Ruins (3 page)

The sharp crack of a gunshot drove a spike of sound through the echoing rooms.

Logically, Cassandra knew the shadowy men couldn't be close. She had to be far ahead of them. She must have lost them in the twisting and turning passages, but her fear drove her faster and faster down the sloping ramp ... until the passageway opened into a grotto of wonders, glimpsed only briefly.

Glass panels on the walls around her reflected arrays of crystal spheres, gleaming shapes, metal strips laid down in geometric paths along limestone blocks. But she caught only a peripheral blink of everything around her before her flashlight winked out, as if something had con-sumed its electrical power, sucked its batteries dry, in the same way as her microcassette had been mysteriously erased.

Cassandra swallowed hard, feeling claustrophobic, lost. She staggered forward blindly, sweeping her hands in front of her, searching for a landmark. Her questing hands encountered an opening, a small doorway. She staggered through it, hoping to find some source of light.

A brilliant glare washed around her, and in an instant Cassandra saw that she had crossed into a dead-end room the size of a closet... or a coffin. Blazing illumina-tion flooded from behind smooth, glassy walls.

Too late, Cassandra wondered if this fate might not be worse than the men with guns.

Icy, cold light cascaded over her like liquid, freezing hard—and all of her thoughts ceased.

FBI Headquarters, Washington, B.C. Tuesday, 9:14 a.m.

Every time Special Agent Dana Scully ven-tured into the bowels of FBI Headquarters to see her partner, Fox Mulder, she felt as if she were doing something illicit—or at least unwise.

She remembered the first time she had come here to Mulder's private sanctum, a fresh young field agent inex-plicably assigned to the X-Files. "No one down here but the FBI's most unwanted," he had called by way of intro-duction. At the time, Agent Mulder had considered her a spy for Bureau higher-ups who did not condone his pas-sionate interest in unexplained phenomena.

Now, after three years of working together, Scully and Mulder had investigated dozens of cases and relied on each other's help more times than they could count. Mulder's belief in the supernatural and extraterrestrials remained unshaken, while Scully remained just as steadfast in her search for rational explanations. Though they frequently did not agree on their conclusions, they performed extraor-dinarily well as a team.

Scully visited her partner's narrow office often enough that its dreary clutter was etched permanently in her mind. She knew exactly what to expect.

This morning the room did not disappoint her.

Debris from his unusual research lay strewn about the office: videotapes, DNA records, medical histories, close-up photos of smallpox scars on withered skin, blurry snapshots that supposedly showed evidence of flying saucers. A hunk of twisted shrapnel, purportedly from a crashed spacecraft found in Wisconsin, rested on one shelf. A dozen unsolved mysteries in open folders waited to be put to rest in the nondescript black file cabi-nets that contained Mulder's raison d'etre: the X-Files.

She knocked on the frame of the open door and stepped inside, brushing a hand through her red-gold hair. "I'm not sure I have the energy to face this chaos so early in the morning, Mulder," she said.

Mulder swiveled around in his chair, spat out a sun-flower seed, and stood up.

"Try eating more presweetened breakfast cereal," he said. "That'll give you the energy to face anything." He grinned at her.

She felt uneasy when he grinned like that, because it usually meant he had focused his attention on some new or unorthodox theory ... a theory she would most likely have to debunk.

Looking down, she noticed that he had piled his desk with archaeology texts, books on ancient mythology, and detailed maps of Central America. She tried to put all the ingredients together in a flash, because she would have to prepare herself for what her partner would propose for their next investigation.

"Take a look at this, Scully," he said, and held out an object about the size of his fist, intricately carved and pol-ished, made of a buttery, whitish-green stone. "Three guesses."

She took the heavy relic and held it in her hands. The stone's surface was polished so smooth it felt as if it had been oiled. The carving showed a sinuous serpentine form, some kind of viper bristling with large, incongru-ous feathers. Curved, needle-like fangs protruded from its mouth, giving the creature a ferocious appearance.

The artisan had been a master. The design fit exactly with the irregular contours of the chunk of rock. She ran her fingertip along one of the notches, wondering what sort of test Mulder might be putting her through.

"What do you make of it?" he said.

"I give up." She scrutinized the artifact again, but it remained a mystery. "A Christmas tree ornament?"

"Not even close."

"Okay," she said, taking the question seriously now. "I think I recognize the stone. It's jade, isn't it?"

"Very good, Scully. I didn't know they taught miner-alogy in medical school."

"I didn't know they included mineralogy in behav-ioral psychology courses either," she countered, then turned her attention back to the object. "It looks very old. Some sort of mythological figure, maybe? From the books on your desk, I would guess its origin to be ... Aztec?"

"Maya, actually," he said. "Best estimates date this piece of work to be about fifteen hundred years old. The Maya people revered jade. It was a sacred stone to them, used for only the most precious of objects."

"As valuable as gold?" Scully asked, playing along, wondering what he was getting at.

"Much more valuable. The Maya used to wear it around their loins as a cure for colic and other maladies. They even placed a piece of jade in the mouths of dead noblemen, because they believed the stone would serve him as a heart in the afterlife."

"Talk about a heart of stone." She turned the piece over in her hand. "It's obvious they put a great deal of effort and intricacy into the carving."

Mulder nodded, pushing one of the books out of the way so he could rest his elbow on his desk. "And it had to be quite a challenge for the carvers, too.

Jadeite is exceptionally hard and dense, and so craftsmen couldn't use their traditional flint or obsidian tools." He reached over to tap a fingernail against the carving in her hands. "Instead, they had to use abrasive powders and dispos-able tools, dozens of them—wooden saws, bone drills, cords drawn repeatedly across the surface to wear down small grooves. Then they polished the whole piece of jade with gourd or cane fibers. Quite a piece of work."

"Okay, Mulder, so this wasn't a simple figure whit-tled out of wood for amusement. Somebody really wanted to make this particular object. In that case I take it there's some significance to the special design? A serpent with feathers. Did the Mayans revere snakes?"

"Ah," he said. "Not exactly. You'll notice that's no ordinary snake. It's a famous mythological figure associ-ated with the god Quetzalcoatl. That's what the Aztec called him. The Maya used the name Kukulkan, a god of great wisdom.

Some sources say Kukulkan taught the Maya about calendars and astronomy."

He offered her a sunflower seed. She shook her head, so he popped it into his own mouth.

"The Maya astronomer-priests were so precise in their calculations that the accuracy of their 'primitive' calendars wasn't surpassed until this very century. They even built interlocking gear-machines to make their calendar computations based on overlapping cycles out to fifty-two years. Kukulkan must have been an exceptional teacher ... or he knew something the rest of the people didn't.

"Their mathematical abilities were extraordinary, too—in fact, they were the only ancient civilization ever to invent the concept of zero. That's important for balanc-ing your checkbook, of course."

"Not my checkbook," she said.

With some effort, Scully found a place to sit down, moving a cardboard box filled with plaster casts of huge footprints. She glanced down at the casts but decided she didn't want to risk asking about them.

"That's all very interesting, Mulder," she said, "but what does a fifteen-hundred-year-old lump of jade in the shape of a feathered serpent have to do with a case? Have people started seeing feathered snakes in their back yards? Or have you discovered some discrepancy in our calendar that can only be explained by ancient Mayan carvings?"

She handed him back the jade sculpture, and he care-fully placed it atop his Central America reference works.

"Under normal circumstances it wouldn't have any-thing to do with one of our cases," he said, "but this particular relic was recently confiscated at the border of the Mexican state of Quintana Roo, down in the Yucatan. The arrested dealer claims that this artifact came from the archaeological dig of a rediscovered Maya city deep in the jungles, a ruin called Xitaclan.

"According to official Mexican reports, there have been numerous unexplained disappearances in the area, dating back decades. And because the area is so primi-tive and isolated, you can bet plenty more of them have gone entirely undocumented."

"I'm still not sure I see the connection here, Mulder." She waited, casually crossing one leg over the other.

"Most locals won't go near the place, claiming it's cursed, or sacred ...

depending on which translation you use. Their legends tell of vicious feathered serpents, and the god Kukulkan, and the lost ghosts of sacrificial vic-tims whose blood stained the temple stones."

Scully shifted on the old, government-issue chair. "I doubt that the Bureau would consider sending us to investigate an ancient Maya curse."

"There's more to it than that." His eyes grew bright. "A team of American archaeologists had just begun excavating Xitaclan under the auspices of the University of California, San Diego. According to early reports, this one site is untouched and the key to many mysteries of Maya history. It could be the first large-scale construction their civilization attempted. Definitely the site of fre-quent sacrifices."

He smiled, as if delivering a coup de grace. "Also, my preliminary chemical analysis of this object turned.up some interesting anomalies, an odd crystalline structure, unidentifiable impurities that imply that this material did not come from the Yucatan near the ruins...."

She focused on the soft green color of the stone. "You think this thing comes from outer space?"

He shrugged and brushed a pile of damp sunflower-seed shells into his wastebasket, accidentally leaving sev-eral behind. "The archaeology team disappeared without a trace a week ago. No signal of distress, no sign of trou-ble. You and I get to go find them."

"But, Mulder, wouldn't this normally be handled by the Mexican authorities?"

Mulder said, "I also received a call yesterday from the father of Cassandra Rubicon, the young woman who led the UC-San Diego team. It seems her father's an extremely well-known archaeologist himself. He's made a few phone calls, contacted the FBI field office for San Diego. They heard the words 'ancient curse' and 'Maya ruins' and passed the case on to me." Scully me his gaze, and he raised his eyebrows. "I have a meeting vdth Skinner this afternoon. You and I are going to meet Vladimir Rubicon tomorrow. He's here, in Washington."

Scully glanced at the jade sculpture, at the mythology books, and then at the fascinated expression on Mulder's face. "I don't suppose it'll do me any good to try to talk you out of this?" she asked.

"Won't do you any good at all," he said.

"In that case, I suppose I always wanted to go to Mexico," she answered.

Assistant Director Skinner sat at his desk, ritually tap-ping his fingertips on the neatly typed forms in front of him. He did not stand when Mulder entered the room.

That's usually a bad sign, Mulder thought. On the other hand, Skinner had thrown him a curve enough times that he decided it would do no good to second-guess him.

The balding man was either a very good friend or the worst kind of enemy.

Skinner knew things and passed the information on to Mulder only when he con-sidered it important to do so.

Right now, Mulder needed to stay in Skinner's good graces. He and Scully had to get down to the Yucatan.

Skinner looked at him through wire-rimmed glasses.

"I'm not sure you realize just what a sensitive subject you've stepped into, Agent Mulder."

Mulder stood at attention in front of his superior's desk. Keeping his expression neutral, he looked at the framed photographs of the President and the Attorney General on the wall. "I intend to exercise due discretion, sir."

Skinner nodded, showing that he had already con-sidered this. "See that you do. As far as the Bureau is concerned, this is an important missing-persons case, relating to possible crimes committed upon American citizens. I have obtained for you and Agent Scully the status of LEGATS, legal attaches sent out of the country operating for the United States Embassy in Mexico City."

He held up a finger. "But bear in mind how delicate this situation is, given the current economic and political tensions. The Mexican government is always sensitive to intrusions by U.S. officials on its soil. I don't need to remind you about the number of DBA agents who have been assassinated by drug lords in Central America.

"The area you're heading into, in the state of Quintana Roo, is a political hotbed at this time. The local government is particularly vulnerable because of a vio-lent separatist movement that seems to be growing in force, thanks to an unidentified supply of weapons."

"Are you suggesting that the archaeological team might have fallen victim to political unrest?" Mulder said.

"I find that more likely than an ancient Mayan curse," Skinner said. "Or weren't you going to suggest that?"

"Maybe, maybe not," Mulder said. "We have to examine every possibility."

Skinner picked up a set of travel authorizations and expense vouchers. He passed them across the desk, and Mulder took them, noting that all the signature lines had already been filled in.