by Steven James
I hand the geo-tracker to the officer. “General Gibbons told me that you can use this to find them.”
“General Gibbons?” He looks confused. “Find who?”
“All of the escaped, crazed, tattooed-eyeball prisoners,” I tell him. “From the top-secret, government-funded torture site,” Kyle adds helpfully.
“Oh.”
As the officer radios dispatch to get word to the senator, Nicole asks me quietly, “Any sign of Malcolm?”
“No.”
“Do you think he’s alive?”
“He can take care of himself. I’m sure he made it out.”
But I’m really not sure about that at all.
Wondering if the bats will reappear, I study the fringe of darkness surrounding the fire.
But maybe they’ve finally served their purpose because they don’t emerge.
However, the boy with the old-fashioned clothes does appear again, standing beside the hotel. He nods once toward me, turns to vapor, and merges back into the night.
PART IV
SYNCHRONICITY
CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE
TWO DAYS LATER
CADES COVE, TENNESSEE
THE GREAT SMOKY MOUNTAINS
We step off the trolley.
Evening mist circles through the cool, twilit forest.
The park rangers limit the number of people who can visit this valley, the only place in the United States where the synchronous fireflies congregate. However, even though the tickets for tonight were sold out, they found a way to fit us in.
Nicole points toward some of the rangers who are cheerily directing people where to go. “They look so happy in their Smokey Bear hats and uniforms. And so pleased to have all these people here in their park.”
“Warms my heart,” Mia mutters.
Kyle takes her hand. “Mine too.” In his other hand he’s carrying his energy drink concoction. “Do you know what time it is?”
“Give it up, babe. You’re never gonna break your record.”
“No, I’m serious, if I can make it through until midnight I’ll hit thirty-nine hours and forty-two minutes.”
“You’ll probably fall asleep before the fireflies even come out.”
Just behind us, Tane is leading Alysha, who hasn’t had a chance yet to get a new cane.
Yesterday, she and I talked through things regarding the “girlfriend issue,” as she put it. I made it clear that I was taken, and later I saw her sitting with Tane. She had her hand on his cheek feeling his face and I took that as a good sign. Who knows where it might lead?
My shoulder is back in place.
Thankfully.
A new sling.
Still hurts, but not as bad as when it was dislocated.
And this time, despite the fact that I’m missing the basketball camp, I’m going to rest it. Sometimes it just takes time for things to heal, and there’s no way to hurry the process along.
The doctors are still going to do a few more tests on me, but so far it looks like Dr. Waxford didn’t give me enough of his chronomorphic drug to have any long-term effects.
Nearby, my parents are talking with Kyle’s mom.
The three of them flew down yesterday morning—compliments of Marly Weathers.
Still haven’t met her.
Or him.
At least not that I know of.
Mia’s and Nicole’s parents couldn’t make it. Neither could Tane’s mother. Alysha’s mom and dad will be arriving tomorrow morning.
Sue Ellen drove up from Atlanta this afternoon with homemade fudge for everyone, and now ambles along beside Petra and Senator Amundsen. He may have resigned, but Petra told us that once you’ve been a senator it’s a title you get to keep for life.
Earlier tonight, at supper, she mentioned that she’d started taking her antipsychotic meds again and, though they hadn’t totally kicked in yet, she was beginning to feel better.
She even solved some of Kyle’s math and logic problems. A kindred spirit. She was at least as good at them as I am.
The doctors gave her a shot of some type of steroids to calm down her reaction to the poison ivy, and she’s recovering.
Senator Amundsen got a note from Marly Weathers telling us to cash in the debit card and split up the money between our families. He and Petra declined accepting any, but it would sure help the rest of us, even provide me with some cash that I could put aside for college in case I don’t end up with a scholarship.
Together, we move with the throng of several hundred people toward the expansive picnic area.
With the touch of fog wisping through the towering trees, it almost seems like we’ve entered another, slightly magical world here in the Smokies.
The crickets chirrup at us as we pass.
A park employee with an infectious smile motions us forward. “Just go off by yourself, find a boulder or a log to sit on—there are plenty of them out here. We have some historical cabins in the area, so let’s avoid going into those. As it starts to get dark, the fireflies will come out. Don’t disturb them and you’ll see what you came here to see!”
“That’s Tiff,” Kyle tells Tane and me. “She’s the one who gave us the package from Marly Weathers the other day.”
“So does she work for the park service or the educational center?” Tane asks.
“Dunno.” Kyle takes a slurp of his drink. “That’s a good question.”
Tiff continues with her instructions by reminding everyone not to use flashlights unless they have a red cellophane filter over the lens. “Otherwise, it can disrupt the activity of the fireflies.” She sweeps her arms to the left. “For complimentary red filters, please line up over here.” And then to the right. “If you’re all set, c’mon this way. Remember to pack out your trash and enjoy your time at Cades Cove! The fireflies await!”
When she sees us, her eyes light up. “So, you got some tickets after all!”
“We did,” Nikki replies.
“I’m so glad you could make it.”
“So are we.”
“When do you fly back to Philly?”
“Sorry?”
“Back home to your dad, Mr. Weathers.”
“Oh, right. We’re hoping to enjoy the South for a few more days first.”
We move to the right and join the people who are picking out viewing spots throughout the valley.
“Your dad?” I ask Nicole.
“I sorta fibbed to her the other day.”
“I’m sure you had a good reason.”
“Sure I did. Finding you.”
It’s been an eventful couple of days.
My dad posted the videos from the USB drive that General Gibbons gave me and they went viral. Dr. Waxford’s secret research is all over the Internet.
Even though the senator’s committee meeting was cancelled, now the FBI is involved and there’s going to be a full investigation—not just on the proper use of Waxford’s findings, but also on the role of consciousness in punishment to examine what is ethical and what isn’t.
His research might be beneficial someday—like maybe to help alter the perception of how much time someone spends in pain after surgery, to make it seem shorter. Or for drawing out positive experiences so they seem like they last longer: prom nights, birthdays, graduation parties. First dates and sunsets and fishing trips and roller coaster rides.
Or maybe, it’d be better if we left things as they are.
Maybe we’re meant to just experience every moment as is, taking it for what it’s worth, nothing more, nothing less. I guess that’s something to consider too.
As far as Dr. Waxford, neither he nor the serial killer who dragged him back into the building survived the fire.
The other convicts were all located through the tracking unit and U.S. Marshals were returning them to the prisons they’d originally been transferred in from.
Henrik Poehlman never made it out of the hotel. They found his body in the basement, his lungs filled with smoke, his th
roat with dead flies.
As it turns out, Deedee didn’t die when she fell from the fourth-story window, but she did break her leg, and the fall knocked her unconscious. Her partner, Sergei, was picked up by state troopers after trying to hitchhike near Gatlinburg. Both are in custody and being guarded by the police.
Waxford’s other staff members and researchers have been arrested as well. Depending on how much they participated in his work, they’re each facing a whole list of charges.
For helping save the other inmates, it looks like Ty Bell is going to get some leniency in his sentence.
I’m not sure how I feel about that, but my dad said there comes a time to trust the justice system and I figure, after all that’s happened, he probably has a point.
We still don’t know where Malcolm is. No one has seen or heard from him and, although the fire investigators are still going through the charred remains of the hotel, so far they haven’t found his body. Though his eyeball was tagged, he didn’t show up on the tracking unit.
And Dr. Carrigan?
The police are trying to figure out what to do with him. Evidently, he’d been hypnotizing Dr. Waxford’s prisoners over the last few months and implanting destructive suggestions while they were in their trances. It wasn’t ethical, but it wasn’t clear if it was an actual crime or not.
He said that when he drew his gun he was just trying to protect himself from the prisoners, but I doubt that. The last I heard, he was in custody, but his lawyer was trying to get him free and I’m not sure they’ll be able to hold him with what they have.
The trail we’ve been taking through the picnic grove fingers off into a series of more overgrown paths that meander through the valley.
Initially, my mom and dad were pretty upset with my friends for not telling them that I was missing the other day, but they’ve had some time to process what happened and it doesn’t seem like they’re going to hold a grudge.
So that’s cool.
Now, I tell them that we’re going to head down by the stream where it looks like there’s a clearing.
“So you can see more fireflies?” my mom says.
“Exactly.”
Over the last few days we’ve talked more about the shadows she sees out of the corner of her eyes and the bats that have been haunting me—or helping me. At the hotel, the monsters from my childhood turned out to be not so monstrous after all.
Maybe these things do run in families.
So maybe, as a family, we could learn to deal with them better.
As I turn toward the creek with my friends, I see her reach over and take my dad’s hand.
Tiff was right about there being plenty of places to sit.
We all locate logs or boulders surrounding the stream.
Not too many other people have found their way down into this part of the cove.
“Have the fireflies come out yet?” asks Alysha, who has positioned herself on a massive log near the water.
“Just a couple here and there.” Tane is sitting beside her. “So this is for real, though? Thousands of them are supposed to just blink on and off, all together?”
“That’s what they say,” Nicole replies. “On the trolley ride over here, the guy next to me mentioned he’s been coming for five years. He said to just give it some time. There need to be a bunch of them first before they start blinking synchronously.”
Tane shakes his head. “That’s impossible, though. The whole synchronous thing. I don’t get it.”
Alysha smiles. “And this coming from a guy who hears people who are miles away talking to him in his thoughts. I’d say lots of impossible things happen every day.”
“It doesn’t make any sense,” Mia says. “How do those little buggers know when to blink?”
“I say God designed them that way,” Nicole tells us confidently. “And he’s an expert at making impossible things come true.”
“Not to change the subject.” Kyle clears his throat slightly. “But, Alysha, I’ve been meaning to ask you something.”
“Yes?”
“How do you spell your name?”
“A-l-y-s-h-a. Why?”
“It’s crazy, but Alicia is The Thing’s blind girlfriend in the Fantastic Four comics. It’s spelled differently, though: A-l-i-c-i-a.”
“Well, I can definitely tell you that The Thing is not my boyfriend.” But then she adds, “Although, I have had guys about as interesting as a rock ask me out.”
“But you have to admit it’s kind of a cool coincidence, though. I mean, you weren’t blinded in a laboratory explosion by a vat of radioactive clay, but you do have the same name as her.”
“Maybe it’s not a coincidence at all. Actually, I don’t believe in them.”
“Neither do I,” Nicole notes. “I think there’s a bigger reason that we can’t always see, directing the things that we can.”
Her words make me think of the Chinese folktale again.
Curses.
Blessings.
Turning the first into the second.
Blurs and clues, glimpses of the future through the lens of the present.
I guess a lot depends on your perspective and whether or not you trust those reasons that you can’t see.
And maybe that’s something I’m finally ready to do.
The darker it gets, the more fireflies begin to emerge.
A few dozen flicker around us now.
They’re still blinking on and off intermittently.
Not in sync quite yet.
“Okay,” Kyle speaks up. “I just thought I’d mention that no one has solved my riddle yet.”
“Which riddle is that?” Tane asks.
“The one I made up on the drive from Wisconsin—I guess I never told it to you guys. So: ‘What’s the largest thing you’ll ever see, yet smaller than a pin? You’re looking into history, so let the guessing begin.’”
Tane stares thoughtfully into the distance. “Is it a problem—that’s something that can be small but seem big, right? Or maybe a riddle?”
“Nope.”
“A blur?”
“Nice try, but no.”
A little boy who looks about seven years old starts walking toward us.
“I think I might know the answer,” Alysha tells us.
“What is it?” Kyle asks her.
“A star.”
After a moment of shocked silence, Kyle exclaims, “That’s it! You got it!”
My attention is split between the riddle conversation and the boy coming this way.
Nicole looks curiously at Kyle and Alysha. “How’s it a star?”
Though I don’t know the boy, he seems to recognize me as he angles my direction.
I’m not entirely certain that he’s real.
He might be a blur.
“Because you’ll never see something bigger than a star,” Alysha answers, “but when you see it in the sky—”
“Oh.” Nikki catches on. “Right, it looks smaller than a pin.”
As discreetly as I can, I take out my cell phone and tap the video recording app.
“Yes. And you’re looking into history because the light from the star takes thousands or even millions of years to get here, so some stars might have already burned out, but their light is still traveling through the universe.”
“Wait. How do you know all that?” Nicole says, as it dawns on her that all this is coming from a girl who was born blind.
No one else seems to have noticed the boy.
Maybe because they’re focused on solving the riddle.
Maybe because he isn’t there.
I tilt the phone toward him.
“I’ve heard a lot about stars over the years,” Alysha explains. “I hear they’re beautiful.”
“They are,” Nicole tells her.
The boy shows up on the screen.
So, real after all.
“You didn’t solve it Daniel,” Kyle says to me. “I finally got you.”
“Right.”
I’m still distracted.
I remember looking at the stars when we were at Mr. Schuster’s house on our way down to Atlanta. Also, when Alysha told me the story of “The Country of the Blind,” she mentioned that the mountain climber looked up at the stars and found his freedom from the valley.
It seems like there really is something at work here in my life, something that’s lacing coincidences and blurs together in an intricate and remarkable way.
Synchronicity.
The boy stops a few feet from me.
“Hey there,” I say.
“That ranger wants to talk to you.” He points behind him.
Wondering if it might be Tiff, the only ranger we’ve met, I glance toward where he’s pointing.
The ranger stands about fifty feet away from us, facing the other direction. Definitely not Tiff. He’s using his red-filtered flashlight to direct people.
“He sent you over here to tell me that?” I ask the boy.
He nods, hands me a small tile, the same kind that was used to create the geometric patterns on the floor of the hallways beneath Centennial Olympic Park, and then darts away and joins his parents who are waiting by the trail and offer me a friendly wave.
Okay.
Weird.
I stare at the tile, then tell my friends, “I’ll be back in a minute. I need to check on something.”
Then I leave to go talk to the ranger.
CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX
Though it’s getting dark, there’s just enough light for me to pick my way along the trail without having to turn on my flashlight.
“Excuse me.” I walk up to him and hold up the tile. “Did you ask a little boy to give me this?”
He turns to face me.
A patch covers his right eye.
A scar marks his cheek.
The bruises from when he was beaten are still visible.
“Malcolm?” I gasp. “What are you doing here?”
“Walk with me.”
He takes off briskly down the trail but I’m able to keep up with him.
“Your eye patch,” I say, “that’s the eye they tattooed, isn’t it?”
“It was.”
“What do you mean ‘was’?”
