“Please,” she urged. “It’s important to me.”
Alverez’s jaws worked, as he seemed to mull the request over. “Señorita Wilson, you must be very careful, and do not lift the stone free.” He glanced over his shoulder. “Quickly then.” He watched her closely.
Emma raised her hand, fingers outstretched, and edged them toward the dark stone. She touched its coolness, and ran them into the slight depressions, feeling the pads of the foot, the toes.
“It was found over a hundred years ago in the mouth of a river after heavy rain. It was washed out of the dark lands of the deepest Amazon.” Alvarez watched her as she ran her fingers over the footprint, almost lovingly. “Who, or what, made those prints has been long gone for 100 million years.”
“Not for me they’re not,” she whispered. She snatched her hand back and turned on her heel.
“Huh? You are finished?” Alverez straightened as he watched her leave. “Ah, perhaps we could talk, have coffee, or… ”
Emma turned briefly as she got to the door. “Thank you very much, Señor Alverez, but I have much to do and very little time left.”
She walked out front and skipped down the steps, her mind working overtime as she thought through what she needed to do. Rather than grab a taxi immediately, Emma walked down the street, turning down avenues with her mind somewhere else, some time and place long, long ago.
She imagined Ben in that dark primordial jungle, running for his life as he was pursued. For all she knew, that race for survival had happened right here, where she stood now.
The last time, they were just a group of dumb kids who had no idea what they were up against. And they had all paid dearly, most with their lives. But this time, she’d be ready; she’d gather a team with appropriate expertise, and she’d need firepower. She had a lot to do, and she’d left everything to the last minute. But her determination to be there when the wettest season returned burned within her as brightly as the day she had scaled down from that hellish place and then watched as it vanished.
Personnel, logistics, timeframes, and finances all ran through her mind, and she paid little attention to anything else. Without thinking, she found herself in a less-salubrious area of the city. The veneer of respect was extremely thin in Venezuela, and when tough times hit, some people hit back. In this place, she wasn’t just a woman or even a human being anymore; instead, she was a target.
As she passed an alleyway, she was grabbed around the throat and a small-caliber handgun jammed into her cheek. Emma would have cursed her stupidity, but her throat was already constricted.
She let herself be dragged into the darker depths of the alley. Another man appeared in front of her. He had the brutish appearance of a thug — fleshy broken nose, jaundiced eyes, and a stained gap-toothed grin.
The pressure on her throat eased.
“Take it.” She kept her eyes on him as she held out her bag.
Broken Nose snatched it from her. “Let’s see if today is a good day,” he said in ruined English. He looked up at her. “But I think, not good for you.”
The bigger man holding her guffawed into her ear.
“Take the money and let me go. I won’t report you,” she said evenly.
“Oh, I know this,” Broken Nose said, turning one squinted eye on her again. “But I think we not finish with such a pretty lady yet.” He went to empty her bag. “Americano?”
She ignored him, knowing how this was going to go, and the theft was the last of her worries. They’d rob her, beat and rape her, and if they wanted to cover their tracks, they’d cut her throat. Every city in the world had scum just like them.
Her anger welled up. The big guy holding her shifted his grip so he could see over her shoulder as Broken Nose emptied her bag.
“Last chance,” she said.
He began to shake her bag onto the ground and frowned. “Shut her up.”
The gun shifted from her cheek, and the beefy arm around her throat moved even more as the big guy went to either clamp a hand over her mouth, or something worse.
For a split second, he wasn’t fully in control of her; it was the opportunity she was waiting for. She let herself drop, sliding down in Beefy’s arms, and he bent forward to grab at her. But when her knees were bent, she jammed her heels into the ground, launching herself back up at him like a spear, the top of her head aimed directly at his chin.
It was a direct hit — his head snapped up and she grabbed his gun hand, her finger going over his on the trigger. She jerked his hand around, the muzzle now pointed at the surprised face of Broken Nose. She didn’t hesitate for a blink and fired.
The man’s ear disappeared in a spray of blood and cartilage, and he howled as his eyes went wide with shock and pain. He dropped her bag and she wrenched the gun free from the still-groggy Beefy’s paw, and then used it to club his temple. He fell like an oak tree.
That was enough for Broken Nose, and he turned and ran. Behind her, Beefy groaned with a purple welt on his chin and matching lump growing on the side of his head.
Emma expertly ejected the magazine, and the round in the chamber, and tossed the pieces into an open trashcan. She gathered her things, straightened her clothes and hair, and headed out of the alley.
She’d been busy since she clawed her way out of the Amazon jungle. She’d trained hard, toughened herself. She might be nearly ten years older, but now she was made of iron.
When Primordia returned, she’d be ready.
Emma Wilson walked calmly from the alleyway and waved down a taxicab. Across the road, another car sat pulled in by the sidewalk, windows down. Inside, a long camera lens pointed at the woman, and the whir of an auto-drive captured her every movement.
When Emma’s taxi pulled away, the camera was lowered, the car started, and it followed.
CHAPTER 03
Emma knelt beside the bed of Cynthia Cartwright after bringing her a cup of luke-warm tea. She couldn’t help notice that the older woman looked frailer than usual. The toll of losing her son, Ben, to a damn mystery in the Amazon had aged her considerably.
Cynthia had listened to Emma’s story and had believed every word. After all, in 1908, the Amazon in similar circumstances had consumed one of Ben’s ancestors, and it was his notes that had led Ben to that god-forsaken place.
Cynthia had begged, and then demanded, Emma find her son and bring him home no matter what the timeframe, cost, or the dangers. She had made her wealth available to Emma to bring it about, and Emma had pledged to do so.
Bottom line was, Emma would have done it anyway, but having the Cartwright money at her disposal meant she could do the job right. She loved Ben, and he had been trapped only because he sacrificed his freedom so she could escape — if he was alive, she’d find him and bring him home, even if she died trying.
Emma stood and tiptoed from the room, and then headed up to her office. Cynthia had invited Emma to move in and she accepted, quickly becoming an unofficial daughter to the old woman.
She eased the door of her office shut and turned. Inside, there were several large computer screens, charts, and newspaper clippings dating back over a hundred years. Each told of weird phenomena, unexplained events, and sightings of strange creatures down in the Amazonian jungle. She’d been busy.
She sat down and pulled her chair closer to one of her screens and opened the astral chart on comet mapping.
There was just one she was interested in: Comet P/2018-YG874, designate name, Primordia. It had finished its elliptical curve around the sun and was well on its way back toward Earth. In a few months, it would be at its apparition point — the closest point to Earth where it becomes visible to the naked eye. At that time, its astral effects would be felt, but only in one place on the globe — a tabletop mountain, or tepui, in the Venezuelan jungles of the Amazon.