Ice Shock (26 page)

We're through the door within seconds and onto the deck outside. And we're running along decks between the houses and the river, leaping fences and gates, eyes scouring the backs of the houses for the only thing that can save us—the boat.

A few houses ahead, I spot an elegant mansion—modern, all glass and gray brick, with a magnificent green lawn. Bobbing on the river next to it is a small speedboat. To even get to the house, we'll have to jump across a channel of water between the mansion and the neighboring house.

And then I hear him. Madison smashes through the white picket fence near the mini-zoo. He's yelling with rage. If running in a flowing habit slows him down, it's hard to tell. As we get closer to the gap between the houses, I shout to Ixchel, “Jump!” I leap into the air, sail across the gap. Ixchel follows. She lands squarely on the lawn.

“Start up the boat!” I yell, panting.

She moves swiftly. I limber up as Madison hurtles toward me, preparing his jump. I'm getting ready to spill him into the water the second he lands on my side. Then he makes a movement that roots me to the spot.

Still running, he reaches under his cloak and pulls a pistol from a shoulder holster.

I throw a glance over my shoulder at Ixchel—she's sitting in the speedboat, but I don't hear a peep from the engine.

Madison trundles to a stop on the opposite bank. He's grinning, shaking his head and waving the gun.

“Jeez, man, you should learn when to quit. Now throw the Adapter over here.”

It strikes me for a second that Madison doesn't know that the Adapter is safely wrapped in plastic.

Yet he shows no sign of being afraid of touching the Adapter or breathing in the gas
.

“You can touch it,” I blurt.

“Way to go, dumbass.”

“You have the Bakab gene?”

Madison gives a slow nod. “You got it, kid. Not so special now, huh?”

I'm completely thrown. “But … back in the jungle … you wouldn't touch the codex …”

“First-time nerves.”

“It was the same for me—but I did it.”

Madison pulls himself up straight. His eyes grow cold. “You calling me a coward?”

“Me? I'm the one with a gun pointed at me.”

Livid with rage, he spits his words. “Throw. Me. The. Adapter.”

“Or what?”

Madison cocks the gun, slips off the safety. Lightly, he says, “Or this.”

“They want me alive, though, don't they? Your bosses—I heard them say so.”

This confuses him, for just a second. Behind me, I hear the engine explode into action. I give the pistol one more glance, and then spin on my heel, make a dash down the jetty for the boat. Shots ring out from Madison's gun; bullets whiz past my ankles.

Then one of them hits me in the left thigh.

The pain is surprising. It doesn't feel anything like I've imagined. At first, it's like a good, solid kick, like you might get in a soccer game from someone wearing cleats. I keep going until I reach the boat, and I jump in. Ixchel grabs the rudder and revs up the engine. The boat springs away from the moorings, cuts a deep swath into the murky water.

I collapse onto the boat's deck, groaning loudly in agony. Within seconds the pain is deeper and fiercer than anything I've ever known. It feels like my thigh muscle has been sliced open and a hot poker stuffed inside. Desperately I clutch at the wound. My hands come away covered in hot, sticky blood.

When I see that, I practically faint.

“Don't look at it!” warns Ixchel. I close my eyes, leaning my head on the deck, on the verge of tears.

Ixchel's voice is firm, calm. “Take deep breaths. Into your nose, out through your mouth. As slowly as you can.”

I grit my teeth. My whole body begins to shake violently.

“Hold on, Josh. You'll be okay.”

Eyes screwed shut, I concentrate on breathing for a few minutes, on the high-pitched roar of the boat's motor, on the rush of water streaming past us. A few seconds later, I'm a tiny bit calmer. I open my eyes to look at Ixchel. She's gazing over the river, toward the town's main dock.

“Don't get up to look,” she says in an even voice, “but
he's hitching a ride with one of the tourist boats. It's going in to pick him up right now. They can't catch up with us. But when we get to the dock, you need to be able to walk. At least to a taxi.”

I give a loud groan. “I can't walk!”

“I'm sorry, Josh. You must.”

I stare into the gathering clouds high above the river. It takes all my self-control not to whimper in pain. If I were alone I'd be a blubbering wreck by now. In front of Ixchel, there's no way I can let that happen.

The boat begins to swerve toward the left bank.

“Get ready, Josh. You need to get up in ten seconds.”

I take a few quick, deep breaths, and then pull myself into a sitting position, roaring from the bolt of pure agony that surges through my left leg. Ixchel's waving at someone on the bank, and she shouts, “Help! Emergency!”

I can't turn around without hurting, so I can't see what's going on. The engine slows and Ixchel steers the boat into the moorings. As soon as it comes to a standstill, she steps over to me. She offers me a hand, helping me to my unsteady feet.

On the deck, two young guys hold out their arms, saying, “Come on, grab hold, grab hold!”

My blood is everywhere. My left jean leg is soaked, dark and rusty. Both my hands, and now Ixchel's too, are coated with blood. But that doesn't put the young guys off. They
yank us both out of the boat, then the two of them support my weight, practically frog-marching me to a waiting silver VW Beetle.

They help me into the backseat, where I lie moaning and writhing. The pain gets worse by the second. I stuff my collar into my mouth and bite down, tasting the blood that's now smeared all over my T-shirt.

And then I hear a voice I recognize—Susannah St. John.

“Josh.” Her voice sounds sharp, very clear. I focus on it. “Is that a gunshot wound?”

I nod, trembling.

“Thought so. I heard the shooting; think the whole town did. Still, at least it helped me to find you. Now, darling, can you walk?”

Barely. Again, I nod.

“That's good—probably nothing broken, then.”

“It hurts like hell.”

Susannah makes a sympathetic clucking noise. “I know, dear. Now, listen, before we can take care of that leg we're gonna have to drive some. That fella's on his way to the dock on a boat. Better put some distance between us. That means driving fast. Can you be brave?”

I grit my teeth and nod.

“Give him your hand, dear,” Susannah orders Ixchel. “Try to help hold his leg still.”

Ixchel gives me a look of deep concern. Slowly, she takes
my hand. The car begins to move. Every pothole we drive over is pure agony, forcing a scream from me. But when we're finally on the open road, the surface is smooth.

Susannah slams her foot down on the accelerator. “Seat belts, kids,” she shouts above the high-pitched revs of the engine. “We need to get out of here—and fast.”

This guy who's after me, Simon Madison, keeps popping up when I least expect him. How is he following me? It's as if he knows every step before I do
.

When he turned up at this house yesterday where I was visiting someone named Susannah, it crossed my mind that maybe Susannah had set me up
.

But then she rescued me from him. She even stitched up my wound. Madison sort of shot me in the leg yesterday. Don't worry! Nothing too serious, as it turns out. Mind you, it was the worst pain I'd ever felt, like my leg was crawling with fire from the inside. Having the wound cleaned and stitched was no picnic either
.

Susannah is a retired nurse. So when she realized I'd been shot, she tossed a top-notch first-aid kit into her car and drove out to find me. We stopped somewhere on the road. In the back of the car, Susannah did a clean-and-repair job on my leg. The bullet had gone
straight through—it was “just” a flesh wound. But my jeans were kind of disgusting, so we stopped off somewhere to buy some new ones
.

I tried to phone you again—no reply. I guess I always call when you're at Mass. I left a voice mail—just want you to know I'm okay. Well, kind of okay
.

If I don't tell you anything about where I am, Mom, it's because I've even started to worry that this blog has been compromised. What if somehow the Sect has gotten into my school, broken into my locker, found the letter to you, guessed the password, and is now reading this … ?

So—no town names, okay? But I can't stop blogging. 'Cause then you'd worry even more
.

All this uncertainty. It's getting to me. I just want the answers—now!

In a roadside restaurant today, I had the most amazing eggs— “Hawaiian style” with ham and pineapple. The strips of ham and pineapple were arranged in a pattern to make the dish look like a whole pineapple
.

I'm finally getting to know this country. And still, I feel completely lost
.

Thirty minutes out of Tlacotalpan we stop at the outskirts of a coastal town, Alvarado, where we drink glasses of fresh pineapple juice and eat the most elaborate omelettes I've ever seen. There's an Internet café, so I post a quick update to my blog.

When I'm done blogging, I rejoin Ixchel and Susannah at the restaurant. I take Arcadio's envelope out of my pocket and place it on the table in front of us. Susannah kisses her fingers and then lightly touches the envelope.

Ixchel and I watch her. We can't hide our curiosity. Bluntly, Ixchel asks, “You loved him, didn't you?”

“Yes, dear, I did” is Susannah's soft-spoken reply. “Which is why it's such an honor to be of assistance to his grandson.”

But am I? She keeps insisting that Arcadio's my grandfather, but secretly I wonder if it's the other way around.

My future grandson, traveling backward in time …

I open the envelope. There's a single sheet of paper inside. The message:

Dear Josh,

By now you must suspect that your fate is intertwined with the Mayan prophecy of 2012
.

As the poet once said, our destiny is not frightful by being unreal; it is frightful because it is irreversible and ironclad
.

The truth you seek awaits you on the slopes of Mount Orizaba
.

A terrible storm is brewing. Yet you will never find peace until you confront your truth
.

Forever in your debt,

J. Arcadio Garcia

I don't know how to react. I gaze into Ixchel's face and then Susannah's. They stare back at me with an expectant air.

Finally, I crack. “What the heck is he talking about?”

“Mount Orizaba?” Susannah says. “It's there.” She jabs a finger into the air, pointing at the distant snow-capped cone of a volcano that's just visible on the horizon.

“But what about the rest of it?” I say. “The stuff about destiny being ‘irreversible and ironclad.' What's that supposed to be?”

“I think it's a warning,” says Susannah. “Arcadio sees your fate—whatever that may be—as inescapable. But this
is very strange. What's this mention of the Mayan prophecy? What fate of yours could he have known about all those years ago?”

“Maybe he consulted a
brujo
?” Ixchel offers.

Susannah surprises me by nodding at this, apparently serious.

I'm incredulous. “You believe in all that?”

“Of course,” she nods. “I've seen remarkable things in Mexico.”

“I guess,” I say, remembering my own encounter with the
brujos
. “But there's
another
way Arcadio could know about things that are going to happen to me.”

Susannah and Ixchel bristle with instant intrigue.

“Go on …”

“It's just an idea … ,” I say.

“Yes?”

“Time travel.” I ignore their skeptical looks, continuing, “Arcadio could be from the future. My son, or grandson, or something. And that's how he knows what's in my future. In my future—he knows
me
.”

I don't mention that he could be Itzamna himself, the very guy who founded Ek Naab. That would be a step too far—and it would break my promise to Montoyo.

“You're so sure of yourself, aren't you?” says Ixchel with a touch of scorn. “Typical macho man—so confident that some woman will give you a son. And a blue-eyed blond too!”

For the first time ever, I feel actual anger toward Ixchel. “All right, he could be a nephew, then—not that I have any brothers and sisters. Does that make you happy? Sheesh … I can't say anything around you!”