“But I thought you said there is no magic and that this is all science.”
Wanda just smiled in response.
“This is all very hard to believe,” Zoya said, scrunching her face with frustration.
“Why?”
“I mean, how did I just happen to meet you here? I could have gone to Princeton or Berkley or—”
“But you didn’t. Can you remember what made you decide to apply here, instead?”
“Umm…well, I got a brochure in the mail…”
“Yes. We sent it.”
“Oh?”
“Yes. Was that what convinced you to apply?”
“I suppose and oh yeah…I had this dream. It was so vivid, like it was real—”
“I know.”
“You do?” Zoya’s mouth fell open.
“Nothing in this world is a coincidence, my child. Especially not in the world of a Hekameses,” Wanda said, smiling mysteriously.
“I see. So, am I automatically part of this organization, the Heka-something? Because of when I was born?”
“The Hekameses. No, but we’d like you to be, now that you know.”
“So that I can help you find more mutant children?”
“Yes and no. First of all, we are not ‘mutant children’ in the way you seem to perceive it. Second of all, finding others like ourselves is not the sole purpose of our organization. You see, mankind is in grave danger, danger of self-annihilation and those that have been blessed with the power to stop this should do something. We must do something.”
“I…I am not sure I am cut out for this…you have to forgive me ma’am, but I am not the type of recruit you are looking for…I am just an ordinary girl who wants to keep her head down, work hard and get on with my life. I don’t believe I have any special abilities like you claim. I’m just intuitive, I suppose, but that’s not enough to save the world. I am sorry, I really am.”
“No need to be sorry, dear child. It is getting late. You better be off to your dorm before Nancy starts getting worried that you missed supper.”
Zoya suddenly remembered Nancy. They were supposed to have dinner together. But how did Dr. Faraday know?
“Right, I should get going then…” Zoya trailed off.
Professor Faraday got up from her chair and took the empty tea cup from Zoya’s hands and said with a smile:
“You know they say that tea leaves can show you your destiny. Perhaps one day you will find yours.”
“Perhaps,” said Zoya with a sigh as she got up to follow her teacher to the door.
CHAPTER four
Atall young man with broad shoulders walked hurriedly through the state-of-the-art new campus of The Max Planck Institute for Brain Research in Frankfurt, Germany. After climbing two flights of stairs, he rushed down a broad corridor with a shiny, white marble floor, bordered by stunning floor-to-ceiling glass windows and finally arrived at the closed door of an office on the third floor. He quickly swept the wanton strands of dirty blonde hair away from his dazzling blue eyes and knocked rapidly.
“Come in,” said a booming voice from inside the office.
“Ah, Chris, please sit down.” Professor Müller invited, motioning to the chair across from his desk.
“Thank you.” Chris closed the office door behind him as he walked in to take a seat. His eyes met those of the gaunt man sitting in front of him at the dark gray, chic, twenty-first century, composite wood and metal desk.
“You have news?” Dr. Müller inquired, lowering his voice.
“Dr. Weilhammer went missing yesterday afternoon. You probably know. No trace of him anywhere.”
“Yes, I heard.”
“I could not pick up his brainwaves last evening or this morning from the towers. He must not be in Frankfurt.”
“Most likely.”
“Do you think they killed him?” Chris’s voice was cracking with emotion.
“No, there would be absolutely no motive for that.”
“Then?”
“They are recruiting. You see, there are two types of people that Aifra want in their organization.”
Dr. Wolfgang Müller got up from his chair and crossed his hands behind his back. He started pacing slowly as he continued to think out loud.
“One, the brilliant minds to navigate from behind the scenes; and two, the rash young ones who will fight in the front lines without fear of death. Both guided by a distorted ideal, yes, but fulfilling two completely different roles.” He stopped at his desk and poured himself a glass of sparkling water. He set the bottle down on an otherwise empty desk aligned along the southern wall of his stark and sparsely decorated office.
“Water?” he asked Chris.
“No, I am fine.”
Wolfgang took a large gulp of water himself and continued.
“It is this first kind of recruit that they are picking up from amongst us, and I fear that Dr. Weilhammer was their latest prey.” He paused and sat down behind his desk in his large rotating leather armchair. “Did we hear from the girl?” he continued.
“Yes, she is not interested. Seems like we will have to move on without her.” Chris sighed.
“Did we show her the papyrus?”
“It’s delicate. Dr. Faraday doesn’t think Zoya is ready yet. Unless she willingly joins the cause, there would be no point.” He paused and then continued, “she did apply though, as per our plan.”
“Ah! She did? That is good news. Good news indeed!”
“Really? You think so? But what’s the point of her enrolment if she’s not bought into the cause?”
“It is a first step. Then it is for Wanda to bend her will. When do you return to England?”
“In two days, sir.”
“Alright. Till then, lie low. If Weilhammer comes back to campus, we will be vulnerable.”
“I will,” said Chris as he left Müller’s office and walked out into the deserted corridors of the Institute.
* * *
A moment later, there was a second knock on the door.
“Come in.”
Wolfgang got up from his chair as a lanky man in his mid-forties poked his head through the partly open door to his office.
“Pst… outside,” the scrawny newcomer motioned.
Wolfgang scrambled out of his chair and hurried to the door.
“What’s happening, Gunter?” he whispered. Gunter was the night guard in the building and served as a very reliable informant for the Hekameses that operated out of this institute.
Gunter didn’t say a word until they were both out of the office. He started walking briskly down the corridor, gesturing Wolfgang to follow. When the two of them had walked past at least three other closed office doors, he stopped.
“Your office has been compromised.”
“How do you know?”
“The security camera in your room suddenly went wonky just like last time. It must be the same virus as before. The camera has been breached. Be careful what you say or do in there while we try to fix this.”
“Thanks for the warning. When did this happen? I wonder if they caught me talking to Chris…” Wolfgang wondered out loud.
“I don’t think so, I saw Chris leave on cam before the feed started to flicker like last time.”
“Good. I will steer clear of the office till I get your okay then. I am going home. Call me if you need to.” Wolfgang gave Gunter a friendly pat on the back and left for the night.
CHAPTER five
Half way across the world, in the ancient crumbling town of Dwarka, India, anthropologist Alejandro Garcia waited in the scorching sun with his guide, the famous Indian archaeologist, Dr. Nirmala Kaur, as a dingy little boat pulled onto the beach.
“Are you sure it’s safe for us to set sail in that little thing? The Arabian Sea is rough, I hear,” Alejandro quizzed, clearly not looking forward to his upcoming voyage.
“Don’t worry, my graduate students have been on these trips countless times. There is nothing to worry a
bout. The local fishermen that are with us were born on these waters and know everything about the currents and tides. As long as we follow their instructions, we should be okay.”
Nirmala was a marine archaeologist, in her late thirties, with a PhD from the University of Florida. She had been working on excavations around India’s vast coastline for the last ten years, ever since she returned from America to pursue her lifelong passion of investigating the legends of ancient India. Recently, she got assigned to this particular project off the coast of Gujrat, and that’s when Alejandro had first contacted her. She was tall and athletic with a head of gorgeous dark, shoulder-length hair that beautifully framed her kind and feminine visage.
Alejandro startled at the soft musical cadence of her voice that seemed to soften the harshness of the sweltering midday sun beating down upon them. He looked up at her beautiful face and smiled, not managing to say much more. He was never a seafarer by any means. High waves tended to make him queasy.
At least the recent investment in scuba diving lessons off the coast of Cancun are finally about to pay off, he thought.
Alejandro climbed on to the boat and extended his hand to Nirmala.
“Be careful, it’s slippery,” he cautioned, indicating the patch of moss on the edge of the boat.
“Thank you,” replied Nirmala, accepting Alejandro’s hand and hopping swiftly onto the boat like a pro. She smiled at the two local fishermen who were navigating the boat and said something to them in broken Gujarati.
“We will wait for the cameraman; Haresh and my two grad students. Then we’ll be off. Ah, there they come.” She spotted the three silhouettes emerging from a parked Maruti Suzuki in the distance.
Within minutes, everyone was on board, and they were rowing off into the open seas, heading around thirty kilometres northeast towards the tiny island of Bet Dwarka.
“This is it! We are almost there,” shouted Prateek, the eager grad student peering intently through his binoculars. He hurriedly shoved the binoculars into his weather-worn rucksack and started pulling out diving gear. The other grad student, Sujata, followed his lead and also started handing out some scuba equipment to the crew. The fishermen would stay on board. The others got ready for the dive.
“Let’s go,” said Haresh, once his camera was safely lodged inside the brand-new underwater housing he recently bought in Ahmedabad.
“I’ll go first,” volunteered Prateek as he put on his diving mask and took the plunge.
He was followed by Nirmala and Sujata, leaving Haresh and Alejandro to exchange a quick glance at each other before diving into the murky depths of the open Arabian Sea.
Alejandro could not believe his eyes. As he swam deeper and deeper into the frothing belly of the vast Indian Ocean, the crumbling ruins of an ancient mythical civilization slowly materialized. Walls and columns from once massive fortifications stood sunken and desolate at the bed of the ocean, hundreds of feet below sea level, like a pirate’s treasure long forgotten. As he wiggled his way past the columns, he could make out carefully excavated outlines of roads and passageways that intertwined and met at a central open space that resembled a large courtyard or piazza of sorts. In the moment, he was transported back to a beautiful and bustling city with grand palaces and plazas wrapped in gold and silver and precious stones, with its gardens and lakes and wide avenues lined with trees: the magical Dwarka, the gateway to heaven.
Nirmala escorted him back to his car in silence after they returned to shore. Alejandro, still in awe of what he had just witnessed could barely manage the niceties when they were about to say goodbye.
“Alright, I’ll see you tomorrow then?” he finally muttered, clearing his throat.
“Yes. I’ll be at your hotel, like we discussed. You seem awfully silent since the dive though. What’s on your mind?”
“Oh! I have been quiet, haven’t I? I’m just in awe and surprise, I suppose.”
“Surprise? Why surprise?”
“I mean, look at that site. It’s just mind boggling, isn’t it? How is it that such a magnificent, ancient ruin was hidden here in plain sight the whole time and no one knew about it?”
“Ah, that! It was my first question too when I was assigned to this project.” Nirmala stopped to take a deep breath. Then lowering her voice, she continued, “It’s my understanding that the funding for this research had been suppressed for years.”
“But why?”
“Political reasons. We recently re-opened investigations.”
“I see.” Alejandro became thoughtful. “Still so many questions…”
“Ask me.”
“The site, it’s so easily accessible, isn’t it?”
“Your point?”
“I mean, why is it that no one accidentally discovered it and leaked the news to media?”
“Who do you think would be likely to make such an accidental discovery?”
“I dunno…fishermen, tourists, local divers?”
“No one really dives in these turbulent, murky waters. Diving is not a popular sport in Dwarka or in the country for that matter. The town is an ancient pilgrimage. People don’t come here to dive. They come here to pay tribute to their God. This is not Cancun, my friend.” Nirmala chuckled.
“Hey, don’t make fun of Cancun. It’s a beautiful place.” Alejandro quipped in mock admonition. “Have you ever been?”
“Nope. But I’d like to one day,” Nirmala replied with a broad grin. “But it’s getting late. You should probably head to your hotel. See you tomorrow?”
“Yes ma’am!” Grinned Alejandro as he boarded his car.
* * *
Back in his hotel room that night, Alejandro tossed and turned, unable to get the image of the ancient submerged metropolis out of his head. Something about that haunting image reminded him of his own Mayan heritage and the myths and legends that surround his people to this day.
This is what has brought me here. There is a link. There must be a link between the ancients of my world and theirs and it is my destiny to uncover it.
CHAPTER six
The princess sat on a high window in her castle tower, overlooking a lush ornamental garden as she rocked the baby back and forth on the swing.
“The beloved of Lord Krishna, you are the chosen child
Your heart besought His Kingdom, your countenance so mild
You sing into the heavens, you swing into the sky
The beloved of Lord Krishna, Meera, Meerabai,” she crooned as the baby made gurgling sounds of satisfaction.
Zoya woke up in a pool of sweat, her heart beating fast. It was the same dream. The one that has haunted her since childhood. It was a beautiful yet terrifying vision. Each time, it transported her into an alternate reality through a soul-churning sequence of events, culminating with her feeling like she was merging completely with an unseen energy field. Tonight, she was not ready for that journey. Lucky, she woke up.
“Nightmares again?” Nancy questioned from her side of the room. She was up in her bed hugging her knees, a blanket wrapped around her.
Zoya nodded in agreement.
“Why are you up? Wait, were you crying?” Zoya asked, squinting her eyes to adjust her focus in the moonlit room.
“Hm-mm,” Nancy tried to lie.
“Yes, you were,” Zoya said getting up from her bed and coming over to sit at the edge of Nancy’s.
There was silence.
“It’s Jake,” Nancy finally responded.
“The guy you’ve been dating?”
“Yes.”
“What about him? Did he hurt you? Is he cheating?”
“No, no,” said Nancy, violently shaking her head to emphasize her point.
“Then what?”
Again, there was silence. After what seemed to Zoya like an eternity, Nancy spoke again.
“You know he is an orphan… his parents died in a plane crash when he was five. He was raised by his father’s step brother and his second wife…”
“Okay�
��” Mumbled Zoya, clearly not sure where this was going.
“Anyway, it was horrible for him. His step-uncle was abusive, and his wife was on acid…” Nancy murmured on through quiet sobs.
“I am so sorry. That’s really sad for him but please don’t cry—”
“That’s not all! He, he…”
“He what?”
“Never mind,” Nancy managed to mutter as she broke down crying.
“Aww, honey.” Zoya moved closer and put her arms around her roommate, planting a tender kiss on her forehead. “You can tell me,” she whispered.
“The doctors think that he has become a schizo because of this, because of his childhood and the trauma. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to help him,” Nancy panicked.
“Shh, shhh, oh no! That is terrible. But girl, you can’t solve this alone. Don’t blame yourself for not being able to make him feel better. He needs help. Professional help. I know you are not really focussing right now, but you must encourage him to get the professional help that he needs and once you do I am sure you will start seeing the difference. Otherwise, both of you will suffer and nothing good will come out of it. Do you get me?”
Nancy shook her head in denial and cried uncontrollably into Zoya’s shoulder without saying anything more. On some level, Zoya knew her advice had fallen on deaf ears. Nevertheless, she tried. She will be by Nancy’s side regardless. After all, that’s what friends were for, was it not?
The girls didn’t realize that they had fallen asleep when they were woken up by the sound of a cat purring loudly outside their dorm-room door.
“Oh man, must be Patty’s cat again,” grumbled Zoya, rubbing her eyes and straightening herself up in Nancy’s bed.
“Yeah, that kitty is hella nutty.”
“Feeling better, I see,” Zoya smiled, happy to see her friend in a better mood than last night. “Want to go down for breakfast?”
“Sure. By the way, thanks for listening last night. It really meant a lot.”
“Of course, what are friends for!”
At breakfast it was Zoya’s turn to be pensive.
“Whatchya thinkin’ chica?” Nancy teased.
“Nothing”
The Coming of Kalki Page 3