Mr. Grey’s “eternity to heal” has yet to arrive.
I’m rapidly bleeding out.
Matt and Seymour kneel beside me. The other two have gone off to try to fire up the warp engines. The interior of the vimana is warm but I shiver. Excess blood loss—it can bring a deathly chill. Seymour’s eyes burn with tears.
“You have to hang on,” he pleads.
“Why won’t you accept my blood?” Matt asks.
I find it too much of a strain to keep my eyes open; I close them.
“This is Mr. Grey’s moment,” I say. “It’s why he came to us.”
“How do you know?” Seymour asks.
“I was terrified to enter their ship. I knew where it would take me. I could never have actually done it without him. And all he did was tell me the end of Veronica’s story, and my fear left.” I pause. “Seymour, Cia would have shot you if I’d hesitated for a second.”
“What miracle are you expecting from him next?” Matt asks.
“What miracle are you expecting?” I whisper.
Matt puts his head next to mine. “Have you guessed?”
“You want to say good-bye to your father,” I say.
I can feel Seymour shift in confusion. “What does Yaksha have to do with right now?” he demands.
“Tell . . . ,” I mumble, losing the ability to talk.
Matt speaks to Seymour. “If Mr. Grey can get this ship afloat, it can transcend relative velocities. Which will allow it to step outside time. Five thousand years ago my father was aboard this ship. But once we pass light speed, there will be no was. There will only be the eternal now.”
“And you expect to meet your father here?” Seymour asks.
“I hope. It’s something I’ve hoped for a long time.”
The floor of the ship shakes. I feel as if I am rising. It could be the ship shooting into space or else my soul leaving my body. It may be the two events are related. Matt and Seymour fall silent as a gentle but powerful hum vibrates the vessel.
“Sita! There are stars outside!” Seymour exclaims suddenly.
That’s nice, I think. I want to say it but the words feel like such an effort. I can’t complain, though. I feel little pain. After all the crap I’ve been through, I couldn’t have hoped for a better death.
“We are leaving earth orbit,” I hear Matt say from far away.
“Hell, we’re leaving the solar system,” Seymour says.
Sarah and Mr. Grey reappear. I don’t see them but I hear them.
“How is she?” Mr. Grey asks.
“She’s out cold,” Seymour says.
Yeah, right, I think. I feel someone touch my wrist.
“Her pulse is getting stronger,” Mr. Grey says.
I don’t know about that. I still feel as if I’m dying.
“Will she live? Don’t bullshit me,” Seymour says.
“She can heal herself. She just needs time,” Mr. Grey says.
“Has time stopped yet?” Matt asks.
Mr. Grey speaks. “Yet? That word has no meaning aboard this ship. Time has begun to turn back on itself. On earth you experience time as linear, as a sequence of moments, one second followed by the next second, all in a straight line. But time is much more dynamic than you realize. In a sense it’s alive. If life is a play that takes place on a stage, then time is the director. He—or it—says when the curtains are to be raised and when they are to fall. There can be no life without time, and life itself creates time. Do you understand?”
“Gimme a break,” Seymour says. “Of course we don’t understand.”
Matt speaks up. “I heard what you and Sita said. Are you really from another time?”
“Yes and no. The Mr. Grey you see before you was born in your time and hopefully will die there. But the mind that currently occupies this body is a projection from the future.”
“From how far in the future?” Matt asks.
“Ten thousand years,” Mr. Grey says.
“How did you come back? Why?” Seymour asks.
Mr. Grey answers. “In our time we’re capable of building ships that can travel faster than light. And we discovered, as you’ll soon discover, that once we transcended that barrier, time no longer held us bound. I am a distant descendant of the Mr. Grey you see standing before you. Ten thousand years from now, I entered a ship such as this and sent my mind back through my genetic line to his body. I took over his body.”
“Why?” Seymour repeats.
“To fix what was broken. In our time—in our history books—the Nazis won World War Two. All the mistakes that you saw Hitler make were negated by a powerful force working through the Third Reich. That force did so to create the template of a purely materialistic society. A society where science is the only God. Where even the idea of something beyond the physical creation is seldom contemplated.”
“It sounds like a pretty sterile world,” Seymour says.
Mr. Grey sighs, a heavy sigh that holds much grief. “You have no idea. In my time there is no magic. There is no mythology. Our scientific achievements are beyond your wildest dreams, but our culture is stagnant, without purpose. We know there’s no God, no angels, no demons. We have proven it scientifically. It doesn’t matter where we travel in the galaxy, what other cultures we discover. They all see the universe as we do. You might say we have discovered the ultimate truth, and found that God doesn’t exist.”
“How can earth’s history affect other worlds?” Seymour asks.
“You can’t uncover what you know doesn’t exist. I come from a reality that is black and white, colorless. Nobody experiences a flash of intuition or a sense of déjà vu. None of our children grow up believing in Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny. On our birthdays we don’t even blow out candles and make a wish. No one even bothers to write fantasy stories. Why should they? No one would read them. The word ‘mystical’ cannot be found in our dictionary. I have never met a person who has ever stopped to pray to God. The Third Reich did not form the seed of a cruel and barbaric world. It did something much worse. It formed a society that has forgotten the meaning of the word ‘hope.’ ”
“Where do you fit into this black-and-white picture?” Matt asks.
“I’m a historian. In the midst of our search to absolutely prove there was nothing left for us to uncover, I was given permission to use a technique our scientists have discovered that allows us to view the past. How the technique works is beyond your understanding, but suffice to say it can only be used aboard a ship that is traveling faster than light. While scanning our past I came across a remarkable fork in the road of our evolution. It was as if someone had seen it before me and had already adjusted it—without our knowledge. I studied this fork for years, trying to understand what caused it, why it was created, who was behind it. After decades of research it finally became clear to me that Sita stood at the center of the fork in the road.”
“Are you saying she caused it?” Seymour demands.
“No. I was never able to define who caused it. But I saw that Sita could fix it. Fix our past.”
“Why Sita?” Matt asked.
“Stop and imagine what it was like for me to stumble onto her. Here was a young woman who was five thousand years old. She wasn’t even human, she was a vampire, and everyone in my world knew there was no such thing as vampires. Not only that, she had met gods and fought with demons—beings that didn’t exist in our universe.”
“You must have thought you were hallucinating when you found her,” Matt says.
“That’s not far from the truth. I spent years just trying to confirm that she really existed. Then I discovered something equally strange. I saw that Sita herself—like our entire society—had been manipulated several times in her life. In the Middle Ages, when she fought Landulf of Capua and Dante. In World War Two, when she was taken captive by the Nazis. Worst of all were the events of this morning, when she allowed Frau Cia and her partner to take control of the red vimana and fly unchallenged into the sky.”<
br />
“But they took off unchallenged this morning,” Seymour says.
“Not true. Even as we speak, this ship is hot on their tail.”
“I don’t understand,” Seymour says.
“You intend to destroy them,” Matt says suddenly.
“Yes,” Mr. Grey says. “With this ship we can easily destroy them.”
“I still don’t understand why you had to enter our time,” Seymour says.
“When I originally viewed Sita’s past, I saw her panic on top of the hill and refuse to go with Frau Cia into her vimana. The prospect of eternal damnation was too much for her, even if facing it meant she could save your life. In a sense she failed a major moral challenge.”
“A challenge any sane person would have failed,” Seymour says in my defense.
“True. But Sita is unique to your world. Besides living an endless life, she has come in contact with a being that many in your past considered a god. I’m speaking of Krishna. Her relationship with him linked her to the supernatural, to both angels and demons. In a sense it has been Krishna’s grace that has made her life so magical. But it has exacted a terrible toll on her as well. Sita has faced and passed an incredible number of painful moral tests.”
“But why does she keep getting tested?” Matt asks. “And what is this force that distorted your time in the first place?”
“I’m glad you asked the two questions together,” Mr. Grey says. “The answers are linked, I believe, although I have to admit I’m still not sure what exactly this force is that altered mankind’s timeline. For lack of a better word I would have to call it evil. I say that because in order to defeat it Sita had to choose what was right or good.” Mr. Grey pauses. “Forgive me for being so vague. Remember, I come from a world where the concepts of good and evil don’t exist.”
“I understand,” Matt says thoughtfully.
“I don’t,” Seymour nearly explodes. “Are you saying that because Sita was willing to sacrifice her soul to save me that mankind’s future has been fixed?”
“It has been corrected,” Mr. Grey says. “It will now be the way it was supposed to be. In a practical sense—if I can use such a word while discussing such matters—it was Sita’s sacrifice that caused the Vishnu vimana to manifest on top of the hill this morning. And with this vimana we’ll be able to catch and destroy Frau Cia’s vimana. Once she and her partner have been removed from this present time, the connection this unseen force has to earth will be greatly weakened.”
“Why didn’t you just return to our time in one of your fancy spaceships and destroy them?” Seymour asks. “Why all the song and dance?”
“We can send our minds back in time. We cannot send physical objects back.”
Matt interrupts and there is pain in his voice. “So even aboard a ship such as this it’s not possible to go back in time and visit with, say, a deceased parent?”
“Yes and no. You can send your mind back to when you were an earlier age. You can send your mind back to the body of your father at an earlier age. But you cannot send your present-day body back in time.”
“Let’s stay on point,” Seymour insists. “You still haven’t explained why you returned to help Sita.”
Mr. Grey replies. “My purpose in returning was to give Sita the moral courage to face down Frau Cia’s challenge.”
“But how did you do that?” Seymour demands.
“By translating The Story of Veronica for her,” Mr. Grey says.
“I don’t understand,” Seymour says.
I hear Mr. Grey kneel by my side. I feel him; he touches my hand.
“Sita understands,” he says, shaking my hand gently. “You have stopped bleeding. You’re almost healed. Time to open your eyes.”
I do as he commands, but as I stare up at him I’m forced to blink. Mr. Grey leans over me, I see him, and yet I see another figure as well, a ghost of a man, overlaying his face. This man is hairless, the dome of his skull is larger than normal, and his eyes are emerald green, so bright they would make him stand out in any crowded room. I realize I’m seeing him as he looks in the future, the real Mr. Grey who came back in time to save us and the rest of mankind.
“Thank you,” I say.
The ghost image smiles. So does his human body.
“I should thank you,” he says. “I expect my home will be a lot different when I return.”
“Will they believe in fairies and unicorns?” I tease.
“Anything is possible.”
I suddenly realize the full implications of what we’re doing.
“Wait a second,” I say. “Will you even exist in your future?”
“I honestly don’t know.”
He is trying to let me down gently. With a change in the timeline as big as this, the chances of him being born a hundred centuries in the future must be incredibly small.
“Do you have to leave so soon?” I ask, feeling crushed that he probably only has minutes of life left. I loved him from the instant I met him, and never understood why until now. If ever there were guardian angels, Mr. Grey was mine. He did not just save me from death, he saved my soul.
He nods. “It’s time.”
“But the other vimana . . .”
“It was destroyed while I was speaking. And I’ve programmed the ship to take you and your friends home.” Mr. Grey pauses. “That is, if you want to go home.”
I close my eyes and let my mind wander through the past. Of course, right now, aboard this ship, traveling faster than light, I can do far more than wander. . . .
“You know me too well,” I say.
EPILOGUE
I stand near my hut in India. Inside, my daughter, Lalita, and my husband, Rama, sleep peacefully. Although it is late at night and the forest is silent, a faint noise has awoken me and brought me outside to investigate.
It is Yaksha who made the noise.
He has come for me. Holding me in his powerful hands, he makes a terrible offer. I can come with him and become like him. A monster who feeds on the blood of the living. A creature as strong as him, one who even time cannot destroy. All I have to do is leave my family and promise to stay with him.
If I refuse, Yaksha will kill Lalita and Rama.
I have no choice.
Or I should say I had no choice.
Unknown to Yaksha I hold a sharp wooden stake in my right hand. I wear a loose-fitting white sari and keep the dagger hidden behind the folds of silk. Even with his great strength and reflexes, he can still be killed. He is not expecting an attack. And he stands so near. . . .
If I thrust upward beneath the tip of his sternum, drive the stake into his heart, he will die and my life will go on as it should.
The stake—I picked it up before leaving my home.
I knew he was coming for me . . . this time.
Yaksha stares at me in the dark, waiting for my answer. I don’t know why I delay. I won’t have a better chance. Perhaps I’m afraid. If my aim is off by a fraction of an inch, or if I hesitate as I stab, he’ll snap my neck. It doesn’t matter that he loves me and feels he needs me. He’s a yakshini, a demon by birth, and, at this point in his life, he’s cruel. If I allow him to change me, I’ll be no different from him.
Yet there’s something in his eyes I’ve never seen before. He appears uncertain, and he’s giving me more time than he should to decide. I don’t understand why he’s the one who is hesitating.
“You can do it, you know. I won’t stop you,” he says.
Damn, I think. He must have seen the stake.
Yet I’m missing something. This isn’t the Yaksha I used to know.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I say.
He brings his head close to my ear. His warm breath brushes my skin, and I’m puzzled because he’s always felt so cold before. Plus there is an inexplicable sorrow in his voice.
“I suspected you would try this. Even though it means I’ll never be born, that I’ll never exist.”
I realiz
e in an instant what is happening.
I’m not talking to Yaksha!
“How did you know?” I blurt out, accidentally exposing the stake in the process. He stares down at it with disappointment in his eyes.
“Sita,” he says, and I’ve never heard so much pain in my own name.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper.
“Can you tell me why? Just that—why?”
“I’m so tired. I feel I can’t live all those years over again.”
“But you’ve already lived them. Return to the present with me and your whole life will be just like a memory.”
“You don’t understand. I want to remain in this time. I want my husband back. I want to hold my daughter again. I need my family.” I pause. “I tried to tell you that night in the hotel when I told you that Yaksha was given a chance to have a family.”
“Ah.” He nods in understanding. “And you’ll lose your family if we leave tonight alone.”
“Yes.”
He hesitates. “You love Rama that much?”
He is really asking why I don’t love him as much.
“Yes,” I say.
The word seems to strike him like a stake. Yet he drops his hands and spreads his arms, leaving his chest vulnerable. “Then do it,” he says.
I nervously fiddle with the stake, touching the sharp tip, drawing a drop of blood. My eyes burn. “No, it’s not fair.”
“Life is not fair.” He chuckles at the irony in his remark. “Of course I won’t have to worry about my life if you do it.” He pauses. “Go ahead, Sita. Be honest with yourself. This is what you have always wanted.”
A terrible fear grips me. If I kill him while he’s in his father’s body, I’ll still be killing his father. And without Yaksha, I’ll never live to touch all the people I have. Matt will never be born. Seymour and I will never meet, even though I’m stealing a page from one of his stories by returning to this time. All of history will be altered.
“The legend is vague on this point. I don’t know what it means. But the legend does say that the Abomination will destroy our history for the love of a witch.”
I can’t worry about the Telar’s legend of the Abomination. It was a bunch of nonsense, it has to be. In their story Matt had to meet a witch to destroy history and I’m not that witch.