The Deeps (Book Three of The Liminality)

  As we glided across the landscape, our vision expanded beyond the single perspective that we had shared to an all-encompassing, almost God-like sense of knowing. It was almost too much for my mind to process, this seeing near and far, a thousand places at once. My natural response was to shut my mind down, and block most of it out.

  “No. This is not the time to be a turtle. Come out of your shell. Use the Singularity.”

  I couldn’t. I feared losing myself. Once I let my soul scatter, I might never get it back. I turned inward to a dark and cozy, womb-like place that was ever-present inside me but seldom visited. A place with no external noise, no demands. Heroin must feel like this the first time.

  Before I could lock myself away, a blazing beacon erupted and seared through my shell. The Singularity reasserted itself, dragging me back into the light.

  Close by, just one horde over from the marching column we had just visited, it had found a heart that resonated with mine, a soul whose core burned brighter than the rest. I opened up and fluttered towards it like a moth to a flame.

  “Yes! You’re doing it! Keep yourself open. Let it take you. It is finding what you seek.”

  I couldn’t accept what was happening. It was too good to be true. Something had to go wrong now. Something would happen to make everything go to shit. That was the way of the universe.

  We swooped into the next horde, a larger group, even more strung out than the first, flanked by well-organized squads of Protectors led by Hashmallim. Faith was vivid and strong in this group because they had recently met the Horus and it had taken hundreds of their number. Those in the vanguard who had witnessed the taking had become galvanized and all the more fanatical in their chase.

  And there was my beacon, limping along in the back of the column. We circled cautiously. I held us back. But this had to be Karla. It could be no other.

  “Go to her, you fool!”

  Against my reluctance, we hurtled forward, and there she was, looking all gray and battered, dusty and fragile, but unmistakably Karla. She was damaged, somehow. There was a hitch in her gait. Her legs weren’t working quite right.

  The bits of our souls pressed forward and meshed with hers. She gasped and collapsed to her knees.

  In an instant, I was privy to all that she had felt and experienced since we parted. Her initial fear turned to defiance and disdain, compassion for the broken souls in the column, a raw and recent memory of several encounters with Hashmallim, the latest resulting in a vicious attack. She had been clubbed and crippled as a punishment for lagging.

  I found in her the seed of a desperate, burgeoning belief in the Horus, her last shred of hope. She had nothing else to cling to in this world. The Horus now offered the only possibility of escape.

  She still held a place for me, sequestered deep in her consciousness, but it had atrophied in to a dusty keepsake, tucked away like a widow’s shrine.

  She felt my presence. It occurred to her that I might be with her, but she denied it. Her body tried to summon tears that could no longer flow. Instead, she heaved with sobs, swamped in a misery.

  “I’m here, La. It’s really me. I’m here.”

  But my message could not penetrate the wall around her soul. She sensed me only as a distant apparition from her own memory.

  “She can’t hear you.”

  “Why not?”

  “She’s not like you. She’s not attuned to the Singularity. Let her go. You accomplished your task. You found her. But you can’t stay. It’s not good for her or you to linger.”

  Powerful forces began to build and tug at my soul. I didn’t want to go. I clung to Karla like an ant to a leaf in a windstorm. I tried to help her, reaching out with every iota of my soul to give her strength, to heal her.

  “Let her go. You’re hurting her.”

  “But....”

  “Let her go. You got what you came for. You found her, didn’t you?”

  “But if I go, how will I—?”

  The Singularity surged and wrenched us away. I lost all contact. We soared up and out of the horde, whipping around the back of the looming Horus, over column after column of marchers arrayed around it like extra hands around a clock. Accelerating until all was a blur, we retreated over the hills and dunes to Tiamat and its catacombs, to Lady An’s chamber.

  I fell convulsing to the floor. My mind’s eye filled with the image of a clock with the Horus at the center, Tiamat at high noon, the first horde at one, Karla at four o’clock.

  Lady An stood over me, smiling, reaching out her hand. A hellish heat began to build. My vision began to fade.

  Chapter 35: Dartmouth

  Heat meant life. I opened my eyes to a partly opened car window smeared with bird poop. Scraggly-looking thunderheads were building in the west, but the sun still shone between them, glaring through the windshield, I felt like an ant under a looking glass, the rays focused into a beam concentrated enough to blister my exoskeleton. This was the one part of coming back from the Deeps that I would never get used to.

  We were stopped outside a Wendy’s just off the highway. The girls munched French fries and spicy chicken sandwiches. When Ellen noticed me alert, she reached for a sack and handed it to me.

  “We got one for you, too. Have a nice nap?”

  “Not … a nap,” I said, all thick-tongued and befuddled. “Four o’clock.”

  “Actually it’s more like four-thirty.”

  “No. I mean … I was just trying to remember something.”

  I was burning up, sweating profusely. My inside of my mouth felt as dry as leather. I grabbed a cold soda from the tray and began sucking it down.

  “Um … that actually my Coke you’re drinking. But what the hell. Go ahead.”

  “Where the heck are we?”

  “White River Junction.”

  “Where’s that?”

  “On the edge of New Hampshire. Close to Hanover, actually. We’re only about twenty minutes away. Wendell’s been sending texts, by the way. I think he wants you to call him.”

  I picked up the phone from the dashboard. The sun-warmed aluminum casing felt like a hot potato in my hands. I counted three messages from Wendell since I had been away. I rang him up.

  “Hey guy. Good to hear from you. Nice to see you guys back on track.”

  “What’s the address?” I said.

  “Whoa. Chomping at the bit, are we? Did I touch a nerve there? Is it that little girl Isobel? She must mean a lot to you.”

  “Fuck you. Give me the fucking address.”

  “You already got it. Check your GPS. You’ll find there’s a new waypoint uploaded.”

  “How did you—?”

  “Magic. What can I say?”

  “What’s his … her name?”

  “Just look at your GPS. I’ll send you a picture once you’re on site. I need you there no later than 6:15 pm. I’m a little worried about the weather, but it may not be an issue. In fact, it might work out to our advantage. I have to say, I like your change in attitude. I guess it takes all kinds. Some Facilitators … all they need is carrots. A nice, fat expense account and voilà—it’s like we got a natural born killer on our hands. But I guess you don’t respond as well to material wealth. A guy like you needs a good stick. Something for the personnel file, I suppose.”

  “Yeah. Whatever. Bye.”

  I pulled out the GPS, turned it on, clicking through the screens until I found that a third set of coordinates had been added to ‘treegirl and ‘laurent.’

  ‘JasonCollins.’

  I glanced over at Ellen. She was staring at me, trying to bore into my psyche again.

  “Why are you looking at me like that?”

  “You’re sounding a little too eager to find this next guy.”

  “Don’t worry. I know what I’m doing.”

  “But … we agreed—”

  “Shush! You gotta trust me, Ellen! I’ve got a plan. Now, how do we get to Hanover?”

  Ellen slumped and crossed her
arms. She wouldn’t look at me.

  “Ellen?”

  “We need to double back on the highway. 91 North. I think it’s the second exit. We drove right past it on the way down, when you were snoozing. I had a craving for spicy chicken so we went hunting for this Wendy’s. Had half a mind to keep on driving. Probably should have.”

  “Start up the car,” I said. “Let’s go.” I winked at her. “You need to have more faith in me, kid.”

  ***

  As we crossed the bridge into Hanover, the darkened skies began to spit and sputter. Tired thunder growled, barely registering over the sound of the radio. The storm, however strong it might have been, was now feeble and spent. The sun, which had never completely left us, sent shafts stabbing through the gaps in the tattered clouds. Sun showers.

  The brick and ivy of Dartmouth soon made its imposing presence known over the green and the fancy little restaurants and shops clustered at its base. This was a college town, through and through.

  “I’ve got a friend from high school who goes here,” said Ellen. “She’s probably a senior by now.”

  “Looks like a nice place,” I said. “Looks expensive.”

  “They all are these days,” said Ellen. “Even the shitty ones.”

  “How’d you end up in the UK.”

  “Thought I told you. I went to Bates for a year. And then to St. Andrews for what was supposed to be a semester abroad. But I liked it too much. I didn’t want to leave. I stayed on, till they caught me working without a visa.”

  Something about that time line clashed with my perceptions.

  “How … how old are you, exactly?”

  “I turned twenty-one a few months ago”

  “Huh. Go figure. You could have been buying us drinks all along.”

  She scrunched her eyes at me.

  “Why? How old are you?”

  “Nineteen. I think.”

  “You seem … older.”

  “Must be my gravitas. What can I say? I had a rough life these past couple years. Nothing like Urszula, though. She’s thirteen, going on a hundred.”

  “That, I can see. She seems pretty mature … for her age.”

  Urszula wriggled out of her slouch in the back seat. “Are you people talking about me again?”

  “Hey, have you gone back … since—”

  “Yes.”

  “How are things back there?”

  “Good. Things are good.”

  ***

  It was all trial and error trying to home in on Wendell’s coordinates with that old school GPS unit. No sexy robotic to guide you along step by step. Instead we’d take a turn and find ourselves rolling farther and farther from our destination. I don’t know why Wendell couldn’t have just given us the damned address. Or at least, a better GPS.

  We knew we lucked into the right street when the unit started beeping on the fringes of campus, just past a hill crowded with dorms. I pulled over immediately and checked the display. That name—’JasonCollins’—was flashing.

  I checked my watch. It was a little after 5:30.

  “We’re a bit early,” I said. I turned off the wipers. Raindrops immediately speckled our view.

  The iPhone chimed in a text. It was a photograph, just like Wendell had promised. A red-haired kid with freckles and flowing locks. I shared it with the girls.

  “Oh dang,” said Ellen. “Look at that smile. He looks so nice.”

  “Yeah, well. Someone in Frelsi doesn’t think so.”

  “Please tell me you’re not gonna hurt him.”

  “Trust me, Ellen. Okay? I know what I’m doing. I just don’t want to talk about it in the open.”

  Urszula grinned broadly, as if she could read my mind. Ellen remained wary and puzzled.

  “As long as … you’re doing the right thing. That’s all that matters.”

  “Pull the car forward,” I said. “Slowly.”

  We crept ahead until the proximity reading on the GPS unit fell to fifty meters, then twenty.

  “Stop right here.”

  We found ourselves in the middle in the middle of an athletics complex. A gate in a chain link fence led to an array of rain-slickened tennis courts. Dark blue in a sea of green.

  “Maybe … he’s an athlete,” said Ellen.

  “You think?”

  A windswept drizzle kicked up and spattered the pavement. There was nobody around.

  “What if the rain keeps him away?”

  “Not much we can do.” My eyes scanning the pine trees, their trunks wet and dark. Lush lawns sloped up to some brick buildings atop the hill. They looked too barren for dorms, but their facades crawled with ivy.

  “Funny. And I thought the ivy thing was just a name.”

  “My dad really wanted me to come here,” said Ellen.

  “So why didn’t ya? Too much money?”

  “I didn’t get in,” she said. “Busted my butt all through high school. Took every AP class. Field hockey. Volunteering. Anything I could to make my Dartmouth app more competitive. All for nothing.”

  “Bates? That doesn’t sound like nothing.”

  “No ivy. The whole point of my life up to then was to get into an ivy.”

  “Weird,” I said, shrugging. “I don’t see what the big deal is. A school’s a school.”

  “Not … quite,” said Ellen.

  “Ivies help you get places in life … that you otherwise would have a hard time reaching. So they say.”

  “Yeah well. Life isn’t the be all and end all of things.”

  “But you only get one.”

  “No, you don’t.” I smirked at Urszula. “She doesn’t have a clue, does she?”

  “What about you? Did you—?”

  “College? Never applied. Mom made me take ACTs. Did pretty good—a 32. But after she and dad passed, college was out of the question.”

  “What do you mean? Why?”

  “Well … I didn’t see the point. I was kind of preoccupied with … other stuff. And besides, who was gonna pay for it?”

  “What? No one ever told you about financial aid? An orphan with a 32 ACT score. I bet there were a lot of places willing to give you a free ride.”

  “Dartmouth?”

  “Not likely. You have to be pretty special to come here.”

  “I’m special. So is Urszula.”

  “Magic doesn’t count.”

  “Well, it should.”

  “What about you, Urszula? Did they have colleges where you came from?”

  “No,” she said. “Only coal mines. And war.”

  A text chimed into the iPhone: “Plan B if you need it. Second floor of Bissell. Choate dorms.”

  Another burst of rain spattered the windshield. The drops congealed and ran down the glass. Puddles formed on the tennis courts.

  “I’ve always hated tennis,” I said.

  “Why? It’s just a game,” said Ellen.

  “It’s that culture. All those prissy people in the white skirts and all.”

  “Oh, it’s not like that anymore. You ever see Serena Williams?”

  “I don’t care. I still hate it.”

  Ellen sighed. “It’s not even worth hating. It’s just a silly game.”

  My gaze drifted to a clump of dead leaves stuck under the wiper blade. I had seen it before and didn’t think anything of it, but now I noticed it curling and uncurling weakly. Whatever force of will had animated it had dissipated or returned to its source. It was kind of sad to see.

  But was this actually Billy or some leftover piece of Wendell? I felt no connection to it, but I couldn’t be sure it wasn’t Billy. So I let it be. Wendell probably had plenty of other ways of keeping tabs on us.

  It was ten after six. I wondered how long we should hang around after the designated time. It sucked that we couldn’t just get this all over with tonight.

  The back door opened. Urszula stepped out and strode into the middle of the street, wielding her scepter like a rifle and scanning the neighborh
ood like a soldier walking point.

  I rolled down the window. “Get back in here. Someone’s gonna think that thing’s a gun.”

  “Someone is coming,” she said.

  I craned my head around. A kid with tousled ginger hair came loping down the walk with a sheathed racket tucked over one shoulder, carrying a gym bag bursting with tennis balls. He dressed more like a snowboarder than some preppie tennis player.

  He gave Urszula a long glance, but went right past her through the gate into the sodden courts. A thick and steady drizzle was still coming down.

  He unsheathed the racked and started whacking overhand serves. Ball after ball whipped across the net on wicked curve, each one splashing into a puddle in the far corner, flirting with the back line but always landing with at least an inch to spare.

  “Man, he’s good,” said Ellen.

  I sighed. “I guess I should go see if this is our guy.”

  “Wait. I’m coming, too,” said Ellen, eying me suspiciously.

  We got out and slipped through the gate. Droplets of drizzle collected on my fleece.

  “What the heck is he doing out here in the rain? A place like this must have indoor courts. A practice bubble?”

  “Maybe he likes to handicap himself with the elements. Or he just likes to practice alone.”

  “Cross country, I could see, but tennis?”

  The kid tossed a glance our way as we approached, but he kept firing away. When he had blasted the last ball, he grabbed the empty gym bag and trotted over to retrieve all of the stray balls. One rolled up right in front of me and Ellen. I picked it up and brought it over.

  “Thanks,” he said, holding open the gym bag, avoiding eye contact.

  “Are you … uh … is your name Jason Collins by any chance?”

  “Yeah. That’s me. Why?”

  “Okay. This is gonna sound weird. But we thought we should warn you, someone wants you dead.”

  Ellen startled me with a squeal and plonked a kiss on my chin. She squeezed my hand and made sure I noticed the approval in her eyes.

  “Yeah?” said the kid. “What else is new?”

  He didn’t seem the slightest bit perturbed or surprised. I thought it prudent not to mention that the ‘someone’ who was supposed to do the deed was standing right in front of him.

  “You already know?”

  “Well, yeah. I’ve been getting death threats for … well … it’s been a while. But … all last year ….”