Jared Padalecki and the Faith of the Feathered Serpent (Chapter Six)
Title: Jared Padalecki and the Faith of the Feathered Serpent
Author: hunters_retreat
Fandom: J2 (CWRPS)
Pairings: Jared Padalecki/Jensen Ackles
Summary: They were legend, the Egyptologist with a love of mysteries and the General with a love of adventure. Over the years they'd faced everything Egypt had to offer, never backing down and never giving in, until they'd tamed her secrets. What happens when they find themselves leaving their home for the wonders of the new world in search of a missing colleague? What happens when Jensen Ackles and Jared Padalecki are surrounded by jungles and ruins and find the faith of the fallen serpent?
Jared woke, groggy and aching, the world spinning as he tried to sit up. He felt hands on him and tried to jerk away, knowing instinctively that it wasn’t Jensen.
“Wooohhh boy, hold still. You’re going to make yourself sick moving like that.”
Jared jerked his eyes open, forcing himself to breath to keep his stomach from heaving violently at the sudden light that coursed through his vision. “Chris?”
“What the hell are you doing out of Egypt?”
Jared didn’t protest when a canteen was pressed to his lips and Chris didn’t bother to wait for him to answer either. “Don’t know what you’re doing here Jared, or why they brought you here, but we’ve got to get you out.”
“Did they bring anyone else in with me?” Jared asked as he tried to sit up. He moved slowly and Chris’s hands came up to support him as he did. Chris looked like a wild man, his beard unkempt and his tanned skin even darker with the grime of days unwashed. His clothes were torn and he looked skinnier than Jared could ever remember seeing him, not starved but lean. He was bruised and there were scrapes and cuts all over his body in various states of healing. They were in a small building with only a single window, a handful of other people huddled in corners, eyes staring blankly out around them.
“No,” Chris said softly. “They didn’t say anything about someone else either.”
Jared let out a sigh of relief. “Thank the gods for that.”
“You got the cavalry coming for you Jared?”
Jared smiled. “Jensen.”
“You convinced your foreman to travel to Yaxchilan with you?” Chris asked with a raised eyebrow.
Jared didn’t answer, but he was sure the blush that covered his cheeks was enough to give Chris any missing information he might need about Jensen. Chris knew him too well to hide it which was why he’d never said anything about Jensen to him. He ignored the question and started with his own.
“What’s going on Chris? We came looking for you, but your hotel wasn’t sacked and your site wasn’t attacked. We were travelling out to the closest village you were looking into.” He pointed to the people in the corner. “These are the missing people you were looking for, right?”
Chris nodded. “Yeah. Jared, look. The people that are involved in this, it’s pretty bad stuff. The others won’t help, but with the two of us, we might be able to fight them off. We need to get you out of here before they try to take you.”
“Take me where?”
Chris moved out of his crouch and sat down beside Jared, his back resting against the wall as he stretched his legs out beside Jared’s. “How much do you remember about Waxaklahun Ubah Kan?”
Jared took a deep breath, trying to remember the days of throwing out random images and names to one another, tried to remember the books he’d been looking at before he set out to find his friend. “The war serpent. He’s related to the Aztec god Quetzalcoatl. He was also known as Kukulkan, the feathered serpent. There was a cult that developed around the worship of him. In Chicken Itza he’s seen to be presiding over sacrifices and the god is known as the vision serpent.”
“A+ boy,” Chris said with a smile. “Now the best as I can tell, the locals started to go missing. I was working at Yaxchilan when one of my crew members told me he needed to leave. His sister had disappeared. She’d been around the site a few times and I offered to help him look. When I started asking around though, it seemed like a lot of people had gone missing.”
“More than usual,” Jared said with a nod. “Jensen found out the same thing when he started asking around.”
Chris nodded. “I thought it might have to do with the Lacondon when I saw the god bowls.”
“It’s the logical connection,” Jared said.
“When I started talking to the villagers though I knew they didn’t have anything to do with it. They were afraid through, Jared. They knew what was happening but they wouldn’t talk about it. And then one night we were attacked. We were all hit with darts before anyone could raise an alarm.”
“And you woke up here.”
“Yeah,” Chris said as he looked down at his hands.
“What happened to your men?”
Chris didn’t look up and Jared understood. Chris got crew the same way Jared did. He didn’t buy their loyalty, he earned it. His crew was friendly, some were family. Anyone that came with him was someone Chris cared about.
“I couldn’t see what they did, but they took them, one each night until they were all gone. I could hear them screaming; they were fighting for their lives, Jared but I couldn’t do a damn thing.” He shook his head and Jared could see the grief in the set of his shoulders. “Not one has come back.”
Jared nodded, his own feeling of foreboding pulling the silence closer to him.
Chris misread him and an arm was thrown over his shoulder, pulling him closer. “I’m not gonna let that happen to you Jared,” he said as Jared looked over at him in surprise. “I’ve always taken care of you. Not gonna stop now just because you’re all grown up and think you know what the hell you’re doing.”
Jared let out a small huff of a laugh and shook his head.
“What the hell were you thinking, coming out to the jungle, Jared?” Chris went back to his initial question.
“I got the picture you sent. I tried to get in touch with you but they said you hadn’t been around in a while. I knew there was trouble so I came to find you myself.”
“You knew I was in trouble from a picture I sent you when everything was still going just fine?”
Jared looked down, knowing that Chris would be able to see something else in his eyes if he was facing him. “It seemed like a good time to get away from Egypt anyway,” he said. “We all need a break, right? You used to tell me that all the time, said I needed to get my head out of the sands of Egypt and come visit your jungle.”
“Jared?”
He took a deep breath. “Something happened when I went to Egypt,” he heard Chris’s small intake of breath and he held his hands up quickly, “nothing bad. I just … I’ve never known how to talk to you about it. You already know enough about the skeletons in my closet,” He said with a small smile.
Chris answered it back, but there was concern in his eyes. “You know you never have to hide that shit from me, Jared.”
“I just didn’t know how to say this Chris and you really didn’t need to know about it. Now I guess we’re past that.” He felt like an idiot. Chris had always been there for him, but whereas Jim had taken him under his wing as a young professional and treated him as an equal with a slant towards the mentoring role, Chris had been a big brother and Jared hated feeling like he was suddenly thrust into the little brother role again.
He took a deep breath. “I started getting visions. It doesn’t happen all the time, but when I touch certain artifacts I’ll get a vision of what something was like when it was still new and in use. When I got the photograph you sent, I had a vision of Yaxchilan but there was something else there, something dangerous and I knew you were in trouble.”
“So you,” Chris paused, shaking his head as he started up again. “You thought I was in trouble because of a vision and you came for me?”
“Yeah.”
Chris nodded. “I don’t know what to say about this vision business, but it’s good to know you cared enough to come looking for me.”
Jared closed his eyes as he let his head rest against the wall of the building. He didn’t expect everyone to believe in his visions. He’d always found it easier to keep it hidden than to explain, except to those that had witnessed him getting caught up in one. He’d always known Chris would have a hard time accepting it though and he’d never wanted to tell him. He just had to hope that his friend wouldn’t think him crazy in the long run. “I had another vision when we were at Yaxchilan. I grabbed a god bowl and the vision took me back to watch the Mayan’s making sacrifices to the gods. In the first part, they were sacrificing grain, bread, and liquor but there was blood letting in the second. The third part is where it turned strange.”
“That’s where it turned strange?”
Chris’s voice sounded a little choked but Jared ignored it. “They were performing a human sacrifice. They were starting the calendar round.”
“The calendar round? You mean to say in your vision you saw them make a human sacrifice to start the 52 year calendar cycle?”
“Yeah Chris, I remember what the calendar round is. The sacrifice was complete with the lighting of a fire in the chest of the victim and the relighting of the city lights from it. The strange part was that there was some sort of dark presence hovering over the body before it caught sight of me and tried to attack me.”
“What happened then?”
“I … uh … I woke up.”
“So it was just a dream?”
“No, it was a vision Chris. Look, think I’m crazy all you want but you know I’ve never been wrong on a dig. Even when my instincts told me to look where everyone else said there was nothing, it always panned out. You know that. It was because of the visions.”
Chris just shook his head. “For the sake of argument, let’s say these visions are accurate. You think they’re trying to start a new calendar round?”
“I don’t know. You’re the expert, Chris. I’m telling you what I saw.”
“Tell me everything, Jared, just as it happened.”
Jared took a deep breath. He knew Chris wasn’t really sure about his visions, but he was at least playing it out to the next step. He was letting Jared discuss it, letting him talk about the visions and how they had played out in his head.
He told him everything about the first vision and how he’d tried to contact Chris and then what they’d found at the hotel. The ended with the last vision he’d had sitting next to Jensen in the camp site at Yaxchilan.
“If what you saw was real Jared, we’re in for some trouble.”
Jared gave a mirthless laugh. “I figured that already.”
“What you’re saying is you had a vision of the calendar round being performed. These people, I think they’re from the Cult of the Kukulkan. If they are and they think you’re having visions, they’d want to make you the last sacrifice to the great Vision Serpent.”
“Won’t Jensen be thrilled,” Jared said with a slight hitch in his laugh, “this time they want to cut out my heart.”
Author: hunters_retreat
Fandom: J2 (CWRPS)
Pairings: Jared Padalecki/Jensen Ackles
Summary: They were legend, the Egyptologist with a love of mysteries and the General with a love of adventure. Over the years they'd faced everything Egypt had to offer, never backing down and never giving in, until they'd tamed her secrets. What happens when they find themselves leaving their home for the wonders of the new world in search of a missing colleague? What happens when Jensen Ackles and Jared Padalecki are surrounded by jungles and ruins and find the faith of the fallen serpent?
Jared woke, groggy and aching, the world spinning as he tried to sit up. He felt hands on him and tried to jerk away, knowing instinctively that it wasn’t Jensen.
“Wooohhh boy, hold still. You’re going to make yourself sick moving like that.”
Jared jerked his eyes open, forcing himself to breath to keep his stomach from heaving violently at the sudden light that coursed through his vision. “Chris?”
“What the hell are you doing out of Egypt?”
Jared didn’t protest when a canteen was pressed to his lips and Chris didn’t bother to wait for him to answer either. “Don’t know what you’re doing here Jared, or why they brought you here, but we’ve got to get you out.”
“Did they bring anyone else in with me?” Jared asked as he tried to sit up. He moved slowly and Chris’s hands came up to support him as he did. Chris looked like a wild man, his beard unkempt and his tanned skin even darker with the grime of days unwashed. His clothes were torn and he looked skinnier than Jared could ever remember seeing him, not starved but lean. He was bruised and there were scrapes and cuts all over his body in various states of healing. They were in a small building with only a single window, a handful of other people huddled in corners, eyes staring blankly out around them.
“No,” Chris said softly. “They didn’t say anything about someone else either.”
Jared let out a sigh of relief. “Thank the gods for that.”
“You got the cavalry coming for you Jared?”
Jared smiled. “Jensen.”
“You convinced your foreman to travel to Yaxchilan with you?” Chris asked with a raised eyebrow.
Jared didn’t answer, but he was sure the blush that covered his cheeks was enough to give Chris any missing information he might need about Jensen. Chris knew him too well to hide it which was why he’d never said anything about Jensen to him. He ignored the question and started with his own.
“What’s going on Chris? We came looking for you, but your hotel wasn’t sacked and your site wasn’t attacked. We were travelling out to the closest village you were looking into.” He pointed to the people in the corner. “These are the missing people you were looking for, right?”
Chris nodded. “Yeah. Jared, look. The people that are involved in this, it’s pretty bad stuff. The others won’t help, but with the two of us, we might be able to fight them off. We need to get you out of here before they try to take you.”
“Take me where?”
Chris moved out of his crouch and sat down beside Jared, his back resting against the wall as he stretched his legs out beside Jared’s. “How much do you remember about Waxaklahun Ubah Kan?”
Jared took a deep breath, trying to remember the days of throwing out random images and names to one another, tried to remember the books he’d been looking at before he set out to find his friend. “The war serpent. He’s related to the Aztec god Quetzalcoatl. He was also known as Kukulkan, the feathered serpent. There was a cult that developed around the worship of him. In Chicken Itza he’s seen to be presiding over sacrifices and the god is known as the vision serpent.”
“A+ boy,” Chris said with a smile. “Now the best as I can tell, the locals started to go missing. I was working at Yaxchilan when one of my crew members told me he needed to leave. His sister had disappeared. She’d been around the site a few times and I offered to help him look. When I started asking around though, it seemed like a lot of people had gone missing.”
“More than usual,” Jared said with a nod. “Jensen found out the same thing when he started asking around.”
Chris nodded. “I thought it might have to do with the Lacondon when I saw the god bowls.”
“It’s the logical connection,” Jared said.
“When I started talking to the villagers though I knew they didn’t have anything to do with it. They were afraid through, Jared. They knew what was happening but they wouldn’t talk about it. And then one night we were attacked. We were all hit with darts before anyone could raise an alarm.”
“And you woke up here.”
“Yeah,” Chris said as he looked down at his hands.
“What happened to your men?”
Chris didn’t look up and Jared understood. Chris got crew the same way Jared did. He didn’t buy their loyalty, he earned it. His crew was friendly, some were family. Anyone that came with him was someone Chris cared about.
“I couldn’t see what they did, but they took them, one each night until they were all gone. I could hear them screaming; they were fighting for their lives, Jared but I couldn’t do a damn thing.” He shook his head and Jared could see the grief in the set of his shoulders. “Not one has come back.”
Jared nodded, his own feeling of foreboding pulling the silence closer to him.
Chris misread him and an arm was thrown over his shoulder, pulling him closer. “I’m not gonna let that happen to you Jared,” he said as Jared looked over at him in surprise. “I’ve always taken care of you. Not gonna stop now just because you’re all grown up and think you know what the hell you’re doing.”
Jared let out a small huff of a laugh and shook his head.
“What the hell were you thinking, coming out to the jungle, Jared?” Chris went back to his initial question.
“I got the picture you sent. I tried to get in touch with you but they said you hadn’t been around in a while. I knew there was trouble so I came to find you myself.”
“You knew I was in trouble from a picture I sent you when everything was still going just fine?”
Jared looked down, knowing that Chris would be able to see something else in his eyes if he was facing him. “It seemed like a good time to get away from Egypt anyway,” he said. “We all need a break, right? You used to tell me that all the time, said I needed to get my head out of the sands of Egypt and come visit your jungle.”
“Jared?”
He took a deep breath. “Something happened when I went to Egypt,” he heard Chris’s small intake of breath and he held his hands up quickly, “nothing bad. I just … I’ve never known how to talk to you about it. You already know enough about the skeletons in my closet,” He said with a small smile.
Chris answered it back, but there was concern in his eyes. “You know you never have to hide that shit from me, Jared.”
“I just didn’t know how to say this Chris and you really didn’t need to know about it. Now I guess we’re past that.” He felt like an idiot. Chris had always been there for him, but whereas Jim had taken him under his wing as a young professional and treated him as an equal with a slant towards the mentoring role, Chris had been a big brother and Jared hated feeling like he was suddenly thrust into the little brother role again.
He took a deep breath. “I started getting visions. It doesn’t happen all the time, but when I touch certain artifacts I’ll get a vision of what something was like when it was still new and in use. When I got the photograph you sent, I had a vision of Yaxchilan but there was something else there, something dangerous and I knew you were in trouble.”
“So you,” Chris paused, shaking his head as he started up again. “You thought I was in trouble because of a vision and you came for me?”
“Yeah.”
Chris nodded. “I don’t know what to say about this vision business, but it’s good to know you cared enough to come looking for me.”
Jared closed his eyes as he let his head rest against the wall of the building. He didn’t expect everyone to believe in his visions. He’d always found it easier to keep it hidden than to explain, except to those that had witnessed him getting caught up in one. He’d always known Chris would have a hard time accepting it though and he’d never wanted to tell him. He just had to hope that his friend wouldn’t think him crazy in the long run. “I had another vision when we were at Yaxchilan. I grabbed a god bowl and the vision took me back to watch the Mayan’s making sacrifices to the gods. In the first part, they were sacrificing grain, bread, and liquor but there was blood letting in the second. The third part is where it turned strange.”
“That’s where it turned strange?”
Chris’s voice sounded a little choked but Jared ignored it. “They were performing a human sacrifice. They were starting the calendar round.”
“The calendar round? You mean to say in your vision you saw them make a human sacrifice to start the 52 year calendar cycle?”
“Yeah Chris, I remember what the calendar round is. The sacrifice was complete with the lighting of a fire in the chest of the victim and the relighting of the city lights from it. The strange part was that there was some sort of dark presence hovering over the body before it caught sight of me and tried to attack me.”
“What happened then?”
“I … uh … I woke up.”
“So it was just a dream?”
“No, it was a vision Chris. Look, think I’m crazy all you want but you know I’ve never been wrong on a dig. Even when my instincts told me to look where everyone else said there was nothing, it always panned out. You know that. It was because of the visions.”
Chris just shook his head. “For the sake of argument, let’s say these visions are accurate. You think they’re trying to start a new calendar round?”
“I don’t know. You’re the expert, Chris. I’m telling you what I saw.”
“Tell me everything, Jared, just as it happened.”
Jared took a deep breath. He knew Chris wasn’t really sure about his visions, but he was at least playing it out to the next step. He was letting Jared discuss it, letting him talk about the visions and how they had played out in his head.
He told him everything about the first vision and how he’d tried to contact Chris and then what they’d found at the hotel. The ended with the last vision he’d had sitting next to Jensen in the camp site at Yaxchilan.
“If what you saw was real Jared, we’re in for some trouble.”
Jared gave a mirthless laugh. “I figured that already.”
“What you’re saying is you had a vision of the calendar round being performed. These people, I think they’re from the Cult of the Kukulkan. If they are and they think you’re having visions, they’d want to make you the last sacrifice to the great Vision Serpent.”
“Won’t Jensen be thrilled,” Jared said with a slight hitch in his laugh, “this time they want to cut out my heart.”