Instinct: A Chess Team Adventure - By Jeremy Robinson Page 0,107

of the hall led to square rooms arranged in a cruciform. Three steps staggered down the sides of each room’s walls, plummeting into deep fishponds stocked with very large fish of a multitude of species.

Past the cruciform of rooms, at the end of the hallway, rose another set of stairs, this one leading out of the temple roof, into open air and the central tower itself. Again, Weston’s instructions were simple but now punctuated with a shove. “Up.”

Each step displayed a line of ancient pictorial text scrolling from one end to the other as though they were meant to be read as the steps were climbed. The Asian-style script was plain but artistic. Sara stopped on the fifth step up and traced the lines of the script with her finger. “Do you know what it means?”

Weston stopped next to her. “They’re curses.”

Sara looked up the stairs. The script seemed endless. “Curses on who?”

“On you. On me. On all of humanity.” Weston waved the gun at her. “Keep moving.”

A sick feeling burrowed into her stomach and made a home for itself. This whole temple, this whole city, had been founded on a hatred for humanity. And she was being led to its core. She didn’t believe in ghosts, but she’d sensed the spirit of the place since passing through the first gallery gate. It wasn’t just Weston that had her spooked. It was the entire city.

Homo sapiens were never meant to tread here.

They were not welcome.

Sara moved quickly up the stairs, not wanting to look at the script anymore and fearing the city might suddenly come to life and fling her down the steep incline. Reaching the top, she found herself out of breath and facing an average-sized wooden door. A relief had been carved into the wood, similar to the ones worn by many of the city’s buildings and shrines. Yet this one was a recent addition. The wood of the door, like that of the newer roofs, shone brightly against the dull gray stone of the temple. The relief featured a single face—Weston’s.

He stopped next to her, looking at the relief. “A bit crude, but effective, don’t you think? They’ve only just begun to re-form their culture, yet their artistic skills—” Weston looked her in the eyes. “Their artistic skills seem to be intrinsic.” Weston opened the door, motioned with the gun, and said, “In.”

Sara complied.

The circular room she found herself in was one part holy temple and one part caveman bachelor pad—no doubt Weston’s home away from home. Light poured in through circular holes that vented the ceiling. She realized this inner chamber was a miniature-sized version of the mountain above. It even had a crystal chandelier that reflected and amplified the light throughout the room.

At the center of the room, below the crystal lamp, was a fire pit. The surrounding walls were covered with several ancient carvings depicting scenes of human sacrifice, spirits, and strange rituals. Sara’s eyes froze on a relief of several Neanderthal men holding a human woman down upon an altar. It became clear in that moment what the Neanderthals had done to offend the humans. Thousands of years ago, the Neanderthals would have been much more “human” than the group she’d seen. More hairy, maybe, but not nearly as strong. A hyperevolutionary leap had done that during their time in isolation. But they had been wicked, practicing what appeared to be magic of some kind, sacrificing humans, performing rituals. Perhaps in secret at first, she thought, but they must have been found out. And the Homo sapiens, horrified, did what they did best—exterminated.

She turned away from the relief and saw a modern-looking bed. Fashioned from wood and covered with a homemade mattress. Weston removed the belt holding his holster and knife and placed it on the bed. The red band of flesh on his waist revealed the belt was a smidge too snug. He sat next to the belt and scanned the walls of the room. “Before I got here, I thought the Neanderthals were victims of human ignorance and violence. But this room opened my eyes. They did awful things to humanity. True crimes. And they paid for it.”

“Then why are you protecting them?”

“At the end of World War Two, did we kill all the Nazis? Did we continue dropping nukes on Japan? Of course not. We helped them rebuild. They were wrong and they got trounced. But the Neanderthals have never had a chance to make up for what they did