The Water of Life Read online



  The Water of Life

  By Kyle S. Taylor

  Copyright © 2015 Kyle Taylor

  All rights reserved.

  The Water of Life

  At last, he finally found it.

  All the years of trekking through Brazilian rainforests, plodding through the swamplands of southern Florida, and scaling treacherous Peruvian mountains were about to come to fruition. He had finally tracked down his white whale - the legendary Fountain of Youth.

  They laughed at him, those archaeologists and historians. He devoted years of his life pouring over countless manuscripts, journals, and maps from centuries long ago, and touted its existence to all those within earshot. Still, he was always dismissed - swatted away like an annoying gnat. A man of his esteemed repute and stature should be focused on more important things, they would say, not childish fairytales. It was a wild goose chase; the most foolish of all fools’ errands.

  “‘There goes crazy Maverick’ they would snicker when I walked by them at the conferences!” he shouted to no one in particular. “They never ran out of ways to mock me! ‘Have you found the fountain yet?’ ‘You should check the one near the bathroom, for I feel much younger since drinking from it myself!’”

  Maverick recited every snide comment ever made to him in jest of his conviction that the fabled fountain existed, as he eagerly made his way down the cave. Every insult, every jeer - he spat them from his mouth with a mixture of pent-up anger and gleeful satisfaction; the kind of satisfaction that only comes from validation and vindication.

  In Maverick’s eyes, there was no sweeter satisfaction imaginable.

  “Mr. Maverick…Mr. Maverick…if you don’t mind…can you please slower your pace…!”

  Maverick stopped and glanced over his shoulder.

  “Look Nicole, I’m in no mood to listen to you whine about me moving too fast,” he said. “I’m here to finally locate this legendary treasure, not babysit you. With all the gender equality drivel you’ve forced me to digest these past few years, you should be more than able to keep up with me! You’re one of those loudmouths who thinks God made us all equal aren’t you? Well now it’s time to prove it - either keep up with my pace, or head to the kitchen - where you belong.”

  Nicole, Maverick’s assistant, with a bit of huffing and puffing, eventually caught up to him. The straggles of blond hair that snuck out beneath her hat were dripping with sweat, and her glasses were a foggy mess. A young woman in her late-twenties, she was accustomed to him berating and talking down to her due to her gender. At this point, she was essentially numb to it and never took it personally, for he was like that with everyone. That is, everyone who didn’t look like him.

  “You move surprisingly well for a man your age sir,” she said to him, hunched over and trying to catch her breath.

  “I imagine that’s because God didn’t curse me with womanhood,” he replied. “Now stop breathing as if a rabid dog was chasing you and let’s get a move on! And where’s that boy at? Chico, where are you!? He needs to stop going so far ahead of us!”

  “Iván! Iván!” Nicole yelled. She turned on her flashlight and shined its light ahead, straining her eyes with hopes of catching at least a glimpse of the boy. After a few minutes he came scampering up the cave’s path, torch in hand, easily maneuvering around the jagged rocks on the path, and stood before them.

  A somewhat smallish young boy no more than thirteen, Iván was known for being an adventurous lad. There was not a tree in his village he had not climbed. To his parents’ chagrin, he often adventured alone far from home without alerting anyone. They would usually find this out after searching for him, only to be told by his friends or neighbors he was last seen going somewhere they forbade him to go. No matter how many lashes he received upon his return as punishment, it never killed his curiosity and desire to explore his surroundings.

  So when two Americans found their way to the remote Central American village, overturning stones and rustling leaves about a mysterious fountain hidden in the area, everyone knew there was only one person who would know the answers to their questions. With promises of financial compensation, Iván’s wary parents allowed him to help the pale-skinned foreigners.

  Though he could not fluently speak it, Iván understood English well enough. He learned it over the years in the town market; travelers from both America and Europe would often visit the market when their itch to see the world beyond their lofty confines needed to be scratched. While they never paid him a second thought, Iván would study their body language and the movement of their lips as they spoke, dissecting their accents and inflections, eventually gaining a rudimentary understanding of what they were saying.

  “Come,” Iván said to them, motioning and pointing towards a crevice ahead. “Almost there.”

  With that he darted back ahead.

  “Can we trust this boy?” Maverick asked his assistant as they carefully made their way down a rocky slope, following the flicker of the boy’s torch. “We’ve been at this for hours and I have yet to see any sign of water flowing anywhere around here.”

  “Well, Mr. Maverick, there’s no sense in going back at this point. As they say, we have already crossed the proverbial Rubicon.”

  “Well hell, I don’t completely trust this little runt,” he gruffly admitted. “He could just be wasting our time. And seeing as how you care to wax philosophical, here’s a theory I heard growing up - ‘if they ain’t white, they ain’t right.’ Can only trust your own kind, not any sneaky Spanish folk or trickster Negroes. I’m sure this kid isn’t much different from any of those Mexican border-jumpers.”

  “Well seeing as how we are thousands of miles away from America sir, I sincerely doubt our little friend here can be described as a ‘fence-jumper,’ or ‘border-hopper,’ or whatever term you just used,” Nicole said. “And as learned and cultured a man as you are, having travelled around the world, I am always surprised that you still cling to those 19th century stereotypes.”

  “You call them stereotypes, I call them the principles that our great country was built upon,” the prideful man retorted. “It’s bad enough that women can cast a vote now thanks to that fool Wilson. As if people care about what they have to say! What’s next - a woman president? A colored president? That will be the day indeed!”

  “Indeed it will,” she replied after a brief moment of silence. “Times are changing, Mr. Maverick. You will have to either change with them, or get left behind.”

  As they followed the fleet-footed boy deeper and deeper towards the heart of the cave, Nicole found herself pondering her current situation. She had longed to work with Maverick before even meeting him. A lover of archaeology since childhood, she knew him to be an authority in the field, and was fascinated by his theories and research that supported the Fountain of Youth’s existence. His credibility in the field was just as renowned as his bigotry, however. Though her academic credentials were impressive, it took a ton of convincing in the form of her constantly harassing him before he even considered taking a woman under his wing. Although she found many of his beliefs detestable, she did not hate her employer. Despite his archaic view of the world, more so the people in it, she did not find him to be a morally bankrupt individual. She knew that his views were shared the world over by many like him - men who were raised and molded from birth to look down upon others who were not born into a certain mold - and wondered who was truly at fault for that. To her, he was just a cranky middle-aged man stuck in his ways.

  “Ahh! I hit my bloody knee!” Maverick suddenly screamed as he tumbled forward, interrupting her thoughts. Both Iván and Nicole rushed towards him with Iván reaching him first. Iván reached out his free hand to help him off the ground, only to have it slapped away
by Maverick.

  “I don’t need your help boy!” he snapped at the child as he grimaced in pain while rubbing his knee. “And how much farther is it!?”

  “Right there. Fountain ahead.”

  Both Maverick and Nicole looked in the direction the boy pointed and could see an opening and a faint light in the distance.

  “Well what are we waiting for?” he said, ignoring his pain and springing to his feet. “Let’s see if this little chico has been leading us on a wild goose chase. I hope he knows he’s not seeing a dime of mine if he’s been wasting my time.”

  The trio quickened their pace, reenergized by the light ahead of them. Maverick could not wait to see if it could be true, if he had finally found his Holy Grail. Had he succeeded where Ponce de León failed? As they drew nearer he could hear the faint trickle of water and could feel the moisture in the air. His heartbeat quickened as the scent of water invaded his nostrils. As they approached the opening, the rocks began to smoothen as the path steepened until they were finally standing in something that resembled an archway.

  The three of them - Maverick, Nicole, and Iván - stepped through the opening into an enormous room. The walls rose far above them, with seemingly no end in sight as a ceiling could not be seen. There was nothing in the room, except a waterfall from heights unknown pouring water into a huge rock-like fountain a good 200 yards ahead of them. The water flowed constantly into the fountain, yet it barely overflowed. The room itself illuminated on its own, its oddly smooth walls and ground emitting a soft bluish-green hue. The small puddles of water around them shone as if comprised of the brightest of diamonds.

  “This is…this is unbelievable,” Nicole gasped. “In all your travels sir, have you ever seen anything so beautiful and mesmerizing?”

  “I…cannot say that I have,” Maverick said, his eyes darting in every direction as he spun in a slow circle. He was completely awestruck by his surroundings. “This is beyond words to describe!” Then the moment finally sunk in for Maverick. “I cannot believe I found it,” he said, a victorious grin plastered across his face. “I actually found it…!”

  Maverick stooped down and scooped some of the water from a puddle with his hand, analyzing it. He stared intently at it as it slipped through his fingers and ran down his wrist, his gaze fixated on its glimmer and color. Never before had he seen water so blue; never before had he seen water that seemingly contained particles of light itself.

  “Well, Mr. Maverick, I believe there’s a host of individuals who will owe you an apology,” Nicole said as she walked over to him and put a hand on his shoulder.

  “No!” he exclaimed, startling the girl. “Not yet at least. Before that day comes to pass and we let anyone know what we’ve found, I must first confirm this discovery. There’s only one thing left to do now…”

  Maverick stood up and took a deep breath. Never one for showing much emotion, besides disgust, he looked at Nicole and gave her an awkward hug before turning to the fountain.

  “Wait,” she said as he walked towards it. “Surely you don’t mean to… Wait, wait, wait…there must be another way, a safer way, a smarter way!”

  “This was always the only way.”

  “Mr. Maverick be sensible about this!” she exclaimed. She rushed ahead of him and blocked his path with her arms outstretched. “I cannot in good conscience allow you to do this! If this is in fact the legendary ‘Water of Life,’ - and I have no doubt that it is - we have absolutely NO idea what will happen to you if you were to consume it. It’s bad enough we’ve come into direct contact with it. Look…I know you’re excited about finding it Mr. Maverick, as am I, but don’t let that cloud your better judgement. We know where it is, so we can always come back. Let’s just go and come back with our equipment so we can properly document and record everything. Or better yet, we can just take a sample of the water and run tests on it to determine its content.”

  Before he could even respond she motioned quickly for Iván to come.

  “Have you ever drank from this?” she asked the boy, pointing to the fountain with one hand and making a drinking motion with the other.

  The boy shook his head. “No, no drink. Never. Too scared,” he said. “Water look…different.”

  She turned back at Maverick, barring his path with her arms again. “See! Even he has the common sense not to drink from here!”

  “Nicole,” Maverick began, as he gently moved her arms down. “Nicole, I have been cheated out of many a thing in my life. I’ve had collaborators - peers of mine who pretended to be friends - come work with me, only to secretly steal my theories and announce them as their own,” he said, his voice rising in anger. He then relaxed his tone. “They’d come to me, then take my work and run with it… But it’s ok, because they know I was the first one with it… So this…this moment right here…I refuse to pass up. All my travels and all my research…all the wrong turns and mistranslations that led to dead ends…all the clues that only led to more clues, and all the bread crumbs I followed have led me to this very moment. Because if I drink from this fountain, no matter what worst case scenario befalls me - if I suddenly died or even if I somehow reverted back to infancy - this will be one moment no man can ever take from me.”

  Nicole lifted her glasses and wiped a tear away a tear from the corner of her eye. She grabbed him and gave him the tightest hug she could muster.

  “Go Mr. Maverick,” she said. “If anyone has earned the right to do this, it is you.”

  She stepped aside, no longer blocking the path to his destiny.

  As he approached the fountain, it almost seemed to approach him, it was so vast. It was an immense triple-tiered fountain, more than three times his height. The steady stream of water from above caused each tier to overflow, yet this only resulted in a small puddle of water surrounding the fountain. Small streams of water trickled from this puddle to different parts of the cavern, forming smaller puddles. Strangely enough, the room was never even close to flooding.

  Nicole and Iván followed closely behind Maverick. When he finally stood before the fountain, he rubbed his hand along its surface. The fountain itself appeared to be a natural structure and not man made; it felt smooth and polished, but was composed of the same rock-mineral as the cave; its foundation seemed rooted to the ground, almost as if it had sprouted from the ground like a flower. He looked up to where the water was pouring but could see nothing but darkness.

  He wanted to turn around and give his companions one last look, but didn’t, for fear of neglecting this blessing and turning to salt. Behind him, Nicole waited in anxious silence; Iván stared intently at him, genuine concern embedded in the boy’s doe-eyed face. Maverick stared at his reflection in the water, his dirty, tanned and weather-worn face staring back at him with impatience. He closed his eyes, took another deep sigh, and cupped the water flowing from the bottom tier with his hands, drinking it all.

  Nicole and Iván held their breath, as neither knew what to expect next.

  “Mr. Maverick,” Nicole said after a few seconds passed, her voice a loud whisper. “Mr. Maverick are you ok? How do you feel?”

  “I’m ok,” he said, turning back around. “I feel… I feel…”

  Maverick listlessly fell to the ground. Nicole and Iván ran to him, shaking him and yelling his name. They managed to drag him to a dry section of the cavern and propped his back against the wall as he sat on the ground. Nicole squatted in front of him, examining his face. He was still breathing and his eyes were wide open. His pupils, she noted, were extremely dilated, and he appeared to be in a trance. His breathing decreased with each passing second; each second took a sliver of hope away from Nicole that Maverick would wake again; each second fueled the fear in her heart that her mentor’s next breath would be his last.

  “What did that water do to you sir?” she wondered out loud.