Blair tossed his duffel in the back of the jeep, next to Daniel's suitcase and their travel packs, as Daniel haggled in Spanish with their jungle guide. He idly considered the point that they wouldn't need a guide if Jim had come with them, and felt a little pang somewhere in his stomach that he quickly squashed. He distracted himself by listening in on Daniel's conversation. The guide was telling him that there were no roads to the area they wanted to visit, and nothing to look at when they got there. Daniel asked how close the guide could get them, and the answer seemed to be satisfactory, because Daniel shelled out a rather ludicrous amount of money. The guide nodded as the money disappeared, agreeing to take them as far as he could.

"You paid him way too much, man." Blair said with amusement as they climbed into the Jeep. Daniel shrugged.

"We don't know what we're getting into here," he said in Russian. Blair raised an eyebrow. "It eases my mind."

"What are you worried about? If the ruins are there, they haven't been touched in centuries." Blair answered in the same language. Daniel shrugged as they started off.

After an hour's drive and another hour of hacking through the underbrush, the guide stopped, pulling out his canteen and taking a deep draught as Daniel and Blair came level with him.

"Señors, there is nothing here. I'm going to go back to my Jeep."

Daniel and Blair looked at each other, considering.

"I'd like to look around a bit more..." Blair said quietly. "We came all this way."

Daniel nodded.

"We'll give you a call." he said to the guide. The guide looked concerned.

"You will be ok out here alone?"

Daniel nodded. "We'll be fine."

The guide shrugged. "Alright, Señor. Good luck." He turned, following the trail they'd hacked through the undergrowth.

When he was out of sight, Daniel turned to Blair.

"Whatcha thinking, B?"

Blair smiled slightly at the old nickname. "I'm thinking we've got to be close." He closed his eyes and deliberately slowed his breathing, opening his mind and his senses to any sort of inspiration.

Daniel's mouth quirked at his friend's tactic, and he let his own eyes drift closed. While he listened, he sent out a mental hail to those he knew were listening.

A little sign here would be much appreciated...

They stayed like that, still, for several minutes. Daniel gave up and opened his eyes, about to bring Blair out of his meditation. But Blair's eyes popped open of their own accord just as Daniel heard a twig snap to their left. Both heads turned toward the noise, and Daniel's hand went to the small of his back, automatically feeling for his gun. He spotted a flash of something – or rather, a pair of somethings – in the underbrush a ways ahead. He and Blair looked at each other, then started carefully towards the spot without a word.

They had not gone fifty yards when Daniel caught another flash, this time much larger, out of the corner of his eye. When he turned to look, it was gone, but he stopped and stared, thinking. Blair realized he had stopped and turned to look at him.

"D?"

Daniel took a step backwards, to the exact spot he'd been in when he'd seen it. His eyes went wide.

"Blair, come look."

Blair picked his way over, and Daniel took him by the shoulders and steered him exactly in front of himself. Blair gasped as an enormous stepped Mayan pyramid shimmered into view in the distance.

"How...?" Blair asked. Daniel took a step to the right. Sure enough, the pyramid disappeared. When he stepped back into place, it reappeared.

"You can only see it from this exact spot," Daniel said in wonder. Blair's eyes widened, and he tried it for himself.

"Whoa." His eyes were wide, his jaw slack with amazement. He turned to look at Daniel, who was digging in his pack.

"Danny?" he asked.

Daniel came up with a small black device. He flicked a switch and started burying the device at their feet.

"GPS emitter." he said by way of explanation. "In case you or I or anyone else has to find this spot again."

"Cool. Where'd you get one of those?" Blair asked.

"Working for the government has its advantages." Daniel said as he finished and straightened. "Like getting to play with cool toys."

Blair grinned at him as they set off towards the pyramid.

They broke through the underbrush and into a flat clearing in a matter of minutes. They could move from side to side now without losing sight of the ruin. It was massive, nearly as high as the Giza pyramids, and the area around it for a good thirty feet was paved with remarkably well-preserved stonework.

Setting their packs down on the stone pavement, they gazed up at the structure. A stripe of red marred the plain of the side facing them, from the very top straight down the center to the pavement. Blair set his hand on the red-stained stone.

"Blood. They performed blood sacrifices here." he murmured to himself. He followed the red streak up the side of the pyramid with his eyes, and squinted at the top of the pyramid. "Daniel, there are carvings up there."

"There are carvings down here, too." Daniel called back. Blair looked where he was looking.

"That's Quechua." Blair said. "Looks like it runs all the way around the base."

"Can you read it? Pre-Columbian languages are not my strong suit." Daniel said. Blair nodded.

"If I have some serious time with it, yeh. It's a pretty old form. Come on, D, I wanna check out the top."

Together they carefully climbed the steps, testing each level before putting their weight on it. They reached the top in about ten minutes.

"Oh, my God." Blair said, taking the last few steps at a run. "Daniel. Oh my God, Danny, you've got to see this!"

Feeling his stomach sink, Daniel joined Blair at the top of the pyramid and ran his hand over the familiar carving.

"The Eye of Ra." he whispered, stunned. Blair was practically bouncing with excitement.

"Danny, do you realize what this means? You were right! This absolutely proves your theories!"

"No, it doesn't." Daniel said absently, concentrating on the area around the carving. The top of the pyramid was split many ways by lines – rays, really – that centered at the Eye. On the right and left sides of the Eye were two lines of hieroglyphs, which Daniel immediately began copying into his journal.

"What do you mean, 'no it doesn't'? There are Egyptian hieroglyphs on a Mayan pyramid in the middle of Incan territory! If that doesn't prove cultural cross-pollination I don't know what would. Daniel, you could use this to get your credibility back. The bigwigs of Academia can't possibly ignore this."

"They're not going to see it." Daniel told him as he finished copying the carving into his notebook.

"How can you even say that?" Blair said, aghast. Daniel ignored him, turning his attention to the carvings that lined the edge of the platform. Blair looked over his shoulder.

"...What language is that?"

"Not one you know." Daniel said quietly. Blair glared at him.

"I suppose you know it?" he asked snidely. The tone of his voice made Daniel look up. He studied his younger friend's face, and his own countenance softened slightly.

"Yes, actually. I've come across it in my work." He turned back to the carvings, copying them meticulously into his journal. Blair was silent, watching him, for a moment.

This is all about his work, he realized. The government has something to do with this.

He turned and started back down the steps.

"I'm going to work on the writing at the bottom. Come down before the sun starts to set, okay? Trying to climb this in the dark would be suicide."

Daniel looked up at him, and Blair gave him a small smile. He didn't know what Danny was up to, but he was willing to go along – for now – without asking too many questions.

Daniel gave him a big smile back, expressing his relief without words. Blair nodded and disappeared over the edge.