I managed to fight off the nightmare again, although convincing myself it wasn't real was harder than last time. Instead of to my own screams, I woke up to the r-r-r-r of a propeller. It was still black out, with only a tiny amount of moonlight to see by. Sarah, with her head sticking out of the face area, had climbed out of the sleeping bag and started the engine. I had a head full of questions to ask her, stuff I've managed to wonder even through the nightmare.

"Sarah.. we killed everyone on that boat. In almost every major accident, at least someone survives. Won't that raise questions of its own?"

"That's the wrong direction of thinking, because weird stuff happens, and most of it without us. The right one is to ask yourself this: what will the normals see? You two weren't there when I made the fuse and set up all the flammables. Fortunately for us, they had an almost completely full tank and a lot of other stuff to burn as well, including alcohol. People check fire patterns these days so I didn't pour gasoline all over everything. You two probably didn't notice, but I moved your more smashy kills" Heh, I guess some of them were a bit 'smashy'. "closer to the main blast. What the normals will see is a missing lifeboat, a few people dead from falling objects and blunt trauma, some missing people- and there's always missing people- and a lot of charred, broken skeletons. I also put a few packs of cigarettes in the right place- someone was just smoking way too close to the engine when the gas cap was off. Even if someone does suspect foul play, what are they going to come up with? You two probably didn't see him, either, but one of those guys was a major coke dealer." And we killed lawyers, and from the way they talked it sounded like people would want to kill them, too.

"But you didn't know that before you went in there.", I said.

"No, I didn't. Every operation is a calculated risk. We needed a boat, and stealing one without nuking the main boat wouldn't have worked at all." She took her hands off the steering wheel, and leaned very close to us, speaking in a very, very quiet whisper. "Besides, if anyone does determine things to make it a secrecy breach of any level, you'll be the Dominator by then, so don't fucking worry about it." Even for me, that sentence was an amazing relief. "And get back to sleep." My bladder protested that, but I forced myself to ignore that for now and managed to get a few more hours of sleep.

"All right, guys, this is where we stop.", Howard and I were awoken with. It was dawn, and there was a fairly large cacophony of insects and birds everywhere.

"Is there no one around?", he asked.

"It's clear." He got up to take a piss off the side of the boat and I joined him, spelling relief U-R-I-N-E. "Just so you two know," Sarah said playfully, "there's a fish that can swim up your stream of piss and lodge itself in your dick. It's called the candiru. Of course, since you two regenerate, it's just a one-swipe fix." Wow, that's not something I want to think about this morning. Or ever, for that matter.

"You.. can't delude me, Sarah.", Howard said, warily.

"I'm not. It actually happens." Both Howard and I watched our streams and saw no candiru. "In more pleasant news, we're across the Amazon and we're making wonderful time." Whew. "That's no reason to slow down, though.", Sarah said, rolling up the sleeping bag. When we got out of the boat, Sarah pulled it out of the water, and we both looked at her quizzically. "Guys, we're not downstream of where the yacht was. We have to destroy this thing.", she said, pulling out her super-sharp machete.

It is a testament to the power of Illuminated engineering that our weapons were not damaged in our hacking-up of the boat. It took almost an hour to do it the way Sarah wanted it, and she used a big piece of the boat to dig various holes in the dirt, burying every piece. Neither of us questioned whether this was worth it.

Then we set out again. Sarah looked bleary-eyed all day, but that wasn't a surprise at all, considering how little sleep she's gotten. We did the same thing for the rest of the second test. Each day was the same old drudge, each night, the nightmare got a little closer, a little harder to fight off. A few times we had to make secrecy-necessary detours, once around a military camp. We were probably slowing down- it felt like we were, despite our efforts to the contrary- but Sarah said that we'd get there on time..

..and, to our great relief, we did.

The green-covered hill we saw from the satellite photographs appeared to be an Incan temple from the ground, but there's no way it actually was under all the overgrown stone. I have no idea how they're keeping this place a secret, but this thing is definitely not for normal eyes. I visualized the inside being full of traps, for Illuminati that always wanted to build a hero-killing supervillain base and never got the chance.

"About.. nine hours to spare.", Sarah said. "I'm surprised. In a way, I was expecting a few minutes."

"But it looks like we're going to need those hours.", Howard said. "As I should have expected, there's no door." The stairs ended onto what was effectively a block face, covered in stones bearing pictograms, some of which seemed to be faces, some of which seemed to be Illuminati symbols. "And I had to leave all my entrance-makers at home." I think it was Caesar who cut that knot in half with his sword instead of bothering to untangle it.

Sarah thought for a minute, looking up and down the sides of the green-covered temple, then back up again. "I know what you're thinking, Sarah.", Howard said. So did I.

"He never gave us a height measurement.", I pointed out.

"Well, it's easy to climb, so I doubt it's up there..", she said, shrugging.

"Climb it and check anyway.", Howard commanded her, and she moved from block to block with the ease of a mountain goat. "Billy, do you see anything that I don't?"

"If I did, I wouldn't be standing here puzzling over how to get in. You know, it would be just like these guys to put all these symbols and stuff here, but put the actual entrance in some obscure place on one of the sides." I really, really wished I had one of Howard's entrance-makers.

"Or put some weird push-the-blocks puzzle to open up the entrance, only the blocks are everywhere around the temple and need to be hit in a certain order. These symbols are a clue. That one's me.", he said, pointing to the figure with the long hair. "And I think that's you.", he said, pointing to one with shorter hair.

"And I think they're mocking us.", I said. Near the corners of the pictogram wall were pictures of us engaged in acts I hope he never considers doing.

"Yes. They are most definitely mocking us. I really doubt that's what we have to do to get in." I sure as hell hope not. "But these aren't push-blocks, so if we look at them a certain way, they almost certainly tell us how to get in."

"This time, I think it's you who's forgotten your Illumination, Howard. This isn't Indiana Jones. This might be just one large block, but who the hell says it doesn't have sensors?" I noticed Sarah climbing down, shaking her head.

"Shit. You're right. I have definitely been getting way too far into this. Okay. This one.. this.. no. No. THIS one symbolizes the Dominator." He pushed on a pyramid that had an eye in its center. "It's the floating top of the larger pyramid."

"Then this is my picture, and.. this symbolizes me.", Sarah said, pushing on two other blocks- a female symbol (the only one on the wall, I noticed) and a brick falling from the top of a flat-topped pyramid- the pyramid that Howard's symbol floats above. "They're mocking me, too. I was supposed to be a first."

"I don't think I have a symbol.", I said, looking them over, looking around Howard and Sarah. I don't belong here, and the guys who designed this thing know it. "I'm not really supposed to be here, I guess. Wait." There was a pyramid with no eye, of the exact same size as Howard's. I pushed on it and the short-haired symbol of myself. All of us pushed on our chosen symbols, enough to trigger any sensor. Nothing.

"Fuck.", Howard said. "That's obviously not it."

"Wait. I'm being a dumbass. How long is my hair now?", I said. I reached around Sarah to touch with my left hand the same long-haired symbol that Howard touched with his right.

"How's it going to know there's two of us?"

"Touch the others, but push this one real hard. Maybe it takes both of us." The new configuration pushed in the long-haired block- and the entire wall fell over. There was a sharp 90 degree angle to the left in front of the collapsed block- the stone hall that went that way instantly lit up with an odd glow. It sloped downwards and gradually to the right, and from what I could see, I guessed our path was a spiral.

"Well, it's a good thing we didn't bother looking around the rest of the pyramid. Okay, Sarah, how many traps?", Howard asked.

"LOTS.", Sarah said. "And just look at how that hall curves around. Come on guys, you know what that means."

"Rolling rock fun.", I said. Howard just groaned and nodded.

"Well, it's not impossible and we don't have anywhere else to go. Fuck it, I'll take point.", he said.

"Wait a minute, Howard. Depending on how big that rock is, how fast it moves..", I said, making pushing motions with my arms. Both Howard and Sarah got the idea instantly.

"Stick together until it triggers, then.", Howard ordered us. "And once it does, I'm either going to run or push that thing, and of those two you're going to do what I do." He always watches his words. "Let's try this."

We walked not five feet down the hall when the stone wall directly behind us (perpendicular to the crashed pictogram wall) crashed down to reveal a rolling rock. I estimated its speed at twenty-five miles per hour and its weight at maybe a ton and a half.

Howard ran at it, screaming. We followed him- his palms hit it just before mine did, and Sarah hit it right afterwards. We pushed not just against the rock, but against its rotation, as that pushed down on our hands- we needed to lift our hands and keep hitting it again to prevent getting our arms forced under it. The three of us gave a little ground (we can't give too much- other traps!!) to its momentum.. and then the tide turned. The rotational velocity lessened and the three of us pushed upwards on it.. my muscles hurt like hell pushing a rock this size, but I was damned if this wasn't going to work. The thing finally began to roll the other way, back up the slope. Howard smiled and began to push it to the right, out the door. We followed.

It was incredibly enjoyable watching that rock of death bounce down the stairs and into the forest below with an enormous crash. I flipped it two middle fingers, laughing. Sarah was a bit giddy, and Howard looked impressed.

"Fucking excellent, Billy. That probably pissed them off a good deal and made this a whole lot easier.", Howard said, smiling.

"Billy, I think you just ruined a lot of other people's fun.", Sarah said. "That was fucking hilarious. Howard, still taking point?"

"Of course." He sauntered down the hall. There were various arrow traps- he grabbed the flying projectiles leisurely and threw them to the side. There was a spike trap that popped up at his foot immediately after he stepped on a stone- he simply moved his foot out of the way of the spike which then retracted. He grinned, pushed his left foot where the spike would trigger but not hurt him, and simply kicked the spike with his right, sharply bending it and wrecking the trap out of sheer spite. I can't blame him for enjoying it- after all, they were going to enjoy his panic.

The hall was quite a distance- apparently they wanted to have enough for memories for a long time to come- but despite the traps it didn't seem to take very long and, at the end, there was a passage (just narrow enough to block a rolling rock) leading to a large, circular room- we stepped through.