I closed the door of the bathroom, opened a window for fresh air, and lit a joint, thinking my path was about to change again. From Teresa’s dream, I deduced there were gods interested in my movements and debating whether to kill me even if they didn’t understand where my power stemmed from. And now that I realized who my dark friend and guide was, I knew I had to leave the people in the other rooms who were depending on me. The desecration of the time tunnel was not as petty as I had grown to believe. Although it despaired me to think of abandoning the sick, my mission had become clearer and my priority had to be in fixing a great harm I now understood the universe had suffered. I calculated another week of healing would convert all the tire tracks into golden patch visions on the drawing and perhaps reveal to me where the tunnel collapse was located.
My ability to cognitively uncover clues was strengthening as I was being drawn closer to the ruined tunnel. Whatever the costs to my soul and people in my circle might be, I hoped as my knowledge grew, I would be able to dispel the price better than I had in the past.
The black Cadillac was cruising the strip. Two new ladies and two new men had marked out a neighborhood street corner, and they all closely resembled Filomena. One afternoon, after stabilizing an asthma attack a young Mexican boy was having, I turned around and recognized one of Freddie Cranston’s girls in my living room. She met my eyes with a mindless stare but left quickly. Stepping to my window, I watched as she climbed into Cranston’s green and tan van with the ugly scribbles on it.
Enemies were circling.
Could I hold out another week? Or should I run with the drawing and try to decipher its golden insights in another location?
Freddie struck before I made my choice.
He came sauntering in with Jerry and two women and stood hovering near me as I helped an old woman stand up and get her cane.
“What do you want here, Freddie?” I said as I ushered the woman out the door.
He held up a bloody middle finger at me and cackled.
“Go get a bandaid.”
“What kind of holy man refuses to heal the wounded?” He mocked me with a lopsided grin.
“You want a taste of what Jerry and Chuck got up in your burial ground?” I sneered back at him, not knowing if I could rally my warrior magic at will but willing to trust that danger now triggered it, much like my golden hand rallied to cure the sick.
Four knifes flashed.
“In front of witnesses, Freddie?”
“Who said anything about witnesses? The nigger on the couch is dead drunk, and if that lump under the sleeping bag even moves, it’ll go back to being a lump. Permanently.”
The black man muttered, “It’d be best if you left.”
“What’d you say, man? You want a knife in your throat to shut you up?”
“I’m saying, aren’t you wondering why nobody’s here? Miracles happen in this room.” He gulped on a bottle wrapped in a paper bag, his voice slurring as he spoke. “Why no one’s here but you scum?”
“Well, Pops, lucky, I guess. No one wanted to come watch me cut your damn eyes out.”
“Heh, heh, heh, oh yes, that’ll hurt, but I’m trusting in Mister Deets here. Heh, hee, hee, I’m already blind. Was hoping I could get a taste of watching the pretty ladies again. Maybe see Ali return to the ring. Anyway, I was just hoping. But what I do know for a fact is you four hoodlums are in for a heap of trouble.”
“Jerry, shut him up.”
The man held up a hand, palm outwards, signaling Jerry to stop. “Jerry, I can’t see with my eyes, but I’m real good at sniffing and tasting.” He took another pull on his bottle. “And I’m sniffing right now. You know what I smell?”
“You drunken fool. Do him in, Jerry.”
“I smell monkey.”
It was over in three seconds. From under the sleeping bag, Monkey Man leaped with a flurry of teeth and claws, ripping at the two women. They dropped their knifes, screaming hysterically, and elbowed each other frantically in their dash out the door. A bolt of red shot from my hand, penetrated into Cranston’s left ear, and came out his right. His head wobbled, and he fell to his knees, then onto all fours, then flat on his face. Blind Man’s bottle thumped Jerry’s arm, then with a loud crack on the nose, knocked him cold.
Monkey Man growled, “C’mon Deets. You’re out of here.” He scratched his hairy chin and nudged the moaning Freddie with one foot. “That’s some powerful fireworks you’re throwing around now. You’re a fast learner, but Sheoblask’s not going to go down so easy. This game’s over. War’s broken out in three different hells and Pan wants you moving.”
“What about my large drawing? It has clues or a map or something.”
“Leave it. You’re on a roll and need to stay a step ahead of Sheoblask.”
“What happened to me just living my life and everything would fall into place?”
“You are living your life. It just so happens a skirmish has just escalated again into a full-scale god’s tunnel-war and you better watch your ass. You’re no longer the innocent. Sheoblask’s lords have decided there’s a newborn god and you’re too much of a threat running its errands. Let’s move. I’ve got to cover a spot where trouble’s brewing, but Blind Tuma here will get you to the ocean to hook up with Fish Man.”
“Blind Tuma?”
“He’s a denizen of the tunnels. His eyes work fine there, so that’s where he hangs. He hates Steel though, so watch it if you run into him.”
“Bastard Doctor Snake keeps tearing down my houses I build. Says I’m cluttering up the passages.” Blind Tuma chugged his bottle for a full ten seconds. He let out an exhalation ripe with satisfaction and turned his clouded eyes in my direction. “We’re traveling light. Ready?”
“You live in the tunnels?” I anxiously emptied my colored pencil box into my knapsack, threw it over my shoulder.
“Sure do. Let’s see if we can learn the whereabouts of this broken section. Let’s go.”
Monkey Man was gone, somewhere in the tunnels, by the time Tuma and I reached the street and ducked down an alley behind Mandrake’s Folly.
Tuma explained he couldn’t take the chance of whisking me through the nearest portal. It would be risky as I’d only done one Pan-controlled, full-fledged jump, my effect on the tunnels was unpredictable, and as a major target in the resurgence of hostilities, Pan’s enemies would zero in on my whereabouts too easily. The immortals believed I operated best on the outskirts and peripheries of tributaries, peeking in or moving in slight spare hops.
“Monk told me you’re just learning to crawl.”
“Yeah, I guess so.”
“But you’re a natural, else you’d be dead, I suppose.” He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “That damn Sheoblask. I come from a land of predatory beasts, and he’s a mean one.”
We moved slowly across Los Angeles, always on foot, following some zigzag, convoluted route Tuma knew. As we cut across the city, I began to discern better when I was walking outside the tunnels while he stayed inside them.
At times he would hold my wrist where Amelia had touched me and then inform me we were huddled in some distant cubbyhole of a tunnel that lay forgotten. I was becoming accustomed to small tunnel hops. We could cross avenues unseen, through crowds untouched. My insight into how I had witnessed Jenny skipping down New York sidewalks and how Cranston’s feet hit solid floor beneath me as I crawled across his room was clearer now. From within a god passageway, I could see and sense the physical world around me, but couldn’t be seen by the uninitiated.
In quiet places, Tuma pulled on his brown-bag bottle, and I lit up a cigarette as he gave me lessons on how to tunnel jump. “When you’re adept and moving properly, it feels like you’re as light as smoke. If you jump by portal, you’ll use your power symbol to unlock it, then for a split second you’ll think you evaporated. It’s different with minor jumps. Tribu
taries just suck you in on their own will. There’s no need to unlock or plan. The tunnel understands your needs. There’s learning pains though, as I’ve heard you’ve gone through. Eventually it will feel as natural as placing one foot in front of the other. Depends on your situation and experience. Right now though, you’re in test mode, with mostly Monkey and Steel attuned to you. We don’t know the full benefits or hazards of your energy, but so far you haven’t ripped the tunnels apart when you use them.”
On our third night, we were huddled in a place Tuma called a trickle. “Sheoblask is too power hungry to find us here. He wouldn’t have room to blast through into this tiny thread.”
I could smell Mexican food and hear music from the outer world. It seemed like we were surrounded by a transparent veil, but otherwise we were just two guys huddled under a tree in a park. Invisible guys. At times, the tunnel appeared to me as a thin string of illumination, its skin brightening to an aura of bright colors, then fading to nothing before reenergizing its glow again.
It’s like a current, or breath, in and out, lights on and off. It’s life pulsing through a vein.
I wondered why we hadn’t just flashed right over to the Pacific Ocean to meet up with Fish Man, but Tuma explained the tunnel was transmitting me to where it felt I belonged.
“Can I move on my own, or is it always like I’m on a subway and have no steering power?”
“You can move on your own. Even though you follow the tunnel like a leaf floating down a stream, you’ll eventually learn to kick-paddle, so to speak, and steer when needed. Don’t worry, it’s the most reliable mode of transportation in the universe once you get the hang of it. Until recently, of course. This war sure has mucked things up for time-jumps.”
“How come nobody knows—”
Tuma held up a hand. “Shh, listen. Did you hear that?”
I heard a sharp boom, far off down the tunnel. Then another. And another.
“What is it?” I whispered.
“It’s from the world. Something just happened close by that caused a huge emotional impact. Remember these tunnels carry dreams and thoughts as well as us travelers.”
“Is it Sheoblask? Or did I crack the tunnel?”
“No, if it was a direct link, we’d be totally aware of it. Let me listen.” He sat, leaning forward, hunched and worried, focusing his attention down the tunnel. His eyes widened with his intent, his ears flicked forwards. The way he had prowled the back tunnels, I should have noticed sooner—his tunnel self had the habits of a cat on the hunt. He groaned painfully, “Aw shit”, and reached for his ever present, brown bag. He took a swig and handed me the bottle. “They killed Kennedy.”
“What? I thought time tunnels were blocked. That was five years ago. Why are we hearing the shots?”
“No, his brother Bobby. Somebody just shot him too. Close by. He’s not going to make it. It could be Sheoblask is trying to lure you into showing yourself to do a healing.”
“Maybe—”
“We stay put. Sheoblask is sniffing. Damn demon always goes overboard.”
I spent the night Robert Kennedy died drinking wine from a brown bag with Blind Tuma, sitting in a hidden recess of a god tunnel, feeling the sorrow and frantic worry of strangers swirl and eddy around me. It was agonizing and claustrophobic, but, after a while, I found comfort in the shared grief of Tuma and the compassionate prayers and words of solace traveling the tunnel.
The next morning, I wondered aloud why people’s prayers would meander into our hiding hole and not fly directly to their god.
Tuma shrugged. “Maybe their god doesn’t exist, or their prayers got mucked up somehow, lost in a tunnel hiccup. Or maybe they aren’t transmitted directly, but need to hopscotch around for awhile. Who knows? Maybe this tree we’re under, or a nearby rock, or you or me, or our own sentiments had to be added to the mix.”
We leaned back against that tree for another day. Fearing the search for me would cause more deaths, I told Tuma I was going to make a break for the coast by bus. We were taking too long. I had traveled from Monster Valley to New York almost instantaneously.
He grabbed me and held me back from making a breakaway.
“Where’re you going in such a hurry that’s going to satisfy your quest? The tunnel knows your needs. We’re all different. Right now, Sheoblask might be traveling at forty million miles a second in his search for you. We’re in a living thing, Deets, some god’s creation. Whatever ancient deity dug through the original Chaos, it designed the tunnels like they were a system of veins and arteries and nerves and brain cells, all operating in unison. Out in the world, ants scurry, birds fly, trees grow upwards, but a bird can also hop, an ant dig, and a tree shoot its roots downwards into the earth. Same as in jumping tunnels, everything has its pace or reason. We’re strolling instead of running. I once built me a little living space and stayed for a year before Steel told me to move on—said I was blocking the flow. Another time I curled up for a nap outside Chicago, yawned and stretched, and damn if in the next blink I wasn’t in a temple on the Ganges River.”
“How long have you known about the tunnels?”
“About four hundred years. Fish Man taught me the ropes after I survived the sinking of a slave ship.”
“The Santa Paloma, right?”
“Yeah, damn curse of a boat.”
“Sure is strange how the gods use knots to straighten things out.”
Tuma liked to talk, and I had a lot of questions. I learned that he had been thrown into the sea with three other slaves as the boat went down. Each had an ankle stuck in an iron clamp attached to a broken board. They drifted for days hugging some wooden planks that had held together. When Tuma worked his shackle off and decided to swim for an island off in the distance, the others had told him he was looking at a cloud bank, not land, and they chose not to leave their half-sunken raft. Hours later, he dragged himself ashore on a sandy beach overshadowed by a smoldering volcanic mountain. He was found by a group of Arawak Indians who lived off the plentiful fruit and fish of the island. Tuma was accepted and thrived as one of the tribe. Eventually he fell in love and married an Indian girl.
High up the mountain, a solitary community of goats and cows grazed undisturbed. The natives said the animals had been shipwrecked years before. When Tuma suggested killing a cow for his wedding feast, an elder denied his request, and led him up the mountain to what was referred to as the Meadow of Magic.
“Mushrooms all over the place. Popping up through piles and piles of cow dung.”
“Far out.”
“The elder invited me to take a bite of the tasty snack of the gods.” A tiny squeak of laughter escaped from the back of his throat. “Heh, damn if I wasn’t struck blind the moment that first shroom passed my lips. Never seen the world since. Can’t even see out through the tunnel walls, have to rely on my other senses for that. You pop your head in, I can see your face but not your body.”
“I usually see both in some kind of hodgepodge that I’m just starting to decipher.”
“So I figured. Sounds volatile. Mixing it up like that. Never can tell how things are going to shape up in these tunnels. This leads me back to why you and I are together.”
“Why?”
“I’ve had my share of adventures slipping in and out of these tunnels. Still miss my earthly eyesight, so I’ve spent most of my life roaming the jumps.”
Tuma paused to watch a lizard scamper through our cubby hole.
“Odd, how some animals take to the tunnels. Wonder how this little fellow came across the blessing of mushrooms.”
“I keep meeting the same dog spirit.”
“Hmm, I kept me a pet bear for a while. Pigeon travels as a bird. After a while you can tell the difference between a natural trait and a traveler’s inherited one.”
Tuma took a swig from his bottle. I lit up a Kool.
“So what happened? Why are you my guide now?”
“I was a witness to the tunnel blowing up too. Just like you in New York. I saw it from that island paradise way back four hundred years ago.”
“What did you see?”
“I was a distance away, but I saw the tunnel ripping open and felt a suction that could have turned the universe inside out. All sound disappeared briefly, but then a great rattling filled the tunnels. It seemed like an avalanche was moving down the passage, so I got out of there quick, exiting back to my beach. My safe, blind beach.”
“What’s the name of that island?”
“Translates to Silver Island. Damn Spaniards built mines, enslaved and killed off my family and friends.”
“Jesus. I’m sorry.”
Tuma bowed his head, then cocked it back to take another swig. “By the time of the tunnel blast, Fish Man was a buddy of mine, and I knew Monkey Man and Pigeon but couldn’t contact them to tell them what I had seen and heard. Time-jumping was all screwed up. Of course, Pan’s family had learned of the time rupture in their own era. I had to wait for centuries of Earth time to pass before that creep Steel caught up with me a few years ago and questioned me about what I knew.”
“Are you immortal?”
“Semi, you spend a lot of time in the tunnels and aging slows. One of the god tunnel gifts.”
“So, let me see... In simple terms, Steel was about to time-hop while Pigeon started his jump from the New York portal in 1965, on his way to Pan’s Valley. Sheoblask pulled a sneak attack, and the time section of the tunnel got blown to smithereens. You saw it from inside the tunnel four hundred years ago. And me, from outside the tunnel, in 1965. No one ever told me what happened to Doctor Steel or Gerald Pigeon.”
“Steel got flung across the country. Pigeon, knocked out of his jump.”
“Charred feathers near the portal in 1965. Santa Paloma appears smoldering in a shower of feathers four hundred years ago. To a certain extent, it feels like I’ve been steered by those events. Lot of pigeons in this story.”
Miracles (The Remarkable Adventures of Deets Parker Book 3) Page 21