At the end of the path was another stone, this one with letters cut into it:
WE DON'T KNOW WHO THEY WERE
WE DON'T KNOW WHY THEY CAME
WE ONLY KNOW THEY CHANGED OUR VIEW OF THE UNIVERSE
THIS UNIVERSAL SACRED SITE
IS DEDICATED JULY 1997
TO THE BEINGS
WHO MET THEIR DESTINIES
NEAR ROSWELL NEW MEXICO
JULY 1947
"If only they knew," said Seb2. "Now step forward about ten paces. This may sting a little."
Since being healed by Billy Joe and finding himself the center of attention for various groups that would give conspiracy theorists all the validation they'd ever wanted, with power he had never dreamed of and a personality fractured into three parts to deal with it, Seb had remained an optimist. He had a strong sense of who he was and, possibly due to his Catholic upbringing (despite having been nowhere near a church all his adult life), he'd always experienced a deeply-rooted sense that everything would, eventually, work out for the best. But, as he walked into the innocent looking patch of scrub in front of him and began to feel an itchy buzz through the soles of his feet, he felt a genuine, profound moment of existential fear. He could feel the Manna this time, it was nothing like Red Rock. It was as if the biggest engine ever built was buried underneath the desert floor and his presence had turned the key. The ground actually began to shake and a deep bass profundo pedal note whispered, hummed, spoke then roared into existence, his whole body shaking with the force of it.
"Question," he said. "After this, will I still...will I still be me?"
Seb2 had always answered questions quickly. Since Seb2 was, in fact, Seb, he already knew the question before Seb asked it. This time, however, the long pause before he answered was an answer in itself.
"I don't know," he said. "But right now, we're broken, half-made. This completes us." The roar grew louder. Seb felt his eyes roll back in his sockets as he fell to his knees. His back arched, his head whipped backward and his arms reached out to his sides.
"Then what?" he said, hissing the words as he felt white-hot silver threads arc from the ground and touch each of his fingertips in turn, caressing and burning them.
"I don't know," said Seb2. The hum in Seb's skull crescendoed into a sudden absence of noise, a sudden absence of anything, his consciousness stretching out to embrace the edges of everything, then shrinking and un-becoming in the white noise of all knowledge collapsing into itself.
***
The only organized group of Manna users that still kept a physical base going in Roswell itself was the Elohimians. Their founder, Jimmy Michaels, had been a mediocre Manna user who claimed his ability to heal animals and predict deaths was God-given until the alien craft came down 20 miles from his farm in 1947. He was one of the rubberneckers investigating the next day, and he recognized the power he felt there immediately. He started the Elohimians, alien-worshippers who believed their faith was being tested by the unattainable Roswell Manna. The Roswell alien was Elohim, and he would return to bestow the gift of his mighty power upon his followers when they had proved themselves worthy. At first, proving themselves worthy just meant subscribing to Jimmy's twice-yearly newsletter and buying the "rocks of power" he collected (initially from as close to the site as he could get, but later from his yard) and posted to subscribers as far away as Canada, Belgium, or Australia. When Jimmy developed a liver condition that left him unable to tolerate alcohol, all Elohimians were advised to abstain from drinking "like our glorious alien Lords". According to an early newsletter, Jesus, Mohammed, Buddha, Krishna, Ghandi and - somewhat incongruously - Buster Keaton, were all Brothers Of Elohim, sent to our planet to spread the message of universal love. And the importance of laughter through means of silent comedy, apparently.
When Jimmy died while investigating lights in the sky and falling down a well, his son Darwin took over. Darwin had no Manna ability at all, and was completely unconvinced by his father's fledgling religion. He studied business at college, however, and came to see the Elohimians as an almost perfect model of capitalist opportunity. After his father's death, the newsletter went monthly and the subscription price went up 300%. He churned out books expanding his father's work at the rate of at least two a year, and when one of his early books, Elohim: The Savior Of Our Sick Planet was cited a decade later as one of the first written works to predict global warming, he found his cottage industry was bringing in a very respectable income. He embraced the internet early on and automated much of the business, bringing it into the digital domain. He knew his dad would have enjoyed the success, but was glad he didn't have to keep up the pretense of believing in "that alien horse-shit" when he was at home any more.
He kept a complex system of motion detectors set up for two reasons. One was practical: every year, he organized a pilgrimage to the site and, as part of the $10,000 price-tag on that trip-of-a-lifetime, wanted to show the faithful that, when Elohim returned, Darwin would be the first there to greet him and announce his presence to his followers. The other reason was sentimental; despite dismissing his father's beliefs, keeping watch like this allowed him to feel he was staying true to Jimmy's dream. But it was just window-dressing, really.
So when one alarm, then another, then a third, started bleeping from the den while he was fixing himself a beer in the kitchen, he dropped the bottle and ran through, his eyes wide. The first two cameras were standard tech, rugged and camouflaged, unlikely to fail, but not impossible. It stretched credulity for both to fail within seconds of each other. But the third device, buried in the desert, had cost him six figures, used military stealth technology and was in the category of surveillance equipment that the US military, who had illegally sold it to him, liked to call 'deniable'. He had been assured that anything short of a tactical nuke would simply bounce off it and the battery would need replacing a couple decades after his death, assuming he lived to 100. Without thinking of the possible consequences should Daddy's theory prove to be more than a theory, he grabbed a camera, ran to the truck and drove, knowing he wouldn't be the only interested party, but sure he would be the first on the scene. Some footage of a genuine alien and he could sell the Elohimian business and retire to Hawaii.
Even as he parked the truck as close to the site as he could get and ran past the red stone markers, he could hear an approaching helicopter. He glanced at the pickup alongside the stones. Maybe not an alien. But who could have simultaneously sabotaged three bits of tech, one military grade?
"Goddammit," he said, turning on the camera. It took a while for his eyes to adjust to the dark, but, when they did, he saw a man lying on the desert floor, curled up in a fetal position. He kept the camera focussed on the body as he moved forward. No, he wasn't dead, he was breathing. When Darwin got a few paces away, the figure rolled onto his knees, put his hands in front of him and slowly got to his feet, his back turned. He took a few long breaths in and out, then turned round. He was just some guy, nothing special. Then Darwin noticed his eyes. Even in the gloom, they seemed to pierce him. It was like looking onto the eyes of someone who'd seen civilizations rise and fall, watched planets form in the cold emptiness of space. He let the camera fall to his side. The man blinked and the moment passed.
"Who are you?" said Darwin. Then the noise of the helicopter made both of them look to the west where, only visible because of the way it was blotting out their view of the stars as it flew, it was coming in to land. Before it even touched the sand, eight figures dropped out of it, dressed in black, sprinting toward them. Two of them came straight at them, weapons drawn.
Darwin raised his hands, the camera dangling from his wrist.
"Nothing to do with me," he said, "you wanna talk to this guy." He nodded in the direction of the man he had found. When the two armed men didn't even glance away from him, he took a look himself. There was no one there. And no cover for 15 miles in any direction. He'd just disappeared.
"Shit," said Darwin.
&
nbsp; Two incongruous figures were the last to exit the chopper. One was very tall and obviously in charge. The other barely came up to the waist of his companion. They ignored Darwin and walked to the center of the crash site.
"Well?" said the tall one. The dwarf - must remember to call him a small person, don't want to offend him when I've got guns pointing at me - stood very still for a moment, his eyes closed.
"It's gone," he said simply, and started back for the helicopter.
"All of it?" said the tall one, frowning.
"All of it."
"The power's gone?" said Darwin, blurting out the words before thinking. He had never been able to sense the stuff his father had claimed was buried there, had always assumed it was just another delusion.
The tall man walked up to him.
"What did you see?" he asked.
Darwin considered his options. He had always been good at negotiations, but none of them had taken place at the wrong end of a gun. He swallowed.
"Er, some guy was here," he said. The tall man took a photograph from his pocket and shone a flashlight on it.
"That's him," said Darwin.
"And where is he now?" said the tall man.
"I don't know," said Darwin. "His truck's still back there. He was just...here."
The tall man sighed and put the photo away. He spoke to the soldiers guarding Darwin.
"Make it look like he tripped and hit his head on a rock," he said. "And bring me the camera."
Darwin ran. It was human nature. He knew he wouldn't get far. He was out of condition and these guys were obviously trained killers. His last conscious thought was a silent apology to his dad, who wasn't quite as full of shit as Darwin had always believed.
Chapter 39
Woodbine Cafe, Earlham Street, London
By 6:57am, Marco had already been awake for two hours, dragging himself reluctantly out of a warm bed into a tepid shower, then downstairs to the cafe he had run for eighteen years with his wife, Constanza. 6:00-8:30am, the Woodbine was always busy with the same mix of transport workers, office and shop employees and a handful of bankers and hedge-fund managers who like to slum it a couple mornings every week, knowing they'd get the best bacon and eggs in town. Marco was a good cook, he stuck to the simple stuff, the food his father had told him Londoners wanted. He hadn't changed the menu in over a decade. Long before it had become fashionable, he had been brewing roasted Italian coffee and serving freshly-squeezed orange juice.
But Marco's real talent, the reason his cafe was busy even in the quiet summer months, was his memory for names. He had never been particularly gifted academically, but in his teens, he'd read a great book claiming the most successful people in business always remembered names and faces. He applied himself to the task and listened hard when someone introduced themselves, studying their face and repeating the name to himself in his head over and over. He seemed to have a natural gift for it - so much so, that people might go and work in another country for a few years, then walk back into the Woodbine only to be greeted by name, and offered their "usual". Word spread, and the cafe thrived.
So when a disheveled man in a suit materialized at the counter just as Marco was flipping a fried egg onto a piece of toast for Anna, the girl who worked at the stationer's opposite, his initial shock was followed, almost immediately, by the kicking in of his habitual memory stunt.
"Seb!" he said. "Great to see you. Such a long time. No Meera today, mm? So, the usual? Fried egg and mushroom bap, brown sauce? Black coffee, no sugar. Sit down, sit down, I'll bring it to you. What a lovely surprise."
Seb stumbled to the nearest table and sat down heavily. The conversations around him picked up again. The sudden inexplicable materialization of an American at the counter of the cafe had produced a stunned pause, but this was England, after all, and the general consensus seemed to be to pretend it hadn't happened, as it would be rude to stare. Mrs. Barclay, perched on her customary stool at the end of the counter as she sipped her weak tea, saw Seb's magical appearance occur about three feet from her nose. She glared at him for a moment as he sat down, then sniffed and returned her attention to the Times crossword.
The egg and mushroom bap was as delicious as Seb remembered. This had been one of Mee's regular haunts, although it had been weeks before she brought him in, shyly introducing him to the ebullient Marco.
"Why is it that brown sauce has never been big in the States?" said Seb2, while Seb chewed.
"Maybe it's the name," said Seb. "It hardly sounds like a delicacy."
"Says what it is," said Seb2. "It's a sauce. It's brown. What's the problem? Folks back home don't know what they're missing."
"True," said Seb. He finished up and left £10 on the table, unsurprised to find the bills in his wallet were now UK currency.
"Ciao, Seb, see you soon," called Marco as Seb opened the door. Seb raised a hand. As the door shut behind him, there was a collective feeling of relief. No one likes a show off.
"Word of advice," said Seb2. "Next time you Walk, go for a less public place. Maybe an alleyway, or behind a tree. Think Clark Kent, no need to draw attention."
"Fair point," said Seb. He found a bench outside a Polish food store, its windows plastered with posters advertising various international calling cards. "So, what's changed? Please use words I can understand."
"Ok. Primarily, you can now go where you like, when you like. The Roswell Manna was the latest nano-technology from Billy Jo's people. No one else could get it, because they were trying to run a brand new app on a 2000-year old Operating System. Imagine Windows Vista, but even clunkier."
"Wow," said Seb. "So what else can I do?"
"Hmm. You know that old expression? Show - don't tell?"
"Fine," said Seb, "show me."
He spent the morning wandering the streets, remembering those intense months with Mee before his visa had run out. He had been in London to write songs for a boy band that was supposed to be about to break through. When two of the singers had been arrested for possession, the album had been mothballed and Seb had found himself out of a job. By then, he'd met Meera and everything had changed.
Meera was a revelation. After an amazing few months of mutual discovery and unexpected happiness, she'd come back to America with him. Within a week, she had formed a band - first Crushed Asians, then Clockwatchers. Things had started happening for her. It was only a matter of time before a major label showed some interest. But Seb hadn't really been interested in the musical direction the band pursued - Mee was more interested in the lyrics and saw the music as primarily the delivery system for whatever message she wanted to get across. She loved Seb's musicality, but it didn't fit with the sound she wanted. They parted ways professionally and, soon afterwards, personally. It had hurt, but Seb had always been confident they would end up together. He had believed that right up to the point he'd been diagnosed with a terminal condition. Then he'd decided not to tell her about it, despite knowing she would be furious.
"You think she's going to come back to you now you're half-alien?" said Seb2.
"Yeah, actually, I do," said Seb. "Now, come on, I want to buy her a falafel kebab before we go back."
Chapter 40
Taking Seb2's advice, Seb decided to choose a less conspicuous spot to Walk to this time. He didn't close his eyes, just decided to Walk and his options opened up like someone riffling through a deck of playing cards, each card representing a different geographical location. As he looked for somewhere on the Las Vegas city limits where he was unlikely to be seen arriving, Seb became aware of other possibilities opening up. He paused the process, his options slowly revolving in front of him like tabs on an internet browser.
"What are these?" said Seb, his attention turning to a group of tabs showing potential arrival points containing inexplicable images. Some showed buildings that weren't there in others. Many had no buildings at all. A whole trench of possibilities looked like the surface of the moon, bearing no signs of life at all. Some ju
st showed the star-filled vacuum of deep space.
"Each of these is a doorway," said Seb2. "They all lead to the same place."
"No, they don't," said Seb. "Look at them."
"The same place, but not the same universe," said Seb2.
"What?" said Seb. "You mean those Scientific America articles I read were-,"
"- onto something? Yeah. Parallel universes, different dimensions, the role of consciousness in holding together the fabric of reality. Just don't get too caught up in it. Humans currently have as much chance of understanding this as a newborn being asked to read, absorb, then write a thesis on the Theory Of Relativity, but yeah, this stuff is true."
"Humans? Last time I looked, that was me, too."
"Yeah, whatever," said Seb2. "Thing is, you could spend the rest of your life trying to understand the theory behind what's happening, but you'd get absolutely nowhere. Remember when music recording software used to drive you crazy?"
Seb thought back to the wasted hours spent installing and trying to use studio software on what was - at the time - the fastest computer he could afford. After weeks of frustration, he had eventually given up and wrenched the plug out of the wall, pushing the whole setup into a corner and throwing a sheet over it. That's how it stayed for five years, by which time the value of his entire rig was about half that of the average cell phone.
"I remember," he said.
"And remember the first time you tried a piece of software that worked?"
That had been a beautiful day. Processing power had moved on to the point when someone not particularly tech-savvy could put a laptop next to their music keyboard, plug in a mic and a guitar and make music easily, the software helping the process rather than obstructing it. In a weirdly masochistic way, Seb was glad he'd lived through the period of history when software evolved from expensive self-torture devices to affordable solutions that enabled, rather than hindered, creativity.
World Walker 1: The World Walker Page 29