Aztec bliss 2

It took Jolande a day to arrive to Germany, and finally, Sarah picked her up at 19 o'clock that day. "Ugh, I'm super exhausted, I'll eat then sleep ok Sarah?" Jolande said, "Sure, I'll cook us dinner" Sarah replied.

The airport was two hours away from John's house by car, so Jolande arrived there at 21 o'clock. After finally carrying things home, Sarah said "It's late, I think I should order or cook something quick, what do you think Jola--".

Sarah stopped talking after she saw Jolande so tired that she slept on the floor, "Ehh, think I will carry her to her new bed" said Sarah. Then she carried Jolande to sleep in the comfy bed of hers.

Sarah said "You look beautiful in your sleep – not that I'm stalking or anything!", then she put a blanket over her and closed the windows.

Sarah went back to the living room after putting Jolande to sleep, and sat down on the couch. She was thinking about the amulet nonstop, and about how she will let John know about it…

"I think we should sleep already, it's already 23 o'clock, and I'm exhausted" Sarah said, and John agreed, "I will sleep at 12, or 24, or 0, which one do you prefer?" said John quizzaciously to Sarah, "Go to bed honey, goodnight".

Sarah said "Goodnight" and went to her bed. People often get a shower of thoughts before going to sleep, and that's what happened to Sarah, which brought so many unneeded thoughts to her mind, and started staring at a smoke detector on the ceiling of the room.

"Smoke detector, huh? I remember something that uranium or americium is inside those, really? If so, how does it work? And why would the government allow our hands on free uranium?", and the thoughts continued to flow in her mind…

A thing she remembered was how the platinum sphere glows and explodes when it finishes spinning, "Why think of this now?" she said, because it doesn't make sense to think of this out of nowhere…

The next day, everyone woke up at 5 o'clock, did their routine, ate breakfast and went to do their work. Jolande and Sarah went to work with the map and amulet while John went to his job.

Sarah started by taking out the map, compass and other objects as well. She then showed Jolande everything saying "Jolande, okay look, here we have these bearings written on the book and it's like a puzzle. Please work it out with your big brain!".

Jolande looked at her with the are-you-kidding-me eyes saying "Really? Can you tell where the statue is on the map?"…

Sarah: Yes I do, *points on exact location…

Jolande: At a bearing of 112 degrees?

Sarah: Yes.

Jolande: 32km ?

Sarah: Yes!

Jolande: Hmmph, so what is that thing that hard you want to find?

Sarah: The bearing thing!

Jolande: Give me a protractor!

Sarah: Take it, here, ugh.

Jolande correctly aligned the protractor and pointed at 112°

Jolande: That was it? This easy? It's in Kottenforst, next to the river, we check the map there okay?

Sarah felt a moment of shame for not knowing this simple thing in math, and tried acting like it's something else, saying: No wait! Not just that!

Jolande: Hmm? What else do we need?

Sarah: It's the, uhh, look! How will we know the exact location of the thing?

Jolande: I'm sure the book has a clue in it, c'mon lets pack up and go!

As Sarah already packed her boots, trench coat, and backpack full of tools, Jolande started preparing her items, she brought her kimono, and relied on Sarah to bring the rest.

"Are we ready?" Jolande said cheerfully to Sarah, "Start the car and let's go". Sarah told her to check the list one more time before they head out, "See this paper? It has all equipment, gear, food and clothes we need, check that nothing is missing".

The list was separated into categories, food, tools, clothes and miscellaneous items, Jolande confirmed that all items were present and they're ready to go.

Sarah estimated that the trip should be around two hours in total, because some parts of the route don't support a car to drive on.

After two hours have passed, they finally arrive at the forest, next to the river. "Ok, so first step?" Jolande said.

Sarah: I think we should read the book.

Jolande: Well that's what it says, "Read the book" bla bla bla…

Sarah: So let's look, here it is.

" "Plug in the twin amulet" it says, what the hell?" Sarah said, which reminded Jolande of an amulet looking exactly the same, "Oh wait, let me see if it's in my backpack, I hope it is" Jolande said.

Sarah stared at Jolande as she was searching through her backpack trying to find the amulet. She then picked it up and showed it to Sarah and said "The back of this looks like a key - like a thing that could fit in that lock - like thing, so try plugging it in!".

Jolande handed the amulet to Sarah, and then Sarah said "You know I didn't understand a word of what you just said but okay" then plugged them both together awaiting something strange or surprising to happen…

They suddenly glowed very brightly and started to release heat. As a reaction, Sarah dropped it out of her hands quickly to avoid any casualties at a time like this.

"Are they fusing or what? Pick them up and look at the result!" Jolande said to Sarah after she dropped them fearing any casualty or mistake. "It's flaming hot, isn't it? Well, I can't be sure" Sarah replied.

Jolande stared at Sarah and said "Flaming hot would scar the ground beneath it, burn the grass and steam would rise, but as you can see, it's just warm".

Sarah asked Jolande for gloves before picking them up, just for safety. After she picked them up, they both inspect them closely, "Ohh, careful, take those glasses, I brought two protective glasses from China, and don't worry, they're highest quality in store" Jolande said and handed them over to Sarah, "Safety is number one priority!".

"Do you know what was in yours, Jolande? And where did you get it from?" Sarah asked, and Jolande replied with full detail of how she got it from Leoni and Leoni got it from her father's safe, she also told her about the sample she brought with her to China first time.

Sarah opened both amulets and took out the contents of them, she was surprised how that sound didn't come out, which allowed her to safely extract items from it.

From Jolande's amulet, it was microscopic leviathan's sample, a flash memory and a family tree of Helga. From Sarah's amulet, it was the book, a small sac with powder and a paper with unrecognisable patterns.

"Now let's continue what we came here for, what is after fusing both amulets?" Jolande asked. Sarah opened the book and read the next step. "We are supposed to look for a strange stone with carvings on probably" Sarah replied.

"What does the book say?" Jolande asked, and Sarah answered "By one, something something, carved stone, it even said 'geschnitzt' which is German for 'carved' " They both went looking for a stone meeting those descriptions. As they were searching, there was a stone that glows when light falls on it, "Oh hey Sarah, it's a fluorescent stone! Seems like it has uranium or some element in it!" Jolande said gleefully, as she noticed because of the feeble fluorescent neon yellow glow it gave off.

Sarah felt strange, and asked "How could you know this is the stone we're looking for just from this?", Jolande said "It's the only odd stone here, and it's almost noon, this stone doesn't reflect too much light, but under the shade of the tree, you can see the neon yellow!". "Aha, understandable, what could I do without you?" Sarah replied, genuinely implying her words.

After spotting the stone, Sarah suggested that they roll it around so they could reveal what's beneath it, but Jolande refused, "We can't touch this with our bare hands! As you can see, the area around it seems to be really scary and dangerous for the touch". Sarah advised using the gloves they brought with them, and a face mask to avoid ingestion or inhalation of the stone.

Fully equipped, they flip the stone and reveal what's under it, "Oh! It's patterns again! I will check the book once again, hang on…" Sarah said, as she stared at the lines and patterns for a while. "No clue!" Sarah informed Jolande, they had no clue what to do after this.

Jolande tried linking the paper's patterns from the amulet to the ones on the stone, because they seem to be opposite from each other, "Hey Sarah, what if we place the paper on the stone?" Jolande asked, Sarah was thinking about it, "Yeah, sure, let's see".

Sarah handed her the paper and saw her do it. As she placed the paper on the stone, drawings started to appear…

"So each time I put an X from the paper on the X from the stone, pictures appear? Oh wait, that's the map of this forest with an X in it! Come look Sarah!", Jolande was inspecting it excellently, there were five crosses on the paper, each one will form an image on the stone…

Jolande took out her iPAQ and took a photo of each map that appeared when she aligned the Xs, five different images showed up.

"Come Sarah, help me recognise each one of them, first one is a map of this forest I believe" Jolande said, as she was aligning the Xs together. Sarah recognised two of the images formed, "First one is this forest, you're correct, and the second is an image of an Aztec temple I believe".

They were both unsure, not knowing what to do. Sarah suggested they do it another day, but Jolande didn't accept; as it might be related to Helga somehow, and they should both work on it, "Let's take the stone home I think, if that's legal" Jolande said. Both feared that they will illegally own uranium or some dangerous element, "Oh wait, where would we put it at? We can't leave it in the living room!" Jolande said, as it is dangerous to have this thing sitting around them.

Sarah suggested they buy a wooden box and a radiation detector so they could know what kind of radiation it's releasing. "So this uranium looks peaceful but a bit worn at the edges. The area around it looked kind of disturbed, what radiation do you think it emits?" Sarah said, "By the way, I studied radioactivity in university".

"You're a therapist, why even need radioactivity? Haha" Jolande inquired, and Sarah answered "Because I changed my path from a worker in a nuclear power plant to a therapist after I learnt of the scary consequences".

"So judging from the appearance, I'm so sure it's uranium rather than any other element, first of all, fluorescent, secondly, seems like it disturbed the area around it". Sarah was a real expert at radioactivity, and she has a B.A in nuclear physics, which makes her eligible for work at any nuclear site.

"A wooden box blocks alpha and beta radiation, so the real problem is gamma radiation, so we will hide the box away from any living organism", Sarah suggested, and Jolande nodded her head.

They both started thinking of a way top transport it home safely, "Looks like it weighs a ton! Let's hire something or someone" Jolande said, but was afraid that they will know this is uranium and they might be fined. Sarah thought that they might not know what kind of stone this is if they didn't allow any light to hit it.

Jolande had a better idea in mind, "We just camouflage it somehow, to look like another object", and Sarah asked, "Yet the real question is what and how?". Both kept thinking for a moment about it…

"Oh I guess a good idea is, we get a barrel its size, a wooden barrel, right?" Jolande suggested. The stone is 0.125m3 in size, so they decided to pretend it's a barrel of supplies for karate and kung fu, which seems very practical.

"So we say that we wanted to train on riverside, but the barrel was too heavy for both of us to put back into the car after we finished training" Jolande said, as a story to tell the forklift.

So they called the forklift and it's on its way to Kottenforst, to pick up the barrel into their car and safely back home…

To Be Continued

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