The mist was lifting and merging with the smoke and the scent of the copal. I was uneasy at the strange visions I had experienced. I tossed on my pallet. I know that an archaeologist is one who studies the past, like priests who learn the stories of the Popal Vu, but I found trouble in merging minds with this man.
The effects of the dreaming draft were wearing off and, though I could not yet see my house or my apprentice Three Rabbit, I was conscious again of who and where I was. I knew, too, that I had been travelling to recover information from the world of the spirits. I was Smoke Monkey and I knew how the long count, the fifth sun, would end. I did not understand the date 28th of December 2012 when el quinto sol would end, but I knew that was the date on a calendar they would use by the time the rock from heaven destroyed their world.