The Merman and the Moon Forgotten

Three • The Peruvian





The mountains of central Peru.

Same time.





Tink. Tink.

Hollow . . . metal? The Peruvian man squeezed the shovel.

Tink. Tink. Tink.

He threw the shovel aside. The Peruvian knew what to do. First, he would report to the project leader and then begin the tedious work of gently removing the dirt away with a soft brush for the next three days.

He did neither.

The Peruvian clawed the ground. Bits of rock shoved under nails. Dirt flew into nose, teeth, and eyes.

They gave up on the western site. Thought I was an idiot. The Peruvian laughed to himself. Yes, yes. Cigar-shaped . . . self-emanating alloy, just as he told me. And here it is—the oldest artifact on the planet.

The Peruvian thought he saw an engraving. He inhaled and blew.

L? An English L? In Peru? He glanced over. Only the ruins of Machu Picchu leered over the twenty-foot hole. “Ha!” He congratulated himself. English? Chinese? What do I care? Oldest artifact ever to be discovered, and I made the find. That project leader told me it would be worth more money than these Peruvian eyes have ever seen.

The idea swelled before he could stop it.

I could slip it into my pocket. Sneak out after nightfall. And I know just the buyer. The Peruvian loosened his pocket as the object parted from its archaeological grave. A shadow passed over.

The Peruvian leapt to his feet.

What is he doing down here?

There stood the crazy old project leader with his straw white hair and green trench coat. He never came groundside, preferring to stay in his hovertruck 24/7, so he could watch over the Machu Picchu dig like some Norse god of archaeology.

“I—I think we’ve found it—” The Peruvian man yielded. “—Mr. Steward Lyons.”

“Yes. I saw it from the truck. Bring it here, quickly now,” the project leader barked in what sounded like a Scottish accent.

The Peruvian obeyed. He tapped the UP symbol on the auto-lift. Electromagnetic thrusters raised him twenty feet and eye level with the project leader. But the Peruvian didn’t make eye contact with him, couldn’t make eye contact with him.

The project leader frightened him.

No other way to put it. He was abnormally tall, with the beard of a wild man and a temper to match. And he used big words like “forsooth” and “malcontent.”

With a sigh, the Peruvian surrendered the oldest artifact on the planet into a hand trailed with dirt. Idiot. Weak, stupid idiot, the Peruvian thought.

The project leader withdrew a monocle and for the first time ever, smiled.

The Peruvian smiled back. “Wonder if the Smithsonian has my Friendbook address. You know, for follow-up questions.”

Or a job promotion? the Peruvian thought to himself. Maybe even director? Suppose I should hire a publicist.

The project leader cupped his hand, raised his chest and spit.

“Ugh.” The Peruvian covered his mouth.

The project leader rubbed the artifact and spit between his palms, shook it, and then scratched it with blackened nails. The Peruvian dug through his back pocket and offered up a bottle of hand sanitizer.

The project leader ignored him. “Very good, Ludwig, very good. Couldn’t have made the clue more difficult to find. You and your puzzles.”

“It—it is quite strange,” said the Peruvian. “This script, it is an English ‘L’, yes? Could not be Incan.”

The project leader’s face rounded on the object. “And why should it be? Laid here when Peru was nothing more than an ice sheet.”

A twig cracked in the distance. In one motion, the project leader shoved the artifact into his coat, reached behind his neck and unsheathed an axe.

“Woah.” The Peruvian scrambled backward. “What? What?”

The project leader traced a figure eight with the axe head. The jungle responded in silence. The axe was mysteriously sheathed again.

“Wh—why do you have a battle axe at the dig . . . at all?” The Peruvian cocked his head. “And where do you keep that thing?”

The project leader curled both fists around the artifact.

Snap.

“Are you crazy?” The Peruvian grabbed his hair.

The artifact released tendrils of yellow dust. A breeze swept most of it away, leaving only a trace of letters behind.

“I, um, I . . .” the Peruvian mumbled.

“It’s stardust. Now be quiet.”





Steward Nikolas Lyons XI,

Mayist 12th. Year 4570 of the 5th Epoch

I pray the clues were not too severe, and this message fell into true hands. The trackers followed you to Earth’s future, as I’m sure you’ve suspected. While they have run you off to another time, a greater crisis has emerged in our own. My informants tell me the Merrows of Eynclaene will be attacked within the month by the Dujinnin and some foul creature. I do not need to remind you they are guardians of all Huron’s wealth, which leaves your fair city vulnerable to an ill and unthinkable ruin. The Council of Teine insists upon your return, demands it in fact. Who knows? Could it be that time and space will fend off the trackers once and for all? Do not delay.

Your friend,

Ludwig, Master Toymaker





“The Merrows attacked!” The project leader swiped the words into an unreadable cloud. “That’s it then . . . bloody creatures chased me from Huron. I left her exposed . . . I should return. I must return . . . but the trackers? You might be right, Ludwig. Abandon the trackers to this time and return home. Kill two birds with one stone.” The project leader squeezed his palms. “Oh Huron, what is the way? What is the way? Confound it all! Why is the city quiet?” He locked eyes with the Peruvian. “Why will the woman not speak to me?”

“Take it from personal experience, move on.” The Peruvian shrugged. “They never call back.”

The project leader’s eyes searched the Peruvian’s. “Aagh.” He waved him off and faced the archaeological team. “I have tarried long enough. Must find Steward Nikolas Lyons now. Good day.” Without another word the project leader marched to his yellow Ford hovertruck, which was as swarthy and beat up as himself.

“Wait.” The Peruvian moved between two team members flirting at the water station. “You’re going to do what—who? Are you not this—this Steward Nikolas Lyons? For years you’ve demanded we call you Mr. Steward Lyons.”

The project leader looked at the Peruvian with his blazing green eyes, making him feel six feet short of his five foot ten. “I was! Huron knows that I was. Steward Nikolas Lyons the Eleventh. But now I must find Steward Nikolas Lyons the twelfth. My grandson.”

The project leader heaved into the truck. A harness responded to the presence of a body and unspooled itself. With a slam of the door, he nodded an empty salutation to the crowd and pressed the power on symbol. An electromagnetic buzz came from the hovertruck and it began to lift.

The Peruvian man stared at his own stunned reflection in the hovertruck window. The scene was fizzling away like a bad radio signal. He looked down to two empty hands. The artifact that would make him wildly rich currently sat in the passenger seat with a crazy project leader who needed to find his grandson and save the Merrows.

“What’s a Merrow?” the Peruvian said to himself.

The Peruvian leapt to the hovertruck, grabbed the door handle, and yanked it open. The hovertruck pitched to the left, forcing the project leader to prop one hand on the roof while gripping the steering column.

“Are you mad?” yelled the project leader.

“The artifact. You have the artifact!” the Peruvian cried.

“I cannot waste my time in parlay with you. The Merrows, sir. The Merrows are in need of salvation. Now let go before you pitch the hover over!”

“Merrows?” the Peruvian said. “What are you talking about?”

“Merrows,” the project leader shouted over the hovertruck’s whining stabilizers. “Mermaids! Merfolk! Whatever you folks call ‘em. They are under the citizenship of Huron and in need of me. If I’m to save them, I must have access to the voice of Huron. I may access the voice through my grandson, Nikolas. Henceforth, I must return him to his proper time in history. In short, good day, sir!” He wrenched the car door from the Peruvian.

The hovertruck kicked a foot, and then twenty into the air.

“Hey . . . HEY! The grant? What am I to tell the endowment board?” The Peruvian punched the air. “Crazy old man!”

The hovertruck stopped its ascent and the driver window rolled down. Two silvery objects spat out to the grass. Then, the hovertruck pointed its grill northward and puttered off into the clouds. Incandescent F O R D letters were the last to be seen.

“Told you that guy was a nut,” a voice came from the onlookers.

The Peruvian toddled after the artifact. He clutched it to his chest, stood to his feet and bolted toward a stack of empty briefcases. Finding one, he dropped to the ground and stuffed the artifact into it. With a few taps, the password was set. He wasn’t going to let it out of his sight again.

A llama cried from the outer perimeter. Its bottom lip lolled back and forth as it galloped past.

Cliiiiink, tiiiiink. Cliiiiiink, tiiiiink, came the sound of grinding chains, escorted by canine growls. Three shadows emerged from the jungle.

The Peruvian wobbled to his feet. “Now wha—?” his voice trailed off. “Heaven help us.”

What he saw next utterly convinced him that it was time to retire from archaeology and accept his brother Felipe’s open invitation to start a line of clothing apparel for small dogs. That is, if he could manage to survive the next five minutes. Three monstrous animals lumbered across the site. Someone must have taken the head of a hyena, stuck it on the neck of an ostrich and stitched it to the body of a raptor.

One of the creatures, which had bits of chain crisscrossing its torso, stopped at the hole where the Peruvian first discovered the artifact. Its neck dropped to the ground while oily eyes stayed on the archaeological team.

Grung, grung, grung, grung, grung, grung, came guttural sniffs from the bottom of its neck. The Peruvian’s lip curled. Instead of nostrils at the end of its face, this creature’s nostrils were on the bottom side of its throat.

The creature stopped and rose up on two hind legs. Membranous skin whipped open from behind both ears while its head moved around like some prehistoric satellite dish.

It found the Peruvian.

“Reegh!”

The Peruvian scrambled for the closest hovertruck. Sound of clattering chains moved towards him. He reached for the handle. It was locked. Claws forced him down. He was looking back at a canine mouth. It opened, revealing teeth for gutting set in a jaw for tearing. The Peruvian heard his own machine gun breath. The creature’s neck slithered over until the two neck nostrils found his face. The nostrils flared, sniffed, growled, and then sniffed unsatisfied. The creature turned to the briefcase in the Peruvian’s hand.

“Grrrrh.”

The creature’s gaze returned to the Peruvian. Something rolled through its jaw. His eyes widened as the bottom jaw unhinged from the top with serpentine ease. Between rows of teeth pulsed a tubular, pink throat. The Peruvian closed his eyes for what he knew would be the last time in his life.

“Ooh,” the Peruvian moaned.

Wet lips brushed his hand and the briefcase was ripped away. The creature’s head jerked back several times until the case slid down its gullet.

The oldest artifact in the history of archaeology now lay in the belly of a monster.

The membrane fan folded behind the creature’s head. It looked back at the other two, who were currently investigating their own career-changing team members.

“Schreeg-gah!” it commanded. In some strange chorus, all the heads lifted northward and in the direction of the project leader.

And just like that, they left.

The Peruvian rolled over. He watched the tip of the last creature’s tail disappear into the jungle.

Project leader leaves babbling about his grandson saving some mermaids? Says he needs to “fetch him” and bring him to his true home? Monsters attack the site? Attack me? It swallows the oldest artifact on the planet and my future in archaeology with it? The only way for me to get it back is to hunt that monster down and gut the artifact from its stomach? I would have to be a . . . hero?

The Peruvian knew what to do next.

He tapped the inside of his ear drum. A tinny voice answered.

“Communication One. How may I connect you?”

“Felipe Sánchez, please.”

“Connecting. . . .”

“Aló?”

“Felipe. . . .”

The Peruvian retired from archaeology and became a moderately successful producer of leggings and scarves for toy terriers. And never again did he have to worry about a crazy old project leader babbling on about some girl named Huron.