01-01-00

by R. J. Pineiro

  Susan nodded. “Problem is, it won’t be as easy as clicking your heels three times and saying the magic words.”

  “Maybe,” said Cameron, walking over to the relief of Pacal being lowered into his current resting place, placing his hand on the mosaic of the Mayan chief’s seal, and pressing it. The stone caved in almost a full foot. Several things happened at once. First, the door to the crypt slid shut with the force of a steel safe. Next the sarcophagus’s lid scraped back, reaching the back wall, which also began to move out of the way, revealing a tunnel that seemed to angle up, toward the surface.

  “Then again, maybe not,” added the archaeologist in a triumphant tone, inspecting the coffin’s reddish interior, finding a human skeleton, its face covered by a mosaic mask of jade quite similar to the one found by Ruz at Palenque. Dozens of jade necklaces adorned him, as well as several bracelets.

  Susan was speechless, inspecting Pacal’s mortal remains as well as what appeared to be their way out of this place. “How—how long have you known that this was the way to get out?”

  He tilted his head toward her. “Like I told you before, I had my suspicions, but it was too early to tell for certain. The glyphs describing the preparations needed at Palenque gave it away.”

  10

  The tunnel led them to another flight of stairs, this time flanked by plain stone walls. After thirteen steps they reached a landing with a U-turn, similar to the one they had taken on the way down. After twenty more steps, they reached the top of the stairs and another landing. A stone slab blocked the way. Next to it was another array of mosaics.

  “The way out,” said Cameron, starting on the lower left quadrant and working his way counterclockwise.

  The slab at the bottom of the stairs closed as this one creaked open, revealing thick jungle, along with a stream of fresh night air, which Susan inhaled deeply.

  “Freedom,” she whispered as they stepped away from the edifice, realizing that they had exited at the other side of the temple.

  A moment later the slab shifted back, as if controlled by an ancient timer, closing the passageway.

  Cameron pointed a thumb at it. “The reset mechanism. Now we know the secret to completing the whole cycle.”

  Susan kissed him on the cheek. “Thanks,” she said.

  “Why?”

  “For the greatest and scariest experience of my life.”

  Cameron smiled. “Stick around, Susan. And you’ll be kissing me every day.”

  The couple walked around the temple, reaching the tunnellike entrance to the left side, by the stone pillar, where only two days ago they had been threatened by Strokk and the terrorists as they tried to make their way into the jungle. Now that same spot was being guarded by a pair of Navy SEALs, who turned their camouflaged faces at them, eyes narrowing in suspicion.

  “Hi,” Susan said. “We’re the ones who were trapped down there.”

  One of the SEALs looked toward the temple and back at the scientists in their soiled clothes. “Ma’am?” he said. “How did you…?”

  “Long story,” said Cameron, putting an arm around Susan, who also ran an arm behind him as they walked side by side, her thumb stuck into his back pocket.

  “But quite a story,” said Susan as they walked past the startled SEALs and waved at Reid and the Japanese team.

  Epilogue

  In the Year of our Lord, 1999, the Earth continued to rotate along its longitudinal axis relative to the Sun, just as it had for the past 4.5 billion years, along an eternal path defined long before the Solar System was born, long before a spinning nebula of boiling gas shot away from billions of exploding stars and became its own galaxy, the Milky Way; long before the entire universe, an infinitesimal mass of super-heavy matter, began to expand following the cosmos’s most phenomenal and unequaled release of galactic energy.

  Planet Earth continued to spin as the new millennium neared, continued to radiate the crimson energy of thousands of digital clocks counting down to the sequence of numbers that would bring total planetary alignment with a distant life-form, one whom none of the scientists involved in this historic quest could even begin to dream about, for it existed far before everything else known to mankind, and it would exist long after the Sun expanded at the end of its life and swallowed the Earth, before shrinking to a dark, smoldering mass of heavy metals.

  In the days that followed what Cameron Slater called the single most important discovery in the history of pre-Columbian studies, much activity took place both at the temple of Kinich Ahau as well as in Palenque, all directed by the original four scientists, whom together had unlocked the key to achieving galactic synchronization. Even the special envoy of scientists, deployed to the site at the request of the U.S. president to witness and record the event, followed Cameron and Susan’s direction.

  As the days leading to 01-01-00 unfolded, adding more glyphs to the cartouche, Cameron made further adjustments to the site deep within the Temple of the Inscriptions, making sure that not only the true mortal remains of Pacal Votan were deposited in the stone coffin, just as it had happened over twelve hundred years before, but also positioning the right offerings according to the information downloaded from the virus each day.

  The millennium clocks froze across the Earth, the succession of numbers required for total planetary synchronization washing the heavens from Washington, D.C., to Seoul, from Tokyo to Rio de Janeiro, from Singapore to Moscow, from Delhi to Paris. The visual energy propagated across the sky, scattering through the galaxy, acknowledging a state of readiness that matched the recent events taking place in a remote clearing in the Yucatán Peninsula, also matching a similar series of numbers from a previously unknown planet 139 light-years from Earth.

  As thousands of clocks flashed the final series of numbers, presenting it to the firmament with undeniable clarity; as the millennium came to a close, also completing the Great Cycle, the thirteenth baktun, the heavens filled with a new kind of energy, one that was immeasurable by man’s systems, but which did pulsate across the galaxy at infinite speed, crossing the boundaries of space and time, rushing through the scorching core of the Sun, and striking the third closest planet with uncanny accuracy.

  Cameron and Susan were sitting on the steps of the Temple of the Inscriptions when it hit, blinding at first, like a thousand high beams, but much more powerful, and warm, but not the warmth that’s associated with ambient temperature. Susan felt an inner heat, one that warmed her core, her very soul, as the light enveloped her, vanishing her surroundings, swallowing the jungle, the limestone edifices, the sky itself.

  Then a vision came to Susan Garnett, from the very distant past, and then another, this one more recent, and yet another from ten years ago. The back flashes came with no relative order, rapidly, one after the next, like in fast-forward video, but much faster and far clearer too, for every vision carried its own set of feelings, of emotions. Susan watched them all not as she had remembered or perceived that they had occurred, but as they had actually occurred, without her personal bias, envy, greed, or pride to distort reality. She found herself reliving each image, smoldering guilt or overwhelming joy expanding through her in exhausting, alternating cycles. She saw in vivid detail the pain she had inflicted on others, knowingly or not. And she also experienced the happiness that she had spread during her lifetime. But another realization chilled her, for she was judging not just what she had done or said—or failed to do or say—but also what she had thought. In fact, thoughts carried far more weight in this hazy, self-assessing courtroom than her actions, for the level of pain or joy seemed stronger, sharper.

  Consummating guilt struck her with the power of a thousand bad dreams not just from the mere acts themselves, but from witnessing the effects of such acts, of such words, of such thoughts on the people she had touched during her life. Susan’s visions came in various levels, the highest dominated by the visual memory of her life, but right beneath it, snippets of the lives of others as a result of her actions shock
ed her mind. Some visions were pleasant, satisfying, for there were many times when she had acted out of love, without the dark veil of selfishness, of anger, of greed. But other apparitions raked her mind, like a white-hot claw, slowly turning, scourging her. She saw the effects of not returning phone calls from friends, of her offending driving style, of failing to come through on a promise, of lacking benevolence as a college professor, of ignoring her parents, of forgetting to call on holidays, of being judgmental. She saw with uncanny detail every single opportunity in her life where she could have done good to others and had not, from a homeless person on the side of the road, to the old widow lady next door who just wanted company, to the collection basket at church that she would sometimes just pass on. She watched with horror how a vagrant killed himself following Susan’s stoplight speech about getting a job and not being a bum. The guilt ravaged her, eating her alive, like a predator. No, more like a cancer, for it came from within. Her heart cried out for the visions to stop when she saw that old woman next door returning to her apartment heartbroken every time Susan had pretended not to be home to avoid wasting time talking nonsense with her. And there were so many other unexpected visions that shocked her, visions from school, from her childhood, from her early married days, during her pregnancy, during the trial, when Hans Bloodaxe was carried away from the courtroom. She felt ashamed of the joy that she had felt at the time, finally achieving retribution for the murder of her family.

  Susan Garnett found that there was no place to hide from such torturing apparitions, no place to run, no way to explain or justify, no room to apologize, just unconditional acceptance of past behavior, just guilt or joy, two commanding feelings that wove themselves in a repeating cycle as her life, as they so often say, flashed before her eyes. This period of self-evaluation, reserved as the starting point of the afterlife, flooded her senses with constant appraisement, followed by either joyful praise or utter reprimand, depending on the vision.

  The swirling haze, of similar composition as the one in her dreamlike experience, spun faster and faster, like a whirling cyclone. The celestial tornado swept through Susan Garnett violently, not only exposing all of the wrong in her life, but also extracting it, like a filter, purging the bad while letting the good continue through as a part of her. Every pain-racked vision of wrongdoing, even at the smallest levels, was followed by a growing feeling of relief, of forgiveness, of renewed hope, of a promise to change.

  Only then, after she had been distilled in mind and spirit, after she had mentally atoned every impure act, or word, or thought, after her whole self had been purified to the innocence of a child, was she ready for the next step, for the next vision, one of indescribable peace, comfort, exultation. She felt a powerful being around her, within her, providing total unity, total harmony, absolute molecular synchronization. She also felt the presence of Tom and Rebecca, but their memories no longer hurt, no longer crushed her senses. They spun around her like an ethereal fog, encouraging her to go on, to fulfill her life, to remember this moment, to preserve the immaculate state of her soul.

  The mist began to recede, like the morning fog, thinning under the power of the sun, until all that remained were crystalline star-filled skies, and the peaceful serenade of the surrounding jungle as she sat on the steps of the Temple of the Inscriptions at Palenque, Cameron Slater next to her.

  The scientists stared at each other, not certain what to say or how to say it.

  “Did you…?” she began, not sure what to call the experience.

  “Yes,” he replied, holding her hand. “Every last thought.”

  They stood and gazed down at the large site, white tents pitched among the ancient ruins. People walked about in a daze, staring at the stars. She saw Troy Reid, as well as several members of her FBI team and most of the scientists from the presidential envoy, stepping out of tents, their faces looking about, gazing upward, toward the cosmos.

  “Look at them, Cameron. Look at them all.”

  “They experienced it too. All of them.”

  She checked her watch, amazed that such a deep, life-enriching experience had lasted but a minute; one minute and one second to be exact, though she wasn’t sure how she knew that. She just did, and she also knew that everyone else did as well. The sequence of numbers frozen in the millennium clocks around the world had been the final progression that had unlocked this magical experience, achieving galactic synchronization with a distant civilization. Or was it something beyond just a civilization?

  “What about out there?” she asked, pointing beyond the jungle. “Do you think everyone experienced it?” she asked, suddenly realizing that this event, like the global daily freezes, had touched every corner of the world, but not with the same intensity as in the heart of the ancient Mayan world. “It faded as it spread. We felt the full effect, but those far away did not. In fact, those in distant places may have only sensed a brief feeling of warmth, of harmony, like that of an infant being kissed by its mother. But nothing that comes close to what we’ve just witnessed. But how do I know that?”

  “Total harmonic synchronization,” said Slater, also staring in the distance. “The Maya knew this thousands of years ago, having received the entire message, like we just did, while also realizing that those from distant lands did not, and also sensing the urge to spread the word, to carry on that message across space and time. There’s even a parallel here to Jesus Christ and his apostles. Only very few got the Holy message and were asked to spread the good news to the rest of the world.”

  Susan filled her chest with the magnitude of the experience, and also with the possible explanations that it brought. “If only the Maya experienced it in its fullness, back at the beginning of the last Great Cycle, do you think that could explain the bizarre similarities between the Maya and other cultures?”

  Cameron nodded, his eyes on the starry sky. “I … I think you might have something there. It certainly fits the observations. Many people experienced this at some point back then, at the beginning of the last Great Cycle, just as we know it now. But only some civilizations were able to preserve this celestial gift, this vision, this prophecy, like the Maya. For the rest, it was lost, probably after a few generations, if that long, either because they were too far away from the source, or just because they stopped caring, or maybe got conquered by another civilization, or because of one of a thousand other reasons.”

  “Do you think mankind can keep it alive longer this time?”

  The archaeologist shrugged. “Who knows? By tomorrow I’m sure there will be some people who will offer a logical explanation for the event and try to shove it aside.” He leaned closer to her while whispering, “I wouldn’t be surprised if one of those scientists down there twists the entire thing to fit some kind of scientific model just to get himself on the cover of Newsweek.” He straightened and added, “Anyway, probably some groups will go along with that and some will not, choosing instead to hang on to the true message. I’m sure many religious groups will put their own spin on what happened here as well, trying to fit the facts with their own beliefs, though I suspect that there might be a fair degree of truth in their thinking. A part of me feels that what we experienced here today was of a supernatural nature.”

  Susan nodded. “I feel it too. Only something omnipotent could have triggered such a self-evaluating journey … I even knew how other people felt because of my actions.”

  “I know,” he said. “And some of them weren’t pleasant. But maybe … maybe it wasn’t supernatural. Perhaps it was extraterrestrial. Maybe on that tenth planet lives such an advanced civilization that we cannot even begin to imagine it, opting instead for the supernatural explanation.”

  “Perhaps,” said a female voice from behind.

  The scientists turned around and watched Ishiguro and Jackie descending the steps, hand in hand. Susan had forgotten all about them. The Japanese-Americans, who had set up their equipment at the top of the temple, the highest structure for miles around, sat nex
t to them, their faces awash with the same trancelike glow that radiated from Cameron Slater and which no doubt she also wore.

  “From a scientific perspective,” said Ishiguro Nakamura, “the technology to attempt to communicate with other civilizations is less than fifty years old. Given the age of the universe, the odds are that if another civilization could receive our messages, that civilization is quite likely to be much ahead of ours, probably thousands of years ahead. If you take what we have accomplished in the past one hundred years and extrapolate it out to a thousand, you can easily see why our world would seem like the stone age to theirs.”

  Jackie nodded. “And even a thousand years is insignificant in the larger scheme. Some civilization could have existed for much longer than that, mastering disciplines that may seem even beyond science fiction, like some of the myths that you have told us about the Maya.”

  “Mind control, transportation to other galaxies without the assistance of today’s imperfect mechanical surrogates,” said Cameron. “That’s what the Classic Maya had mastered. Galactic agents like Pacal Votan were able to comprehend this incredible gift and use it to build an entire civilization.”

  “Until the Europeans came,” said Susan, frowning. “Their arrogance prevented them from understanding this incredible blessing, choosing instead to burn, to enslave, to eradicate.”

  “But Pacal’s son foresaw this and used his ruling years to build a secret temple to preserve the gift from the likes of Diego de Landa, who burned so many records, so much history.” Cameron looked up the steps, toward the temple atop the pyramid.

  “What’s going to happen to the hidden site in the Petén?” asked Jackie.

  “It never existed,” replied Susan. “It’s back in the hands of its rightful owners. One of the priests survived, but more than that, everyone in that village experienced what we just did. They have been injected with the gift to preserve it for another 5,129 years.”