Race for the Flash Stone (The Anlon Cully Chronicles Book 2)

by K Patrick Donoghue

  Pebbles smiled and handed the paper back to Anlon. “There you go.”

  He scanned the drawing and nodded. After turning off the flashlight app, he leaned over and handed back her cell phone. “Nice touch adding the names.”

  “Like I said, easy peasy.”

  “Okay, hot shot, what was the name the Munuorians attached to the flood story?”

  “Munirvo. It means ‘star washer’ in their language. It’s the name they gave the asteroid, not the flood, per se.”

  Anlon lowered onto the center island bench and faced Pebbles. “Okay, Munirvo. Got it. Now, give me a snapshot of the story. A minute, maybe two minutes long.”

  “Um, that might be a little tough,” she said.

  “Why?”

  “To get everything right, I need to think about it for a few minutes.”

  “Nope, no time. Start talking, tell me what happened.”

  Pebbles crisscrossed her legs and massaged her wrists. “Hmmm…Okay, I’ll try. So, there was this asteroid. I’m talking huge asteroid. It passed super close to Earth and pretty much destroyed the planet. The gravitational pull of the asteroid was crazy intense. When it got near Earth, it pushed the Moon further back and flipped the Earth. That caused a monster tidal wave that seriously crushed everything in its path. There were fires, volcano eruptions, earthquakes, you name it.

  “Almost nothing was left. Most people were killed. Same with plants and animals. But, there were some people who survived. Barely. That’s where the Munuorians came in. They knew the asteroid was coming long before anyone else, and they knew what it might do. So, they hunkered down and waited out the worst. When it was over, they went out to look for survivors. To help them. Well, some of the Munuorians went out to help. There were others who weren’t thrilled about it, but enough went out that it made a difference.”

  “And the Stones?” asked Anlon.

  “Right, well, the Munuorians were special. They were different from other people on Earth at the time. They had a sixth sense; they could interact with the Earth’s magnetic field. It allowed them to create magnetic tools that helped them do a bunch of stuff. Build, farm, heal injuries, move things.

  “They used the tools to protect themselves when the asteroid came, and then they went out and shared their tools with survivors, people who didn’t have their sixth sense. Without their help, the survivors would have been hosed. The Munuorians saved them. If they hadn’t helped, pretty much everyone would have died. That last part’s my opinion; Malinyah doesn’t say it that way.”

  “It’s been, what, three months since you’ve been with Malinyah?” Anlon asked.

  Embarrassed to give Anlon the precise day count, Pebbles nonchalantly said, “A little less, but close enough.”

  “A minute ago, you said the Munuorians knew Munirvo was coming, right?”

  “Yep.”

  “How did they know?”

  Pebbles patted Anlon’s knee. “You know that, I’ve told you before. Malinyah said the asteroid came from Cassiopeia. She said they were watching Cassiopeia and saw it.”

  Looking up at the sky, Anlon asked, “Why were they looking at Cassiopeia?”

  “Again, I’ve told you this already. Because other asteroids had come from there before.” Pebbles frowned.

  “Don’t get frustrated with me, there’s a method to my madness.”

  “Sorry.”

  Anlon pointed in the direction of Cassiopeia. “Did she say whether they could see Cassiopeia year-round?”

  “She said it was visible most of the time.”

  “Do you remember if she showed you a vision of the constellation when she told you the story?”

  “Yeah, that’s how I know about the W butterfly thing,” Pebbles said.

  Leaning forward, Anlon said, “All right, let’s see how good your memory is. Try to remember where Cassiopeia was in the sky in the vision she showed you. Was the asteroid inside the W or outside it?”

  “What? There’s no way I can remember that.” Pebbles said.

  “Ah, I think you’re wrong. I think you can pull it out of your memory,” Anlon said, tapping his forehead. “Concentrate on sensations you associate with her telling of the story. A smell, a sight, a sound. Anything. Take your time, there’s no rush.”

  “Hmmm…I’ll try, but I’m not sure it will work.”

  “That’s all I ask.”

  Pebbles closed her eyes and tried to recall her last session with Malinyah’s Sinethal. It was a few days after the Stillwater Quarry incident, that much she remembered. Anlon was in the hospital and Pebbles was staying at Devlin’s house. She and Jennifer had spent most of that day cleaning up the mess left by the Corchrans when they trashed the house while hunting for the Sinethal. After Jennifer had left for the evening, Pebbles had poured a generous goblet of Cabernet and settled on the study’s sofa with the black Stone. She remembered sipping the wine and running her fingers over the etchings before lying back on the sofa and activating the Stone and Malinyah’s memories…

  The first thing that popped into Pebbles’ mind about the “visit” was Malinyah’s cheerful greeting as she approached from across the marble hall. She could still visualize the wide strands of sunlight filtering between the hall’s columns. Then, she remembered the sound of the trickling fountain outside the hall and the pungent aroma of the flower gardens beyond. Malinyah reached for Pebbles’ hand and led her outside. Together they walked up a hilly path of red clay.

  Pebbles opened her eyes and wiggled her toes. Looking at Anlon, she said, “It’s so weird, but my feet feel clammy again just thinking about it.”

  Anlon said, “Thinking about the asteroid makes your feet clammy?”

  “No, silly, the red clay does,” she answered.

  “What red clay?”

  “The clay on the path,” she said.

  “What path?”

  “Forget it,” she said. “It’s not important.”

  Pebbles closed her eyes again and wiggled her toes.

  Back into the memory, she recalled Malinyah leading her to a massive, wide-branching tree with bright pink foliage and dozens of long, ribbonlike roots jutting two to three feet above the ground in every direction. Gaping at the canopy of pink above her head, she exclaimed, “That’s a cool-looking tree!”

  Malinyah turned and smiled. “It is beautiful. We call it Seybalrosa.”

  In the background, beyond the hill crest where Seybalrosa anchored its snaking roots, Pebbles could hear crashing waves. Peering left and right, she noticed rows upon rows of tall cacti curved around the tree. To Pebbles, the collection of prickly plants did not appear to be a natural formation but rather a designed garden. The limbs of the cacti looked like outstretched arms reaching toward the Seybalrosa’s drooping leaves.

  Arriving at the tree’s base, Malinyah motioned for Pebbles to sit on a curled root. Sliding beside her, Malinyah patted her thigh while inhaling the Seybalrosa’s pleasing aroma. Pebbles recalled asking Malinyah why they had come to the tree. Malinyah told her she wanted to share the Munirvo saga so that Pebbles could understand their purpose in sharing the Stones with the asteroid survivors. Malinyah said it was customary to tell important tales about their history at the shrine.

  The sights, sounds and aromas of the Sinethal experience always stretched believability to Pebbles, but every time Malinyah physically touched her it seemed a sensation beyond possibility. Yet, there could be no mistaking the feel of Malinyah’s hand gently tapping her knee. She could feel its warmth and the light pressure of her fingertips rapping against her skin. Even now.

  Pebbles’ eyes opened and she said to Anlon, “Ugh! It’s happening again. When we sat by the tree, she touched me. I can literally feel her fingers on my leg right now.”

  “Tree?”

  “Yeah, the Seybalrosa tree,” she said.

  “Say-ball-rosa?” Anlon scratched his head. “You’ve never mentioned that before.”

  “Really? I’m sure I must have. It’s a shrine.�
��

  “Shrine?”

  “Yeah, they had this big tree with gnarly roots. It had pink leaves and a bunch of cacti around it. Malinyah said it was the place where they tell important stories. Now, be quiet!” Covering her face with both hands, Pebbles searched her mind for the beginning of the Munirvo tale. It was a struggle to drop back into the conversation. She chided Anlon, “Now you’ve made me forget!”

  “Remember what I suggested,” Anlon said. “Focus on the sensations you remember, not the story. Her hand on your leg, the clay on your feet, the pink leaves, any scents or sounds.”

  Pebbles peeked from behind her hands and hissed, “Shhh!”

  She took a deep breath and tried Anlon’s suggestion. She concentrated her focus on the Seybalrosa’s pink leaves and suddenly remembered a light wind tickling the leaves. Then the sound of the waves filtered back into the memory and she recalled the butterfly…a golden butterfly with black dots that came to rest on Malinyah’s shoulder.

  When it landed, Malinyah didn’t even notice. Then several others touched down on her shoulders and head. They both laughed when one tried to land on the bridge of her nose. Malinyah wriggled her nose and it fluttered away. It circled the two of them before descending onto Pebbles’ shoulder. Malinyah smiled. “The Breylif, he wants to hear the story too!”

  Anlon watched with fascination as Pebbles’ hands slid from her face. Her eyes remained closed, but her head moved about as if watching something. She reached to her shoulder and softly giggled. Then she nodded her head and clasped her hands in her lap. Her face adopted a grave expression.

  Pebbles listened intently as Malinyah commenced the Munirvo tale: “We call ourselves Munuorians. The name means ‘star watchers.’ We have watched the stars for years beyond count and have learned many secrets from them. Over the ages, they’ve fed our powers, fostered wisdom, brought new life…and reawakened terrors.”

  One night, she told Pebbles, a new star appeared in the sky. It was faint at first but still drew the attention of their astronomers, people Malinyah called the Fandis. She said the Fandis had been expecting the new star to appear.

  Pebbles interrupted to ask, “Wait, why were they expecting it?”

  “Because, it has happened many times before,” she said.

  Malinyah bent down and used her finger to draw a pinwheel design in the red clay. Pressing a finger into the clay, Malinyah made a mark on a thin inner spiral. She said, “Terra is here.” She then pressed her finger at a spot slightly ahead of Earth on an outer spiral of the pinwheel. She said, “The trouble always comes from here.”

  Malinyah motioned her hand to imitate the pinwheel spinning. She said, “As we move around the sun, so does the sun around the wheel…and the wheel, in turn, spins through the black.

  “The Fandis believe that as the wheel turns, its path crosses stones that sit in the black. When the crossings happen, the Fandis say the stones hit stars and planets in the outer spiral. Some of the pieces fall into the path of Terra’s spiral. Sometimes the pieces fly close to Terra, sometimes not. Sometimes they are small, other times very large.”

  “How did they know where to look?” Pebbles asked.

  Malinyah drew a W in the clay and then took Pebbles by the hands. She filled her mind with a vision showing a sky full of stars and a small-but-bright Munirvo. She said, “Can you see the shape I drew?”

  “Yes, I see it.”

  “The pieces always come from the sky around this. We call it Breylif.”

  “You call it a butterfly?” asked Pebbles.

  “Yes, does it not look like one?” Malinyah asked in return.

  “Hmmm…maybe,” said Pebbles.

  Exiting the constellation vision, Malinyah lifted a butterfly with the tip of her finger. “What do these creatures do? They go from one flower to another, taking food from one to give it to others. We view Breylif in the sky the same. Sometimes it gives, other times it takes.”

  Returning to the story, Malinyah told Pebbles the Fandis watched Munirvo for a year. As it grew brighter and larger, they measured its path and speed and assured the Munuorian elders, including Malinyah, it would not come near Terra. She gripped Pebbles’ hands again and showed her a vision of Munirvo approaching in the night sky.

  Malinyah said, “They said it would come close to Rosa, but not Terra. Then, the unspeakable happened. The star clashed with Rosa. For three nights, the night sky flashed with lights brighter than Manã. When the light faded, Rosa throbbed in the night sky…and the star veered toward Terra…with many smaller lights trailing behind.

  “It was then the Fandis foresaw the catastrophe to come. They said Munirvo and the stars trailing it would pass close to Terra in less than six months. We began preparations immediately.”

  Malinyah paused and bowed her head. A terrible ache rippled through Pebbles’ body. The butterfly lifted off her shoulder and drifted toward the cactus garden.

  Anlon watched the rapid changes in Pebbles’ body language and facial expressions. Her face suddenly twisted in anguish. She clenched her arms across her abdomen and rocked forward. She uttered a low moan.

  Malinyah described to Pebbles the preparations her people took to protect themselves from the chaos that was to come. Using their special Stones, she explained, they burrowed safe havens in the mountains. In these chambers, they stockpiled food and other supplies. For water, they tunneled through the rock and channeled a mountain waterfall into a carved streambed. Around the base of the mountains, the Munuorians piled massive boulders into a makeshift breakwater.

  “All the while, Munirvo drew closer,” Malinyah said. “Soon, it was visible during daylight and grew as large as the Sulã. Unlike the golden rays from Sulã, however, the star-washer was bright white. At night, its flickering tail spread across the horizon and dwarfed Manã’s light.”

  The Munuorians sent out their trading ships to acquire a final round of provisions. Upon returning, the ships’ captains reported unrest among the civilizations in the foreign lands across the seas.

  Malinyah described the civilizations as primitive tribes with disparate cultures. “They possessed only a rudimentary understanding of the stars,” she told Pebbles. “For some, the constellations served primarily as mystical deities. For others, Terra and the stars were of one world.”

  Although the Munuorians built friendly relationships with many of these civilizations, the foreigners were universally skeptical of the more advanced Munuorians. Understanding this, the Munuorian elders, the Andaers, forbade the use of the Stones in the presence of foreigners.

  Malinyah looked intently at Pebbles. “Upon returning from the trading voyage, the greatest of our captains, Mereau, met with the Andaers. He told them the nations were completely unprepared for what was coming. He begged us to let him disperse the fleet to the closest nations and warn them, help them prepare.

  “Some of the Andaers, including me, supported Mereau. Others did not. One voice was stronger than all. Muran. Muran said it was too late to help them. Already the seas had begun to roil. Muran said the ships would be destroyed before they reached them. Mereau called Muran heartless. I was there when he screamed, ‘We have the power to save them. We have to help!’ But Muran’s argument swayed the Andaers…all except me.”

  Malinyah’s face flushed crimson and Pebbles felt the Munuorian’s emotions surge through her own body. Malinyah unfurled her hand and one of the butterflies danced off her shoulder, circled down and landed on her open palm. A tear trickled down Malinyah’s cheek. She whispered, “It was unforgiveable.”

  To Pebbles, it felt like someone clawing her insides. She tightened her hands into fists and slammed them on the boat bench. “Why? Why wouldn’t they help?”

  The sudden gesture startled Anlon. He watched with concern as tears streamed down Pebbles’ face. She barked deep, guttural cries. Sweat coated her face and neck. She pounded the bench over and over. Anlon had watched long enough. He leaned over and grasped her wrist. He called out sharply, “Pebb
les! Stop! Snap out of it!”

  She fought against him, eyes still closed. Anlon grasped her other wrist and lifted her off the bench. He pulled her against his body and quickly wrapped his arms around her. Pebbles’ whole body shuddered and she tried to squirm away. Anlon placed his lips against her ear and whispered soothingly.

  Her body suddenly slumped against him and her eyes fluttered open. She panted heavily for a short time. When her breathing settled, she wrapped her arms around Anlon’s waist and lowered her head to rest on his shoulder.

  Huddled inside the folds of the blanket, Pebbles leaned back against the aft bench and rested her feet on the center island. Still in a daze, she closed her eyes and struggled to understand what triggered the intense experience. After all, tonight wasn’t the first time she had revisited a conversation with Malinyah. In fact, during Anlon’s long recuperation, Pebbles had thought of Malinyah constantly. There were certainly emotions that arose when reminiscing about their past conversations, but nothing like tonight’s explosion.

  Pebbles was also surprised by the new details that rushed forth during tonight’s replay of the Munirvo tale. Given the time that had passed since Malinyah first shared the saga, she expected the opposite.

  In the background, footsteps stuttered across the deck. A moment later came the unmistakable plunk of a cork stopper, followed by two extended trickles. Then Pebbles felt Anlon cup her hand around a chilled shot glass. She smiled and took two small sips.

  Anlon gulped down his shot and flopped onto the bench next to Pebbles. They sat in silence for several minutes. The lake was perfectly still.

  It was Pebbles who spoke first. “I don’t know what to say.”

  Anlon remained silent, unsure what to say himself. He was dying to know what transpired during her trance, but he felt it was too soon to ask her to talk about it.

  Pebbles stirred in the seat, opened her eyes and looked at Anlon. “That was some crazy you-know-what!” He smiled and took hold of her hand. She said, “How did that happen? I never touched the Stone.”