The Gemini Bridge (The York Street Series Book 1)

by Shea Meadows

  “And the ashes? Why are they in bed?”

  David gave a confused shrugged. “They made her feel safe. I’m wondering if all of this is too much for her. She just lost her twin a few weeks ago. Even though we can visit with Moon whenever we want, it doesn’t cancel out the fact of her traumatic death.”

  “But that is just it, David. She has been given absolute proof that physical death of the body does not end life. She is remembering her past incarnations and working with disincarnates by reviewing their records. This is an extreme reaction to a dream,” Shri said. “I need to have another look at her. I think the Stealer somehow breached our shields.”

  “Do you see an attached ghost? Or is another incarnation in charge? I checked for that last night after she drifted off. All I saw was fear, which again I think is normal in the situation,” David answered.

  A few minutes later, Ricky came out of the bathroom in her bright yellow sundress and blue sandals; her long hair tied in an upsweep and clipped in place. But she didn’t really look like the Ricky either of the men knew. Her reddened eyes darted around the room, her skin was pale. None of the usual decisive strength in her walk; she startled when Shri stood up to greet her. She nervously put her night shirt in the wardrobe and forced a smile. “David, I’m going to the library with Shri; I’ll see you in a little while.”

  David stood up and walked to her, giving her a tender hug. “Okay, dearest, talk to Shri. He needs some answers.” Ricky nodded, looking nervously at her mentor, then grabbed the urn with Moon’s ashes, clutching it like a small child would hang on to a stuffed animal.

  Ricky followed Shri to a room down the hall with comfortable chairs and walls lined with books. Those who had been preparing Serenity Farm for the overflow guests had put a cot in the room and a small chest for clothes. Ricky and Shri sat in chairs facing each other, Ricky holding the urn on her lap, letting her fingers play over the engraved stars and angels on the deep blue surface of the container.

  “David said you reported a very troubling dream. Could you tell me about it?” Shri asked.

  Ricky’s eyes shifted around the room. “They’re watching us, you know. Not just the Stealer and his crew, but the ghosts and the guides, who are really just ghosts as well.”

  “Yes, I agree that’s true. Moon put the shields up to contain most of that, and we’ve cleared the ghosts that were living here. Now the guides, that’s a good thing, they’re our brain-trust so to speak. They are our strongest allies.”

  Ricky shifted nervously in her chair. “So, the dream was horrible. I was in the car with Moon driving to Chicago. She was talking to the ghost, Megon, but I was sitting in the seat next to her. She didn’t acknowledge my presence at all. Kept on asking Megon for advice. She was always that way, even when we were kids; she preferred ghosts over living people. Something wrong with the woman.”

  Shri’s brow knitted in confusion. “So what else in the dream was disturbing?”

  “Well, I tried to tell her it was me, Ricky, not Megon, and she thought that was ridiculous. She called me Megon again, and said Ricky would never wake up and she would have to do everything by herself. As she said that, she started clawing at her eyes like she was in pain, then ran into the median on the freeway. The car rolled over crushing Tilda and my body flew on top of hers, and we were both screaming.”

  “What else happened?” Shri asked. “David said you heard someone talking; what was said?”

  “They were calling me the ‘bridge’. They said I was getting too strong and that what we were doing was messing up their plans. They argued about how to take care of it. Someone said they needed to do something right then. The person who seemed to be in charge said they should wait until the rest get here.” Ricky shivered and got up to pace around the small room.

  “Ricky, you know about this already. You know you’re working with Moon. You know she knew her death was most likely to happen. You know you’re the bridge between the incarnates and the guides. Why does this confuse you?”

  Ricky turned toward him, a look of rage and fear distorting her features. “I know no such thing! I would never agree to something that bizarre. I’ve been terrified of ghosts my entire live. Tilda was crazy and now she’s just as much a ghost as the rest of them. I can’t work with them. I can’t help them. I’m no use to you people. David and I are packing up and going home. I want to get my shit out of Tilda’s house and move to somewhere that no one thinks I belong to Tilda’s crazy religion.”

  Shri sent calming energy to Ricky but it bounced back at him. “I will have to think on this for a moment. Could I close my eyes and contemplate?”

  Ricky nodded reluctantly, still gripping the urn close to her heart as she collapsed back in the chair.

  In the moment that he asked for, Shri went out-of-body to the guides meeting place. The group popped in the instant he arrived, all with worried looks on their faces.

  “We have been trying to remove it, but it seems deeply enmeshed in her energy field. It came directly from the Stealer, no intermediary this time,” Moon reported. “We know he’s in the Boston house for sure. He was together with Sam Reading and a woman.

  We think we know who he is, considering Ricky’s reaction to him. Roy Fielding is the name he’s using. He’s the so-called doctor Ricky lived with for almost a year. He was close enough to her to know her triggers for anger, guilt and fear. He slept with her. All he had to do was plant these energy bombs in her field for future detonation.”

  Shri shuddered. “I suspected as much when she told me about her relationship with the man. What would you suggest? He’s regressed her to the point that she’s afraid of ghosts and thinks you’re a charlatan. I don’t think I could bring her up to your frequency; she’s just too terrified at the idea of ghosts. What do you see in her energy field? I know something is off in the meridians and the major chakras but her fear blocks my view of it.”

  “Ricky needs her mother. Emotionally, she had devolved to the place of loss that she experienced when our mother ended her incarnation. Marie was the one that helped Ricky balance. Mother was an amazing spirit communicator within her own right and recognized it in the rest of us. Ricky was the one person in our family that refused to accept that path, but Marie’s energy helped her to remain productive in spite of that. She encouraged Ricky to dive deeply into service as a nurse. But Marie is not around anymore to play that role; she is deep into a new incarnation. So, we have arranged a substitute.

  “When I saw this happening, I talked to Katera. She is a shapeshifter of amazing talent. We can all change our appearance when we go out-of-body, but Katera is able to alter how others see her even in the physical.

  “I sent Marie’s pattern to her, and Katera went back in time and observed Ricky and Marie together. Katera caught an earlier flight and should be there shortly. Let her spend time alone with Ricky, so Katera can convince her to allow us to help,” Moon instructed.

  “It is seven in Georgia. When is she arriving?”

  “About a half an hour. Keep Ricky in the library until then. Don’t let George or Beth Ann see her, it would be too upsetting for her right now. They are bound to try to convince her that she needs my help. She’s not going to listen until Katera has calmed down the terror to a manageable level.”

  Moon reached into a metallic mesh bag that she held in her hand. “Here is a malachite prism that has been programed to remove the terror the Stealer implanted. After Ricky is in a more receptive state, you can use it to pull out the magnified toxic programs that have invaded her meridians.”

  “We’ll be helping from here,” Maya commented. “She’s too freighted to see us right now.” All the other guides nodded in agreement.

  Shri took the gold bag with the extraction stone. “If it’s etheric, will it disappear after I use it?”

  “Yes, after it absorbs the terror, it will be unusable and will disappear into the seventh dimension, where it will hopefully cleanse and be restored,” Moon answered.
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br />   “Thank you all. I’m sure Ricky will want to thank you as well once she’s again part of us,” Shri said as he popped out of that reality back to the library.

  “So are you done contemplating?” Ricky asked. “Nothing really to think about. I just can’t be involved with something that focuses on ghosts. I can’t take over my sister’s life. She was precious to me at one time, and I still care for her, but why would I put myself in danger? My death isn’t going to bring her back.” She massaged the urn as she spoke.

  “Why did you bring the urn with you?”

  “It reminds me she’s really gone. That everything I was trying to do before was a fantasy generated by some nervous hysteria. The only good thing that came out of it was meeting David. Could I go down and see him for breakfast?” Her eye’s shifted longingly toward the door.

  Shri reached out to pat her on the shoulder but she backed away after the slightest contact. The glancing touch was enough to calm Ricky slightly and she even smiled. “You’ve been a good friend too. Everything is just so mixed up for me. In June, I was in Chicago, working in a hospital and living with Roy.”

  A dark expression cancelled the momentary cheer. “Roy, this whole crazy thing has something to do with Roy. I just remembered another dream.”

  “Another dream you had last night?” Shri asked.

  Ricky shivered. “I was in the apartment we shared and we were making love. I didn’t really want to; I was mad at him about something.” She shook her head, unable to remember what. “He attacked me; insisted I behave myself. He used to talk to me like that sometimes; like I was a kid and he was a grownup and knew better than me.”

  She paused for a moment. “I’d forgotten about that. He got me all dependent. I lived for his approval. I’ve never been a good judge of men, I guess, first an addict and then Roy. I’ve repressed tons about our relationship. Moon was right about one thing: Roy was pond scum.”

  “So the dream was about Roy forcing you to make love?”

  Ricky nodded and shivered as she remembered. “And it was painful, and very unloving. It was like making hate instead of love. I could feel his hate drowning me. Why did he want me if he hated me that much?”

  “Do you think this was a dream or a memory?” Shri asked.

  Ricky shook her head, her face bewildered. “Maybe both? I don’t know. I’d just made love with David, which isn’t anything like what it was with Roy. David is giving to me; Roy was always taking, trying to change who I was.” She stood up. “I have to talk to David. Maybe he can help me sort it out.”

  Just then, there was a knock on the door, and a melodious voice asked: “Might I come in?”

  To Shri, it sounded like Katera who he’d met once while with the guides. To Ricky it had a whole other quality; an inflection and cadence that sounded like a person who had been missing since she was a teen. She dropped the urn on the chair and rushed to the door, swinging it open before Shri could stop her. There, standing in the doorway was Marie Banner. Ricky wrapped her arms around her mother and held her close, both of them weeping together.

  “Mom, you’ve been away so long. Where have you been? I know you’re not a ghost. I can feel you, and see you, and smell you and hear your heart beating.” She moved back and scanned the woman head to foot. “Just as I remember, but you’ve gotten younger instead of older. How did you do that?”

  To Shri, it was Katera, tall, stately, with dark ebony skin, deep brown eyes, her black hair in a wrap that matched her long, blue, lace-fringed dress. To Ricky, it was Marie Banner as she looked long before she died of cancer, long black hair, green eyes, pale freckled skin, and dressed in a blue dress that the twins had bought for her on a shopping trip on Mother’s Day.

  Katera pulled a chair over next to the one where Ricky had placed the urn. “What is this, Rick?” Shri could hear the New Orleans accent, but to Ricky her voice was pure Minnesota.

  Ricky’s face saddened. “It’s Tilda’s urn. She was involved with a project with ghosts and tried to get me into it too. She died in June. I wish you could have been there for the funeral.”

  “I was there. You just didn’t see me,” Katera-as-Marie answered. “Death is not the end, just a change. I’ve been telling you that for years.” Katera turned to Shri. “Could my daughter and I have some time alone? I will call for you soon.”

  Shri looked to Ricky who nodded her agreement then he left the room. David was moving nervously around in the hallway, pacing back and forth. He looked up from his examination of the floor boards when he saw Shri.

  “What’s going on? Is she doing any better?” David asked.

  “Walk with me and I’ll tell you all I know,” Shri answered, as they went to the first floor.

  David listened intently and had all he could do not to run up and wrap his arms around Ricky. She needs her mother now and Katera is providing that. He kept reminding himself.

  The others were in the process of bringing the food to the table for breakfast and were discussing the arrival of the Chicago group within the next couple of hours. Questions came at Shri and David. “Where’s Ricky? “Is something wrong with her? I had a creepy dream about her.” “I dreamt someone got through the shields. Is that true?”

  “We can’t talk about Ricky. She’ll tell you what’s going on as soon as she can,” David answered.

  “Does she need me?” George asked, as he started toward the stairs. Shri put his hand out and stopped George.

  “We are doing what Moon instructed. Stay calm,” Shri told George and all of them. “This may seem strange to all of you who are energy healers, but don’t send energy right now. Things are coming back into balance, and we can’t nudge Ricky’s energy field at the moment.”

  Beth Ann looked stricken. “Would you give us a straight answer? This is making me crazy. Something happened to her. I can feel it.”

  David laid his hand on Beth Ann’s shoulder. “You can feel it but don’t try to change it. All will be explained. Moon wanted Katera with Ricky right now. That’s all you need to know.”

  Beth Ann’s shoulders dropped and tears began to fall, but she nodded in agreement. “I trust Moon. We’ve all got to trust Moon.”

  The food was on the table but the group was eating only a little here and there. Their eyes keep darting to the stairs, waiting for news, much like relatives of a person in the midst of surgery. Finally, an hour later, Katera stood at the top of the stairs and calmly said: “Shri would you please come up to the library? We are ready for you.”

  George and Beth Ann looked at each other, then at Shri. “I saw Moon and Ricky’s mom!” Beth Ann said exclaimed. George nodded in agreement.

  Shri smiled. “You both are so connected with Ricky’s history that you are seeing who she sees. I must go up.”

  David looked nervous and frustrated but nodded yes as did the rest of the group.

  Shri found Katera-as-Marie sitting with her arm around Ricky, who was leaning into Katera’s shoulder. Ricky was calmer but still showed hints of terror in her expression and in the rigidity of her body. She smiled apprehensively at Shri as he pulled up a third chair near them.

  “Tell him, Rick, what we decided to do,” Katera urged.

  Ricky cleared her throat. “My mom has been a spiritual counselor for years. She worked with people with extreme anxiety and developed rituals to help release what was making them ill. We decided that was what I need right now. I haven’t released my connection to Roy, even though I thought I’d moved on, so that has to go. I haven’t gotten over my fear of ghosts; even though, for a while, I fooled myself into thinking I was over it. I haven’t released Moon or forgiven her for trying to rope me into her work. I haven’t released my guilt about not listening to her. Maybe if I had let her tell me what she was doing, I could have talked her out of it.”

  Ricky sighed. “I’m a little nervous about this, but Mom says she needs your help since you work with stones. The rest of our family always had this thing for stones. We had them all over th
e house. I always thought they were beautiful, but that’s as far as it goes. I trust Mom, so I’ll suspend my disbelief and see if you can help.”

  Shri nodded and took the small gold mesh bag out of his pocket. “I happen to have a stone here called malachite. When I use it in my work it helps people release toxins from their bodies. Emotions can be toxic and make our minds and bodies unbalanced. Can we try and see if it helps?”

  “Unbalanced? Do you think my mind is unbalanced? I can’t remember a lot of things right now. I know I love David but I can’t remember when that started. I thought Mom died but she’s right here. What’s wrong with me? Why did I come to Georgia? When did I meet you?” She started tensing and breathing fast and hard.

  Katera-as-Marie held her close and stroked her head. “Hush dear heart. You’ve had a shock. That’s what we’re taking care of. You are so brave.”

  “Okay, I’m brave. I can do this. Do whatever you have to do Shri.” Ricky sighed and looked at the woman she saw as her mother.

  “I’ll sit right next to you, but I can’t hold on to you until Shri is done using the malachite,” Katera explained.

  “Okay Ricky. I am from India and we use chants in languages that are thousands of years old to help with healings. So that’s what I will be doing as we release the toxic emotions. First we must set an intention. I will ask you a question and you must repeat my words. Can you do that?” Shri asked.

  Ricky nodded, her hands twisting nervously.

  “We declare that all toxic fear, harsh judgement, false memories and anger that were planted within the energy of Rachelle Therese Banner will be extracted now. And any portal created by malevolent beings to contaminate her energy field is now closed and can never be used against her. Do you agree to this intention?”

  Ricky cleared her throat and a bit of the Gemini Bridge within her reemerged giving her the courage to speak. “I declare that all toxic fear, harsh judgement, false memories and anger that were planted within me, Rachelle Therese Banner, will be extracted now. And any portal created by malevolent beings to contaminate my energy field is now closed and can never be used against me. I agree to this intention.”