Xibalba

CHAPTER 22

Kasey returned the next morning, right on schedule, setting the ersatz Red Cross helicopter down in the clearing Maddock and Bones had hacked out shortly after arriving. Maddock was expecting another hurried take-off, so was a little surprised when Kasey cut power and hopped out before the rotors could wind down.

She held out a satellite phone. “It’s for you.”

Maddock took the phone and held it to his ear. “Maddock, here.”

After a second or two — the time it took for the signal to bounce through the satellite network to its destination and back again — Tam Broderick’s familiar voice sounded in his ear, though her tone was lacking its usual wry humor. “Did Dr. Bell find what he was looking for?”

Bones probably would have countered by chiding Tam for rushing past a polite greeting and an inquiry about their good health, but Maddock sensed that Tam was in no mood for jokes, much less rebukes. “More or less,” he said. “We found the City of Shadow and just maybe solved the mystery of what happened to the Maya civilization.”

“Tell me exactly what you found.”

“Evidence of a plague outbreak of some kind. Bell calls it ‘the Shadow.’” He gave a quick summary of the previous day’s exploration of the pyramid temple to the Lords of Xibalba. “So,” he finished. “Are you ready to tell me what’s really going on? What’s your interest in all this? Is the Dominion trying to get their hands on a bioweapon?”

Tam’s task force — the Myrmidons — had been created for the express purpose of rooting out and destroying the international quasi-religious far-right criminal organization known collectively as the Dominion. A few years earlier, Maddock and his crew of ex-military treasure hunters had joined the Myrmidons to stop a Dominion plot to launch a cataclysmic attack against the United States using a mysterious technology discovered in the ruins of ancient Atlantis.

There was another long silence, too long to be simply attributed to satellite lag, Tam spoke again. “Not the Dominion,” she said with a sigh. “Another old friend. ScanoGen.”

The name brought back a rush of bad memories.

Maddock’s first meeting with Tam Broderick had been in the Amazon jungle, on the trail of missing explorer Percy Fawcett and the mythic lost city of “Z.” Tam, at the time an FBI special agent, had been working undercover at a biotech company run by the brutish Salvatore Scano. Scano, who had partnered with Dominion operatives, was chasing rumors of a chemical compound that could turn men into mindless, and nearly unstoppable, killing machines, a search which had put him on a collision course with Maddock.

“I thought ScanoGen was kaput,” Maddock replied after overcoming his initial shock. “Isn’t Salvatore Scano in prison?”

“He is. His psychopathic spawn, Alex, is now running the show.”

“Ah. So the apple didn’t fall far from the rotten tree.”

“Pretty much. Other than being a spoiled pharma-bro, Alex is the spitting image of his dad. He even has the same delusions of grandeur.”

Maddock recalled that Tam’s cover at ScanoGen had placed her very close to both Salvatore Scano and his son. If anyone was qualified to make that judgment, it was she.

“Under Alex’s leadership,” she went on, “ScanoGen has continued to pursue research into exotic organic compounds, with a particular interest in ethnopharmacology — herbal medicines and other traditional knowledge from isolated or extinct societies. That’s how I learned about Dr. Bell’s search for Xibalba. ScanoGen is one of his primary financial backers.”

Maddock glanced over at Bell and Miranda, both of whom were standing close enough to overhear his side of the conversation. He chose his words carefully. “I wasn’t aware of that connection.”

“I doubt Dr. Bell realizes what Alex Scano has planned for his research. To be honest, I wasn’t completely sure that Scano was up to no good, which is why I kept this on the down-low. That and the fact that, technically speaking, this is outside my jurisdiction.”

Now Maddock understood. Tam’s history with ScanoGen and her feelings about Alex Scano were a matter of record, and absent any demonstrable connection to the Dominion, an investigation into Scano’s activities might easily be construed as a witch-hunt.

“Well, I’m afraid I haven’t seen anything to confirm your worst suspicions,” Maddock said.

He expected either relief or disappointment, but instead, Tam’s tone remained grave. “I’m afraid I have. While you’ve been playing Tarzan of the Jungle, I’ve been keeping an eye on ScanoGen, and they’re definitely up to something. Under the guise of offering emergency medical support, they put a research team in Honduras ostensibly to help stop an outbreak of a disease that sounds suspiciously like Dr. Bell’s Shadow.”

“You do know that Tarzan was set in… I’m sorry, did you say Honduras?”

“I did,” Tam said. “Your little jaunt to Copán put you practically on the edge of the hot zone, which is why I don’t think any of this is a coincidence. I think Scano is looking for the Shadow, probably so he can turn it into a bio-weapon. Or maybe he already has it, and Honduras was just a test. Either way, we cannot let him get his hands on the source.”

Maddock considered this for a moment. “If what you say about Honduras is true, then he’s already got it.”

“Maybe not. Last night, his offshore research facility went up in smoke. And that Honduran village at the center of the outbreak is gone too. Scorched earth. Unless I miss my guess, Scano is back at square one, which means the next stop on his itinerary is the City of Shadow.”

“I told you. We destroyed what we think was the only supply of that fungus.”

“Are you absolutely certain of that?”

Maddock frowned, recalling Bell’s assertion that the true source of the Shadow fungus lay in some hidden cave system — the Underworld, realm of the demonic Lords of Xibalba. “Owing you a favor is one thing, but I draw the line at crawling around the jungle in search of the fungus of bloody pus and jaundiced death. If certain is what you want, I say nuke the entire site from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure.”

“Cute, but I’m not sure I’d get very far with that recommendation based on what little actual evidence we’ve got. But if you can get me something concrete, I’ll send in the Marines and a great big bucket of napalm.”

He sighed. “I’ll talk to Bell. Maybe there’s something we missed.”

“I’ll have Kasey stick with you for the duration. I’m sorry I can’t do more.”

“Right. But just so we’re clear, you—”

The phone beeped in his ear, indicating that Tam had hung up.

“Owe me one,” he finished, shaking his head.

Bones shook his head in mock despair. “She suckered you in again, didn’t she?”

Maddock ignored him and turned to Bell.

“I heard you mention ScanoGen,” Bell said. “They’re one of my most generous sponsors. Is that a problem?”

“It might be,” Maddock admitted. “When you wrote your grant proposal, did you share your theory about the Lords of Xibalba representing a plague?”

“It’s the central thesis of my work.”

“Well, that explains why you had no trouble getting them to fund your research. It sounds like Alex Scano is trying to find a way to weaponize the Shadow fungus.” He threw a glance in Bones’ direction. “You might get your Maya apocalypse after all. Just a few years late.”

“Please, tell me you didn’t just volunteer us to go looking for it,” Bones replied.

“We just need a location.” He turned back to Bell. “The exact location of Xibalba.”

“So you can destroy it?” Bell put a hand on Maddock’s forearm. “There’s more to the story of Xibalba than just the plague. In the myth, the Hero Twins journeyed to the Underworld to defeat the Lords of Death. And they escaped alive.”

“Defeat?”

“Xibalba isn’t just the source of the Shadow. It’s also where we’ll find the means to stop it.”

Maddock felt as if a light had just been switched on. “Now it all makes sense,” he murmured. “Scano already has his bioweapon. The only thing he’s missing is the cure. We have to find it first.”

Angel made a face. “Does that mean we’re going back in there?”

“We must have missed something yesterday,” Bell said, nodding. “According to the Popol Vuh, after passing through the three rivers, a person seeking to enter Xibalba would reach a crossroads — four roads that would try to confuse and trick the pilgrim. And once past that, they would enter the council place of the Lords of Xibalba.”

“The stelae?”

“That’s what I thought at first, but maybe we made a wrong turn somewhere without realizing it. In the legend, the Lords tried to trick travelers with lifelike effigies. Maybe that’s what those stelae were — false choices.”

“Crossroads,” Miranda murmured.

Maddock turned to her. “You got something?”

“Maybe.” She knelt and took out her laptop computer. “I noticed this when I was reviewing the footage from my GoPro. It didn’t seem important at the time, but… ”

She trailed off as the video file began playing. She fast-forwarded to the moment where they descended the stairs into the courtyard with the ten stelae, and then slowed the replay to one-quarter speed. After a few seconds of this, she stopped and reversed back a few frames. “There.”

Maddock studied the frozen image, which captured all ten of the statues representing the Lords of Xibalba. “The stelae. What am I supposed to be looking for?”

“Not the stelae,” she said. “The floor. Don’t you see it?”

Maddock shifted his focus to the shadowy textures of the decorated floor. At a glance, it looked identical to the repeating patterns they had seen in the other chambers of the pyramid. Bell however immediately saw what his daughter was talking about.

“It’s a map!”

Maddock squinted, but it wasn’t until Bell traced the image with a finger that the outline of a landmass came into focus. It was subtle, and impossible to see except at a distance, but it was there, filling up the entire vast chamber. “That’s the Yucatan.”

Bell nodded enthusiastically. “Not just the Yucatan. Most of Mexico and Central America is represented here. This is unprecedented. There are no known examples of cartography in pre-Columbian antiquity.”

“No maps at all?” Bones said. “How did they know where to go?”

“They obviously did have maps,” Bell said. “The Spanish must have destroyed them all. But as far as getting around is concerned, the Maya, like the Roman Empire, built roads. They called them sacbeob: ‘white roads.’” He shifted his finger, tracing lines on different parts of the image. Against the backdrop of the map, the enormous stela, seemed small and insignificant. “The white roads connected the major commercial and religious centers. Here’s Copán.” He tapped more spots on the screen, which Maddock now recognized as distinctive glyphs like the star sign they had seen in the El Caracol observatory at Chichén Itzá.

“I’ve seen ancient maps,” Angel said. “They don’t look anything like what we have today. How did the ancient Maya get such an accurate picture of the Yucatan?”

“Just like the Nazca lines,” Bones said. “It’s easy to see from up in the sky.”

“The Maya were expert mathematicians and astronomers,” Bell said, patiently. “They had centuries to make precise observations and calculations.”

Miranda rolled her eyes. “Please don’t tell me you guys buy into that ancient alien astronaut crap.”

Angel’s face tightened as she fought to hold back laughter. Maddock just grinned. “Do the stelae mark our present location?”

Bell ran the video forward several minutes to the point in time where they had examined the carvings up close, then froze it again and pointed to a tile near the statues. “There. That’s the glyph for Serpens. The Serpents Maw.”

“Also known as Ciudad de Sombre.”

“If this is accurate, they’re actually marking a spot a bit to the south of where we are. And there’s a second road system leading directly here from each of the capitals.”

“Black roads?” Maddock suggested.

Bell nodded. “It’s as good a name as any. And here… ” He traced another line leading into the circle of statues. “This is the route to Xibalba.”

“Wait, so now you’re saying the City of Shadow isn’t the entrance to Xibalba?”

That took Bell’s enthusiasm down a notch. He ducked his head in embarrassment. “Evidently, I misinterpreted the legend in that respect. Ciudad de Sombre is the gateway to the Underworld in a figurative sense, but not the literal entrance.”

“Sort of like St. Louis is the gateway to the west,” Bones muttered. “So where do we go next?”

“Not far, I should think.” Bell tapped the image of the stelae. “This is somewhere in the Petén region, south of Tikal. A hundred miles or so. Unfortunately, this could represent an area of several hundred square miles.”

“So the map really isn’t going to help much.”

“Unless I’m mistaken, the purpose of this map was to instruct travelers to follow the black road. I’d be willing to bet that road starts right where we came out of the temple yesterday.”

“Only the road is completely overgrown now.”

“The white roads were discovered and mapped by NASA, using remote sensing and GIS technology,” Bell said, hopefully. “Perhaps we can do the same.”

“It’s gonna take more than Google Earth,” Maddock said. “Looks like I’m going to owe Jimmy a whole case of Wild Turkey.”

“One case?” The long distance Skype connection in no way diminished the disdain in Jimmy Letson’s nasally voice. “Maddock, you’re so far in debt to me that I’ll die of alcohol poisoning if I let you pay me in booze.”

“What if we threw in some Cheetos?” Bones said.

Maddock grinned. “Hard work is its own reward, Jimmy. You live for big challenges.”

Jimmy grunted. “Well, you’re not completely wrong. But as challenges go, this one barely rates.”

Maddock knew Jimmy wasn’t bragging, at least, not much. It had taken him less than an hour to come back with an answer — barely enough time for them to get settled into their hotel room in Belize City where Kasey had established cover for all of them as Red Cross relief workers.

“Allow me to direct your attention to exhibit one,” Jimmy went on.

A browser window opened on the computer, revealing a satellite photo-map of Central America. The picture zoomed in close on the mostly green mass of land that was the Guatemalan rain forest. The image froze and then changed to what looked almost like a photographic negative of the same image, except that now a series of lines and shapes — all too regular and uniform to be naturally occurring — were visible. “That is the City of Shadow,” Jimmy said.

Bell was suitably impressed. “This is remarkable. How did you obtain this imagery?”

“He hacked it,” Bones said with a shrug. “It’s what he does.”

Maddock shot his friend an annoyed glance. While no one in the room was under any illusions about the illicit nature of Jimmy’s activity, some discretion seemed advisable, particularly since both Kasey and Miranda were officers of the federal government.

Jimmy, however, didn’t seem particularly concerned with being outed. “The CIA commissioned a LIDAR survey of the area a couple years back. They were looking for—”

“That’s not important right now,” Maddock said quickly, cutting him off. “Let’s focus on finding the black road.”

An arrow-shaped cursor floated over the map, settling on the largest square. “This is the pyramid you explored.” A white outline appeared to highlight the temple. “And here is where you came out.”

Maddock saw not one, but four distinct lines radiating out from the side of the pyramid, similarly accentuated.

“The crossroads,” Bell said, as if reading his mind. “Only one of them is correct.”

“True, but they all appear to go somewhere.” The image zoomed out again, revealing how the roads curled around the outskirts of the city before diverging in different directions only to terminate abruptly at seemingly random intervals. Jimmy zoomed in on each of them in turn, revealing more structures — square buildings and round cisterns — all invisible to the unaided eye.

“The southern route,” Bell said. “That will be the one.”

The screen resolution bobbed and jumped and then settled on the terminus of a trail that followed a more or less true line to the south of the City of Shadow, but unlike the others, there appeared to be no hidden ruins at the site. It was also the only black road route that came anywhere near an inhabited area, just twenty miles or so from what appeared to be a fairly large city. The surrounding region had been mostly deforested and divided up into agricultural plots.

“I’m afraid that’s the one site that’s already been discovered,” Jimmy said. “The Naj Tunich cave.”

Bell seemed unfazed by the caveat. “Naj Tunich. Of course. That has to be it.” He turned to Maddock, his enthusiasm back in full force. “Naj Tunich was only discovered about forty years ago. It’s an enormous cave system, adorned with hundreds of paintings and hieroglyphic texts. It was a major pilgrimage site for the Maya, associated with the Underworld and Xibalba. In fact, one of the inner caves is called Mictlan Ch'en—Cave of the Underworld. There are still several unexplored passages, including a five hundred foot deep vertical shaft at the end of one passage. It’s one of the deepest caves in Central America. That has got to be entrance to Xibalba.”

Maddock thought it sounded like a long shot, but Bones just shrugged. “It’s close to beer for a change.”

“I suppose it wouldn’t be the first time we found something hidden in plain sight,” Maddock said with a sigh. “All right, Jimmy. Send me the GPS coordinates for the other three points, just in case.”

“Will do.” An electronic tone signaled the end of the Skype call, but the LIDAR image remained on the screen.

Maddock turned to Bell. “So what can we expect in Xibalba? More tests?”

Bell nodded. “Xibalba literally means ‘the place of fear.’ The Hero Twins had to make their way through six ‘houses,’ each of which seems to correspond to a primal fear. Dark House. Blade House. Shivering House, sometimes called Cold House, which is said to be full of bone-chilling cold and rattling hail. There’s also Jaguar House, Bat House, and Hot House. And that’s just to reach the part of Xibalba where the Lords of Death reside.”

“Right. So lots of chances to get killed. And that’s aside from insects and snakes and tropical parasites. And a five hundred foot long vertical descent in an unexplored cave.” He cast a meaningful glance at Angel. “I don’t suppose I can convince anyone to stay here where it’s safe.”

Bones, his expression completely deadpan, started to raise his hand, but Angel slapped it down. “Not a chance, Maddock,” she said, firmly. “Besides, if experience has taught me anything, it’s that I’m safer with you.”

Maddock prayed she was right about that.