Torrent (10 page)

Chapter 28

"So, what was it like growing up in the jungle?"

Renau glanced past me. "How'd you know about that?"

"Miranda told me." Graham hobbled over to join us. "Just a few minutes before she threatened to throw me out the cabin door."

Renau chuckled. "You disagreed with her on climate change, didn't you?"

Graham nodded.

"I'm not surprised. She's a wonderful person. But when it comes to that subject, she takes no prisoners." Renau paused. "To answer your question, I loved growing up in the jungle."

"Do you ever visit it?"

"Well, we return home as often as possible. But we spend most of that time visiting our tribe. It's too hard to see the jungle, especially after all the development."

The chopper jolted. I steadied myself. "Is development a problem? Miranda told us the Lacandon Jungle was part of a reserve."

"It shouldn't be a problem," Dora said. "Our people own a lot of land but no one respects our rights. The Highland Indians have been illegally carving farms out of our jungle for years."

"Doesn't your government help out?"

She shook her head. "We deserve better. In many ways, we're Mexico's last remaining link to its ancient past."

"I think you've got your facts mixed up." Graham stared intently at Miranda. I winced as I noticed the look in his good eye. Apparently, he'd enjoyed his little fight with Miranda. Now, he was spoiling for another one.

Her face darkened. "How so?"

"For starters, your tribe isn't indigenous to this area. It isn't even related to the original Lacandon tribe. It's actually descended from the Carib, who migrated to the jungle a couple hundred years ago."

"We're still Maya. And we're the rightful owners of the jungle."

"Only because the Mexican government pulled off one of the biggest land redistribution schemes in history. They gave control to sixty-six families and kicked out four thousand others in the process."

"We're still the owners," Renau insisted. "And we deserve praise for protecting the jungle. The Highland Indians are destroying it. They farm soil to exhaustion and turn it into cattle pasture. Then they carve out more land for themselves. It's an environmental catastrophe."

"That's just government propaganda. The settlers mostly abide by strict rules. They've banned slash and burn techniques and prohibited the use of agrichemicals. If we're being honest, the Mexican government causes the bulk of the environmental damage. It uses its influence over your people to gain access for logging and all sort of quasi-governmental ventures."

"Our people are poor, desperate." Dora balled up her fists. "You can't blame them for being tempted by easy money."

"I don't blame them. In fact, I feel sorry for them."

"Why?"

"They traded away their dignity and true heritage in exchange for power over the jungle. Plus, the government parades them around as the last Maya tribe, even though that's far from true. They've become living, breathing folklore." Graham smirked. "Modern day noble savages, if you will."

Dora turned stone-faced. Without another word, she stood up and marched to the front of the helicopter.

Renau avoided Graham's gaze. "I'd better talk to her."

He joined Dora in the niche near the cockpit. I couldn't hear his words, but it looked like they had an effect. Slowly, she unclenched her fists. Her face returned to its normal color.

"What's your problem?" I asked. "Are you trying to make enemies?"

"You wanted to know if we could trust these people," Graham replied. "The best way to do that is to push their buttons and see how they react."

"You pushed plenty of buttons," Beverly said. "So, can we trust them?"

"Tum seems like a genuinely spiritual guy. I get the feeling he cares deeply about the jungle and everything in it. However, the shaman thing creeps me out. The Maneros are extremely proud of their Maya heritage. They'd probably do anything to help a fellow Maya. At the same time, I have my doubts they'd do much to help anyone else."

"What about Miranda?" Beverly asked. "I haven't spoken to her yet."

"She's a competent archaeologist and sincerely believes everything she says about manmade climate change. But it's clear she's more than a little crazy." Graham shook his head. "In fact, I'd say she's a goddamn lunatic."

Chapter 29

The chopper banked to the side. I stared out my window, trying to peer through the thick cloud cover. I caught the barest glimpse of vegetation. It seemed somehow darker and more mysterious than the rest of the jungle.

I squinted. Far below, I noticed browns, blacks, and grays poking out of the dark landscape. It looked like the beginnings of a large mountain range.

The helicopter jolted and the rain sped up. The mountains grew larger as we started to ascend. Individual cliffs and ridges materialized. They looked ancient, far older than the jungle that surrounded them.

I turned toward the opposite aisle and watched as Emily stowed her family history book. Beverly had told me about Emily's earlier outburst. That information, combined with Dr. Wu's statement, made me apprehensive. Still, I'd decided to keep my concerns to myself.

At least for the moment.

"What's that?" I asked as Emily pulled a rectangular object out of her knapsack.

She passed it to me. "It's my computer tablet."

Gingerly, I touched the liquid crystal display. It felt smooth, yet firm as steel. It was an amazing piece of technology. Amazing, yet disturbing. I always felt a little uneasy in the presence of technology. Although young, I was already outdated.

"What model is that?" Beverly asked. "I've never seen it before."

"It's a next generation prototype," Emily replied. "Carden Computers owed me a favor. The screen features proprietary electronic paper, which allows it to be read like a book even under the most glaring light. It's also got vastly extended battery life, over one hundred hours on a single charge."

Beverly nodded, clearly impressed.

The screen's top banner read
SWARM
. A textured map of Mexico covered the rest of it. "What's SWARM?" I asked.

"It's an Intranet. Carden set it up for us. It's an acronym but for the life of me I can never remember what it stands for. Regardless, we won't need it until the full excavation."

"How will you use it?"

"It's designed to facilitate information gathering using crowd-sourcing techniques. Users will be able to add photos of the dig site as well as write and edit articles on any subject."

I handed the tablet back to Emily. "Sounds helpful."

"There are still some bugs." Her fingers danced over the tablet's surface. "But it's got a lot of promise."

"How are you going to power it?" Graham asked. "It's not like you can just plug it into an outlet."

"I plan to install solar docking stations. That should help, although the cloud cover could be a problem. For the long-term, we'll need a more permanent solution."

Wind slashed against the helicopter. The sudden jolt made me long for land. "Where are we?" I asked.

"Directly above the Eastern Mountains," Emily replied.

I shifted positions and peered out the window again. I saw nothing unusual. Just a few limestone and sandstone cliffs as well as the occasional glimpse of jungle, shrouded in heavy cloud cover and rain.

"I see a bunch of clouds," Graham remarked. "But not much else."

Emily smiled. "Our destination won't look much different. At least not from up here."

"What do you mean?"

"We're going to a small canyon. It contains a marsh ringed by a dense cloud forest. So, the canopy and cloud cover keep it hidden from view." She shrugged. "It's a good thing really. The cloud forest is part of the reason no one else has found the library yet."

"What's the other part?" Beverly asked.

"The canyon isn't a normal canyon. I don't know if there's a technical term for it, but steep mountain ridges seal it off. There's no river or any other outlet. As far as Miranda's team can determine, the only way to access it is by air."

"Good thing you've got a helicopter." Graham furrowed his brow. "But if the canyon is sealed off, how did Hunahpu and Xbalanque enter it?"

"That's a good question." A troubled look appeared on Emily's face. "A very good question."

Chapter 30

"I just spoke to Dr. Wu." Emily sat down and buckled her seatbelt. "We'll be on the ground in twenty minutes. But before we land, I'd like to give you some information."

Eagerly, I leaned forward.

"What about them?" Graham nodded at Miranda's team.

"They prepared most of the information. Now, as I said before, our destination is a closed-off canyon. It's located deep in the
Montañas del Oriente
, or Eastern Mountains." She held up her tablet.

I leaned in for a closer look. A satellite image took up the entire screen.

"The canyon covers an area smaller than one square mile," she continued. "It's shaped like a rough circle. Sheer rock walls surround it on all sides. We haven't figured out the exact height of the walls yet, but they could be as tall as five hundred feet in places. There's a small marsh in the middle of the canyon. Thick jungle surrounds it. The land between the marsh and the jungle is firm ground. Our camp is located on the southern part of that land."

"Where's the pyramid?" Beverly asked. "In the jungle?"

"Actually, the jungle appears to be devoid of manmade structures. The pyramid is situated in the middle of the marsh. Since it's the only building in the area, we believe the library is stored inside it."

Emily swiped her finger across the screen. A new image materialized. It looked like a Jackson Pollock painting. Blotches of dull textured colors covered every square inch of the screen. I saw turquoise, red, and yellowish-green, among others.

"I didn't take any pictures during my initial visit," Emily said. "So, this will have to do. You're looking at a high-resolution, false-color satellite image of the canyon. I've also got some old images taken by high-altitude planes as well."

"What are all those colors?" Graham asked.

"The yellowish-green areas indicate color and reflectivity variations in the foliage."

"So, the vegetation isn't all the same color." He frowned. "Is that important?"

"It indicates a disturbance at ground level. Hunahpu used materials—limestone and lime plasters from the look of it—to construct the pyramid. After he left, the marsh started to reclaim the land. But limestone doesn't hold moisture well. So, plants had difficulty gaining traction above and within the pyramid. At the same time, chemicals from the plaster leaked into the marsh, altering its chemical content. Some plants lived, others died, still others changed colors. The differences are tiny. You wouldn't be able to notice them from the ground or even from our helicopter. But from space, they're quite clear."

I pointed to a brown splotch in the center of the screen. "So, this square-shaped thing is the pyramid?"

She nodded.

"Are the other images as clear as this one?" Graham asked. "Because if they are, I'm surprised no one ever thought to take a closer look."

Emily's smile faded. "Let me show you."

She touched the screen again. A new image appeared. It was covered with different shades of grey and looked completely different than the previous picture.

"What's that?" I asked.

"It's a close-up of the canyon. It was taken two years ago by a team of geomatics experts using lidar, which is a remote sensing technology. Essentially, an airborne laser sends pulses. The pulses bounce off the ground and return to the sky. The longer a pulse takes to reach its origin, the lower the altitude level. And—"

"We know how it works. With enough pulses, you can build a fairly accurate three-dimensional map." Graham studied the image. "That's odd. This picture looks nothing like the other one."

"That's correct. Apparently, the geomatics team discovered a small gap in their lidar images after flying sorties over the area."

"Sounds like the laser malfunctioned."

"That's what they thought. So, they commissioned another sweep of the area. But the laser malfunctioned again over the exact same chunk of land. It took them two more tries to get something that resembled a traditional lidar image." Emily looked pensive. "We noticed similar problems while looking over other images. The vast majority of them are blurry. Some of them appear completely different from other ones. But none of them show anything resembling a pyramid."

"Any idea what caused the disruptions?" Beverly asked.

"There are no settlements or military installations in the immediate area. So, my best guess is the cloud forest plays tricks on the equipment."

"There's another possibility," Graham said. "Something within the canyon could be causing electromagnetic interference."

"That's possible. But it would have to be emitting an awful lot of energy to interfere with overhead aircraft, even ones that are flying low."

"I know."

A hush fell over our small group. All I could hear was the beating of the blades and the whirring of the engine.

"Are you sure there aren't any settlements in the area?" I asked.

"Yes, I'm sure. The pyramid was built in an extremely isolated location. There's nothing around for miles. In many ways, the canyon is an entire world onto itself." She paused and her look became distant. "A lost world."

Chapter 31

The helicopter jolted. I lurched into the aisle. Air shot out of my lungs as my chest crashed into Emily's knees.

The chopper dropped a couple of feet before slamming to a halt. The impact jarred me to my bones.

The helicopter dropped a few more feet. Emily lost hold of her tablet. It bounced across the floor.

I tried to stand up. But the chopper reeled to the left. The sudden shift pitched me to the ground. My forehead smacked against the metallic floor.

Cries rang out as the chopper jerked forward. Then backward. Then side to side in a circular motion. I struggled to return to the bench. But the winds showed no mercy, causing the helicopter to shift erratically.