Summary: Nash considers himself a myth buster but, on occasion, he proves the myths are true instead. Like the existence of a hidden level beneath an ancient temple full of forgotten historical documents, treasures, and possibly a mummy or two. And, according to the precocious thirteen year old he just caught breaking into his camp, a map to a fabled City of Gold.
Notes: Tagging this for Allegra even though it's really her doppelganger Maya who shows up here.
So the information on the Inca Empire and the legendary `City of Ceasars` comes mostly from web searches, but this is presenting something of an alternate history since Nash is from an alternate Earth that we know very little about. Had some fun dropping hints of a similar, but ultimately very much not our Earth, set of history and nations in here.
This isn't a perfect fit for what Nash mentions in canon about Maya. But I had the idea for them to find a lost city (not El Dorado, it's a bit overdone) and so that's what I went with.
The Story of Maya
Chapter 1
Nash's first love was geology. And when he introduced himself as a scientist, it was as a geologist. Sure, he was an expert in a number of other fields too, including archaeology and anthropology, but... rocks were basically his first love. He got his first rock tumbler when he was seven or eight and when the shiny gems were uncovered from beneath their gritty surface, well, that was it for him. Nash Wells was hooked.
Somewhere along the way, however, Nash developed a second great love. Investigating myths and legends. He called himself a myth buster, but he proved the legends to be real as often as not. Case in point, his latest find.
The City of Ceasars is one of many 'city of gold' myths. Thought to be located somewhere in Patagonia, some believed it might have been the true source of the El Dorado myth (though it was far more likely that El Dorado was a separate myth that started with the story of a man covered in gold who disappeared into a lake, which later snowballed into the story of a city by a lake and then an empire). It was also known as the City of Patagonia, the Wandering City, Trapalanda (or Trapananda), Lin Lin or Elelín and it's founders were rumored to be everything from shipwrecked conquistadors, exiles from the destruction of the seven cities, the much rumored Patagonian giants, and survivors of the Inca Empire.
Just to be clear, Nash was not actually looking for the legendary city, nor had he found it. What he did find, however, was a depiction of the city. Quite possibly proof that the city had been real after all and it was indeed considered a fall back stronghold for the Inca Empire when escaping from a besieged Cusco. Because the depiction was in a hidden level beneath a temple in Cusco. The level was likely sealed off to keep the Spanish invaders from discovering it, though Nash suspects that the sealed entrance he discovered wasn't the only exit. There's a section of tunnels leading out from under the temple that's partially caved in and a few skeletons half-buried in the dirt.
The image of the city itself is a gorgeous mural upon one of the main rooms of the hidden level, likely repurposed from a place of worship to a place of sanctuary. There's evidence that supplies were hidden here and what Nash has translated so far of the records left behind is that they would hide people here until there was enough supplies to send another group of refugees on the arduous journey from Cusco in what was now Peru to the Patagonia region in the southern region of South America. They would have been escaping not only the Spanish invaders but the small pox pandemic introduced by those very invaders.
The temple itself is some ways outside of modern day Cusco and was likely near the edges of the historical city before large sections of Cusco were burned down - or otherwise destroyed - during the 100 day siege that brought the third, and final, fall of the Inca Empire.
On some Earths, the Inca were felled by a Civil War that the Spanish took advantage of. On others they fought a long and bloody war over a decade long against a seemingly unending swarm of European invaders. And on some Earths the Inca Empire remains strong even to this day, a pinnacle of human civilization.
But this is the first time, on any Earth, that Nash has found evidence that the legendary City of Ceasars, the haven of Elelín, might have actually existed in some form. And it's on his own Earth.
Given his reputation, Nash got hired to go treasure seeking, as it were, on a number of different Earths. Though sometimes he ran his investigations for his own personal satisfaction. This was a case where the two happened to coincide.
He'd been hired by the local government, after submitting a proposal for the search some months earlier. And given his reputation, both as an expert who got results and as an explorer who ensured that his discoveries were made in such a way as to honor the past instead of plundering it, it hadn't taken too long before Nash had been in talks to run his one-man expedition. An expedition that had, now, paid off in spades. He'd found the hidden level of the temple and in the morning and he'd contacted the authorities so that a research team could be assembled.
The research team would know how best to honor the dead and what preservation methods to use on the walls, baskets, and documents left behind. Nash would get his finder's fee and stick around for a while, see if he could find some clues to the actual location of Elelín. That would be quite the discovery.
Still, it was late and Nash was exhausted after the thrill of discovery had worn off. Time for him to return to camp, grill something over the fire pit, and crawl into his tent for the night.
Though, tired as he was, Nash still remembered to set up his proximity alarms around the site before making the short trek back to his camp.
Nash was just starting to drift off to sleep when the alarms went off. He jerks awake, heart racing, and thanks a god he doesn't really believe in for giving him the good sense to sleep in his day clothes when he's on an expedition. He jams his feet into his boots and grabs his gun and then uses his short range teleport to arrive at the scene of the tripped alarm.
He'd been expecting grave robbers and thieves. Adults.
Not a little girl who looked maybe twelve and looked like she'd gotten caught with her hand in the cookie jar. Wide eyed little thing staring at the gun he'd pointed at her on arrival in fear.
Groaning softly to himself, Nash holstered his gun. The alarm had only registered one intruder, which meant she was the long and short of it. And this was guaranteed to be a pain in Nash's ass.
Nash crossed the room and reset the alarm. And then he took the rolled up parchment from her - carefully so as not to damage it - and put it back where he could only assume she found it. She stared at him. He glared at her. "What the hell is a toddler doing at a temple in the middle of nowhere as midnight?" Nash demanded.
"I'm thirteen!" the girl protested.
"Oh, yes, excuse me, that makes it so much better. What's a thirteen-year-old toddler doing at a temple outside Cusco at fucking midnight?" Nash will never claim to be good with kids. Because he isn't.
"You've found something more valuable than you realize, Dr. Wells. There's a map here. A map to the lost city of Elelín," she told him and, well, at least she'd done her homework.
Heaving a sigh, Nash muttered, "that's it. I'm calling CPS."
"No! No, that's not..." frantically, the girl lunged forward. Grabbed on to Nash's shirt. "I'm a treasure hunter. Like you. I just want to get my start."
And that really shouldn't speak to him, but... she's scared of something. Nash sighs again and said, "I already knew this place could lead me to Elelín. But, kid, treasure hunters - the good ones - aren't thieves. Everything here belongs to the nation of Peru and the descendants of the Inca Empire. Sneaking into an excavation site at midnight is the kind of behavior I'd expect from a hack. However, you're just starting out so I'll let it slide. It's been a long day and i'm exhausted. Promise not to set off anymore damn alarms and I'll let you use my spare tent for tonight and we'll discuss the possibility of you coming along on my search for Elelín next. Best you're gonna get at midnight, kid," he added when she looked like she might protest.
"Fine," she muttered, grumpy looking and pouty as she crosses her arms.
"What's your name?"
"Maya," she tells him, scowling at the ground.
"Well then, come on Maya. It's past my bedtime, which means you should have been asleep hours before that."
"Do you even know what a toddler is?" Maya demanded, but she followed him out of the room.
Nash smirked.
Nash wakes early, despite his late night, and starts breakfast over the campfire. And coffee. Ambrosia of the gods, coffee was indeed.
Maya takes longer to wake, clambering out of her tent and watching Nash warily. He still manages to snap a decent picture of her face without her noticing and then send both it and a text message to a friend of his in the local government. 'Had a stray kid by the name of Maya show up at my site last night. No last name offered. Scared when I mentioned CPS. Look into it for me? Kid's fine for now.'
'You got it,' is the response.
Next Nash officially calls in and reports his find. Then he takes Maya back to the room with all the scrolls and decomposing baskets and various other items. Nash has come to think of it as the hub room where those seeking escape from the city would have gathered to be outfitted with supplies before sneaking out through the caved in exit.
"So," he tells Maya, "if there is a map to Elelín, it'd be in here."
"Which is why I was looking in here last night."
"So, do you read Quechua?" he asked, grinning when she gave him a blank look.
"I... thought they wrote it all in Spanish," she finally said. "At... at that point in history, they spoke Spanish here, right?"
"Well, yes and no. So Quechua was the official language of the Inca Empire, though it was something of a lingua franca among the various nations in the Andean region. The writing system was something called quipu, or a knot language. No one knows how to read them anymore, but we do know that different colored ropes paired with different numbers of knots could mean a myriad of different things and we do have a general idea that at least some of it was used for recording detailed census data. So those neatly tied up ropes over there," he gestured to the ancient shelving with several quipu on it, "could easily be the directions to Elelín, but they don't do us any good. However, the Spanish invasion did bring their language and alphabet and Quechua was transliterated into Spanish for documentation purposes, which was picked up on by the Inca for being more efficient than quipu for certain purposes."
"So I could be right about the map," Maya said, voice defiant.
"You could be right about the map. And all the landmarks noted down would have their names written largely in transliterated Quechua with some Spanish thrown in for flavor." He gave her a look. "If we can find a likely map before the research and preservation team arrives then we can take images of it for our own purposes. But the most likely location for Elelín is somewhere in the Patagonia area. Are you actually prepared to travel there on your own? A thirteen year old kid."
"I made it this far on my own," she shot back.
"Based on your accent, you're a fellow North American. United Canada, maybe, or the New England States."
"United Canada," she muttered. Which was something else Nash could send his local contact to look into, though now he also knew he could reach out to his contacts back home.
"Got your passport?" he asked and when she looked away, he rolled his eyes at her. "Snuck over the border, huh?"
"My accent is passable enough in Spanish and Portuguese that I can pass for a local. They never even asked for my passport when I left the Panamanian checkpoint."
Nash rolled his eyes and sighed heavily. To travel between most countries in the United North America, you didn't even need a passport. The New England States, United Canada, Texas, California, French Louisiana, Mexico, Panama and various other North American nations were all free to pass through from one to another as long as you had a legal ID from one of those countries. Only the religious state of Greater Utah - which, having visited, Nash could honestly say had nothing particularly great about it - and a couple of other hold outs required a passport to pass freely through its border. There was a similar setup for the Southern American Conglomerate. Both the Conglomerate and the United North American Council were comparable to the European Union, each with their pros and cons. But the ease of travel and immigration within the continent the 'super-set' governance allowed was worth the headaches it also brought, or so most people thought.
Nash certainly appreciated it. It mean that he rarely had to worry about bringing out his passport unless he was traveling between continents or inter-dimensionally. And since he did a lot of traveling, well... anything that made his travels easier instead of harder was much appreciated.
Maya, however, had not only skipped through multiple UNA countries on her own, she'd illegally entered Conglomerate countries. The former was merely frowned on for unaccompanied minors. The latter was illegal.
The worst the kid was likely to get was a slap on the wrist and community service, but she still shouldn't have done it. Which begged the question of why she had.
He dropped the subject for now. Sort of.
"Well, if you don't even have a passport, then why would I believe you've got the cold weather gear necessary for where we'd likely be headed next once we've got a copy of the map? Face it, kid, you want to go treasure hunting, then you need a partner."
"You offering?" Maya gave him a skeptical look.
"I could use an assistant. I guess. Or an apprentice, if you're willing to learn something along the way."
"I'll think about it," she sniffed, turning away.
Nash grinned and then led her over to the parchment scrolls. "Gloves first, kid," he said, pulling on his own and then handing her a pair. "Documents this old are fragile. You don't want to find the map only to have it rip or crumble because you weren't careful enough."
Maya followed his directions readily enough and the rest of the morning was spent pouring over the rolled up old papers, trying to find something that resembled a map.
Though Nash finds some documents that might very well wind up being the Rosetta stone for quipu rope knots, there's no dice on anything he'd call a map. And he's about to call Maya off to check out the mural of the city in case he missed something the afternoon before when the girl lets out an excited shout.
He hurries over to her and carefully inspects the old document and... it's map-like, that's for sure. He carefully smooths it out on an old table, surrounded by lamps that give off a soft golden glow that is, supposedly, safer for artifacts that are a few hundred years old. Less likely to cause ink and paint fading, anyway.
It's definitely a map. Some of the old ink is a little faded in places, but he ought to be able to virtually restore much of it once he takes an image of it. Which he immediately does.
"Good find, Maya."
"Not bad for a toddler, huh?" she snarks, grinning proudly at him.
"Could be worse. Last person who broke into my excavation site I deemed an infant. Because he wouldn't shut up about dying from a non-venomous snake bite. He was perfectly fine, in case that wasn't clear."
Maya snorted with amusement. "So, where does the map say to go?"
Nash hummed thoughtfully. "Okay, so the city indicated in the mountains here is Machu Picchu, which the Spanish Conquistadores never actually found. Unfortunately, historical records show that the city actually lasted for a few years after the fall of the empire, but was abandoned when it was hit by a combination of small pox and a food shortage. Over here is Vilcabamba, which would have been under a second siege from the Spanish at the same time the Cusco was under fire. Unlike Cusco, Vilcabamba was razed to the ground. Choquequirao was something of a sister city to Machu Picchu, but was discovered and attacked by the invading conquistadores. This here might be Paititi," he gestured to a city indicated in the rain forested area to the east of the Andes. "Another mythical city of legend, though this one was actually discovered already last year. Not made of gold, but full of fascinating history nonetheless. But down here in the southernmost region, there's a lake and a city that... it's hard to tell because that part is more faded than the rest, but the marker seems to indicate Elelín."
"There's treasure there, just waiting for us." Maya beamed at Nash and he smiled back.
He wondered just what she was running from.
Nash's texts when his communicator gets a satellite data burst are enlightening. From back home he hears there is a one Maya Garcia, age thirteen, gone missing from her aunt's house. Her aunt was her legal guardian, but there had an inquiry several weeks ago after Maya's disappearance had led to a teacher raising concerns. The girl's cousin had been taken into custody pending an investigation into Maya's disappearance - foul play had been suspected, apparently, since the last place Maya had been seen was getting the shit kicked out of her by the older girl. Maya's picture matched the missing Maya Garcia's appearance to a T so she was now being considered found. The aunt was no longer considered a fit guardian for either of the girls and Nash could guess why, though there was no explanation on that part.
He could ask for more details later, he supposed. A valid passport was being sent for Maya and since the girl had reason to be considered in fear for her life back home, the usual juvenile penalties for crossing the border illegally were being waved. But they were asking if Nash could act as temporary guardian until Maya's foster situation could be cleared up and there was a place for the girl back in United Canada.
Now, Nash was not... he didn't consider himself a parental type person. Once upon a time he might have... if things with Tess had gone a little differently, then maybe... but he'd never know. Though he did have the credentials to be a temporary - or even permanent - foster parent, having taken the courses a few years after Tess... passed away, when a friend's cancer scare had left her scrambling to make sure her kid wouldn't go to her family if the worst should happen. Thankfully the worst didn't happen; without Tess there with him, Nash is pretty sure he'd have been a terrible option for guardian for that kid. But it did mean that he was in the perfect position to smooth things out for Maya now.
Nash had offered to make the girl his apprentice for the Elelín quest and he intended to honor that if she agreed. So he texted back an agreement to look after her, but adding in a warning that he was going to be dragging the girl around the Conglomerate nations while he continued his work until they were required back to finalize Maya's foster placement.
His local contact in Cusco said he had a passport on the way for Maya, so if they'd stop in by his office then that could get handed over and Nash could sign the temporary guardianship paperwork.
All that was left was to get Maya to cooperate on this. Which probably meant selling the kid on the apprenticeship thing since if she ran off now, Nash isn't sure he could really do anything to stop her.
"So. Maya Garcia, huh?"
And that gets Nash a visible flinch as Maya freezes up, clearly considering running off already.
"Apparently there's been some concern that your cousin might've killed you, but she's headed off to juvie regardless." Nash hesitated a moment and then handed her his comm and let her read the text messages.
He watches her relax as she reads.
"I don't have to go back?" She finally asks, looking up at him with wide eyes.
"No. You don't have to go back. Not to your Aunt's anyway. They'll be looking for a foster family to place you with while you're running around looking for the lost city of gold with me," Nash told her. And then, he added, "if you want me to stick around in case the new foster placement doesn't suit you, I can do that too."
He isn't quite sure why he offered that. She doesn't know him, not really. No reason to trust him to be a good person. Just because he's foster certified doesn't mean he's a safe person for her to be around and she has to know stranger danger is a cliche for a reason.
But there's the beginnings of trust in Maya's eyes as she nods. "Yeah. Sure. Whatever. So I'm your apprentice for now?"
"If that's what you want."
She purses her lips. Studies him carefully. "Yes. It is."
"Then once the research team gets here this afternoon, we'll turn the site over to them and stay one more night in camp. Then we'll pick up your passport, get a hotel room while we plan our route to Elelín, and figure out what supplies we'll need. Been a while since I've had to plan an expedition with more than one person."