So she stood, looking down at her body, trying to see what she must have missed, and failing to see it.
15.16
Cole's heart pounded. That last wave had risen up and bashed them like a giant fist, washing over the entire deck and taking over the railing anything that hadn't been firmly secured. Cole worried for a second that they were going to flip over. Then the sound of the engines changed.
The twin diesels were struggling now, and black smoke was pouring into the cabin from below. Doobie bent to check the engine compartment, then slammed the hatch and zipped up his raincoat. "Take this!" he shouted to Marionette over the din of the storm, gesturing toward the wheel. He stumbled through the door and out onto the deck.
Cole watched as Doobie made his way along the starboard rail, leaning over to inspect the hull. Another wave rose and broke and crashed and it was all their pilot could do to maintain his hold against the force of rushing water. Ahead, through the fogged windshield and the storm, Cole could just make out the rough outline of Squirrel Island. The engines beneath them sputtered and coughed. Eddie got it all on his video camera.
Doobie made it to the bow, leaning over the railing as far as he dared as he slowly moved forward. Then he turned and shouted something back to them. They could not hear what he said. Another wave rose and crashed and Doobie slid back toward the stern, gripping the rail but allowing the force of the wave to push him along. At one point he fell to his knees. It looked like he'd lost his grip. Then he grabbed a handhold on the cabin and hauled himself back to his feet. As another wave rose to hit them, he pushed through the door and into the relative safety and quiet of the cabin.
"We've got a problem," he said, stumbling forward to grab the wheel. The engines sputtered and died just as he took control. He turned to Stan. "Big hole in the hull. Multiple bullets, like a shotgun blast. About a foot across."
Stan glanced up toward the island. "Bastards!" he spat. He looked at Doobie. "Did you feel the hits?"
Doobie shook his head. "Not in this storm," he said. "You?"
Stan hadn't felt a thing. None of them had.
"So what do we do now?" asked Cole.
Doobie raised an eyebrow as he looked at Cole. "We sink," he said.
15.17
Another ember had crawled up onto the ledge. And another. More were following. So Emily and Grace and Mihos did the only thing they could think to do: they jumped into the darkness beyond the ledge's outer rim, hoping to fall through that hole of daylight and out of the Murk, as Dennis had said they would. Grace sobbed as she stood at the edge, screaming her grief and rage at the loss of her brother and her dog. Emily, wiping away her tears, reached out and grabbed her little sister's hand and pulled the cat to her chest. "One! Two! Three!" she shouted above the din. They jumped. The three of them fell into blackness. The ledge, and the embers, were soon lost from view.
They fell through the Murk. Sure enough, the circle of daylight below them slowly increased in size and brightness. As they got closer, they could make out a twisting of thick gray clouds, scudding quickly past the hole. A storm.
The circle of daylight soon engulfed them, and once again they found themselves in the strange astral skies over the physical world. Everything was as it had been before, when they'd first left their bodies: they could move about at will, hover, fly, change form, and blink from one place to another. Only it was not like that at all, because Iain and Dennis were no longer with them.
The three of them sank slowly down through the thick clouds. Below they could see the ocean, and directly underneath, an island. They could see how fiercely the wind and rain were battering the real world, and were glad to be a step up from the physical. But they knew where they were, and were afraid of what they might find.
"That's Squirrel Island," said Emily.
"It would make sense that the Murk would be centered in the place where your mother was being kept," murmured Mihos.
"Was?" said Emily, looking at the cat with one eyebrow raised.
Mihos could only shrug. He didn't know what to say.
They floated down to the island, to an open lawn just north of Linda's cabin. On one edge of the lawn stood three tall steel towers. They could see soldiers through the windows in the top level. In the center of the lawn, standing alone as if newly planted there, standing bravely against the harsh winds, was a large plant almost three-feet tall, almost a cactus, with thick, dark, spiky leaves and a single large cone - orange and red and black at the rim - nestled in the center of the plant and pointing downward. They knew, because they could feel the truth of it, that this plant was the Murk, or how the Murk looked in the physical plane. It had been put here. To guard this place. To guard Linda. To guard against anybody ever knowing whatever it was they were doing here.
Emily knelt beside the plant, grabbed the stem near the ground, thinking to pull it out by the roots. Grace reached out to stop her. "We don't know where Iain and Dennis are," she said sadly. "We don't know what that would do to them." Emily nodded, let go of the plant, and stood. She reached out and took her little sister's hand. Both of their faces were still wet with tears.
Mihos cleared his throat. "We should go," he said gently. The three of them turned and started toward the cabin. The girls had only been here once, but they remembered it well. This was the place that Grace had really, really wanted to go. This was where they'd brought Linda. This was where they would find some answers. They moved quickly to the deck and stepped through the back door. They searched the house. There was no one inside.
Emily suggested that they go to the steel towers where the soldiers were, thinking they might find some clue to Linda's whereabouts there. She led them back out onto the deck and started for the towers. "Wait," said Mihos. The girls turned. The cat stood on the deck railing, pointing along the back wall. There was a soldier, walking up a flight of concrete steps that had to lead to a basement the cottage had never had.
"Ah... " said Grace, realizing in an instant what that meant. She stepped back into the cabin. Emily and Mihos followed. Together in the kitchen, the three of them looked at each other, then sank down through the floor.
15.18
All thought of cameras and live feeds and reaching Squirrel Island had been abandoned. There was nothing to do now but grab their flotation vests and jump into the water. The Pokey Joker listed at a thirty-degree angle, stern up, and was slipping further into the sea with each crashing wave. Sten and Eddie were already in the water. Cole and Stan were climbing carefully over the railing. Doobie and Marionette were still in the cabin.
"C'mon you guys!" called Cole. He didn't want to jump until he knew they were all away from the boat. He thought maybe Doobie was pulling some sort of "captain going down with the ship" bullshit. But finally the cabin door slammed open and Doobie and Marionette stumbled out, each carrying extra life preservers.
Cole held tight as another wave crashed over them, then watched as the two young people climbed over the rail and jumped into the sea. With a thumbs-up to Stan, who was hanging on beside him, Cole fell backward into the water, pushing away from the boat with his feet. Stan followed. All six of them were now floating in the churning waters of Booth Bay, rising and falling with the waves. The wind and the current conspired to carry them quickly away from the boat. They watched, cold and wet and helpless, as The Pokey Joker gave up her fight and slid beneath the surface of the sea.
15.19
The girls found their stepmother standing near her own body in the lowest level. Grace threw herself at Linda at first sight, managing only to speak Iain's and Dennis's names before breaking down in heavy sobs. Emily joined them and the three hugged as was only possible in the Astral realm, their forms and outlines blurring together as love and life passed between them. Through the exchange of words and touches and brief packets of experience, they soon caught up with each other, and the three of them grieved their mutual losses.
Mihos, for his part, stood off to the side and watched respectfull
y. Nicky, who had been wandering the halls, had returned to the room with Linda's body soon after they'd arrived. He sat beside Mihos in the doorway, watching the children and their mother. Every now and then the two cats would glance at each other across the realms, but neither said a word.
At last Linda pulled away from the girls, holding them at arm's length. "We're going to look for them," she said, meaning Iain and Dennis. "Okay? We'll do everything we can." Emily nodded, trying to match Linda's determination. Grace gulped another sob.
Emily pointed at the dead body. "But what...?" she said. She shook her head in confusion. There was no red rash on her stepmother's face. "We knew it. You weren't sick." She looked up to confirm that Linda's mole was exactly where she remembered it. "It was all a lie. But now you're... " She couldn't bring herself to say it.
Linda hugged the girls close. "Sshhh," she said softly. "There's too much right now. Things none of us know or understand. Things we have to share. And so much to figure out." She wiped the astral tears from her own habitual self-image and kissed the tops of their heads. "For now, just know that I don't plan on staying dead any more than I plan on losing your brother. I just need to figure out how to get back into my body."
Grace pulled away to look at Linda. "I did that once," she said. "Remember? Alice helped me."
Linda nodded. "We don't seem to have their help this time, sweetie," she said, smiling gently. "I've tried calling for them. For the Life. For Spud. For Alice. But I think we're on our own this time."
From the doorway, Mihos cleared his throat. "Um... excuse me," he said. He gestured toward Nicky with his head. "Cats here. Duh. Masters of the Nine Lives and all of that." He stepped forward and peered up at Linda. "Good morning, Mrs. President Monkey," he said cheerily. "I think we can help you."
15.20
Even as hot as it had been for the past month, the waters of Booth Bay still felt icy cold. Already, Cole could feel his fingers going numb. And the storm seemed to be pushing them farther from the island, back toward Boothbay Harbor, and apart from each other. Whoever it was on the island had shot a hole in their boat, intending to sink them. Intending to kill them all before they even had a chance to set foot on the island, and in a way that avoided any news coverage. The last thing Sten and Eddie had done before they'd jumped into the water was upload a short report to their network, explaining how the military had fired on the boat carrying the President's husband, how they were sinking, how they were going to have to abandon The Pokey Joker. They had no idea if the uplink was still working. That it had worked at all in this storm seemed like a miracle. They'd done what they could.
But that wouldn't be enough, even if it got through. Rescue would take too long. And rescue would not get them to Squirrel Island. Where Linda was being held captive. With the full force of the storm yet to hit them.
Enough. Cole had had enough. It was time for him to do what he could do. He kicked with his legs, leaned back into the life vest, and raised his hands up above the water's surface. Instantly they spouted small fountains of pure white light. Working quickly, instinctively, forcefully, Cole pushed the light up and out and away, waving his hands slowly as he kicked himself back, forming the light into sheets and billows, pure white sails of white light that reached into the sky and spread out across the waves.
Glancing around him, he found the others from his crew. Stan was close by, watching him. Doobie was floundering in the trough of a wave. Marionette seemed nowhere in sight until a wave pushed her upward, silhouetting her against the sky for a brief moment. Sten and Eddie were farthest away but together. Collecting them all in his mind, Cole increased the size and span and strength of his light to include them, then brought it all together, above them, beneath them. He painted a tunnel of pure white light on the canvas of the storm, with himself and his crew inside of it, then raised it up until it sat on the sea's surface, a cylinder of light undulating on the waves.
Up out of the water now, he stood on the tunnel floor and pushed, strengthening it, stabilizing it, forcing it to calmness even as the wind and water raged around it. He pushed the tunnel forward, stretching it further and further across the water, toward the distant shore of Squirrel Island. He formed it and pushed it and stretched it and held it as the others found their footing and stood with him, watching in awe as Cole mastered the light that issued forth from his hands. Doobie's eyes were wide with wonder. Stan nodded his respect. Sten and Eddie hurried to catch up. Marionette, her patch now missing and revealing a reddened concavity where her eye should have been, bowed in appreciation. Cole held the tunnel of light, then looked at each of his companions in turn and smiled. "Let's go," he said, with a nod. The six of them started walking to Squirrel Island.
15.21
Mihos had explained it as a matter of resonance. Things had to converge at the vibratory level in order to align and fuse together. So while Nicky lay on Linda's body's chest in the physical realm, Mihos lay on Linda's astral body's chest in the Astral realm. Linda hovered, stretched out over her dead body, then slowly lowered herself down until she and her body occupied the same space in different realms. She shifted and wiggled until, point for point, her astral body matched her physical body. Mihos' also moved until his body matched Nicky's body. The girls stood on either side, offering their love and support and prayers and intentions. Then the cats began to purr.
None of them could tell how long the purring lasted. The vibrations, shared body to body and realm to realm, seemed to take on a life of their own, enveloping them all in a pearly mist of healing sound. The purred pulses aligned, resonated, strengthened, became one. The two Lindas blurred together, one clothed and richly colored, the other naked and gray. The two cats blurred together as well. After a time their eyes became a single set.
The purring and blurring continued. After a while, Mihos called out in a strained voice. "Help us, girlfriends!" he said. Grace reached out and put her hand on the two cats' backs. Emily reached out and put her hand on Grace's hand. They closed their eyes and began to hum, doing their best to match the pulse of the purring. The power of the vibrations increased with their help. Eventually their hands blurred together.
Then the purring softened and slowed and died out. With a sigh, Mihos raised his head and looked around. Nicky stirred and raised his head as well, shaking it from side to side as if scaring off a bug. He sat up, then leapt quietly to the floor. The clothed, habitual image of Linda had disappeared. All that remained was her naked body on the gurney. And that body was now trembling.
"Is she...?" asked Emily, looking at the cats.
Mihos nodded. "I think it worked," he said.
It occurred to Emily then that they'd made no plans for what to do if it did work. If Linda was now back in her body, they would no longer be able to communicate with her. Apparently this was the first thought on Linda's mind too. She opened her eyes and inhaled sharply, almost a gasp, then raised a hand to shield her eyes. "Emily?" she said. "Grace? I'm okay, girls. We did it. So go home now, okay? Go home and find your bodies and come back into this world. Your father and I will be home very soon. Go home." She pushed herself up onto her elbows, her face still slack and gray. She glanced around the room like a blind person might, as if trying to locate the girls. "I love you," she said. "Go home. I'll be there soon."
Emily and Grace looked at each other, then at Mihos. "Do we go?" asked Emily.
"Would you defy a Presidential command?" asked Mihos, raising an eyebrow.
15.22
McAfee scanned the bay through his binoculars. The boat was gone, as had been their expectation, but what the hell was that? It looked like a giant white worm, crawling toward them on the surface of the sea. Whatever it was, the storm didn't even touch it. It was rock steady in a way that seemed impossible.
"It's about to make contact with the north shore, near the Ferry Landing, Colonel," said Sparks.
McAfee sighed. "I suppose we should go see what the hell we're dealing with, Lieutenant Dan," he said.
15.23
Linda pushed herself into a sitting position, her legs dangling over the edge of the stainless steel table. Her head was pounding. She felt like she might vomit. And she was so cold. So cold. She scanned the room but saw nothing she might put on. Not so much as a lab coat on a hook. She rubbed at her eyes, which were dry and still quite blurry, then pushed herself slowly forward until her feet touched the hard tile floor.
The cabinet was right where it should be and she stepped to it and opened the glass doors. Inside, where she'd seen it before, was the little brown vial that William had told her held the cure for the alien flu. She grabbed for it, but her fingers, so cold, so stiff, knocked it over. The vial rolled off the shelf and fell to the floor. With a yelp Linda looked down. The vial was intact. She bent over and picked it up, making sure to grasp it tightly. Then she tried to stand. A wave of nausea and dizziness swept over her. She started to fall, but caught herself on the edge of the gurney and stood, bent over, until it passed. Slowly, she managed to right herself. The vial was in her left hand. Still intact. Good.
How Linda might escape was not at all clear. She knew she was pretty much alone down here, having been left for dead. She knew a huge hurricane was raging above at ground level. And Cole and his crew might have made it to the island by now. So Phelps and his crew might have a great deal on their plate at the moment. Which meant that she had a chance.
The first step was obvious. It made sense to get out of the lowest level of this facility as quickly as she could. They were sure to come back for her at some point. And the storm surge might fill this whole facility with seawater. Perhaps if she just got to the surface, the next step would present itself. Glancing around the room one last time, Linda clutched the vial to her breast and stepped out into the viewing room, and then the hallway beyond.
Rumi's Field (None So Blind Book 2) Page 55
