A sharp sound echoed several times and startled Yuri. Then there were more sounds like it. It was gunfire. Yuri looked around. Daylight illuminated the cave. Don Vergara had vanished, along with his mule. The other mule was standing, quiet and motionless nearby. Yuri opened the zipper of his sleeping bag and ran out, fully clothed, to the opening of the cave.

He could see a group of men coming down the trail, one by one. They were less than a hundred yards away.

"Tokarev!" someone yelled. Yuri's name was repeated several times by the echo. "Professor Tokarev! We are Adams, from the United States, and Wilson, from England."

"We finally caught up with him," said another voice that also echoed.

Yuri recognized the man called Belisario at the very moment that he appeared to fire his gun in the cave's direction. Six other men in military clothing were also carrying guns. Yuri understood that the foreigners had brought the soldiers with them. When he saw Belisario firing his rifle in his direction, Yuri decided to escape.

He quickly put his mountain boots on and, taking his report, he climbed on top of his mule without a saddle, leaving the rest of his belongings behind. He left the cave, urging the mule to hurry on. He began to move away from the soldiers, who were already very near. The trail stopped abruptly. The mule panicked, raising its front legs. Yuri fell into the abyss. The report was scattered in the wind as Yuri's body struck the edge of a cliff, and then another, tumbling onto a pile of rocks. Yuri's body continued to roll slowly downward, until it finally rested on a pile of snow.

Half an hour went by before the search team could reach Yuri. The soldiers were improvising a stretcher by wrapping some blankets around two rifles. The American came over to Yuri's side.

"Professor Tokarev," he said softly, almost pleading, "why did you do that? Everything had been resolved, almost." Adams took Yuri's hand. "What were you thinking about? What were you thinking about?"

"The report..." Yuri said with great difficulty. "Everything is explained there. The report..." and he could say no more.

His broken body was lying on its back over the snow, but there was a faint smile on his face. Everything turned silent. His large blue eyes became motionless as the wind continued to scatter his reports in all directions. Yuri remembered Igor, scattering papers to the wind and exclaiming: "Oh Shiva, how beautiful is the snow in Moscow!" The cold wind kissed Yuri's face.

The Aconcagua began to move.

Enormous blocks of ice fell one after the other as the snow melted away. The mountain was growing and growing, ever and ever taller, and as it grew it became transparent. The rocks moved away as the crystal walls emerged amid a deafening thunder. There, finally, stood Mount Meru, with its summit climbing towards infinity, uniting the earth with the heavens. The colors of the rainbow glittered on the crystal edges of this gigantic pyramid; a golden rain whirled over the everlasting snows...

"He is dead," said Wilson. He closed Yuri's eyelids.

First, the dark tunnel. Then the light, at the very end. Finally, a dull roar. A voice was describing the date: year, month, day, minute, and second. He began to advance through the tunnel towards the light. Slowly, then more quickly, then at a dizzying speed, while the voice continued to count the years, the months, the days.

Yuri was launched into the future, into the very center of Mount Meru. He crossed through its enormous crystal walls and suddenly arrived at the heart that was made of ice.

Yuri V. Tokarev, who was born in Novgorod on July 7, 1940, and died on the Aconcagua on June 11, 1979, was now facing the Light.

"Where are you coming from?" the Light appeared to ask.

The black bull fell as the hammer struck its brain; a crowd of women threw themselves at Igor in the ashram; an Indian stranger was holding his little brother and asking for a few rupees to afford a sacrifice; Igor receiving messages from the telex machine. All of these images appeared floating in the air.

"What do you want now?" said the Light.

Don Vergara's voice, a thousand years old, provided the answer: "He who dies before his death, will never die again."

Then the Light recited the following teaching: "Reconcile with your past."

Everything became dark. Yuri's entire life was projected in mid-air, like a film. Thoughts would come to him, he would feel them, and he would live those thoughts. Emotions would come to him, and he would live those emotions. He began to forgive all of the frustrations within himself, all of his anger, his entire past. His heart became pure and open to receive the Light. "

"Your past is forgiven. Wake up and leave this world."

Yuri felt that he was being pushed backwards. Then he heard a dull roar. A voice gave the date: year, month, day, minute and second. He began to move back through the tunnel, away from the light. Slowly at first, then faster, then extremely fast as the voice went back in time, reading back the years, the months, the days...

He was launched back into the past from the center of Mount Meru, from the heart of ice.

"Wake up and leave this world. Wake up...wake up..."

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