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of the walls high overhead was a strange stone hoop covered in glyphs. Dan tried to think of a joke about ancient PE classes, but his brain still felt like it was sloshing in his skull from the crash.
    â€œWow!” Atticus ran right up to the ring.
    â€œAtticus, how can you care about Mayan ruins at a time like this?” Dan asked wearily. “We just escaped death by a nose hair.”
    â€œBut this is amazing!” Atticus said.
    Dan, Jake, and Amy rested and caught their breath while Atticus ran his hands over the stone glyphs. Dan was glad Att seemed to recover quickly, but he didn’t trust this sudden enthusiasm. He knew Atticus was coping in his typical way — by immersing himself in history. Maybe that was why he’d become such a prodigy. His life had had its share of trauma, but he found safety in knowledge, the more obscure, the better.
    â€œDan, look!” Atticus waved at him. “I’ve always wanted to see one of these with my own eyes.”
    When his head stopped spinning, Dan sat up. They seemed to have crashed in some ancient stadium.
    â€œReminds me a little of a tennis court,” Jake said.
    â€œIt is,” Atticus told them. “It’s a
pok-a-tok
court.”
    â€œA what?” Dan asked.
    â€œA
pok-a-tok
court,” Atticus repeated, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
    Dan tried to walk, but his legs were wobbly. He let himself plop down on the grass. “I know you’re saying something important, Att, but forgive me if I have trouble caring right now.”
    Sirens blared in the distance, gradually getting closer. “I hope that’s an ambulance,” Amy said.
    Jake shot a piercing glance at her. “Are you hurt?”
    â€œI can’t tell. I don’t think so, but my arms and legs are numb, and I want you all to be checked out for injuries, too.”
    The ambulance arrived, followed by a jeep full of Guatemalan soldiers in camouflage uniforms, with green berets on their heads and rifles strapped over their shoulders. “The army?” Dan whispered. “Isn’t that overkill?”
    â€œWe did crash a helicopter in a national park,” Amy reminded him.
    Two medics jumped out of the ambulance and checked the kids for injuries. One of them spoke English, and the army captain who oversaw the examinations did, too. “Where is the pilot?” the captain demanded.
    â€œHe jumped,” Amy explained.
    â€œAnd he tried to take the little one with him,” Dan added, gesturing toward Atticus.
    The captain’s eyes narrowed in disbelief. “He jumped? Why would he do that?”
    â€œYou tell us,” Jake said. Dan caught the dirty look Amy flashed him. They knew why the pilot had jumped — he’d taken a bribe from Pierce to let the Cahills die in an “accidental” helicopter crash.
    But letting the Guatemalan army in on their troubles wouldn’t help. For all they knew, Pierce had an in with them, too. His long arm of evil reached all over the world. “We don’t know why he jumped,” Amy said. “You can ask him if you can find him out in the jungle.”
    The captain stared dubiously into the thick forest. Dan knew that it grew so fast it could cover a crashed plane in a matter of days.
    The medics finished checking Dan, Amy, Jake, and Atticus for broken bones and signs of concussion. “Some bumps and bruises, but they’re okay,” one reported to the captain.
    â€œGood. You may go.” The captain dismissed the ambulance and crossed his arms over his chest. Dan eyed the pistol in his belt. These guys didn’t fool around. “Now, may I ask what you children are doing here in Tikal?”
    â€œWe’re tourists,” Amy said as the ambulance drove away. “We just want to see the ruins, that’s all. We have a reservation at the hotel.”
    As if to confirm Amy’s statement, a Tikal park ranger drove up in