The Pyramid Gambit

Cristina Valari looked like a woman in her mid-thirties. The look she cultivated was deliberate: she was fit. At first glance, she resembled a stylistic businesswoman, as she fixed the young interns with a steady gaze from the other side of the glass walled office which stood on the second floor building and received their respectful approbation. It came as a surprise one morning when she received a message from her past self, warning her of the consequences of her actions.

The message read: 'I know things didn’t go as planned, and I could have handled myself better. I didn’t realize the device’s alloy would resist your attack, and I regret not being more careful. I understand you were just doing your job, and I respect that.

I’d like the chance to make things right. We both want the same goal—a safer future. If you’re open to it, I’d like to talk.'

Sincerely,

Cristina Valari, aged 23

As her identification card slid through the scanner, all the processes of security which she hated, she gave a reply in her own voice in answer to a question about her parents’ first love tryst, and only then did she reclaim her backpack from the locker. The sliding doors to the second floor opened silently, admitting her to the secure wing. An access card was handed to her, permitting entry to the room where Thomas Creer was waiting to tell her the whole story.

 Cristina had conducted numerous interviews, but this one was special. The story must be all over the media by now. The facility was tested for the best sound, cones having been added to remove dead spots, and she could hear her own her high heels unmistakably clicking on the reflecting surface. The LED lights cast the indigo-colored walls in a charged light. The next and last barrier was the door to Thomas Creer’s room, and the last step before making her impromptu statements. 

"If you would face forward and give me a sound test," the recordist requested, pointing to a microphone on the table.

 "Cristina Valari," she responded, placing her right hand on the stem of the microphone gingerly. "Code: 1212 Tango Braveheart, Devon cream tea 11." She observed the bullet-shaped skyscrapers for as far as her eye could see through the second floor.

"AI clearly utilized," she said accusing the technician of setting up the scene to shake her perception of where she was.

“No,” he answered. We are still in 2060 Lima." Then he quickly retreated to a sound booth behind one-way glass. Alone, Cristina Valari put her backpack on the table. Surveillance cameras tracked her every move, and it came as a surprise to her that a seamless door in front of her began to open towards her. She nodded in the direction of where a camera stood.

"Your conversation will be monitored," the technician informed her while she was practicing several long and very full lung breaths. "At the slightest sign of you hearing a message in your head about your past actions, you will receive backup from my hired security."

 Cristina was somewhat relieved that they didn’t think she was crazy, as Thomas Creer began to slide around the door and she allowed herself a smile, reassured by the words but unassured of the outcome.

Inside the room, Creer in a white jumpsuit smiled at the corners of his mouth. The room was dark and the wall-mounted camera was cleverly hidden. His face was a mask of calmness, and he exuded a level of self-control that suggested his willingness to participate in what he hoped would be the disclosure of vital and favourable evidence.

 "Hello," said Cristina.

 Creer returned her greeting with a frozen smile, then took a seat opposite her. Cristina re-positioned herself, noting that Creer showed no signs of nervousness. She activated the recorder, and with practiced calm she sorted the priority of her questions. Then, hanging her jacket on the back of her chair, she could observe Creer’s eye movement. Creer watched her face, his expression at once startled and composed. She knew he knew the ins and outs of negotiation in interrogation. She began.

"On a cloudy dawn in September of 2060, something unimaginable happened in the Nazca Desert, Peru. The locals, accustomed to the legends of their ancestors and the strange energy emanating from the Nazca lines, those who trekked out that far, saw a structure that had never been there: a golden pyramid, of perfect proportions, shining under the first rays of the sun.

One of the first to arrive was myself, the Peruvian scientist, Dr. Cristina Valari, an archaeologist and specialist in ancient languages, who has dedicated her life to deciphering the pre-Columbian mysteries. I had studied Peru's ancient cultures from the age of 23, when I still wore a ponytail and had always been obsessed with the idea that the Nazca lines hid secrets much deeper than had been believed.

With my research team, I discovered that the pyramid was not a simple inanimate object. It seemed to vibrate with an energy that affected both the scientific instruments and the people nearby. But most surprising was the discovery of a series of inscriptions in an unknown language at the base of the pyramid, which strangely resembled the hieroglyphs used by the ancient civilizations of the region.

Days later, after intense studies, we found an ancient manuscript in the National Library of Lima, attributed to a pre-Columbian civilization of the Nazca region, a text that had been ignored for centuries. The manuscript, written in a lost language which took a machine learning program to decipher, spoke of a group of beings called "The Eternals." According to the document, "The Eternals" were inhabitants of the future who, in ancient times, interacted with the civilizations of the past, leaving signs of their power in the Nazca lines.

The text contained a surprising prophecy:

'And when the heavens weep gold, those who rule time will send a sign to guard the spacefarers of the world. The structure that belongs neither to the past nor to the present will appear on the lines of the ancients, made from a substance hardly found on Earth foreshadowing the return of the Eternals, guardians of the flow of time.'" 

Cristina was fascinated by the coincidence. According to the inscriptions and legends collected in this forgotten document, the pyramid could have been sent from the future as there was no consensus about its radix. The text suggested that "The Eternals" controlled time and had influenced ancient civilizations, including the Nazcas, to create the lines, in order to receive some kind of message or structure from the future. No one, not even the University of Toronto's prestigious computer department, could decipher the inscriptions in an unknown language at the base of the pyramid.

As she delved deeper into her studies, Cristina realized something even more puzzling. In another part of the manuscript, reference was made to a direct connection between the pyramid and the stars. Maybe this was what would come back to haunt her. The Nazcas, it seemed, had been guided to draw the lines in order to align their creations with certain cosmic events, events that could only be triggered by technology from the future, the technology of the Eternals. And she had been looking at it in the wrong way, and this Creer character knew more than she did. She was disciplined and dismissive of the conspiracy theories which surrounded Nazca after the discovery of the lines by flyers in the 20^th century. But she hadn't taken that step to place it in the future, and he had.

The scientist couldn't help but think about the implications of this discovery. Could it be that the leading figures of that ancient civilization had been special in consequence of which they had contact with time travelers? What if the pyramid which puzzled the military was the physical extension back into present existence of these Eternals who could dwell out of time inputting to the past to re-purpose time?

What she did know was that the appearance of the pyramid on the Nazca lines was modelled by someone who’d imitated the design but not the materials. And as Cristina stared at that golden structure, she felt that she was just beginning to uncover a detail that she’d missed at first. The Eternals, whoever they were, seemed to have returned to Earth a strange material. Cristina interlaced her fingers, and rested her chin on them. Creer did not appear mad or unbalanced, yet he showed the incomparable self-assurance of the delusional.

 "Are you aware of what you’ve done?" she asked.

 Creer offered an irritating self-assured smile, his tone unchanging. "I executed a missile attack on the pyramid," he stated, breaking the barrier of cooperation which she had feared he would by being outright defiant.

She scanned her notes. "The launch of three homing missiles in the exclusion zone at the Nazca lines, Peru."

 Cristina's expression hardened. "You took off from Las Palmas Air Base at 06:15 on Sunday, the 5th of September, fourteen days ago. Your routine flight between Lima and Coronel FAP Alfredo Mendívil Duarte Airport in Ayacucho was scheduled for two hours. However, to get to the point, you directed your plane towards Nazca. The missile indicator suddenly switched to assault mode. We have reason to believe that the coordinates in both the plane's auto control and launch unit were changed, most likely by you, resulting in the launch of two armed air-to-ground missiles targeting an area 500 meters southeast of the hummingbird geoglyph."

 "I know," Creer said, without a touch of regret in his voice. "But as I mentioned upon arrest, no innocent people were hit, and..."

"What about the pyramid?" Cristina almost erupted, but kept her tone quiet yet deadly serious. "You of all people should know that explosions can cause extensive damage and that the Fuerza Aérea del Perú, FAP. would not permit it."

"I was aware of that."

"This may not end well for you but it could if you are cooperative. Who were you working for?"

"How is this interview meant to discover my motivations?" asked Creer, who seemed to possess prescience, for he must have known there weren’t going to be repercussions if he could disappear as unobtrusively as he'd appeared. "I hope you can see that humanity has activists who feel impelled to defend the last vestiges of time as physicists direct us to interpret it."

"What do you mean ‘last vestiges?’," Cristina thought his syntax was maybe a little futuristic as she asked.

"You I see have a background as a scientist too, albeit a psychophysical specialism in suiting for extreme environments, still it is enough for you to see that our world has been given a guardian object which prevents us from spacefaring." Creer smiled faintly and went on. "Actually, I had put my whole career into spacesuits and now timesuits."

 Cristina leaned back in her chair and shook her long hair. "I'll be assuming then that you are not anti-time travelling per se but who, may I say, for his own amusement, is having a laugh at the expense of the Peruvian government and, er...Earth in 2060," she added after a short pause. "I don't care whether you are a timesuit designer myself, but the Canadian Spacetime Agency has put a price on your head of $250,000."

 Creer didn’t flinch. He glanced briefly at her before leaning forward, his expression unchanging, his voice calm and almost amused. 

"688,300 Peruvian Nuevo Sol?" He tilted his head slightly, a faint smile tugging at his lips. "It seems my value has increased since our last conversation."

 Cristina raised an eyebrow, checked her calculator, impressed by the fluency of the math. "You don’t seem particularly bothered by it. I would’ve thought a price that high might get your attention."

 Creer shrugged, his tone still casual. "To some, perhaps. But I’ve never been one to put much stock in numbers. The game we're playing, Cristina, goes beyond that."

 She narrowed her eyes, scanning his face for any crack in his composure, any hint of fear. There was none.

 "So, this is all just a game to you?" she asked, her voice edged with frustration. "Destroying a piece of pre-history, the lines, hummingbird, almost the pyramid—manipulating time itself—what's your endgame, Creer?"

Creer leaned back, his gaze thoughtful for a moment, as if weighing how much to reveal. Then, his eyes met hers again, sharp and unreadable. 

"Endgame?" He paused, a flicker of something almost like an evolutionary mutation crossing his face. "You see, that's the problem with people like you, Cristina. You think in terms of beginnings and endings. But time..." He gestured loosely with one hand. "Time isn't linear. It’s... adaptable. Fluid. And those who understand it—those who master it—aren't concerned with games of punishment or reward."

Cristina exhaled sharply, growing more impatient. "Spare me the philosophy, Thomas. Who are you working for?"

Thomas Creer smiled faintly, the picture of calm confidence. "You think a bounty will change anything? That I’m some sort of pawn in a larger scheme? You're asking the wrong questions."

Cristina’s fists clenched under the table. "And what are the right ones?"

 He held her gaze for a long moment before finally replying, his voice as smooth as ever.

 "Why haven't I run yet, why is our viewpoint on this Earth so small?"

Her breath caught slightly at the implication, and for the first time, she felt a thread of uncertainty coil around her.

"You’re calculating something," she muttered, more to herself than to him. "I knew it all along. I got the message."

"Always you did, we chose you," Mares answered, his smile widening just a touch, his eyes gleaming with a secret she couldn’t quite grasp.

Cristina nodded to herself. Creer displayed impressive self-assurance, but he probably still thought she was bluffing. Well, he would learn otherwise, she thought grimly. He had pre-empted her personal hypothesis though.

"Very well," she finally said, "for starters, let me know what was supposed to be destroyed?"

Creer smiled, almost teasing her with his look. "Let's see - Cristina Valari, enlisted in the Canadian Spacetime Agency from Ricardo Palma University in Lima under Bedford Jackson. For the last nine years, you've worked for the CSA, specializing in profile analysis and interrogation, and you have your own office on the at The CSA. Honestly," Creer added with a shake of his head, "you ought to ask me some more astute questions."

 Cristina's eyes narrowed. This was a game to him. She leaned forward, her voice steady and controlled. "Why don't you enlighten me, then? What exactly do you hope to win by this, if winning is your game?"

 Creer's smile didn't falter. "It's not what I live for, Cristina. If it's what comes to your attention, that’s part of you. You're now worried that you made a mistake you're now regretting, aren't you?"

Cristina opened her mouth slack jawed and shut it again after recalling her years of gruelling training. "I see. You have the better of me. Do go on."

 Creer acknowledged then dropped the smile. "It was clear from the beginning that my action wouldn't go unnoticed, and as it was likely to cause an already tense situation tenser, no, more intense, it was presumed that you would be the one brought in to interrogate me. Your choice of words has been profiled."

"Are you suggesting that life can be lived in reverse?" Cristina asked, still keeping to her notes script, as her mind raced to figure out how Creer had retrieved classified personal information about her.

"Hmm," said Creer, looking straight at her notes.

Cristina made a note in her laptop to check for any record of Creer's insanity. "But for a minute, let's get back to the decision about launching the missiles: You confess to having changed the coding of the plane, and are absolving yourself of any responsibility."

 "Of course not," Creer answered immediately, "I take full responsibility."

 "Duly noted, but there is a small problem with your confession."

"Yes...?"

 "The codes couldn't be changed just like that. It’d require special passwords and privileges, or a significant amount of hacking knowledge, and I find it hard to believe you could achieve that."

 Creer smiled ruefully. "I haven't claimed that I could, but nevertheless the codes were activated."

"Your conclusions...?"

"No mystery," Creer explained. "I logged onto the system and reverse-engineered it."

"The codes weren't activated until after being used," Cristina replied, "we have the plane, so I can't imagine how you did that." 

"Aha, very true," said Creer, sarcastically. "Then what is your theory?"

"That you have come from a place where you had help, but tell me this briefly, did you hack it? No, stop, we will get to the bottom of this later."

"For starters there won't be any later," said Creer, " and secondly I haven't denied having helpers," he added, then, "but you may have a few problems arresting them."

"We'll see," Cristina said with a smile that could cut glass. "Right now, there are other things I'm far more interested in."

"Yes...?"

Cristina made herself comfortable in the chair and discreetly adjusted her fringe. She enjoyed every moment of extending her power, declaring. "I have reason to believe you are an imposter."

For a second, she considered letting Thomas Creer take in the import of her accusation, but decided to jump right in. "I'm a woman who doesn't leave anything to chance," she said with firm clarity. "Unlike many of my colleagues who use ordinary persuasive methods, I value both intuition and reason. Some might even call me a balanced decision-maker, but only a few have the courage to say so. I'm accusing you of being Hector Mares, an anagram of Thomas Creer."

"I can imagine you have profiled us both," Creer chimed in countering her gambit, "but that was part of the reason we chose you."