Emily's House (The Akasha Chronicles) (32 page)

We stood in stone cold silence for a few moments. She looked aghast at the heap of a body that was her one and only son. I was still in shock over what had just happened.

“You. . . you killed your son.”

“I did not kill my son,” she said. “This man was no longer my son. He must have left a long time ago. Oh my poor, dear son. . .” she said as she broke down in tears and fell to the floor, and held his blood-soaked body in her hands.

I fell in a heap too. Down against the wall I slid and tears welled in my eyes.

“Why do you weep?” she asked. “He was your enemy. He tried to kill you. Why do you weep for him?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe I’m crying because I should have hated him, but in the end, I felt sorry for him. Maybe it’s because I’ve been away from home for so long. Maybe it’s because – well – because now it’s over.”

She didn’t say a word but gave me a brief warm smile. As I sat in that tiny room filled with the stench of the blood and body odor of two dead men, I could see why Dughall became the madman that he was. His mother was more than just a mom. She had a warmth, compassion and knowing about her that was rare. I could see why he loved her so much.

Before long we heard the sound of another person entering the small abode. “Dughall,” she said.

It was, in fact, the young Dughall. He was about my age. If it wasn’t for the fact that I knew how he turned out all grown up, he might have been cute. This Dughall didn’t have the hard-chiseled brooding look about him yet. And his hair instead of being jet black was flecked with a little red highlights from the sun here and there. His skin, not alabaster white but bronzed by the southern Italian sun. His eyes were the same dark brown, but these young eyes were more playful and warm, less like two lumps of cold, unforgiving coal.

Without saying a word between us, we settled on a story about the two dead bodies that didn’t include a future Dughall coming back in time. The young Dughall had no way of knowing that the large dead man was indeed himself from another time.

Using my sight to guide me, I helped them escape their bondage and set out on a new life. Who knows, maybe this time it will turn out different for Dughall.

I said my goodbyes and prepared myself to go back to the Netherworld. Now that Dughall was history, I wanted to spend some more time with the Goddess before I went back to my own time. I still had a lot of questions for her. And like she said, I could jump back into my time whenever and wherever I liked. So why not stay a while longer, really figure some things out?

I looked forward to getting answers and then a long rest. But you know, things don’t always work out like you plan.

60. Afternoon at the Horror Movies

When I was ready to go, I got myself to a quiet spot on top of a southern Italian hill, dotted with cypress and olive groves. It was a beautiful place, and as I closed my eyes to mediate on my return to the Netherworld, I thought maybe I’d like to go back there some time.

I concentrated on my breath as Madame Wong taught me but soon came doubt.
How do I return to the Netherworld?
After all, the portal I used to enter it was far away from here and in another time. I wasn’t near any known vortex of energy.

But I knew that doubt would prevent me from returning not only to the Netherworld but also to my own time. I focused all my thought – all my energy – everything that I had on the Goddess. Soon floating before my mind’s eye was the image of her shimmery blue-green ever changing face. I held that image in my mind as I thought of being in the Netherworld.

When I felt like it was the right time, I opened my eyes. There I was, back in my kitchen and there she was, the Goddess herself, making chocolate chip pancakes.

“I thought you might be hungry,” she said.

From somewhere deep inside came long, riotous laughter. The kind where you think you might pee yourself.

“Did I say something amusing, dear one?” she asked.

“No, no you didn’t. I’m sorry, it’s just this whole situation. I’m still not sure any of it has been real. I may be in my tree house at home right now, asleep after the slap to my head from Muriel, and I’m in a delirium dreaming this whole thing.”

“Yes, that’s possible I suppose. But you are here with me, whether a dream or not, so you may as well eat,” she said as she placed a large plate of steaming pancakes in front of me.

They were just as I liked them. Smothered in butter and dripping with maple syrup.

After I wolfed down about a half-dozen pancakes, I was ready to ask some questions. You know, philosophy-type questions – the deep stuff that thinking minds wonder about. Why are we here? Where did we come from? Where will we go when we die? Is there a God? If so, where did he or she come from?

“Yes, you have many questions, don’t you,” she more said than asked.

“I want to know everything.”

“I know you do, young one. In time, in time. You already know the answers to many of those questions if you allow the answers to come. Others you will find in time.”

“I don’t feel like I know anything anymore.”

“Good.”

“Good? Why is that good?”

“Not knowing is closer to allowing the truth than knowing all.”

"One last question. Am I now a High Priestess?"

"You have become a warrior, Miss Emily and have learned some of the mysteries. But no, Miss Emily is not a High Priestess yet. Perhaps someday you will come back to the Netherworld and learn more of the mysteries of Akasha."

“What now then?”

“You return to your own space and time.”

“But when in time do I go?

“Ah, that is an excellent question. I think that this will help you decide.”

In an instant, we were no longer in my kitchen but in the misty, foggy, timeless nowhereness of the Netherworld. And before us was what looked like the portal that I came into this place the first time but instead of being a hole, it was more like a movie screen. I could see vague images appearing out of the mist and fog.

“Here child is the unfolding of critical events that have happened in your space-time while you have been here.”

With a wave of her hand, the picture became clear. It was like I was watching the ghost of a movie. The images were there but with an ethereal shimmer – there, but not quite.

But the images were there enough for me to get the gist of what had happened. I saw Fanny and Jake go to Dublin. And then my dad with them but no longer the Zombie Man.

It was hard to watch without feeling a ripping tide of emotion within me. I thought I was as good as dead to him. I had convinced myself that he didn’t care enough to look for me.

I had been so wrong. I could see in the replay of a life that had happened without me that he did care. All he could think of was saving me. And he was helping out Jake and Fanny to boot. Go figure!

As the scenes played out, it felt like they were moving faster and faster until at last I saw my dad and Fanny and Jake holed up in a little building at CERN. Then Dughall’s smirky face running into the portal he created. Then the images became downright frightening. The more I watched the more it felt like I was watching it all unfold in real time.

Mere seconds after Dughall ran through the portal, the portal exploded, ripping apart the magnificent giant magnet that had created it. The whole collider was in danger of a cascade of explosions as those particles that were accelerating through it and colliding with each other were backed up in a large packet, much larger than was ever anticipated by the designers of the machine or its experiments.

The anomaly – the portal – created by Dughall rapidly dissipated itself and became a nonfactor. The only thing to contend with there was the fire that raged due to the explosion. But up the stream from super magnet number two it was a different story.

As an observer of a story that had already unfolded, I watched in horror as the particle beams, now with many times more particles than expected, collided in collector number one. Conspiracy theorists had warned of the possibility of black holes being formed by the LHC, but the scientists had quickly dismissed any concerns. The scientists had said that because they were colliding extremely small bits of particles, black holes that would form, if any, would be extremely small and would basically burn themselves out before they became larger than a subatomic particle.

No worries.

Apparently not one of those scientists had anticipated the possibility that some idiot like Dughall would not only be able to successfully infiltrate their security, but also use their machine to create a portal to another dimension and create the conditions ripe for the formation of a black hole worth worrying about. Time to worry.

I watched in horror as the hole became larger and larger, sucking in the matter of the machine that had created it. Up top, I saw my dad working feverishly with the other scientists to come up with a solution to stop it while Fanny and Jake sat in the corner of the main control room looking on worriedly.

“Come on guys, it’s now or never. There has to be a way,” he said. “This thing is getting away from us.”

“We know Liam, but there just isn’t enough energy left in this thing to pulse it again,” offered one of the scientists.

“What else can we use, goddammit?”

They were all silent for a moment. Even through the vacuum of space and time I swear I could hear their brain cells vibrating with thought.

“What about anti-matter?” offered a tentative voice.

“What? Who said that?” said Liam.

“Me Sir.” It was none other than Mr. Ted Schaeffer.

“Anti-matter. Okay, thoughts. Could it work?”

“Well, theoretically it could work,” said a scientist. “But the problem is, if we put together all the anti-matter ever produced on the whole planet and were able somehow to get it down there – which we couldn’t do without dying because the temperatures down there are still -200° – well, it wouldn’t be enough to do diddly.”

That was the last anyone heard from Mr. Ted Schaeffer. He melded back into his computer station.

I watched in horror as my dad along with the other scientists worked feverishly for a solution. Soon, the building started to shake. The electricity was going out. Alarms of every kind went off – sirens and bells and ascending alarms.

I could do nothing but stare and cry as I watched the entirety of CERN collapse into a hole – a black hole the size of a large town and growing exponentially by the minute. My dad was lost. Fanny and Jake. . . lost.

No kid should see both their parents die.

My tears flowed in a torrent down my face. Lost. All was lost to me. I was too late.

“Why the tears, child?”

“I’ve lost them all,” I hiccupped.

“Oh goodness dear one! Lost? You’ve lost nothing. Do you not remember anything that I’ve shown you? Anything that you’ve learned here?”

“You mean. . . I can stop this from happening?”

“Of course you can. Why else would I show this to you?”

“But hasn’t it already happened? I mean, how can I change the future?”

“By changing the past, isn’t that obvious?

“Goddess, I’m so tired and confused. I don’t know anymore what to do.”

“You simply step into the stream dear, like you did before. Only this time, you’ll step in at the place where you can stop it.”

“But how? Even if somehow I am able to choose the right moment to step into the stream, how do I stop a runaway black hole?”

“You know the answers to these questions young one. You know. Allow the stream to move through you. Become one with the web of all things. You are, after all, Akasha. Become one with Akasha.

"But before you go, remember well these words I now give you. The torc on your arm and the knowledge you have gained here, these items are not to be used for folly. A Priestess of the Order of Brighid uses her skills and powers for the best interests of all sentient beings, not her own self-purpose. Do you understand?"

"Yes Goddess. It's like what Hindergog told me about the dagger that he gave me," I said as I pulled it from its sheath and held it in front of me.

"Yes, the same as the dagger. And know this too young one, that if you ever use the torc or your powers for your own selfish purpose, there will be consequences for you dear Emily."

I nodded my understanding. "Good, now Miss Emily, it is time for you to fulfill your purpose."

As if she had reached into my brain itself, I saw flash before my mind’s eye a vision – a memory really – of the time I was with Madame Wong and first saw the Web of All Things, Akasha. It was like I was there again and the Netherworld and the human world, all that I had known or would know melted away.

Once again I was in the loving bosom of the Web. All around me the vibrating harmonies of countless strings of the Great Web, all their own distinct note yet all in harmony with the others.

My senses gone, yet still able to see and hear and smell. My brain history yet still knowing.

But this was no memory. It was happening again.

I felt myself inexorably drawn a certain way. I don’t know even now what guided me or why I went the direction I did in the infinite web.

But direction and guidance drew me to one particular shining orb. One particular note. One particular voice in an endless sea of voices.

It was like touching without touch. Melding together of two entities. In that moment, at that time, I knew once and for all where my mother was.

She wasn’t in the kitchen making pancakes. She wasn’t in her studio painting. She wasn’t in the garden planting geraniums. She wasn’t even in a coffin underground.

She was there – in the web. She had been there all along.

I can’t describe in words the feeling that I felt in that moment. Joy. Jubilation. Neither one comes close. To know – really know – without any doubt of mind, body or soul. To have, in that moment, not one doubt or fear about anything. To know that I am eternal and that she is eternal and that we are connected always and forever. I wanted nothing more than to stay there feeling that way.

Suddenly the utter bliss of knowingness was interrupted by what felt like a terrible ripping. I heard a large whooshing sound and my innards felt like they would be ripped apart.