“I assume you mean Art,” Jinx said, gently shoving the man back. “Things with Art don’t work that way.”
“So, how do they—?” Unger muttered, looking at the tiny hand in mild reproach.
Jinx made a noise in his throat to interrupt. “You wouldn’t understand. It’s an us thing.”
I watched Unger’s expression tick. There was no chance he cared about what we were, because I saw the look on his face when he’d broken down Ursula’s door. Unger cared about life. It was what drove him to exhaust himself, to fight for people in need, to discover. “Try me.”
“Art never asks anyone to do anything. He just seems to attract exactly the type of people to fulfill whatever tasks might be waiting.” Jinx frowned in concentration, obviously trying to put words to inexplicable feelings. “I’m pretty sure he knows what we’re going to do and so he just lets it happen and only intervenes when he thinks we need it.”
“So he used Lilith.”
It was a very different tone of voice than the one Unger had used to suggest I be more patient with Arthur’s dharma, but then again, that had been a vision. The real Matthew Unger probably never suggested anyone allow themselves to be compromised for any cause, noble or otherwise. If I had had more faith in him, I would have known it was a vision much earlier and would have been able to prevent all of this.
Some uncanny insight.
“Arthur uses you to get things done?”
Jinx shook his head in perplexed denial. “No. I mean, it’s more like, I dunno, outsourcing, or something. It’s his ability, I think, like, a combination of the whole fortune-telling thing and sooth saying.”
The detective eyed his blue hair in disbelief. “So, you have a hunch that’s really his, and then you do all the work, because it’s your hunch. Then you take the work to him and he does what with it?”
Jinx shrugged.
“But they’re your hunches. Don’t you want to take them somewhere?”
“I do, but that’s kind of the point. I take them somewhere and get back to him. I’m an independent contractor.”
“Who isn’t paid.”
“Have you had Sam’s coffee?”
Unger’s brows drew together and though he was stoic, I could see the smile he was trying to hide. Their faces seemed so much clearer in the jhana, as my eyes did not get in the way of my sight. It was heady how much detail I could find. It would be easy to become reliant upon it.
“So he didn’t ask you to do something illegal, but you did it anyway.”
It was the demeanor of an investigator, acted out in tiny gestures and suggestions. Unger was interrogating an immortal without even seeming to, baiting him into answering questions, taking advantage of his weaknesses to gain information. I’d have called it supernatural, if not for the fact that I now had a different perspective on the word.
“If I told him I was doing it, he would have told me to stop, for my own safety; which is why I didn’t tell him.” Jinx looked up at him mischievously, completely oblivious to the manipulation, or obeying it without concern. “He also didn’t ask me to find out who sent Eva the money. Nor did he ask me to find out that the corporation in question is a front for another group. And when I find out what I’m looking for, I probably won’t tell him that either. I’ll get back to him when I hit a wall, and then we’ll plan something.”
Unger’s face blanked as he tried to sum up all he wanted to know in a single word that would make it past Jinx’s impatient guard. “Group?”
Gloating, the hacker turned away and gave a lazy shrug. “Yeah, but it’s all real confusing, so you probably don’t wanna hear about it. I mean, you’ll probably end up investigating it, and then you’ll find out all this secret stuff, and then you’ll eventually end up needing help or wanting to tell someone, and then it will get back to him, and maybe turn out that it was all a part of his game plan anyway. Besides, you work for a government agency, which tends to breed suspicion against any large-scale conspiracy theory.”
The scowl on Unger’s face was comical. He crossed his arms and glowered down at the boy.
“What?” Jinx said lightly, still enjoying his strategic advantage. “It’s a documented phenomenon. I mean you guys know how incompetent you are and how impossible it is for you to keep secrets, so you think you’re in a position to know how unlikely a conspiracy is. Which is exactly how they keep a conspiracy a secret from the very people who are a part of it! I don’t even want to go into . . .” He trailed off helpfully, just as Unger opened his mouth to interrupt.
“Jinx!”
Leaning back, the hacker tapped a few keys aimlessly. “I’m just saying . . .” But trailed off, anticipating Unger’s hasty rejoinder.
“Well say something useful.”
Jinx was already looking up at him speculatively and considered him for a long while. Then the sparkle of revelation awoke in his eye and he launched forward in his chair to point at the screen of his computer.
“Okay, so, like, the money that was deposited into Eva’s account originated in the Caiman Islands. It was a dummy account, a way of washing money.”
“Laundering?”
“No, ‘washing.’ They just wanted a few degrees of separation; they weren’t even trying. It’s almost like they wanted the Sangha to know.”
“‘They?’”
But Jinx was a snowball rolling downhill. “Normally, any inquiries into the money would end there, because it was just a number and was closed right after she died, but there is not a single safe that these hands cannot crack.”
Just to accent this, he squeezed his fists and cracked his knuckles.
Unger rolled his eyes.
“I took it upon myself to follow the money backward, and you’ll never guess where it ended.”
“Where?”
Jinx’s smile flashed. “You sure you want to know?”
“Just get to the—” Unger growled.
“Not easy to do, Sherlock.” Jinx got up from the table and went to the wall of lines, to the branch on which Eva and I were both positioned. Without a word, he pointed at our photograph and then traced the line backward, past other photos, pages of biographic information, and old newspaper clippings. He walked slowly, Unger trailing behind in something akin to awe at the sheer size of the “family tree.” When they came to the beginning, just to the left of the doorway, the boy’s polished nail lifted and tapped a name. And that’s when I understood.
There was the Buddha, a mounted bas relief sculpture, gilded in gold. From him sprang a list of names, written in both English and Sanskrit, but only one had “offspring” and it was a name I recognized.
Unger stared at it in bewilderment.
“The Buddha didn’t write anything down. Writing is antithetical to the ‘live in the moment’ ideology. It wasn’t until after his death that his followers transcribed his sermons, but . . .”
They couldn’t remember, I thought to myself, just as Jinx echoed my words.
“The disciple Ananda was graced with an idenic memory, so they wrote down what he told them to, but there’s no guarantee that his reproduction was accurate.”
In triumph, Jinx turned back to Unger and watched him follow the logic, which the man did like the expert he was, but concealed like the old curmudgeon I loved.
Hand crooked over his rough chin, he brooded. “So, what are—?”
“Well, I’ve been thinking about it for a long time; I mean, it’s not like you hear about any of these guys”—he pointed to the list of names beside the Buddha—“rampaging over earth, laying waste and shit. It’s all the younger guys raising hell.” Jinx’s childlike eyes were glittering in fierce amusement and pent-up excitement. “So what if it wasn’t Buddha’s fault? What if it was Ananda’s? What if he did something, and every Arhat after that was fucked?”
I waited, desperately willing Unger to ask the question I longed to ask. After a few pensive moments, he did.
“Intentionally?”
“Well, th
at’s the real question, isn’t it?”
“What’s that have to do with Eva’s bank account?”
Deflated, Jinx threw up his hands. One of them collided with the list of names on the wall. “Look, the disciples of Buddha who were left after his death ended up forming the First Sangha. They told Ananda, still a Stream-Enterer, that he wasn’t allowed to be a part of the meetings, unless he achieved the next ‘stage’ of enlightenment, unless he was liberated. The legend says that he studied hard, meditated for days to achieve the jhana, just so that he could recite the sutras. What if he was pissed enough to sabotage their efforts to spread Buddhism? The original Arhat go on, completely oblivious, passing around their pamphlets like Mormons, unaware that they’re spreading a lethal disease!”
Unger stared at the wall. “You think that this Ananda guy formed a group too?” At Jinx’s prodding look, he chewed his lip and continued to murmur, “And you think that that group might just be willing to keep their eye on the Sangha, approach one of their assets, and turn them.”
Jinx almost exploded in a rush of air he fluffed and fanned with his hands. “That money originated in an account that was opened by a charity called ‘The Guardians of the Dharma’ which was Ananda’s title! They paid her to recover information from inside AMRTA. And the payments began two weeks before she started work at AMRTA.”
Something was missing. Why would the Guardians of the Dharma want to hand the Sangha a potential cure for the disease their leader created? Most importantly, why had Eva agreed? I could still see the determination in her face as she stood arguing with Arthur in the alley. She had seemed to want the cure as well, which meant that she was probably not an ideal informant for the Guardians.
“I’m not sure about this,” Unger muttered. “There’s a lot missing. Without facts, we can’t be sure. You’re the mathematician. I thought that was your thing.”
For a moment, it seemed that Unger had leveled the boy with the gravest of insults. Silently fuming, he turned on his heel and walked back to his computer. It was obvious he had come to like the astonished admiration with which I greeted his momentous disclosures and did not like being directly criticized. Something told me that was one reason why Arthur preferred him to research on his own.
“I’ve been wading through several thousand years of history. You didn’t even know the Sangha existed before two weeks ago and you expect me to have proof? You go find proof! I’ve got stuff to do!”
Eyebrows raised, Unger leaned against the door and took out his cigarettes. Packing them as loudly as possible, he watched the boy ignore him. Soon rings of smoke encircled him and wafted toward the immortal. Sardonic smile in place, Unger tossed the butt on the floor and stepped on it, trying to get a rise out of my colorful friend.
Which he did. “Pick it up.”
The unofficial winner of the stand-off grinned. “So what does he say about this hunch of yours?”
Obviously bothered, Jinx slammed the laptop closed. “He doesn’t say anything, because I don’t need the help! Unlike some people, I’m very good at figuring things out and I don’t make it a habit of getting into trouble out of which other people have to rescue me!”
There I was, the third party to an argument that was about me, but unable to break it up. I hovered between them, longing to take their hands and force them to shake, to explain to Jinx that I did what I did because I liked Unger, and to explain to the detective that the immortal was not dangerous to me or anyone else.
Was this the point? I was flattered two people cared so much about me, but why was I seeing this when I could in no way change anything?
Unger glared at Jinx, who glared back.
“I didn’t ask her to do it. I didn’t want her to do it. I would gladly trade places, but something tells me they wouldn’t offer.”
I would have smiled if possible. If I didn’t know any better, I’d have thought he had a crush on me. His protectiveness was almost sweet.
Jinx looked away, shaking his head, “Yeah, that’s easy for you to say.”
“I knew her longer than you did, so what’s your problem? If anyone should want to help her, it’d be me.”
“Right. You’re going to rescue one of ‘us,’ huh? Why does that surprise me?”
Stepping away from the wall, Unger started toward him. “I don’t care about any of that!”
“Could have fooled me.”
“Look, you little . . .”
Just then, the door opened and Sam appeared holding a tray. He blinked in the uncomfortable silence and held up the tray as if it was a shield or a peace offering, or both.
“Um,” he whispered in his gravelly voice, “Art thought you guys might want some coffee.”
At mention of the benevolent leader, the two combatants exchanged a glance and, in an instant, came to a truce. It seemed Arthur was astute enough to put both of them in their places and remind them why they were there without ever stepping foot in the room.
Sam set the tray down across from Jinx, who snatched up a cup and slurped at it as if he was dying of thirst. “Sweet fucking Christ! If coffee was sex you’d be a motherfucking gigolo, you magnificent, growling bastard!”
With a sigh, Unger sat down next to them and I could feel his resignation. No, the world would not obey the rules he had spent his life upholding; it was a waste of time to hold out any longer. “So what are we going to do?”
Jinx looked up from his cup and glanced between the two humans. They looked back, deferring to the most experienced person in the room, a tiny man with blue hair and a lip piercing.
“Are you a pirate or a ninja, Unger?”
The detective frowned as Sam choked on his French roast. “What?”
“It’s a serious question,” Jinx insisted.
The man blinked.
“Can you be—?” Sam rumbled.
“No.” Jinx looked horrified at the very thought of someone choosing to occupy two diametrically opposed worlds simultaneously. “Look, a pirate would knock down the door with a cannonball. A ninja would find a ventilation shaft. Which is more tactically sound?”
Sam leaned forward in all seriousness. “Depends on what your enemies are.”
A shiny, black nail rose. “And that is why we do our research ahead of time.”
“We don’t even know where she is!”
Jinx got a hand tangled in his spikes. “Wow, you have a low opinion of me. As soon as I saw her face after the vision, I knew. She didn’t walk in with nothing.”
“The drive?” Unger demanded skeptically. “What’s that—?”
“And whe’ do we put da dwive when we wanna see da thtuff dat’s on it?” Jinx carried on in a false voice, still trying to tug his fingers free from his eggwhite-coated head.
“Into the computer,” Sam offered judiciously in place of whatever swearword was about to pop out of Matthew’s mouth.
“Exactly,” Jinx picked the cup back up and cradled it as if it was the holy grail. “If they so much as try to access that drive, I’ll swoop in like a motherfucking pterodactyl and detach their fucking heads with my wicked awesome claws.”
“Dinosaur techno ninja,” Unger muttered, rolling his eyes again. “Now I see why she likes you.”
Arthur picked that auspicious moment to enter the room. He had a faraway look on his face and was carrying one of Eva’s red journals. It was as if my spirit jumped in response, and like a series of time-lapse photos, my vantage skipped to his face. Sharp focus made the perfection of his visage almost impossible and though I had no fingers, I wanted to touch him.
I knew he didn’t care about the cure, wasn’t responsible in any way for Eva’s death, and wanted nothing but the best for me, but I could still feel my churning, conflicting emotions, permeated by that pervasive attraction I could not explain. The man was still a mystery, perhaps a more tantalizing one than the sister I’d never known, but he was all I had. Locked in my rubber room, just seeing him was a tremendous comfort.
Jinx turn
ed to him, and before Arthur could say hello, leapt up. “Pirate or Ninja?”
Arthur blinked and glanced at the others.
“That’s not a fair answer, Art! You can only pick the pirate or the ninja, not their accessories.”
“Why?”
The boy gave a harassed sigh, beset on all sides. “Fine, whatever.”
“What did he—?” Unger began.
But Jinx was already annoyed with the metaphor. “Never mind!”
I had a sneaking suspicion I knew what he had answered, though, and it probably flapped colorful wings and asked after crackers.
The parrot.
“Sure shut you up,” the detective laughed.
“Screw you, Dick.” Jinx crammed his headphones deeper into his ears and out of apparent spite, turned up the volume again. “You know, you should probably indulge me, given our current circumstances!” Then the hacker went back to his computer in a mild sulk.
One of Arthur’s dark eyebrows arched slowly. “I take it that he feels he is not appreciated.”
Unger shrugged casually and leaned back in his chair, still holding out hope that the hierarchy was undecided. “I have a feeling he thrives under—”
“You wouldn’t know, you bovine fucktard,” Jinx grumbled under his breath.
“Jinx,” Arthur murmured, coming up behind him to smooth his bristling, blue head, “I am positive whatever you are doing will benefit Lilith. Defensiveness will only slow us down.”
I wanted to smile, to reassure the youthful immortal, even if his research was making things less clear for me. There were so many agendas being pushed, it was less like playing chess and more like Chinese Checkers. As rational as I was, I had never been much for playing games; they just seemed like wastes of time. It probably had something to do with being completely uncompetitive, something my life of sacrifice had beaten into me.
Jinx sighed. “I wish we could be sure she’s alright. It’s been a week, and we have no new info!”
A week? I could have sworn my memories were recovered in the span of a few moments, that they were just behind a mental door I had opened. It now occurred to me that perhaps the jhana wasn’t as simple as a nifty means of doing research. It did something to time, or it took a long while to achieve and slip from.
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