The Girl in the Mayan Tomb

by Kevin Tumlinson

  He looked back to see Knoll stripping out of his wetsuit.

  “What are you doing?” he asked. “We need to get moving!”

  Knoll shook his head. “First, I'm getting the hell out of this wetsuit. Then I'm taking a leak. Then I'm going to hunt down every one of those sumbitches and put a bullet in their heads. But I ain't doin' it in a wetsuit.”

  Denzel had to admit that the wetsuit wasn't exactly the most comfortable or practical clothing for these caverns. He let Hicks and Knoll get changed while he stood guard, and then traded places with Hicks as he made his own wardrobe change.

  This wasn't just for comfort. It also gave them all time to think, and even to recuperate a bit. As he shed the wetsuit and pulled on his clothes and gear, he snagged three protein bars from his pack, tossing one to each of his team. He also stooped and picked up one of the radios, checking it.

  There was no sign of transmission from the mercenaries, which could mean either that they were out of range, or that they were all dead.

  Letting Beta One have such a head start on them was probably a bad idea, Denzel knew. He could warn the others, and they'd be prepared for Denzel and his team, when they arrived. But something about that exchange over the radio made Denzel think that the mercenaries had bigger things to worry about, at the moment.

  Fully dressed, with a bit of food in their bellies, and better armed than they'd been when they first arrived, Denzel and the others now made their way through the cavern opening, into the darkened corridors beyond. They snapped on headlamps, as well as the flashlights mounted to the M4s, and used as much caution as they could as they wound their way deeper into the stone labyrinth.

  It was nearly ten minutes later when Denzel realized that he didn't have even a hint of claustrophobia, at the moment.

  Thank God for small miracles, he thought. And adrenaline.

  Chapter 25

  Kotler entered the chamber cautiously, but once he was inside he relaxed a bit. It was certainly true that there might be more traps in this space, but he didn't think it was likely. By this point, anyone who had entered here had already navigated safely through the corridor and the altar chamber alike, as well as the hidden chamber beneath the altar—all of which had been laden with traps. The Owl Chamber, as Kotler was calling it, was the final destination.

  Hopefully that wouldn't be literal, in his case.

  But as the last stop on this little Mayan temple tour, it was reasonable to assume that it wouldn't have the same level of protection in place. Whoever built all of this had gone to a great deal of trouble to prevent anyone from getting to this room, and they would want to be able to move about freely.

  In theory.

  Kotler held the electric lantern above his head as he moved into the Owl Chamber, taking in the details of the room. He was, for the most part, looking for a passage out. That was his purpose here, after all. But an occupational hazard for an anthropologist would always be an insatiable curiosity, in the face of ancient mysteries. He simply could not move past a series of artifacts and symbols and give them no mind whatsoever, particularly when he'd just faced death multiple times over to even be in this room.

  He was not disappointed by what he saw.

  All around him were signs of a prolific and wealthy lost culture, with a plethora of artifacts made from materials that included limestone, wood, and gold. The owl motif continued in here, with statues and carvings of the bird everywhere. But another motif stood out to Kotler, sending chills down his spine.

  The skeletal visage of Ah-Puch stared at him from every wall, every service, every corner of this room.

  This, he realized, is the real tomb of Ah-Puch.

  He felt his pulse quicken as he inspected the treasures here. That old excitement, the feeling of discovery, thrummed in his veins, infusing him with adrenaline. Here it was, the tomb of a god!

  And more.

  As he looked, he realized that he was far from being the first member of modern society to have breached this space. There were modern wooden tables here, for a start, and each laden with Mayan artifacts that had no place in a tomb. Art, utensils, tools, and more all shared space with carved effigies—statues and figurines of various members of the Mayan pantheon. None of it belonged here.

  There among them, however, were the effigies of Ah-Puch, distinct in their placement. Each of these occupied a stanchion or dais, or were placed intentionally on some hand-chiseled stone shelf, in alcoves along the wall. These, Kotler realized, were original to the space. They belonged here. They were symbols of the tomb's rightful occupant.

  But those were not the only examples of Ah-Puch.

  As Kotler passed the light around the room, he noted that one entire rack of modern shelves had been dedicated to effigies of Ah-Puch—statues large and small, figurines by the dozen, and clay pots and urns, sealed shut for millennia, all adorned with the death-mask visage of Ah-Puch.

  Death is watching me from every angle, Kotler thought, immediately shivering.

  And even more jarring were far more modern artifacts. Along one wall there were heavy industrial shelves, spanning from the floor to the high-vaulted ceiling. On these were crates and a few other odds and ends. Kotler inspected these and found they contained everything from plastic bundles of what he assumed were drugs, to shrink-wrapped and oil-soaked weapons, ranging from hand guns to sniper rifles.

  Kotler pulled one of the hand guns out of a nest of packing material. It was a .45 ACP, much like the one Graham had been using. Kotler riffled through more of the crates and found ammunition for the weapon. He unwrapped the .45, and used a shop towel to mop the oil from it. It had been incredibly well preserved—likely in anticipation that the buyers wouldn't want their weapons rotting and rusting in the jungle humidity, prior to purchase.

  This was clearly the cache of the dealer who had sold Maggie Hamilton all of her Mayan artifacts. It was the trove that the guerrillas had sought, when they'd pried at the faux door of the tomb above. The dealer, whoever he had been, had discovered all of this, had somehow managed to find his way through the traps and to decipher the riddles, and he had used this place to store antiquities, drugs, and weapons.

  Quite the enterprising smuggler, Kotler thought. He chose to ignore the implications that a smuggler had somehow matched him in all of his own clever deductions and machinations. Though he'd admit to a slight ding to his pride.

  Kotler wasn't entirely sure why, but he felt a great deal better being armed. Perhaps it was his experience with Graham, and being shot at in the dark of that corridor. Or maybe it was simply psychological—as if the weapon was a bit of a security blanket, against the constant presence of threats here below. Either way, he was grateful to have it.

  He began moving around the room, searching. It was time to find his way out of here. And he hoped to God there was a way, because he couldn't fathom going back to the entrance again, facing down Graham, even with a weapon in hand. There had to be a way out, and through this room was the only path Kotler could conceive of.

  He was carefully moving among the artifacts and items stored here, and came to a table that was absolutely covered in statues of Ah-Puch.

  Most were roughly the same size as the one that had been stolen from their camp, two nights earlier. Kotler picked one up, hefting it, studying it.

  All of this—from Maggie Hamilton's murder to the threat of a biological weapon, to even the challenges of navigating this temple and tomb, had come because of this one obscure symbol of death. And here he was, holding but one of hundreds of the very statue that had started it all. At the moment, Kotler was too tired to determine whether there was any irony there.

  He looked around the space, and found a leather pouch with a bandolier belt. It would have been used to carry ordnance of some kind, though the pockets and loops were too large to be standard ammunition. Kotler shrugged the bandolier over his shoulder, crossing his chest and letting the leather pouch dangle at his side. He put the statue of Ah-Puch in this
. The stiff leather of the pouch would protect it, as he moved about. It might be good to bring this back to camp for further study, once Denzel's CDC specialist arrived. It might be the key to figuring out what was going on.

  He began moving around in the tomb now, looking for clues to any sort of hidden exit. He closely inspected the various owls, but soon eliminated them as a possibility.

  Eventually he came to a patch of wall near the storage racks, and paused.

  It was blank, more or less. But it was also conspicuous for its lack of detail.

  Turning slowly, Kotler saw that nearly every other space in this room was being used for some purpose. If there were no Mayan artifacts or symbols, then the dealer had covered the rest of the space with tables and shelving and items for storage. He had effectively utilized as much of this space as possible. So why leave this one wall clear?

  The space was further called out by the fact that there were modern shelves on either side of it. The negative space, left between two large racks of shelves, might just have been an accidental gap. But as Kotler stood back and looked it over, he couldn't shake the sense of it being a doorway.

  He moved to the stone wall, and started moving the palms of his hands over the surface. He felt every seam, every nodule of stone. Eventually he gave the wall a solid push.

  It moved.

  Kotler laughed aloud, and grinned. After all he'd been through, in this temple and the tomb, and all the riddles and mysteries that had to be solved just to stand here, it was almost absurd that this one secret passage way was so easy to find and even easier to open. But there it was—a stone door balanced on a single pivot point, allowing it to swing open with only a small bit of pressure.

  Kotler opened it wide, and stepped through, hoisting the lantern high. He patted the .45 at his hip, nestled in one of the large loops of the bandolier, and took some comfort from it.

  Once more into the breach, Kotler thought, and moved deeper into the tunnels that, he prayed, were a way out, and not a means to his end.

  Chapter 26

  The darkness of the corridor was nothing new to Kotler, but there was a definite vibe here that was unlike anything he'd experienced so far. The energy of this place was somehow different. The air, which had seemed a bit dry and stale back in the tomb, now seemed to have a bit more life to it. There was a sort of ionic tinge to the smell and taste of the air, as if Kotler had stepped from a musty, hot car and into an ocean breeze.

  It gave him hope that this was a way out.

  He moved along carefully, but at a much greater speed than he had while exploring the main entrance into the tomb. It was certainly possible that this back exit might be just as protected as the front entrance had been, but again Kotler was playing the odds of human psychology. This passage was well hidden, from above, and took a great deal of effort to reach. It had all the earmarks of serving as an emergency exit, however. And Kotler knew that when it came to making a hasty retreat, the last thing anyone would want was to worry about avoiding elaborate traps.

  Which didn't mean there weren't any, of course.

  Kotler felt confident enough in his ability to spot a trigger as he moved, illuminating the path before him with the swell of light from the lantern. His chances of avoiding danger would be better if he hugged the wall of the passage, he reasoned, so he kept to his right-hand side.

  Again, this was a bit of psychology as well. Right-handedness was a dominant trait, even among a disparity of cultures throughout history. If there was a “safe zone” of sorts here, the odds favored it being along the right-hand wall, which most humans would tend to favor. That orientation would be influenced by whether someone was coming or going from the tomb, as well. The odds, again, favored “going.”

  He was making good progress when suddenly he heard a noise from ahead. It was refracted and reflected by the stone walls of the corridor, making it a jumbled mess, but it was clearly the sound of human voices.

  He couldn't make out the words, but he could certainly decipher the tone.

  Stress. Fright. Groans of pain.

  Kotler paused, and turned down the light of the lantern. This cast him into darkness, but after a moment of adjustment his eyes began to pick up traces of light ahead.

  Someone was here.

  He felt for the .45, pulled it free, and quietly worked the slide to chamber a round—something he should have done sooner, he realized.

  There were ten rounds in the clip, and he had an additional clip in the leather pouch, along with the statue of Ah-Puch. He took this clip out and tucked it into one of the leather loops of the bandolier, putting it within easy reach, in case it was needed.

  He wasn't entirely sure all of this was necessary. The voices ahead could be Sarge's men, or even Denzel, bringing along a rescue party.

  But something didn't feel right, and Kotler couldn't take any chances. He would use caution, and keep a low profile.

  He crept along in the dark, keeping to the right-hand wall, ducking below stone outcroppings as he came to them. He felt ahead with one hand, supplementing the low light. The light itself was growing more pronounced as he approached, and he realized it was coming from around a bend, just ahead.

  “Dead,” a male voice said. “Both of them. Carlton is still alive, but he's in bad shape. That spike pierced his kidneys.”

  There was cursing from another man. “What can we do for him?”

  “Morphine,” the first voice said. “Give him an easy out.”

  Kotler knelt in place, and edged forward to get a better view. He kept quiet, cringing even at the slight whisper of his feet sliding across the stone floor. Eventually he came to a spot where he could see the corridor curving to his left.

  There were several men, and they were well armed. They wore tactical gear, and carried what Kotler recognized as M4s. Military issue.

  Were these soldiers? Their accents were American, but Kotler couldn't see any sort of insignia. He also didn't recognize any of them, which meant they weren't any of Sarge's men. It seemed unlikely that Denzel would have called in a military unit to help in a rescue.

  These are mercenaries, Kotler realized. And not the good kind.

  Kidding aside, Kotler knew he was in real trouble here.

  By his count, there were at least eleven well-armed men lulling about in the corridor. Three more men were incapacitated—two of them skewered and still hanging on what looked like wooden spikes. The third was currently getting an overdose of morphine, to help ease him into whatever followed this life.

  They set off a trap, Kotler realized. He swallowed, thinking back to his trek here, from the tomb exit. His choice to hug the right-hand wall seemed like a prescient instinct now, but he'd really just been lucky. It could have been him, skewered like a kabob, and all because he'd been anxious to find the way out, as quickly as possible. He would make sure to be a lot less cavalier about this place, going forward. If, of course, he wasn't gunned down by mercenaries.

  “It's done,” the first man said. “What now?”

  “We still have some statues to liberate,” the second man replied. He turned to his men. “We move slower, check everything, but we keep moving,” he ordered.

  Kotler edged away, and as soon as he could stand he began a rapid retreat, back toward the tomb.

  Statues to liberate, he thought. They're here for Ah-Puch.

  Kotler reflexively put a hand on the bag at his side, thinking of the statue within. What was it about this figure that made it valuable enough that someone had actually engaged both guerrillas and trained mercenaries to retrieve it? It had to be someone powerful, and wealthy. These guys didn't work cheap.

  What was the objective here?

  The men had said “statues,” which meant they were aware there was more than one. It also meant that the statue they'd already retrieved wasn't enough. Or perhaps it wasn't what they'd been expecting.

  Kotler thought of the tomb, filled not only with all of those Ah-Puch statues, but with a veritab
le armory as well. He couldn't yet fathom what anyone would want with hundreds of statues of a Mayan death god, though he knew it couldn't be good. What he could wrap his head around immediately, however, was the fact that letting all of those weapons and drugs make their way to the streets wasn't exactly a desirable outcome, either.

  Kotler had to keep that tomb out of the hands of the mercenaries. And to do that, he would have to get creative.

  He made his way back to the tomb, moving rapidly though he was having to feel his way along in the dark. He couldn't risk using the lantern or a flashlight, in case he was seen.

  He was counting on the fact that the mercenaries would have to take their time, moving cautiously to find and avoid triggers in the floor. Kotler had lucked out, on his earlier path into the corridor, but it had at least given him the advantage of knowing the terrain. He could move with confidence.

  Once he reached the chamber door he rushed inside and pushed it closed behind him. Now he could turn on the lantern. He would need the light. He placed the lantern on one of the nearby tables, and got to work.

  He'd have to move quickly. He had the advantage of time, for now, but the clock was running.

  He began tearing open crates, quickly running through the inventory of what he had. He pulled an automatic rifle free, wiped it down, and loaded it. He stashed clips near the door, and throughout the room, as well as carrying a few in the pouch and bandolier. He kept the .45 tucked in its original loop, as a backup.

  Among the arsenal were several “big ticket” items that gave him pause.

  Certainly, a grenade launcher could end things quickly, and in his favor. But it could also bring the temple down on top of him. That was out.

  The same was true of various mortars and other explosives.

  He had nearly given up on sifting through the crates for anything useful when he found one jammed with something that made him smile.