victor showed them to the second level of the house, which was their guest quarters. The group was shocked at what they saw. It became immediately apparent, the import placed on hospitality in this culture. The guest quarters were far and away the most modern and well appointed room in the entire villa. Their hosts actually lived in another mud brick bulding on the other side of the court yard, which is where the kitchen was, also. The guest room featured two twin beds, each with five thick, alpaca wool blankets for the cold winter nights. The walls were finished with plaster, even including a couple of traditional inca trapezoidal alcoves into one wall as built in shelving. Max thought this was ingenious and should be incorporated into western architecture. The floor was hard wood, and there were two small windows, one to the west and one to the south. The walls, strangely, were painted pink. The four of them drew straws to see who got to sleep in the beds, with Tom and Nick winning. Max and Cesar used Tom and Nick’s sleeping bags as cushions under their own, rolling them out on the floor.

Tom: Look, we even have our own bathroom!

Everyone looked at tom, who was holding up a plastic bowl that resembled a spittoon.

Nick: Bed pans, lovely.

Cesar: there is also an out house, up the hill on that trail we didn’t take right before we turned to arrive at this house.

Tom: What about showers?

Cesar: This village has no running water. In fact, this room is one of the few with electricity.

Max: You’re just going to get used to stinking. More than usual, even.

Tom threw a pillow at Max.

Max: Thanks, I thought for a minute there I was going to have to use my pack for a pillow.

Tom got ready to protest, but decided to let max keep the pillow, since he had won the bed.

Max: OK, tomorrow, we’ll examine Nick’s sketches, and photograph them to put them in sequence with the other inscriptions we have collected. Then, we’ll figure out what our next move will be. Hopefully, the new inscriptions will offer some guidance. Nick, you should charge up the laptop, we don’t know when you’ll get another chance.

The next morning they were awakened by Victor, who had brought them all hot Coca tea. They were growing fond of Coca tea. It provided an energy boost, as well as aiding with altitude sickness. By the time they had finished their tea, Victor and Mami arrived with two small tubs filled with hot water.

Cesar: These are for several purposes. First, while it’s clean, you brush your teeth. Then, you wash your hands for breakfast, then, if you like, you can soak your feet. If you’re still sore from yesterday.

The group followed Cesar’s suggestions then were ushered downstairs for breakfast, which consisted of fresh baked bread, butter, crackers and strawberry jam. By the time breakfast was done, Nick’s laptop had finished charging, and the set themselves to the day’s planned activities, using Victor’s guest room as an office of operations.

Nick: those last set of inscriptions were fascinating. They were clearly designed to be ignored by all except those that are specifically looking for them. It’s really somewhat miraculous that we were able to spot them at all.

Max: Well, let’s figure out what they are telling us.

Nick: Well, it looks to me like they are referring to the path of knowledge, which is named after the path that some sort of item followed as it was being moved to more and more secure locations throughout the duration of the Inca empire. It looks like it came to Pisaq from Cuzco around the time that the civil war between the warring brothers began to break out.

Max: Does it say what the item is?

Nick: The item is called “The knowledge” or some equivalent translation. That is strange, since knowledge is an abstract concept, rather than a concrete object.

Max: At any rate, it’s no longer at Pisaq, we can be certain of that?

Nick: Well, even if it had stayed at Pisaq, it would have been found by archaeologists by now, if not by looters ages ago. It’s a pretty well picked over site.

Tom: So what about this path of knowledge I keep hearing about?

Nick: Well, “The knowledge” is this mysterious object, and the path is the path it followed to it’s final destination. It also appears to be metaphorical, because one must possess much knowledge in order to follow its footsteps and find the object, and because one will learn what one needs to know simply in the undertaking of the journey. Seems like some sort of ritual or something.

Max: How do the new inscriptions fit in with the overall sequence?

Nick: They appear to be the most recent ones we’ve yet collected. That means that we’re on the right track if our goal is to find this object.

Tom: Is there any indication of where the path leads from here?

Nick: It states that the peacock carried the knowledge to the turtle before the peacock died.

Tom: Do we know what the turtle is? Cesar?

Cesar: My best guess is Ollantaytambo. It was Inca’s most strong fortress outside of Cuzco, which gained it the nickname of the turtle.

Max: how long is the hike to Ollantaytambo?

Cesar: We won’t need to hike that, necessarily. We can lay low one more day. Victor has said that he can borrow the car of the town president to get us to Ollantaytambo. That is the good news. The bad news is that our pursuers are likely to guess that is where we’ll go. We will have to be very careful.

Max: Can they not be reasoned with?

Cesar: It is rumored that they have members placed high up in the Peruvian authorities. They’ve been known to abduct people from public places in broad daylight. They worked with the dreaded Shining Path movement during that dark period in Peru’s recent history.

Tom: Yeah, we don’t want to be getting mixed up with those guys. Communist extremists are not my idea of fun people to hang out with.

Max: well, I guess it’s one more day of rest and relaxation, then back to the quest.

Tom: You know, I really hate it when you call it that.

Max: You know I only do it to rile you. Besides, what’s wrong with the word quest?
<!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]-->
<!--[endif]-->

Tom: It just gives the impression that we’re holy crusaders or something. We do need to retain a modicum of scientific method here, prophetic dreams not withstanding.

Max: I understand. It’s just fun to push your buttons sometimes.

Tom: That’s what she said.

The next day the group made the forty five minute drive through the Sacred Valley to Ollantaytambo. Upon arrival, they navigated through a narrow road that climbed up actual ancient Inca terraces. The whole modern town of Ollantaytambo was built on top of the remains of the original Inca city. Many of the buildings had modern structures rising from Inca foundations which had survived Spanish destruction and countless earthquakes.

There, despite his protests, they bid farewell to Victor. They had no desire for harm to come to their quiet, kind host. Besides, as Cesar pointed out, Cesar had been an Inca trail guide for a time, he knew this area well, and could take them where they needed to go from here. They had left one hundred American dollars under a pillow in the guest room for him to find, which would be a substantial sum of money in Peru.  

They navigated the busy market area that had sprung up around the most common tourist entrance into the main ruins and found their way in. Passing through the modern wall that secured the ancient from the modern, Max was confronted with an awe inspiring sight. Before him, a series of terraces stretched up the mountain side to a low ridge. These terraces gave one the impression of being a stair case for giants. Fortunately for them, there was a stair way for normal sized people cut into it, with which they could access the impressive megalithic remains that made the site famous. After making their way up the stairs, they came across one of the terraces to another smaller stairway leading up toward the ridge that housed the major structures of the ancient fortress. The stairs ran along side what struck Max as the single most impressive piece of megalithic stone masonry that exists in the world. The front wall of the main fortress was constructed of massive stones, weighing as much as ten tons, that were cut, placed, and smoothed so precisely and accurately, that it was difficult to even detect the lines that separated them. It looked at first glance like a wall carved from a single enormous stone that merely had  a few very fine cracks running through it. Even the lichens were fooled, as many of them grew right across the small joints as though they weren’t there at all. After following along the front of this wall for a while, they came to a door way that led onto a small plateau that held some of the Inca’s most enigmatic structures. Through the door way and around a corner, the group was confronted with a truly massive wall of unknown purpose. It was constructed with a different stone and different style of masonry from the rest of the site, and indeed the rest of Inca stonework as a whole. This particular wall ranged from twelve to fifteen feet high, with an uneven top that stepped gradually upward to the right. It was about sixty feet long. It was constructed entirely out of six individual, massive upright stones. Each of the stones weighed well over forty tons. Just in front of the wall, there lay another massive stone, apparently intended for the wall, on its side. Cesar explained that the site was believed to have never been completed, due to the arrival of the Spaniards.

Tom: How did they move these massive stones?

Cesar: As far as we know, they just dragged them, using logs as rollers.

Nick: whoa.

Cesar: That’s not all. These stone were quarried almost ten miles away. You can see the remains of the quarry on the far side of the valley over here.

They followed Cesar around the side of the massive wall, onto a ledge overlooking the valley below. They were immediately buffeted by a very strong constant wind. Struggling against the wind, and shielding his eyes from blowing dust, Cesar pointed out a portion of the valley wall in the distance.

Cesar: They were quarried there, then drug down the hill into the valley. Once they reached the river banks, they actually diverted the course of the river, then dragged the blocks across the emptied river bed. Then, once they reached the diverted river’s edge, they returned the river’s flow to the original river bed, then dragged the blocks across the second river bed. Then they followed the valley up towards us, finally ascending a ramp the remnants of which you can see became this road here.

They Examined the blocks closely. There were designs on the stones.

Cesar: These designs used to be much more pronounced, but the Spaniards scraped them off in their continuing effort to eradicate the culture and history of this continent. They surely would have destroyed the entire wall if they had been able to.

Nick: If those were the inscriptions we needed, we’ve reached a dead end.

Max: I don’t think they were. Everywhere else we’ve found our clues, they’ve been carefully and intentionally hidden. Putting them on this massive and impressive wall would be the opposite of hiding them.

Tom: let’s hope so.

Max: I’ve had trouble getting into the heads of the people that built these places. Cesar, you’re mostly Quechan, think like an Inca!

Cesar: Well, at Pisaq, we got inside the head of the peacock, and that’s where we found what we were looking for there, right?

Max: Right.

Cesar: Perhaps we should look into the head of Viracocha himself.

Tom: Are you going to summon him?

Cesar: I don’t have to, the Inca did for us.

Tom: I hope you’re going to start making sense soon.

Cesar pointed out across the valley behind them, which contained the modern town of Ollantaytambo, on the opposite side of the small ridge from the valley where the large stones were quarried.

Cesar: You see those structures on the side of the mountain opposite us?

Nick: Yeah

Cesar: Just to the left of those two large structures, there is a rock formation that is lighter than the rock surrounding it.

Max: I see it.

Cesar: The builders of this place took advantage of a natural rock formation, and shaped it into the face of Viracocha. Can you see it?

Max: Yeah, it kind of looks like an angry face, facing north.

Cesar: The direction of Pisaq. The Inca were working on shaping the entire mountain side into a massive portrait of the god when they were interrupted by the conquest. Here is an artists interpretation of what it looked like before becoming overgrown, and what they think it was eventually going to look like.

Max saw that the face was on a head that was perched atop massive shoulders that were easily fifty yards across. The figure’s right arm was bent at the elbow, stretching upwards across it’s chest to the shoulder, as if securing a robe or a load upon it’s back. It’s left arm was by its side, giving the impression of readiness, as if its hand, which was no longer visible, were resting on a weapon. The light colored rock formation, the more you looked at it, definitely gave the impression of a pale face peering from the mountain. The face was clearly bearded, with a tall, domed forehead, and seemingly long wavy hair. Resting on the top of its head was a structure, all that remained of which were four columns in a square, which gave the impression of a crown.

Max: He’s even got on a crown.

Cesar: Yes, the crown is actually a temple. There is a little known passageway there that leads to a room enclosed in the head where you can actually see out of his eye.

Nick: Amazing.

Max: I think it’s clear that that is where we need to go.

They made their way back down the way they had arrived. Cesar noticed they were being followed.

Cesar: we’ve got company.

Tom: Dammit!

Max: Lets split up, we can individually lose them in the busy market place outside the ruins. We’ll rendezvous at the head.

Cesar: Better if we split into pairs. Max and Tom, you go ahead, here’s my map of the area, I already know where I’m going, Nick and I will meet you there.

Max: Good plan. We should take circuitous routes there, we don’t want to tip them off to where we’re headed.

Cesar: Right

As soon as they reached the gateway leading out of the ruins into modern Ollantaytambo, they went in opposite directions, walking quickly into the crowd.

To Max, it appeared that they had lost their pursuers almost immediately. They still took their time walking in different directions through the town. Eventually they made their way to the trail that wound its way up the mountain opposite from the main fortress, which was their destination. They climbed up to the top of the trail, which emptied out next to the large buildings that had once served as granaries, set high on the valley wall to keep them safe from raids. The little temple on top of the rocky outcropping that served as Viracocha’s head was outside the publicly accessible area of that part of the ruins. So they waited there for Cesar and Nick to arrive, hoping Cesar would know someone that could grant them access, rather than having to sneak in. It seemed they were in luck, Cesar and Nick approached with a uniformed official in tow.

Cesar: We’re in luck. Abel here is going to let us access the temple.

Abel ushered them past the barriers placed to keep the public away from the temple, more for their safety than anything else, since this little temple was perched precariously on the edge of a dangerous drop off. There wasn’t much to the temple. Only a small shell of its structure remained, showing nothing of note. Cesar walked over to the back wall, which was essentially built up against the mountain side. There he directed their attention to what seemed to be a missing block. And beyond the opening was nothing, where the stone of the mountains should have been.

Cesar: Abel, if you’ll keep an eye out.

Cesar began tugging at the stones around the opening, collapsing a small portion of the wall.

Nick, shocked: Cesar!

Cesar: Don’t worry, this portion of the wall isn’t original, it was placed here to hide the entrance to the actual temple.

The others came over to help Cesar.

Once a clearing was made that was big enough to fit through, they squeezed in, one by one. Before them was a stair case, descending into the darkness.

Cesar: Don’t worry, flashlights won’t be necessary.

They followed Cesar trhough the darkness until they came to a corner, turning to the right. Once they rounded the corner, they could see a faint outline of the distant wall at the end of this passage, meaning there was a light source ahead. They walked ahead around the further corner, sloping down hill all the time, and they were presented with a doorway that had been stopped up by a rough hewn, and obviously not original, wooden door. Cesar pulled open the door, revealing a room.

Cesar: Welcome to the temple of Viracocha.

The room was roughly ten by ten feet square, with rounded corners. It seemed to have been carved out of the very rock, with minimal masonry added to give the room shape. There were traditional Inca trapezoidal alcoves in each wall. There was a round opening on the far wall which was letting in daylight.

Nick: Is that Viracocha’s eye?

Cesar: Yes.

Nick: That is very cool.

Tom, walking toward the opening: So, what’s Viracocha looking at?

Cesar: The eye is actually for an astronomical alignment. On mid day of the winter solstice, when the sun crosses its northern most point in the sky, the sun’s rays come through the window and illuminate this central column.

They drew their attention to the central column. The column was richly carved with beautiful detail.

Tom: Looks like the Spanish didn’t get to this!

Max got out his flashlight to aid Nick in getting detailed photographs of the column’s inscriptions.

Max: We’ll worry about translations later, now we need to get what we need and get out.  

Max and nick worked to photograph every inch of the column, while Tom and Cesar looked around the rest of the room for anything of interest.

 

Max: We’ve got what we need, let’s get moving, before our friends figure out where to look for us.

 

Nick, as they are leaving: I didn’t really make all of it out just yet, but it seems like this temple used to house something of great importance. Most likely it was that which we seek. There was one inscription that caught my eye, though.

 

Tom: What was that?

Nick: There was one that looked hastily done. It almost looked like it was graffiti, clearly added later than the other inscriptions, probably over the top of an earlier one.

 

Tom: Ancient graffiti, maybe?

Nick: Maybe, but its style and content is consistent with everything else. It seemed to show the head of Viracocha being carried off by a Condor.

 

Cesar looked as if he’d known Nick were going to say that and had a response prepared.

 

Cesar: Machu Picchu is the mighty city of the sacred Condor, on it’s mountain top perch.

 

Max: Maybe at the time of the Spaniards arrival, they hastily moved their sacred items to Machu Picchu, and left that hastily scrawled inscription as a clue to their followers who came in search of it?

 

Tom: That sounds about right. Many of the Inca’s top preists and officials were evacuated to Machu Picchu during the invasion because it is their most defensible edifice.

 

Max: And since the Spaniards may have never found Machu Picchu, whatever this thing we seek is might have survived the conquest at Machu Picchu.

 

Tom: Which means that it’s already been discovered by one of the billions of archaeologists that have worked, dug, or restored the city.

 

Max: assuming that it wasn’t moved again, or somehow has remained hidden.

 

Cesar: Well, the trail to Machu Picchu is nearby. It’s a two day hike. That will give us plenty of time to think about what we might look for there.

 

Tom: You know, Cesar, I still get the feeling, everywhere we go, that you already know everything that we’ve discovered. It’s like you’re just shepherding us along this “Path of knowledge”, making sure to give us the appropriate clues and prompts whenever it seems we might stray from the path.

 

Cesar: I have seen most of these things we’ve examined already, yes. But it wasn’t until this very expedition that these pieces began to fit together in my mind, much the same as they’ve begun to fit together in yours. My knowledge of the history and culture of the Inca has allowed me to anticipate the next move before it becomes clear to you, that is all.

 

Tom: I guess that makes sense. It’s still kind of creepy, though. Like we’re being led along, like lambs to the slaughter.

 

Max: Tom, that’s a little harsh.

 

Tom: I know. Big C’s paranoia is wearing off on me, I suppose.

 

Nick to Tom, out of earshot of Cesar and Max: Cesar’s paranoia has turned out to be well founded, however…

 

Chapter Ten: Machu Picchu, lost temple of the moon gives clues

 

The Inca Trail; the great highway of pre Columbian Peru. Unlike the great roman roads, it was not designed with horses and pack animals in mind. No cultures prior to the Spanish arrival had the wheel in South America, so the wheel was not considered during the building of the road, either. Consequently, the road was narrow. It also hugged sheer ledges. It made great climbs and drops in elevation. Steep stair cases were frequent along its length. Essentially, the road’s sole purpose was foot traffic, mostly of an un laden variety. Some say that the Inca made the road difficult to traverse intentionally, as a method of spiritual purification and strength building.

 

During their two day hike from Ollantaytambo west, and slightly north, to the legendary lost city of the Inca, the group had time to analyze the inscriptions from the temple of Viracocha, and venture some guesses at their meaning. The inscriptions seemed to tell the story of Viracocha’s life up to the time of his arrival in South America. They say his people were stricken by disasters at the dying of the fourth moon. His people had become masters over nature and earth, and as a result, the earth had cast them off as too powerful. He had arrived after a time of great flooding, after then end of the fourth sun. His lands had become uninhabitable. He had brought the knowledge of his people to share with the inhabitants of South America, hoping that they wouldn’t make the mistakes that would cause their destruction, as his people had. The legend said that this land of the gods had grown too powerful for the earth to bear, and their own learning had lead to their destruction. Viracocha had believed that perhaps another civilization could bloom that wouldn’t make the same mistakes his had made. It also said that he, himself, would eventually return. If the civilization his knowledge had given birth to had grown wicked, he would see to it’s destruction. But, the legend stated that if the civilization had lived up to it’s potential, he would grant it the rest of his knowledge.

 

Nick: This is a part of the Viracocha legend that I’ve never heard. I’d be willing to bet that nobody, outside of the few people that have been allowed into that room, has heard this part of the legend.

 

Max: What nothing has explained, however, is what exactly we’re following. What is this item or knowledge?

 

Nick: I’m guessing it ties into the end of the fifth sun, our sun. Viracocha arrived shortly after the death of the fourth sun ended the time of the gods, the time of his people. He survived and decided to offer his learning to the primitive people of South America. Perhaps he had some sort of knowledge about some sort of cycle of cataclysms that have befallen the earth and possessed the knowledge to either prevent or survive it.

 

Max, laughing: Well, we’d better find it in a hurry. It’s already August of 2012, we’ve only got 4 months to save the world. That is, if you buy the Mayan date of December twenty third of this year as the end of the fifth sun.

 

Tom: Oh boy, we get to save the world? Why didn’t anyone tell me?

 

Max: I’m exaggerating of course.

 

Tom: What could people that lived thousands of years ago have known about the earth that we don’t know now?

 

Max: Well, it wouldn’t be an asteroid or anything. There’s no evidence that their astronomy advanced to the point where they’d be able to predict the orbit of a comet or other extra terrestrial object that might obliterate us. I doubt they could’ve detected any sort of climatic cycle that would end the world as we know it, the way the end of the ice age signaled the end of Viracocha’s “Time of the Gods”.

 

Cesar: We should get some sleep. We arrive at Machu Picchu tomorrow. We should arrive before sunrise, dawn is the best time to be at Machu Picchu. Trust me.

 

Tom: The lost knowledge of Viracocha awaits! All we have to do is find something among the ruins that none of the millions of previous visitors have found! Piece of cake!

 

During their hike up the Inca Trail, the group had felt somewhat secure, due to the large number of hikers and tourists that the Inca trail drew during the dry winter season. Tomorrow, they’d be even more secure, because of the large number of tourists that would fill the lost city of Machu Picchu. Thousands of visitors visited it each day.

 

When they arrived just before dawn, the earliest tour groups were already filing in through the main gate below.

 

Max: We’ve got a lot of ground to cover. We should split up so we can cover the entire city as quickly as possible. I’ll cover the east side, and focus on finding my way down to the less visited lower terraces on that side. Nick, you cover the west side, try and get down the slopes somewhat to see what you can find away from the tour lines. Cesar, being the most familiar with the site, you should cover the center and main portions of the city. Particularly anything that’s always seemed odd to you, or anything, really, that you think might shed some insight on what we’re looking for. Tom, I know you’ve always wanted to, so you can climb Wayna Picchu, the peak adjacent to us. Check out the ruins up there, and see if there’s anything you can detect from a bird’s eye perspective that might prove helpful.

 

Nick: sounds like a plan.

 

Tom: Sweet!

 

Cesar: I already know where I’m going to focus my search.

 

Max: Good. We’ll meet in the main plaza in two hours. By that tree. (Points to the only tree standing in the main part of the Macchu Picchu ruins.)

 

They headed their different ways. Max made his way down the steep slope. Countless stairs later he’d crossed the main plaza to the eastern face of Machu Picchu. There were several paths leading down into the lesser visited areas of this part of Machu Picchu. He systematically eliminated all of them that featured tour signage, instead preferring to remain off the beaten path.

 

Max thought to himself: Ok, whatever it is that has been guiding me all along. If you could point me in the right direction now, I’d appreciate it.

(NANOWRIMO ENDED HERE)

 

He wandered around for a while, occasionally stopping to take pictures. He was still a tourist today, despite all the goings-on. He followed a pathway, and some stairs, down as far as he could, and stopped to rest on a grass covered terrace overlooking the northeastern valley and the Urubamba river below. Not knowing what else to do, he sat down in a quiet, shady spot and meditated for a while. He reached out with his feelings, trying to get a sense of the people that had once lived here. He tried to picture this place in his mind as it must have looked before being abandoned, with people living in the houses and the lives they lived. “One thing is for sure”, Max thought to himself, “the Inca could never be accused of laziness.” They did nothing for convenience. It took a bus 20 minutes to zigzag its way up this hill to the site. The Inca had  a staircase leading from Machu Picchu to the valley below. Max couldn’t imagine climbing a staircase up this massive mountain, much less build massive stone buildings once he got here. Then consider Wayna Picchu. The steeply angled smaller, but higher, neighboring peak also had buildings built on top of it. They were virtually perched on the edge of straight down, thousand foot or more drops. What kind of people would see a peak like that and think, “Yeah, no problem. I can build a city on top of that”?

After a while, Max wandered around some more, beginning to wonder if he was going to find what he was looking for. He climbed up to the next level of terraces above him, intending to head back to the main city to look for the others. There he noticed one of the "watchers", the security personal at the site that made sure people stayed on the paths they were supposed to be on, and didn't climb on fragile ruins. Max noticed this watcher had been watching him, so he struck up a conversation.

Max: How's it going today?

Watcher (who, surprisingly, spoke english): Its a beautiful day. Did you have a good meditation?

It creeped Max out a bit that he'd been watching him, but it was his job, after all.

Max: Yeah, well it was ok, but with all the tourists around here, it's hard to get a feel for the energy of the place.

Watcher, smiling: This is a powerful place. I'm Claus. (extending his hand)

Max, shaking his hand: Max.

Claus: Let me show you something...

Claus reached into his jacked and pulled out an impressive, and quite large, quartz crystal, and extended it towards Max. Max took it and admired it.

Max: Thats a nice one!

Claus: It was given to me by my father, who found it in the temple of the moon.

Max was intrigued.

Max: Temple of the moon? At what site.

Claus, smiling: Here! At Machu Picchu.

Max: But, to my knowledge, there isn't a temple of the moon here.

Claus: To your knowledge. It is a closely guarded secret. Its a little peice of the heritage of this site that my people have kept for themselves, secret to the tourists.

Max: Really?

Claus: Yes, and even the archaeologists have had little access to it. It is a sacred site, and one of the few that we have kept hidden.

Max, handing back the crystal: Kind of strange that you're telling me about it, then.

Claus: It seems to me you are looking for something, and I suspect the temple is what you are looking for.

Max, getting nervous: What makes you think that?

Claus: There is one with you who has warned you of us, but we are not your enemy. We want to see you finish the quest, that is why we have not interfered to this point.

Max was now very nervous, looking around. He realized that there was no one else in sight, and nothing but sheer cliffs as possible escape routes.

Claus, chuckling: I can see that his paranoia has had an effect on you. I can assure you, you are in no danger.

Max: But you've been following us, or you're people have, at least.

Claus: It's true. But we've been very interested in seeing your progress. No one has ever put as much of the puzzle together as you have. (Leans closer, clearly exited) Is it true that you are a dream walker?

Max: I've been told that, but I don't know...

Claus: I must warn you about your companion, however, your guide as it is. He is not as he appears.

Max: What do you mean?

Claus, looking stressed, grabs Max's arm, hard: You shouldn't beleive everything he says, he's...

Claus lurched forward with a sudden "Urgh!", and collapsed, unconscious. Standing behind him was Cesar, holding a signpost he'd apparently uprooted.

Cesar: I can't beleive they managed to get you cornered! Are you alright?

Max: well, yeah, but was that really necessary?

Cesar: Be careful about trusting anything he said to you.

Max: You mean about the temple of the moon?

Cesar: I'm surprised he told you that.

Max: I'm surprised you haven't. He suggested it was that that we're looking for.

Cesar looked uncomfortable. Then: I suppose he's right. I found someone that knows where it is. Come on, we should try to get to it while there's still daylight.

 

Chapeter 11: Trail to Choquequirao, create some suspense

Chapter 12: Choquequirao, final dream, final puzzle piece, earthquake.

 

(Just as I was collecting my winner’s certificate for NaNoWriMo, the song “After the Thrill is Gone” came on my shuffle. Sheesh).