Not quite entertaining or pleasant enough to be true theme park fare. The ancient sluice system pumped in a bunch of disgusting swamp water, with all the associated flying insects and oozing algae. Also, it was dark, rows of sconces on the wall appearing to have once been filled with oil or other type of fuel, but no longer. We had to again make do with our inner light sources. Not much to see in the dim light, either, the walls undecorated...it seemed royalty only used the tunnel to make dramatic entrances and exits for ceremonial purposes.

Not much of a ride, either. We had a brief, anticlimactic splashdown after a short waterfall-like drop.

"I've been on kiddie rides more thrilling than this," Pete remarked.

On the upside, though, it made it possible for Spike and ET to come wading after us with Gertie's pod.

Our boat-like thrones came to a jarring stop in a large octagonal chamber, each locking into a separate dock.

Someone had been waiting for us to arrive, apparently for a long time.

The skeleton of a Qulpari rested at the foot of a stone font, arms spread out in a welcoming gesture. As we approached him, one skeletal hand released an odd looking compass it had been holding, as if to say `Here, you can have this.'

With reverent awe, Pete picked up the object, giving the skeleton a respectful bow. "Thank you, One Eyed Willie!"

Jamie rolled her eyes.

"Who's One Eyed Willie?" Roy asked.

"He watches too many movies."

The device reminded me of National Geographic photos I'd seen of old Chinese ladle compasses. Square rather than round, spoon shaped directional indicator, difficult to read inscriptions, both in Qulpari and alien astrological symbols. I couldn't quite tell the difference between northeast, north or east due to its irregular square shape.

Two other skeletons lay on crumbling beds in adjoining rooms. Carved pictograms covered the walls of the main chamber, images of miraculous healings, a blind Qulpari washing with something and receiving sight, a bedridden one being carried in, but washing with something and walking out. "We've found it! This is the place!"

Roy crossed his arms. "Cool it, kid. This could be just a bunch of ancient mythology, or at least an exaggeration about the benefits of cleanliness...which this place is in desperate need of, I might add."

ET rubbed his chin thoughtfully as he examined the carvings.

Gertie wanted to sit up and look around, but we didn't like the stale air in that place either. We instead used communicators to show her what we found.

Jamie wandered into a bed chamber.

"Don't run off!" Roy scolded.

"To where? This is a dead end!"

Pete looked into the other room. I guess he didn't find anything worthwhile in there, because he soon came back out.

I took a closer look at the font. Although bearing a vague resemblance to something you'd see in a church, two additional stone bowls connected to the larger from above, their channels indicating that the main bowl should contain a mixture of something, medicines perhaps.

I dragged my two Qulpari companions up to the object and pointed.

At first, they looked baffled, shaking their heads, but then ET paused in thoughtful silence for a moment, checking his communicator. A couple button taps and he showed me an image of my gold Frisbee, bearing the same inscription. "It is an ancient word meaning `Growth from dead things,' or `Fungus.'"

I scowled. "Great. So I actually have to use that thing?"

ET only shrugged.

Spike waddled to the other side of the font, pointing to an inscription on the second bowl. "Ihyokxa!"

My eyes widened as realization dawned. I almost felt like I'd bathed in that blindness curing fluid. "All you need to do is combine fungus with that slimy goop creature? I've made gallons of that stuff!...It can't be that easy!...What's it supposed to look like?"

Spike waddled up to a carved mural. "...The black fungus combines with the gray fluid from Ihyokxa, making pink elixir. It...is very dangerous. Many risked their lives to retrieve a small jug of the substance."

"Pink? That's the same stuff!"

Excited, Spike rushed to the next mural. "Fatally sick Qulpari wash in pink substance, becomes well." He dashed to the one adjacent, read the inscription and pointed. "Pink liquid! Just like the other!" Then, at the image of a leper, "The same!"

"Wait!" Pete glared at me. "You made gallons of this stuff already, and we had to go through all this crap, waste all this time, and kiss disgusting fish just to find out the recipe for something you've already made?"

"How was I to know what it was? For all I knew, it was poisonous, and it could have made her condition worse, maybe even killed her!"

Pete, failing to imagine what the me from the past had been thinking before entering this ancient tomb, simply argued, "It's not poisonous. You had the cure the whole time. Why did we have to go through all this just to figure out something you already knew?"

"I didn't know!" I shouted. "All I knew for certain was that it killed Xetgupa!"

Roy put his hands on both our shoulders. "Boys...Elliott may have known about this, but he was right to do some research before trying anything on his sister. We still don't know if this stuff is safe to bathe in, or ingest."

"He was swimming in it, and he looks just fine," Pete argued.

"Yeah, well, you can swim in a sewer and look fine. You just...might get sick later on. Anyways, this is an ancient remedy. Some old wives' tale they carved in stone. I take about as much stock in this as Valerian root, or ginseng. Best case scenario: You got a tasty bedtime drink. The worst: Malpractice."

"It is a sofeiwa," ET said. "This may be what we were seeking. It is a risk, but you agreed to this before we traveled."

"I was expecting a person."

ET shrugged. "If the cure works, will it matter?"

Roy didn't reply, he just frowned.

"The stuff helped me against Xetgupa." I know, not exactly helping my case, but I wanted to help my sister. "In fact, I think it's the reason he died. If Gertie's suffering from something Xetgupa directly caused, I think it's worth a shot."

Pete crossed his arms indignantly. "See? Like I said before, he knew about this the whole time, and we went through all of that for nothing."

Jamie emerged from the other room, bearing a device resembling an oversized dust mite with strings fastened between its legs. A proboscis at one end looked a lot like a flute. "Look what I've found!"

Roy did not look pleased. "Hey, put that back! Haven't you watched Indiana Jones? You may have set off a trap!"

"This is coming from someone trying to pull rings in the floor."

Spike smiled, nonverbally saying `May I?' with an outstretched hand.

Jamie let him take the object.

He played a tune suspiciously similar to Alice Cooper's Some Folks.

Pete stared. "How'd you learn that tune?"

"Vorxora sent me some recordings."

"That's badass! What else can you play? Deep Purple? Zeppelin? Motley Crue?"

Spike groaned and shook his head in frustration, clearly bewildered by all the weird rock band names.

"That's great," Roy said facetiously. "But we really need to get going."

"Where?"

"Where do you think? If this pink stuff is the only cure we can come up with, we might as well go look for it. Elliott?"

I sighed and gave a slight nod, embarrassed to say I didn't remember exactly where I went.

We couldn't find any usable exits in that place, other than the one we came in. All around we could only find the living quarters of priests/royalty, and a food service corridor (I assume, since it seemed to link to their dining room) had collapsed over the ages, a wall of rubble barring our path.

Although unable to get the thrones to reverse direction, we could still swim back up to the opposite end.

I nearly got decapitated by the gold Frisbee thing.

Without warning, it burst from the water like a weird UFO, and by some invisible, otherworldly force, shot over my head, dropping down around the neck of the welcoming skeleton at the base of the font.

The skeleton's arms dropped. Clouds of mildew gathered at ends of its fingers, drawn from, presumably, everywhere in the musty surrounding area.

I knew something had gone horribly wrong. "Guys! We should probably go. Now!"

"What's the matter?" Roy asked.

"It's Xetgupa! I...don't think he's completely dead!"

Pete clenched his fists. "But you said you—"

"I know what I said, but I'm wrong! We need to go now!"

We dove into the water.

A backwards glance told me everything I needed to know:

Xetgupa had somehow found a way to reconstitute himself. The skeleton turned a solid black, mushroom-like Coolie hat slowly forming on the top of its skull.