ENCOUNTER by Hep Aldridge (bill gates books recommendations .txt) 📕

Joe said, “Some kind of luminescence, maybe lichen or fungus.”

Dimitri had started moving forward again. “This is really weird; I can see more of them further ahead,” he whispered. As we approached the first of the spots, he turned on his flashlight, and the blue glow was lost in the red glow of its light. Dimitri said, “The brush is thinning out ahead.” He turned off his light, and the blue glow became visible again.

We had been walking, relying on our night vision since artificial light can be as distracting as it is beneficial in the jungle. The shadows it creates can hide a multitude of dangers, so we try to use it sparingly and only with a red filter over the light not to disrupt our natural night vision. Thus, we were able to see the blue glow. We were now standing in a group with small spots of blue extending to our left and right five to six feet apart. They seemed to be marking the outer perimeter of the path that had opened in front of us.

Ahead, I could see a few blue patches in irregular shapes until they were swallowed by the night. Dimitri had dropped down to one knee and was scraping the ground with his knife, removing the growth and debris around one of the patches. As he did, the blue patch grew larger, and soon, he had cleared a rectangular-shaped area. The entire rectangle was clearly emanating a faint blue glow.

Still on one knee, now with the red glow of his flashlight lighting the area, he said, “Guys, this flat stone is not natural; it’s been worked smooth.” Our trail or path had turned into something completely different. He continued clearing the dirt until he uncovered another stone. There were more stones set next to it. Rubbing his hand across them, he said, “I mean, this is really smooth, almost like glass, and the stones are so tightly placed, I can hardly feel a joint between them.” He rose, shone his light forward, and said, “This is a manmade road, but it’s not like the Inca Road.”

O’Reilly said, “None of the other stones around it are glowing.” She was right. The next spot of glowing blue was a good 15 to 20 feet ahead. We continued to it, cleared the dirt and undergrowth away, and uncovered another glowing stone the same size as the first one. Looking further ahead, two small blue spots were visible. They were across from each other, separated by about five or six feet. When we got to them, we found them to be directly opposite each other and on the sides of the roadway. We turned and looked behind us and were amazed when we saw the two stones we had cleared were in the middle of the road, marking the outside edge of the road.

The blue stones in the center of the roadway all seemed to be equally spaced. Before anyone else could say anything, O’Reilly piped up and said, “These are markers just like the ones used to show pilots the runways and taxiways at night.”

“Son of a bitch” Doc breathed out. “Roadway markers, how the hell is that possible?”

Dimitri had walked ahead and, in a low voice, called back, “Everything smooths out up here, and I can see more spots of light. Hey… look behind us; the lights are gone!”

We turned and looked; sure enough, the blue lights were gone. Reggie had started retracing our steps when suddenly, a blue stone slowly glowed into existence, and then another. She stopped and started backing up; after a few feet, the lights went out.

O’Reilly said, “Damn, that’s some pretty cool high-tech stuff for a stone road in the middle of the Andes.”

“No kidding… this isn’t the yellow brick road, but I think we’re being shown the way to go.”

Eduardo spoke again; he sounded nervous, “Senor Colt, what kind of magic is this?”

“It’s not magic, and I’m pretty sure we’ve got nothing to worry about,” I said in my best reassuring voice. Shit, if only I believed it!

“Well, that’s reassuring as hell, Colt,” Joe said under his breath. “Don’t worry, Eduardo; it’s cool, compadre,” and he patted the lad on the shoulder.

“Bien, Senor Joe,” Eduardo replied.

We slowly continued up the road, finding the glowing blue stones at regular intervals. When we got to an area where none were visible, it didn’t take us long to kick around the dirt and sparse vegetation cover on the roadway before we uncovered another one. It was at one of these stopping points that Doc said, “Hey, that weird tingling I had before is gone.”

Dimitri chimed in, “Mine too.” As it turned out, we all agreed that the feelings we had gotten as we first approached the road were gone. Joe was the first to offer a hypothesis, “You don’t think that whoever built this thing had devised some way to let people know when they were getting close to the road?”

“Like a signal or something,” O’Reilly added.

“Or maybe an early warning system that lets them know when someone is on the road,” Reggie said, “Whoever ‘they’ are,” she added.

“Damn…” I said, “With what we have seen so far, it wouldn’t surprise me at all if both those things were true.”

“Well,” Dimitri said, “If that’s the case, then whatever is at the end of this road is probably going to be pretty freakin’ cool!”

Chapter Sixteen

We set up camp on the road that night—easily cleared and a smooth surface, real pluses as tired as we were. It was funny; I think the thrill of our discovery and the amazing technology associated with it had kept us energized and moving for the last hour or so. It wasn’t until we decided to stop for the night that the toll of today’s trek on our bodies kicked in. We sat around the fire, built in the middle of the road/path, which provided us with some much-needed warmth.