The Mummies of Blogspace9
Page 16
For my part, I come away from this reborn. I’ll miss my mentor Cyrus Sanderson who sold his soul for less than 1% of what I now have in my bank account. That was poor judgement, Cyrus.
I’ll miss Michelle too. I’ll miss her every time I cook paella and remember the smile on her sexy face. She made some poor choices, as we mortals sometimes do. And from time to time I regret letting my current girlfriend eat her. But dense times demand creative solutions, and in the end, I think Michelle would have approved of my decision.
I will spend the rest of my life with Naya, or as much of it as she allows. I suspect, given what we’ve learned, that I have many centuries ahead of me. I’m not immortal as she is, but if Bolivar is any indicator, the love of a walking mummy can add not only decades to one’s life, but a spring to one’s step.
For his part, Simón Bolivar bid us farewell, kissing Naya’s hand like a gentleman, and leaving his former lover to my great care. I don’t know what will become of him, but I’m not worried. Like the rest of us, he’s hugely, ridiculously rich.
The old gypsy Melchor Negromonte didn’t get much of his gold, but he didn’t fare too badly either, with close to two billion euros as his take. As chief executive officer and sole owner of Blogspace9, he agreed to extend our service contract indefinitely. I shook my head at his duplicity, having never imagined his involvement in that end of things, but he only laughed.
He had spent half a million euros splashing that newspaper ad all over creation, the one with Cyrus and the pyramid, in hopes of luring in anyone else from the old neighborhood who might still be drawing breath. And it worked too. We got Duran and Cuellar. “I only wanted the money Queen Isabella promised us,” Negromonte told me. And he got that money, with more than ample interest.
For my part, I’ll stay in Seville with my love. I have some outstanding legal issues, but a retainer of five million euros paid to one of Seville’s most storied law firms has already made a difference. I have been assured that all charges will be dropped within the month.
Naya and I have a wonderful apartment in the Gran Melia Colon, courtesy of Leon Samples. I have high hopes for my research as a historian. If you need to find me, look no further than the Bruce Wheeler wing of the Archive of the Indies. We even have an espresso machine.
Rest in peace, Michelle.
So that’s all for now. Signing out here – Bruce Wheeler, investigator #00219222.
July 29, 2011
New York, NY
Rafael Duran
It is done – our foes vanquished, our objectives met. I left Spain a richer man than I came, but I was already a rich man, so what of it?
I’ve brought the girl Kim with me, to counsel her, nothing more. She is young, and there are few guides in this uncharted realm. I am perhaps the best. I’m honored too, that my old friend Vasco is with me now at my home in New York. He’s had a time of it, Vasco has. The years have not been as kind to him, and I’m eager to make amends on behalf of eternity.
We have hours ahead of us, Vasco and I. We’ll play some chess, drink fine wine, purchase some adult diapers, spend yet more dollars, and perhaps secure the services of a delightful whore or two. I can’t predict what our adventures will entail, but I can promise that dancing girls will often be present.
I confess that even now I do not fully comprehend the nature of this evil we battled. Did we make some unanticipated contact with a demon of old? Had we wandered into an ancient drama, a terror from before the time of men, still extant in the dusty corners of our world? Or is this a glimpse of the Christian hell that awaits men? Even now, I have not a clue.
I don’t know what I am. I may be, along with Vasco, the girl Kim, and Naya, the last of our kind. Am I a walking mummy? Or shall I call myself something else? I don’t know. I am Rafael Duran. I have fought bravely, suffered brutally, loved wisely, and lived life beyond any human measure. And for the first time in centuries, I have people who call me friend.
Jul7 29, 2012
Segovia, Peru
Leon Samples
note: sequence interrupted -
this communication was posted 414 days after project initiation
It’s been a year since we left Spain, since we vanquished our foes, as Duran noted. But as I said in the beginning, it didn’t end well.
I returned to Peru a rich man, but I should have stayed away. I guess I figured that with that Sopay gone, our worries were over. Nothing but a couple of imps left in the pyramid - what’s the worst that could come of it? I’m a scientist, right? I was a scientist.
I never heard from Kim Castillo again. Things didn’t go well for her. Duran did his best, but her baser nature grew too powerful, too unpredictable, and she left New York one day for parts unknown. I only know this because Vasco Cuellar recently paid me a visit. He found me at the pyramid, which I never leave.
“You’re looking prosperous,” I told him, admiring the leather jacket, the Italian shoes. “Are those bell bottoms?”
“I find them delightful; comfortable and stylish too.” He frowned as he looked around the antechamber.
“I’ve been having a difficult time,” I explained as I lifted my jug of mescaline for another swallow. Maybe it was the drugs, or some hallucination, but standing there in front of me, old Vasco looked the picture of sanity.
“Some of those who are turned,” he began, “become quite savage. My own madness was tempered by centuries of cannibalism and distress, but I feel as if I’m turning a corner. Duran and Naya, on the other hand, came to terms more gently with what they had become, even if they didn’t entirely understand it. And of course Sebastiano had long wanted nothing other than a holy end.”
“But the last of the Sopays is gone,” I moaned, at which point he lowered his head.
“The hunger won’t ever abate,” he said softly, lifting a tibia from the floor of the pyramid’s antechamber. “Who was she?”
I closed my eyes. “Girl from the Ministry of Antiquities. Something about a new round of permits.” It only happened once, I started to tell him, but he had already kicked aside the bones of the policeman from last month, and found those of the new age shaman, the teenage couple with the bad music, and six or seven looters.
“The hunger won’t ever abate,” he repeated, “but in time, it will become manageable. On the other hand, you’ll become more powerful with each passing century, Sopay.”
“No.” I grabbed at his sleeve but he pulled away. “I just wanted to come back and learn, and... and I never went into the chamber. The imps never touched me. It’s not possible...”
“Did you never wonder if it was the pyramid itself itself? A corruption half as old as time - who do you think the first Sopay was, if not an ordinary man who wandered inside?”
“No...”
“It speaks to you, doesn’t it?”
“No, that’s just the drink, this beverage the shamans make from the San Pedro cactus, that’s where the voices come from.”
“And where do you get the drink?”
I returned my jug to its niche, and I watched as the drips began again, filling it from somewhere deep in the bowels of the pyramid. “No.”
“I’ll check on you every decade or so,” he said, letting his backpack fall to the ground. “You’ll find a laptop with several extra batteries. With this, you can stay in touch. I’ve arranged for a woman from the town to come by every week to change the batteries. But I warn you, Leon, if you eat her, you’ll be all alone.”
THE END
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