Somehow that didn’t make Kat feel any better. If there was a way out and this man knew about it, why hadn’t he simply left? He hadn’t been murdered, as far as could be determined. His relaxed pose was odd, just as Megan had pointed out. He wasn’t hunched in extreme agony; he wasn’t lying down as you’d expect of someone drawing a last breath. He just looked like he’d leaned against the column and given up. And why would he do that if there was a way out? But the fact remained that he had achieved this depth, without the sophisticated equipment they had. The tunnel where he’d come in was their best hope of getting out.
“Let’s rustle up something to eat, Megan,” she said. “Then we should start moving.”
Kat turned and trudged back to her makeshift bed. She rummaged in her pack, extracted granola bars and cheese, and handed some to Megan. Ray moaned and slowly sat up, scratching his head.
“Hey, no one told me it was lunchtime.”
Kat smiled and handed him some food.
“Great, I’m starving.”
“Someone should wake up Pete,” said Kat, staring at the gently smiling man nestled beneath his silver space blanket. “Didn’t he say he had energy to spare?”
They all laughed, but no one moved to wake him. No one was eager to hear his grumbles and sarcastic jibes. Kat held her food over her baggie as she ate, careful to let crumbs fall into the bag so as not to contaminate the pristine cave. Pete was never so considerate of the natural environment. He was here for the prize—a cave bug with curative powers that could bring him wealth and prestige. Which reminded Kat. Even if this microbe wasn’t strong enough to save her, it still had amazing quick-healing abilities, and she shouldn’t leave it behind. After she’d swilled a good eight ounces of water, she reached into her pack for a Petri dish and some packaged sterile wires.
“What are you doing, Kat?” asked Ray.
“You know,” she said with a frown. Ray had seen her collect microbes enough times. She broke the seal and withdrew the wire from its bag, all the while taking careful steps down the slick stone to the water. Leaning over the cave rafts, she skimmed the gelatin mats with the wire and tenderly slid them over the agar in the Petri dish.
“What makes you think those are worth collecting?” he asked.
“Just a feeling,” she said. She slipped the lid back onto the dish, scribbled “Cave Raft Sample” on the top, and zipped it into her collection kit. “Now we have to wake up Pete.”
Again no one moved.
Kat rolled her eyes. “Okay, I’ll do it.”
She sidled over to the silver mound and tentatively touched his shoulder. “Pete,” she called. “Time to get going.”
Pete groaned and rolled over. This wasn’t going to be easy. The man was probably exhausted. She tapped his shoulder again, but he didn’t move. Gently, Kat plucked up the corners of the crinkly blanket and pulled it off. The man was still in damp coveralls—the idiot—and shivering, although not enough to wake himself up.
“Pete,” she said louder. “Get up!”
“Wh- what?” he mumbled in his sleep. “Yeah, I can do it. Any trouble, I’ll just get rid of them.”
Kat hesitated. What was he dreaming about? The way he’d said “get rid of them” reminded her of Robert DeNiro in a mobster movie. Goosebumps erupted all down her arms and the back of her neck. No. She shook herself. He was just having a dream.
She prodded him harshly this time. “Pete.”
With no warning he sprang up, whipped his hand under his arm, and pulled out a six-inch knife.
“What the hell are you doing?” he asked.
Chapter Ten
Kat froze, eyeing the blade that hovered near her chest.
“Were you snooping in my bag?” Pete asked.
“Of- of course not, Pete. Why would I do that?”
“Calm down, Peter,” said Ray, his voice pitched higher than usual. Apparently he didn’t like the shimmering blade pointed at her, either.
“What the hell was she doing then?” Pete asked.
“I was trying to wake you up so we could get moving,” said Kat. “It’s only a matter of time before we run out of batteries, and we won’t have a hope of getting out of here without light.”
Pete’s tight grip relaxed. He blinked the sleep from his eyes and lowered the knife. Then he seemed to realize what he’d done and quickly stuffed the knife back into its hidden sheath under his arm. “Ah, um, sorry about that,” he said. “You startled me.”
“No kidding,” said Kat. Psycho. She backed away from Pete with deliberate, measured steps, her hand instantly swallowed by Ray’s as she came abreast of him.
He leaned over and whispered, “Are you okay?”
She nodded, although, with the tribal rhythm that her heart had suddenly adopted, she wasn’t entirely sure.
What was this man up to? They’d known from the start that he was hiding something. The effusive smile from Jacob Ruskit, one of Spore, Inc.’s senior managers, as he introduced her to Pete had been enough to make her suspicious.
“This is the fellow who will be accompanying you,” he’d said, clapping Pete on the back. “Peter—” He’d hesitated as if he couldn’t remember his name. “—Fleming. One of our brightest researchers. He hasn’t explored as many caves as you have, but he has ventured into a few. You shouldn’t have any problems.”
Right, she’d thought. “A few” inferred that he was a rank amateur. Nothing more dangerous than an amateur.
Pete had jerked a nod, hardly the friendliest greeting. Then he’d stared at her long and hard. Too long, really. And he’d shared a glance with his employer before heaving the pack onto his back and following them into the jungle.
Yet Pete had pulled his weight. At times throughout the five-day journey he’d appeared as if he was on the verge of collapse, but somehow he’d tapped into a reserve of strength and continued. He’d mastered rappelling skills with ease—when Mark, in his few attempts, had tangled lines and forgotten to secure links—and had dived into the treacherous sumps without a protest. But just when Kat was beginning to respect him, he would break off a delicate helictite—a corkscrew of limestone—or crush gypsum flowers beneath his feet.
“Watch what you’re doing,” she’d say. “Do you know how many thousands of years it takes for these things to develop?”
He’d look at her with an arctic stare. “We’re not here for the artwork, are we?”
Miserable, callous bastard.
But she’d never thought he was dangerous. Aloof, yes. Careless, definitely. Up to something, probably. But a bodily threat? She’d never imagined that.
“What’s up with the knife?” asked Ray, stroking his own small switchblade, which was attached to his belt, as he gave her hand a reassuring squeeze. A knife was a must in caving, in case your line became tangled on a rock and you had to cut yourself free, but a six-inch dagger hardly seemed necessary.
“Part of the caving kit,” said Pete. He turned away from them and fished out his water bottle and a protein bar. “Required, isn’t it?”
“Seems a little big,” said Ray, still watching the man nervously.
“Overkill, you mean?” Pete turned back to them and sat casually on his mat. “I’m often accused of overkill.”
“Just watch where you wave it. You don’t want to overkill your team.”
Pete gnawed and nodded.
“Nope, wouldn’t want to do that. I’d never get out of here.”
Kat gulped. Was he serious or joking? It was so hard to tell. Could the man be so cold as to only estimate the value of his fellow human beings according to their usefulness to his own survival? He wouldn’t be the first man she’d met like that. But down here, it frightened her. Each member of her team had to be reliable, and someone with Pete’s attitude was capable of cutting you loose from a lifeline if you were of no more use to him.
“Well, we’d better get going,” Kat said, shaking off her latest brush with death as best she could. She relinquished Ray’s h
and. Shouldn’t be holding it, anyway. Then she bent down and began re-packing her supplies. She rolled up the mat and stuffed it down the side of her pack, along with her p.j.’s. The collection kit and food came next. Nylon ropes, a compass, and her survey notebook for mapping were crammed into another corner, along with gloves and an extra pair of socks. The drysuit had already been coiled and compressed into a waterproof bag. And of course the belay devices for rappelling, the harnesses, the descenders and ascenders with carabiners to connect and disconnect things while on rope. The last thing she had to shoulder was the rebreathing apparatus. Not the lightest load, especially for a sick woman. My God, was she ever a sick woman, crawling around in a cave when she could be dying like any normal person, curled up under a soft down duvet surrounded by the comforts of home!
“Let’s go,” she barked, and the troops obeyed, although Pete raised a curious eyebrow first. That quirk no longer amused her. She certainly wouldn’t look on him as a disobedient child anymore. She marched forward, ignoring him, as well as the return of the little stab of pain in her chest. The breeze fluttered along the serene shores of the lake, teasing tendrils of unruly hair from her forehead and calling to her. The exit is here. Right over here. Along the lake and two thousand meters up.
What could be easier than that?
Three hours later, they were still walking. The weight clawed at Kat, but she walked. The pain gnawed at her, but she walked. One foot in front of the other. Over jumbled rock, around giant boulders, through slippery streams that fed the lake.
“How big is this cavern?” asked Ray, behind her.
He was obviously as puzzled as she was. But just when Kat thought the cavern was never going to end, an alabaster wall glistened in front of her flashlight.
Kat played the light up and down the wrinkled rock, looking for a crack or a tunnel that would lead out. Nothing here but solid stone. The wind whispered over her face again, from the right. She walked along the wall in that direction, following the tiny gasp of air. The light prodded gaps, seams—searching for a dehiscence of rock. Finally she traced the breeze to a small tunnel about twenty-five meters above their heads.
“There,” she said, aiming the light directly at the hole. “That might be our way out.”
Chapter Eleven
The rainforest stood, thick and resilient in front of Mark, like a wall. Yet the Mayan men had no trouble discerning a path amidst the tangle of roots and shrubs, between the unending columns of giant trees. They marched forward, Sergio or Chico taking turns hacking ferns and saplings with a machete. The burros plodded behind, but sometimes they stopped and needed to be prodded into motion again, and what better prod than the teeth of a mangy cur? As Mark began to see past the fronds in his face and buzzing gnats and mosquitoes that hovered around him, he began to take in the scenery. Above them towered the umbrella-shaped ceiba tree—thirty to forty meters tall—and the grand mahogany, interspersed as they climbed higher with Mexican pine and oak. Everywhere, the trees were webbed with liana vines and fenced with ferns and shrubs. Orchids and bromeliads adorned the forest with colorful flowers and perfumed the air. He was thankful the rankness had lifted.
Despite the misery, the pain, and the monstrousness of the last two hours, he had to admit this place had a certain charm. A fern-feathered kingdom dotted with rainbow-billed toucans, crimson-collared tanagers, and variegated squirrels. But as he doused his neck with DEET and continued to survey the surroundings, something slithered over his feet.
“Snake,” he yelped and jumped back.
Jorge glanced at the three-meter black and yellow specimen and shrugged.
“Tiger rat snake. Not poisonous.”
Mark closed his eyes and regained his composure. After all that had happened, to lose it over a snake . . . but snakes were part of his nightmare. Snakes that slithered over your legs in the pitch dark. Snakes that hissed and tickled with their tongues, and you couldn’t see them. Couldn’t see them anywhere. Mark opened his eyes again and snapped himself out of that world. Yet that was where he was heading, wasn’t it?
“Are there poisonous ones here?” he asked, clawing back his sanity.
“Of course.”
“Okay,” he said, releasing a nervous gust of air from his lungs. He had to keep admiring the beauty, that was all. Keep his mind off the other trappings of the jungle, especially the snakes.
As he gazed once again at the majestic trees, a blood-curdling roar erupted from somewhere in the dense thicket near him. His heartbeat thundered in his ears.
“Wh- what was that?”
Jorge looked behind, his face still masking any emotion. “Nada.”
“Nothing?” said Mark.
Chico and Sergio looked over their shoulders, wide grins pasted on their faces. Suddenly even Jorge couldn’t keep a straight face. He burst into a gut-busting laugh.
“What?” asked Mark. “Tell me. What was that?”
“Howler monkey,” said Jorge, still chuckling and grinning.
“Monkey? That was a monkey?” He sighed. This place really had him spooked. No wonder, after he’d nearly taken a nosedive into his own grave. But he had to keep cool or he’d never make it. “That was just a monkey,” he said, mainly to reassure himself. “Not everything in this damn jungle is deadly.”
“Not everything,” said Jorge, his face once again a solemn mask. “Another half hour,” he said. “Just over the next rise.”
“Thank God,” said Mark.
“Then you can start praying.”
Mark bristled and growled deep in his throat. Damn this Mexican, or Maya, whatever he was, for making his testicles rise in fear again, for making him taste the sour remnants of the tortilla from hell, and once more feel the gun barrel against his skin. Well, he could play at that game too. Maybe he couldn’t make the man afraid, but he could provoke another response, maybe find out what this man was up to. Not wise, a little voice whispered. These men have guns. But when had he ever listened to that little voice? He’d followed Kat wherever she’d led him—even here.
“So Jorge,” he said, picking up the pace so he was walking right behind the man. “You said you were Maya, right?”
“Sí,” said Jorge, not looking back.
“So your ancestors built all these amazing palaces and pyramids, right?”
“Sí.”
“So what happened?”
Now Jorge did look back with narrowed, suspicious eyes. “What do you mean, doctor Mark?”
“I mean, you were a proud people, geniuses in architecture, craftsmen and statesmen, even great warriors. What happened? How did your empire crumble? Even before the Spanish invasion or the Aztecs, it had been swallowed by the jungle, right?”
Jorge grunted and scowled.
“Strange, isn’t it? A civilization so powerful can fail so utterly. And now there’s nothing left but you. How the mighty have fallen.” Mark smiled.
“Yes, we have fallen. Just as every empire in your history eventually fell. Now there is another in the great and mighty United States and her associates. Do you think it will last forever? Do you think you can outlast your enemies? Do you suppose you are grander in your Toronto mansions than my own family is in our one-room shack? You may look it, but where is your soul?”
Mark paused, meeting Jorge’s fierce gaze, but cringing inside. “What do mean, my soul?”
“I mean the man who cares for another has a soul. The man who cares only for himself belongs to el diablo.”
“But,” said Mark, “I care. For God’s sake, I’m a doctor. How can you say I don’t have a soul?”
Jorge stopped and turned fully to face Mark. “Can you not see past your own nose? You drive the cars; you dispense the medicines. Where do you think the oil comes from, or the herbs? Your companies come down and steal it right out from under us. Our government allows it and you sustain it.”
“But,” said Mark, “the medicines help everyone. You yourself drive a vehicle and use the oil.”
&nb
sp; “The medicines go to the wealthy,” said Jorge, turning away. “I am the only one from my village with a truck.”
“You have no medicine?” asked Mark, trying to fathom this. “We send medicine to countries that need it every day. How can that be?”
“No doctors. No nurses. No medicine. Sometimes not even clean water. We have nothing.”
“But,” said Mark, now totally confused. “I saw clinics on the way here. In Villahermosa.”
“In Villahermosa!” Jorge yelled. “Of course there are clinics in Villahermosa, in Tabasco!” He spat out the last word. “In the heart of the oil country! I am from Chiapas—the land forgotten by all who are not Maya! Here . . .” He took Mark’s arm and tugged him to the front of the procession, leading up through a gutted section of the forest to the crest of a hill. “Here is Chiapas.” He extended his arm to engulf the rolling hills, the black and mottled green volcanic mountains that rose from the land like natural pyramids. A smoldering volcano was a few kilometers away, and Mark thought he could glimpse a collection of shanties on the scorched earth of a mountainside. “I took you to my village. You saw the way we live. This is the land the tourist brochures will not tell you about. This is the forgotten land!”
Mark caught his breath as he gazed out over the great rolling forest, so rich in resources and yet so poor. It was no surprise that the Mexican government was selling out its people by racing to hand over its wealth to the highest bidder. Nor that North Americans were buying into the opportunity. He’d just never considered . . . The knot in his belly tightened.
“If it’s true,” said Mark, “I didn’t know about it.”
Jorge snorted. “Do you know how often I’ve heard that?”
A click echoed in the jungle, like the release of a snap. Mark began to turn back toward the guide when a cold steel barrel was once again pressed against his head.
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