The Lost Treasure of the Aztec Kings

by Wyatt Liam Anderson

  Miles and Robert were the only ones left. They went back to the chamber where Miles was held. Miles went to the section where he had witnessed the transmutation of other elements into gold. He picked up some tools and began to heat the furnace.

  "What are you doing?" Robert asked impatiently.

  "Just trust me on this."

  ___________

  The chopper had disappeared again into the distance after a few scares from the guards. If they hadn't missed a few times, the helicopter would have crashed down when they shot rocket launchers at it.

  The mine site turned into a frenzy. The forced laborers were on the run. Guards shot at them on sight. Jacques suggested they look for a secure place and hide until it was safe to leave the village. The idea sat well with the others. They headed for the parish house.

  Things looked a bit peaceful at the current location compared to the mining site. Hugh went out to turn on the generator. What he saw kept him transfixed for a few seconds. Itchaca's wild dogs were back to collect their hunt. They also stared back at Hugh, wondering if it was bravery or sheer foolishness that would make him stand there like a statue.

  A moment later, the race for survival began. At the moment of shock, Hugh decided to run toward the back of the chapel instead of the house. He was quick enough to get there before them, but his poor decision almost cost him his life. Before the dogs closed in on him, he had spotted a small fence some three yards away. He made a run for it.

  Others observed the show from the windows, running in their minds for Hugh.

  The vicious creatures barked continuously without leaving the spot. Zoe and the others began to get concerned. It seemed strange. If they had Hugh, they would have pounced on him already, but they kept barking instead of howling or attacking its prey.

  "I'm going there," Zoe said finally.

  Gary was quick to disagree. "No, Zoe. That's the worst idea ever. Let's just remain here until someone shows up. Clearly, the dogs still don't have him yet."

  "Do you hear yourself? Remain here and wait for who? If that were you out there, you'd be mad at us right now for negligence. I'm going. Someone here has got to have the balls, at least!"

  She went to the kitchen to check for some sticks. She also carried a rod with her just in case. No one stopped her. Most of them would rather face the dog than stand in Zoe's way. Whenever she got in such a mood, she was uncontrollable.

  Slowly, Zoe began to approach the chapel. She carried some sticks in one hand and a metal rod in the other. The dogs were too focused on the same spot even to notice the proximity she had closed in. She got as close as five feet and noticed they were barking into a pit. She suddenly realized that Hugh was less endangered than she was. The dogs were afraid to enter the hole. They'd probably learned from the deep slide she tricked them into back at the mine.

  She began to trace her steps back. Her feet got tangled with some thick ropes that were left carelessly on the floor by the guards, and she landed on the floor. She tried to get up as quickly as she could, but the dogs were faster. One of them went for her jugular, and the other pounced on her leg. They were vicious, fast, and starving. Gary, Jody, Ian, Jacques, and the rest threw fear out the window as emotion took over. Some of them didn't even think of taking a rod or anything for the reprisal. They just went there fearlessly. The dogs, however, saw the numbers and took off in fear. Jody quickly went to help Zoe up. The wound in her neck went deep—so deep that Jody burst into tears.

  They rushed Zoe back inside while two others went to fetch Samuel.

  Epilogue

  Ave Fountain

  North Johannesburg, South Africa

  October 2019

  Miles followed a path on the map that he had assimilated to heart. When he spotted a guard with a military-grade weapon, he walked back with stealth, almost dragging Robert with him. The guards in that path were more armed compared to those Jody fought.

  "If you want your friend alive, you're going to have to do what I say."

  Robert nodded.

  "Take off your clothes."

  There were about thirty guards at the entrance alone. The core had always been a secret vault. The men guarding it had sworn to protect it at all cost.

  "Make way, boys!" Robert yelled as he approached the guards. "This is a suicide," he said in a low tone.

  Miles was bound hands and feet, and Robert had changed into a dead guard's attire with a giant headlamp rolling over his head like a pot.

  When the first few guards parted obediently for him, he mustered more confidence. His voice got louder as he dragged Miles through the cluster of Itchaca's army to the front of the vault.

  The monstrous-looking man that guarded the door placed a hand over his chest. Robert did the same. He parted the way for him, but just when Robert was about to enter, his oversized headlamp fell off.

  "Sorry, n-new recruit," he stuttered.

  The big man stared at him for a few seconds. Those seconds were enough for Miles. He rolled forward, and the moment he got in between the motion sensor in front, the vault gave way. The big guard had a few moments to decide whether to go after Miles or snuff the life out of Robert.

  "I hope you take prisoners?" Robert said in fright.

  Miles rolled himself from the wall. He stopped and snapped out of the chain. As the guard came for him, he coiled the chain around his neck and hung him on a hook execution-style. The room was strangely warm, and there was no sign of a fireplace.

  Six more guards rushed in, but before they could touch Miles, Itchaca held out his hand, signaling them to stop.

  He was holding in his hand a coin Miles had given him.

  "How did you get this?"

  "I tried to tell you, but you were quick to put me in your dungeon. My girlfriend's dad survived a mine collapse in India years ago. When I heard about what happened here, I told myself this is it. This is the time to meet you."

  Itchaca looked at the coin in his hand, rubbed his hands against it, and slowly let out a grin. Miles kept his eyes on him. He was tempted to look around but to avoid losing an advantage in the process of building trust, he played a game he understood so well—winning the heart of an audience.

  Itchaca turned his back on Miles. Still, Miles gave him his rapt attention.

  "So, you traveled all the way here for this? With fourteen of you, all to deliver this to me?"

  "Not exactly. You've got your ways; I've got mine. There are more where that came from. I wasn't here to meddle in your business. I just wanted to do business."

  "As much as I feel doubts in my spirit, I am pressured against logic because no one that I know could craft this symbol, my father's signature, and the markings so well." He finally sat down on a seat that was sculpted out of a rock and asked, "What do you want?"

  "Money. And if you'll be kind enough to release my friends too," Miles added.

  Itchaca pressed his thumb on a button on the handrest of his seat, and a guard walked in immediately. He got up and walked toward a metal chest shaped in the form of an altar. When the guard got close enough, Itchaca grabbed his hand, stabbed a knife through it, and guided it into the center of the metal chest. The blood circulated the chest. The bottom raft of the chest opened like a drawer.

  Miles took this opportunity to have a good grasp of the warm room.

  "Here," Itchaca said.

  Miles took that as his cue. He went ahead and took out a bundle from the opened chest. While he was returning with the bundles, he felt the wave of heat from a specific area scantily veiled by the hides of a wild animal. He noticed something that looked like a burning coal in a small chest. It illuminated the place. His mind couldn't unsee what he had seen if he could reach into that place and solve that remaining puzzle once and for all. He was still premeditating what to do when he caught a glimpse of Hayden behind the hides used as a curtain. He must have slipped out from the guards without their knowing.

  "Is that enough?" the old man asked again.

  Miles too
k two more. Itchaca closed the chest and went back to his seat while the guard left to tend to his injury. His entire army was hypnotized. That was another practice Miles used to be quite familiar with. But the one thing about hypnosis as he knew it was that it required the hypnotist to free the minds he had induced.

  "You know, I have a private jet ready. You and your friends are welcome to come with."

  "Thanks." Miles was careful around his name to avoid offending him by mispronouncing it.

  The longer he waited, the more Itchaca kept him waiting, talking about how the land belonged to his father and other stories from his past.

  Miles couldn't keep it in anymore.

  "I'm sorry. I'd love to take my leave now. And I want to go with my friends."

  "Are you bored already? Were my stories boring to you?"

  "Nah. I have—"

  "More important things to do?" Itchaca interrupted. He signaled his guard to come. Immediately, two guards hurried in. He spoke to them in the native language. Miles may not have understood the language, but he could smell that the weird old man was up to no good, especially when it came to his friends. He felt it was coming down to a point where violence might occur. Miles loved to solve his problems without bloodshed, and this sometimes had cost him dearly.

  Miles dropped the bundles of cash in his hands and approached Itchaca without mincing his words.

  "Listen, old man. I'm going to leave here with my friends, and you have ten seconds to produce them."

  Itchaca laughed hysterically.

  Miles could have left with Hayden, but he feared they might lose Robert. Miles snapped. He pinned the man down to his sculpted chair. Itchaca pushed him back and flung a knife that landed on the center of Miles's palm. Miles removed it and launched forward in a spiral punch that landed the old man on his back. He waved his hand. Hayden picked up his cue and went out through a different exit.

  Itchaca tried to use more of his knives, but Miles was quick to predict his moves. He had Itchaca by the jugular and was about to finish him off when Doug came in with a gun pointed at Miles.

  "You don't want to do that, Mr. Cleveland. Now, take the money and go away. If you need anything else, I have your number. Don't do anything stupid. I have your daughter, remember?"

  "Nah, three bundles are not enough. After all, I found the coin. Ask him."

  Doug turned toward the older man for confirmation.

  Itchaca nodded.

  Doug instructed the guards to give him three more bundles and release Robert as well.

  ___________

  The chopper came back for Miles and his crew. He circled aerially around the mining facility until he spotted someone on the roof of the parish house waving a cloth.

  "Are you sure you set it correctly?" Miles asked for the second time in a row.

  Hayden answered in the affirmative.

  Miles still had doubts. Then suddenly, they heard the shrieking sound from the nuclear reactor. Hayden had taken his time to set the timer, and when it went off, the ultrasound effect killed everyone within eighty meters.

  Itchaca and Doug didn't survive the hit.

  The ladies got into the helicopter while the men tried to retrieve Hugh from the pit. Hugh came out following the rope Jacques had thrown down.

  Nicholas followed. The natives that were prisoners also came out. Jasper died nine minutes before the chopper arrived. And Zoe was taken to an excellent medical facility in Johannesburg.

  She lived but lost her pregnancy.

  END