by Brandt Legg
“Okay.” For some reason it was easier to agree with Booker than Spencer. He was commanding and had nothing to prove.
“Pretty high stakes,” Dustin said.
“Fate of the world... ” Booker said gravely. “But defeating Lightyear doesn’t solve all our problems.”
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Spencer said, immediately. “You’re going to have to meet with Luther Storch.”
“That’s not funny.”
“You think Storch is going to agree to meet with Nate?” Dustin asked.
“He’d like nothing more,” Booker smiled.
“Will Nate be safe?” Dustin asked.
“Will Storch be safe?” I asked.
Booker roared with laughter.
“I could kill him. Why not rid the world of that if I had the chance?” I asked.
“Let’s see where we are when that time comes. You may feel differently then.”
“When do I meet him?”
“Early December looks most likely.”
“Won’t he know Nate might try something? Why would he leave himself open to that?”
“We’re talking about seven or eight weeks from now. A lot can change. Let’s not waste time speculating,” Spencer said.
Booker and Spencer went on to the main house after dropping Dustin and me at our bungalows.
“Having Booker Lipton involved takes this to another level. Between his cash and our soul-powers, we’ve got a real shot at beating those Lightyear bastards!” Dustin said, as he left me at my door.
“Fate of the world,” I whispered incredulously to myself. “He’s been waiting for me.”
12
I sat by the window, alone in my room, letting the humid salty breeze satiate my senses. Through the trees, the Pacific mirrored the starry night. Despair overtook me. If Booker couldn’t defeat Lightyear, what chance did I have? Was I really safe here? How long until they tracked me down and finished the job Fitts had started?
I was suddenly looking at Kyle’s loft. His hands were working the impossibly massive all-white jigsaw puzzle that drew him in when he was most troubled. His usual unlit cigarette dangled. If only I could talk to him now, I thought, as I said his name out loud.
“I thought you agreed to stay out of my head?” he said smiling.
“Kyle, you can hear me?”
“Either that or I should start packing for Mountain View.”
“Spencer says I need to stay here for a while. Try to change the future by not doing anything. It doesn’t make sense to me. And I feel like I’m getting swallowed.”
“Meditating?” Kyle asked.
“Not enough.”
“Listen man, if you lose it, then Linh and Amber are dead. You need to meditate as much as you can. And do what Spencer says.”
“Got any new advice?”
“Federal agents were at school the past two days. They dragged in everyone who knew you, anyone who might know your whereabouts—students, teachers, even a janitor and a couple ladies from the cafeteria. They kept Linh, Amber, and me the longest.”
“Damn. I’m sorry.” With that, Kyle faded out and all I could see were soldiers running through trees—horribly unsettling, but Kyle returned.
“They threatened to indict us,” Kyle continued. “Aiding and abetting a fugitive. Even suggested Amber and I could be implicated in crimes because they know we drove you around at the times of your alleged terrorist acts.”
It was all so unfair, so unreal. I thought of the Kafka book I’d read somewhere with my Vising power. How deep did the corruption go? Would we be able to bring down something as big as Lightyear before we were silenced?
“My uncle called the principal, school superintendent, and even our congressman to complain,” Kyle began. “He and Amber’s mom have hired the same top criminal defense attorney for the three of us. Now my uncle is under surveillance just like the rest of us. It’s totally out of hand.” Then he was lost again. Images of police surrounding an RV on a busy street appeared before he, abruptly, came back.
“You all should be in hiding with me,” I suggested.
“Nate, you’re the only chance we have to save Linh and Amber. It’s too risky to lead Lightyear to you.”
“Maybe if I turn myself in the girls will be safe.”
“I hope you never have to make that choice.”
The following night I was able to communicate with Amber over the astral. “What a rush having you inside my head.”
“Sounds like you’re holding up under all the pressure.”
“Why shouldn’t I be? We’re going to win. Lightyear doesn’t know what they’re dealing with.”
“That’s the problem. I think they do,” I said.
“I saw on the news they released your mother an hour ago.”
“What?”
“You don’t know? Haven’t you talked to her? Homeland Security picked her up this morning. Held her all day for some kind of interrogation. Her attorney issued a statement and said your house was also ransacked.”
“Jesus! I have to talk to her.”
“No phones are safe. Can you get her on the astral?”
“I’m going to try now. I’ll find you later.”
But for some reason, even after meditating for an hour, I couldn’t reach her. I went to Dustin’s room and told him about Mom, and he suggested talking to Booker and Spencer. They must know something.
They were on a wide veranda overlooking a gorgeous section of beach.
“Nate, she’s all right.” Spencer stood.
“When were you going to tell us?” I tried to remember what Trevor and Kyle had said about trusting Spencer, but he always seemed to be keeping things from me.
“I’ve been monitoring the situation and would have informed you in the morning.”
“Informed me?”
“Nate, what could you have done?” Spencer asked.
Booker raised an eyebrow at the question.
“Spencer, do you know everything I can do? And even if you do, it needs to be my decision. The other day you asked why it always has to be so difficult between us. It’s because from the day we first met on Tea Leaf Beach you’ve been telling me only part of the story. It’s hard to trust someone who keeps so many secrets.”
“Just because someone holds secrets doesn’t mean they’re being deceptive or have something to hide.”
“Did you hear what you just said?”
Dustin laughed.
“Listen to me, Nate. Will you admit that this is a lot for anyone to handle? That a sixteen-year-old has little life experience to be able to deal with this kind of situation? And if I told you everything at the beginning, you might have either not believed me or run away?”
“You underestimate me, Spencer. Do you know the extent or limits of my power?”
He looked past me. His gaze stretched beyond the ocean. No one spoke.
“Are you going to answer?” I pushed.
“There are no limits. You can do anything.” His eyes focused back on me. “But that’s the broad answer. The difficulty is in the details.”
“If I can do anything, then details don’t matter.”
“Everything matters. It’s one of the truths of our human experience... Everything matters.”
Silence returned until Dustin asked, “What about our mother?”
“She was taken into custody for questioning. Your home was aggressively searched. Your mother was put through a punishing interrogation, but was released unharmed—”
“And she has a top attorney representing her now,” Booker interrupted.
“Did you hire the lawyer?” Dustin asked.
Booker nodded. “We’ve put undercover security on her round the clock.”
“You may be able to do anything, Nate, but you don’t know how yet. You couldn’t have stopped it, and she’s fine.”
“Since they took her into custody, does that mean we’ve changed the future?”
“We’re co
nstantly changing the future. There’s been progress made toward avoiding the mall attack. Even Amber’s and Linh’s deaths have been pushed back, but they’re still happening.”
“How can you be so sure that waiting on this island can change anything?”
“I know it’s frustrating, but it’s the only control we have.”
“Don’t I have any say in the decision making? I can’t take this hurry up and wait. If I’m the chosen one, why can’t I choose?”
Dustin looked at Spencer. “One of these days, Mr. Copeland, you may find that the Ryder brothers aren’t so easily controlled.”
13
The next few weeks passed slowly, as time does in the tropics. Spencer and Booker both left the day after Mom was questioned. Dustin taught me to drive in one of Booker’s nine beautifully restored convertibles he kept on Cervantes. In turn, I worked with Dustin on powers. Spencer had told us it was as important for Dustin to learn them as it was for me to practice teaching. “The Movement is filled with people ready to learn,” he said. But whenever I pressed for details about the Movement, the conversation seemed to slip away. Spencer had also warned to limit astral communications with my mom and friends as Lightyear’s tracking tactics were advancing fast.
The small staff Booker kept on the island was friendly but they weren’t interested in much conversation. They did, however, keep us well fed with healthy gourmet-style food. “We have to be the luckiest fugitives in the world,” Dustin said, almost daily. But that was when he was happy, usually after a great meal. As the days crawled, he struggled with horrific Outviews and painful micro improvements in his powers.
“Where’s Aunt Rose?” He demanded one day, after spending an hour trying to get a book to float.
“Dead.”
“You know what I mean. How come she hasn’t spoken to us? She would come to me in a dream, a vision, a voice inside my head, something. Dad’s gotten through to us.”
“Yeah, but nothing major.”
“Dad speaking to me from beyond the grave, telling me to forgive Mom, is a big deal to me. And it’s pretty freakin’ major to get a tin of matches through time from your dead father when you were about to freeze to death.”
I nodded.
“So where the hell is Aunt Rose, Nate? She was part of all this. She was helping us.”
“I don’t know. I still try to contact her every few days, but there’s nothing.”
“Maybe Lightyear figured out a way to obliterate a soul. Or maybe they found some corner of the universe to imprison souls that can’t be reached by your powers. Even dead, she’s a better teacher than you,” Dustin complained.
“I don’t deny that, but you have to take part of the blame for your problems. Maybe if you hadn’t done so many drugs.”
“Maybe if they hadn’t forced so many pharmaceuticals into me.”
“Which came first?” I paused. “Let’s just get back to practicing.”
“You practice, Golden Boy, I’m done for the day.”
Dustin ran off down the beach and was soon swimming through the surf.
I headed in the other direction. The warm, soft, white sand caressed my feet. A storm churning hundreds of miles to the west echoed in the ocean. Its mood matched mine while I sorted the fears, tension, and anger fighting for dominance in my mind. As the sun came through the clouds, I was reminded of the painting, the Ninth Wave, which was the namesake for Trevor’s boat. Its depiction of shipwreck survivors clinging to debris had inspired me since Trevor first described it, and suddenly I felt hope and excitement. My powers were real, and in my growing comfort with them was the realization that not only could I survive but that defeating Lightyear was possible. Perhaps I could help the world find enlightenment, or whatever being one of the seven meant.
I wandered back to the bungalow and pulled Rose’s journal from a drawer. It was the first time since I took it from her Merlin home that I’d done more than flip through its pages. After a couple of paragraphs, it was obvious this wasn’t Rose’s journal. The words were definitely written in her handwriting but they described a life that was not hers. By the third page I knew this book was meant for me. The mention of Taos, New Mexico, and a posse raised by the bishop to hunt the man whose story Rose had transcribed were identical to the Outview I had the night before we came to the island. It was filled with details of Thomas Mercer, Tagu, and the Indian village where I hid in that lifetime. It was called Taos Pueblo and my name was Clastier. Rose had carefully copied his/my writing at some point. Did she know I was Clastier reincarnated? Who was he, and why was the Church so against him and his beliefs? As questions continued to ricochet, I absorbed the rest of the book using my Vising power. More information and images came through than were contained within the pages, and Clastier’s words would become a constant inspiration—and distraction—to me.
14
Over the next few days the tension between Dustin and me grew as we continued working hard to advance our powers. Every session ended in an argument, and I didn’t know what to do about it. Meditation didn’t help, although it kept me calm and focused. That infuriated Dustin even more. I began taking long walks alone instead of practicing with Dustin.
Exploring the far end of the island, I wandered down a narrow trail of thick jungle and came upon a small hut, on a slight rise, with a commanding view of a dramatic and rocky section of beach. It appeared to be a place Booker might come to meditate. As I walked around looking for the entrance, an incredible sight halted me. A bone-skinny brown man wearing only faded gray shorts was levitating three feet off the ground. He seemed oblivious to my presence. His hair was shaved close and matched the color of his shorts. I couldn’t take my eyes off of him. Suddenly he spoke in a deep and steady voice that shattered the sound of surf unexpectedly.
“Can I do something for you?” He remained floating, his gaze not leaving the ocean.
“I’m sorry to disturb you,” I stuttered.
“I am not disturbed.” For some reason this made him laugh.
“I’m a friend of Booker’s. My name is Nate.”
“I am also a friend of Booker’s, so you and I must also be friends. Please. I am Wandus.”
“Do you live here?” I asked, peeking into the empty hut.
“I’m present at this place.”
“Are you a mystic?”
A broad yellow smile stretched across his narrow face. “Booker calls me a sage, but I am merely a seeker.” He spoke without moving and his humility would not allow him to admit he was a mystic. He was older than anyone I’d ever seen.
“Will you teach me to levitate?”
“You think I am too old because you are young now, yes?” he said in an accent, which confirmed he was from India. While still smiling, he floated slowly around. “But you are older than me too. Perhaps you teach me, perhaps I teach you.” Another laugh, his eyes reflecting light. I wanted to stay with him and listen to anything he had to say. His energy was so pure that being in his presence left me feeling better than I had since the Lightyear ordeal had begun, better than I had since before my dad died. Dustin needed to meet Wandus. Dustin needed to live with him.
“Come old-and-young Nate.” He unfolded his legs and they touched the ground, or at least I think they did. His steps were light and left no marks in the sand. He led me down to the beach and quickly was levitating again. “You’ll like this. I call it, ‘wave-o-tating.’” He laughed several beats under his breath. His eyes widened and his yellow teeth lit his wrinkled, leathery face. He floated just above the water until he was out above the rolling surf. Then as waves broke and crashed, he somersaulted with them, inches above the water—body-surfing for gurus. Wandus even whooped a few times.
He floated back to shore. “Now you try.”
Twenty minutes later I felt heavier than ever and thought this was impossible without years of study and contemplation.
“You think you’re not skinny enough?” He pointed at my stomach. “This is not what makes
me float. It is true I do not eat, but that is for purity of thought.”
“Wait! You don’t eat?”
He shook his head and smiled. “Not for many decades, I think.”
“How is it possible to live without food?”
“How am I here if it is not? I am here, yes?” Wandus put his hands together. “I am alone much of my life, and it becomes difficult to know if I really am here sometimes.” He looked puzzled. “Yes, see the air is full of life. As energy, all we need is energy. Food keeps us in the physical.”
“But how?”
“It can only be done by creating a life that is more spiritual than physical.”
“How long does that take?”
“A day... ten thousand days. More or less. This depends on the concentration, the contemplation... ” he said, his eyes brightened wide, “and the imagination.” He said the word as if it was brand-new.
“My world has quite a few distractions right now.”
“What if the world was run by imaginations instead of separate nations?”
“That sure would help.”
“Let me show you again.” And he rolled above the crashing foam, smiling.
After he came back to the sand, I Skyclimbed, running on top of the waves, the water falling away with each step. Breathlessly, I returned to him and fell to the sand, exhausted. His wave-o-tating didn’t tire him at all.
“Your body is tired from all the food.” He winked.
“You have seen the Mayan runner, the imprisoned martyr, the fleeing slave, defrocked priest, a betrayed soldier, a child in the plague, wealthy banker, the terrible holocaust—”
“You know about my Outviews? You can see my past lives?’
“Oh, so young in this life. They are not past lives. All those experiences are happening to you at this moment.”
“This moment?”
“This very one. Those incarnations of your soul are all in your eyes, in your aura, radiating from within you. The energy that’s in Nate on this island is all of them.”
“How do you see them?”
“It is not hard to see once you know how to look. The difficulty, my friend, is knowing how to look. Many years I have quieted myself to remove distractions. The more we look within, the more we know that is where we are.”
