‘Mick’s dead, Jake. He’s been dead for twenty years. You’re never going to meet our long-lost lunatic father. Never. So get over it.’

‘He wasn’t a lunatic, and you’re wrong. Our father fulfilled his destiny, and so will we. Under the spiritual guidance of the Guardian, Mick made the ultimate sacrifice—to return to Xibalba in order to save the souls of the Nephilim.’

‘The Nephilim?’

‘The Fallen Ones, the ones whom the Guardian were forced to leave behind when they came to Earth. The Nephilim are being tortured. Our father was chosen to be their messiah, only he failed, just as the Guardian knew he would, just as is written in the Mayan Popol Vuh. Now it’s up to you and me to rescue him. We need to save his soul and those of the Nephilim. Open your eyes, Manny. Accept our destiny so I can prepare you.’

‘Maybe it’s your destiny, not mine. I’m not going anywhere.’

‘Ah, but you are, just as you have long ago. You are the Yin to my Yang. Only together can we hope to succeed.’

‘Okay, Dim Son, I’ve had it—I’m out of here.’ Immanuel tries to push his way past Jacob, but the white-haired twin is too strong. In one motion he pivots around his brother, catching him from behind in a choking headlock.

‘I love you, Manny. I gave you six years, but now it’s time—time for you to join me. Did you really believe God gave you these abilities so you could score touchdowns? The sooner you face your destiny, the better prepared you’ll be for what awaits us on Xibalba.’

A wisp of thought, in the consciousness of existence.

It took our secret band of scientists eight weeks to squirrel away a year’s worth of supplies and make one of the three Mars shuttles spaceworthy.

Our Guardian clan now numbered thirty-seven: Twenty men, twelve women, and five children—three of whom were first-generation infants born with elongated skulls. Through genetic manipulation, New Eden’s women could control their ovulations and times of conception. They could select boy or girl, even fraternal or identical twins. Most important, the mother could influence an unborn infant’s chromosomes while in the womb, preventing disease, even altering certain attributes—including the size and shape of the newborn’s skull.

This type of genetic manipulation seemed amateurish in comparison to the mind-boggling things Professor Bobinac and I had discovered down on the planet’s surface. Situated beneath the floating city was a vast genetics compound erected on the shoreline of an artificially created sea. Within this facility, the transhumans had left behind evidence of an advanced gene-splicing technique that combined cybernetics with synthetic artificial intelligence enhancements to produce a biomimeticbiomemnetic organism. These beings, dubbed Tezcatilpoca by their transhuman masters, had been weaned within the silvery exotic liquids contained in their artificial sea.