Dustin Thomason - 12.21

“We need samples of all of these to test,” Stanton said. “The exact species the ancient people used to eat.”

“Where would we get that?” asked Rolando. “Even if you could find them in the forest, how would we know it was the same species?”

“Archaeologists have extracted residues from pottery,” Chel interjected. “They’ve found trace evidence of dozens of different plant species on a single bowl.”

“Inside tombs?” Stanton asked.

Victor stood up and walked toward the door to the lab. “Excuse me,” he said. “I’m going to the washroom.”

“Use the one in my office,” Chel suggested.

He left without a word, seeming not to have heard her. He was acting strangely. A sad possibility suddenly occurred to Stanton; he would have to check the old professor’s eyes for signs of VFI.

Chel said, “We have to go down there.”

“Where exactly?” Rolando asked.

“The opposite direction of Lake Izabal,” she said. “From Kiaqix.”

Paktul wrote that he would lead the children in the direction of his ancestors, and elsewhere in the codex, he’d written that his father hailed from a great lake beside the ocean . Lake Izabal in east Guatemala was the only one fitting that description anywhere in the vicinity.

“If he led them toward Izabal,” Chel said, “and they ended up at Kiaqix, we have to assume the lost city’s less than three days’ walk in the opposite direction.”

“Izabal is enormous,” Rolando said. “Hundreds of square miles. The range of that trajectory could be huge.”

“It has to be somewhere in there,” Stanton said.

The lab door opened again. It was Victor. He wasn’t alone.

IN THE SECONDS THAT FOLLOWED, CHEL CAME TO A SERIES OF terrible realizations. First, that one of the men with Victor was his friend from the Museum of Jurassic Technology, who’d once advised the ladino military. Then, that the two men trailing Colton Shetter—dressed identically to him, in white shirts, black pants, and boots—were dragging a rolling metal warehouse cart between them.

So when Rolando asked, “What’s going on, Victor?” Chel already knew.

They were here to take the codex from her.

Victor had let these people in. He had picked up the phone, called security down the hill, and gotten them waved by.

Chel circled to the front of the light tables, putting herself between the men and the codex. Through her jeans, the cold edges of the metal table pressed into the backs of her legs.

Taking a step into the room, Shetter turned to Victor. “I assume those plates behind her are what we’ve come for.”

Victor nodded.

“Who the fuck are these people?” Rolando demanded. He and Stanton were still behind Chel on the other side of the boards.

“Dr. Manu,” Shetter said, “we will appreciate your and your colleagues’ cooperation. Mark and David have to pack up the plates. I know how fragile they are, so we want to be as careful as possible. I need you to go back and stand with your team.” Reaching into his waistband, Shetter pulled out a gun, then casually held it at his side. It was so small that it looked like a toy.

“What are you doing?” Victor asked him.

“Making sure we get what we came for,” Shetter said. “I’m sorry, Daykeeper, but I can tell it’s necessary.”

Chel glanced at the intercom panel. There were fifteen feet between where she stood and that wall, but to get there she’d have to make it past Shetter’s men. They started to walk toward her, pulling the warehouse cart behind them like little boys with a sled. She stayed where she was.

She would die here before she would move.

“Why are you doing this, Victor?” Stanton asked from behind her. “What the hell is going on?”

Victor ignored him. When he finally spoke, it was only to his protégée. “Listen to me, Chel. You can come with us. We’re going to the land of the ancients. To your true home. But we must have the book. All we can do now is run, Chel.”

She felt tears streaming down her cheeks. “You’re gonna have to kill me, Victor.”

She was wiping her tears on her sleeve when Rolando made his move. She didn’t see him dart across the room toward the intercom. She only heard the noise that brought him down before he got there.

And the silence after.

Chel ran to him. It seemed to take forever to cross the room. No one tried to stop her.

She didn’t see the blood until she was holding his head in her lap. His hand clutched his belly. Chel covered it with her own.

Shetter’s gun was still pointed in their direction. The look on his face belied the steadiness of his arm. Even he seemed surprised by what he’d done.

“I’m a doctor,” Stanton said, starting to move. “Let me help him!”

“Stay where you are,” Shetter commanded.

“Take what you want and go,” Stanton said. “But let me help him.” He started to inch over, and, when Shetter didn’t stop him, he moved faster. Shetter kept the gun trained on the three of them.

Chel pressed down on Rolando’s wound. The blood continued to gush. She whispered to him. Trying to keep him conscious.

Victor stood frozen behind Shetter. Silent.

“Get the plates,” Shetter commanded his men.

It took them less than a minute to load up the codex plates and get them out of the room. The two silent men left first, then Shetter.

He turned at the door. “Coming, Daykeeper?” He was confident enough in the answer that he didn’t stay to find out.

Victor stood there, watching Stanton hold pressure on Rolando’s wound with one hand and deliver chest compressions with the other.

Chel held Rolando’s head in her lap. She’d streaked blood from his wound into his hair, and she tried not to stare at the pool spreading beneath them.

“Chel…” Victor finally said. “I didn’t know he had a gun. I’m so sorry. I—”

“You did this, Victor. You did this. Get out!”

He turned to leave the room. At the doorway he stopped to whisper back to her, “In Lak’ech .” Then he was gone.

A minute later, from her place on the floor with Rolando, Chel saw a flash of the truck’s headlights playing against the lab windows as it vanished into the night.

She knew she would never see Victor or the codex again. And those would be the last words he ever spoke to her.

I am you, and you are me.

THROUGH CLOUDS OF ASH FROM THE WILDFIRES IN THE SANTA MONICA Mountains, a trio of F-15s in formation roared, leaving contrails in the gray night sky.

Two hours after Victor quietly escorted Shetter and his men past Getty security, Chel stared out the car window in silence. The Pacific Coast Highway looked like a run-down used-car lot—hundreds of vehicles wrecked or out of gas and abandoned, barely allowing a path through.

There’d been nothing she or Stanton could do to save Rolando. They were all covered in blood by the time Stanton had given up trying to revive him. Chel cradled Rolando’s head for nearly twenty minutes, saying a Qu’iche prayer for safe delivery to the overworld into his ear.

She and Stanton still hadn’t spoken a word about what had happened. But they both knew what they had to do.

Stanton pulled his Audi off the highway toward Santa Monica State Beach. The sand was empty. Only a single vehicle sat in the parking lot: He’d called Davies and arranged to meet him here.

Stanton was surprised when he saw another man step out of the car with his partner. “What’s up, Doc?” Monster said.

“I was worried about you, man,” Stanton said. “Where’d you go?”

“Cops kicked us out of the Show, so the little Electric Lady and I found ourselves a hideout in the tunnel beneath the Santa Monica Pier. You have no idea how useful a woman who can make her own light is down there.”