“Not just decisions! Major decisions, Alejandro,” Wolfgang corrected.
“Yes, yes, I agree. But you are forgetting that I am also a man of science, Wolfgang! I do not want to simply try something out without a solid theory for why I think it could work. This time though, I have a strong feeling that it might. My feeling however, is not enough. First let us try to figure out the rest of the poem and think about this more deeply before dismissing it off altogether. Amon, what are your thoughts?”
“I agree and although I am no scientist, I have some trivia to add that might help us figure out why this plan might actually work.”
“Let’s work on that then. Mind you Wolfgang, time is of the essence and if you are hoping for a scientific thesis to substantiate our theory then we might as well prepare for our deaths instead. Come Amon, we could use the office upstairs to discuss,” Alejandro concluded decisively before heading towards the stairwell. He stopped on the first step and turning his head, looked at Wolfgang who was staring intently into his phone. “You are free to join us Wolfgang, or else we can fill you in later.”
“I have to leave. We’ll talk when I get back. Don’t leave the house,” said Dr. Müller, as he stormed out the door.
CHAPTER twenty-eight
It was a cloudy morning and Dr. Müller had not returned all night. Alejandro sat meditatively in the living room, arms crossed over his chest, waiting anxiously for news. Wanda and Nirmala were finishing breakfast. Amon was in Wanda’s office upstairs. No one spoke. Wolfgang never gave anyone too much insight into his activities until the air around the affair had settled. So, all Alejandro and the others knew at this point was that Wanda’s house in California had been burned down. Ever since Wolfgang called in to announce this, Nirmala had been walking around the house wearing a sorry expression. Now she came over to the living room, sank in to the sofa next to Alejandro’s armchair and sighed deeply.
Alejandro stirred and turning to look at her, smiled affectionately. “Don’t blame yourself,” he said with his usual air of understanding.
“I know that Dr. Müller will.” She sighed.
“Who cares about that grumpy-pants.”
“You and your jokes! But seriously, I am worried he will kick me out of the organization and for good reason. I should have been more careful with that diary.” Nirmala looked sullen.
“Like not having written it to begin with,” said Alejandro with a wicked grin. “Jokes aside, you are worrying too much. Wolfgang tends to come off a lot harsher than he actually is. You are one of us now.”
At that moment, the doorbell rang and Wanda rushed to answer it.
“Speak of the devil…” said Alejandro, getting up as Dr. Müller’s tall frame appeared through the door.
“And?” he asked impatiently, walking up to him.
“The whole place burned down. The police have evacuated the area.”
“Damn! Any suspects?”
“It doesn’t matter who the police suspect. We know who did it and that’s enough for me.” He turned to look at Nirmala. Nirmala froze on the spot, transfixed by his gaze.
“Thank you,” he said to her abruptly.
“Huh? I mean…” Nirmala was at a loss for words. “I don’t understand.”
“For warning us on time. About your diary.”
“On time? How could this be on time? The house burned down because of me. I am so sorry. I cannot begin to—”
Before Nirmala could finish the sentence, Wolfgang broke into a chuckle. This was the first time Alejandro had ever seen his friend laugh like that and he too was slightly perplexed.
“Do you think we neglected to take precautions?” Dr. Müller asked when he had stopped laughing.
“Well…I…” Nirmala turned her head sideways and saw that Dr. Faraday was also grinning from ear to ear.
“The house that burned was a decoy, in the same locality. It wasn’t inhabited. Just a stage. Wanda’s house is safe. We also removed the most valuable possessions from her house well in advance. If you had not warned us about your missing diary when you were kidnapped by the Aifra, then this would not have been possible.”
Now Alejandro broke into laughter. “See, I told you not to worry,” he added.
“The very moment you told us that you wrote mostly about your time at Wanda’s house, we expected—” Wolfgang was cut-off in mid-sentence as someone came clambering down the steps with a loud thudding sound.
“I have it! I figured it out,” boomed Amon as his muscular frame materialized.
“Oh, you have?” asked Alejandro, enthusiastically.
At that moment, the doorbell rang.
“Must be Albert,” said Wanda as she walked over to let him in. “Perfect timing. Now, we have everyone,” she said, opening the door. Dr. Albert Cobb hobbled in, accompanied by Chris and Zoya who looked like they hadn’t slept in days.
“Ah, Zoya, the thread that holds us together. Finally, we meet! I am Amon, at your service,” said Amon walking up to her and bowing ceremoniously.
“Amon! We have not showed it to her yet,” Wanda quickly cautioned.
Zoya looked like a deer in the headlights. “Uhm…showed me what? I don’t get it…”
“Don’t worry Zoya, Amon is a bit of a drama queen. A lot has happened since your little escapade. You will learn about it all very soon and we have a great deal to hear from you as well but for now, you must freshen up and get some food. Till then all else can wait,” Alejandro jumped in to change the conversation.
* * *
Later that morning, Zoya took a long shower in Dr. Faraday’s guest bathroom on the second floor, right next to her little office. She let the warm water douse every weary tendon of her body, relaxing and unknotting the painful soreness that had accumulated over the last few days.
That was some escapade! she thought, remembering Alejandro’s words. Had she known in advance what would happen on that trip, would she have still followed Chris? She did not know the answer to that question. She knew that she had bitten off more than she could swallow, yet somehow it didn’t feel daunting. As if she had known all along that this was her path.
I wish I could see Mom. Dad too, of course. But mostly Mom, she thought. It would have to be before 24th April she imagined, because she would probably have to play a part in whatever the Hekameses were planning to stop this attack. She would run this by Alejandro today. He would be able to figure out a way to squeeze in a short visit home for her. After that, no one knows what might happen. She was feeling overwhelmed. This was the first time she had seen so many Hekameses all at once. It was really happening. She was one of them now. Part of a covert gang. It felt special, yet unnerving. Her mind flitted briefly to the new member she met earlier.
Amon, was it? His first words to her flashed before her eyes, “Zoya, the thread that holds us together.” Why would he say that? What perplexed Zoya more was what Dr. Faraday had said in response. “Amon! We have not showed it to her yet.” This was all very strange. Not that this surprised her. Ever since she found out that she was some sort of a mutant, her entire life had become very confusing.
Zoya got out of the shower and wrapped her bushy hair in a towel. She made up her mind to get dressed and walk straight into Dr. Faraday’s office to accost her with these questions.
The door to Wanda’s office was closed, but Zoya could hear voices inside. It sounded like Alejandro and perhaps some others. They weren’t very loud but seemed to be engaged in a deep discussion. Zoya knocked tentatively, half expecting the company to shoo her away. Alejandro opened the door.
“Zoya, come in. We were just talking about you,” he said with a hint of a grin.
“Oh, you were?” Zoya glanced around the room. It was a snug little chamber with a small desk in the corner and a few chairs around it. All but one of those chairs looked mismatched with respect to the desk. They seemed to have been brought into the room from various other locations within the cottage. Chris and Amon were missing from the room,
but the remaining company sat huddled around a laptop that was positioned on the desk.
“Yes, we were,” Alejandro responded as he pulled up a chair for her, the last one in the room that was still available. “Sit, please. How are you feeling? Hungry?”
“No, not really. I am kind of exhausted though.”
“Then why don’t you go and take a nap and we will get you when lunch is ready. Unless there is something else that you need, of course.”
“Well actually, I came here looking for Dr. Faraday. I wanted to ask her something.”
“Can it wait, my child?” Dr. Faraday asked.
“I suppose…”
“Your thoughts are saying otherwise,” Wanda said with a smile. “Given what you are thinking, if I heard it right, then your arrival here is opportune. We were discussing something very similar right now.”
Sleep deprived and fatigued, Zoya could make no sense out of Wanda’s words. So she grabbed the chair Alejandro had offered earlier and sat down with a sigh.
“Should we tell her then?” asked Dr. Cobb, who Zoya now noticed, was sitting right in front of the laptop and seemed to be operating it.
“Yes, I think we should,” Wanda agreed. “I’ll let you go ahead.”
“Young lady, first of all, I must beg your pardon for what I am about to reveal. It might appear to you that I infringed upon your privacy without your prior consent. But you must understand that I had no choice and you, yourself are partly to blame for this eventuality,” Dr. Cobb began in a shaky voice.
Zoya’s heart fluttered. Infringed upon my privacy? What, now? she thought as she dreaded the account that was about to follow.
“When I received a call from your homestay that you had not been seen for over twenty-four hours and neither had you shown up at my lab, I started to panic,” Dr. Cobb continued. “Thankfully, Wolfgang was also with me and we branched out to search the campus. We called your phone. The police stations…” He paused.
“Oh, I am so sorry. I had no idea…” Zoya started to apologize.
“That is alright. What is done is done. I am not recounting this story to reprimand you.”
“Yes, we are going to do that after this story is over,” Alejandro added with a sly grin. Zoya chuckled in spite of herself. She now noticed that there was a small window in the room directly across from the desk where the tall figure of Dr. Müller stood leaning against the sill. He was looking gravely in Zoya’s direction. His taciturn disposition was the reason why Zoya hadn’t even spotted him until this moment.
“Now, where was I? Yes, the day you went missing. That day, we looked everywhere without any success. We started to fear the worst when Wolfgang suggested that we search the lab one last time. Even if we didn’t find you there, perhaps we would find some clues that would point us to your latest whereabouts.” Dr. Cobb paused for breath. “The last place we checked was inside the RF shielded room. It was there that Wolfgang noticed something odd.”
“Oh?” said Zoya. “What was that?”
“There was a memory recording in your name that was less than a day old.”
“Ugh!” Zoya gasped, covering her mouth with both hands.
“Relax,” said Alejandro with a gentle pat on her shoulder.
“We listened to the tape, of course, because that was the only clue we had to figure out what you had been up to shortly before you disappeared,” Dr. Müller chimed in, finally deciding to join the conversation.
“Yes, we did. Nothing in there was of particular relevance to the matter at hand, mind you. Nevertheless, the effort was not futile because we found something that could turn out to be of paramount importance to our cause,” Dr. Cobb confirmed.
“I cannot imagine what that might be,” Zoya muttered, although in her heart, somehow, she knew exactly what they were talking about and it daunted her. She could not contemplate how this piece of information could be of any significance to this organization.
“Well, young lady, there was a dream you had on the plane on your way to London, isn’t it? In that dream there was a verse sung in a strange language. Do you recall?” Dr. Cobb inquired.
“Um, well, I…” Zoya searched for words.
“It is alright if you don’t. I was merely curious. Anyway, I wondered what that language was and what the words meant. I was not aware that you spoke any language other than English, and this puzzled me all the more. It wasn’t until recently, when this wonderful lady, Nirmala arrived here in England that we were able to put everything together. What we found was astounding.”
“Now you’re scaring her, Albert,” Alejandro cautioned. “Let me explain. In that dream, the verses you heard were, in fact, in an ancient Indian language, Sanskrit. Nirmala was the first to point this out, and since then she has been able to use Google to decipher the words. Roughly translated, they go like this:
‘Where are you my beloved one, my heart will ever pine
Oh Lord, my Lord you rule my heart, forever you are mine.
As Krishna you set foot on earth draped in brilliant light
Come back as Kalki in my arms in your glorious might’,” he summarized.
“But that’s crazy!” Zoya objected. “I have never even heard of a language called Sanskrit!”
“We knew that would probably be the case,” Alejandro agreed. “And that is precisely why this is a huge revelation. You hearing a verse in Sanskrit in your dreams and not just any verse, this particular verse with a very specific meaning, which Nirmala can explain later, is not a happenstance, I am afraid. It has a profound significance to our cause.”
“Was this the first time you had such a dream, dear child? Or were there others like it before?” Wanda asked softly.
“Well, ever since I was a child I used have these fits. At first, my parents thought it was epilepsy or worse, but the doctors never found anything. And then…” Zoya paused, unable to continue.
“And then, what, my dear?” Dr. Faraday urged. “You can tell us. All of us here are born with oddities that the world cannot comprehend. Just like yourself. Well, all except Nirmala, of course,” she added, nodding in Nirmala’s direction.
“You have no idea about my oddities, yet,” Nirmala replied with a wink.
“Okay then. Here’s the deal. I have been under counselling for years. They think it is a psychological issue,” Zoya confessed.
“I am not surprised,” said Wanda. “And every time you had these fits, you heard words in a strange language, did you?”
“Yes, I did.”
“Do you understand the words?”
“Strangely, I do.”
“I figured as much.” Wanda grew thoughtful. “Are there any scenes in the dream, or you just hear words?”
“I can see scenes. Usually like a movie. I often see a palace, a very ancient palace, a cradle and I am the baby in the cradle. Sometimes someone is crooning to me like a lullaby. At other times, I am the one singing.”
“Meera!” exclaimed Nirmala.
“The what?” Zoya asked.
“Go ahead. Explain it to her, your theory,” Wanda encouraged Nirmala.
“You know how the poem talks about Meera, Meerabai?” said Nirmala, pulling her chair closer to Zoya and leaning forward to make herself audible.
“Yes, it often does. What does that mean?”
“Well, Meerabai was a lady born in Medieval India. She was a princess by birth. But when she grew up, it is said that she denounced the royal life in favor of a more spiritual pursuit. She was a devotee of the Indian God, Krishna and dedicated her life to singing hymns in order to invoke Krishna to reincarnate in this world in his mortal form.”
“Okay, so why do I see her in my dream? Am I related to her or something?”
“No. My theory is that you are Meera, and your dreams are simply memories from your past life.”
“Whoa there,” said Zoya. “This is nuts. I don’t believe in reincarnation.”
“Well neither do I, really,” said Nirmala, “But wha
t is uncanny here is that the Indians predicted that this Meerabai will be born again when the time comes to summon a new avatar of Krishna to our world. This avatar will be called Kalki and he will be the saviour of the modern age.”
“But that proves nothing. Ancient scriptures say a lot of weird things,” Zoya vigorously objected.
“I would tend to agree,” Wanda joined in. “But this situation is somewhat unique. Had it simply been the dreams that you were seeing, we could have easily dismissed them off as an aberration of the mind, and so we would have done. However, there is one other element for us to consider that changes everything.”
“Which is, what?” Zoya asked.
“I think it’s time for us to show her,” came Dr. Müller’s booming voice from next to the window.
“Yes, I think it is,” Wanda agreed. “I will get it. It is in my bedroom.” She got up and left the room.
“Get what?” Zoya asked in complete confusion as she stared down her professor’s back.
“You will soon see,” said Alejandro in a comforting tone.
Dr. Faraday returned in under ten minutes carrying an old wooden box, roughly the size of a briefcase. She walked over to the centre of the room and delicately set the box down on the ground right in front of the eager crowd. She then crouched on the floor beside it and carefully opened the lid. Inside, Zoya could see what looked like rolls and rolls of crumbly, dusty, yellowing papyrus scrolls.
“Oh my, are they what I think they are, the Faiyum scrolls?” she exclaimed.
“Indeed,” said Dr. Faraday, gently pulling out about six rolled up scrolls from the top of the pile. She walked over to the desk and started unfurling them one by one.
“But Alejandro told me they were at the Cairo museum!”
“Well, yes and no,” said Alejandro with a chuckle. “That is a story for another time.”
“This is where you kept them then, in this cottage?” said Zoya, walking up to the desk to get a closer look.
“Not always,” Wolfgang corrected. “We brought them here from Wanda’s house in Stanford, fearing an imminent Aifra attack, when Nirmala’s diary was lost.”
The Coming of Kalki Page 23