10/20

Gabriel, Eric, Alyssa and I are walking down a stone paved, torch lit hallway that seems to be underground. We come upon a fork in the hall. To the left there is a rustic looking door with Mesoamerican frescos decorating it. The door on the right is a brilliant shining gold with ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics. Alyssa doesn't hesitate and tells us we need to take the door on the left. Immediately the door slides open. Another torch lit hallway stretches out beyond the door. There is an engraving on the wall that looks like the word 'MAYAN.'
The hallway ends and a large room opens up. An old man is sitting behind a table. The table is covered with a colorful cloth with an ethnic pattern. There are ceramic bowls full of spices, incense and small magical looking talismans. He hands us small sticks with bright blue feathers attached to the end. We hold the feathered sticks and look at him in confusion. He take a torch and lights the ends of the feathers. He tells us we need to go light the incense to the God and make our offering. He looks beyond our faces, we turn to match his gaze and see a great statue of a beast with wild eyes and many feet. There are bushels of flowers, incense and food at its feet. We light the incense with the flames of the blue feathers. The smoke slowly slithers up over the beast's face. His eyes glow and a deep voice erupts from within. It tells us we can procede.
The wall to the left of the statue shakes and a segment slides back, bringing in a small gust of wind. We step through the opening in the wall and are suddenly outdoors.
It is dusk, but we are able to make out the treetops, which tower above us. The trees are unusually large. The sky cannot be seen beyond the trees. The trees outline a rolling stretch of land. We begin to explore and come upon an enormous structure.
A ladder awaits us in front of the structure. It reaches nearly to the top of the trees. We begin to climb, and climb for nearly an hour. At the top of the structure we can see the levels below. Dark orange rectangular cushions stretch across the four posts of the structure. They have at least a two foot gap between one another. Beneath that we see a black mesh net. The structure reminds us of a giant trapeze artist's station. Eric and Alyssa are excited with the great height and leap off the top towards the cushions. Gabriel and I stand back, astonished. We watch them fly through the air and fall atop the cushions. They burst into laughter, which Gabriel and I can barely hear. We hear the echoes of their shouts to jump. Gabriel hesitates and says he will jump if I do. They beckon us more with their calls. Gabe shrugs and steps off, his hair flying back, arms stretched out and slams into the soft orange cushion. Now the three of them are sending broken shouts and echoes to me.
I swallow the nervousness that holds me back and take a leap off the top of the tallest structure known to us.