Caleb grinned and practically jumped up and down.
“Wait ‘til you see these fireworks, Caleb,” Nina yelled over the din. “They’re supposed to be even better than last year’s!”
Caleb hadn’t seen last year’s fireworks, but he figured that they must have been pretty impressive.
Uncle Bill pulled back his sleeve to look at his watch again.
“Ok, guys,” he said. “One minute! Fifty seconds... Forty... Thirty...”
Caleb was staring at his own small plastic watch, which he had carefully synchronized with Bill’s.
“Twenty...” Bill continued. “Ten, nine, eight, seven...”
Caleb’s watch kept perfect pace with Bill’s countdown.
“Six, five, four, three, two, one...”
The whole bridge suddenly erupted in a roar of screaming and cheering.
“HAPPY NEW YEAR!”
Caleb turned to stare out at the bay, holding his breath as he waited for the fireworks to start. Behind him, Bill and Carol were kissing. Aunt Nina leaned over and gave Caleb a little peck on the cheek.
“Happy New Year’s, kid!” she yelled.
Caleb turned back to look at the bay just as the first burst of fireworks rocketed up into the air like a tiny comet. The flare of sparks and color filled the whole sky with light, illuminating the bottoms of circling blimps and airplanes.
Caleb found himself jumping and dancing uncontrollably as the fireworks burst into one dazzling rainbow after another. Huge starbursts and streamers of every color painted a dazzling path across the night sky.
After several minutes of display, the fireworks paused, probably preparing for a second burst. Caleb looked down from the smoky sky to peer out at the glowing skyline.
On the other side of the bay, beyond the docks and buildings of Berkeley, the lights of the distant towns faded into a rushing wave of shadow.
Caleb’s eyes bulged at the sight. His mouth hung open, gaping like a fish, but no words would come.
Slowly, the joyous roar of the crowd began to twist into a wailing shriek of panic.
Caleb felt his uncle’s fingers dig into his shoulder with a frightened jerk.
In less than thirty seconds, the darkness had spread down from the hills and completely enveloped the Berkeley skyline. All around, the crowd surged and wavered as panicked onlookers tried to decide which way to run. Without warning, a press of people dashed past, pushing Carol and Nina away from Bill and Caleb.
Uncle Bill was gripping Caleb’s hand now, tugging him quickly along the bridge toward one of the massive support cables, in the direction that Carol and Nina had been pushed. In the next fifteen seconds, the darkness had spread halfway across the bay. The lights of Treasure Island and the bridge to Oakland winked out as if a giant switch had been flicked. The crowd was tightening around them, threatening to carry them away in a human wave. Bill grabbed hold of one of the smaller cables attached to the larger support cable.
“Caleb!” he called over the screaming. “Hang onto my back and don’t let go!”
Caleb jumped onto his uncle’s back and wrapped his arms and legs around his thick torso. Bill began climbing up the cable at a steady pace. A few feet up, he began hollering.
“Carol! Nina! Up here!”
Another fifteen seconds brought the wave of darkness surging across the streets of San Francisco and up to the Golden Gate Bridge. Every light on the railings and support cables winked out at once. In the middle of the bridge, the car headlights blackened and the motors sputtered to a stop. Several hundred vehicles banged, scraped or smashed together.
.
The city was powerless. Streetlights stood like gangly, blind giants on the sidewalks. Escalators and elevators jerked to a dead halt. Televisions, computers and battery-run radios died with a brief surge of static. Scenes of panic and disaster erupted in nearly every corner of the city.
At the intersection of Lombard Street and Van Ness Avenue, traffic lights blinked into darkness along with streetlamps and headlights. Dozens of cars, their power steering and brakes rendered useless, careened into piles of bent steel and shattered glass.
In the operating room of the cardiovascular hospital, a doctor stood in pitch blackness, cradling a half-open heart in his gloved hand and screaming.
Over the San Francisco Bay, a gigantic passenger jet carrying more than two hundred people suddenly fell silent. As the interior lights blinked out, the eerie quiet was replaced with the sobs and cries of the passengers. The pilots tugged and wrestled with useless controls, their curses giving way to prayers. In one of the aisles, an otherwise healthy young flight attendant fell limply across the lap of an elderly businessman as her pacemaker froze to a stop.
The crowd below was enveloped in a complete animal panic. Caleb looked down over his shoulder and saw people lying trampled under the feet of terrified partiers.
Uncle Bill stopped when he was about twelve feet up. Several other people were climbing nearby cables to escape the crushing mob. Bill wrapped one arm around the cable and cupped his other hand around his mouth.
“Carol! Nina! Up here!”
Caleb tried to spot either of his aunts in the shadowed crowd below, but there wasn’t enough light for him to see by. Several people began climbing up the cable below Caleb and Bill. Swearing, Uncle Bill began climbing again, stopping at a height of twenty feet. Looking up and down the length of the bridge, Caleb thought he saw a flash of Nina’s bright red jacket.
“Uncle Bill, look!” he cried, pointing to the base of a distant cable. They could just barely make out the shapes of Carol and Nina climbing up the steel.
“Thank God,” Bill gasped. “Carol! Carol! Over here!”
Caleb saw Carol’s head turn, then she and Nina waved frantically.
Caleb turned and looked at the blackened bay and cityscape around him. Aside from a few small fires, the entire area was in darkness. Even the batteries of the cars and boats seemed to have failed.
Somewhere overhead, a low sound was building. Caleb craned his neck and searched the starlit sky, trying to find the source of the noise. It was something like a heavy groan mixed with a low, whistling noise. Caleb spotted movement in the air over the bay and blinked his eyes, trying to see the object clearly.
“Uncle Bill!” Caleb screamed, pointing into the air.
Bill looked up just in time to see the lights of a nearby fire glinting off of the reflective metal belly of a huge airliner. The plane was sweeping down through the thinning firework smoke, headed straight for the bridge.
“Hold on!” Bill screamed, wrapping his arms and legs around the cable in a savage grip.
Moments later, the plane came rushing in. The blunt metal nose plowed directly into the middle of the bridge, shattering the steel and cable like glass. The wings shattered against the support cables on either side, slicing through several of the smaller lines before being sheared off by the main cables. The body of the plane passed right through the center of the bridge, carrying a section of the roadway with it into the waters. Smaller fragments of the plane flew in every direction, and fire erupted in great billowing plumes from the torn wing.
Caleb could feel the jerk as the cable that Bill clung to came loose, then swung wildly toward the crowd below. At some point, Bill released his grip on the cable and fell spinning, with Caleb still hanging from his back.
Bill landed hard on the heads and shoulders of several screaming people, with Caleb’s added weight on his back. The people fell underneath them, and they all lay in a dazed heap on the road for several minutes. All around, flames and clanging metal filled the night.
In the distance, someone was screaming about the end of the world.
THE ROOTS OF THE WORLD TREE trembled with the vibrations of living and dying beings. The One Who Strides Far moved along the paths of the roots, bodiless and graceful, like a clever thought. He had spent many years making the sleep-journeys, and knew well the flavors and fragrances of life. Somewhere down the roo
t he now traveled, he sensed the odor of impending violence, like the tang of electricity that precedes a thunderstorm. The odor grew stronger and more bitter as he moved along the root-path. Soon, he was circling the focus of the danger.
The cluster of living beings radiated life energy like a beacon. The hopeful emotions and energies of the middle-people were strong, focused intensely on their dream city and the new life that awaited them. The stink of violence did not emanate from this cluster. The menace was directed toward it from another, more sinister source. The One Who Strides Far traveled onto another root-path, cautiously approaching the source of the destructive energies. The bringers of destruction were easy to find, but difficult to approach. The seething cloud of malformed emotion was painful to the senses. Anger, hate and arrogance flared and burned, while the dull throb of aimless cruelty and ignorance numbed the soul like ice. The Striding One was cautious for other, more frightening reasons as well.
Although the bringers of destruction were, for the most part, a shortsighted and closed-minded mob, there were those among them who shared the senses of a sleep-traveler. Their powers were limited (in fact, they were hardly aware of their own potential power) but they were suspicious and greedily guarded what power they knew. The Striding One had to approach carefully, lest the light of his mind shine into the probing eyes of the enemy.
Fortunately, The One Who Strides Far was intimately familiar with the patterns and rhythms of the world. He was able to alter the flow of his thoughts and feelings, weaving them into and under the waves of life and death that surged all around. The destroyers remained focused on their mindless quest, oblivious to the presence of the clever spy.
A quick examination was all that was needed to reveal the nature and number of the enemy. The unnatural ones were gathered inside one of their vessels of death, scouring the land for any threat, imagined or real. It was clear that they were currently unaware of the middle-people’s presence, but the two groups would inevitably cross paths.
With the ease of a dancer leaping from one foot to another, The Striding One shifted focus, sliding away from the present moment and into a moment not yet formed.
He saw the lines of the two groups’ world-paths intersect. The line of the middle-people halted and broke, scattering into fragments. Some pieces tumbled away and faded into the surrounding life energy, but the majority of the fragments were absorbed by the destroyers and dimmed to a dull gleam. The destroyers’ path continued steadily on its blind march, hardly slowing as it shattered the path of the middle-people.
In the spiritual stain of the middle-people’s terror, a single spark of brilliant light shimmered. The gleam of this life was as plain as the sun to The Striding One’s senses, but the dim-sighted destroyers paid it no heed, thinking its wild and savage energy to be nothing more than an unreasoning beast of the wilderness. The Striding One knew better, recognizing the cool light of peace and hope that lingered under a savage exterior. This being was like fire, lethal and dangerous, but also warm and life-giving.
The One Who Strides Far sensed that there would be no more revelations on this journey, and began sliding back along the World Tree’s roots. He returned to his body, entering it and slowly filling it with his mind once again.
.
Caleb and Chuck had been awake for almost two hours, but the strange, elderly Awaru still slept under his poncho, still as death. He had made no sound or motion since Caleb had woken, except for an almost imperceptible rising and falling of his breath.
Caleb looked at the dying embers of the breakfast-time fire, then back at Krezahu. Finally, kicking a half-charred log in frustration, he rose and approached the small dinosaur.
Krezahu’s wrinkled eyelids were tightly shut. A tiny string of spittle hung from his beak onto the edge of his bright poncho. Caleb knelt down and listened carefully to the hiss of his breath. The sound was thin and faint, nearly unnoticeable over the gentle morning wind.
Caleb picked up a small twig and, ever so slowly, reached forward to poke at the Awaru’s feathered shoulder.
The creature’s breath stopped abruptly with a quiet grunt.
Caleb’s eyes widened. He jerked his hand back and tossed the twig to the side. Krezahu showed no sign of rousing.
“Oh, crap...” Caleb gasped.
The little dinosaur lay still, seeming more lifeless than ever. Caleb extended his hand forward once more, wondering how a person would perform first aid on an elderly dinosaur. His hand gently brushed the tip of Krezahu’s bony crest.
“Aaa-kuuuu-aaar!!!” Krezahu shrieked, leaping into the air and spinning like a dervish.
Caleb cried out and fell back into the dirt, kicking and flailing his arms.
The suddenly wide-awake Awaru landed neatly on his feet several yards away, then began hopping about and turning in small circles.
“Kuu-Kuu! I have seen it!” he croaked. “The crossing of roots! The breaking of paths!” Caleb rolled into a sitting position and tried to rise to his feet, but nearly toppled again as Krezahu leapt toward him and offered a steadying hand. Caleb took it and pulled himself up, scowling and brushing himself angrily.
“What the hell were you...” he began.
“Evimipo—I have frightened you. My sleep-journey shows the same story. I have again seen the place where your middle-people will fall under the hand of the Ne Shaazi. The place where the broken wheel will lie. We must hurry—it has almost happened.”
“Wait a minute...” Caleb said. “Almost happened? I thought you said something had already happened to them. And you still haven’t explained what the hell these Ne Shaazi are!”
“Evimipo. True words. I fear to speak of unformed moments for fear that the paths will tangle. But you are in need of a clear telling. I will say as much as this:
“The Ne Shaazi are the Bringers of Destruction, the Unnatural Ones.”
Caleb shuddered at the epithets. He was already rather certain that he knew what the Ne Shaazi were, but had not wanted to contemplate it. Krezahu ignored his shivering and continued.
“The peril that I saw befall your middle-people had not yet formed. It is an unborn moment, still merely a seed among the roots of the World Tree.”
“You mean that you’ve been seeing the future,” Caleb said, sounding both awed and doubtful.
“Ouk! Yes! The future. Silly word—lacking much meaning.”
Krezahu stared impatiently as Caleb thought about his words.
“So... the caravan hasn’t been attacked yet?” he asked.
“Wi’im-duzi! No, not yet. But it is of no matter. It will be attacked most definitely. It is already done, we have yet to reach the moment.”
“It’s inevitable,” Caleb mumbled.
“Ouk, yes!” Krezahu bobbed his head excitedly. “There is no way for us to reach it before it is attacked, and we could not prevent the destruction even if we were there.” Caleb’s shoulders sagged.
“Do not mourn, fool-hero. It is not your path to be there during this violence. You are to arrive after, so that you may find the hidden one and reclaim what has been lost. Sorrow is but a prelude to joy.”
“Yeah, right,” Caleb said. “Every cloud has a silver lining.”
Krezahu cocked his head and blinked. “You are truly a fool-hero. Those who waste their days searching for silver in the sky are even greater idiots than those who spend their lives digging it from the rocks.”
Caleb shook his head and looked into the rugged mountain trail to the north of their small camp.
“Well, I still think I’m a sucker for listening to your stories.”
Krezahu clucked disapprovingly.
“What the hell. Let’s get out of here.”
The old Awaru hopped happily and turned to help Caleb gather his packs and blankets.
The bright, blinding haze of midday surrounded the three travelers. With their eyes squinted almost shut and their faces turned to the shrub-covered ground, they almost missed the thick plume of black smoke billowing
in the distance.
It was Chuck who first alerted them to the fumes, her sensitive nostrils flaring at the faint odor. Caleb struggled with her harness straps, trying to steady her course, but she kept bucking and snorting nervously. As the trio stopped and Caleb climbed down from the saddle, his gaze swept across the irregular contours of the surrounding peaks.
“Oh no,” he whispered.
Krezahu’s head swiveled on his lanky neck. After a minute of squinting and searching the rising path ahead, he focused his gaze on the distant column of ash and smoke. “There,” he rasped. “The broken wheel. The smoke and flame. This is the harvest the Ne Shaazi have reaped.”
Caleb’s jaw clenched as he thought of the giant, cheerful wagons reduced to ashes. He studied the rugged mountain pass, trying to see the clearest path.
“We should be there in an hour or two,” he said, his voice cracking.
“Your lost one will be waiting,” Krezahu answered quietly.
Caleb tugged at a blackened and crumbling beam, stirring a cloud of smoke and ash from the smoldering pile of timber that had once been a sturdy, house-sized wagon. The slender beam snapped into chunks as he pulled and the wreckage settled further. Caleb blinked and coughed as a swarm of embers blew up past his face and into the deepening twilight. No sound or movement was evident in the pile of ruined wood.
In fact, Caleb had found almost no sign of any of the old-bloods in the two hours he had spent searching the debris. Although the slaughtered corpses of several of the old-bloods’ mounts lay half-buried in the ruins, he hadn’t found a single old-blood body. A few charred bloodstains and blackened clothing fragments were the only traces to be found.
Nearby, Chuck stepped carefully through the shattered timbers, sniffing and prodding gently with her horned nose. Krezahu sat perched on an ash-speckled boulder, unusually quiet and somber. Caleb himself had said barely half a dozen words in the last hour.
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