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LONG TREK UP A SMALL
MOUNTAIN
By Jeanne Rudmann Grunert
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Rick Marshall consulted his
watch. Then he glanced down at the
crudely lettered map drawn on a dinosaur hide that he held in his left
hand. "Well, son, by my
calculations, we've walked about three kilometers from High Bluff."
"That's about…the same
distance as the Mist Marsh is, the opposite way." Will formed a mental map of the area he
and his father had traversed. He
wiped his forehead on the back of his shirt sleeve. "Is it my imagination, or is it hotter over here?"
Bare sandstone gleamed red and
ochre in the late morning sunlight.
Cavernous mountains rose in jagged peaks along the range that
contained their cave, High Bluff. A
deep crevasse, plunging many miles down to a dimly glittering stream, flanked
them to the left. The heavy
coriander scent of dinosaur nip–a dark, leathery fern much enjoyed by the
local dinosaur population in the Land of the Lost–rose thick in the heating
air.
"You probably feel hot
because we've been walking with these heavy packs," Rick replied. Will and Rick had left Holly, Will's
sister, back in High Bluff along with their pakuni friend, Chaka, while Rick
and Will explored and mapped the strange land. They had been thrust into this
adventure on a warm summer's day when, rafting along the Colorado River on
one of their father's routine expeditions as a forest ranger, a tremendous
earthquake opened a time doorway to this land of ferocious beasts, hostile
beings, and unknown origin.
"Hey Dad, are you sure
Holly's going to be all right?" Will asked his father. In truth he'd been thinking about her all
morning and worrying about her quite a bit.
He liked to tease her, but hey, that's what older brothers are
for. He wondered at his father's
decision to leave Holly back at High Bluff while the men went exploring and
camped out overnight. It was an
incredibly dangerous camping trip, for they did not know what they would
find, nor did they know if the hostile beings in the land -- the dinosaurs,
the Sleestak, or some unknown -- would find them camped out in the jungle.
"Oh, your sister will be
fine," Rick said easily.
"She's growing up, Will.
She's got to learn to stand on her own. What if something ever happened to me, or to you? We have to think of these things here in
the Land of the Lost."
"Yeah, I guess you're right,
Dad," Will said. "But Holly
is…" he searched for the right word.
"A girl?" Rick
smiled. "Yes, she is, son, but
that just makes her different, not any less than you. She's grown up quite a bit since coming to
the Land of the Lost." "But she's still annoying." "I'm sure that you annoy her too. Remember how she was before we came to the
Land of the Lost?"
"Afraid of everything,"
Will said. "Heights, spiders,
snakes…" He remembered vividly
catching spiders and leaving them in selected places, like the seat of her
bicycle.
Rick must have remembered that
incident too, for he frowned at his eldest child. "I remember grounding you for certain insect related
incidents…"
Will had to laugh. "Insect related incidents?"
Rick laughed too. "Okay, son. I do understand wanting to put spiders onto your sister's bike,
or leaving a snake in her doll carriage…I remember doing things like that to
Aunt Ruthie. Uncle Jack, Uncle Tom and I used to be quite the
gang…I was the oldest, so I was supposed to know better, but I never stopped
them…Jack and Tom were unstoppable, in fact. Especially Jack. He
was always the wildest of the four of us."
"Do you miss them?"
"Miss them?" Rick
thought for a moment. "I suppose
I do. I miss Ruthie, and Jack now.
Tom, well…he's been gone, son, since the war. I think of him often. He was killed in battle, you know, in
Korea….and Jack and I were there too, though Jack was a medic, and I was in
the army corps of engineers, building airstrips and the like…but Tom, he was
right there, on the front. Luck of
the draw when they drafted us. We
could all have been killed."
"Do you think…do you think
they're looking for us?" Will asked.
They continued to trudge on, trying to walk the land and map it as
they went.
"I don't know." Rick had in fact been thinking the same
thing. He wondered what was going
through his family's minds right now.
His brother, his sister, his late wife's family…surely, someone had realized
they were gone by now. His neighbor
was taking care of the kids' horses, Comanche and Wildfire. Surely when the Marshalls did not return
as scheduled from their expedition, someone would raise the alarm. But what would they find? He thought of his Park Service
colleagues. Would they discover
their raft, smashed? Their
bodies? He remembered the time
doorway portal in Enik's cave, and the view of the Marshalls as they tumbled
over the waterfall. Enik had said
that it was possible that the other Marshalls, an alternative version of
themselves, had been killed on the rocks as they fell. A paradox, Enik had intoned in his
sonorous voice. But what if that
were the case? He shuddered to think
about it. In fact, they could be
stuck in the Land of the Lost with no one looking for them…and even if they
raised the cry that the Marshalls were missing, who would know they had
fallen through a time doorway? The
Park Service would take weeks, months to comb the thousands of acres along
the river, looking for an injured family, traces of a natural disaster. Nobody would think of a time doorway,
that's for sure.
They walked along the path for
another fifteen minutes in silence, the heat radiating off of the sandstone
rock cliffs and baking them as effectively as a kiln. Rick felt his shirt soaked with sweat
where the backpack pressed again the serviceable material. He shrugged his pack several times to
ease the weight but to no avail.
"These rocks…" Will
said, glancing up at the cliffs.
"They look like out west.
Utah or Arizona or something."
"I think they're the same
type," Rick replied.
"Sandstone, and some other materials. Soft enough so that winds and rains scour them into these
unusual shapes."
"It's like you can see shapes
in the tops," Will said.
"Like making shapes out of clouds. See, that one looks like a horse….and that one could be a king
with a crown…and that one could be a Sleestak…and that could be a
pylon."
Rick stopped suddenly. "Where do you see a Sleestak and a
pylon?"
"That's because it is a pylon!" Rick cried.
They stopped. Ahead of them was a small mountain that
rose halfway up to its neighbors. The
top was shadowed by the neighboring mountains, but shafts of sunlight lit the
tip, and a subtle golden glow glittered with hidden powers. The vague outline of a pylon could be
seen. Rock formations jutted out from
the surrounding hillside near the small mountain's crest, and Rick could now
see what Will's sharp young eyes had discerned. The rocks were carved to resemble two Sleestak, both about
double the size of an actual Sleestak, standing guard, one to the right and one
to the left of the pylon.
Rick dropped his pack to the sand
and opened it, searching for the map.
He squatted next to a rock and smoothed the map over the top. Will had already taken several steps towards
the base of the cliff. "Dad! I
think there are steps here…big steps, Sleestak or Altrusian sized steps,
going up the cliff."
Will reluctantly turned back to
his father and knelt beside him.
Using the charcoal that Rick had sharpened into a makeshift pencil,
they opened the map and marked it carefully, indicating this new pylon.
"What do we call it?"
Will asked.
Rick held the charcoal over the
map. For a moment, he felt strange,
an odd buzzing sound filling his ears.
Dreamily, he moved the charcoal over
the map. His hand traced out a
word. Then the dreamy sensation
left. He had written something over
the map.
"The Temple of
Learning?" Will looked up at his father. "Well yeah, but isn't that kind of far fetched….Dad, are
you okay?"
Rick was still feeling strangely
disconnected from reality. He shook
his head sharply, allowing the sights and sounds of the world around them to
fill his senses. He took a deep
breath, then released it. "Yes,
son, I'm fine…I…for a moment there, it was strange. It was like someone else
was guiding my hand over the map. I
didn't think of that name."
"You didn't?"
"No, son, I didn't."
"Then who did?"
"I don't know." Rick rose to his feet and rolled the map
back into a tube. He tucked it into
the side pocket of his pack.
"But I think we should investigate that pylon. But carefully, son." He looked
meaningfully at Will.
"Yeah, I know…don't touch
anything…look around before you fool around…everything could be dangerous…don't
assume anything…" Will recited the litany of his father's pet phrases by
rote.
Rick looked at him through
narrowed eyes, trying to determine if Will was being sarcastic. But Will had the most innocent look in
his bright blue eyes. Rick decided
to ignore any implied sarcasm. He
pointed towards the rocks.
"Those do look like steps, but they were carved for someone much
larger than us."
"Sleestak?"
"Perhaps. Enik's people were shorter than the
Sleestaks."
"The Builders?"
"Perhaps." Rick walked towards the base of the
mountain. Again, the odd, dreamy
sensation filled him. Will watched as
his father slowed down, walking so slowly he was shuffling.
"Dad? Dad!"
Rick shook his head. He looked around. He was about halfway to the base of the
rocks. Will was still by the rock
where they had spread out the map.
"Yes, son?"
"Dad, what's the matter? You
looked like you were walking through water or something. Slow motion, like in the movies."
"That feeling came over me
again…like when I wrote on the map," Rick said slowly. "Will, there is something strange
here. Look at your arms." Rick
held out his right arm and pointed to it.
The tiny hairs on it were standing straight up. He felt prickling at the base of his neck,
and he could see Will's hair, already tightly curled from the humidity, kink
and curl even more. His own hair felt
the same.
"It's like being out in a
lightning storm," Will said.
"Electricity, or some type of
power," Rick confirmed.
"Come on. Let's store our
packs behind those boulders. Take
your knife, your canteen and some crystals.
I have my knife. Let's move
slowly."
"Okay." Will did as his
father instructed. Rick tossed his
pack over to Will. Will stashed their packs behind the boulders and came quickly
to his father's side.
"Do you hear it?" Rick
asked his son.
"Hear what..?" Will strained to listen. "I don't hear anything at all."
"I know," Rick
replied. "That's what I
mean."
They halted at the base of the
cliff by the gigantic stone stairs.
It was as if they had walked into a completely sound proof room. One minute they could hear the wind, the
rustle of dinosaur nip in the wind, the creaking of trees on the other side
of the crevasse, and the far-off bellows and hoots of dinosaurs in the valley
jungle. Then, stepping through the
sand to walk towards the base of the cliffs, the sounds were abruptly cut
off. The only sound was the sound of
the beating of their hearts as the blood coursed through their veins.
"Dad?" Will waited for
his father's instructions or explanation of the phenomena.
Rick had none. "Come on Will," he said
softly. "Let's go on up the
cliff and investigate that pylon. But
be careful. I have the feeling…"
"That someone is watching
us?" Will looked up at the stones resembling Sleestaks. He swallowed. "So do I."
Rick went first, keeping the pace
slow as they climbed the small mountain.
It was difficult climbing.
Every once in a while, they paused, listening. The eerie stillness remained. Not a breath of wind stirred on the
hillside, although they could see trees swaying and the ferns moving below
them. From up on the cliff, they had
a stunning view of the crevasse, and Rick again wondered how deep it really
was. He could see a tiny river like a
glittering blue thread running through it, deep and far below. They had tried once to raft out of the
Land on another river, finding only that the river came up once again
underneath the tunnels of their enemy, the Sleestak. There was no escape on the river.
"Dad? Are you ready to move
on?" Rick shook his head. "Yes, son, I'll be right there. Don't get too far ahead of me."
"But you said that you needed
to rest," Will replied, "and you've been leaning on that rock for
fifteen minutes."
Rick looked up. Will stood above him. It was funny how the shadows made his
shirt look emerald green…
"Dad?" It was Will's voice, this time coming from
behind him. "Dad?"
"Of course it's me,"
Will said, equally puzzled. "Why
wouldn't it be?"
"Because I just saw you, on
the rocks ahead," Rick replied.
He pointed up the trail to where he had seen the image of his
son. "But it wasn't really
you. Will had on a green shirt…"
"Dad, I've been standing down
here waiting to see if we should move forward since you stopped," Will
replied. "I saw you stop and
rest. I didn't seen anyone else."
"It must have been my
imagination," Rick replied.
"Let's go on."
He began climbing again. The rocks grew steeper. In some sections, he had to scale what had
been one step to the builders in three human sized steps, using chunks
missing from the rocks for footholds.
His palms were scraped raw from the rocks, and the knees of Will's
jeans were white with sandstone dust.
They rested about halfway up and passed the water canteen between them.
"It doesn't look like we've
gone anywhere," Will complained.
Rick looked down the
mountain. He expected to see that
they were about halfway up to the peak.
Instead, he was looking down perhaps twenty feet to the sandy valley
floor. Waves of heat shimmered up in
columns from the sand. Sweat dripped
down their faces. Even without the
packs, it was slow going, and very hot.
He sat with his back against the sandstone wall in a bit of shade
created by the mountain. A slow,
easy kind of peace suffused his limbs.
He closed his eyes.
"Dad!" Will shook his
shoulder. "Dad, wake up!"
Rick shook his head groggily. "Oh, I'm sorry, son," he
said. "I must have dozed off for
a few moments."
"Not for a few moments, but
for hours!" Will said. He
pointed at the sky. The sun had moved
far to the west and was slowly sinking.
"We must have both fallen asleep."
"There is something strange
about this mountain," Rick declared.
"Ever since we've gotten nearby, time has seemed to slow
down. I saw an image of you that wasn't real. Someone -- or something -- in the Land of the Lost does not
want us investigating this mountain."
"And that must mean only one
thing," Will said.
"What, son?"
"That we HAVE to," Will
replied with assurance. "Because
you know that if the land doesn't want us to investigate, it's probably
something important…"
Will stood and brushed the sand
and dirt off of his jeans. "Dad,
come on. We've got to get to the
top. Besides," he grinned and
held out a hand to help his father rise.
"We'll have a spectacular view from the top, and that will really
help us with this map."
Rick smiled and took Will's
hand. He hauled himself to his feet
and brushed off his serviceable twill pants.
Will was becoming a surprisingly strong adult. Well, maybe it wasn't surprising after
all. Will had had to face some pretty
tough circumstances, Rick reflected as they began climbing the rock steps
again. First, when Elizabeth died,
Will was only eight years old. He'd
had to deal with the loss of his mother pretty early on. Then having his whole life turned upside
down by being dumped through a time doorway into this hostile land and having
to grow up pretty quickly at the age of seventeen…Rick remembered his own
sheltered childhood on 4th Street in Indiana, his teenage years at
Filmore High. Aside from the usual
pranks and mischief he'd engaged in with his brothers Jack and Tom, and
sometimes even with his sister, Ruth, it had been a mundane, middle America
idyllic childhood. Until Korea, of course, but everyone his age had to deal
with that–and the generation before his had dealt with Flanders Field and the
Pacific Theater of World War II.
Nothing at all like what Will and Holly had faced, but perhaps similar
in that it transcended the normal growing-up process and forced men and women
to become stronger than who they thought they were. His two children had grown in spiritual grace and
understanding, overcoming not just this hostile environment but their own
emotional and psychological limitations to rise to new challenges. He was pretty damn proud of his kids.
He halted and grabbed the back of
Will's shirt to make him stop.
"What?" Will asked.
Rick said, "Sshh. Listen.
Do you hear that?"
The silence pressed against
them. Then they both heard it. "That was a car horn," Will
said. The car horn bleated again. Then came the wail and siren of a police
car.
"There must be a time doorway
open," Rick said tersely.
"Come on, Will. We've got
to get to the top of this mountain."
They redoubled their climbing
efforts. The higher they climbed,
the steeper and rockier the path became.
Now small pebbles and rocks were dislodged with every step, and
sometimes the boulders shifted precariously as their weight touched the
step. Rick kept his head down and
watched where he placed his feet. A
wrong step could unleash an avalanche and possibly bury the path that could
take them safely back down to the foot of the mountain.
After about fifteen minutes of
climbing at the redoubled pace, Rick had to stop and catch his breath. "Will, wait a minute
please." Will kept climbing. Rick looked up. Will was on a small rocky outcropping. He was walking straight towards the
edge. The drop down was incredibly
steep, since they were about two thirds up the small mountain.
"WILL!" Rick
shouted. He scrambled up the last
few steps to the ledge and with a swiftness which surprised even himself, he
lunged forward, caught the back of Will's shirt, and hauled his son off the
edge of the cliff.
Will fell backwards and hit the
rough stone wall of the mountain.
"Ow! Dad, why did you do
that?"
"What do you mean, why did I
do that?" Rick demanded.
"Son, you were about to walk off the edge of a cliff."
"No I wasn't," Will
said. His eyes were slightly
unfocused and his voice, dreamy.
"I saw a better path, an easier path off to the side that would
take us directly to the top.
I…" Suddenly his eyes
snapped back into focus. He turned
and looked towards the path he had been traveling. He blanched. "Oh
no. I was walking off the cliff. I swear, Dad, it didn't look like a
cliff…I saw a path, smoother than the one we're walking on now, and it seemed
like the best way…"
Rick felt a tingle of anger, and
fear, and he let go of Will's shirt.
"It's okay, son," he said.
"There's something on this mountain that is making us hallucinate. I had that same dreamy feeling at the base
of the mountain. Then I saw you when
you weren't there. And I bet that car
horn was a hallucination, too. In
fact, just seconds before it happened, I was thinking about my
childhood…about how it was so different from yours. I was thinking about 4th Street in Indianapolis,
where I grew up. And I
remember…" Suddenly Rick snapped his fingers and his face lit up. "Yes! That was it! I was
thinking of how different my childhood was from yours. I remembered how, during my youth, there
were still wagons for the milkman and the coal man even though most people
had cars, and I remembered how strange it seemed when the horse drawn wagons
left after World War II and there were these big trucks. That was the horn that we heard. I remember the first time I heard that
horn. It was the milkman's
truck. The milkman liked to bleat it
loudly at us kids when we walked to school, to make the girls jump. We weren't used to it, you see. And the police siren…I was thinking of
your mother…" Rick's voice trailed off. He was remembering the accident that had claimed Elizabeth's
life.
"Dad, something on this
mountain is taking our thoughts, and making them into illusions," Will
said. "Like the time the
Sleestaks made us see Mother."
"And that something may also
kill us if we're not careful," Rick said. "My thoughts tends to wander while we're hiking. I think of all sorts of strange
things…"
"So do mine," Will
replied. "Like when we were
climbing these rocks. The going was
getting tougher. I kept thinking,
'Gee, I wonder when the path will level off?' And then it did, so I followed
it…"
"Whatever this pylon is at
the top of the mountain, it must be pretty special to want us to keep
away," Rick said.
"That is, if it is doing it
intentionally," Will replied.
"I mean, maybe we think it's hostile, but maybe it's just being
it, you know?"
Once again, Rick was struck by how
much his children had grown during their Land of the Lost experience. "You know son, you could be
right," Rick replied, nodding his head in agreement. "After all, we are the intruders
here. The crystals, for example, are
merely tools, yet by touching the wrong ones I got shocked and nearly
died. We could interpret that as the
crystals being hostile, or we could simply say that I was the intruder, not
using them properly…"
"We should continue,"
Will said. He pointed towards the
west, where the sun had dipped lower towards the horizon. "We've got maybe three, three and a
half hours of daylight left."
Rick agreed. "But we should
climb together," he said.
"Don't go off ahead. And
let's talk with one another so that we keep checking to make sure the other
hasn't gone off into dream land."
"Good idea, Dad," Will
said.
Carefully, they walked off of the
ledge and back to the path. Rick
looked up. The golden pylon was now
more clearly visible, and the rocks
that Will thought were fancifully carved by the wind into Sleestak shapes
were definitely statues, large stone statues more in keeping with the
appearance of an Altrusian than of a Sleestak. Rick pointed.
"What do you see?" he asked Will.
"I see the pylon. It's
closer." Will raised a hand to
his eyes to shade them even further.
"And I see two of those rock outcroppings…oh boy, they are
statues, aren't they! And they look
like Enik, so they must be of Altrusian origin, rather than Sleestak."
"Good thinking son. What do you estimate our climbing time to
be?"
"Maybe another fifteen,
twenty minutes, if we don't get sidetracked with those illusions again…"
"I think so too," Rick
replied. "Let's stay very close,
and keep talking. Let's talk about
something that we know would be ridiculous to appear in the Land of the
Lost."
"Baseball," Will said
instantly. "If I hear the crack
of a bat and the roar of the crowd at Wrigley Field, I'll know I'm
hallucinating."
So they talked baseball. Will recited all of Willie May's
stats. Rick recited the 1973 starting
lineup of the Red Sox, the Marshall family's favorite team. Will began reciting the rules of the game,
starting with scoring practices. They
kept their minds focused on the sport and continue climbing, slower and
steadier.
"We're almost to the
top," Will panted. They could
see clearly the golden shimmer of the pylon and the large status with the protruding,
orb-like eyes. Now that they were
closer, they could see that the statues had once been painted in bright,
jewel like colors, but sand and wind had sanded the colors off, leaving only
a faint, tantalizing glimpse of what was.
Will could see the tannish-green of Altrusian skin on the left statue
and the faint shimmer of ochre paint on the tunic on the right statues. The statue on the left was a bit damaged,
with the point on the skull sheared off, giving the head an almost human
appearance.
Suddenly they both heard a man
shout, "Play ball!"
Rick and Will burst out laughing
as the illusion chimed in right on cue.
They ignored it and continued to climb side by side until they reached
the top. The last few feet were difficult for the eroded steps were smooth
and slick. Will hauled himself up to
the top, then dropped to his knees and leaned over the edge, giving his
father the support he needed so he could clamor over the edge.
"Oh wow," was all Will
could murmur as the two sat, side by side, and gazed upon the scene.
A ruined courtyard encircle the
whole top of the small mountain.
Broken columns lay in shattered ruins and heaps at the far side of the
mountain. A deep, trapezoid-shaped
indentation in front of the pylon was rimmed with dark green crystals that
still sparkled with hidden depths.
Stagnant water pooled inside the trapezoid, indicating that it had
once been a beautiful reflecting pool.
The guardian statues flanked
the top of the path, once the entrance to the grove. At their feet, one either side, was a
pylon-shaped slab of obsidian, carved with symbols resembling letters. A few twisted and stunted trees grew next
to the columns. Orchids bloomed among
the fallen pillars, providing a ghostly glimpse at what once must have been a
splendid garden.
"Dad…what is it?"
Rick slowly stood, and Will rose
to his feet. He surveyed the
area. The statues, the gardens, the
reflecting pool and the broken pillars…not even an insect chirped in the stillness. He walked over to the guardian statue on
the right, bent down, and traced the letters with his fingers.
"I don't know, son…"
Rick said. "But whatever it was,
this place was obviously very special to Enik's people. And beautiful." He admired the carving and the fine
workmanship on the statues, then walked back to Will. "Shall we look at the ruins together
before we go into the pylon?"
"Sure!"
Will and his father walked in a
counterclockwise circle, starting with the right guardian statue, then
examining the broken columns and pillars and the beautiful orange, purple,
and yellow orchids that cascaded over the edges. From the far side they could look over the edge of the
mountain and down into the valley, and they spent a few minutes there,
discussing points to put on the map.
They could actually see little green specks moving in the jungle far
away. Dinosaurs. From on top of the small mountain, they
looked like ants. Will bent over to touch one of the beautiful orchids. As he pulled the flower closer to him, a
stinging pain coursed through his index finger.
"Hey!" He pulled his hand away just in time. A long thin spike like a needle protruded
from his index finger.
"Let me see that Will."
Rick bent over to look closely at the injury. "It's swelling.
How does it feel?"
"Like a bee sting." Will
held his hand steady while Rick pulled out the thorn. "Whoever heard of
an orchid with a thorn?"
"Probably a protective
mechanism against the dinosaurs," Rick replied. "Damn, I think part of it broke off
in your finger."
"It feels better." Will
flexed his hand. There was a red mark
on the tip of his finger where the thorn had entered it, and the area was a
bit swollen, but it felt better now that Rick had removed the thorn.
"Okay then?"
"Yes. Let's keep looking around."
They finished examining the
ruins. There was more of the unusual
writing and flecks of paint on the columns that hinted at beautiful
decorations and colors. Crystals were
impressed into the tops of some of the columns into an intricate, stylized
design mimicking leaves and flowers.
Rick wondered at the skill of the Altrusian artisans and their high
level of culture. How could they have
degenerated into the Sleestak? No
wonder Enik was so upset and driven to warn his people…
They had come around full circle
and now stood in front of the reflecting pond in front of the pylon. The water was dirty brown and a skim of
greenish brown algae grew on the surface.
Weeds thrust through cracks in the decorative edging. Something about the reflecting pool
attracted Rick and he peered closer into its depths. Was it his imagination or did something
flicker below the surface…? He shook
his head. No. He would not give in to
these illusions again.
"What's next?" Will
asked. "Looks like we've got an
hour or so left before dusk. And we
still have to set up a camp."
"Yes, I know." Rick
looked at the pylon. The pylon key
was in place. "We should look
inside."
Will had been hoping his father
would suggest that. "Okay."
Rick walked to the pylon and stood
on tip toe, turning the key. The
familiar hum filled his head as the doorway disappeared into nothingness,
revealing the black interior of the pylon.
He stepped through and Will followed.
"Where's the matrix
table?" Will whispered.
Rick shook his head. The pylon was black as pitch. They could not see anything. He took Will by the sleeve so that they
would not be separated. He stepped
forward.
Suddenly, a greenish light
suffused the interior. A large,
crystalline globe appeared high on the wall over their heads and directly in
front of them. It glowed and swirled with green mist.
A voice called out to them. "Welcome. We have scanned your mind as you approached the temple. What do you wish to learn?"
"Will!" Rick
called. "Don't listen to
it. Don't think…!" He tried backing out of the pylon. With a growing sense of panic he realized
that the door had slid closed behind them.
Everywhere was blackness except for the glowing green globe.
"Dad!" Will cried. A circling halo of lights had appeared around
Will. The lights swirled in a double
helix pattern. Will's form began to
shimmer. "Dad! Help!"
"Will! Hang on!" Rick tried to approach the glowing globe
but he could not move. It was as if
his feet were bound to the floor.
The voice inquired again,
"What do you wish to learn?"
"Let go of my son!" Rick
cried.
"Command not
recognized," the voice stated in the same unemotional tone. "Learning Program One
commencing.…"
Will's body disappeared. * *
*
For a second or two, Will was
suspended between two worlds. He saw
his father's face illuminated by the green glow from the globe on the
wall. Overlapping this image was a
brighter image of High Bluff. For an
instant he thought he would be transported back to his father, but then he
was rushing headlong towards High Bluff as if he were inside a car traveling
ninety miles an hour. He raised his
arms in front of his face as if to shield himself from the crash.
Then just as suddenly as it had
begun he was standing in the middle of the family's cave. His younger sister Holly was sitting on
the edge of her cot sewing a dress she was making out of an animal hide. Her back was to the entrance to the cave. Will was sorely tempted to yell
"Boo" or something else to make her scream. But he remembered that he had left his
father in the Temple of Learning three kilometers away, and for all he knew,
Dad could be in trouble. He needed
Holly's help him to make sure their father was all right.
"Holly?" he called.
She still jumped and gave a little
scream. "Will Marshall! Look
what you made me do!" She held
up the index finger of her left hand.
She'd pricked it with her sewing needle when he'd called our her
name. "What are you doing back
so soon? Where's Daddy?"
"It's a long story," he
said. "I've got to take a few
more supplies and hike back to where I left Daddy. Can I borrow your pack?"
"Sure," she said. "But where is Daddy?"
"We found a new pylon,"
Will said.
"A new pylon!" Holly
leaped to her feet. "Where? I'm
coming too."
"No you're not!" Will
snapped. "This pylon is
dangerous. Daddy and I got separated
somehow. Weird things happened as we
approached it. It pulled me out and
transported me over here…I'm not sure how."
"I bet Enik would know."
"Probably, but we don't have
time to go over to the Lost City for a visit," Will said. "Look, Holly, I can't explain, but
the pylon lead us into all sorts of traps as we got closer to it…well, I
don't want you to get hurt…"
"I won't get hurt. I want to help, Will. I can!
I'm not the baby you think I am…"
Will stopped. He looked at his younger sister. He thought of his conversation with his
father on the way towards the small mountain. Holly had matured since they had come to the land. She'd worked hard to overcome her fear of
heights. She didn't scream or cry so
much at the things she used to; bugs, spiders, mice, and snakes. Heck, Will thought, once you've seen a
stinking dinosaur carcass you've seen the grossest thing there is. Maybe Holly was right. Maybe she could help. But he'd be really
angry with her if she turned into a baby again just when he needed her help.
"Okay. Grab your pack. And some crystals!" he called as she scrambled to pull her
backpack out from under her cot where she had stored it. "And a full canteen! We'll hike back to the small mountain
together. But you've got to do
exactly what I tell you to do, all right?"
"Right!"
Together, the brother and sister
team left High Bluff. * *
*
As soon as Will dematerialized,
Rick could move. He rushed forward to
the green globe and pounded it with his fists. "Where is my son?" he roared. "What have you done with him?"
"You have entered the temple
of learning. What do you wish to
learn?"
"I wish to learn how to get
my son back! Release him."
"To be released from this
temple, one must complete a cycle of learning. If you do not wish to learn, leave this place." Rick whirled around as the familiar hum of
opening pylon doors filled his ears.
The doors had materialized again.
By the sunlight that penetrated the darkness inside the pylon, he
could make out the green globe, and the crystal matrix table, not on a pillar
in the center of the pylon, but high on the wall, next to the globe.
"I'm not leaving until I get
my son back," he muttered through clenched teeth, walking to the matrix
table and studying the rapidly blinking lights. "Enough of this.
Release Will!" * *
*
Will couldn't shake the feeling
that something was off about this whole hike. He glanced down at his watch.
It had taken his father and him three hours of hiking to reach the
small mountain that morning; now he and Holly had reached it in less than an
hour. And it wasn't as hot as it had
been when he and his dad had walked there that morning. Granted, the sun had shifted in the sky,
so perhaps the light was reflecting and refracting differently off of the
rocks. But why would the distance
change?
And as for Holly…he was ready to
throttle her, right there at the base of the mountain. He had never been so angry at her. First, her shoelace broke; they had to
stop while she fixed it. Then, she
began whining that her pack was too heavy.
Will discovered that she'd put in all sorts of useless items; her
jacket, an extra bedroll, and a loaf of smilax cake that she had baked last
night. Worst of all, she'd taken her
damn makeup case with her! The
perfume alone could attract a whole herd of dinosaurs…
"Now why the heck did you
bring that?" he demanded of her. "I told you what to pack. Now
you've just loaded yourself down with useless junk."
"Well, you never know what we
might need." "We won't need your makeup case, that's for
sure!" "You never know. We could need something in it.
And we might get hungry. But
the pack is too heavy for me." "I can't carry your pack and mine. You've got to just buck up and carry what
you've brought."
"But Will, I'm tired…"
"So am I. I've hiked double what you've hiked today
but do you hear me complaining? Come
on, we've got to get back and help Dad."
"You don't even know Daddy is
in trouble. Maybe the lights only
took you away and didn't hurt Daddy.
My feet hurt."
"Maybe they took Daddy
someplace else. He could have been
transported anywhere. Maybe even into
the Lost City! He could be surrounded by Sleestak even now!"
"You don't know that. I'm
hot."
"Will you be quiet and start
walking?" His finger was aching
again. He looked down. The tip was swollen and red.
"I can't climb that
mountain!" She pointed to the small mountain. "What if we get to the top and I'm too scared to come
down?"
"You'll come down all
right!"
"You're so mean to me,
Will. Why don't you ever understand
me?"
"I am not mean to you! You are infuriating!" A surge of
anger welled up inside of him, fueled by fear and frustration, and the energy
spit forth at her in his words as hot and fiery as if it were a flame.
"Why couldn't I have had a baby brother instead of you? At least a boy would be brave and wouldn't
complain about being tired. You're
useless!" He strode forward
double time, leaving her to trot behind him to catch up.
"Will, you don't mean that,
do you?" Holly looked at him
with tears in her eyes.
He whirled around. "You bet I mean that!" he
roared. "I've had it with
you. With your screaming at every
little sound, your fear of heights and your stupid girlie things. You're useless, do you know that? I don't care what Daddy said about you
making progress here. You did a
couple of brave things over these past few months, but you're still a big
baby. A little brother wouldn't be
like this."
"Oh Will," Holly sighed.
A single tear dropped from the corner of her right eye and rolled down her
cheek. She sniffled. "Okay, then. I'll go."
A whirl of white lights swirled
and descended on Holly. A noise like
a rushing freight train clattering upon metal tracks sounded. Will watched in astonishment as the lights
encircled Holly and her form shimmered and vanished.
"Hey! I didn't mean it! Bring her back! Holly…"
The lights continued
swirling. In their midst a new form
appeared. The lights scattered.
There stood a little boy about the
age of twelve. He had the Marshall's
curly hair, though his hair was sandy blonde instead of brown, and the same
bright blue eyes. He wore a light
blue T-shirt, jeans and sneakers. He
smiled at Will.
"Hi Will," he said. "Let's go. We've got to help Daddy."
"Who are you?"
"Thomas," the little boy
said, his face puckering into a frown.
"Will, what's wrong? Why don't you remember me?"
"Thomas?"
"Your little brother, Tom,
remember? Like, duh, Will, what's
wrong with you?"
"I don't have a little
brother named Thomas. I have a sister
named Holly. What happened to
her? Bring her back!"
Tom smiled. He hefted his pack onto his shoulder and
walked forward until he was just a foot away from Will. Will looked down into the boy's blue
eyes. Unquestionably, he was a
Marshall.
But there was something else about
his eyes. Something odd. For an instant, it was like a ghostly
image on the television screen when the reception isn't coming in
strongly. A white outline and vague
form of another set of eyes stared back at him from Thomas's blue eyes. Large, circular orbs, multifaceted like
gems…Altrusian eyes.
Was he still inside the Temple
Pylon? Will shook his head. He felt dizzy. No. He had transported
out of the pylon in a mechanism similar to what they had found inside the
Moongiver Pylon. He had found Holly,
walked with her, she'd gotten all whiny on him, and then…
Thomas. She had turned into Thomas when he had wished for a little
brother instead of a sister. "Let's go and save Daddy," Thomas said
quietly. * *
* Where
are the skylons when you need them? Rick thought. He touched crystals gingerly, one by one. Nothing happened. The pylon door remained open, so he grew
more confident.
"What do you wish to
learn?" the voice from the green globe inquired every time he touched a
green crystal.
"Where is my son?"
"He is in the learning
chamber."
"Release him!"
"He will be released when he
completes his learning cycle," the voice replied with infuriating
detachment. "Choose your
learning program."
"Go to hell," Rick
muttered.
"Unrecognized command,"
the voice replied. "Unable to
comply. What do you wish to
learn?"
He touched blue crystals
next. A blue and red combination made
the pylon shudder. The green globe
suddenly threw off a fierce, hot light.
A different voice, recognizably Altrusian, stated, "You have
entered the diagnostic module."
Ah ha, Rick thought. This sounds promising. He touched blue and red in groups of
two. The voice repeated its
message. He paused, thinking
carefully. If I were an Altrusian
using this, he thought to himself, I would be logical. I would be careful. I would…he looked at his own five fingers,
slender and mobile, and thought of Enik's cumbersome three digits. I would have three fingers, Rick thought
suddenly. Multiples of three. Maybe that's it!
He touched red, red and blue. Nothing.
Blue, red, blue. Nothing. Then blue, blue, red.
The inside of the pylon lit up like
he had pulled the cord on a 100 watt light bulb.
He was staring at a large crystal
sphere mounted on a metal pole protruding from the pylon wall. The walls were black and shiny, like
obsidian. The matrix table was
different from the ones he had seen in the Lost City. Instead of being in a stone tray it was in
a black metal tray. He could now
clearly see the crystals. They were
cut and faceted with care, like a jeweler's diamonds in a tray. He carefully took his fingers off the
crystals. The light stayed on.
"Okay," he
breathed. "I'm onto you,
pylon. Now give me my son back." * *
*
"I don't have a
brother," Will said stubbornly.
They had hiked on for another
quarter of an hour. Thomas kept pace,
scrambling over rocks and taking two strides to every one of Will's.
"Will, what's wrong with
you?" Thomas pleaded. "This
new pylon's affected your brain. Of course you have a brother. You want one, don't you?"
"Just shut up."
How had he caused this mess? He'd often thought over the years of how a
little brother would have been so much more fun than Holly. No toy tea sets cluttering up the
basement, no stupid dolls mixed in with his Hot Wheels in the playroom, someone to ride bikes with and go down to
the pond and catch frogs…
Thomas turned and smiled at him.
No! It was as if Thomas could read his mind. It was creeping him out.
They had reached the base of the
small mountain. Will grabbed Thomas
by the shoulder and shook him as the boy started to run ahead and scramble up
the mountain.
"Look, I don't know who you
are or how you got here," he said.
"But let's get something straight. We're here to find Dad.
There's something about this mountain that makes you see illusions,
that makes what you think become real…so don't go running on ahead. We've got to concentrate on finding Dad
and making sure he's all right."
"Yeah, sure. Let's go."
Was Thomas being sarcastic? Will looked down at the boy but Thomas'
face was angelic and serene.
"Sure Will. You go first."
Will started to climb. He followed the hand holds and foot holds
that he and his father had focused on.
He kept his mind firmly fixed to one thought: saving his father. What if the pylon had taken his father to
someplace bad, worse than the Land of the Lost? You couldn't predict a pylon.
Look what it had done to Holly…
Holly. He swallowed. Where was
she? What had become of her? Was she really gone, or was this just
another trick of the pylon? He
couldn't be sure. When he'd touched
Thomas' shoulder, he had sure felt real enough. But for a moment he had seen something beyond those blue
eyes…something alien. This whole
thing wasn't what it seemed, he felt sure, but he didn't know what was
happening, so he continued climbing the mountain, determined to stick to the
course of action he had undertaken. He just hoped that Holly was okay. And he hoped that when he found his dad,
Rick would have a better idea of how to find Holly, because Will didn't have
a clue.
He had been so busy climbing and
thinking that he didn't notice Thomas.
The boy scrambled up the side of the path onto the higher, more jagged
rocks, and was now ahead of him. "Hey Thomas, what did I tell you?"
Will called out.
Thomas turned around and stuck his
tongue out at Will. "I can climb
better than you can, Will Marshall!"
"Thomas, get back here…"
"You think you're so great
just 'cause your bigger than me. But
I can do anything you can do!" Thomas
danced out on a flat boulder. The
drop from the side of the mountain was perilously steep. "Chicken! Chicken! Bet you won't come out on this boulder after me…"
"Thomas, this isn't a
game. Get back on the path or so help
me…"
"You're a chicken, you know
that? It would be faster if we climbed on these rocks."
"Thomas, this mountain is
dangerous! Look out!"
Suddenly, Thomas lost his
footing. His feet shot forward and he
landed on his back on the rocks, then began to slide down the flat
boulder. With split second timing,
Will leaped forward and grabbed the boy by the back of his T-shirt. He heard the seams rip as the material
pulled taunt and the boy's weight was suspended by a thin piece of
cotton. Then he grasped Thomas by the
arms and pulled him sideways over the
rocks and back onto the path.
Thomas started laughing. "That was fun!"
Will wanted to haul off and punch
his laughing face. "You
idiot!" he swore. "You
could have gotten yourself killed, and me with you, if the rest of the rocks
gave way when you fell. What were you
thinking?"
"Oh come on, Will,"
Thomas said. He stood and brushed off
his jeans. "Let's have some
fun. Daddy will be all right. You're such a chicken, you know that? I wasn't scared. Were you?"
"You bet I was. What if you'd fallen? You could have been killed!"
"All you do is nag,"
Thomas complained. "You and
Daddy both. 'Thomas, stay on the
path' 'Thomas, don't eat that plant' 'Thomas, stop teasing the
tryceratops'." Thomas whirled on
the path. "You're no fun at
all."
"We're lots of fun,"
Will snapped, "when it's safe to have fun. You can't be running into danger with every turn."
Thomas' eyes sparkled. "Would you rather I be
Holly?" He opened his mouth and
Holly's voice issued forth.
"Will, I'm scared. I
can't go on. It's too hard."
"Who are you?" Will
asked. "What have you done with
my sister?"
Thomas merely laughed and
scrambled up the path. Will had no
choice but to follow.
Suddenly, the ground started
shaking. "Thomas!" Will
cried. He leaped the last two feet
towards his younger brother as the earth began rolling. Rocks crashed down around them. He grabbed Thomas by the waist and pulled
him behind a large boulder on the side of the path, shielding the boy's head
from the bouncing rocks. The earthquake
lasted for several minutes.
Dad, Will thought, I hope you're
okay. I hope you're all right in the
pylon.
"Don't be scared, Will,"
Thomas said, as if reading his mind. "Dad's all right. It'll stop soon." * *
*
Damn! Rick swore under his breath.
A combination of nine crystals, which he felt for sure would have opened
the time portal that had taken Will, had instead caused a hard and quick
earthquake, a tremor that had shaken the rubble outside and caused a
landslide down the small mountain. He
took his hand away from the matrix table.
Another combination? He was
tired, thirsty, and desperately worried about Will. Where had he gone? What was happening to his son?
He rubbed his eyes. Once again, he touched stones. Red, blue, red, green, green, green,
yellow, blue, red… The green globe glowed steadily. A sound like the metal wheels of a rapidly approaching freight train filled the pylon. A ring of lights descended from the ceiling in the exact place where Will had been standing. Ah-ha! He had found it! |
