by Jon Chaisson
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Poe – Caren – Denni
Poe leaned against the back of the one chair in his kitchen that didn't have paperwork or books covering the seat, and lit up a cigarette to celebrate the end of a long and stressful day. A warm breeze lifted up from the street through the row of open windows and filled the room with the familiar scents of Ormand Street life. The dusty-sweet aroma of fresh bread from the bakery down the street where he’d get free loaves every time he stopped in. The tangy spice of fried noodles and vegetables from Ataru's Ichiban just around the corner. The ozone of the city itself. The smells of the neighborhood that he’d known since he was a kid. The sounds were the same, evoking memories of his childhood growing up in this apartment. The chatter of multiple conversations on the street below. The constant dreamlike flow of traffic. The rumble of a Nullport shuttle takeoff and flyover. The soft shudder of the BMPD helicopters sweeping the area every so often.
Long day, he mused, and took a drag from his cigarette. It was days like these, the particularly arduous work shifts that had no end or uplift in sight, where he curiously managed to feel the most relaxed as he reached the finish line. He brought his job home with him, there was no way around that. He would solve cases in his sleep if he could. Once he came through the front door and went through his ritual of the post-dinner cigarette in his oversized kitchen, the thoughts stayed with him, but the nervous energy and bad karma that came with the job tended to disappear.
Today's events, however, would not go away without a fight.
He pulled the chair out from the table and sat backwards in it, facing the windows. As with any other day in the Sprawl, he felt the changes of the night as he sat there for an hour or so, dutifully watching the last hours of the day tick by. Outside, friendly neighbors became tense and guarded, distancing themselves from everyone except those closest to them. As an ARU officer he was well known and well liked in this area, but now he felt those same people pushing him away as a stranger. Friendly, but a stranger nonetheless. People tended to build up a protective wall around themselves when they lived in a sprawl. He’d grown used to the nocturnal change, expected it.
He found himself staring at Mirades Tower, some distance away. Offices appeared as beads of light up and down its surface, the lifeblood of commerce and politics working endlessly within. Somewhere in that monolith was a key to unraveling this frustrating case. Someone in there knew something about the attacks today. If only he could figure out who, he could stop this insanity before it got any worse.
He thought of his visit to the Crest again. He’d witnessed a spiritual healing process taking place throughout the entire city, and both Kai and Ashan had confirmed it. But what was it healing from, and what had hurt it in the first place? The Council of Elders had claimed it was a spiritual imbalance that no one but Nehalé and perhaps a few others had been aware of until recently. If that was actually true, then the imbalance had culminated with the awakening ritual and the hrrah-sehdhyn to set things right again. Five attack points, equidistant from the Mirades Tower…which had been the starting point of the ritual. And the ritual had been in response to…what? Why had Nehalé performed it?
“Balance,” he said aloud. Yes…yes, that had to be it!
He pushed himself off the chair, nearly knocking it over in the process, and grabbed his overcoat from the rack near the doorway. He fished out his comm and with some considerable digging, found the number for the Mendaihu agents. Perching himself this time on one of the windowsills, he dialed the number, at once excited and nervous. Kai answered after the third ring with a stifled yawn.
“Kai? It's Agent Poe. Did I wake you up?”
“Oh...hi,” she said. “Sorry, you caught me napping. What can I do for you?”
“Sorry to wake you, but something about this case just occurred to me, and I need your input.” He found himself feeling giddy. It felt like high school all over again, oddly enough. “Well...I'm thinking, what if the awakening ritual wasn't part of a...what did you call it earlier? A shimshiya. That's a bit of a misnomer, isn't it? Doesn't that actually mean 'endgame' rather than 'a call to arms' in Anjshé?”
She hummed in thought. “Eons ago it did, Alec. Before the spacefaring eras. Back then it was more of a...um...well, probably a stalemate, more than anything else. The Ariantos Dynasty is what gave the change in meaning....” She let out a small laugh. “I'm sorry. I'm tired and I'm rambling.”
“No, actually that's exactly what I wanted to know,” he said. “You were right. Nehalé wasn't issuing a call to arms, Kai. He doesn't want a revolution or a spiritual war. He doesn’t want to gather all the Mendaihu together to fight the Shenaihu at all. He wants a checkmate. He doesn't want anything to happen.”
“Funny way to express it,” she said.
“In a way, it makes sense. He wasn’t so much trying to awaken people for an army…like everyone says, a Mendaihu wouldn’t actively do something like that, right?”
“Well…yes, as a Mendaihu who follows a certain code of ethics, I’d either have to be utterly despondent, or in real need of a defense against an enemy.”
“In other words, what Nehalé did was way out of line, considering any perceived threat was in reality quite negligible.”
“In that context, yes.”
Poe nodded. “Okay then. If it wasn’t a defensive move, could it possibly be an offensive move?”
Kai huffed. “Alec, that would be completely illogical. Would you hurt Caren in any way just out of a mere suspicion that she may harbor plans to hurt you?”
“Of course not.”
“Same goes for the Mendaihu. Same exact reasoning. It’s just not something we would do to those we care for unconditionally.”
“So that leaves one thing…” he said.
“The shimshiya…” she finished.
“Exactly.”
“So, you’re suggesting that Nehalé deliberately made the first move so that the Shenaihu had no other choice but to respond? He wanted the hrrah-sehdyhn to happen?”
“Well, I think in a way he did. Maybe he didn’t expect it to be so violent, but I’d be surprised if it hadn’t crossed his mind.” He turned away from the window and stood again, trying to get the words correct as he worked out his thoughts, and began pacing the room. “So let’s say my theory is correct. Let’s say Nehalé performed a large-scale awakening ritual for two reasons. First, considering the scale, he was trying to affect as many people as possible. Second, he wanted the Shenaihu to force their hand. And in doing so, both sides are now on level ground.
“Next — remember what Nick brought up? He was worried about a major Awakening, perhaps an Ascension of the One of All Sacred. It got me thinking…what if another Embodiment is now an inevitability? If that’s the case, Nehalé would want to be sure the Light was in balance, if not stacked in his favor, right?”
“That’s…an interesting theory,” Kai said unevenly. “Even if it were true, there are so many loose ends it could unravel pretty quickly.”
“Point taken,” Poe said. “But that’s just it. He’s not a rogue Mendaihu. A good number of the newly awakened have been all over the place — Mendaihu, Shenaihu, cho-nyhndah and nuhm’ndah. And of all the witnesses and affected people in the Downtown area that we asked that night, not one of them had a bad thing to say about what happened. It wasn’t blind, religious fervor, either. They let it happen, and they’re fine with it. He’s deliberately trying to keep a balance, so if or when the time comes for an Ascension, it won’t be destructive.”
Now that he had voiced his theory to someone else, even if it seemed odd not to pitch it to Caren first, he was surprised he hadn’t come to this conclusion earlier. Nehalé Usarai was not an aggressive man at all. All reports tagged him as one of the best and strongest Mendaihu in Bridgetown Province, and Poe was not a man to be made cynical easily. His previous Mendaihu experiences led him to believe that a man
like Nehalé simply would not pull something like a massive awakening ritual without a damn good reason. The man was an extremely cautious prophet.
“So,” he said. “Why don’t we all meet up tomorrow at Yoshi’s Diner to discuss it? I’m sure with the four of us together, we might be able to work out what Nehalé might do next.”
Kai hummed in agreement. “Yes, let’s do that. I’m sure Ashan will have a few things to say about your theory.”
“I’m sure he will,” he grinned, pleased that the conversation had gone so well. He let a rare wave of optimism rush through him. “I’ll let Caren know and we’ll meet up around eight. Thank you, Kai…I appreciate your input.”
“You’re welcome, Alec! I enjoy chatting with you. Oh, before I forget…I do have one question I’ve been meaning to ask. I hope I’m not overstepping, but…do you mind?”
“Not at all,” he said. “What’s up?”
“I…well,” she paused, clearly embarrassed. “I’m sorry if this sounds forward, but it’s been on my mind. You see, since we’ve met, I’ve been curious about your spirit signature. It’s…unique, shall we say. I’ve never scanned anything like it before.”
“Well, uh…” Poe smiled and raised an eyebrow. “How does it read to you?”
“Cold. Not Shenaihu cold, just...I don't know. An ominous cold.”
“Ominous, eh?” Poe masked his amusement. He’d had it called weird, freakish, and dangerous, but never ominous! “Let’s say it’s a very long story.”
“I'm so sorry! It was a dumb question. I just...”
“No, quite all right, Kai,” he said, letting her off the hook. “I get that from a lot of Mendaihu. I'm not sure, but I think it's hereditary. My birth parents apparently had the same off-kilter spiritual energy, or so I'm told. I never knew them in that manner. I was adopted.”
“Oh...” Kai whispered. “I'm sorry...”
“No worries,” he said. “Anyway, it’s in the past, and I’ve made my peace with it.”
He could tell she wanted to offer a soulhealing, though she did not say it. He'd thought about it many times, but never followed through, for one reason or another.
“I won't push you, Alec,” she said softly. “I understand. And thank you for answering my question.”
Poe smiled. “Sure thing. Tomorrow, then?”
“Tomorrow it is,” she said. “Good night, Alec. Pleasant dreams.”
“You too.”
He ended the call, turned off the comm, and dropped it back into his coat pocket. He stopped at the windows again, looking out at the Tower. He’d hoped that talking with Kai would have calmed him down some, but it had actually done the opposite. She’d accepted his theory, but she’d also held back from saying too much in response. The two Mendaihu siblings were definitely keeping things from them. Perhaps it was for their own good, perhaps it was for their safety, but it irritated the hell out of him. He hated being coddled like that. He pulled out another cigarette, lit it, and leaned up against one of the window frames. He exhaled heavily, knowing there was nothing more he could do about any of this until morning.
He’d get answers then, one way or another.
