Justice League of America - Batman: The Stone King by Alan Grant (best english novels to read .txt) 📗

scientists can now duplicate it in the lab, where it manifests as plasmoid light.

"Then there's telluric energy, the flow of natural energy from points of varying resistance on the earth's surface. Almost every sacred site ever found has stood on one of these flows–raising the possibility they might once have formed a worldwide grid. And the magma mantle, deep in the earth's crust, may have properties we can't even guess at."

Peter paused, noting the skepticism on the faces of his audience before plunging on with his theory. "It's suspected that at least some of these energies are capable of interacting with electromagnetic fields . . . such as those generated by the human brain."

"Phew, Peter!" Lorann Mutti, the youngest and prettiest of Mills's team, whistled. "That's some stretch of the imagination you're calling for. How exactly do you think it affected humans?"

"Who knows?" Peter shrugged. "But if things like this pyramid were built to store the energies, someone must have been able to use them. My guess is that the shamans, the tribal priests, somehow used it to cause hallucinations in their people.

"Imagine the degree of control they'd have if, for instance, they could make people see a giant representation of whatever gods they worshiped. Or maybe the shamans could directly access the energies–which would explain how supposedly primitive tribesmen could move stones that weigh tens, even hundreds, of tons."

"Interesting theories, Peter," Mills had observed, "but as you admit, not a shred of proof. And definitely not the sort of thing to be preserved in the archaeological record. So we've no way of ever knowing–"

"Yes, we have," Peter broke in. "If we can rediscover precisely how they harnessed the earth energies, we can replicate anything they did."

Lorann Mutti laughed. "We have super heroes," she pointed out. "Superman and Green Lantern. Do they count?"

"If you won't take me seriously, then what's the point?"

There was anger on Peter's face as he turned and strode away. Jenny had hurried after him, trying to soothe his ruffled feelings. She knew that it was more than the jokes of his peers that was upsetting him.

Almost midnight, and the excavation team's patient astronomical experiments had failed to pay off. Using the surrounding hilltops as sighting beacons, they'd been trying to extrapolate the straight lines into space, to see if they aligned with any particular stars. But there was nothing that could be attributed to anything other than random chance.

Len Dors, the final member of the six-strong expedition, snapped the case shut on his theodolite. "Waste of time," he said curtly. He blew out through his mouth, making the hairs of his burgeoning mustache quiver. "It's beginning to get cold, too."

A chill breeze had blown up not long after sunset, and though it wasn't particularly strong, they'd been exposed to it on the pyramid top for hours.

"I vote we go back to the SUV and head for home," David Rymel suggested. He swung the beam of his flashlight, playing it over their equipment. "We can leave this stuff till tomorrow, rather than try to carry it down tonight."

"Oh, very adventurous." Scorn dripped from Peter Glaston's reply. "Good thing Werner and Evans and a thousand other archaeologists didn't say that–'Ooh, I'm cold, I want to go home'–or we might still not have discovered Troy, or the Tomb of Tutankhamen!"

Jenny saw Rymel bristle, and hastened to smoothe things over. "That's a little unfair, Peter. It's been a long day, and David's right, we haven't found anything interesting tonight We should go home and get some sleep. We'll all feel better in the morning."

"I feel fine right now," Peter snapped. "If you want to go, I'll stay here alone. I have a feeling about this place. There's something important here, and I for one don't intend to give up until I find it!"

"We're not giving up, Peter," Robert Mills added, "just taking a much-needed rest."

"And we'll be back tomorrow–" Jenny began, but Peter cut her off.

"I might have known you'd side with him," he accused Jenny, and she flushed. "Well, enjoy each other's company." He picked up a flashlight, snapped it on, and started to follow its beam to the edge of the small plateau.

"Where are you going?" Jenny cried in alarm.

"Maybe there are no stellar alignments from the top," Peter muttered, "but that doesn't mean the ancients didn't use another part of the pyramid for their observations."

"Peter! Come back here!" Robert Mills insisted. The professor moved to follow him, but Jenny shook her head.

"Give him a few minutes to calm down," she said. "He's just a little overwrought."

They saw the beam of Peter's flashlight dip, and a faint motion as he clambered down the rope ladder they'd erected for access to the pyramid's lower courses. As the beam of light disappeared, Jenny felt a sudden chill that seemed to penetrate to her bones.

The breeze was picking up. It really was time to leave.

Peter Glaston's mind was buzzing as he lowered himself down the rope, picking out the rungs with his flashlight before trusting them with his weight. He didn't know what was wrong with him lately; he was always arguing, even with Jenny, picking fights for no reason at all.

A brief memory of the previous summer flashed through his mind. The long hot days in the Peruvian desert . . . the freezing nights under the brightest panoply of stars he'd ever seen . . . and Jenny, her blond hair burnished by moonlight, wrapped in the arms of . . .

Why couldn't he forget? Why couldn't he just accept the fact that what was done, was done, and get on with the rest of his life? He was an adult now. Why couldn't he control this constant frustration, these unwelcome bouts of rage?

He had just stepped off the ladder onto the fifth course, halfway down the pyramid's face, when it happened. His concentration wandered and he looked up into the star-strewn sky, idly wondering if perhaps it had been from here that the pyramid builders made their astronomical