Victor was already nodding approvingly. “Yes, yes. I like that. And what about you?”
Aeros explained, “I’m a nano engineer, and I can synthesize nanites on the fly and extrude them from the porous holes in my body. I’m also the most chip-enhanced of the group, meaning I’m the most likely to come up with nanite solutions in the moment that might possibly slow the beast down.”
Victor nodded. “Thank Techa for small mercies.” He turned to the Silver Surfer. “And you?”
“My board can trap Soren temporarily in a space-time bubble without you having to risk opening a portal to another dimension and creating even more problems for us. That’s your real talent, isn’t it?”
Victor grimaced back at him, but let the dig slide. It seemed warranted. “Very well, then.” Victor rose on his mandala bridge which started manifesting at his feet. His top hat, tux, and cane teleported back to his clothes closet. The others had taken an alarmed step back. Not sure if he was perhaps coming after them.
“Why are you powering up?” Aeros asked.
“Soren’s having another episode. We’re psychically connected, provided he’s agitated enough to get on my radar. Whatever’s going on, you can bet all of your abilities will be put to the test soon enough.” He shot out of the room on the mandala bridge that pointed the rest of them on where to go. Ry and An hopped back on top of Surf’s hoverboard, and the group followed after him.
Ramon strode to the ledge, stepping over the shards of glass crunching beneath his feet. He wasn’t exactly envious of what the others were rushing into, and with Victor still the far more powerful mandala magician, there was no point in putting himself in harm’s way. For now, and for the near future, his job remained making the most of the trinkets in Victor’s flat. Though Victor was loath to admit it, he hadn’t made much headway with them either. His own talents had arisen by instinct, like a pianist who could replicate a tune after just hearing it once, with no musical instruction at all. His instincts would have told them the amulets did something, but what? It had fallen on Ramon to find out. Hopefully in time for one or more of them to do any good at all.
Something told Ramon, considering the ancient evil they were dealing with, and the ancient nature of the amulets themselves, they might be very necessary to save them all.
SEVENTEEN
Soren woke up on his operating table—sort of. When he stood up, he realized he was on the uppermost level of a stone pyramid overlooking a tropical jungle. Although it had lost none of its dimensions, the stainless steel tray that he used for operating had morphed into a slice of polished geode with complex swirling patterns that looked a bit like a starry nebula.
He glanced at the other pyramids in the distance, visible just at the crowns that rose over the canopy trees of the forest.
Provoked by flies, which he kept swatting away, he hiked down the steps of the pyramid he’d woken up on until he was at the jungle floor.
He followed what looked like a trail. He hadn’t gone far along it when he ran into a purple lion. Soren stopped dead in his tracks and gulped. “I’m sorry, but are you purple, or are my eyes playing tricks on me?”
“I am, and that better not be some kind of bigoted remark. I should tell you, I’m prone to eat people and tackle them from out of nowhere; you’ll never see me sneaking up on you in this jungle. If I don’t eat you, I might just play with my food. Fancy being mauled?”
Soren smiled. “Natura. I should have known.” He gazed up at the daytime sky and there wasn’t any ceiling or skylights, but somehow he just knew he was still in his lab. Witness his morphed operating table, which he took a moment to glance back at. Now it looked a bit more like a sacrificial altar, but that, too, seemed more in keeping with the truth and not less, at least of late. Techa knows, he’d been sacrificing his soul at his operating table every moment he spent staring at that 18th century book on cabbalistic nanites.
The book!
“Where’s the book?”
“Look, pal, I only take this talking animal nonsense so far. If you think you’re putting a set of spectacles on me and teaching me to read, you can forget about it.” The lion turned away and disappeared back into the thick jungle foliage.
Soren kept hiking the trail until he chanced upon Natura. She was perched on a dragon, flapping its wings in place in the sky just yards above, and blasting boluses of fire out its mouth—not far enough to reach him, just far enough to make a point. First the lion, and now the dragon. She must have been feeling nervous around him, worse than usual. He put his hand to his forehead to stare up at her, in the direction of the sun behind her back and of the dragon, large enough to blot out the sun, just not polite enough to do so.
“What happened to me? I remember finally getting somewhere with that symbol I’ve been tracing my finger over for days, like a retarded imbecile—” Yes, of course, the beast. He was trying to understand the symbol from the perspective of the beast; that’s why he felt like an imbecile. But the beast was as smart and as cunning in his own way as he was thick. He knew that concentrating on that symbol would take him somewhere eventually. But where?
“Did I do something to upset you?” Soren asked.
“You’re just a moody, tempestuous, blowhard, that’s all, worse than Player.”
Soren honestly couldn’t remember what he’d done, but apologized anyway. Whatever it was, it couldn’t have been too bad; Natura was acting twelve, as opposed to six, so, if that was any indication…. Then again, she’d been doctoring herself with her own nature magic, so maybe…. The truth was, he honestly didn’t want to think about it. He didn’t like the idea of terrorizing her, of terrorizing anybody.
“I need to find my book.”
“Naomi says, ‘First you take a break.’ You experienced some sort of breakdown. Nervous exhaustion. I guess when she says you’re feeling better, I can play a game of find the Easter egg with you.” She flew off on her dragon before he could protest the matter. He groaned loud enough for his voice to carry on the wind clear up to her on that dragon receding in the distance.
“Maybe Naomi has a point, Soren. You haven’t eaten or drank anything in days. Your eyes are so weary and bloodshot from staring at that book, they probably couldn’t focus any longer on that pattern if you tried.” He put his hands up to his face to confirm that he could no longer bring them into focus from up close. What’s more, the nanites weren’t compensating. Something told him that might be a good thing. But a shiver shot up his spine. His nanites not cooperating with him indicated that they were now at the disposal of the beast—not the doctor.
That was likely what had landed him here. Again, he just didn’t want to think about it. Guilt-tripping himself could end up summoning the beast, inviting him to take the stage again. He had to hold on to the positive emotions, make use of the nature therapy; it might well be the best gift anyone could give him right now.
His lab had been situated over one of the planet’s power spots; anything else wouldn’t have made much sense for a chi master who was very dedicated to advancing his fringe science into regions traditional science would have balked at. Unlike conventional apparatuses, his inventions could work with chi energy, using it to better detect and analyze the paranormal.
Soren traced the Ley lines connecting the smaller vortices about the central one that his operating table had been sited on, continuing to suck up the feel-good energy. The invisible pattern etched in the earth beneath his feet was like one of Victor’s mandalas. The way the vortices interlinked were just not as neat, not as geometrically precise—more like the fractal geometries of the human body, or of a branching tree.
The first energy vein took him to the first of the peripheral vortices, where Natura had another surprise waiting for him. The animals must have been able to sense the energy veins, too, and were only too happy to congregate in the areas where the Ley lines merged and the healing chi’s properties magnified further. The creatures were gathered around a watering hole, staring int
o it transfixed—for the most part. Some of the beasts had outgrown the fascination of staring at the water and were relaxing a little further back.
“Go on, ask it another question. The gag never gets old, I tell ya.” That was the panda bear doing the talking, sitting on its rump, chewing bamboo.
“Water, water on the ground. Who’s. The. Fastest. Creature. In. The. Forest?” the sloth asked, fighting his own nature to get out the words before everyone forgot the question.
“Um, can we get someone besides the sloth to ask the questions? I swear I’ve aged ten years in that guy’s presence,” the panda bear balked.
“The cheetah,” the water said. Just then a cheetah splashed the water chasing after a whippet that splashed it just a half second before; the cheetah looked to be gaining on the anorexic-looking dog.
“Yeah, I guess we can take that one on faith,” the panda bear said, shifting his attention back to the bamboo in his hand after panning his head to catch both darting animals shooting through the shallow pool of water. “I’m still not sure I trust that thing, though.”
“Oh yeah, like talking water is such a shocker after talking animals,” the white wolf said with the piercing blue eyes, interrupting chewing on his bone.
“Yeah, but we lie. Why should it speak the truth?” the panda bear rebutted.
“Hmm, you got me there.” The wolf returned to his gnawing.
Soren, smiling, though not enough to show any teeth, meandered closer to the waterline. He sensed Naomi’s magic mingling with Natura’s. She was forever trying to pass off her magic as someone else’s just to downplay her own abilities, which included more magical aptitudes—largely absorbed from others—than she could remember most days.
As soon as the animals saw Soren’s reflection in the water, they balked, making whatever protesting sounds that came along with their natures. “There goes the party,” the crocodile said, following with a deep growl resembling an echo. “One look at that face and I’d be too scared to answer any more questions, too.”
“Hey, in some circles, I’m considered rather handsome,” Soren said.
“And just which corners of hell are those?” the panda bear asked, interrupting his nibbling again long enough to burp out the words. Then he huffed. “Scratch that. Like I really want to know.”
The animals were already retreating from the watering hole.
Soren stared into the water and asked, “Hey, where do I find my girlfriend around here? And is she as hot and bothered as I am?”
The animals all stopped and did an about face. “Wait, there’s humping in this movie?” the panda bear asked.
“I’m in,” the donkey said, who, up until now had been reclining on his back on a patio chair recliner, reading a chunk of Rosetta stone with hieroglyphics, suspended between its fore hooves, through his steel-frame spectacles. He set the stone down and forced himself back onto his feet, braying all the while.
“Someone find that damn giraffe,” the panda bear ordered. “I want to make sure we don’t lose track of these two.”
The sloth whistled for the giraffe by putting a paw in his mouth and using his claws like fingers. The giraffe came running. “What?”
“They’re going to hump,” the crocodile explained, pointing to Soren, “the humans, I mean.”
The giraffe bleated. “Christ, front row seating is going to be at a premium. What animal doesn’t get worked up by humping?”
“None in this forest,” came the chorus of replies.
The water finally managed to get a word in edgewise in reply to Soren’s question. “She’s waiting for you at the next energy vortex.”
“Ah, would that be the one to the east or to the west?” Soren asked, turning back to the water when he realized the earlier instructions were still a bit too vague for his purposes, his anxiety level rising too much to waste going in the wrong direction.
“Like east or west hold any significance to a spherical entity, nimrod,” the water protested.
Soren decided to pantomime his way out of this. “Which arm?” he said holding out his arms in both directions.
“Oh, yeah, like right and left have so much more meaning? They don’t make humans as smart as they used to,” the water complained. “That much is clear through even muddy water.”
Soren sighed. He dropped one arm. “This way?”
“Yeah, and you step over me to get to her, see if you ever hear the truth from me again. You just wait until that cheetah and whippet need another drink from me. They’ll be pissing fire for a month.”
“Thank you!” Soren said, sounding as exasperated as he felt.
He ran off in the desired direction—running right through the pond.
“Am I speaking another language here?” the water balked, its moving lips formed by ripples in the water.
The other animals were already bounding after Soren—right through the water. “Guess so,” the water mumbled.
“Don’t lose him!” the crocodile, with the lowest vantage point of them all, shouted to the giraffe. His voice once again seemed to echo everywhere.
The giraffe bleated. “Not a chance.”
***
Soren ran the path of the energy vein toward Naomi, feeling it beneath his feet as surely as if it were a conveyor belt pulling him along at an airport.
When the blind trail finally opened again, permitting him to see more than a few feet in front of his face, there she was, feeding a bottle of milk to a baby ram with a full set of horns as big as any adult’s. The youngster didn’t take to having his bottle feeding interrupted. He charged Soren repeatedly every time Naomi took the nipple out of his mouth to give the walking distraction a piece of his mind.
“Easy there, big guy,” Soren said in between, “ouch” and “ouch,” and “This thing can really hit.” Then he grabbed the bottle out of Naomi’s hand. “I think I have a solution to this problem.” He handed the bottle over to the panda bear, who muttered some protests under his breath.
“I suppose I can stomach babysitting in exchange for a front row seat. Hey! Someone got a blindfold to go with this pacifier? Things are about to get real racy. I have a strong feeling about this.”
“Yeah, don’t we all,” the crock said, closing ranks in the circle about the pair of lovers, making sure none of the late arriving animals crowded him out; that included the late-arriving snapping Cayman, who he snapped back at. “Hey, pal, be there or be square, you know.”
The giraffe yanked a palm frond with its teeth for the panda bear to wrap the infant’s eyes. “The preliminaries out of the way…. Can. We. Get. This. Party. Started?” the sloth said.
“Have you been carrying on about our epic love scenes again, Soren?” Naomi teased.
“Animals infer a lot from, ‘Where’s my girlfriend?’ let me tell you.”
“Amen,” the chorus of animals said forming the circle about them. “Ain’t it the truth,” the donkey echoed. “Now, get going, you two. That’s a lot of weight I’m supporting on four spindly legs here.”
“I don’t know,” Naomi admitted to Soren, looking as unsure as she sounded. “This is Natura’s fantasy world, which I think is G-rated, by definition.”
“Oh, we won’t say anything,” the wolf assured them.
All the animals made a zipping it gesture with one of their front paws or hooves or…across their lips in unison.
“Well, that settles that,” Soren said with a wicked smile. “Now, where were we?” He took Naomi in his arms and brought her closer. “I seem to remember that of the hundred and seven unacknowledged lesser chakras along the energy meridians of the human body that we left a few unexplored last time. On account of your talent for connecting to the absolute wrong person at the worst possible time,” he said, in deference to the Tillerman, whom she’d opened a psychic link to, just when their hearts and minds should have merged perfectly at the height of coitus. “That’s one,” he said, bringing her left arm to his mouth and kissing the wrist.
&n
bsp; She seemed surprised to find it an erogenous zone, forgetting that his chi mastery turned every one of those lesser chakras into an erogenous zone. Her protests were sounding more mock each time she made one. “I don’t know, Soren.” He kissed the opposite wrist, sending more energy through it than he sent through the last kiss, pulling the chi right up through the power spot he was standing on. She swooned and her knees buckled. He caught her in his arms as he brought them both to the ground.
“Oh, yeah, this is getting good.” The donkey brayed. “Anyone remember the edibles?”
“Get your people pleasers, here!” the vendor declared, strolling the aisles; the animals were already three rows thick, and rows were multiplying by the number before he could make a complete circle. The treat seller was the chimpanzee carrying a basket of straw people—his “people pleasers.” The chimpanzee tossed them into the mouths of the animals without hands, like the donkey, and other grazers—which included a gazelle, a deer, and a few other grass eaters by this point.
The people pleasers were voicing their protests. “Hey, do we get a vote in this?” Soren heard a “guess not” sounding very muted as one of them mouthed off slipping down the donkey’s throat.
The chimpanzee tossed candied beetles and clumps of ants to the insectivores and ant-eaters respectively. “Hey, these rows get any higher, we’re going to need a gorilla working the outer aisles with a chance in hell of reaching those mouths,” he remarked, eying up the giraffes closing in to form the outermost perimeter.
Naomi was moaning louder and her resistance to Soren’s entreaties receding further. The chi flowing through her at Soren’s every kiss nullifying not just all reason to the contrary, but likely all thought, as well. He was saturating her body with more ecstasy than it could handle last time. She had already levitated off the ground—taking both of them, still lying horizontally—up a few feet into the air.
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