Black Sun

EPILOGUE

Arnold Moore stepped out of a gray four-wheel-drive Humvee with the USAF logo stamped on the door. He stared at the open expanse that stretched out before him. It was the same type of barren terrain he’d seen on the journey between Groom Lake air base and Yucca Mountain, with one minor difference. This was the desert in its natural state — unscarred by bomb craters, piles of rubble, or endless rounds of weapons testing.

In the distance, whitish salt flats shimmered in the morning sun. Beyond them lay rugged mountains the color of chocolate, as if the endless waves of heat had blackened them over time.

To his surprise, Moore found it beautiful, majestic, awe inspiring.

As he admired the scenery, a second man exited the Humvee behind him. Moore turned to Nathanial Ahiga. “Ready for a hike?”

“I really think I’ve had enough of climbing,” Ahiga said.

“No ladders this time,” Moore said. “I promise you.”

With Ahiga following, Moore took to a winding trail that snaked up the side of a weathered hill, about a hundred and fifty feet high.

“I thought you might want to see this,” Moore said. “In a way it was your idea.”

“My idea?” Ahiga said.

Moore nodded. “I was trying to figure out what we should do, based on what they sent back to us. You told me it was the other way around. That our descendants weren’t asking us to do anything, but were responding to what we asked of them. That being the case, I thought we’d better send them a message. Just to be sure.”

They crested the hill. Ahead of them, a deep circular section had been hollowed out. In the center, a hundred feet below, stood a tall, thin obelisk, gleaming like polished silver.

“You’re leaving them a marker,” Ahiga said.

“The Maya called them Stelle,” Moore said. “According to McCarter they carved stones like this around most of their major monuments. Ours is made of hardened titanium, covered with a layer of clear Kevlar, but the principle’s the same.”

He pointed to the side facing them. Markings could be seen in the surface.

“The larger details of what occurred have been engraved on its sides, laser cut and protected, in four different languages. English, Russian, Chinese, and — out of respect for those who kept the legend alive — Mayan hieroglyphics.”

“The Brotherhood of the Jaguar,” Ahiga said.

Moore nodded. The small sect had kept the truth alive as they journeyed from South America to the jungles of the Yucatan and the surrounding countries. Protecting the secret of the stones, passing it on in the best way they could, energized by the feeling given to them by the stones themselves.

In some ways Moore, Danielle, and McCarter had themselves become members of the Brotherhood. Certainly, as he looked back on it now, Moore found many of his own decisions irrational, even if they were ultimately, desperately needed.

In some strange way, he’d felt a sense of fulfillment and release only as he watched the laser cutting the glyphs into the sides of the marker. He knew then he was doing his best to pass the message on.

Was it the influence of the stones and the effect they had on his brain chemistry, or was it his own sense of duty?

He couldn’t be sure. Ultimately he’d decided that it didn’t matter. Certainly others had made the decision to help without such influence, Hawker and Ahiga chief among them.

Remembering that, Moore turned back to the scientist.

“Thank you,” he said, “for what you did.”

The old Navajo shook his head. “For giving me a chance to help the world? I should be thanking you.”

Moore didn’t feel that way, but he understood what the man was saying.

At the edge of the hollowed-out section a large crane swung a bucket of fill dirt into position and released it, allowing it to cascade down the side of the crater.

“Why are you burying it?” Ahiga asked.

“For the same reason we’re keeping it all a secret,” Moore said. “We’re not sure that the world at large is ready to comprehend it yet. But this way, the people who need this information should find it about a hundred years before they decide to do something about it.”

Ahiga cocked his head.

“The erosion in this valley is ninety-five percent wind driven,” Moore explained. “It progresses at an extremely consistent rate. About a thousand years from now, the bulk of this hill will be scoured away and the obelisk will begin to appear.”

Ahiga looked out over the barren plain. “What if no one’s here to see it?”

“Three others are being set up,” Moore explained. “One each in Russia, China, and Mexico. In addition, each marker contains a small nuclear core, an atomic clock — like those on the Voyager spacecraft — and a transmitter. If no one has found these things by the time they’re needed, the markers will begin broadcasting a signal to draw someone to them. Inside, stored in multiple formats, is everything we know about the stones.”

Ahiga put his hands in his pockets and looked out over the expanse once again. He seemed pleased.

“Symmetry,” he said. “They sent us four stones that were transmitting signals. We send them four that are doing the same. I like it.”

Moore liked, it too.

“Any worries?”

“Tons of them,” Moore said. “I worry about everything I ever do. But this …” He waved a hand over the hollowed-out mountain, and the obelisk slowly being buried within it.

“Nathanial, this is the first message I’ve ever sent that I’m certain will be received.”