The mayan prophecy (Timeriders # 8) (29 page)

A section of the plaza floor had collapsed on to Liam as a column nearby had been casually knocked aside like a stack of poorly balanced books. The thing had been bearing down on him and he had been certain that this was
it
.

This is me done. Smoked like a kipper.

However, the debris from above – not just flagstones but a
trader’s cart, several woven sacks of guavas, bushels of straw – had all but buried him.

He found himself hidden from view and watched, petrified, as the beast had stamped and swirled mere feet away from him. Where his skin was exposed and not covered in dirt and dust, he could feel the heat from this thing radiating like a blast furnace.

It was his first proper close-up glimpse. It was invisible mostly. But occasionally small portions here and there flickered into view, visible for a moment; blink and you’d miss it. Its form and texture seemed to be changing from one second to the next. Spines and bone-like protrusions extruded one moment, then collapsed inwards the next, as if the creature’s form was in a constant state of wretched indecision.

A patch of the entity’s ‘skin’ appeared, then turned semitransparent, revealing a spinning, churning mulch of human body parts inside. A face was suddenly pressed up against the membranous ‘skin’, nose squashed, eyes wide, mouth far wider – an unheard scream of torment from within this beast. Then the next moment it was gone, whisked away.

Liam thought, lying here, trapped under the avalanche of debris, that he was certainly going to die. The thing would find him,
sniff
him
out
.

But it didn’t.

It stamped angrily for a moment, then paused. The roaring ceased and Liam thought he could hear a muffled chorus of wailing voices coming from deep within its mass.

Then, invisible once again, just shimmering air, he heard it move off. Heavy booming footsteps taking it away from him. He saw another column, further away, lurch to one side like a pile of playschool building-blocks spitefully knocked over by a child’s hand. It appeared to be heading towards the faint outline of the distant entrance.

A shadow loomed over him, blocking out the pink evening sky above, and he felt the pressing weight of fallen stone blocks lessen as Bob began to dig him out of the mound of debris.

‘Are you damaged, Liam?’

‘I don’t think so.’ Nothing seemed broken. ‘I think I’m all right.’

Bob helped him up on to his feet. ‘Where are the others?’ asked Liam.

‘The others left the chamber through the entrance.’

Liam shook his head, steadied himself. Pulled in a couple of breaths. ‘How the hell are we going to fight this thing?’

‘It is pure energy. There is no way to fight it, Liam.’

‘Then what do we do?’

‘Evade it.’ Just then the entire chamber shuddered. Grit and dirt cascaded down from the low ceiling. The entrance on the far side, a second ago a pinprick of faint light, was now a much wider, ragged hole.

‘We will have to evade it until its energy has been fully depleted.’

Becks suddenly became aware that she had lost visual contact with the others. She was being carried along by a press of fleeing bodies, up a narrow alleyway. Taller than most of the people around her, she craned her neck to be sure. But she could locate none of them.

‘Enough,’ she grunted.

She barged through the desperate natives until she was out of the ‘flow’, her back pressed up against a cool stone wall. Systematically, her eyes swept across the faces passing her, but none of them were Maddy, Liam or the others. She realized that in the turmoil of panic she’d become separated from the others, pushed up a different narrow alley. Her lips stiffened; if she’d had a decent enough database of profanities and curses, she might have tried one out. Instead she put her mind to something more useful – determining where she might locate them again. They needed her.

The only likely place they would try to head towards was surely the exit tunnel. The only way out of this natural basin. The highest probability: that would be where they’d make for.

She pushed her way back into the flow of people, against it this time, roughly shouldering fleeing men, women and children out of her way as she made her way back towards the plaza, to go round it and towards the tunnel exit on the far side.

The tide of terrified people carried Maddy and the others up the narrow stepped street. Many of them seemed determined to flood into the various temple buildings, either because they believed those stone structures with their thick wooden doors were robust enough to keep this thing at bay, or because they believed their gods and their priests would protect them. Others filtered off into narrow passageways, presumably hoping to hide in their small dark homes.

Maddy and the others went with the flow, with little choice in the matter, and finally felt themselves being carried, pushed and jostled through the large doorway of the main temple building. The sounds of screaming and wailing coming from the women and children now bounced off the high stone walls around them: a cacophony of panic and terror magnified tenfold.

Some men pulled the thick wooden door of the temple firmly shut. It slammed with a deep boom that silenced many of the voices inside.

We’ve just gone and sealed ourselves in.
Maddy looked around at huddled family groups, mothers with babes-in-arms, holding the hands of petrified, ashen-faced children. Husbands and fathers convened in little groups, speaking in hurried, hushed tones. And eyes – so many pairs of suspicious eyes – settled on the strangers in their midst who’d brought this evil down upon them.

‘This isn’t good,’ said Adam. He looked at Rashim. ‘This isn’t good! Remember all those bones you discovered …?’

Pat-ishka, the city’s shrivel-skinned elder and – as far as Maddy had been able to work out – spiritual leader, began to talk calmly to his frightened people. His thin, reedy voice and birdlike frame belied the hold he had over them. They instantly hushed and listened as he spoke. Maddy wished Billy was here with them. He’d had some vague understanding of the language,
and while he might not have been able to tell her precisely what the old man was saying, he could have given her an impression of what was being said.

Through the thick reinforced wooden door they heard the entity rampage outside. They could hear the crashing and splintering of buildings, that chilling trumpeting roar of chorused inhuman voices raised in unified torment.

The elder hushed the frightened cries of his people with raised withered arms. He then turned round slowly to look at Maddy and the others as he resumed talking to his people.

‘They are frightened,’ said Rashim. ‘They are blaming us for this.’

‘Well, they’re right to,’ replied Maddy. ‘We caused all of this to happen.’

‘Rashim’s right,’ said Adam, ‘he’s blaming us. He’s gonna use us …’

She could see where this was headed. Although these people were far less blood-thirsty and brutal than the sacrifice-addicted Aztecs, they had conducted several animal sacrifices in honour of their guests over the last week. And Adam had found, in their pictoral history, some evidence that in the past – on rare and extreme occasions – they had conducted one or two human sacrifices. Right now, she imagined, Pat-ishka was considering whether this might be a good time to have another one.

A sacrifice to flatter their gods or appease this monster. She looked around for Becks. At least with her they were safe from –

‘
Where the hell’s Becks?
’

The other three did the same look-around. ‘She was just with us!’ said Adam. ‘I swear I saw her moments ago.’

‘She must have got separated from us outside,’ said Rashim.

Maddy felt her legs wobbling. Becks … she’d been sure she was right here, right beside her.
No Bob … now no Becks.

Oh crap.

Pat-ishka was jabbing a finger towards them now, his voice finding a bit more strength and conviction. Only … not jabbing a finger at
them
, he was pointing his finger directly at
her
. He shrieked a command and a group of men, young and old, began to approach her. One of them pulled out a long sickle-like blade from beneath his poncho.

Even if she could speak their language and appeal to them, she’d be talking to men doing the only thing they could think of to protect their families, their loved ones.

All the same, she shook her head. ‘No! Please … don’t do this!’

Rashim raised his torch as a club. Adam reached for the hunting knife strapped to his belt. Bertie balled his fists. The three of them instinctively huddled close together, forming a protective phalanx in front of her.

Outside, the sound of destruction had suddenly ceased. Now a calm had descended upon them; the noise had suddenly reduced down to the ragged breathing of her three male protectors; three unconvincing musketeers facing up to the group of fifteen or twenty men standing before them.

‘We – need – to – leave,’ whispered Adam. He glanced over his shoulder at her. ‘Is there another exit to this building?’

There was none. They all knew that. There was a narrow doorway that opened on to stone steps that led up to the floor above, to the rooms they had been allowed to stay in. Up there, the only way out of the building was the terrace, the low wall and a forty-foot drop over the side down on to cobblestone steps. The drop would undoubtedly result in broken legs.

The men began to fan out round Adam, Rashim and Bertie as they shielded Maddy. And the four of them backed up several steps to prevent the natives working their way behind them.
Backed up until they finally found themselves hemmed into a corner of the large temple room. Nowhere to go and now out of options other than a short, brutal fight that was only going to end one way.

The elder shuffled towards them, he began to speak again, one withered hand extended towards Maddy, imploring her to step forward. With his other hand he was gesturing back at the huddled groups of frightened women and children. Maddy could guess what he was saying. He was imploring her to do the right thing, the decent thing, to offer her life up in order to save all these others.

And perhaps she might have been prepared to sacrifice her life if it could have saved them all. But letting them gut her like a freshly caught fish, right here, right now with that large sickle-shaped blade – a grotesque and futile sacrificial ritual – wasn’t going to make that thing outside go away.

Oh God, not like this … I don’t want to die like this.

She felt her legs trembling beneath her. Her stomach churned, desperate to jettison its contents one way or the other.

A loud crash. Something large and heavy slammed against the door to the temple. The women and children answered with screams. The thick wooden door was already cracked and weakened, a shard of rosy evening light piercing through into the gloomy interior.

‘The door will not hold long,’ said Rashim.

Pat-ishka stepped further forward, eased his way through the younger men until he stood just in front of Adam. His feeble voice didn’t sound angry – which, given the destruction Maddy and her colleagues had accidentally visited on them, would have been perfectly understandable. It was, instead, a plea.

Maddy could see that he could so easily order his group of men to charge down Rashim, Adam and Bertie. These were
frightened men, frightened for their families. At a word they would rush forward and do the bloody necessary. But the old man clearly wanted Maddy to willingly offer herself up, for it not to be a forced sacrifice – but an offering.

The voluntary surrendering of one life to protect many.

Perhaps that was the way it worked with these people; a sacrifice had to be a gift from the ‘victim’? Not something brutally taken by force.

Another crash. The wooden door rattled in its frame, its hinges working loose from the stone, freeing grit and sand on to the floor.

Maddy looked at the shafts of light piercing through the increasingly fragile door. The dying sunlight flickered as something large moved around outside, pacing the narrow street. She imagined the entity could sense the hundreds of frightened souls trapped inside this building. It was determined to find a way in. It was almost through. It wasn’t going anywhere.

‘I’ve already spoken with it,’ she told Pat-ishka calmly.

The elder hushed. He narrowed his eyes. He seemed encouraged at the calm sound of her voice. He offered her a warm, paternal smile. The fingers on his extended hand twitched, beckoning her to step forward, to prevent her friends from dying needlessly.

‘I spoke to it,’ she said again, ‘inside chaos space … I was talking with it.’

Adam glanced back at her. ‘That thing speaks?’

She nodded. ‘It might be … 
reasoned
with.’

All three of them turned to look over their shoulders at her. ‘Tell me you’re not thinking of going out there,’ said Adam.

The door crashed again, this time it bulged inwards, splinters of wood clattered on to the floor. Renewed screams of terror
from those inside. The door was a shattered ruin now. Just one gentle nudge away from collapsing to the floor.

I
may not actually need to go outside. Next bang – it’s coming right in.

‘I’m going to go talk to it,’ she said.

‘
Talk
to it?!’ Rashim shook his head. ‘The thing will tear you apart!’

‘No! Maybe not! I think … I think Sal’s in there!’

‘
What?
’

‘I think Sal’s a part of that thing!’

‘Where did they get to?’ Liam surveyed the scene of panic around them. He and Bob were now standing beside the entrance to the tunnel out of the basin. People streamed past them into the darkness and the escape beyond that would take them out of the cave and down the narrow cliff-front trail into the jungle.

In the city below they could see a thick river of people pushing up the narrow stepped alleyway to the main temple building; a river of those with more faith in their gods’ ability to protect them.

‘I do not know.’ Bob scanned the chaos of the city. Every terrace, every passageway, every rat run between buildings, seemed to be filled with fleeing people, a multicoloured storm of painted skin, flowing robes, rattling beads and flapping ponchos.

They listened to the din of terrified cries all around them, amplified by the bowl-like acoustics of the city. And in that cacophony somewhere they heard the distant roar of the beast and a deep echoing boom as it smashed its way into some building.

Liam had assumed the others would have made their way here. The obvious place for them to rendezvous. The only way out. But clearly they hadn’t.

An old woman slammed into Liam, her brow decorated with
tattoos, her earlobes stretched with clay rings. She screamed something at his face. A curse? A warning? A plea? Or perhaps just raw fear-fuelled rage that he was impeding her exit from the end of her world. She side-stepped and bustled past him, several small children in tow behind her.

It was a true miracle, he mused, that so far, none of these people had been tempted to lash out at him as they’d passed by. A fist, the swipe of a sickle blade, the thrust of a spear tip. And why not? Their meddling down below had brought destruction upon this city.

Their thoughtless meddling.

These people had demonstrated their anxiety and fear over the forty-eight hours they’d waited for Maddy. There had been an angry crowd that had gathered and grown beside the plaza, and the atmosphere of hostility had become intimidating enough that they’d elected to stay out of sight and down in the lower chamber. These people seemed to consider that place either far too sacred or far too dangerous to enter.

Despite their anger, their fear, these people had refrained from attacking any of them. He suspected these poor, poor people, whose world they had just brought to a premature end, were normally a passive and contemplative people. With hindsight, Liam had realized this place had seemed more like a monastery than a city. A spiritual retreat.

They’d been here little more than a week – and look what their curiosity had done to this little piece of Eden. It now looked like the fall of Rome. Sodom and Gomorrah.

Jesus, what have we done to them?

‘Becks is approaching!’ said Bob.

He must be picking up her ident signal. Bob stood straight, alert, craning his neck one way then the other to look over the people flooding past, like a meerkat on predator-watch.

Liam scanned the passing faces, painted many different colours but all punctuated with the same wide white eyes and dark oval mouths stretched with terror. This was their version of the end, their apocalypse in miniature. Their Pandora.

And it was us that caused it. Jesus.

Just then, Bob pointed. ‘There is Becks.’

Liam thrust his thoughts and regrets aside and followed the direction Bob was indicating. By the fading light of evening he just about managed to make out the distinct outline of her tall athletic frame striding up through the river of people evacuating the city. She casually pushed those in her way aside. Her icy glare met Bob’s and she tipped a nod of greeting at him and Liam as she roughly shoved a small girl out of her path. The girl fell to her knees and would have been trampled to death had it not been for the helping hand of some old man scooping her up again. Becks was oblivious to that as she strode out of the flow of people and approached them.

What lay in her wake was irrelevant to her.

She was alone. The others weren’t with her.

‘Where are they?!’ called out Liam.

‘I do not know.’ She frowned. ‘I estimated a high probability they would attempt to rendezvous at this location.’ She pursed her lips thoughtfully. ‘It appears I was wrong.’