Ice Shock(23)

“Totally. In fact, maybe during Christmas vacation, you could help me with physics homework,” Emmy says as she leaves. “That stuff about electromagnetism. I just don’t get it.”

Electromagnetism … ?

I’m nodding, smiling, whatever I need to do to get Emmy out of the house before I’m tempted to talk to her about my problems again. I don’t really think about what she’s just said until I get back upstairs.

When I do, I can hardly believe how blind I’ve been.

My translation of those glyphs from the Ix Codex: el-ek-to mak-ne-ti-ka pul-sa.

Or in English: electromagnetic pulse.

And kan-ta-na.

If you played around with the pronunciation … could be container.

It’s not exact, but probably as close as you can get to making English words using Mayan syllables.

Except for the first page, the Ix Codex is written in English.

School is completely off the agenda now. The next few hours go by in a chocolate-and-soda-induced blur. The next time I look up from my desk, it’s almost three o’clock—and Mom will be home soon.

I have two of the three pages roughly decoded.

And now I know for sure just how bad it is that Madison and his people have this information.

It’s worse than bad—it’s a disaster.

And it’s all my fault. By trusting Ollie—and Tyler too, maybe—I’ve fed Madison all the juicy clues he needed to find the last few remaining scraps of the Ix Codex.

The first page, I can’t translate. It’s in another language, or there’s a different reading order for the syllables; either way I can’t figure it out. I get as far as reading the date (which uses the Mayan Long Count) and a fancy-looking glyph called the Initial Series Introductory Glyph—the ISIG—which tells me that the document is dedicated to Itzamna. Which comes as no big surprise, since the Ix Codex is one of the so-called Books of Itzamna.

On page one, after the ISIG come fifteen glyphs. Some are the same—I count only ten different glyphs. I try to translate the first two and get gobbledegook.

First glyph: aj-la-ni-ne.

Second glyph: li-si-ne.

The third one looks as though it isn’t going to make any sense either. So I give up on page one, move on to the next page.

Where I have much more luck. Using my system of reading the Mayan syllables in each glyph to make a word which more or less sounds like an English word, I manage to get a pretty reasonable-looking translation.


The Fourth Book of Erinsi Inscriptions


To preserve technology under electromagnetic pulse from periodic galactic energy wave. Dates of galactic energy waves calculated.

Essential instructions on use of Revival Chambers. Three elements required. Key, Adapter, and Container. All protected by bio-defense.

First step shows how to make Key. In liquid form Key unstable. Use within sixty minutes. Crystal Key can be … (And that’s the end of the third page.)

All a bit mysterious—and it seems to be about the galactic superwave of 2012.

“To preserve technology under electromagnetic pulse …”

I’m guessing that these pages are saying that the Ix Codex is all about a way to preserve computer technology from being wiped out by the gigantic electromagnetic pulse that’s coming with the superwave in 2012.

From what I can tell, they need three things: the “Adapter,” the “Container,” and the “Key.”

The “Key,” it seems, can be made. It looks like one of the missing pages gives some kind of formula—a recipe for the “Key.”

So what about the “Adapter” and the “Container”? Are they more ancient artifacts? Do the Mayas of Ek Naab have them—or know where they are? And what about these “Revival Chambers”?

If those pages from the document folder have found their way to Madison, he might be able to figure out as much as I have. Will he be able to figure out how to make the Key?

Then from a forgotten little part of my memory, a tiny thought pops up. Madison stole an ancient artifact—from that collector in Lebanon.

Was it the Adapter? Was it the Container?

What else do his people have; what else do they know?

We’re in a race to get hold of and use this ancient technology—and now I have some idea of what to do next. But it won’t be easy.





BLOG ENTRY: DEAR MOM




If you’re reading this, it’s because something happened to me; it’s because I haven’t come back. It means that you’ve been through my locker at school and found my letter, found the Web address of this blog and the password clue.

I’ve thought long and hard about this, and here’s what I think.

I owe you an explanation. It’s been really hard not to tell you what’s been going on. At first, it was because I knew you wouldn’t believe me. And then I began to worry about you.