Time Trial td-53

by Warren Murphy

  He placed it in the empty bag he carried, proof for Smith. "Whoever made this thing is light years ahead of us, only..." He squeezed the butt of the rifle between his thumb and his forefinger. It crumbled beneath his touch as if it were made of paper. What kind of weapon was this, sending deadly power from a casing as fragile as butterfly wings?

  The boy stepped cautiously out of the brush. His face looked pale beneath the sun-browned skin, his dark eyes wide.

  "Do not be afraid, my child," Chiun said gently, extending his arms. The boy took two steps nearer, his left leg dragging uselessly behind the right. Then his eyes rolled back into his head and he fainted.

  "Fools," Chiun said angrily. "We have both been fools." He bent over the boy and propped him up in his arms. "He no doubt has not eaten for two days or more. He needs food. Go find us fish, Remo."

  "Fish? We left the river six hours ago."

  "It has wound around this way," Chiun said stubbornly. "I can smell it."

  * * *

  Chiun carefully unwrapped the bandage around the boy's knee. Inside, next to the skin, was a poultice made of hundreds of the white flowers he and Remo had seen the night before. They were crushed and fragrant, their effect making Chiun dizzy. He slowed his breathing, watching the boy take in the quieting fumes as he slept. His leg was mangled, hurt beyond repair. The boy would never walk normally.

  His parents must have been compassionate indeed, Chiun thought. Few outside of the "civilized" countries of the world, where everyone was forced to live long lives while encouraged to poison themselves with bad food and alcohol and tobacco and medical drugs and worries, would have allowed this child to live. Small, maimed, silent.

  Did he speak any language? Did he understand words at all? He must. He said something at the river, one word. Had it just been nonsense, the babbling of an idiot?

  The sight of the boy tore at the old man's heart. This lame child, mute and doomed, unreachable, was the lost babies of Sinanju, all of the bright new lives that were never to be. By right, this boy should not have lived, either. But he had somehow escaped the Great Void to be with Chiun and Remo now.

  The question was why. Chiun did not know the boy's destiny, but he knew, understood without words, that it was somehow tied in with his own.

  He spotted a few of the flowers near where the boy lay. Keeping his breathing slow, he gathered them up and crushed them into a fine paste, which he smeared on a piece of silk torn from his kimono.

  The boy had awakened when he got back. In the distance, he could see Remo returning, three fat fish in his hands. Chiun wrapped the bright blue bandage around the boy's knee and knotted it expertly. The boy followed him with his eyes.

  "Why have we been brought together, my strange little one?" Chiun said softly. "Is it you who needs, or is it I?"

  "It is my father's prophecy," the boy said.

  Chiun sat up slowly, appraising the young face with its ancient eyes. "And who is your father?" he asked, exhibiting no surprise that the boy could talk.

  "One who knew the Old Tongue," the boy said proudly. "He is dead, but I know the Old Tongue, too."

  There was something hopeful in the boy's dark eyes. "And what is the Old Tongue?" Chiun asked.

  "The language of the gods. Not this white language that the white priest taught me, but the true language. The language of power."

  "Did your father have the power?"

  "Yes. When he died."

  "What did he say?"

  "That I alone of my family would walk with the gods."

  "I do not understand," Chiun said.

  "Nor do I. Yet."

  "Ah." Chiun did not press him. The child spoke like a man, firm, calm, sparing.

  "That was why I had to come with you," the boy said with quiet urgency.

  "Was the pain very great?"

  "Yes." It was plain, true, simple.

  "Is it bearable now?"

  "It is always bearable. But it is better now. Thank you, Master."

  "My name is Chiun."

  "My name is Po."

  "For crying out loud, you speak English," Remo said, throwing down the fish. "Why wouldn't you talk when I asked you where the village was?"

  "I do not belong in the village," Po said. "I belong with you. For now. Until I have completed my journey."

  Remo put his hands on his hips. "Will you listen to that?" he said. "What journey?"

  "Make the fire," Chiun said. "We have things to discuss."

  * * *

  They roasted the fish over the open fire. While they ate, Po told them about his family, his meeting with Sebastian Birdsong, the invasions of the Lost Tribes.

  The boy grew drowsy after eating, and the three of them sat quietly with their thoughts. It was then that they heard the sound, far and muffled, like the mewling of a cat. Remo sprang to his feet.

  "No danger," Chiun said, frowning, trying to locate the source of the sound. It seemed to be buried. No footfalls, no breathing.

  The boy shook himself awake. "I heard nothing," he said.

  "You cannot hear what we hear. Where is the Temple of Magic?" Chiun asked.

  The boy pointed toward the faint sound. "It is near."

  Remo and Chiun sprang away like two animals. The boy pulled himself to his feet, amazed at the speed and grace of the two men.

  No, not men, he said to himself. That is why they fight as they do. That is why they can run faster than the wind. These are beings like Kukulcan himself who walk with me.

  He found a stick and used it to walk, easing some of the constant ache in his leg. Near the entrance to the temple was a crashed helicopter. The bodies inside had already decomposed nearly to bone. By the time he reached the moss-covered, debris-littered ruin, Remo and Chiun were already flinging away the huge stones like handfuls of sand as the sound inside grew louder.

  There is nothing these two cannot do, Po thought in amazement. They can build a world if they wish.

  He cocked his head. The sound was stronger from the rear of the pyramidal base, coming from behind a barricade of rock.

  "It is here," he shouted.

  The two men came around. "Listen," he said. "Dig here, and you will find it more quickly."

  Both men immediately went to work on a mammoth stone, their hands vibrating on the rock, their bodies angling for leverage.

  They did not doubt me because of my youth, Po thought. I spoke truth, and they understood.

  And when they lifted the great stone, the noise burst out of the rock as if it had been buried there for a thousand years.

  Weeping. A woman weeping.

  ?Chapter Five

  Mad. I'm going mad.

  Dr. Elizabeth Drake bit her fingers to calm herself down, but the screaming wouldn't stop. Her screaming. Her fingers were raw and bleeding from trying to keep herself under control, her voice hoarse, her hands shaking, the food exhausted, and she was going to die. The fear lurched out of her like a living thing, the scream filling up the icebox-sized space where she had lived in darkness for— how long? Days? Weeks?

  Ever since Diehl ran out on her. Men. They sniffed around you like dogs until you needed them, and then they sprouted wings. Dick Diehl, the archaeologist. The scholar. The scientist.

  The rat.

  How dare he assume she was dead? How dare he run away to save his own skin while she lay trapped beneath twenty tons of rock?

  She panted softly to ease the pain in her chest from the racking sobs, the screams that shook her until she gagged. On her hands and knees, she felt her way over to the pile of now empty knapsacks stuffed into one corner of the small space.

  She knew where everything was. This was her world now, the tiny, dark space where she lived, and she knew every centimeter of it even without the flashlight she carried in her waistband. Ahead, beneath the jagged stone, were the knapsacks. When Diehl threw her to safety during the attack, she had landed on the pile of canvas bags containing the dig's food supply. That was a stroke of luck, the only one
in this whole luckless expedition. Otherwise she would have starved to death.

  With trembling fingers she undid the clasp of her own knapsack and extracted the plastic vial that had kept her sane during her endless imprisonment. One Valium. The last one.

  So long, sanity. She popped it into her mouth and swallowed the pill dry. Then she closed the clasp and replaced the knapsack where it had been.

  A place for everything, and everything in its place. To the left of the knapsacks, in the low area where you had to squat, was the toilet, reeking, fly-covered. My fellow Vassar classmates, if you could see me now. And to the right...

  She never moved to the right. Not since she had first explored the darkness with the flashlight and found the body lying beside her, with it's glassy eyes and pallid skin. The corpse's face was all that showed, poking out from under an enormous cut stone that had crushed out the man's life. She recognized him as one of the natives brought along on the expedition. She hadn't approached the body again. She hadn't had to. Its stink was a constant reminder to her that she was not alone.

  It should have been you, Dr. Diehl, you cowardly creep.

  No one had gotten out except for Diehl. He had escaped. Logic told her he had. She had heard Diehl shouting her name when the earthquake first shook loose the temple and buried her in its rubble. And then she'd heard the shots, those strange little pings straight out of Star Wars, firing in the opposite direction. And then the thunder of the rest of the temple coming down, cutting off the wild native screams. Oh, God, the temple. The Temple of Magic, the greatest archaeological find since the Dead Sea Scrolls, oh no oh no oh no.

  She dug her fingernails into her face. That was the last Valium, Drake, she told herself. Don't waste it.

  Stifling a sob, she forced her mind to recount the events again. That was real; it happened; it would keep her sane. At least as long as the Valium held out.

  The letter. First there was the letter from the expedition at the Temple of Magic, hinting at some great archaeological find. And the samples. Old. Older than anything she'd seen since the Oxkintok discoveries. The dig at Oxkintok had unearthed a Mayan lintel from 475 A. D., and the discovery had made history. It had also made Dick Diehl, who headed the expedition, a famous man.

  Things had been terrific during that dig at Oxkintok. The thrill of discovery, the easy find, the cameraderie. She remembered the early morning coffee sessions when she and Diehl would go over the work for the day, the jokes, Diehl's easy smile. The evenings when, exhausted and so covered with dirt and ash that they looked like end men in a minstrel show, she and Diehl would amble over to the river and bathe in the cold, deep water while the sun set in a blaze over the Yucatan plains.

  And the nights. The tension, lying in her tent wanting him, knowing he wanted her, too, trying to keep her mind on the dig while she grew wet with longing between her legs.

  And then that wonderful moment when he'd unearthed the lintel, and they'd all gone crazy with excitement, kids at Christmas, dancing, shouting, everybody hugging everybody else. He'd kissed her then. It had just been the joy of the moment for both of them, embarrassing later, never discussed, but when he'd taken her in his arms and put his mouth on hers, it had been the most beautiful moment of her life.

  He'd stayed, wrapped in her warmth, not wanting to let go. Until he'd said those magic words.

  "Let's catalogue this stuff right away."

  Mr. Romantic. Not "Darling. at last." not "Come with me." Not even "Let's fuck." He wanted to catalogue the frigging lintel.

  So they had. And it had been war since then. If Dick Diehl was going to be the supreme archaeologist, then, by God, Elizabeth Drake could out-professionalize him any day. They'd been competitors at UCLA after that, vying for the best digs, the most publications. She'd even topped him a few times. The fool. He hadn't even gotten mad. Her success seemed to please him, the jerk.

  Everything was business with Diehl. Even when the two of them had reached the Temple of Magic and discovered the dead bodies of the entire crew from the first expedition, Diehl had gone immediately to the vases and bowls lining the walls, exclaiming that the temple was the most magnificent specimen of the Formative/ Classic Mayan period since the burial vault discovered at Palenque.

  She had stared at him then, wondering when he would take notice that twelve corpses were sprawled at his feet. But then everything happened so fast that it now seemed to her like a dream. A bad dream.

  First came the tribesmen, primitive, frightening. They wore ash dots on their foreheads, and for a moment, all she could see was the ash dots, everywhere, it seemed, surrounding her like unseeing eyes.

  And then the weapons. Wild things. Certainly not in keeping with the stone spears and crude metal knives they carried. Someone else was here, she reasoned. Some superpower plotting an invasion of North America? No, that was too James Bond to believe. Maybe an experimental American base, testing new weapons? It was a thought. She would certainly write to her congressman and the American Civil Liberties Union about it when she got back. No Defense Department was going to monkey around with exotic weapons in the middle of the most archaeologically significant region in the western hemisphere. A lot of people were going to hear from Elizabeth Drake when she got home.

  Home.

  Don't think about it, she told herself. One second at a time, that's how you've got to live now. No thinking ahead.

  What came next? Oh, yes, the earthquake. The tribesmen were zapping the members of her expedition with these weird weapons, leaving holes the size of baseballs in their victims. Dick Diehl came for her then— who would have thought he cared— and threw her into the corner, against the knapsacks. The stuffed canvas bags broke her fall.

  She thought the natives with the fancy guns were going to get Diehl for sure then, and she screamed. As if her scream were a prayer, it was answered by the earthquake.

  She'd been too terrified to move. Rocks that had been standing for millennia suddenly toppled around her. Two giant square stones fell from directly overhead. It was a miracle that she hadn't been crushed on the spot.

  A miracle, yes. They'd wedged against each other, forming a triangle above her head and scattering the other falling rocks to either side. As the earthquake continued to rumble, she could hear more rocks falling, burying her deeper. She could hear the screams of the tribesmen, crushed at the scene of their own destructiveness. Served them right. They all died except for Diehl. He got away.

  The son of a bitch.

  She could, even now, hear Dick Diehl calling her name. He'd had to run. She knew that, had known it then. He thought she was dead. Anyone would have died beneath the mountain of rock that fell onto her. It was just by pure chance— a whim of fate— that she had survived, unhurt.

  Oh, God, let him have gotten away, the pompous, unromantic shitheel. Let Dick Diehl be safe.

  The Valium was working. The screaming razor's edge was beginning to dull. Good, good. Maybe she would sleep. The less time spent conscious, the better. After all, she thought, it could be night. Maybe it was time to sleep.

  A stone fell from above and skidded along her cheek. She gasped. Another stone. A fall of limestone powder.

  The rocks. They're giving away.

  More stones fell. She skittered to the far side of the area, opposite the knapsacks, and flattened herself against the wall. Another earthquake? Or just the normal shifting of things, an unseen hand moving the big rocks where they belonged, where they should have been all along. On top of her broken body.

  Her face was wet. She realized that she was crying. No pleas to the Almighty now. This final irony didn't deserve them. Just tears, all the tears she'd been saving since she learned that serious women didn't cry. Go ahead and cry now, baby. It's time.

  "Watch it. We don't want a landslide."

  "What?" she said aloud. Someone was out there. The falling stones and dust must have opened an air passage in the far wall. And someone was there, there to help her, speaking English.
<
br />   "I'm here!" she shouted. "In here!"

  "She's in there," the voice said.

  "Do you think I am deaf?" came another voice, a high singsong.

  "Watch the rock."

  "Watch your own rock. And straighten your elbow."

  At least one of the men was an American. Could Dick Diehl have sent them? Was this a third expeditionary team? Oh, God, could Diehl be with them?

  "Dick," she shrieked.

  "Remo," came the voice.

  "Chiun," came the other. "Greetings."

  Greetings? What kind of way was that to talk to someone who'd been buried alive?

  "Get me the fuck out of here," she yelled.

  "Take it easy, girl. We'll get you."

  He'd called her girl. She hated them already. Well, no point in being picky. She would deal with them later, report them to their superior. But at this point, they could be two redneck wifebeaters as far as she was concerned, as long as they got her out. Just keep coherent. Don't lose your head.

  "There are two big stones, about two by two by four feet each, wedged in a triangle over my head," she said clearly.

  "What did I tell you about your elbow?"

  "Aw, lay off, Little Father. This isn't an exercise."

  "All movement is exercise. Even the smallest motion should be performed correctly."

  "All right. This way?"

  "A little better. Not Korean, but better."

  "Didn't you hear me?" Elizabeth Drake screamed.

  "We heard you," Remo said.

  "The yak drivers of the Himalayas could hear her," Chiun whispered. "The elbow."

  A trickle of sand sifted down onto the archaeologist's head. "Watch what you're doing, you cretins!" she shouted.

  "Look, you want us to come get you or not?"

  "I want you to get me alive, idiot. Are you using pulleys?"

  "An insult," the singsong voice said.