The Null Prophecy

by The Null Prophecy (retail) (epub)

  Dallan looked at her with a gnawing hunger.

  Give her time.

  He felt a wave of shame.

  I’m sorry, Lolo, I’m sorry—it’s how I’m wired.

  He swiped his hand across his eyes.

  Oh, stop already.

  Becky was smiling curiously at him. “You okay?”

  “Yeah, yeah. Just frustrated is all. I’ve been trying to get through to my people with no luck.”

  She nodded. “I hear you. I was just heading out for some fresh air—I’m going stir-crazy in here. Want to join me?”

  He quickly agreed and minutes later, after throwing on his cold-weather gear, met her outside. He glanced at the thermometer hanging next to the entrance: minus seven degrees Celsius.

  Twenty-one degrees Fahrenheit.

  “Wow, a heat wave,” he said.

  “Yeah. We should be wearing shorts.”

  He followed her to the snowmobiles, both of them armed with FNC1 rifles. It was regulation protection against feral animals, mainly polar bears.

  Flurries were trickling down from an overcast, Dalí-esque sky.

  “Where are we going?” he said, staring up nervously at the aurora glowering down at them. During the past two days, like everything else being affected by the magnetic storm, the aurora had worsened; it was vaster and more colorful than before.

  “You’ll see.”

  They mounted their snowmobiles and drove away. But before going very far they paused alongside the solitary gravesites of Canadian crew members whose Avro Lancaster crash-landed in 1950. Nine upright crosses were silhouetted by the low-lying sun.

  “What a lonely way to go,” he said in a small, faraway voice.

  What have I done?

  They pulled away and for many minutes Becky led them southward toward Crystal Mountain. Gradually, the low buildings of the ice station grew smaller and smaller along the northern horizon until they vanished completely.

  The snow-splotched slate and shale terrain gave him the impression of a grayscale moonscape. The region, he learned from Brody, was drier than the Sahara Desert, which meant the air was usually as stark and clear as the lunar sky. But not today. Today it was like being inside a shaken snow globe.

  When they had traveled so far across the monotone tundra nothing and no one could be seen anywhere, Becky brought her snowmobile to a stop, cut the engine, and climbed off. He did likewise.

  Slowly, he turned in place, taking in the desolation, straining to hear a sound other than his own breathing. The silence was so profound, the visual field so blank, he felt both dead and alive.

  Perfect freedom—is this it?

  Becky’s voice made him jump.

  “I wanted you to see why my people call this place Nunangata Ungata—‘Beyond the Inuit Land.’ I was born in Grise Fjord, 725 kilometers south of here. It’s as far north as the Inuit have ever settled.”

  He found the information interesting but didn’t have the energy or desire to respond.

  “Dallan, I can tell something is bothering you.”

  Staring into the cold, gray nothingness, he nodded. “Yah.”

  “It’s none of my business but you’re not alone. It might feel that way, I know, but even out here in the middle of nowhere, I believe God is with us.”

  He turned to her. “You believe in God? I didn’t think your people, the Inuit—”

  “Yeah, well it’s complicated. Like most Inuit I grew up believing everything has a soul and everything is connected. Animism. Nature worship.”

  “Right. Worship the creation, not the creator.”

  She looked skyward then toward the distant mountain. “The first time I met a Christian I was a freshman in college. A history professor from Greenland. We became good friends and eventually I came around to his way of thinking.”

  He followed her gaze toward Crystal Mountain. “Why?”

  “Lots of reasons. But mostly I was attracted to the idea of a single god. Inuit believe in lots of gods. Lots of everything actually. To them even a single body has lots of souls.”

  He looked over at her. “You’re kidding.”

  “No. Your arm, your leg, your ear. If you get hurt, it means part of your body has lost its soul. The idea of a single god is simpler. More scientific.”

  “How so?”

  “Occam’s Razor—you know.” She flung her arms out for emphasis. “Given all imaginable explanations for something, science always favors the simplest one.”

  “Hmm. I never thought of Christianity that way. I just grew up going to church. Took it for granted.”

  “So you believe in God too?”

  He needed to think about how to answer. “I guess I do. I mean, I go to church, or at least used to. After I filed for divorce . . .”

  “Yeah, I understand.”

  “My biggest problem with God is all the bad stuff that happens all the time—that’s happened to me and the people I love.”

  “Tell me.”

  “Oh, it’s a long, sad story. It doesn’t matter—I’m over it now.”

  “We have time. I’d like to hear it.”

  He invited her to sit on the ground with him. The sky was getting darker, the snowfall and aurora more intense.

  “I grew up in Columbus, Ohio. My dad was an electrician who drank away most of his weekly paycheck. My mom was too afraid to stand up to him when he beat me. One day he up and left us—my mom, two brothers, two sisters, and me. Just like that. I was the oldest, so I became the man of the house. I dropped out of high school to make us some money.”

  “But you have a PhD.”

  “That came later. After Mom died and my brothers and sisters were old enough to fend for themselves, I went to night school. Studied my as—studied day and night on weekends. That’s how I became a scientist.”

  “Dallan, that’s an amazing story.”

  “That’s not all. My mom was very religious, a dyed-in-the-wool Irish Catholic. Went to mass like clockwork. Made all of us kids go with her. By the time I got my PhD, though, I had stopped going to church. Stopped believing in God. I didn’t have time for either of them.”

  He held up a finger for emphasis. “Then I met this amazing woman: Lorena Armendariz. She blew me away, she was so beautiful. And smart. She had an economics degree from Yale. She was a preacher’s kid—Pentecostal—but didn’t want anything to do with God either. She grew up with all these rules—no dancing, no drinking, no short skirts, blah, blah, blah—so when she left home all she wanted to do was have fun. Make up for lost time, just like me, you know?” Dallan looked out at the mountain. “I’m telling you, we were a perfect match.”

  His eyes dropped. “But then, about two years ago, her older brother got to her. A real Holy Roller. Started filling her head about going back to her roots. About having a family before it was too late.” He paused and looked around at the barren landscape. “At first she didn’t listen. But then one day I caught her reading a Bible. We started fighting. Next thing I know she wanted to go to church and started talking about having kids. ‘It’s time to grow up,’ she said.”

  “So what happened?” Becky said in a quiet voice.

  “What else? I loved the woman. I started going to church with her. But I put my foot down when it came to having kids. I’d already been a father once, as a boy. I wasn’t going to get saddled with that load ever again. But then she said it was either having unprotected sex or no sex at all.”

  Becky shook her head. “Wow.”

  “Yeah. And she meant it. So I gave in to her. But only once. Right afterward I could see the rest of my life being spent as a slave. I could kiss my freedom good-bye. Forever.” He remained silent for a moment. “That’s when I decided the marriage was over. Lorena was not the woman I married. Everything about our relationship became one-way. She was unwilling to compromise, to see things my way. That’s why last week I asked my lawyer to serve her with divorce papers.

  “How did she react?”

  He gave Bec
ky a defeated look. “How do you think? She freaked out. Threatened to fight me all the way. Accused me of being a womanizer and worse. It was pretty ugly.”

  He scrambled to his feet, his stiff muscles nearly upsetting his balance. “I told you it was a long, sad story.”

  Becky stayed seated.

  He lifted his arms and let them fall. “And now here I am with no wife, no life, and a gutful of guilt.”

  He began pacing.

  “Guilt?” she said.

  Without stopping, he looked over at her. “Lorena was—is—a great girl. One in a million. Deep down I still know that. She doesn’t deserve what I’m doing to our marriage—blowing it up because I don’t want kids.”

  Becky stood up and came alongside him, keeping pace. She laid a gloved hand on his padded forearm. “First off, you’re not a bad person for wanting to be free.” She spoke in a voice so gentle he could barely hear it. “Who doesn’t want to be free from people and things that make demands on us? Who doesn’t want to be free from a conscience that rubs our weaknesses in our face? From a God who seems to let bad things happen?”

  He spat into the air. “You’ve got that right.”

  “But what does freedom look like without all of those burdens, Dallan? It’s not very pretty either. If we only do what we want, when we want, we become slaves to our own selfishness. It’s not attractive and it sure isn’t freedom.”

  Becky stopped and stomped her feet. “Oh, wow. There was a time when I could stand out in the cold for hours and not feel it. Getting old stinks.”

  He stopped too. “You’re not old.”

  “Older, then. It still stinks.”

  Abruptly, she closed her eyes, held out her arms, and began chanting—in her native tongue, he guessed.

  When she finished she looked at him. “I just said a prayer for you.”

  “Yeah? What did you say?”

  “I’d rather show you.” Her hand swept over the scenery. “Look around, Dallan. Right now everything looks bleak, right? But at this very moment, hiding here and there beneath the ice, life is starting to assert itself. By next month you won’t recognize this place. There’ll be wildflowers and birds and butterflies everywhere. It’ll be beautiful!”

  She turned her face upward and sucked in the cold air. “Our lives go through seasons too. You’re in a season of desolation, I can see that—thumbing your nose at commitment, shaking your fist at God. You told me a moment ago you had a long, sad story to tell, but you were over it.” She looked squarely at him now. “No, you’re not, Dallan. You’re still being controlled by what your father did to you and your family. You’re still his slave, and will be until you can release him and truly move on. That’s what it means to grow up and be free.”

  Becky’s words struck him like a bolt of lightning. Time stopped. He felt hollow, his ears rang with the indictment.

  She’s right!

  My old man follows me everywhere.

  Even out here I’m not free.

  He stroked his temples. He felt dizzy and his head hurt.

  Suddenly, he was ten again, ducking as his old man threw a left hook at him. After hearing his mom scream, he sprinted up the stairs, hiding in the attic behind a fortress made of boxes filled with junk. His father was shouting, “You can’t hide from me, you little sneak! C’mere and take it like a man.” Dallan saw himself covering his head, his ears, his eyes. “No! Leave me alone! Leave me alone!”

  “Dallan!”

  He stiffened. He didn’t recognize the voice.

  “Dallan! Are you all right?”

  Who??

  He shook himself back to consciousness.

  Becky had a hold of his shoulders. “Dallan! Please, are you all right? Speak to me.”

  “Yeah, yeah, I’m fine,” he murmured, collapsing. He took a few moments to collect himself. “You should’ve been a preacher.”

  She plopped down next to him. “What?”

  He didn’t answer right away.

  “Nothing,” he said finally. “It’s just that you made me realize something I never saw before.”

  “What is that?”

  “That I’m my father’s son.”

  Becky looked on without saying anything.

  He stared at the mountain. “That’s why he hated me; that’s why he left us. He wanted to be free. He wanted freedom, not a family.” His body shuddered; he could not contain the tears or the anger. “Oh, Becky, what a fool I’ve been. What a mess I’ve made. Me—not my father—ME!”

  Baby, please forgive me!

  Dad . . . forgive me.

  I see now.

  Becky waited for him to quiet down then said, “Dallan, life isn’t a Happy Meal, that’s for sure. And wanting to be free of all its problems doesn’t make you a bad person. It’s normal. But what I’ve learned is that true freedom, true joy, comes only when we make peace with our past and rise above our selfishness; when we spend our lives on others, not just on ourselves. I pray God will help you understand that even in the midst of bleakness and despair, there’s always the awaiting discovery of something beautiful.”

  He had been listening to Becky while staring up at the heavily clouded sky. Now he lowered his gaze and saw with crystal clarity what he needed to do—even though it terrified him.

  “Thanks, Becky, more than you know.” He scrambled to his feet. “But we better get back now, okay?—I don’t like the looks of those clouds.”

  THURSDAY, APRIL 27 (3:47 P.M. EASTERN DAYLIGHT TIME)

  By the time they were halfway back to the ice station the snow flurries had evolved into a full-fledged snowstorm. Dallan, blinking constantly to keep from being blinded by the wind-driven flakes, widened his eyes when the aurora’s red and green flames suddenly took on an ominous-looking, pinkish-purple hue.

  “Becky!” he roared over the noise of the engines, gesturing skyward.

  She glanced up, nodded, and opened the throttle all the way.

  He followed suit.

  Moments later—heavy snow peppering his face, wind howling in his ears—he sensed the temperature spiking. Then he gasped in disbelief at what he saw happening: the aurora appeared to be falling from the sky!

  Frantically, he scanned the open terrain. But there was absolutely nowhere for them to hide.

  “Dallan, look!”

  He turned to see Becky pointing up at a large bird being whipped about by the blustering crosswinds. Its body was glowing with a powderblue light!

  “Keep going!” he shouted, struggling not to panic.

  The ice station broke into view on the horizon. At this rate, he figured, they’d reach it inside ten minutes.

  The surging air temperature was now transforming the snowy blizzard into the semblance of a howling, swirling tropical hurricane. Dallan felt as though he were suffocating; the powerful gusts were ramming his face, making it hard to breathe. The melting snowflakes pelted his exposed flesh with the stinging ferocity of a sandstorm. He could barely keep his eyes open.

  He willed his snowmobile to go faster.

  “HELP!” Becky screamed. “Aieeee. . . .”

  Squinting in her direction, he saw her and the snowmobile somersaulting through the multicolored air. Both landed hard on the wet ice and slid in different directions. He hit the brakes and was thrown from his seat. He landed on his stomach, which knocked the wind out of him. The heat was stifling.

  “DALLAN!” she cried. “HELP!”

  He made a move to go after her but just as he righted himself, he heard the air hissing. He looked up: the aurora’s violet-stained hemline was coming down on his head. From his reflection in the wet, icy ground, he saw his hair begin to rise and glow blue. Saw the same thing happening to Becky across the way.

  He struggled toward her on hands and knees. “Becky! Hold on! I’m coming!”

  But the vicious, irresistible wind bucked his every effort to reach her.

  Then he froze at the sight of what looked like a large, multihued candle flame in the near dis
tance—speeding in their direction. In a moment he realized it was actually a towering vortex, a whirlwind of fiery air, bristling with lightning.

  Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!

  He stared, spellbound, as the frenzied twister zigzagged capriciously across the glistening, fantastically colored landscape, ripping open the ice like a giant zipper and roaring like a freight train. He was well aware eddies were able to form within aurorae high in the sky; he’d observed them on many occasions in space weather satellite photos. But to see one at ground level.

  Oh, god! It’s heading for Becky!

  He screamed and clawed against the overbearing wind like a spooked horse straining at tied reins. But the hellish-looking, deafening tornado would not stop. In an instant it bore down on Becky’s squirming, prone body then skipped away like a child’s top, leaving no trace of her behind.

  Laying prostrate in the slush, encircled by the crackling, multicolored aurora, his face thrashed by the driving rain—he wanted to rip out his insides.

  “Why?!” he howled. “Why?! Why?! WHY?!”

  CHAPTER 20

  RUDE AWAKENING

  THURSDAY, APRIL 27 (11:15 P.M. CENTRAL EUROPEAN SUMMER TIME)

  CÁDIZ, SPAIN

  The bell-like cabin alarm startled Allie out of a fitful sleep.

  “Cádiz,” Calder said in a perfect Spanish accent through her headset.

  She rubbed her sore eyes.

  Does he ever sleep?!

  She stretched her arms and glanced outside. High in the night sky she thought she saw an odd coloration. After staring hard at it, however, she chalked it up to starlight playing tricks on her weary eyes.

  “Rise and shine, girlfriend.”

  It was Eva hailing her on the IFB.

  Allie flipped the communications switch. “What’s the latest on Lorena?”

  “Okay, here it is. I tracked down the Denver detective myself and he said they still haven’t found her—”

  “Ay!”

  “No, let me finish, there’s more. They have a solid lead. The detective told me, and this is an exact quote, I took it down word for word: ‘We did an expedited search of the area right after the initial call and came up empty. But then we discovered she boarded a plane. Her final destination is Tel Aviv. We’ve—’”