12.21: A Novel

by Dustin Thomason

  Together, they examined the paragraph where the pair first appeared:

  The father and his son is not noble by birth, and so there is much the father and his son will never fathom about the ways of the gods that watch over us, there is much the father and his son does not hear that the gods would whisper in the ears of a king.

  “It appears more often as a subject,” Victor said. “So I think we have to focus on nouns that could have been used over and over again.”

  “Right,” Chel said. “Which is why I went back to the other codices and searched for the most frequently used subjects. There are six: maize, water, underworld, gods, time, and king.”

  Victor nodded. “Of those, the only ones that make sense are either gods or king.”

  “There are a dozen references to a drought in the early pages and to the nobles waiting for the deities to bring water,” Chel said.

  “But gods wouldn’t make sense. Not in the context of the father and son waiting for the gods to bring rain. The gods don’t wait for the gods to bring rain. The people do.”

  “And I tried king, but it didn’t make sense either. Father and male child. Chit unen. Could it be some kind of indication of a ruling family? Maybe father is being used metaphorically to mean king, and he has a son who will succeed him.”

  “There are pairings with husbands and wives to indicate a ruling king and his queen,” Victor said.

  “But if we assume the father and son pairing indicates a ruling family, then this sequence would read: The king and his son are not noble by birth. That makes no sense either.”

  Victor’s eyes lit up. “Mayan syntax is all about context, right?”

  “Sure …”

  “Every subject exists in relation to an object,” Victor said. “Every date in relation to a god, every king to his polity. We always talk of King K’awiil of Tikal, not simply of King K’awiil. We talk of a ballplayer and his ball as one. Of a man and his spirit animal. Neither word exists without the other. They mean one thing.”

  “One idea,” Chel said, “not two.”

  Victor started to pace around the lab. “Right. So what if these glyphs work the same way? What if the scribe doesn’t refer to a father and his son but to a single man with the properties of both?”

  It dawned on Chel what he was saying. “You think the scribe’s referring to himself as having the spirit of his father inside him?”

  “We use it in English to talk about how similar we are to our parents. You are your mother’s child. Or, in your case, your father’s child, I suppose. He’s referring to himself.”

  “It means I,” she said, astonished.

  “I’ve never seen it used this exact way,” Victor continued, “but I have seen grammatical constructions like this used to highlight a noble’s connection to a god.”

  Chel felt like she was floating. All the other codices were written in the third person—the narrator a distant, detached player in the story he was describing.

  This was completely different.

  “I am not noble by birth,” Victor read, “and so there is much I do not fathom about the ways of the gods that watch over us, there is much I do not hear that the gods would whisper in the ears of a king.”

  A first-person narrative would be unique in the history of the discipline. There was no telling what could be learned from such an account. It could bridge a thousand-year gap and truly connect Chel’s people to the inner lives of their ancestors.

  “Well,” Victor said, drawing a pen from his pocket as if it were a weapon. “I think it’s time to find out if this thing is worth all the trouble it’s caused.”

  FOURTEEN

  No rain has come to give us nourishment in a half cycle of the great star. The fields of Kanuataba have been harvested and humiliated, and the deer and birds and jaguar guardians of the land have been pushed out. Hillsides have been ruined, insects swarm, and our soils are no longer fed by falling leaves. The animals and butterflies and plants given to us by the Holy Bearer have nowhere to go to continue their spirit lives. The animals bear no flesh for cooking.

  I am not noble by birth, and so there is much I do not fathom about the ways of the gods that watch over us, there is much I do not hear that the gods would whisper in the ears of a king. But I do know Kanuataba was once home to the most majestic collection of ceiba trees, the great path to the underworld, in all of the highlands. The ceiba once grew denser than anywhere in the world, blessed by the gods, their trunks nearly touching. Now there are fewer than a dozen still standing in all of Kanuataba! Our holy lake has dried to nothing but dirt. The water made to shoot from stone shoots from the palace and temples no more. In the plazas, untouchables beg us to buy their useless, cracked pots and rotting vegetables, diluted spices for meats that only the nobles can afford. There are no agouti, kinkajou, deer, or tapir to season. The children of Kanuataba become hungrier with each change of the sun’s mighty journey across the sky.

  Forgive me then, monkey scribe, whose ring I wear on my hand as the symbol of scribes past! Here in Kanuataba, I commence my record on the virgin bark paper I stole from the king. I have done little worth recording in the books of Kanuataba. I am the tutor to the king’s son, and I have painted forty-two books in the service of the court. But now I paint for the people, and the children of our children’s children, an honest account of what came in the time of King Jaguar Imix!

  Two suns ago, following a night when the quarter moon hung low in the sky, twelve of the thirteen members of King Jaguar Imix’s royal council were convened. Jacomo, the royal dwarf, who is as lustful as he is small, was also present. I know dwarfs in the fields who love Kanuataba as much as any man of normal size. But this royal dwarf is something else, something terrible. Jacomo is a glutton, and I watched him chewing on the bark of a great tree and spitting vile liquid from his mouth back into the bowl in his lap. Lately I have seen him seduce women by promising crumbs from his beard, forcing them to pleasure him so that they may feed their hungry babes.

  Of the thirteen council members, my friend Auxila, royal overseer of the stores and of zoology and agriculture, was the sole man not in attendance. Five suns ago, at our last meeting, Auxila angered the king, and it seemed most likely he was doing penance. Auxila is a good man, and as trade adviser to the king, he knows much of royal accounting, a burden I would never desire. To count a king’s purse is to know the limits of his power.

  Galam, bearer of King Jaguar Imix’s decrees and daykeeper for ten turns of the Calendar Round, called the council to begin:

  —By the word of Jaguar Imix, by the holy word, we commence this meeting in honor of the new sacred god, so named Akabalam. Akabalam is most powerful. Jaguar Imix decrees that we shall worship Akabalam forevermore.—

  I am tutor to Prince Smoke Song, next ruler of Kanuataba, and I have memorized all the great books. Nowhere does a god named Akabalam appear in any of them. I asked the daykeeper:

  —What form does the god Akabalam take?—

  —When Jaguar Imix sees fit to explain more, Paktul, I will share it with the council. I cannot pretend to understand what his holiness knows about the world.—

  Without explanation, then, we prayed and burned incense to this new god. I resolved to study the great books of Kanuataba and find the deity Akabalam on my own. To understand what god had revealed itself to his holiness, the king.

  Galam the daykeeper spoke:

  —I hereby declare the king’s intention to begin construction of a great new pyramid in the style of the lost civilization of Teotihuacan, which will someday be the place of his interment. The foundation will be laid in twenty days, less than a thousand paces from the palace. The viewing tower shall be built to face the highest point of the procession of the sun and will create a great holy triangle with the palace and the twin pyramid of red.—

  My brothers each clapped twice to signify the glory of Jaguar Imix. But when my turn came to clap twice, I asked of Galam, holy messenger, whether the construction of a
pyramid was most prudent when there has been no rain:

  —The people of Kanuataba have nothing with which to nourish themselves, and even the mandatory laborers will starve as they carry the stones to the top. A temple in the plaza will require plaster that cannot be made without the burning of our most precious trees and plants to dehydrate the rock. Our flora diminishes by the day. The lake has dried up to nothing, and our reservoirs are dwindling.—

  Then Jacomo the wanton dwarf spoke to me with anger:

  —Be it understood, Paktul, that King Jaguar Imix has received a prophecy from the god Akabalam telling us to launch a star war, timed to the evening star, against distant kingdoms. We will bring back slaves and all their valuables. Our army has a new way to preserve food, salting its supplies more heavily than before, so that we may launch wars on lands even more distant. These cities are weakened by the great drought, and they cannot defend themselves against our mighty army. So now you understand why you dare not question the king!—

  There would be no more argument. Jaguar Imix’s power emanates from his ability to communicate with the gods, and each member of the council enjoys rank according to their own abilities to summon the voices of these gods. This we call the hierarchy of divinity. If Jaguar Imix should hear the voice of a god decree that something is most true, and one of his minions should not hear this voice, he shall be considered a man who cannot speak with the gods. His rank in the hierarchy of divinity shall be lowered or stripped from him altogether.

  But where will enough water and wood and plumage come from to build a pyramid thirty men high, as it is ordained?

  His holiness claims the rain will come in five periods of thirteen days, when the evening star falls nearer to the moon. But will it?

  Jaguar Imix would drink the entirety of the water stores if so much water could flow through him and sanctify him, for he believes that his sanctification is the route to our salvation. No royal king of Kanuataba divined by the gods can be evil—I have seen it myself on the stone inscriptions. But his holiness is incapable of admitting to fault. Jaguar Imix believes his power is as strong as the fear he can instill in the hearts of men.

  How I wish I could still worship him as I did when I was a boy!

  We of the council left the gallery and walked to the great steps atop the royal palace, where I stood and witnessed something to forever change what I believe.

  The people outside the palace were chanting, and the blue-painted executioners were standing atop the south twin tower, beginning their rituals. The noise came and went, up and down, high and low. The voices of the royal executioners rose to a near-deafening pitch as the plaza came into my sights.

  A small, aristocratic crowd stood at the base of the twin pyramid of white, along the north face, and clapping echoed throughout the plaza. The yellow, red, and gold paints that adorn the face of the great pyramid shimmered like the sun on a sea of blue, undulating as if the great beast that lives on the ocean floor had risen. The blue-painted men were at the top of the three hundred sixty-five steps, some holding censers bubbling with smoke.

  The grand executioner spoke:

  —This soul is commanded to the overworld by the Lord Akabalam!—Akabalam, once more. The unknown god has demanded sacrifice again, this time in the form of a man’s soul!

  When the grand executioner plunged his glistening flint knife into the man’s chest and ripped open his ribs, the man on the altar let out a wail that will forever ring in my ears. Through the cry that the man exhaled, the grand executioner reached into his body to pull out his heart. And the dying man’s words were heard by those of us above the fray, and they were an omen of things to come, as black as the end of the thirteenth cycle:

  —Akabalam is falsehood!—

  I knew whose voice it was. Auxila, my friend, trusted adviser to the king for three thousand suns, had been sacrificed. Ringing filled my ears. I watched his corpse go lifeless, and everywhere I saw omens in the clouds.

  The gods called for such a sacrifice of a high noble not more than once in fifteen thousand suns. What chance was there the gods had ordained such a sacrifice five days after Auxila spoke out against the plans of the king?

  Beyond the reaches of the noisy crowd I saw Auxila’s wife, Haniba, standing without tears and watching the executioners encircle the corpse once more, and my heart wept for her and for their children, Flamed Plume and One Butterfly, who stood beside her, weeping.

  The bloody priests brought Auxila’s corpse back into the recesses of the temple, an unusual handling of a body. It is honorable to throw it down the steps of the great pyramid, but they would not even do Auxila this small justice. They took the body from sight, and I knew they would not emerge again until the blackest of night, as the evening star reached the perfect angle with the temple.

  Atop the steps of the royal palace, the perch from which I took in this madness, I felt a hand grasp the back of my knee. I turned and found the dwarf Jacomo, who had crept up beside me, chewing on the same mangled bark piece and smiling.

  He spoke:

  —Exalted is the name of Jaguar Imix, holy ruler of Kanuataba, whose wisdom guides us through this life. Do you exalt him, Paktul?—

  I wanted so much to strike the dwarf right there, but I am not a man of violence. I merely echoed his praise:

  —Exalted is the name of Jaguar Imix, holy ruler of Kanuataba, whose wisdom guides us through this life.—

  Not until I returned to this cave to begin painting the pages of this secret book did I let go of the scream inside me.

  It was a scream for none but the gods to hear.

  What am I to understand of a god who’d come with no blessings, who would ordain a temple we cannot build and command the death of a man most loyal to the king! Who is this mighty and mysterious new god called Akabalam?

  12.19.19.17.13

  DECEMBER 14, 2012

  FIFTEEN

  THE 10 FREEWAY WAS SHUT DOWN NEAR CLOVERFIELD SO THAT the National Guard could transport shipments of supplies and food to the west side. Stanton took the side streets, passing abandoned strip malls, elementary schools, and auto-body shops. Traffic moved slowly despite the few cars on the road, with National Guard checkpoints almost every mile. The governor of California had accepted Cavanagh and Stanton’s controversial plan and signed an emergency-powers act, enacting the first citywide quarantine in U.S. history.

  The boundaries had been secured by the National Guard: from the San Fernando Valley in the north, east into the San Gabriel, south into Orange County, and west to the ocean. No planes were allowed out of the airports, and the coast guard had deployed nearly two hundred boats to secure the port and coastline. So far most Angelenos had reacted to the quarantine with a calm and cooperation that surprised even the most optimistic in Sacramento and Washington.

  Beyond the quarantine, the CDC was testing people who’d visited L.A. or residents who’d traveled out in the last week. They checked manifestos for every plane that left any L.A. airport recently, hunted down Amtrak travelers through credit-card receipts, and tracked many of those who went by road by toll-booth passes and license-plate snapshots. Thus far they’d found eight cases in New York, four in Chicago, and three in Detroit, in addition to the nearly eleven hundred people now sick with VFI inside the Southland.

  Stanton saw devastating patterns as the number of infected grew. All he and the other doctors could do was try to keep patients comfortable. For most victims, partial insomnia and sweating began after a brief latent period, then seizures and fevers and total insomnia followed. Those who’d been awake for three days or more were hardest to watch. They began to have delusions and panic attacks, then the hallucinations and violent outbursts Volcy and Gutierrez had shown. Death was likely within a week. Nearly twenty of the infected had already succumbed.

  The sight of camouflage Humvees, and men and women in tan uniforms carrying machine guns on Lincoln Boulevard, was deeply unsettling. Stanton waited to show his ID in a line of cars on his way
back to Venice. He glanced down at his phone, to the newest list of names of infected patients. The victims spanned every ethnicity, socioeconomic status, and nearly every age. Glasses had protected some, but plenty who wore them had been infected. The only groups immune to VFI seemed to be blind people, whose optic nerves were severed from their brains, and newborns. The optic nerves were undeveloped in babies, and until the sheath surrounding them matured, the disease couldn’t make its way into the brain. That protection wouldn’t last beyond six months, so it gave him little solace.

  Stanton inched his Audi forward in the security line while scanning the patient list. On it were doctors and nurses he’d met at Presbyterian as well as two CDC officers he knew and liked.

  Finally he saw Maria Gutierrez and her son, Ernesto.

  He was supposed to be able to deal with mortality. And he had seen some bad cases in his time. But nothing had prepared Stanton for this. He needed grounding, and any other time he would’ve called Nina. She’d gone back out onto the water again after leaving his condo. He’d called to tell her VFI was airborne. Technically, Stanton should’ve ordered her to come ashore and get tested. But she had no symptoms of any kind, so he wanted her to stay far, far away. Buses and public bathrooms and almost every hospital in the city showed evidence of prion now, and even hazmat cleaning agents couldn’t decontaminate them.

  His cellphone rang. “This is Stanton.”

  “It’s Chel Manu.”

  “Dr. Manu. Have you made any progress?”

  She described the father–son-glyph revelation and the first section of the codex they’d translated. Though he didn’t follow her entirely, Stanton was impressed by her obvious ingenuity, by her command of the complex language, and by the vast amount of history she had at her disposal. He also heard the passion in her voice. He might not be able to trust this woman, but her energy lifted his spirits.