by JB Dutton
* * * * *
I opened my eyes and assumed I was dreaming. It was the huge, empty pyramid room in the ToT apartment and I was lying on my back on the floor. The immense ceiling, the black and white tiles, windows covered over... I turned my head and could just see the tiny diamond pyramid sparkling a few feet away from me in the middle of the floor. But now I noticed something I hadn’t seen before: another tiny diamond pyramid embedded in the ceiling above it, pointing downward.
I propped myself up on my elbows and blinked a few times. Okay, I wasn’t dreaming. WTF was going on? I stayed like that, stunned, for several seconds. Why was I here? Where were Cruz and Aranara?
I got to my feet and approached the closed door. Then I froze as I realized that the door wasn’t the same. This door was sleek, made of metal, not the old wooden apartment type. I looked back at the rest of the room. Now that I was paying more attention, I could see that I’d been mistaken. When I woke up, I guess I’d imagined seeing windows boarded up because I was expecting them to be there, so I hadn’t noticed that there weren’t any windows at all. There were just four smooth walls with a door in the middle of one of them. This room was somehow a modern version of the other one in the Warrington.
I reached into my pocket for my phone. It was gone! Okay, now this was super freaky. I ran to the door and tried to open it. Locked. Not only that, but there was no keyhole to look through. I hammered on it.
“Hey! Let me out! Hey!!”
A whirlwind of confusion and fear enveloped me. I was about to shout out again, but then my brain felt like it had been disconnected and a wave of calmness washed over me. I stepped back from the door. And it opened.
Aranara entered, closing it quickly behind her.
“Shhhh...” she said, taking both my hands in hers. “There’s nothing to worry about. You’re totally safe here.”
I looked into her beautiful eyes and I believed her. Somewhere though, in some lost corner of my mind, there was a voice. And it was my voice. The voice that always questioned things, that was always curious. The voice that had gotten me into this situation in the first place.
“Where is here? Where am I?” I asked her.
“We needed to get you away from the Temple of Truth, Kari,” she answered, still holding my hands.
“But this looks just like the room there!”
She squeezed my hands tighter. “There’s a reason for that. You’ll find out soon.”
“Why isn’t Cruz here too?”
“Kari, I’m sorry, but...”
“But what?!!”
She lowered her gaze for a second, then looked back up again. Her hazel eyes and soft hands were so incredibly calming. Why wasn’t I freaking out more?
“We saw each other over the holidays.”
“Yes, I know – you ran into each other in Chelsea Market.”
“That’s what he told you?” she asked, feigning surprise.
Oh man, I didn’t like where this was heading.
“Uh-huh.”
She smiled apologetically. “No. We saw each other a whole bunch of times. Like I said, I’m really sorry. I broke it off when he told me he loved me.”
I couldn’t believe it. Yet I did.
“He...” was the only word that came out through my dry lips.
Aranara pulled a plastic water bottle out of her purse.
“You must be thirsty – have a drink.”
I took the bottle and had a big, long gulp. So I was right to be jealous of Cruz and her! Who could blame him, I guess. Why didn’t I feel more mad at him?
I drank some more, staring off into space. Aranara took back the empty bottle.
“I feel really bad, Kari,” she said. “I thought we were just hanging out, but then he kissed me and said he loved me. I told him right away that I didn’t feel the same and asked him about his feelings for you. He answered that he cared about you, but that you guys were more like brother and sister.”
Why didn’t I feel more mad at her? Wait – brother and sister – I needed to ask her about Noon.
“Where’s Noon?”
“I don’t know,” she shrugged.
“But you said he was in trouble and that I needed to come back to New York to help him!”
“You are helping him – he just doesn’t know it yet.”
“I don’t get it.” My head was spinning. “And if Cilic is your father, he must be Noon’s father too. But I saw a man in a dark suit that I thought was Noon’s father on my first day at Chelsea Prep. Who was that? Plus, I don’t get how you two can be brother and sister and, like, totally ignore each other during an entire lunchtime.”
She threw back her head and laughed loudly. “You know, a lot of siblings don’t get along!”
Made sense. But still...
I stared at her enquiringly. “What happened between the two of you?”
She finally let go of my hands and now I sensed some real pain underneath her carefree exterior.
“Long story,” she sighed. “Long, long story.”
I put my hands on my hips. Time to get some more answers. “Okay, so, speaking of stories, I saw something in a book in the Temple of Truth apartment.”
Her eyes flashed back to mine and she grabbed my hands again.
“I just realized – you have to call your mom back!”
“What? How do you know she called...?”
Aranara seemed stumped by this question. This had all better start making sense soon or I was going to lose it. She pulled my phone out of her pocket.
“I told Cilic that he shouldn’t have taken it.”
I grabbed it from her and unlocked it. There were no missed calls. I looked at her suspiciously. She anticipated my question.
“She Skyped you an hour ago. I didn’t answer. You really should call her back, she sounded worried.”
I opened Skype and said to her, “Can I have some privacy?”
“Of course,” she answered. “I bet you’re starving. I’ll go get you something to eat.”
I watched her leave, closing the door behind her, then pulled up Mom’s Skype contact. I made a video call and a few seconds later Mom’s face appeared on the screen. It looked like she was in a hotel room.
“Hi, Kari!”
“Heyyy...” I said warily, expecting an avalanche of shit to land on me via the medium of Transatlantic video.
She beamed at me. “Everything is great here in Paris.”
“Oh. Good.”
She kept grinning, almost goofily. I actually thought the video had frozen.
“Mom...” I continued, “I feel really bad about – ”
She cut me off: “I know, I know, I spoke to your grandparents and everything is fine. Cruz and his family are wonderful people and I’m sure you’re having a great time with them.”
This was ironic, given what Aranara had just told me about her and Cruz. But I decided to go with the flow.
“So you’re not mad?”
“No, Kari.”
Again, she just smiled. Something wasn’t right though. Maybe the slight delay in the video connection was making the conversation so stilted?
“So... how’s it going with Bob? Oh, wait – is he with you right now?”
“Everything is great! Bob is wonderful.”
Had she gone all Stepford in the space of a few days?
“Uh-huh. Um... how’s the weather?”
“The weather is just great!”
That’s when I realized something. The time on my phone said 4:48 p.m. That meant it was already dark in Paris. But the light hitting Mom’s face looked like daylight.
“Mom?”
“Yes, Kari?”
“You remember what tomorrow is?” I asked, watching her reaction closely.
“Tuesday, isn’t it?”
“It’s December 29th.”
“Oh yes, so it is. Can’t wait for New Year’s!”
This was when I knew that something was very wrong. Because December 29th was the a
nniversary of Dad’s death. Mom was beaming at me like it was no big deal, but there was no way she could ever forget that date.
“Okay, I’ve gotta run,” I said, my voice shaking. “Bye, Mom.”
“Bye, Kari!”
She disappeared from the screen and I just stood there, staring at my phone, a horrible feeling in the pit of my stomach. I looked at the walls around me, at the metal door. I’d been led into a trap. Everything was a lie.
I ran to the door and turned the handle. To my surprise, it wasn’t locked. I threw it open and stepped into another much smaller room with the same tiled floor and smooth, windowless walls. The only thing in the room was a narrow, long table draped with a large white cloth. Aranara was standing behind it next to one of the room’s two chairs, unpacking Chinese food boxes from a bag.
She looked up with a breezy, “Hey!”
I stopped in my tracks. The feeling in the pit of my stomach had vanished and I was super hungry. What was up with that? I sat down and Aranara handed me a pair of chopsticks and a can of soda. I put down my phone and feverishly opened the boxes. The smell of the food inside overwhelmed my senses and I shoveled noodles and unidentified meat into my mouth as fast as I could with the sticks.
“Take it easy!” she laughed, sitting down on the other chair and folding her hands on the table in front of her.
I wolfed down the food, hardly looking at her for a few minutes. When was the last time I’d even eaten, I wondered?
Aranara leaned forward, smiling her brilliant, calming smile.
“I know you have a zillion questions, and now you’re going to get some answers.”
I must have been getting some kind of MSG rush or something, because I suddenly felt lightheaded. I gulped down half the can of soda and caught my breath. I looked at her. She looked at me. It struck me that the calmness that overcame me in her presence was exactly how I felt when I was with Noon. It must be a talent than runs in the family.
I leaned back in my chair and tried to get my thoughts straight. It really wasn’t easy.
“Okay, where am I?”
“Good question!” she answered perkily, like a kindergarten teacher to an eager four year-old. “New Jersey. You’re only half an hour from home.”
I ate some more food, mumbling through a mouthful of snow peas and sauce, “But why did you bring me here? Did Cilic drug me or something?”
“Something like that – it was the only way, but you don’t need to worry, there aren’t any after effects.”
Was she kidding? I felt like I was having an out-of-body experience.
“So?” I continued, “Why am I here?”
But before she could answer, my brain refocused and the horrible-pit-of-my-stomach feeling flooded back. I had broken away from Aranara’s gaze for a couple of seconds. Just long enough to pay attention to something that should have been obvious the moment I entered the room. There was only one door. The door back into the pyramid room. And that room only had one exit too: the one I’d taken into the room I was sitting in now. How could that possibly be?
I looked back at the open metal door, rechecking my observation to make sure I wasn’t crazy. Okay, I thought to myself, maybe I am. Yes, in fact that’s the only explanation, isn’t it? I’d completely lost it at some point (though being crazy, how could I even know when?) and, oh, I know – I must be in an institution right now and I’ve been given meds that make my brain all fuzzy but at least I won’t harm myself or those around me. Maybe that explains the whole Mom conversation. If I had gone nuts, of course she would have acted exactly like that, like nothing was wrong, not even wanting to bring up the tragedy of Dad’s death for fear of setting me off again or something.
So I’m a lunatic. This is what it’s like.
Hold on – what if it’s all just a dream? Yes, this is exactly the kind of thing that happens in dreams. Am I still in Cilic’s car, dreaming all this? Or even back in Florida? Or even in New York? Oh em gee – what if I’m, like, still in Wisconsin and none of this ever happened?
This was effing hardcore. If I wasn’t crazy before, I was doing an awesome job of making myself crazy now...
“Kari,” said Aranara.
I snapped out of my self-diagnosis.
“Just eat,” said Aranara, “and let me explain.”
I ignored her, picked up my phone and dialed 9-1-1. She didn’t flinch. Then I saw why – there was no signal. But I’d spoken to Mom... Was that over wi-fi? But now there was no internet either.
“I know you’re scared, but don’t be, Kari.”
I could feel my heart pounding and beads of sweat starting to prickle on my forehead. I’d never felt like a rat in a cage before, but I did now.
“Let me start at the beginning,” she continued. “When we gave you a lift home from school the first time we met, I took something from you. A hair from your hat. I kept it in a locket until your DNA could be analyzed.”
“My DNA?”
My thoughts spiraled even more out of control.
“Eat some more, Kari.”
My appetite had vanished.
“Why, Aranara? Is the food drugged too?”
She threw back her head and laughed. She was so engaging, so un-threatening. So beautiful. No wonder Cruz had fallen in love with her so quickly. Maybe true love never takes long, what did I know? Wait – focus, Kari, focus...
“How can I trust you?” I asked, pushing a food box away from me and leaning forward on my elbows. That was when I realized that the surface of the table was kinda squishy. Weird. Oh man, really – focus, focus!
“Please, just let me talk,” she asked politely.
“Fine.”
“All this is for you.”
I frowned. “What do you mean?”
“You’re special, Kari. You have no idea how special. The Temple of Truth knows it and that’s why they brought you to New York.”
“But they hired Mom and I just came too!”
“Lots of things aren’t what they seem,” she said. “I’m not what I seem and Noon isn’t what he seems. We’re not from here. We’re not even human.”
I stared at her. This wasn’t something I was expecting to hear.
“We are Embodied. These aren’t our real forms.”
I was too rational to accept this.
“You mean you’re, like, aliens?” I asked skeptically.
“Much more than that. But we’re here to save you.”
“Save me? From who?”
“No, not you, to save everyone. The whole world. In fact, the whole universe.”
Ahhh... so in fact it was Aranara who was insane. Or both of us.
She smiled at my scornful expression.
“I know you think I’m crazy. Why wouldn’t you? But it’s true. And if Noon was here, he’d tell you the same thing. The trouble is, he’s been manipulating you all this time.”
“Noon really cares about me,” I argued.
“Yes, you’re right,” she admitted. “But that’s the problem – he’s gotten too involved and the other members of the Temple of Truth made him leave before he could mess up the whole project.”
“What do you mean? What project?”
“You’ve seen your mom’s office, haven’t you?”
“Uh-huh...” (though how did she know?)
“You’ve seen what they’re working on – a huge worldwide genetic database.”
I nodded. Feelings of dread were gathering like enormous storm clouds.
“It isn’t just a database, Kari. The Temple of Truth has been around for a long time. Longer than you can imagine. Longer than any real religion.”
I flashed back to the ancient Greek book in the ToT apartment. And the pictures of Noon and Aranara.
“Are you in the Temple of Truth?” I asked her.
She hesitated. “Not... anymore.”
“Okaaay... and this is why you and Noon don’t speak to each other?”
“It’s far more complicated than that.”
She stood up, hands on her hips. “But I don’t want to waste time talking about us. There’s a threat to this universe and you are the key to saving it.”
“What do you mean, ‘this universe’?”
She smiled condescendingly. “Are dolphins intelligent, Kari?”
“Sure. I guess.”
“You’re right – they are. But what do you think about their perception of the world? Do they know the Earth is round? Do they know what the stars are? Do they know about gravity? Do they – ”
“Okay, okay,” I interrupted. “I get it – they aren’t as intelligent as people.”
Aranara shook her head. “No, that’s not what I’m trying to make you see. No matter how intelligent they are, there’s stuff that they can’t possibly understand. And it’s the same for human beings. You’re poking around in space, flying up in rockets a few miles out of the Earth’s atmosphere, landing on your moon, looking through telescopes, coming up with your theories. And no matter how much information you collect or how many theories you have, you can’t interpret the universe except by comparing it to what you already know. And what you already know is sitting on that chair in front of me. It’s a human body with eyes to detect light and ears to detect sound. It has a pretty amazing brain that takes the information your eyes and ears have collected, then uses it to come up with a bunch of stories that may or may not help your species survive. But all of your stories, all of your ideas, all of your thought is... embodied. Trapped in the senses you possess and molded by the stories you’ve already told yourselves about how the world works. But Noon and I are truly Embodied. This isn’t my real form. I’m not from this universe, and I understand more than I can ever get you to understand.”
She paused to give me a chance to process. But I couldn’t. How did I even know whether she was telling the truth? Why should I believe a single word she was saying? Whatever. Whether it was true or not, I had to get out of here and I had to find out whether Mom was safe.
“Where’s Mom?”
“In Paris.”
“You’re lying.”
“Kari. There’s a bigger picture. That’s what I’m trying to tell you.”
“And I need to find out what’s happened to Mom.”
“She’ll be fine. If you help us.”
“Wow. You bitch. You’ve kidnapped her.”
“Kari, she’s a part of it.”
“Part of what? You’re a bunch of religious freaks.” I put my head in my hands. “Shit, Bob is in on this too, and I set them up.”
I felt sick to my stomach. I had to do something, so I stood up, grabbed the table by the edge and heaved with all my might. It didn’t move an inch, like it was made of stone.
Aranara watched me, motionless, exactly like a spider might observe a doomed bug smothered in deadly strands of silk.
I grabbed a chopstick and lunged at her across the immovable table. She dodged out of the way before I even got close to her. The expression on her face never changed. She was serene and perfect.
But suddenly something did change. She looked frightened. And I realized that her focus had shifted from me to something behind me. I spun around to see what she was looking at. All I could see was the open metal door leading through to the empty pyramid room.
“We have to go!” she screamed and grabbed my wrist.
Go where? She put her other hand on my wrist and closed her eyes. That’s when I noticed the sound. It was pure, but somehow distorted. Not a musical note, but not just noise either. It was like something I’d never heard before. Something unearthly. And it was coming from the pyramid room.
Aranara still had her eyes closed, both hands clasped around my wrist. I tried to pull away but I couldn’t. I managed to get a glimpse of a light in the middle of the pyramid room. But just like the sound, it was a light I’d never seen before. Brightness that wasn’t light. A shining darkness.
When I turned back around, the wall behind Aranara had disappeared. At that moment I was too confused to do anything. I watched as she let go of me and vaulted over the table, knocking food cartons and my can of soda to the floor. The negative light in the pyramid room was getting stronger, the sound was getting louder. Aranara ran to the door, slammed it shut and locked it.
All her serenity had vanished. “Come on!” she yelled.
I was rooted to the spot. Aranara shoved me out of the room through the space where the wall used to be.
And then I was in a different place. And Cilic was running toward me. It was dim. A huge room, like an arena. I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end as Cilic got nearer with the same panicked expression on his face as Aranara. She locked her arms around me. I struggled to get free. The unearthly sound had been dampened when Aranara closed the door, but now it was piercing through, even louder than before. Cilic stopped running and put his arms around both of us. Part of me was totally freaking out but my mind was somehow disconnected. The vague thought occurred to me that they were protecting me from something. And then everything was silence.
I kicked and screamed but couldn’t break free. Aranara and Cilic were locked together, eyes closed, veins in their temples bulging under the strain. I twisted around as best I could and was able to take in more of my surroundings. The disappearing wall had returned. I was being held outside a building within a building. The inner building was the one with the disappearing wall. The outer building had a wooden track running around it that was raised at an angle like a... like... how weird was that? It was a roller derby arena. It was dingy, falling to pieces, but definitely a disused indoor stadium, inside which a rectangular pair of rooms had been built, like two huge white boxes that formed another building in the middle of it.
Then the sound began again. Cilic and Aranara’s grip loosened. They opened their eyes and stared at each other, faces frozen. I ducked down and managed to wriggle out of their grasp. I ran as fast as I could away from them. The arena was dimly lit and there were no exit signs. I sprinted along the track, but with no indication of how to get out, I reached one of the banked corners, crossed the top of the track and climbed over a few rows of bleachers. I quickly realized that there was no way out in that direction.
Cilic and Aranara were advancing on me from two sides. Squinting through the dusty gloom, I spotted what looked like a door near the other corner of the arena, back the way I’d come from. Cilic and Aranara were getting closer, climbing over the benches. My only option was to go up to the level walkway at the back of the bleachers then run for the exit at the far corner.
Cilic was rapidly gaining on me, leaping over the bleachers with amazing agility for a man of his age. While all this was going on, the sound from the inner building kept getting steadily louder and then suddenly quieter, like a long, drawn-out pulse of energy.
I climbed over the last row of bleachers and made a dash along the back wall. But Cilic had reached the walkway too and was now just a few yards away. I tried to hurdle his outstretched arm as he cleared the benches, but he caught my trailing leg. I tripped and stumbled, my momentum carrying me forward. Not daring to look back, I focused on the door, maybe a hundred feet away, and started running again.
Within seconds Cilic had caught me. His arms locked around my chest, and although I squirmed and stamped hard on his feet, he was oblivious to the pain. His head was next to mine. His stale breath made me feel like puking. I jerked my head back, smashing my skull into his face. I cried out in agony. He barely flinched. Cilic spun around and backed us along the walkway toward the door. The floor was so smooth that I couldn’t dig my heels in.
Suddenly I heard Noon’s voice.
“Stop struggling, Kari.”
I looked around. It sounded like he was right next to me. Except that he wasn’t. The arena appeared to be empty – even Aranara had vanished. The sound was getting louder once again.
“Listen to me. Focus.”
That was when I realized that Noon’s voice wasn’t next to me at all – it was inside my he
ad.
I did what he said and stopped struggling. Cilic was dragging me closer and closer to the door. But once I heard Noon’s voice, a blanket of calmness fell over me.
“Thank you, Kari,” he said.
Could he see me? Why did he want me to stop struggling? Cilic had almost dragged me the door.
“Here’s what you need to do,” he went on. “When he reaches for the door, elbow him as hard as you can in the solar plexus.”
“The what?” I thought to myself.
It was as though he heard my question. “Just below his ribs, right in the middle of his torso.”
I twisted my head around. The door was only a couple of feet away. I could smell blood on Cilic’s face.
“Stay calm, stay calm,” came the soothing voice in my mind.
Right then, the sound from the inner building pulsated for the last time and went quiet. Cilic hesitated for a fraction of a second, then everything happened in a blur. He stopped dragging me and relaxed his grip, just like Noon had predicted. As he reached for the door, I managed to free one arm, then jerked it back as hard as I could. My elbow thumped into Cilic’s chest. He made a choking noise and crumpled to the floor.
I heard Noon shout, “Run!” but his voice wasn’t in my head any more. He was sprinting toward me from the inner building. The disappearing wall had now vanished again. I could see other figures emerging from the smaller room where I’d eaten with Aranara. Cilic was motionless on the floor next to me.
“Run, Kari!”
I snapped out of it and ran. Noon and I reached each other at the bottom of the bleachers. He opened his arms and I collapsed into his chest, sobbing.
Through my tears I saw seven people running past us to where Cilic had fallen.
“Are you okay?” asked Noon.
I nodded and watched as the seven reached Cilic. He was still on the floor, just beginning to stir. They picked him up and frog-marched him down one of the aisles back to the inner building.
“What are they doing with him?”
“You don’t want to know,” answered Noon, shaking his head.
They carried Cilic into the smaller room.
Noon held me by the shoulders and looked me straight in the eyes. “I need to go in there too, Kari. They need my help. I’ll be back in a minute or two.” He could sense my fear at being left alone and added, “You’ll be safe, don’t worry.”
I certainly didn’t feel safe.
“But what about Aranara?”
“She’s gone. Please, just wait here.”
He stepped away from me and followed the others back into the inner building. I stood there, bewildered. As the seconds ticked by, I felt so lonely, so scared. The calm that had enveloped me when Noon’s voice filled my head had completely disappeared. Now there was only fear and an endless stream of questions. And I just couldn’t take it any longer. I ran back through the disappearing wall into the smaller room.
The door to the pyramid room was open. Something was happening in there. I had to see what was going on.
I edged past the super-heavy table and peeked through the metal doorway. Noon was part of a circle of eight, all holding hands, eyes closed, just as I’d seen in the Temple of Truth apartment dining room the first time I’d looked through the grille. Inside this strange circle stood Cilic, his head bowed and face bloodied from my head-butt. It was like he was trapped, although nobody was touching him.
I watched, transfixed, as Cilic suddenly threw his head back and put his arms across his chest. His face tightened and his mouth opened in a silent scream. At the same time I became aware of a low drone emanating from the circle of eight. I could even feel it through my skin, like the buzzing energy of a beehive.
Cilic was fighting some unseen force, unable to escape. Then... well, I don’t really know how to describe it, but he kind of imploded and dissolved. It was like he melted into himself in the blink of an eye and vanished.
The drone stopped, the circle broke and a man picked something up from the floor where Cilic had been standing. It was the man I’d assumed was Noon’s father on the first day of school. The same man I’d chased through the lobby of the Temple of Truth office building when I was waiting for Mom. What was he holding? It was yet another pyramid-shaped diamond.
The others now gathered with their backs to me, partly blocking my view of the man. He positioned himself over the diamond embedded in the floor, directly underneath the one in the ceiling.
The diamonds on the floor and ceiling glowed in unison. The unearthly sound that Aranara had been so afraid of started, then got louder, as a beam of light appeared between the two pyramids, surrounding the man. I craned my neck, trying to see exactly what was happening.
I heard Noon’s voice in my head: “You shouldn’t be watching, Kari.”
But I couldn’t look away. The light grew brighter, then blinding. Noon walked toward me. The sound got louder. I squinted, and finally had to close my eyes.
I felt Noon place his hands gently on either side of my head. Then both the light and the sound abruptly stopped.
Noon’s voice filled my head once again: “We have to leave.”
I opened my eyes. The man who had been enveloped by the light from the diamond pyramids was no longer there. The others were standing silently, looking at me.
“Who are they?” I asked Noon.
He sighed, then appeared to be in silent communication for a second. He took my hand and led me through the doorway. “These are the members of the Temple of Truth.”
I looked from one face to another. They were incredibly beautiful. Just perfect. Like Noon. Like Aranara. I recognized some of them. The two women I had seen joining hands outside the Warrington were there.
“This is Hannah, and this is Miriam,” he said.
They bowed their heads slightly. Hannah was a red-head. Miriam looked exotic. Maybe Arabic? Indian? Next to them stood the other woman who had joined them outside the building that day and had then walked past me like a runway model, with her short, dark hair and shining eyes.
“This is Elle,” continued Noon. She smiled at me. Her beauty was too much to bear, and I lowered my eyes for a moment.
Then there were three men.
“David, Lemuel, and Okihiko,” said Noon, making a gesture with his hand.
I didn’t recognize any of them. David was an athletic twenty-something Afro-American with a shaved head, Lemuel was shorter, older, but just as striking, with a friendly twinkle in his eye. Okihiko, as his name suggested, was Japanese. Middle aged? It was hard to tell. All wore the clothes that Cruz and I had seen in the Temple of Truth apartment bedrooms.
“Nice to meet you,” was the only thing I could think of to say.
They all nodded in silent response.
“We have to go,” said Noon.
“Wait – Aranara said you weren’t human. That you were... Embodied, whatever that means.”
Noon just stared blankly at me.
“Are you?” I insisted. “Are you from a different universe?”
I looked at their inscrutable faces, one after the other. They were more than motionless, they were like statues. They didn’t even seem to be breathing.
“And what about the other man?” I asked. “Your friend, just now. The one who, like, disappeared? Is he dead too, like Cilic?”
Noon tilted his head, as if trying to understand the question.
“That was Silas. And no, he isn’t dead.”
“So? What are you?”
“She was right. We are the Embodied.”
I thought about what Aranara had told me. Were they the bad guys or the good guys? But then I remembered Bob and Mom and that weird-ass Skype conversation, and all those questions became irrelevant. I grabbed Noon’s arm.
“My mom is in trouble.”
“What do you mean?”
“She was with a guy called Bob.”
The Embodied looked at each other knowingly.
“And?” asked Noo
n.
“I Skyped her when I was with Aranara but she acted weirdly... not herself. I don’t think she’s even in Paris!”
Noon was as calm as ever. “We’re going back to the Warrington together. We’ll be there in an hour or so and we’ll try to find whatever clues we can.”
For once though, his calmness wasn’t working on me.
“But is she okay!?” I yelled.
“I’m sure she is. But I’m also sure that the person you thought was your mom wasn’t really her.”
I was frantic. “So where is she?”
“Kari, we’ll find her. But we have to go now.”
I nodded. I was helpless anyway without Noon’s help.
“David, Lemuel, Miriam and Hannah are staying here to guard the portal.”
The portal? Another question. But I really had to get out of there and back to Manhattan.
“Okihiko and Elle will come with us.”
I was beginning to lose it.
“Okay, whatever – I don’t care who comes, let’s just get the hell back!”
Noon took my hands and stared intently at me with those dark eyes – eyes that had seen far more than mine. Yet again, they sent a wave of reassurance washing over me.
Chillax, Kari, chillax... Noon was doing everything he could.
“Fine. So let’s go.”
