For now, Ara remains a small girl when personified as human, in cruel mimicry of her standing with the gods, very much the stunted child forever problem-solving her place within an overwhelming and unfair cosmic hierarchy.
As she is always.
I swear, upon my rebirth I will become a leader and forever in control, and I will suffer no such disadvantages. She quickly dismisses those thoughts and realizes another of greater import. Although, if time and space are one and manipulated by the immortals, of which I am still, why then am I sensing time as the humans and ascribing my mortal incarnate as—helplessly—far away?
She searches the stars for an answer.
Only my father is empowered on matters of mortal life and death. Eron and I will be together, but no, a goddess should not sense time as they do, and I am further troubled. Her thoughts are not connecting, and she is unable to process sensible answers. No! My confusion is because my cycle is not of the natural order. No immortal has . . . expired. This is unfamiliar circumstance, and this is why I have been incapable. This is why I have been unable to sense the precision of my rebirth, and this is why we are not yet together.
Suddenly, an epiphany: Unless they lied, as the humans lie. Unless limitations were enforced upon me by the others, because I truly am capable of . . . more? Unless my understanding is itself a gift, and I already peek beyond the Infinity Pass? Ara rouses. If so, may a further exploration allow me the answers I seek? If I am correct, would not that capability allow me the knowledge of hastening Eron to my side?
Ara stands to enter the cave with renewed determination.
Taebal, she communicates to the dragon in thought, join me.
Taebal stirs, distracted.
“She is calling for you,” S’n Te confirms.
The dragon roars nervously, swinging its tail wildly as if, now, readying for defense.
“To why you are here, my friend,” S’n Te continues, “you needed your rest. As did she.”
Taebal stares forward, gazing into S’n Te’s eyes. He will listen until she arrives; this he has decided, but further action from here is neither promised nor dismissed.
“You trust me,” S’n Te says, “and yet you cannot reconcile why. My friend, I trust you implicitly.”
Taebal relaxes his stance. There have been few in the dragon’s history not of his ilk whom he understood. Eron was the first. Then Ara. And now the mystic, whom he instinctively believes has more in common with his former master than does the muse.
“I am shielded from Ara’s oversight. Meaning, she cannot control me. She can sense me if I so choose, but she can neither influence nor inspire me . . . and nor can she you, if you allow yourself to accept what I am preparing to tell you.”
Taebal gazes deeper into the mystic’s eyes to determine his sincerity. If S’n Te falters, the dragon will not trust him. If he does not falter, Taebal will listen further.
The mystic does not falter. He turns his back only when the dragon dutifully lowers his head. Ara has arrived. Torn, he looks first to S’n Te, then to his new master.
“The dragon belongs to me,” Ara says. “You are but a lowly magician.”
“Your petulance,” S’n Te answers, “holds no quarter here.”
“My—”
“But you are correct, of course. Taebal does not belong to me.” He turns and exits the area, nodding to Taebal on the way. “Forgive me. You are both free to go.”
Seconds pass and a suspicious Ara peers into the adjoining tunnel. S’n Te is nowhere to be seen. Maintaining her composure, she leaves the cave, and Taebal follows. As the dragon walks closely behind, back into the vast wasteland of nearby Mirkwood, Taebal hears the thoughts of the vanished mystic:
Despite your greatest impulse, you must continue your path with the goddess until you are led to water, S’n Te advises. Ara is blinded by revenge. She will lead you to water, and she will watch you drown, believing your fate to be entirely of her own accord. It is not. Darker forces than she surround you, Taebal. Of this the goddess is not aware, but understand—you were not affected by the cessation for reason.
This Taebal believes. As Ara walks he notices her lack of reaction; she does not appear to hear the words as does he.
Ara will watch you suffer and then attempt to save you. Her effort will be a lesson in indebtedness and obedience, and you must not allow it. Your death, as your master’s before you, is consistent with the natural order of things, and you must not be swayed. You must not survive, Taebal. Eron was not . . . allowed to spawn, and his bloodline passed with his father. You, Eron’s closest companion, risk becoming as hopeful as the goddess, and yes, if you live you will remain faithful and her endeavor will, ultimately, prove successful . . . and catastrophic. But your demise is what will lead to the discovery of the lost chronicles, the entirety of the story of man and god in which is held the one true path from the dark. Only in death shall the legacy granted you by Eron hold true. Taebal. Guide to light. Guide us to what has been lost, and only then shall the universe chance to discover its way and be freed from the muse’s vengeance.
When the words cease, Taebal’s immediate impulse is to attack anything in his way; most especially, ignoring S’n Te’s plea, the goddess who leads the way.
If you allow yourself to live, Taebal, there will come a time when the essence of Ara, as a mortal, will once again intersect with Eron. I cannot foretell more than this, but know that the energy building and expended within the muse’s star will cause a ripple in time-space, which will occur soon, prior and following the loss of Ara’s star. These ripples will hasten Eron’s return, and Ara’s plot will progress to its inevitable conclusion.
Taebal is suddenly hopeful, and just as abruptly filled with dread.
He will return, Taebal, if you so allow. I see this. The gods see this, and they have taken precautions. Though you will have been—naturally—gone for many eons, Eron’s restlessness will return him to ground as an Over-dweller. As to the mortal incarnation of Ara . . . she will attempt to piece him together, to work with him to regain his humanity. What occurs from there is something only Ara could know, based on her design, before the blood of spirit is unleashed, which will either signal the end of days . . . or the new beginning. Her decision based on what will bring them together.
He is distracted when the mystic unexpectedly concludes with a reminder:
The choice is yours, but always remember, my friend . . . follow your instinct. Nothing is ever as it appears.
SOHO ARTS DISTRICT, NEW YORK CITY
“Take a seat,” X says.
“I prefer to stand,” Daniel answers.
“As you wish, brother.”
“Can you stop with the brother bullshit for a change? I’m not your brother.”
“Well, not literally. I have never been literal when it comes to us.”
“What the fuck does that mean?”
“Meaning you’re not here to play. And neither am I.”
“What then?”
“London.”
“What about London?”
“I had nothing to do with bombing your wife’s building.”
Daniel realizes that the conversation has taken a surprising turn. Toward the honest. “You want to talk?”
“You want to take a seat now?”
Daniel considers the question . . . and sits.
X does the same, taking a folding chair that had been leaning against the bathroom doorway and placing it feet from his visitor.
“What do you want to tell me?”
Minutes pass. After some preliminary small talk, which X needed to get out of the way, the conversation gears as Daniel expects.
“You know who bombed the Embassy,” X accuses. “Tell me the truth.”
“What makes you so certain about anything?” Daniel calmly asks. He is well aware that any attempt to bluff X is a mistake, and now he knows too that X has him to rights.
“You got me,” Daniel says.
“And so what
then?”
“Why don’t you ask me what you want to ask me? I don’t want to assume anything—”
“What’s next?”
“Next?”
“What is ENIGMA doing next?”
“So . . . you’re certain I’ve joined ENIGMA.”
“Not acceptable. Brother, do us all a favor, huh? Go with your instincts.”
Daniel exhales slowly. When in the military, he had learned any number of methods to convince an interrogator. And this is not the military, he thinks.
“You would make a hell of a soldier.”
“Thank you for the compliment. Can you answer my question?”
“Looks like I have little choice in the mat—”
“You have no choice, because I swear to you, I will call your wife, I will contact Thomas McFee, I will cause you all sorts of grief of the likes you’ve never experienced.”
“Dramatic, as ever.”
“Always.”
“You haven’t changed a bit.”
“No. So answer my question so we can quit this nonsense talk and move on.” He lowers his tone. “Please,” he says. “I’ll be nice.”
“Sam has no idea,” Daniel explains. “She has no idea that . . .” he reconsiders. “No, let me correct myself. I doubt . . . X, that she has any idea. As far as I’m concerned, she believes we are working together.”
“You were going to get there, I’m sure,” X says calmly, “but we haven’t seen each other in a while. Tell me about ENIGMA.”
“I’m an informant for you now?”
“As to why we’re here.” Daniel stays quiet. “I have work to do too.” X grabs his right leg and crosses it over his left, holding on to his ankle for support. “You know I’m not violent. If you wanted, you could take me out right now, but you never had before because I scare you. And in the back of your mind, you think that I may become as advantageous to you as you are of me—”
“All right, enough. I’m here; let’s talk.”
“I have some questions about Project Ara that only you can answer. Since you are the only member of that group I trust—”
“How do you know who else—”
“Since you are the only member of that group I trust, I need to know from you what’s next. I need to know what your organization has planned, and I need to know more about the reason for ENIGMA.”
They spent the better part of the next two hours talking, and Daniel verified X’s greatest fear: ENIGMA was formed days after the release of X’s first Letter to the Media. Daniel asked if X had a copy available. He did, in his cell phone.
“May I?”
X handed Daniel the phone. “I’m not expecting calls from any credit-ors,” he said. “Go for it.”
Daniel silently reviewed the letter in its entirety. The beginning said it all: We have identified the catalyst of human inspiration. You are not supposed to know this. Nor this: Its essence is corrupted. What, then, of our creators? He looks up to X, who watches without saying a word. I had reserved my most intense scrutiny for those driven, frequently unsettled artists and inventors who have attained significance by toiling within man’s darker nature. The most perceptive—and most obsessive—among them have long understood that their influence could be dangerous. The passage of time has taught us that innovators who have so trolled and exploited their primality in search of The Truth were fated to become the vessels who would inform us of our course. They peeked into the unknown more than most, and by so doing returned from the void with a warning—
“Who are they?” Daniel asks.
“What’s the context?”
Daniel reads: “They peeked into the unknown—”
“They being your artists.”
“Who—”
“We’ll get there. I haven’t even released them all yet, but you saw my Ten Measures.”
“And that’s all?”
“Of course not. I’m referring to every artist, if you sincerely didn’t know. Anyone who’s ever put pen to paper, brush to canvas, anyone who’s ever written or sang a musical note . . . I discovered The Truth by studying the writers within my Measures, but my work has been based on the artist in general. Only artists, including your builders and inventors by extension, leave their souls behind when they pass away, and only artists continue to influence for long after that. Some of them, anyway. And Ara influenced the artists, so—”
“Has anyone told you you’re full of shit?”
X shrugs. “You just did, brother.”
“You do know why I can say that?”
“I’m not sure I get what you mean.”
“Oh, you do.”
“I—”
“Those emotions you try so hard to hide?”
“What? Who are you talking to, broth—”
“Time to give it up, X.”
X looks at Daniel in disbelief. “I feel like you’re challenging me. Are you challenging me . . . Daniel?”
“I was sent to you, X?”
“I set a trap for y—”
“No. It’s you who have been followed. It’s you who I was asked to track, and—”
“And what? You know me too well. Tell me—don’t mince words.”
“It’s you who I was asked to extract.”
“They sent you to kill me?”
“I said extract.”
“So, I’ll repeat: They sent you to kill me?”
Daniel could never bluff him. Not then, not now. “They sent me to kill you.”
“Why?”
Daniel is taken aback at the utter . . . innocence of the query. With a single word—why—Daniel puts aside his duty and speaks to X like he would an old friend. He postpones the inevitable, and they continued to speak well into the night. Daniel informs X that the group was originally formed as supportive of X’s efforts. He elaborates:
X’s early letters developed a fast but loyal following among associates of Professor Searle.
Daniel was among those who were surprised, and convinced, early on.
As X appeared to lose his focus, and his grip, in subsequent letters, they believed that by so doing he may have inadvertently released to the world a secret of even greater value. If X’s words were to be taken at face value, Daniel explained, then there appeared to be an unintended hint about the presence of another series of literary art that held the potential of man’s salvation.
“Nothing is unintentional in my wording,” X defends. “Nothing at all.”
“And that’s the gist,” Daniel says. “You’ve been writing as though you alone have been unguided.”
“I don’t understand. Unguided, brother? I write of my own free will.”
“According to your work, no one writes of their own free will.” Daniel continued. He further accused X of being shortsighted, as within his work were indeed found various patterns and threads that verified their theory. “Would not the muse have inspired you as well?”
X’s emotions took hold, and anger was setting. “You’re wrong.”
“You are not immune, and we cannot take the chance. We cannot take the chance of your influence continuing to grow.”
“What then?”
“You will be suppressed. You must be suppressed . . . at all costs,” Daniel answers with some regret.
“So,” X concludes, “Your reason for wanting . . . your reason for needing to kill me, is because you have to do to me . . . what has been done to Ara? That’s your plan?”
“If what you write is true, and we believe that is it . . . exactly,” Daniel says.
“And they sent you? Alone?”
“They sent me.”
“Alone?”
“I’m alone.”
“I assume I can’t convince you to change your mind?”
“This isn’t personal.”
“You didn’t answer.”
“So . . . you kill me, and then what?”
“I take your place.”
“You what?”
“I will become the
new X. At least publically.”
“You’ll become . . . what the hell is that?”
“We can no longer risk your public meltdowns, that’s what the hell it is. We believe in you, we all believe in your work. Sam believes. But you’ve become blinded. There has been another way all along, and you cannot see it.”
“What’s this you’ll become the new X bull—”
“I will write the letters from here on. I will send them to where they need to go. And it will be me who will direct this effort from here. You’ve led us to the dark, X. You are exactly what Ara wants, and you are doing exactly what she plans.”
“And you? Do you have immunity?”
“Me, no.”
“Someone on your team?”
“Someone on my team?”
“I was outwitted, then?”
“You were outwitted.”
“I thought I manipulated you here, to be with me, when in reality—”
“It was the other way around.”
X is unsure of how much of Daniel’s words to believe. “Who sent you?” he asks calmly.
“I told you. ENIGMA sent me here to—”
“No. I mean . . . who sent you?”
“Professor Searle.”
X is at his wit’s end. “Who has the immunity?” Daniel watches, as the boy is about to validate the older man’s words about his meltdowns. “Brother!” X implores. “Who has the immun—”
“Professor Searle,” Daniel repeats.
As X jumps up and kicks his chair in one motion, Daniel stands and blocks his exit.
FREE CHURCH, BROOKLYN HEIGHTS, NEW YORK,
NOVEMBER 2014
Last year.
“Bless me, Mother, for I have sinned.”
“How can I help?” asks a pleasant-enough female voice.
“I need comfort.”
“Comfort. Please explain.”
“I was complicit in the death of a man. I stole. I sacrificed my family for greed and lost them on account of my actions.”
“I asked you how I can help. Would you care to be specific?”
Chronicles of Ara: Perdition Page 15
