by Steve Alten
The Mayan city that had been alive with greenery, farmlands, and irrigation canals is a dead zone—a shantytown of soot-covered abodes and ash-laden streets. The fallen temple of Chilam Balam has been replaced by a ten-level pyramid, topped by a summit structure adorned in jade.
The Jaguar Prophet stands between the temple’s two main pillars, his arms stretched high and wide, strapped to each support. The stone beneath his bare feet is stained black from the ash, save for a crimson creek of dried blood that originates from the massive chacmool situated before him, running down the narrow southern steps to the base below.
The woman is laid out on the chacmool’s back, her naked form secured by her four limbs to the stone idol. Blood Woman turns her head to face him, her turquoise eyes filled with terror. “Balam? How is it we are alive?”
“We are not alive, my love. I have entered Xibalba, and because you are my soul mate, you have been cast into Hell with me. Fear not—”
His response is cut off by the thundering metal reverberations of a gong, its sound summoning the people to the base of the temple. A procession of grunting, moaning, mutilated transhumans exit their shanties, making their way through the streets. Some of the beings lack legs, others arms. They are dressed in heavy soot-covered robes, their elongated skulls tucked inside hoods. Exposed flesh has long disappeared beneath adhering layers of mouse-gray silicon, giving their faces a heavily pruned appearance. Neanderthal-like brows protect dark, deeply set eyes. Noses and surrounding cartilage are missing, leaving behind only open nasal passages from which they expel a fine ebony mist with each excruciating exhalation. Lipless mouths remain slack-jawed, exposing teeth caked with atmospheric dust and film.
Like cattle, these tortured souls push and prod each other, inching their way closer to the pyramid to receive a morsel of sustaining light from their oppressor.
Seven Macaw exits the jade temple to greet his followers, raising his tattooed arms triumphantly to the gathered flock. “I am great. My place is now higher than that of the human work, the human design. I am the sun and the moon, I am the light, and I am also the months. I am the walkway and I am the foothold of the people. And now I am the vanquisher of man, my power as great as that of the Creator.”
Seven Macaw faces his prisoner, his red upturned eyes dancing from the glow of a dozen torches, his fanged grin stained blue. “Chilam Balam … at last. I have chased your soul since the vessel Adam rejected the Creator’s light. Our fates have remained connected throughout existence, every new rebirth of your physicality spawning my own, each reincarnation ending in your death by my hand, along with that of your soul mate. The souls of your deceased followers have kept me nourished these last six hundred years; now, with the end of the fifth cycle I shall finally drink from your light. Welcome to Xibalba, Chilam Balam. Your soul is mine for all eternity.”
Balam smiles at the Mayan death god. “No, Seven Macaw, it is you who are mine.”
The subterranean ceiling fractures and crumbles, exposing the transdimensional portal to the underworld—an emerald-green vortex. The strangelet’s eye opens to the stars, revealing a brilliant orange speck streaking across the dark cosmos. Guided by the hero twin’s consciousness, it soars toward the funneled opening, growing larger with each passing second.
A suddenly panic-stricken Seven Macaw grabs Chilam Balam by his long dark hair, his fanged mouth pressed against the prophet’s right ear. “How are you doing this? As a spark of the Creator you have no power in the eleventh dimension!”
“I share a soul with my twin. His half was nourished by the tree of life, mine by the tree of knowledge. I was conceived for this very moment. I am Chilam Balam—the dark prophet. I am the serpent in your garden!”
The celestial object fills the entire eye of the strangelet’s event horizon, its light cleansing the lost souls of Xibalba. Gray silicon melts away, yielding to revitalized flesh and limbs. Chilam Balam’s followers ascend the pyramid steps, drawn to the light of the Jaguar Prophet.
Seven Macaw’s face morphs into the angelic appearance of Devlin Mabus. The Seraph sprouts a pair of massive wings, keeping the people at bay. “You cannot win, Uncle.”
“It’s not about winning. The end of the fifth cycle is about man transforming his negative behavior, recognizing—finally—that we are all sparks of the collective soul. Love, Devlin, can transform the darkest depths of Hell into the brightest heaven.”
Born from energy dispersed during the near-light-speed collision of matter, the monster had nursed in a parallel dimension. Feeding from the Earth’s core, it had outgrown its womb, its coalescing gravitational forces crushing a path into the physical universe. Inhaling a mass-stabilizing meal of volcanic ash, it had breached adolescence into adulthood to become a fully formed black hole, its infinite orifice consuming everything venturing near its event horizon, from gaseous debris to stellar light.
The monster registers the Earth’s gravitational forces. Unable to move the massive planet, the strangelet latches onto the watery world like a magnet drawn to steel. Though smaller than the Earth, the black hole’s mass equals that of a dozen suns. In the physical universe the rules are simple: size yields to density, atomic structure to gravity.
The monster will consume the planet and nest in its cosmic vacancy. Over time it will continue to grow, until it replaces the sun as the gravitational center of the solar system. Eventually it will consume every planet and asteroid and moon caught within its vortex until it inhales the sun itself—extinguishing the light.
The monster never detects the moon-size object until the ship plunges unannounced through its gullet and detonates. Like acid on flesh, the particle wave of escaping antimatter from the transport ship’s engines burns through the strangelet’s atomic structure, disrupting the sweeping tide of its gravitational vortex.
The event horizon ceases spinning. The eye of the beast flutters and closes.
Birthed in an instant, the strangelet dies in an instant, choking on a belch of antimatter.
Mick squeezes Dominique’s hand as a streaking bolt of orange light soars past the Balam and disappears into the black hole as if guided by the hand of God.
For a split second nothing happens. Then a soft white ethereal light bursts silently in space and is gone—sealing the black hole with it.
The four passengers exhale. Then they smile and cry and hug one another, their bodies trembling with adrenaline and fatigue.
Embracing his soul mate, Michael Gabriel gazes through the Balam’s massive portal at the Earth. The planet’s atmosphere appears blue and clear, their preserved home world offering humanity a second chance.
39
Destiny is no matter of chance. It is a matter of choice: it is not a thing to be waited for, it is a thing to be achieved.
—WILLIAM JENNINGS BRYAN
“Manny, follow my voice …”
Lying in the pit in bone-deep cold through an eternity of emptiness and darkness, he detects the pattern of pink behind eyelids sealed in amber.
“—try to open your eyes.”
He struggles against an immovable weight until he realizes he has no arms.
“Fight your way out. Create pain.”
He stands amid blackness and feels for the wall, bloodying the cold stone with his face. Over and over he strikes the dungeonlike enclosure until he finds his hands tingling somewhere in the abyss. Encouraged, he bashes the pit’s rounded walls harder, all the while opening and closing his long-lost appendages, the pain giving birth to arms. His fingers walk up his broken upper torso to the diseased flesh he has bashed into pulp and claw at the amber sealing his eyes until he unveils the light—
—an onion-shaped chamber, its curved onyx walls illuminated in multicolored controls, encircled by a 360-degree viewport of the Earth, as seen from space.
His soul mate leans over and kisses him. “Welcome back.”
“Laura?” He sits up and hugs his wife, his energy spent. “I missed you terribly. What happened? Where a
re we? Where’s Sophia?”
“I’m here, Dad.”
Immanuel turns toward the hologram, the image of a Las Vegas hotel suite appearing in the center of the command post. His daughter is standing between Mick and Dominique. Kurtz and Beck are seated in the background, the two bodyguards eating room service on a balcony facing the Strip.
“I don’t understand? Laura, where are we? Where’s Sophia?”
“She’s safe, back on Earth. We’re aboard the Balam … inside the Nexus.”
“The Balam? How? Why?”
“You’re aboard the Balam because I’m pregnant,” Dominique answers, offering a wry grin. “We had no choice. You were dying, Manny. Apparently, the same soul can’t exist simultaneously in two different vessels during the same time.”
“We landed after the Mars moon sealed the strangelet,” Mick explains. “The starship protected you by moving into the Nexus. The dimensional corridor will keep the cruiser hidden from radar and telescopes.”
“But what happens when I’m born … again?”
Laura helps him to his feet. “It’ll be okay. Come, I want to show you something.” She escorts him to the viewport.
“My God …” Swirling out in space is a wormhole, its event horizon stable and beckoning. Hovering close to the entrance are several hundred extraterrestrial vessels of varying sizes and shapes.
“What are they doing out there?”
She squeezes his hand. “They’re waiting for you.”
“The wormhole … where do you think it leads?”
“I don’t know, baby. How about we find out together?”
“Laura, no … I can’t let you do that.”
“I’m coming with you, Sam … er, Manny. Sorry, that’s going to take some getting used to. But we were meant to be together, I know that for sure. So just dismiss any thoughts of leaving me behind. I waited eleven years to be with you, now you’re stuck with me. Besides, I’m Hunahpu, too.”
He leans in and kisses her. “What about Sophia?”
“I’m going to stay behind,” his daughter replies. “Mick and Dom said I can stay with them. It’s going to be hard to be normal again, but I have to try. Besides, they’ll need help with the twins.” She smiles. “How many people can say they babysat their own father?”
“The child won’t be your father,” Mick says. “The time loop has been unraveled, your father’s lifespan is a loose end, not a repeating circuit of space-time. Whatever happens from this point forward can’t be prophesied. Maybe that’s a good thing.”
Kurtz joins them. “The president knows what you did, Manny. He’s keeping it quiet, but your family will be well taken care of. Mick used the Balam to destroy the underground complex at Groom Lake. Majestic-12 is history.”
“What about Borgia?”
“Borgia’s in jail for murdering Randolph. They should both rot in Hell.”
“Mitch, there’s something I need you and Beck to do for me. It’s very important.”
“Name it.”
The Balam leaves Earth’s orbit, gliding silently toward the entrance to the wormhole. Immanuel Gabriel hugs his wife and soul mate, his heart full—
—a new destiny awaiting.
With a sudden surge, the golden starship enters the conduit, the extraterrestrial ships following in its wake.
Seconds later, the wormhole disappears, transporting its passengers across time and space.
40
Once more unto the breach, dear friends …
—WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, HENRY V
BELLE GLADE, FLORIDA
SEPTEMBER 22, 2013
12:21 A.M.
Seventeen-year-old Madelina Aurelia thrashes naked beneath a sweat-soaked bedsheet as she cries out to her foster father, “Get this goddamn baby outta me!”
Quenton Morehead, an ordained minister and struggling alcoholic, squeezes the teenaged girl’s hand, his dark eyes lingering on her exposed pelvis. “Don’t blaspheme, child, the midwife’s on her way.”
“Where’s Virgil?”
“I don’t know.”
“Find him!”
The minister cringes as the girl’s high-pitched screech penetrates his brain like a tuning fork. He hears the front door open and sighs a quick Amen.
“Virge?” Madelina stops thrashing. “Virgil, honey? That you … you cheatin’, whorin’ sonuva bitch!”
A heavyset black woman enters. “Calm down, baby, everthin’ gonna be just fine.”
Madelina tears at the mattress as another contraction grips her torso. “Vir … gil!”
The midwife turns to the minister. “Go on and find him. I can handle things here.”
Quenton backs out of the bedroom, then hurries out the front door of the sweltering stucco home and into the night.
Reverend Morehead enters the strip club fifteen minutes later, his senses immediately seized by the smell of alcohol and smoke and sex. He heads for the bar, then sees his son-in-law in a back room, receiving a lap dance.
“Virgil! Get your heathen butt home, your son’s on the way.”
“Aww shit, Quenton, give me two more minutes.”
“Now, boy!”
“Sum’bitch.” Virgil climbs out from beneath the stripper, squeezes an exposed breast, whispers, “I’ll be back soon,” then follows Quenton into the parking lot.
TEMPLE UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL
PHILADELPHIA, PENNSYLVANIA
12:43 A.M.
Dominique Gabriel gazes through feverish eyes at her foster mother, Edith Axler, as another contraction begins. The wave of pain crests higher, the pain excruciating. “Edie, get me drugs!”
“Hang in there, doll. Mick went to get the doctor.”
“I need drugs, now!”
“Okay, okay.” Edith rushes out of the birthing room to find the nurse.
“You do not need drugs,” says Chicahua. “The uterus is a woman’s center. If the uterus is not in proper position during birth, nothing in the child’s life will be right.” Placing her hands on Dominique’s pelvis, she begins to massage the exterior of her daughter’s swollen abdomen and lower back, softening the muscles while repositioning the uterus.
Mick enters the room a moment later, in time to see the old woman extracting a red-faced newborn from his wife’s birth canal. “What the hell are you doing?”
“What I have done since before you were born.” She spanks the blood-streaked, fair-haired child lightly on its rump, encouraging an air-breathing gasp. “Hold your son while I fetch his brother.”
Michael Gabriel stares teary-eyed at his offspring, the child’s eyes wide and azure blue. “Hey, Jake. Daddy’s here for you this time, pal.”
Moments later, Jacob Gabriel’s dark-haired brother is born, announcing his arrival with a healthy wail.
BELLE GLADE, FLORIDA
12:57 A.M.
Reverend Morehead hears the sounds of a baby crying as he reenters the sweltering stucco home. “Madelina?”
The rotund midwife is in the kitchen, an infant in her arms. “Look. There’s your grandpa. Say hi, Grandpa!”
“My Lord, will you look at his eyes, I’ve never seen eyes so blue.”
“Silly, it’s not a he, she’s a little girl.”
“A girl?” Quenton feels the hairs raise along the back of his neck.
“Where’s the father?”
“Puking his guts up outside. Quickly, take the child and—”
The screen door slams open and Virgil approaches, a line of spittle running from his lower lip to his stained T-shirt, a ring of white powder visible in his left nostril. “Okay, le’ me see my boy.”
Quenton and the midwife exchange frightened looks. “Now, Virgil, take it easy. We need to talk.” The minister steps in front of the wailing infant.
“Outta my way, Quenton, I said I wanna see my son.”
“Virgil, the Lord … the Lord has blessed you with a child. A daughter.”
Virgil stops. Facial muscles contort into a mask of rage. “A girl?�
��
“Easy, son—”
“A girl ain’t shit! A girl’s nuthin’ but another goddamn mouth to feed and clothe and listen to her whining.” He points at the screaming infant. “Give her to me!”
“No.” Quenton holds his ground. The nurse stands, preparing to flee with the child.
“I want you to sober up, Virgil. I want you to go to my home and—”
Virgil punches the minister in the gut, dropping him to his knees.
The midwife tucks the infant under one arm, brandishing a kitchen knife in the other. “Y’all git outta here, Virgil. Go on!”
Virgil stares at the blade quivering in the fat woman’s fist. In one motion he grabs her wrist, wrenching the knife free.
The midwife screams, backing away.
Virgil stares at the infant, then hears someone moaning from inside the bedroom. “Madelina? You’re dead …” Wielding the knife, he ducks inside the bedroom, locking the door behind him—
—surprised to find a massive black man inside, seated in a folding chair.
Ryan Beck looks up from reading the newspaper. “Evening, Virgil.”
“Who the hell are you? Where’s my wife?”
“Someplace safe. You’ll be happy to know her Uncle Sam is going to take care of her from now on, along with your daughter, Lilith. Your little girl will be raised in a safe, loving environment away from you and her pedophile grandfather.”
“That so?” He brandishes the knife. “What’s in it for me?”
“For you? A hearty congratulations.” Beck smiles. “You’ve won a Darwin award.”
“Darwin award? What the hell’s that?”
“It’s an award given to those who remove themselves from the human gene pool in order to improve it.”