by Brandt Legg
Once the media got a full grasp of the psychics’ capabilities within Lightyear, special news shows were created to do nothing but follow the story, and even plans for an entire cable channel were discussed. Storch had remained in seclusion, but with calls for the resignation of the CIA director at a fever pitch, and congressional subpoenas for Storch, it was about to get even uglier. I avoided being alone with either of the girls, heeding Booker’s advice to pick one, and because that was too difficult, I chose not to decide.
“We might even be able to go home,” Linh said.
“Do you think Nate will ever be able to go home?” Amber said.
“They say the whole administration may come down,” Linh said. “Our families may be released any day.”
“Soon, at least everyone will know you’re not a terrorist,” Amber said.
“Nate, it’s time to go,” Spencer whispered, as he entered the room where we were watching the coverage.
“Why does he still have to go? Everything is falling apart for Lightyear,” Linh asked.
I looked at Spencer. There was urgency in his eyes.
“I’ll be back before you even have a chance to miss me.”
Amber glanced at Linh then said, “I miss you already.”
“Why do this? You could die,” Linh said.
“When I die, it won’t be today.”
Thirty minutes later, Spencer and I were in the wooded mountains. I saw the portal forty feet above the ground near a trickling waterfall even before he stopped the jeep.
“After Washington, when you return to Wizard Island, take the portal to Cervantes. We’ll be there.” I’d once seen a future where Lightyear seized Cervantes, and I never returned. The future had changed again, and would again.
“Okay. Any more insight as to why I’m seeing Storch?”
His concerned expression softened. “I’m looking forward to you telling me why when next we meet.”
I Skyclimbed up and then dove into the portal. I came out a few miles from Crater Lake. Although it was May, it was still cold at that elevation, particularly coming from tropical Cuba. I expected to come out on Wizard Island and knew Spencer was concerned about the time. I moved fast across the treetops toward the magic lake and looked for the Old Man. When he didn’t appear, I sprinted across the water. He was waiting for me at the top of the cauldron.
“Thought I heard some noise in one of the portals. Then I felt a warm salty breeze. Where you coming from, boy?”
“Cuba.”
“Good place to hide. Where you heading?”
“Washington.”
“Still letting that foolish streak of yours have some control?”
“I’ll be all right.”
“Maybe you will, maybe not.” He looked down into the portal. “Odds are still against you.”
“Thanks for the pep talk.”
“The closer death gets to you, the more you need to be aware. Do you know what I’m saying?”
“No.”
“Keep your brother alive.”
“I’ve been trying.”
“You think so? Foolish boy. Better get to your very important meeting in the cap-it-toll.”
“See you, Old Man.” I jumped, holding the address and information about Storch’s office in my mind.
A moment later, I was staring at a startled Storch from the other side of his desk.
“What the hell are you doing here?” he asked, as I glanced nervously around his large office. We were alone.
“I was hoping you could tell me,” I said, careful not to move out of the portal.
“Yeah, I’ll tell you. I’m going to have you killed.” His eyes glared at me. Who was he? I felt close to knowing, but something was blocking the recognition. That must be why I was here. I needed to know who he was.
Three monitors to the side of me showed the developing scandal. No doubt more information was coming across the three additional screens on his desk.
“Are you filming this, too?” he sneered.
“Everything that has ever happened is always there, always retrievable. Energy doesn’t die.” I recognized the painting behind his desk. It was mine.
“Oh my God, you actually think you’re some kind of prophet,” he growled. “I’ll show you about dying.” He picked up his phone. I studied him, trying to figure out his soul’s identity, ready to duck away. I knew from Spencer that the back of the portal would protect me from being seen or attacked. They would have to come around and get me from the front. Storch didn’t have a gun, or he would have shot me already. Before he could speak into the phone, his face lost color and filled with terror. He dropped the receiver.
An unwelcome person had entered the room. Two tiny-sized darts suddenly hit his neck. He looked at the intruder and then at me, so full of fear that I closed the portal in rapid retreat. But in that last split second with our eyes still locked, his guard dropped, and I saw the reason for my trip, I saw the identity of his soul, and as I landed back on Wizard Island, I was hysterical.
The Old Man sat with me. “You kind of wish you had died, don’t you?”
I couldn’t speak.
“Death is easier than some things, ain’t it?”
83
I stayed with the Old Man that night. I didn’t care about missing the news of Storch’s death because I knew the truth. My most evil enemy still lived through another person. Storch had ordered my father killed and had been trying to destroy me for almost a year. The mass murderer behind the mall attack and greatest force against the Movement was a soul that I knew well and loved dearly. If I hadn’t seen their common soul in Storch’s eyes myself, I never would have believed it.
The Old Man and I stayed in the cauldron, warmed in a weather dome of his making. The questions were so numerous that they remained lodged in my head for hours before I could ask, “Does Dustin know?” It was the first and most pressing question; all the others depended on the answer to this one.
“I’m not like Spencer, I don’t have never-ending insights into your life. But I do know something of this because of an unrelated matter. Your brother does know well of his simultaneous incarnation as Luther Storch.”
“Oh, God!” I’d been wrestling with that possibility since my return from Washington and arguing with my intuition, which said he knew.
“Dustin is a powerful soul. In a prior life he was one of his generation’s seven. And this time, for many reasons known only to him, his torment is great.”
“Maybe he was the betrayer of the original nine entrusted.”
“Now you’re talking above my pay grade. Perhaps he’s trying to help you, or maybe he’s intending harm. But either way, trusting him should be done very carefully, the way one would treat a grizzly bear as a companion.”
“The fact that he has known and not told me, not let us use it to our advantage, not done something to help get our mother and the others released, tells me all I need to know.”
The Old Man was silent.
“And who killed Storch?”
“Spencer may be able to help with those answers.”
“There was a painting on Storch’s wall called ‘Endure.’ It was given to me by the artist, an old friend of mine named Trevor.”
“Surely, Lightyear has removed all your belongings from your house.”
“But the painting wasn’t at my house. Only Trevor knew it was mine and was keeping it for me, on his boat... Oh, wait, I showed it to Dustin when Trevor took us both to Cervantes. That’s how Storch knew. Dustin must have turned Trevor in.” I went on the astral but couldn’t find Trevor; it was the same for Dustin, Rose, and Spencer. They must have all been using some form of Kellaring. I only hoped someone was blocking me from contacting Trevor, and silently added him to the long list of people who had either died or were in prison because they helped me. Sitting in the darkness of night, dazzling starlight visible through the craggy rim of the ancient volcano, surrounded by one of the great energy vortexes, I vowed to free eve
ry one of those still living from the hold of Lightyear. What must Trevor be going through while held in confinement after his lifetime in the concentration camp?
The Old Man was a wise mystic and listened more than he talked. After hours of my theories and speculations, he sent me on my way with these words: “You will never find what you need until you stop searching. You will never be who you must be until you let go of who you think you are. You will never discover all the answers until you understand the questions. Be well, boy. I hope we meet again.”
The portal opened onto the dark beach of Cervantes. A familiar voice, one I most wanted to hear, greeted me as I stepped out: Wandus.
“You have journeyed long since we last met, my friend. To death and back, to love and betrayal, anger and elation, peaceful victory and violent defeat... yes, you are old in your eyes now.”
“I feel old. I’m lost and confused.”
He smiled. “That is when the greatest treasures are closest.”
“Kyle is dead, my aunt is alive and helping Lightyear, Dustin is Lightyear, and I no longer have the ability to know who to trust or what to do.”
“Come.” He walked to the surf and began wave-o-tating.
“It’s too dark,” I yelled from the sand.
“The dark is only your perception. An abundance of light is always there.”
The sun, which was still hours away, rose seemingly minutes later, but my meditation could have been so deep that hours might actually have passed. When we returned to the sand, I felt as if I’d slept for days and had energy enough to Skyclimb for a week and clarity like I’d been soaking in the fifth lake of Outin for a month. What I didn’t know was how soon I was going to need these reserves.
84
A plane landed just as I reached the main house. One of Booker’s employees I remembered from my last visit told me someone was meeting the plane and that Booker and my friends would be there in about ten minutes. He offered me breakfast—a feast of fruit, vegan pastries, and miso soup filled with baby Brussels sprouts that I ate too fast. The girls rushed in.
“Are you really okay?” Linh asked.
“When the news broke of Storch’s suicide, we thought you could’ve been hurt,” Amber said.
“Luther Storch did not kill himself,” I said matter-of-factly, as Booker and Spencer entered.
“I suspected as much,” Booker boomed.
“I was there. He was assassinated.”
“Why?” Linh asked.
“To keep him quiet. He knew too much. And to make him appear guilty,” Booker said. “No trial, no naming names, no mess.”
“What happened?” Amber asked.
“I only had a moment before he was killed... ” I hesitated, unsure how much to share, but when Spencer asked if I now knew the reason for the trip, it seemed right to tell everything. I described each disturbing second of our encounter. Then, before anyone could react fully, Booker took an urgent call and everything changed.
“That was Garcia in Cuba. The house has been raided. Not more than thirty minutes after we left, a SEAL unit came in. They, of course, found nothing, but the breach is critical. Cuba is untraceable to me. It is far more secure than Cervantes. We must go immediately.”
Everyone was given assignments; mine was to gather the IMers. The weight limit on Booker’s plane meant only a portion of them could get out with us; the rest would have to wait several hours for another flight.
I found the IMers on my favorite stretch of beach, a slice of white powder cradled by jungle on one side and a crescent curve of coast on the other. The energy had always been good for training there. Seventeen were practicing, only five could come with us and Spencer had given me a list of the lucky ones. Ren was on it.
I ignored him and found another I remembered from Marble Mountain. He was concerned about the prospect of leaving so many of the best IMers behind. “How are they finding the centers?” He asked the exasperated question we’d all been working on.
I looked over at Ren. “Obviously, a Lightyear agent has infiltrated the upper levels of the Movement.”
“Someone on this island?”
I nodded silently, watching Ren. “There isn’t much time. Tell everyone what’s happening and get the ones on this list to the airstrip. The others can wait in the main house until the next plane arrives. I’ll tell Ren.”
Ren seemed happy to see me. “Another center has been raided, where I just left.”
“How do they know?”
“You tell me Ren,” I sneered.
“Do you think?” he stood back. “I’ve done nothing to harm the Movement.”
“How am I supposed to believe that when you share a soul with Lightyear’s most violent agent?” I shouted.
Several IMers came toward us.
“What do you mean?”
“You pretend not to know, but you must. I cannot believe a coincidence this great exists and that it could go unnoticed by an enlightened guy like you.”
“Please, what are you talking about?”
“You and Sanford Fitts share a soul!”
Gasps from onlookers. Ren coughed and fell backward into the sand. “Why do you say this lie?”
“I’m not lying. You know I’m not. You’re how Lightyear keeps finding the centers and catching mystics. They’re killing people, friends of mine. Do you know how close I’ve come to getting killed?”
“It’s not me, Nate. This is not true!” He scrambled to his feet, but I knocked him down again with Gogen. “Why are you against me? I’ve done nothing.”
My fury was building, all my pent-up rage at Fitts was finding an outlet. All the IMers were gathered round. Some had confused expressions, as they obviously liked Ren. Others were afraid for their own safety and saw Ren as the scapegoat. “You need to admit what you’ve done, admit who you are. Tell us what they know.”
“I know nothing. This is wrong,” He tried to get up again. This time I sent him sailing back toward the water. He tried to run. With Gogen, I easily pushed him into the waves without moving. He fought and clawed as they broke over him. “Tell me the truth,” I screamed, ready to toss him farther.
“Nate! Stop.”
Spencer and the girls were running toward us. Ren was still tumbling in the surf. Spencer must have used Gogen, because Ren suddenly flew out and landed softly next to him. I raised my arms, ready to correct his mistake, when suddenly it went completely dark, as if a giant black tarp had been wrapped around the sun. Not even my night vision worked. The ocean still sounded the same; the air continued to move. All the IMers were whispering and calling out.
“Nate, Ren is not Dustin.”
“I know who Ren is,” I yelled back, trying to conjure light from somewhere, but there was no trace.
“He didn’t know. You’re misplacing your anger about Dustin. We don’t have time for this.”
“This has nothing to do with Dustin. Ren is the traitor.”
“No. You’re blaming him because Dustin isn’t here to blame.”
I could not immediately respond. Either Spencer could be trusted, or he could not. I had to admit to myself that, even with all our differences, one thing was certain: I did trust Spencer and always had. Even when he withheld information, or prevented me doing what I thought best, he had never done anything other than earn my trust since the moment we met. Tears broke the silence of my contemplation. Ren was sobbing softly at first but then uncontrollably. In the absolute darkness, while twenty other people listened, Ren whimpered and sobbed. He had just discovered his greatest enemy was himself. He could not escape.
Spencer was right, I was using Ren to vent my frustration with Dustin. Ren didn’t know about Cuba, but Dustin did. Ren didn’t know about Trevor, but Dustin did. Dustin alone knew Kirby and Baca. Dustin had access to all the centers through his earlier time on Cervantes with me. And Dustin was Storch, who had been alive all this time. Fitts was dead before the raids and mystic arrests began. As much as I didn’t want to admit it, every
thing pointed to Dustin being the traitor, and that meant we needed to escape Cervantes in the next few minutes.
“Ren, please forgive me,” I said, as light returned. I went and helped him to his feet. “I’m sorry.”
I nodded to the girls, but stayed with Ren as golf carts arrived to take us to the plane. Less than ten minutes later we were in the air. The other twelve left behind would not be so lucky. It would be weeks before we confirmed it, but within forty minutes of our departure, half were killed and half were taken into custody.
85
Ren sat next to me on the first part of the flight until Booker asked him to trade places. “Nate, the initial success of our attempts to discredit Lightyear have hit some serious resistance,” he whispered. “It seems that they’re claiming the affidavits are fake and that you have several body doubles. In other words, you were in Minnesota for the mall attack. They now claim that even the Storch film, although authenticated, was part of a sting operation. They say that Storch merely said those things so you would believe the CIA wanted to recruit you, that it was all part of the feds’ plan to arrest you.”
“And his suicide?”
“You did that too and made it look like suicide.”
“Incredible. Our families?”
“They’ll remain incarcerated indefinitely.”
“How do they explain the deaths of the eleven Montgomery Ryders? Did I somehow do that as a twelve-year-old?”
“No, they blame that on a rogue agent and cite it as your initial motivation.”
“Great. What now?”
“Well, they’ve begun freezing my assets.”
“You’re kidding, are you broke now?”
He laughed. “No, no, they’ll never find it all, but things will be a little more difficult from here on out.”