The Wind Rose

by B. Roman

  It can only mean one thing. The spin of the needle on the Wind Rose means that the Singer is near, and so is the great ship Moon Singer. A small rogue wave washes over David's feet and when the tide ebbs something glints in the sand. Its brilliance is unmistakable. It is the Singer. It is the Singer! Desperately, David reaches for it but it eludes his grasp as another wave splashes over it. The breaker pulls the Singer out of the sand and into the receding water.

  Frantic, David wades into the surf to retrieve the crystal, but he isn't fast enough. The strong pull of the tide carries the Singer out to the open sea. David is devastated yet elated at the same time. He now knows the Singer is not lost forever. He will get it back. But how? And when? And when he does get it back, what in the world will he do with it? At the moment, he has no mission, no reason to possess it. Not at this moment, anyway. Is his life about to be disrupted again? Does he really want it to be?

  Eleven

  The members of the Beach Watch Team wait impatiently for their turn on the City Council Agenda while some mundane township business is discussed and entered into record. The Team had voted unanimously the night before to bring their issues immediately to the Council and the public, and hope to have ample time to present their case. Heather takes the podium as spokesperson with an articulate and confident demeanor.

  “The brief but powerful storm Port Avalon experienced yesterday gave us a glimpse of our lack of readiness to handle a severe emergency,” Heather proclaims. “The mess on the beach will take days to clean up, and a lot of the debris out there came from uncontained building materials and hazardous chemicals used in constructing all those ostentatious exhibits for the Millennium celebration.”

  “Miss Du Priest,” Councilman Jergens addresses Heather, with a patronizing lilt to his voice, “Port Avalon needs those ostentatious exhibits as you call them to further ensure the economic livelihood of the town. The more visitors we can bring in for the celebration, the more money we'll have to fund those projects that you and your team so ardently embrace.”

  “Yes,” Heather agreed, “more money for the right kind of projects would be welcome, but not if your contractors cause more problems than we already have.”

  “Problems is an understatement,”Jim Dancy interrupts from the audience. “What's the Town Council gonna do about all the immigrants coming here to take over jobs that we locals are supposed to have? All the construction and landscaping, the craftsman's jobs we could do just as well. But we won't work for peanuts.”

  Jim Dancy had made a similar argument a year ago when Port Avalon was contemplating taking on a Navy contract to build war ships. Only then, his concern was government employees coming in to fill the jobs that the local residents needed desperately.

  Feeling Jim's frustration, several constituents grumble along with him. Mayor Fiori bangs his gavel loudly several times for order.

  “Okay, everyone,” the Mayor imposes, “the jobs issue is not on the agenda tonight. You'll have to sign up with the Court Clerk to be heard on that.”

  “We'll be heard all right,” Jim counters, “by you and the unwelcome out-of-towners who don't belong here…”

  Mayor Fiore is exasperated. “Jim, that's enough of that kind of talk. You try my patience and your remarks are incendiary. Bring it to the Court Clerk for a proper hearing.”

  “If I may continue?” Heather beseeches the panel.

  “Yes, Miss Du Priest. You have the floor, but make it quick.”

  “The Beach Watch Team is here tonight to give you a wake-up call. If this storm is a harbinger, we all must be prepared.”

  “I have to agree with Miss Du Priest on this,” Councilman Deitz says. “We have a Disaster Preparedness Plan that will be a disaster if we don't vote soon on funds to reinforce the levee just north of town. A levee break would be catastrophic if an even bigger storm comes through here.”

  Councilman Jergens, who is the tight-fisted fiscal officer on the Council, differs. “Even with the revenue from new development, we can't make the levee a priority right now. Our funds are primarily allocated in the short term for grants to local businesses to upgrade for the Millennium Project, a policy I might add agreed to by the Council with the full support of the citizens.”

  “I'll tell you one way to raise more revenue,” Heather submits adamantly. “Levy heavy fines on the developers for any damage they inflict on the ecosystem. In fact, let them post a bond in front held in escrow for just such a purpose.”

  The Beach Watch Team applauds enthusiastically, but their outburst is waved off by the mayor who counters with, “That would only discourage growth and limit the town's potential in the free market.”

  “We are not anti-growth,” Heather implores, gesturing out towards the Team. “But with growth comes responsibility. We are the stewards of the Earth, not the custodians of a sewer. The reason people visit Port Avalon and want to live here is because we still have one of the few unspoiled beaches left in the country. We have protected marine life habitats and fascinating tide pools teaming with organisms vital to the health of the environment. They want this more than more high rise hotels and shopping malls.”

  “Or short term residents who steal our jobs then take the money and run,” Jim Dancy pops up again.

  With the meeting going overtime and getting out of control, a motion is made to adjourn, tabling the Beach Watch's issues. The motion is seconded, and carried, but the grumbling of disgruntled Port Avalon citizens follows them from the Council chambers and into the street.

  Throughout the entire proceeding, David has sat quietly, reading lips and absorbing the sign language provided by an interpreter. A year ago, he was not so dispassionate, when the town voted to accept the contract from the Navy.

  He was livid and disheartened to envision the drastic change that would come over Port Avalon. But because some dedicated and innovative children in the town came up with alternative ideas on how to make Port Avalon prosperous using creative ideas and peaceful solutions, the Navy contract wasn't needed.

  For a while Port Avalon reveled in the influx of new business from people all over the country who sought out the town's hospitable and warm environment. Then it happened, the Millennium Madness, as David named it, the desire for more money and bigger commercial enterprises, all fueled by unfounded paranoia.

  David isn't too concerned about Jim Dancy's fury over the immigrant population, for it was Jim Dancy who had made the most startling turnaround a year ago, becoming a kind and selfless neighbor. Had Jim not used his pickup truck to haul in a new storage freezer for Maggie Sturgess' restaurant, she would have had to shut down indefinitely. Maggie rewarded Jim with a month of free meals for saving her business. David believes Jim will come around again this time, for the good of all concerned.

  Twelve

  David unties the rope of the dinghy from its moorings in the estuary, steps in and rows a few hundred yards out into the calm ocean. He opens his laptop and boots it up, and places the Wind Rose compass on the seat beside him. If he can recreate the Star of David grid pattern in his computer, he just might be able to conjure up the clipper ship Moon Singer, the way he did before.

  On that first day of summer more than a year ago David had used his prized crystal collection to form the sacred Star of David grid, placing the Singer crystal at the apex of the dominant triangle. Back then, he didn't have a clue as to what he was doing. It was just a fun experiment. He had used a twig to draw a triangle in the sand, then an inverted triangle over that one, then laid the crystals strategically on the wet sand to make the six-pointed Star of David energy formation. He hadn't known then that the double pyramid design was extremely powerful for elevating one's consciousness, and for facilitating inter-dimensional journeying.

  His sister was with him that day, watching with fascination from her wheelchair. She worried that he might get hurt from the experiment, especially since an electrical storm was brewing. But that's just what David was hoping for, a bolt of lightning to strike
the crystals and energize them to do something amazing.

  And when the lightening finally did strike the Singer, the little crystal acted as a conduit and transmitted its power to each and every other crystal in the grid. The force was so potent that it knocked David unconscious. When he awoke, Sally was gone, her wheelchair empty. And before his eyes, floating majestically on the water, was the mystical clipper ship, Moon Singer, waiting to transport David away on his first adventure: to find his sister Sally.

  But today, David must rely on technology to recreate the experiment. Today, there is no storm brewing, and no Singer crystal, the amazing artifact that can sing the mysteries of the universe and confer on its owner extraordinary powers of communication, if its owner truly believes.

  Meticulously, David draws the Star of David pattern on the computer screen. On each point he reconstructs the geometric facets and planes of each of the crystals he used in his original experiment. Then, ever so painstakingly, David constructs the complex jigsaw arrangement of atoms that comprises the Singer, the miniature replica of the great ship Moon Singer.

  “Now,” he directs himself, bracing for the impact, “I will carefully place the Singer at the apex of the triangle. Maybe, just maybe it will work.”

  But it doesn't. Absolutely nothing happens. Not a shimmer of light, not a quiver of movement. The illustration is dormant on the screen. The Wind Rose compass needle remains still.

  “Rats! How can I do this? What do I need to make a connection?”

  David begins entering programming codes, any numeric combination he can think of that relates to the geometric pattern that he created on the screen. As he does so, the screen blinks off, then on, then off again.

  Panicked, David reboots the laptop hoping he hasn't lost his work. A blue screen appears, then a white screen, and then a vision that shocks David to his core.

  Thirteen

  “Holy cow - Holy cow!”

  “Are you still using that juvenile expression, my dear David?” the holographic vision speaks to him. “Well, I suppose it's better than some of the words you young people use today.”

  David is speechless. His mouth hangs open in astonishment at the familiar sight of the capricious gypsy fortune teller.

  “Come now, David. No words of welcome for an old friend? You do remember me, don't you?”

  How well he remembers the delightful woman who cajoled him onto the Moon Singer the first time, to the Island of Darkness and his encounter with Ishtar and the beautiful Princess Saliana.

  “Dorinda! My God. I can't believe it's you. And I can't believe I can hear you.”

  “Why are you surprised? You invoked me before and you heard me then. You still have the power.”

  “Yes, but I don't have the Singer. I didn't think I could ever hear again without it.”

  “It's just like riding a bike,” she says, with that perpetual twinkle in her eyes. “Once you learn, you never forget how.”

  “I seem to have forgotten everything, Dorinda. My life is a shambles.”

  “This is no time for a pity party,” she chides him, amiably. “You have more important things to do.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like getting the Singer back, and finding the Rose Crystal.”

  “I almost had the Singer back the other day, but it washed out to sea before I could grab it. And the Rose Crystal was given away accidentally by my father. I don't know where to begin to look for it.”

  “Yes you do. Or you will. Once you go back to the Source, all things will be clear to you.”

  David chuckles. “Another of your cryptic clues. I think you have a file drawer full of them. Just what is the Source, Dorinda? I've been trying to figure that out.”

  “David, think. Didn't you come here today to summon the Moon Singer?”

  “Well, yes.”

  “And you know the Moon Singer takes you on a journey to where you find solutions to your problems.”

  “But why do I always have to go somewhere else to solve my problems,” David protests, “make some quantum leap into a fantasy dimension? My dad already thinks I'm crazy for trying to explain what I've been through, and Sally hardly believes anything I say anymore. I haven't accomplished much on my two trips.”

  “But you did, David. You accomplished a great deal. But you know that your journeys are not over. Your dissatisfaction demonstrates that you are still seeking answers to life's mysterious questions, as well as the solutions to mundane problems. Remember what you accomplished on the Island of Darkness and on Coronadus? These were monumental successes.”

  “But then I had a mission. When I sailed on the Moon Singer the first time it was to find Sally, to save her life. And when I went to Coronadus it was to communicate with my mother, to understand why she had to die. But this time I have no reason, no mission to accomplish.”

  “Your mission will reveal itself in a short time, David. Be available to it when it comes. I'll only say that, this time, it's more personal and more imperative than the others.”

  With that, the hologram of Dorinda disappears abruptly. In its place is the Star of David crystal diagram. A message box pops up asking, “Do you want to save this file?” David clicks on “yes” and the screen goes black.

  The Wind Rose needle moves slowly a few degrees in a clockwise direction, then moves no more. David knows the Moon Singer is near, but he doesn't know why he wants her to come for him.

  “More personal and more imperative than I can imagine,” he repeats Dorinda's clue. “What could be more personal than finding Sally or seeing my mother again?”

  David's stomach flutters with anxiety and anticipation

  knowing it is crucial that he find the Singer and the Rose Crystal for personal reasons; but he has yet to fully comprehend that by reuniting them with the Wind Rose - aligning the three sacred artifacts that have been coveted for centuries - phenomenal changes will occur in the world, in the present, and in the future.

  He hopes Dorinda is right, that his newest mission will reveal itself very soon.

  Fourteen

  Dr. Ramirez works feverishly on his keyboards at the observatory lab, despite a pounding headache. The music he composes is lavish with dissonant chords in the Key of F#dim, setting into motion the masculine and feminine polarities of harmony, and the positive and negative forces of nature. Once he has a composition he feels achieves his objectives, he will load it into his computer and hook it up to the weather satellites.

  First, he will impact Port Avalon, then jolt the USA, and then shock and terrorize the entire world.

  He alone will know how to stop the catastrophes that will soon ravish the earth because he created them. He will be famous for his discovery. People around the globe will offer him large sums of money, all the riches in their national coffers, to reveal the secret codes to them that will stop the disasters. No one will ever know that he is the creator of the destructive harmonics; they will only know him as their savior.

  Outside, the twilight sky begins to darken as afternoon becomes night. Needing a break, Ramirez engages the observatory's massive telescope, hoping to catch a glimpse of the shimmering, cloud-shaped light in the heavens that he had seen several times before. When at last the optical instrument brings the light into focus, Ramirez is ecstatic.

  “It's got to be a lightship from some other planet! They hear the din, the chaos, and soon they'll swoop down on the earth and destroy all those who have committed crimes against music and humanity. But when they realize that I have the codes, they will allow me to live. Yes, they will need me. Together we will do great things and rule the galaxy!”

  Ramirez' mad ranting is cut short by a shooting pain that surges through his head. He stumbles backward onto the swivel chair at his computer station, almost sliding off. The flashes of light and blurred vision are more severe than anything he has ever experienced before. He must get that CT scan that the doctor insists he have.

  But as the pain subsides, the urgency Ramirez fee
ls also lessens, and he returns to his primary task, his music. He ejects the disk from the keyboard's CD drive and loads it into his PC tower. With a few keystrokes Ramirez creates a hard drive file for the new composition and begins to implement his insane scheme.

  Fifteen

  Sally Nickerson is a junior at Port Avalon High School, a popular and active girl despite her infirmity. She aspires to become an instructor of therapeutic dance and is already working on a method to teach disabled people how to move gracefully and meaningfully to music. This evening her group of experimental students is meeting in the gymnasium. The floor here is spacious and allows freer movement for the class without the possibility of injury.

  As the students manipulate their crutches, canes and wheelchairs in tempo to the lovely waltz, “Fascination,” Sally is reminded of David's birthday celebration at Lighthouse Point Restaurant when she and her brother took to the dance floor. It was only her imagination, her wishful thinking, she knows, but that night she did throw away her crutches and dance free and light as a ballerina.

  How Sally adores her brother. If it hadn't been for his fearless experiments with his crystals she would still be wheelchair bound. It was an accident that put her there, a horrible car crash that killed her mother, crippled Sally, and nearly destroyed her father with guilt. But it was also an “accident of fate” that allowed her to walk normally, if only for a short time. Or was it a mystical miracle?

  Did she really relapse because Isaac inadvertently gave away the Rose Crystal pendant that healed her? Or was she herself just losing faith? Maybe it was her fault for not believing in David and his powers anymore. Maybe she brought the relapse on herself and caused the breech between her and her brother. Whatever the reason, Sally knows she must get on with her life and accept things as they are. She hopes David can do the same.