Thirst No. 4

by Christopher Pike

  Umara has built up the fire, and the last of the chill of the icy stream has left my body. The thousands of rubies embedded in the inverted triangle sparkle; the central pearl glistens. The Kali symbol reminds me of my daughter, Kalika, and how fearlessly she offered her life to save John. I wish to imitate her courage now but a thread of fear has woven its way back into my heart. I wasn’t afraid when I leapt in front of the laser that originally killed me but I had no time to think then.

  Now I wish I could stop thinking and turn off my mind. I have no idea what is to happen next but I’m overwhelmed with a strange sense of the abyss. Kali is supposed to represent extinction, the loss of all individuality. At another time and place I might have viewed such a state as related to enlightenment but now it just feels like another form of death.

  I know who I am and I want to go on being me.

  I don’t like the odds Umara plays with. She has only done this once before. She doesn’t know whether it’s going to work any more than I do. Nevertheless, I watch closely as she removes a small blue bottle from the folds of her red robe. As she uncorks it, I smell blood and give her a puzzled look. She nods.

  “It’s Krishna’s,” she says.

  “Did he give it to you for this purpose?” I ask.

  “I was with him when he left this world.”

  “But you were in Egypt with Yaksha.”

  Umara shakes her head. “I was with him.”

  “But—”

  “Silence. He’s here. We must begin.”

  For several minutes Umara closes her eyes and sits in silence. Unsure what to do, I follow her example. The feeling of the abyss grows, but out of nowhere a wave of love expands inside it and suddenly I don’t feel so alone.

  I hear Umara’s eyes open and peep over to see what she’s doing.

  Her puja kit is used to perform Vedic ceremonies. It’s similar to a variety of ceremonial kits from all over the world. There’s a brass candleholder, which holds a narrow white candle, and two small brass dishes: one for rice, the other for water. There are three other pieces: a tiny vase that supports a burning incense stick; a small dish equipped with a handle that’s filled with camphor; and a two-inch plate smeared with sandalwood paste. To Umara’s right, in a neat pile, are fresh fruits, flowers, and a brand-new white handkerchief.

  I saw these same items a thousand times when I lived in India. But I don’t understand why she’s defaulting to the trappings of that tradition when she’s originally from Egypt. I wonder if it has to do with the blood she carries. It’s strange but I don’t doubt her extraordinary claim, although it’s no different from a Christian priest or minister saying they had a bottle of Christ’s blood. Of course there aren’t many priests or ministers who can boast they’ve been alive for thousands of years.

  Umara begins to sing in a language I don’t wholly recognize. I say wholly because there are a few words that are familiar—a combination of ancient Egyptian and Sanskrit mantras and hymns. The tune is melodious and her voice is nothing short of enchanting. I know now where Matt inherited his voice. I find myself drifting along with it like a leaf in the wind. I feel as if I’m being hypnotized and don’t really care. Umara waves her candle and lights her camphor as she sings, and I wish the song would never stop.

  Yet at some point she falls silent. It puzzles me because I’m not sure when it happens. I become aware that the loving feeling in the chamber has grown in intensity and I cannot free myself of her remark, “He’s here. We must begin.” Someone sure feels like they’ve stopped by for a visit.

  I glance at John and Matt. They both sit with their eyes closed, so deep, so settled, they could be asleep. Umara is the only one who is busy, slowly dripping the blood from her vial onto the forehead of my dead body. What’s remarkable about it is that it doesn’t spill into my hair or eyes. It’s simply absorbed by my skin. Drop after drop strikes the space between my eyes and vanishes. It’s as if my dead brain hungers for it.

  Or maybe it’s my body hungering for life.

  I blink and my old body suddenly jerks.

  Umara looks over at me. “It’s time,” she says.

  “For what?” I whisper.

  “To die, so that you may live again.” She turns to her son and gently shakes his knee. Matt opens his eyes, his gaze a million miles away. “She will need your help.”

  “Mother?” he mumbles.

  “It’s time to set Teri free,” Umara says. “To do that, you must let her experience the death she was meant to have. Her leg must shatter, the bone must pierce the skin, the artery inside must rupture, and her blood must flow. You can help Sita, and Teri, by doing this to her.”

  “No,” Matt says.

  “I can do it myself,” I say, although the thought unnerves me.

  Umara shakes her head as she continues to address her son. “You’re her love. You are what binds her to this world. You should be the one to set her free.”

  Matt gasps. “Then she’s here! She can be revived!”

  “No. She’s passed on. Only a portion of her is still trapped. With your love, you can free her, but only if you’re willing to let her go.”

  Matt is distressed. “I can’t hurt her. Let Sita do it. She’s the one who caused her injury in the first place.”

  “You can’t blame Sita for what happened. You can’t blame yourself. Teri’s death was destined. Sita’s rebirth is also destined. But there’s only a narrow window in which this can all happen. Sita, lie down on your back with your left thigh near the head of your body. Matt, move between them and lift up her left leg. You know your strength. A single swift crack and it will be done.”

  “Why do I need to put my leg near her head?” I ask.

  “No questions!” Umara says, holding up the vial of Krishna’s blood. “We have only a limited supply, and limited time. Get in position, both of you.”

  I lie back on the stone altar so that my left thigh bumps against the head of my body. By chance I have on a white dress, and I instinctively pull it above my knees so Teri’s skin is in contact with my old skin. I sense the contact is important.

  Matt’s another matter. He’s moved into position so that he’s kneeling between me and my body. He’s managed to lift my leg several inches off the ground. But his grip is weak and he trembles. I understand. He holds the soft flesh of his true love in his hands and he’s being asked to desecrate it. I’m not looking forward to the pain of the break but I know his task is more difficult.

  “Do it!” Umara snaps.

  Matt shakes his head. “Mother?”

  “Do it for Teri, my son. Do it for love.”

  “I can’t hurt her. Not her leg. She was a runner. Her legs were everything to her.”

  “Now!”

  Matt practically sobs. “It’s not fair. She was so young.”

  “Enough!” I cry as I sit up and put a hand over Matt’s. I glance at Umara. “You’re asking too much. I loved her, too. I can do it, and together we’ll let her go.”

  Umara stares into my eyes, then into the vial that is supposed to hold Krishna’s blood. “Very well. But it must be a fatal blow.”

  “I understand.” I turn back to Matt and squeeze his hands. “It’s okay. Teri will find her way to Krishna’s abode.”

  Matt stares at me with red-shot eyes. “I’m sorry,” he whispers.

  I smile and reach out to rub his face. “I always knew you were a softy. You . . . Aaahh!”

  He’s not so soft. He just broke my leg.

  The scream bursts from my chest and tears out my mouth. Yet it is not loud enough to drown out the crack of my bone. Or the sickening sound as the jagged edges of my femur rip through Teri’s flesh. No, it’s my flesh, my goddamn skin, I’m the one who’s in agony. What kind of idiotic ceremony is this? My body’s dead, this one’s alive, nothing’s going to change that. I don’t know how in the world I let Umara talk me into . . .

  “Lie down!” Umara orders. “You must be on your back.”

  “Leav
e me alone, you stupid bitch!” I yell.

  “Matt, help her to lie down. Hold her down if you have to. Turn the head of her body toward the blood. Her body will seek her blood.”

  Now Matt is keen to do whatever Mommy wants. He shoves me onto my back and twists the head of my dead body so my mouth’s pressed against the red gore. From the way the blood is spurting, I know the artery has been severed. My old face drowns in my new blood.

  But neither my new body or blood will last long.

  I feel faint, the torch-lit chamber spins. What I feared to face on the mountaintop is finally happening. With the rip in the femoral artery, Teri’s body is rapidly bleeding to death. I try to sit back up, vainly reaching for the break with my left hand, but even though Matt does nothing to stop me, I’m too weak to find it. My vision goes out of focus, the fire and the faces and the blood blur into a single red wave. Nausea sweeps through my guts. Every cell in my body screams in protest. The tiniest parts of my anatomy know that without blood, my major organs will close down and fail.

  My heartbeat hammers, then the beats start to skip, to flutter, to miss. I gasp for air. There’s plenty of oxygen in the chamber but not enough red blood cells in my lungs to extract it. Only then, as I begin to choke, do I finally accept the fact that I’m going to die. It doesn’t matter that my death is the point of the ritual, the realization brings its own special bitterness. Because it was all for nothing. Umara is crazy. She should have left well enough alone. Now both our bodies will be dead.

  My eyes close. The darkness is deep. I hear the fire burn but I feel cold. My pulse begins to slow. The feeble sounds fade. I want to speak, to weep, to say something, but I’m too weak. I struggle to breathe but I know it’s a fight I’m going to lose. Despair, that’s what I feel most of all. Death is despair for it is both dark and empty.

  Far off, I hear a strange sucking sound.

  And feel a weird tickling sensation.

  The sound and the sensation seem to originate in the identical spot. Where my life pours through the hole in my leg. With my last fiber of strength, I open my eyes and look down, and see the impossible. My dead body is drinking from my dying body. It seems like a dream but it is true.

  Sita is taking back the blood she gave to Teri.

  “Well I’ll be damned.” I don’t know if I say it or merely think it. I have lived five thousand years and was confident I would never see anything new. But this outdoes it all, and I figure if I do end up dying, then at least I got to witness a miracle before I left.

  My eyes fall shut. My chill turns to ice.

  My pulse fades to a whisper.

  The dark is deep and there is suddenly no pain.

  I feel as if I’m floating, before I feel my “I” float away.

  Nothing. There is nothing for a long time.

  From the other side of the galaxy I hear someone call my name.

  “Sita . . . Sita . . . Sita.”

  Whoever summons me, they make my name sound like a holy mantra, a sacred word. I assume it’s Krishna and when I open my eyes I see his wonderful blue eyes. Only the face that holds them is different. He looks like a boy I once knew, like John, and when I blink his eyes change to a dark brown.

  “Hello, Sita,” he says, and smiles.

  “Hi,” I hear myself reply.

  Yet there is another conversation going on, another miracle that I’m about to witness. Taking the white handkerchief, John wipes the blood from my face and helps me up. I see Matt holding Teri in his arms and she is dying. But it is Teri, it’s not me, because I’m back in my old body.

  “You’re here,” Matt whispers as he cradles her in his arms, stroking her head. “I knew you’d come back to me.”

  “Thank you,” Teri says.

  Matt seems to blush in the red light. “Why do you thank me?”

  “For now. For this moment.”

  Matt nods. “This moment is forever. You can live forever. You have Sita’s blood. . . .” He suddenly stops as her eyes close and her head rolls to the side. He shakes her. “Teri?”

  She struggles to open her eyes. A part of me is still attached to her and knows what that struggle cost her. “Oh, Matt. I have to go now but it’s all right. This body dies but our love is forever.”

  Matt is suddenly desperate. “No! Your body will heal. It has to heal. It has vampire blood in it. It’s immortal.”

  Teri forces a smile. “But I’m not a vampire, you never wanted me to be one. Now please, Matt, let me go. Let’s be grateful we got this chance to say good-bye.”

  Matt shakes his head. “No! You can heal. You just need time.”

  “Time.” Somehow she reaches up and touches his lips. “Yes, I see it. We will meet again in a world without time.”

  “Wait!” He grabs her fingers and kisses them but it’s one kiss she doesn’t feel. Her eyes have closed and the life has left her. No longer does her leg bleed. Her heart has stopped. Once again, I have returned to life, but it’s to a suddenly lonely world. My child is gone.

  FIFTEEN

  Thirty hours later, I sit down the hill from IIC’s primary office in Malibu. Beside me in the driver’s seat is Umara. It’s early morning, nine o’clock, and our car is located on the lone road that leads up to the office building, if it can be called that and not a fortress. For the last six hours I’ve been alone in the car with Umara. During that time I’ve learned a great deal about the ancient Telar that she helped create and the modern Cradle Brutran and her associates now wield.

  The parallels are striking but not exact.

  “How do you feel?” Umara asks.

  “Strong. Ready.”

  Umara studies me, smiles faintly, nods. “You understand now why I had to wait for you.”

  “But you know so much more about their psychic rituals than I do.”

  “Knowledge is not the key to this victory, experience is. Only someone who has died and been reborn can face what you are about to face.”

  “Then I wish Yaksha was here.”

  My remark is too flippant. I see I’ve hurt her and try to apologize but she stops me. “He didn’t want to leave either of these monsters behind for us to destroy but he wasn’t given a choice in the matter. Krishna dictated much of his life and I never saw Yaksha disobey.”

  “Yet Yaksha spent centuries fighting the Telar.”

  Umara shrugs. “He fought to contain them. He knew he would never stop them.”

  “How am I supposed to?”

  “You’ve already said it. It takes a thorn to remove a thorn. Until the IIC matured and developed the Cradle, there was nothing on earth that could wipe out the Telar.”

  “Then I guess I better get my butt up that hill.”

  Umara eyes the steep climb from the Pacific Coast Highway. “I’d give you a ride but they have external cameras. I can’t risk them obtaining a photo of my face. Besides, it’s better I stay here. Once you enter the building, I won’t let any cars enter or exit this road.” Umara reaches over and hugs me. “Call if they start to gain the upper hand. Matt and I will come quick.”

  It feels good to hold her. “I’ll only do so as a last resort.”

  She kisses my cheek and lets go. “Time to kick ass, Sita.”

  I laugh as I climb out of the car.

  I suspect it will be a long time before I laugh again.

  I hike the road to the center of IIC’s power at a casual pace. The sky is a brilliant blue and the morning sun feels good on my reborn flesh. Of course, if I wished, I could reach the structure in seconds. But it’s my goal to use as little force as possible to achieve my goal. Cunning will serve me better with Brutran and her people than force. Still, in the end, I know blood will be spilled.

  I’ve been in IIC’s main building before. It’s four stories of bulletproof glass, and was designed by an architect who was so in love with the primal shapes—cubes, spheres, pyramids and such—that he couldn’t help but combine them all into his design. Surprisingly, the structure is pleasant to look
at, nestled as it is in a wide patch of green almost two miles back in the brown hills.

  I don’t bother to knock but walk in like I own the place. The same young woman sits at the reception desk: the secretary who insisted I use the company’s bandages to stop my fingers from bleeding. The woman flashes a bright smile, and I doubt she was in on the plot to collect my blood.

  “You were here a few months ago. I’m sorry I’ve forgotten your name.”

  “Alisa Perne. You are?”

  “Janice Walker. How can I help you this morning?”

  “I’m here to see Cynthia Brutran.”

  “Do you have an appointment?”

  “Just tell her I’m here.”

  “I will. But I must warn you that you might have to wait. Ms. Brutran’s in the middle of an important meeting.”

  I smile but my eyes add an extra punch to my next remark. “Then be sure to add that I don’t want to be kept waiting.”

  Turning, I walk toward the seats. As I do so, I reach in my pocket and remove a glass vial filled with a clear liquid and pop the cork. I allow the fluid to spill across the tile floor. The amount is so small and I leak it so quickly I doubt the receptionist notices. I hear her on the phone. It’s good to have my hypnotic powers back. She fights to make sure Brutran gets my message.

  I’m sitting for perhaps five minutes when Brutran’s handsome male secretary exits a nearby elevator. He glances at me uneasily, he knows I’m dangerous. He has a high-tech metal detector in his hand.

  “Ms. Perne. Ms. Brutran would be happy to see you now.”

  I stand and walk toward him. “Thank you. Fourth floor?”

  “Yes. I’ll take you up. But first let me apologize for a new security measure we have instigated. I have to scan you for any metal you may be carrying.”

  I casually raise my arms, for I am not armed. Not with a gun.

  “Scan away,” I say.

  Minutes later I’m led into Brutran’s corner office on the top floor. The woman doesn’t stand to greet me but remains seated behind what she probably considers legitimate shelter, her beautiful walnut desk, which she keeps crowded with computer screens. She wears a charcoal blouse, an elegant gray pantsuit, and a bright string of pearls. Like before, she’d appear to be thirty at a glance, perhaps six years older with a closer look. Yet I know she’s at least sixty years old and has a daughter that’s five.