I wished he hadn’t said that. It was the sort of statement that could inspire a heartless universe to prove it wrong.
I woke when Malcolm’s alarm went off about four hours later and shot upright, propelled by a dream that dissolved around me. All I remembered was the fire alarm going off inside Abernathy’s, something I was convinced was true for about twenty seconds until my rational brain told me it was just the alarm clock.
Malcolm slept undisturbed, and for a few minutes I thought about letting him sleep in. Surely there was nothing at Campbell Security so urgent that he had to be there right at nine o’clock? But then I remembered the disaster of the previous night and reluctantly shook him awake.
He woke abruptly, and I snatched my hand away, knowing from previous experience that he sometimes overreacted when he woke from a deep sleep. Blinking, he focused on me.
“The alarm went off,” I told him, “and I wasn’t sure if you were allowed to sleep in.”
“I’m not,” he said. “I have to meet with Lucia at eight.” He rolled out of bed. “You don’t have to get up.”
“I’m awake now, and hungry. I’ll make breakfast—” I remembered my injured hand and scowled. “Or not.”
Claude was in the kitchen eating cereal when I went downstairs. “I hope you do not mind that I took advantage of your hospitality,” he said with a smile.
“No, of course not. I’m glad you didn’t wait for me. Did you hear what happened last night?”
Claude shook his head. “Was it an attack?”
“The invaders hit Toronto. It was a disaster.” I quickly explained what had happened. I was just telling him about the reporter who’d been killed when Malcolm joined us. Claude’s expression grew grimmer the longer I spoke.
“The invaders grow bolder,” he said. “If we cannot find a way to attack them directly, they will overcome the world.”
“I know there are Wardens investigating the possibility of entering the invaders’ reality,” Malcolm said. He took a couple of bowls out of the cupboard. “But I am afraid their efforts won’t bear fruit soon enough.”
I retrieved a box of cereal from the pantry and a container of milk and sat opposite Claude. “And there are only two named Neutralities left.”
“There is a plan to regain the Well,” Malcolm said. “A desperate plan, which seems fitting. But the Well’s power might tip the scales in our favor.”
“I thought it was too corrupted to be used,” I said.
“Corrupted, yes, but too corrupted, no one knows,” Claude said. “Repairing the Well requires someone to enter it, and previous attempts have ended in fatalities. But Khalil al-Hussein is a clever man, and I would not be surprised if he had discovered a different path.”
The thought cheered me, though my rational brain knew how long a shot it was. “Could we—no, wishing the invaders out of existence is impossible, or they’d have done it before now.”
“Correct,” Claude said. “But wishing for a weapon that would interrupt their attack, or a device to allow us to penetrate their reality—those things are not impossible.”
I poured myself a bowl of cereal. “Or something that would seal the cracks? Now that the oracle has told us they exist?”
“That, too,” Claude said. “May I join you at Abernathy’s today? I will need access to the internet to follow up on my duties.”
“Sure. Does anyone know you survived?”
“I texted several people at the nearby nodes.” Claude’s expression went grim again. “Unfortunately, many died at the Athenaeum who were key to its operation. It means I have fewer people to notify, sadly.”
“I’m so sorry.”
Claude nodded. “It is a tragedy, but life goes on. We will attempt to regain connection with the tens of thousands of access points throughout the world, and we will see what may yet be done.”
I thought he was way more optimistic than I would be in his situation, but I said nothing. I was teetering on the brink of despair and didn’t feel like jumping in.
Malcolm dropped us both off at Abernathy’s before rushing off to the Gunther Node, promising to return for me in the evening so I could have my hand checked. After he left, I remembered I also had a therapy visit scheduled for that evening. It was going to be a long night.
I got Claude settled at the computer and took my handful of mail-in auguries through the store. As I sorted through them, my phone rang. It was Jeremiah. My heart lurched painfully. “Any change?” I demanded.
“She’s restless,” Jeremiah said. “Like she’s having bad dreams. I hope it means she’s near waking up.”
“What do the doctors say?”
“They won’t commit to anything, but they said it was possible that she was nearing consciousness. But that’s a bad thing, if it accelerates her loss of magic.” Jeremiah sounded near the breaking point. I couldn’t blame him. “It’s already accelerating,” he went on. “Not much, but they said it was definitely draining faster than yesterday.”
“I wish I could be there.”
“I took some time off. I don’t want to leave her. I’d be useless at work, anyway.” Jeremiah laughed bitterly. “I’m useless here.”
“Don’t think that way,” I said. “When she wakes up, she’ll need you.”
“I’ll keep you posted,” Jeremiah said. “They say she’s in no immediate danger, just—” His voice broke off.
“Thanks. If anything…changes, I’ll be there.”
I held the phone in both hands after Jeremiah ended the call and stared at the window with ABERNATHY’S painted on it in reverse. Invaders destroying the world, the named Neutralities ending, Viv…it was enough to put me in despair again. And yet, what could I do except my job? I set the phone down and picked up the stack of augury requests. They all seemed so pointless.
As if the universe knew I couldn’t handle any more crises, the morning was peaceful. Very few people came into the store, all of them with auguries the oracle fulfilled without fighting me, and we heard nothing more about the attack in Toronto. Claude joined me and Judy for lunch and told us more about the attack on the Athenaeum. Strangely, it didn’t discourage me, probably because Claude had survived and was even more optimistic than I usually was.
“I am making plans to resurrect the Athenaeum,” he said. “There are records of how it came to be, and I think, me, that it is possible to repeat the experiment.”
“So the Athenaeum didn’t start out fully-formed?” Judy said.
“It was, in the beginning, merely a power source,” Claude said. “Designed to allow us to store records in a time before digital existed. But as the records increased, so did the power source, and as it did so, it seems to have developed a rudimentary consciousness. I do not know how intelligent it was at the end, because I feel when I communicate with it that it holds back. But it was capable of learning and developing on its own. Its new interface, for example. We did not design it to replicate a physical electronic tablet. That was its own creation.”
“That makes me even sadder that it’s gone,” I said. “Like the invaders killed a living thing.”
“It angers me,” Claude said. “And makes me more determined to see it reborn.”
The afternoon was just as quiet as the morning. To my surprise, the few Ambrosites who came in could talk of nothing but working with the Nicolliens in Toronto. “They have techniques we’d never heard of,” Allie Sanford told me. “I thought it would be difficult, coordinating with them, I mean, but it’s like we fit right into their formations. I wish I could describe how satisfying it felt.”
“Is the rest of the world falling in line?”
Allie shrugged. “I hope so. Toronto was a nightmare, and our teams were the only effective ones. I think some of the others have seen that and are willing to give it a try. This is not the time to hold onto old grudges.” She laughed. “I’m one to talk. I hated Nicolliens as much as anyone. But now I feel stupid at having felt that way for so long.”
Sin
ce Allie was a good friend, I refrained from telling her I thought she’d been stupid, too. “So long as it’s happening now, I don’t think there’s any point in dwelling on the past,” I said.
Allie saluted me with her augury. “That’s very wise. See you later, Helena.”
At ten ‘til six, I gave the shelves a final dusting and trotted downstairs to put my cleaning supplies away. When I returned to the office, Mike was there, his hand on Judy’s shoulder. She wore a furious scowl and had both her hands on her hips. “You don’t want to live together,” she said, “you just want me where you can keep an eye on me.”
“That’s a stupid thing to say,” Mike said.
“Oh, so I’m stupid now?”
“Sorry,” I said, and turned to go.
“It’s okay, Helena, we’re done talking,” Judy said. She stepped away from Mike and sat at the computer.
I hesitated in the doorway. Mike let out a deep, frustrated breath and headed for the back door. I glanced at Judy, whose eyes were bright with tears, and said, “Mike. Wait.”
Mike turned. “Yeah?”
It was none of my business, but I couldn’t bear any more tragedy. “Judy wants to move in with you.”
“Helena!” Judy exclaimed.
“She doesn’t,” Mike said flatly. “She’s made that clear.”
“Only because she doesn’t want you to do it out of pity.” I avoided looking at Judy, who I was sure was glaring at me. “She wants it to be what you want.”
“Of course it’s what I want!” Mike said, throwing up his arms.
“There’s no room for me in your life,” Judy said. “We might as well admit that.”
Mike swore explosively. “You’re so damned independent,” he said. “You don’t want to give that up. I’ve been trying to get you to come over for days now, and you keep putting me off.”
“I don’t see why you care,” Judy shot back. “You’re so protective of your personal space, there’s no way I can fit in there.”
Mike’s jaw tightened. “That’s not true.”
Judy arched an eyebrow at him. “Isn’t it?”
He shook his head. “I cleaned it up,” he said.
“You what?” Judy said.
“I cleaned. I rearranged the living room. I bought another dresser so you’d have space for your things and cleaned out half the closet. There’s even a laundry basket in the corner of the bedroom. It was supposed to be a surprise, but you’re so damned stubborn you didn’t take any of the hints I dropped.”
“I hate surprises,” Judy said, her voice faint. “Mike…you didn’t have to do that.”
“I want you to live with me,” Mike said. “So yeah, I had to do that.”
Judy stood. “I didn’t know. I’m sorry.”
She walked toward him. He met her halfway.
I backed out of the room and shut the door on the two of them kissing. My heart felt lighter than it had in days. Of course, now I couldn’t leave the store, but I could give them a few minutes.
Malcolm and I dropped Claude off at our house before stopping for cheeseburgers and heading for the Gunther Node. I ate happily and told Malcolm what had happened with Mike and Judy in between bites. “I’m glad I said something, because I couldn’t stand the thought of them going on fighting,” I said.
“They’re both independent enough I’m surprised they make it work,” Malcolm said. “I would have bet hard money that Mike would never settle down. I wonder if he just needed to find a woman he didn’t feel depended on him for everything.”
“Judy’s definitely not that. Not that she doesn’t depend on him, but she doesn’t have her whole life wrapped up around him—is that what you mean?”
“Yes, exactly that. I hope they’re happy together.”
“And Mr. Rasmussen and Mike are getting along. You know, I feel like things might not be so terrible after all. Is that bad? Given that the world is in danger?”
Malcolm took the freeway exit to the Gunther Node and waited at the top of the ramp for the light to change. “I think humans can only take so much misery before something gives. Looking for moments of happiness when tragedy strikes is normal. It doesn’t mean we don’t take tragedy seriously, it just means we need a balance.”
“I hope that’s true. It’s like what I’m doing in going to therapy—learning to accept the bad things that have happened without letting them overwhelm me.”
“And remembering the good things that have happened, too.”
I put my hand on his knee and squeezed gently. “So many good things.”
Rick Jeong wasn’t in Green 1 when we arrived, but he’d left a message that he’d be back in an hour or so. Just enough time for me to see Sydney. I left Malcolm waiting and found my own way to Sydney’s office, knocked, and waited for her to let me in. Today she wore a flowing dress in emerald green with a colorful peacock embroidered on the skirt. “How are you today, Helena?” she asked.
I settled myself in my usual chair. “Better than I was this morning.”
“Oh? Why is that?”
I explained about how despairing I’d felt over the attack in Toronto and the destruction of the Athenaeum, and how I was happy for Judy and Mike. “I don’t know why something relatively small could offset something as large as the near-destruction of a city,” I said, “unless it’s because the small thing is personal. But I feel more positive, like the Wardens will figure this out.”
“I think you’re right about how we’re affected more strongly by personal things.” Sydney shifted her weight and propped her elbow on her chair’s arm. “Speaking of being affected, did you write out the descriptions of the three events?”
“Yeah. It was…freeing, actually. I haven’t been disturbed by those memories since. But it feels like that’s too easy. If all it takes to overcome trauma is to write about it, nobody would ever need a therapist.”
Sydney laughed. “You’re right, it’s not that easy. But sometimes, giving ourselves permission to relive events in a safe space opens the door to finally beginning to heal. Tell me, did you learn anything new about those events? A new perspective, or a detail you’d forgotten?”
I remembered my breakthrough in understanding why being shot by Malcolm had been so terrible. “Yeah. There were a few things I’d never realized.”
“Seeing things from a different perspective helps break you out of the self-destructive pattern you’ve been trapped in, where you involuntarily recall painful memories. The more you can do that, the easier it will become.”
I nodded. “That makes sense.”
“Tell me about your mindfulness exercises,” Sydney continued. “How are they going?”
“I’m not good at them yet,” I confessed, “and that’s probably because I don’t practice often. But a strange thing happened with my meditation. It’s brought me closer to the oracle, close enough that I’ve made contact with it while I wasn’t in its space.”
Sydney’s eyes narrowed in thought. “What does that mean?”
I explained about the oracle’s presence and how I’d spoken to it often in the last year, and added, “The point is that the oracle exists within the bookshelves of Abernathy’s, but a few times, I’ve meditated and spoken to it while I wasn’t in that space. I don’t know what it means.”
“I don’t know anything about the oracle, so I can’t help you,” Sydney said, “but it sounds like when you meditate successfully, you make yourself receptive to the oracle’s communication. I assume it exists all the time, and not just when the oracular space is active?”
“I think so. I have the feeling it has things it does when it’s not talking to me, and I don’t think it simply stops being just because I’m not there.”
“And what has the oracle said to you during your meditation? Is its communication different from when you’re in its space?”
I shook my head. “No, it’s always the same sort of thing. Warnings, mostly.”
“Then I’d encourage you to seek it o
ut. Maybe it understands more than you think.”
“That’s almost certainly true,” I said.
We talked a while longer about mindfulness and what had happened at laser tag, and when Sydney said, “I think we’ll continue this next week,” I was surprised at how fast the time had passed. She escorted me back to Green 1, where we said goodbye.
To my surprise, Malcolm was gone. I tried texting him, but as usual had no signal. Rick wasn’t there, and the nurses at the central island were busy and paid me no attention. I decided to visit Viv as long as no one else was demanding my time. This was the Gunther Node’s quiet time, when everyone was either going off-shift or eating dinner, and despite my returning anxiety over Viv, I felt at peace.
When I’d nearly reached Viv’s door, it opened, and Malcolm emerged. He seemed surprised to see me. “Helena, come quickly,” he said.
My peaceful feeling evaporated, and I ran the last few steps to his side. “What’s wrong? Is she—”
“Viv’s still unconscious,” Malcolm said. He held the door open for me. “But there’s been a change.”
Viv looked exactly as she had the last time I’d seen her, white and still like a wax figure. Jeremiah stood beside her, his hands closed loosely into fists and his head lowered. Rick held one of Viv’s hands and had his eyes closed. When I entered, he looked at me with those too-young eyes and said, “Viv’s magic is draining more rapidly. There’s going to be a point past which transfusions will be ineffective.”
I felt like he’d punched me in the stomach. “When?” I managed faintly.
“I don’t know for sure. A few days.” Rick laid Viv’s hand down and flicked the glittering diamond IV bag with his fingernail. “But we have a solution.”
I sucked in a breath. “Why didn’t you start with that?”
“Because it’s impossible,” Jeremiah said. “They’d have to give Viv an aegis.”
The Book of Destiny Page 26