“That’s the temple?” Hawker asked.
“The island is the temple; the cenote is the Mirror.”
“Why do you call it the Mirror?”
Father Domingo nodded. “The water is like glass. Like any mirror it shows us who we are.”
Hawker tried to take it all in. “Where’s the stone? The others were hidden.”
“Get onto the island. The Temple of the Jaguar is a simple place. Up close you will see what looks like a common drinking well. But it is different. Instead of dropping a bucket and working to pull it out, a system of counterweights was developed. All you must do is release the lever. The weights will drop, the shield of rock will move apart, and the stone will be brought up to you.”
“You’ve been there.” He guessed.
Father Domingo nodded. “I have seen it. I have touched it.”
“Last of the Brotherhood,” Hawker said, admiringly.
A gleam appeared in Father Domingo’s eye. “I should hope not,” he said, staring at Hawker.
Hawker didn’t know what to think. All he knew was that he had to get away from San Ignacio as fast as possible, to lure their pursuers in one direction and make his way in the other. “Thank you for trusting us.”
The priest stood and took a sip from a glass of water. “The Mayan people that I know would tell you this day is not doomsday but a day of transformation. Perhaps like many transformations it will be painful, even destructive. But they believe it will lead to a new dawn.”
“What do you think?” Hawker asked.
Father Domingo looked to the Bible at his bedside. “When he was on the earth, the Lord told us that he would make all things new again. He did this through his death and resurrection, and by granting us the faith to believe we could do the same. Painful, destructive, but leading to a new dawn. So who am I to say this isn’t another way of his making?”
Hawker stood to go. “I just wonder why they didn’t design these things to do what they’re supposed to do automatically.”
“You’ve said they are machines, sent here to save us?” Father Domingo replied, echoing an earlier conversation.
“Some people think so,” Hawker admitted.
Father Domingo smiled. “My son, even God requires an affirmative act of faith. Machines cannot save us alone. We must have a part to play. It seems that part is yours.”
Hawker did not know if he had the faith everyone was placing in him, but he had no time left to worry about it. “I have to go,” he said.
“I will pray for your safety,” Father Domingo said. “Vaya con Dios.”
A moment later, Hawker was leaving the village, sneaking out of town two hours before dawn, the stone and the pellet secured in his pack.
In a small house near the edge of the village, Yuri awoke in the darkness. He had heard something, as if someone had shouted. But there was no sound around him, no light or noise. The other children slept, some of them breathing loudly, but there was no movement.
And yet he could feel movement.
He sat up and looked around. He was certain now; he could hear it again. He could feel it.
Carefully, he picked his way across the room and looked out the window. There was no light, but there were colors to be seen. He could see it off in the hills just past the edge of town: The siren was moving.
He found his clothes, put on his shoes, and snuck out the door.
CHAPTER 61
At the helipad in Campeche, armed men piled into the bay of the Skycrane, taking seats and stowing their weapons. There were twenty men in all, followed by their leader, who strode calmly up the ramp, most of his body wrapped in what looked like Kevlar armor.
Kang stepped aboard the Skycrane and looked into the hearts of his men. They had no fear of what was ahead, but they regarded him with a sense of foreboding. He was a man encased in a machine now and they were not sure what to make of it.
He turned toward the cockpit, finally getting used to the speed at which the hydraulic actuators responded to the electrical input from his own nerves. At first it had felt too quick, as if he were being shoved around by some will other than his own. But now that he was used to it, Kang had begun to revel in it.
In the suit, he had the strength of a bear and the quickness of a cat. He had already decided that once he was healed he would continue to develop this suit and use it as he saw fit. He had been right all along. The machines would save him.
“We will find the boy and the other stones,” he said to his men. “And we will take them without pity. And when we return, there will be fortunes waiting for you all.”
A cheer went up from the men, instinctive, unplanned for, like soldiers from the dynasties of old. They had just needed their leader back and now that they had him, Kang knew they would follow him to the end.
He motioned to the pilot and the engines began to roar.
CHAPTER 62
All through the night, Danielle had worked to stabilize McCarter, rigging IVs that she hung from a lampstand, cleaning and dressing his wound, and dosing him with antibiotics. Shortly after Hawker left, Father Domingo had come down to help and sometime around dawn, the fever had broken. McCarter wasn’t out of the woods yet, but she believed he would survive and recover.
Relieved by his progress, she’d rested, until being awoken by the church bells ringing across the street. Was it Sunday? She had no idea.
She checked her patient. He was doing well, lying on the floor of the small guesthouse, conscious now.
“You’re awake,” she said.
He strained to get the words out. “Who can sleep with all those bells?”
He had a point. The church bells were ringing rather insistently.
Insistently.
Danielle sprang to her feet, suddenly realizing that the bells could be a warning. She grabbed her gun and ran outside.
A pair of armed men waited there, aiming weapons at her. Two others held a couple of the town folk as hostages, and an older man, who seemed like their leader, stood off to one side.
“Put it down,” the scruffy-faced leader said.
She dropped the pistol as he walked toward her. “I’m Ivan Saravich,” he said. “And you have something that belongs to me.”
Twenty miles away, Hawker was picking his way toward the fourth ridge. He had hiked through the night, one hour on, ten minutes off. Upon crossing a small canyon, he’d taken a slight detour and flung the radioactive pellet down into it. If he was lucky Kang’s men would track the pellet to the canyon and begin a search there. With all the nooks and caves he’d seen, it might be awhile before they knew they’d been had.
Since then he’d come five miles, though exhaustion was slowing his pace considerably. He stumbled on, scratched and cut from the briars and thornbushes, drenched in grime and sweat. He was exhausted, trudging forward, not thinking anymore, not looking at anything but the ground right in front of him.
In that semi-oblivious state, he failed to hear the sound of danger until it became too loud to ignore. A buzzing noise in the air, not a plane or a helicopter, it sounded more like a flying lawn mower.
He turned and ducked down, then glanced around, scanning sections of the sky. A mile or so behind, he spotted a small object cruising directly toward him. He knew what it was: a remotely operated drone. It meant Kang had found him.
He ran from the sound of the drone. He didn’t bother ducking or hiding in the scrub; the drone had seen him. His only hope was to get to some real cover. The ridge-line up ahead looked like a possibility.