1
The sound of humming gives it away. I’m wide awake within seconds, listening to a sound that I haven’t heard for months: the unforgettable sound of a UFO. This time it’s hovering above my house. By the time I pull on a sweater and some jeans, the humming is gone. I’m left waiting.
Minutes later, there’s the roar of a motorcycle riding up my street on a chilly December morning. I lean out of my window to see the outline of a guy in a leather jacket zoom up to my front door riding a Harley Davidson. I peer at him through the early-morning gloom.
“What’s up, Benicio?” I mutter as casually as I can. But inside I’m bubbling with anticipation.
Benicio here, in Oxford!
The sound of my voice is swallowed by the damp air. My second cousin Benicio pulls off his helmet, shakes his hair free of his eyes. He peers back at me.
“Not much, Josh.”
We stare at each other for a second.
“You gonna come down?”
“You’re not coming in?”
“I thought we agreed. Safer to go somewhere away from your house. So get a jacket, ’cause it’s really cold!”
I can hardly remember what I’d agreed. I mean, when you get a call at two in the morning on a strange-looking cell phone that you’ve never heard ring before—a phone you thought you’d turned off—well, you’re not in the most focused state of mind.
Mainly, you’re excited.
A call like that comes in and it shakes everything up—in a good way. In a great way. I needed to be woken up like that. I feel like I’ve been asleep for months.
Josh, there’s something I need to tell you, to show you. Some important news from Ek Naab. And … I’m gonna come in person.
Good old Benicio—I can always count on him.
Only a few minutes later, I’m squeezing my head into Benicio’s spare helmet, wrapping a scarf around my neck (it really is freezing), closing the front door softly, and joining Benicio on the back of that Harley.
We zip down our little suburban Oxford street and head out toward the main event—Sunnymead Meadow—where Benicio’s hidden the Muwan aircraft that he flew from Ek Naab in Mexico to Oxford.
“I’ve always wanted to see Oxford,” Benicio tells me, his words muffled against the visor.
Well, me too. I’ve always wanted to see Oxford—from the air.
The bike speeds across the short bridge near the meadow; then we’re riding over slippery grass. I stop for a second, admiring the “UFO.” Because deep within the wisps of low clouds, that’s exactly what it looks like: a humming object covered in blue and orange flashing lights. Nothing like any airplane I’ve ever seen.
“How did you land here without anyone noticing?” I ask Benicio as we slide off the motorcycle. With a remote control, he opens a panel in the belly of the Muwan. It’s parked behind some low, scrappy trees. “We’re right next to the highway!”
Grinning, Benicio pushes the bike into the Muwan and closes the panel. The highway is less than twenty yards away, on the other side of a row of trees and hedges. Even at this early hour, it’s so noisy that I need to raise my voice to be heard.
“Maybe someone saw me. But UFO sightings are so boring now; most people won’t bother to report them.” He opens the main body of the plane. “Anyway, Josh, I’m not gonna make a habit of this.”
“So why are you here?”
Benicio shrugs. For a second or two, he tries to look serious. “Get in. We need to have a talk.”
He takes the Muwan up almost vertically. In just over two seconds we’re above the low clouds. I’m in a seat behind Benicio in the Mark II Muwan; in Mayan it means sparrow-hawk.
I can’t think of it as “Mayan” technology. The people of Ek Naab may be descendents of a hidden tribe of the ancient Maya, but their technology comes from somewhere and someone else. When I was in Ek Naab they didn’t tell me from where or who. Could it be they don’t even know?
The Muwan has room for one pilot and two passengers in the rear. The cockpit window covers the pilot’s seat and extends just over the back seats, so I can see up as well as ahead. The glass—if it is glass—is tinted a sort of pinkish gold color. Or maybe that’s a reflection of the dawn sky; as I watch the cloud layer through the window, it’s as though the tint actually changes color, cycling through pinkish gold to silver gray.
“Where do I go for a good view of these ‘dreaming spires’?” Benicio says.
I remember my dad once driving me up a hill near a golf course, where he showed me the famous view of the spires of Oxford. “Hinksey Hill,” I say.