At the End of the World

by Mark Macpherson

‘It’s OK I come too, isn’t it?’ Jim asked Michelle as he walked quickly beside her.

  ‘Of course,’ she said.

  Arthur had stood up after Michelle and fell further behind on the climb. He reached the crest of the steps down to the tomb’s entrance after the others.

  ‘What are you intending, old friend?’ Arthur asked Yax K’in.

  ‘To help,’ Yax K’in said. ‘Although I am no longer the one to help. Pep’Em Ha is the one.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Arthur asked.

  Yax K’in did not reply. He walked down the steps, Pep’Em Ha followed after he beckoned her to come. He studied the place he had tried to push. He was sure what it was. His father had told him. It was a part of the stories of Hachakyum. The same stories he had taught the next t’o’ohil.

  Pep’Em Ha was earnest but confused. Michelle, Arthur and Jim did not interfere. They waited to one side.

  Yax K’in took Pep’Em Ha’s wrist. She resisted but did not pull her hand away.

  ‘No,’ Yax K’in said, softly. ‘Please?’

  He placed her hand over the irregular shape and pushed, as if he was attempting to merge her hand with the rock.

  Nothing happened.

  Yax K’in removed his hand and asked her to push against the rock.

  Nothing happened.

  Yax K’in sat down on the last step. He hung his head. He was confused. He must be misinterpreting something from the stories, he thought. His daughter stood over him, worried about her father.

  Yax K’in asked Michelle to sit next to him. He patted the hard, carved stone of the ancient step. Michelle quickly sat like she had been summoned to the side of a revered teacher. Arthur was perplexed that he had not been summoned.

  ‘My father,’ Yax K’in spoke to Michelle in Maya while they both stared at the stone slab as if it was a cinema screen about to erupt with images. ‘My father told me to remember a shape. I have faithfully recounted that description in my mind since that day.’

  ‘Hachakyum told my first ancestor it is the way into this tomb,’ he pointed at the rock face before him. ‘I would like you,’ he said to Michelle, ‘to hear the description. You would be the first non-KulWinik to hear it. Actually,’ he said. ‘You will be the first person who will not be t’o’ohil.’

  Michelle nodded and glanced meaningfully over her shoulder to Arthur.

  ‘Yes, yes,’ Yax K’in dismissed her look as irrelevant. ‘I know what you two think.’

  ‘Please listen,’ he added, as if Michelle had interrupted him.

  Yax K’in described the shape. He had never spoken those words outside the cave where he had learned them from his father.

  ‘OK,’ Michelle said vacantly as if she had been supplied with meaningless information. She stood up and put her face close to the rock surface and traced an outline with her finger. ‘You think this is it?’ she asked. Michelle turned her head to look at Yax K’in as she asked the question but turned it back before he could reply. ‘It doesn’t look like that description to me. This part looks like the bottom bit,’ she traced her finger over the shape again. ‘But that’s all there is.’ She picked at the rock where Yax K’in had picked previously.

  ‘Oh, I see,’ Michelle said with surprise. ‘It’s covered. We should remove all that and then we can see if it’s the same.’

  ‘We’ve got a wire brush, haven’t we?’ she raised her voice to Arthur.

  ‘Yes,’ he said.

  Michelle stopped picking at the rock and turned to her audience.

  ‘All right,’ she said, taking charge. ‘Not that I believe this, mind you.’

  She barked an order to Arthur, ‘Why don’t you and Jim go and get a wire brush and the other gear? That’ll get us started.’

  Jim and Arthur left. They returned accompanied by Hamish and a few others from the team. The newcomers carried a small generator, a compressor, a drill and a camera with various attachments. Arthur was confident that the entrance would not be opened by Yax K’in. Once Michelle had finished humoring him he would get on with drilling a small hole and then placing a video camera on the other side of the rock slab. Two of the team had sauntered along after the group carrying the equipment. They had brought coffee for themselves and, as if it was a stage show, sat on the topmost step and waited to be entertained.

  Arthur used compressed air to clean the edges of the sealed doorway while he waited for Michelle to finish. She carefully brushed the irregular shape in the rock. When she was certain that it was a natural imperfection she used the wire brush to vigorously scrape the surface clean. Arthur halted his work when Michelle stood back from her handiwork.

  ‘Well, you might have something Yax K’in,’ she said. ‘This is definitely the shape you described.’

  There were many logical explanations how the shape had made it into an ancient description passed from one generation to the next, she thought. She traced her finger around the shape and was amazed how well the oral history had been preserved. It exactly matched Yax K’in’s description. She was already planning a research paper on the, abnormal, success of oral history in this case. Yax K’in came close and ran his finger along the chaotic indentations while he silently mouthed the description. He could not bring himself to say it out loud again.

  ‘Yes. Exactly,’ he agreed.

  Pep’Em Ha decided action was needed to save her father from embarrassment. There was a crowd watching and she decided that she would be the one to look foolish, not her father. She pushed between Yax K’in and Michelle. She placed both her hands flat against the rock slab. She crouched and braced her legs. She lowered her head and pushed with all her strength.

  The stone slab grunted as it moved a little. The last of the dust and dirt that adhered to the edges dislodged and, hinged on the base of the triangular slab, it fell away from Pep’Em Ha. Michelle grabbed her around the waist and held her as if she might be sucked into the vortex like the falling doorway was a sinking ship.

  The slab slid downwards for a few meters and then came to rest. The sound of the collapse slowly dissipated as it raced down the tunnel, obscured by a cloud of dust, as a herald of intrusion to whatever lay below.

  Michelle let Pep’Em Ha go as Jim raced down to stand next to her. He would have loved to have been the one to save her.

  To Michelle’s impatient annoyance, the dust appeared to defy gravity and refused to settle but once she could see part of the way inside, she stared at Arthur as if challenging him to deny the fantasy. He quickly glanced at her but did not want to take his eyes off the unfolding scene.

  The two coffee drinkers stood, spilled some of their coffee and craned their necks forward as if the suspense and excitement was manufactured. The absent doorway, once filled by the triangular stone slab, had left a hole and there were steps that became lost in the darkness.

  ‘Arthur,’ Michelle said. Her voice bubbled with excitement as if she could talk for a month. ‘There’s no rubble. It hasn’t been back-filled. It’s perfect.’

  ‘No,’ Arthur said absently, not taking his eyes off the void before him. He was barely listening to her.

  ‘We’re going to also need a flashlight,’ he said slowly.

  Chapter 2

  ‘Like the fuck you will,’ Michelle exclaimed after Arthur had suggested that he enter the passageway alone.

  ‘Where you go,’ she said. ‘I go.’ She didn’t care that an audience heard.

  ‘It may not be safe,’ Arthur said weakly. ‘We should, really, have it checked out first. Maybe we should wait.’ He prevaricated.

  ‘A second ago it was safe enough for you. Now it’s not safe at all? Arthur, please,’ she exclaimed.

  He was worried for her safety.

  ‘It’s not the nineteenth century and I’m not a weak woman,’ she said. She was not angry with him. She knew where his apprehensions came from. She worried for his safety too.

  ‘Roberto could shut this down tomorrow. You know that,’ she spoke softly. Rational arguments worke
d better with him. In response to her angry moods he became withdrawn and morose, or combative.

  ‘We have a choice until then,’ she said. ‘Go now, and we can still go slowly and carefully if you are really concerned about safety or, wait. And then who knows when we’ll go down there.’ She pointed to the dark passageway. ‘Or if we’ll be the ones. They could get someone else. You know Roberto would prefer a Mexican national.’ Michelle folded her arms. ‘It’s your choice. Or are you all talk now that there is a gaping passageway in front of you?’

  Arthur had been convinced, before Michelle’s histrionic prodding and more so after her quiet arguments, that they had to explore the tomb immediately. Roberto was an issue, of course, but he felt his destiny. He was about to enter the ranks of archaeologists who had made discoveries singular enough to be reported in the popular media. He did not want to defer the moment of discovery.

  They entered the passageway and began a slow descent. The steps were dry and sturdy but they did not trust them for support. They edged over each step, keeping one hand on the step above, and allowed their feet to slowly take their weight. The walls sloped to a point above their heads and the sides were roughly hewn as if construction had been abandoned before decoration was added. The pathway down was wide enough for Michelle and Arthur to progress side by side, if they kept close together.

  They descended to a landing where the steps turned 180 degrees and plunged into complete darkness. Arthur squeezed Michelle’s hand and was pleased to feel his pressure returned. They turned away from the light and the outside world was lost to them.

  They descended to another landing. The stairs then turned at right angles. Thirteen further steps were carved out of the natural slope in the bare rock. Arthur and Michelle halted in a small antechamber, tall enough to stand at full height. A rectangular hole, big enough for a person to crouch and pass through gaped before them. Through it was a black void.

  Ancient cold air stretched to meet them.

  They both put their heads through the opening. Their flashlights illuminated a large, natural cavern. The ceiling was six meters high. The far side was thirty meters away. The walls had been covered and smoothed with plaster. Arthur’s light methodically moved along the wall of the cavern at a constant pace. Michelle randomly shone her light on the cave floor, the roof and the walls.

  ‘Holy shit, Michelle,’ Arthur quietly exclaimed.

  The wall, all the way around, was covered, to a height of four meters, with densely packed writing. Michelle watched Arthur’s light, ignoring her own, as it worked its way around. As soon as Arthur had completed his lap of illumination she trained her light to follow Arthur’s path again, as if to ensure that what she had seen was not a trick and had disappeared in the meantime. The glyphic writing remained. She had not seen so much ancient Mayan writing in a single location. The rest of her working life, she knew, would be spent translating the text on those walls.

  ‘Holy shit,’ he sighed.

  ‘You’ve said that,’ she said. ‘Can we go in?’ she asked but pushed passed him.

  ‘That would be yes,’ he said to Michelle’s back.

  The opening led onto a ledge two meters above the floor of the cavern. Carved stairs fell to a natural, not smoothed, cave floor.

  Michelle picked her way carefully, because of the uneven surface, to the centre of the tomb. She zigzagged her light over the top of a raised, rectangular sarcophagus, looking for markings but there were none. It was, unusual for a sarcophagus, a smooth slab of rock.

  Arthur had not followed Michelle but waited on the cave floor at the bottom of the steps. He heard whispers and scrapings.

  ‘Michelle,’ he called out. ‘There something coming.’

  ‘What?’ she asked, not hearing him properly among the echoes.

  Yax K’in emerged through the entranceway and on to the ledge, Pep’Em Ha followed and then Jim. Arthur swore softly. He regretted leaving the outside world without explicit instructions. He imagined a line of people behind Jim, queuing like it was an amusement park attraction.

  ‘Are there anymore behind you Jim?’ Arthur asked, in English.

  ‘No. Hamish stopped everyone after Yax K’in and Pep’Em Ha. Except me, he couldn’t stop me.’

  ‘I’m glad someone has some sense,’ Arthur said.

  ‘Is this as you expected Yax K’in?’ Arthur asked, speaking in Maya.

  ‘Yes. It is as it has been described to me.’ Yax Kin smiled at Arthur. ‘I knew your skill would find this place.’

  Arthur laughed. ‘Well, we dug under your instruction. So our skill at manual labour has been proved.’

  Arthur flashed his light on the writing on the wall. ‘Are these the stories?’

  ‘You will have to ask Michelle, once she was studied them. I cannot read them, no KulWinik can.’

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me this was here, ten years ago?’ Arthur asked. ‘I could have organized a bigger team, more funding.’ He laughed. ‘Television crews.’

  ‘It was not the time. I can only do what I have been told.’

  ‘How do you know? You don’t keep a record of time,’ Arthur said and then laughed again, he was as happy as he had ever been. ‘You don’t know what year it is.’

  The KulWinik had lost the ancient Mayan ability to count the cycle of days and years. They had no ritual that depended on the passage of time.

  Yax K’in gave a little laugh and nodded his head. Then he was serious. ‘I know because of my daughter. The years have been waiting for her.’

  ‘Did you know about this place, did you?’ Jim asked Pep’Em Ha after listening to Yax K’in.

  She hesitated. ‘I didn’t believe the stories were real.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Arthur said. ‘But I don’t want you three to stay. We don’t want too much breathing down here. Not until we know what there is.’

  Yax K’in ignored Arthur and walked down the steps to the cave floor. Pep’Em Ha followed. Her torch-light lit Yax K’in’s feet.

  ‘I have not come down those steps from outside to look,’ Yax K’in said. ‘There are two things for me in here.’

  ‘What things?’ Arthur asked.

  ‘I will tell you when I find them,’ Yax K’in said.

  Arthur was worried. It was getting out of hand. Yax K’in’s talk of messages from the past was troubling. The accurate descriptions were disturbing. Yax K’in was possessed by a task he had never shared and Arthur found the prolonged secrecy difficult.

  Yax K’in added, ‘I will not touch anything until I have spoken to you.’ He laughed and said, ‘I will not breath until I have obtained your permission.’ He sucked his breath in and held it.

  ‘You can breath,’ Arthur said, rather reluctantly.

  ‘Jim,’ Arthur said in English. He would worry about Yax K’in later, his first concern was to get the three of them out of the tomb as quickly as possible. ‘Be very careful OK? The floor is uneven. If you fall then, still don’t touch anything. We can fix you up but we can’t fix what’s here. Make sure the others understand that.’

  Arthur joined Michelle near the sarcophagus.

  ‘Have I done the right thing?’ he asked Michelle quietly. He was worried about damage.

  ‘You don’t have a choice. It’s his place isn’t it?’

  Chapter 3

  Yax K’in slowly followed the wall around the cavern, like he was a disinterested patron at an art gallery. He stopped and sighed when he discovered the focus of his search. It was lying against the north wall wedged into the corner and covered in a layer of dust. He felt his life was subservient to the needs of inanimate objects. It may not have been found by Arthur or Michelle for sometime, but it would have eventually been discovered, unfortunately, he thought.

  Yax K’in stood over a tied bundle of ancient paper. His eyes followed the line made where the lime-washed wall met the rocky floor and found the second object he required. He called to Arthur.

  ‘These objects are what I have found,’ he said
and waited until Arthur stood by him.

  ‘What do you want with them?’ Arthur asked.

  ‘I must have them.’

  ‘To take away?’

  ‘Yes. When you are ready for that,’ Yax K’in said quietly. He had to convince Arthur that they must be removed quickly. He had a foreboding that time was short.

  Arthur called Michelle over.

  ‘You can’t take that away,’ she said angrily. ‘What sort of site would it be if you did that?’

  ‘I think we should let him,’ Arthur said. He did not want Yax K’in’s departure delayed by arguments. He could retrieve the objects later.