The Star Group (17 page)

“You pushed Sal all day yesterday?”

“Yes.”

“You pushed him at the end to run?”

“Yes.”

“Did you push the cops?”

“Cops are cops. It was not necessary.”

“Did you kill the old man?”

“Yes. He was old. I stopped his heart with a thought.”

“Looking back, I see that once you had the activation session finished with, you did everything in your power to keep me from being with Mentor.”

“That is correct. I kept you from seeing the truth.” She paused. “It was right there in front of you all the time. You missed the biggest clue of all.”

“What was that?”

“That a girl like me would chase a loser like you.”

My face burns with blood. “What was it like to kill Jimmy?”

The topic is a favorite. “He was vulnerable when I reached him by the stream. He was worried about Shena, and at the same time he was gloating over his newfound ability. He thought he would be the richest man in the world. I was able to dominate his will completely. I made him keep his eyes open but his mouth shut while I pounded his skull. I insisted he stand up straight. I wouldn't even let him fall over. He had to stand there and watch his blood soak his shirt. He saw pieces of his brains.” A casual sigh. “I took my time, I prefer to do so. He was not dead until he hit the water.”

I hate her. “You're a monster.”

She is not offended. “I am of negative polarity. It is not that I don’t choose love; I cannot feel it. My power is therefore undiluted.” She pauses. “The world will soon see more of my kind.”

“You will be stopped.”

She mocks. “Could you five stop me?”

I pause. “Teri shocked you.”

She shrugs. “She threw her life away to save Shena. What a waste. I will get to Shena when it suits me.”

“But Teri was strong. She gave her life energy to Shena.”

She is not impressed. “Your type serves others. We serve ourselves. Our course of evolution is straight and clear. You get lost on tangents.”

“I suspect your course is straight and barren.”

“As you wish.”

“What are you going to do to me?” I ask.

She gloats. “How did you start your story? Did you write something silly about having to kill yourself to make everyone safe on Earth?”

“Yes.” I am staggered. “You put that idea in my mind.”

She pities me. “Danny Boy. You
are
Mentor. If you kill yourself and go back to Ortee, you are not going to be able to influence matters here. You will not have a body.” She paused. “But you do not have to kill yourself I give you a way out.”

“I'm not interested.”

She points. “Type with one hand. Pick up the gun with the other.”

I do not want to. Honestly, I fight not to. But my strength is diluted.

I pick up the gun. She is serious now, she no longer smiles.

“Where does it hurt, Daniel?” she asks softly. That familiar gentle tone, always whispering in our brains. The gun shakes in my right hand; I can hardly type with the left.

“Please,” I say.

Her eyes are like a snake's. They peer from the pit. There is not a trace of emotion in them. Why could I not see her soul in them before? She is right, I was a fool.

“Aim the gun at your right thigh,” she says.

I fight her. I appeal to her. I beg.

“No, Gale.”

She will not let me escape her dagger stare.

“Aim the gun at your right thigh,” she repeats.

“No!” I cry. But I do what she says.

“Put your right index finger on the trigger.”

I feel the trigger. The oil of my sweat. This cannot be happening.

“No,” I whisper.

“Pull the trigger, Daniel.”

“No!”

“Do it!”

I pull the trigger. There is an explosion of noise and pain. Red splatters my computer and my face. She does not let me close my eyes. I am not allowed to invoke the power of Mentor. I am alone here on Earth, in this bedroom, in this hell, with this demon. My right leg is a mass of gross tissue. I see my veins, my shredded muscle, my blood drips over the floor. The agony is beyond imagining. I feel I will black out. I pray that I might. She regards me critically.

“Are you sure you're not interested?” she asks.

I choke on the horror. “What do you want?”

“You spoke to Shena after Teri healed her. I am sure she is out there up to no good. If you will tell me what you two planned, and then swear to me on your eternal soul to execute her at the earliest opportunity, I will let you live. Such a vow is important and binding. It will serve two purposes. I will be rid of her and I will have a fresh ally. Because if you join me, you will lose positive polarity. You will become like me and you will serve me for the next billion years.”

My leg, my poor leg. She makes me keep looking at her.

“I don't believe I can lose my soul to the likes of you,” I gasp.

She leans forward. “That is because even at this late date you do not comprehend what I am.” She stops. “Put the gun in your mouth.”

“Gale?”

“Put the gun in your mouth.”

The gun is in my mouth. It tastes of gunpowder.

She's intent. “Do you wish to join me?”

I stare into her eyes. Satan's mirrors.

So much pain. God help me.

I shake my head. Jesus.

“Keep typing,” she says.

I don't know how I do it.

She has the voice of a beast. “You are running out of time. You are alone here. No one is going to come to your aid. I am going to ask you one more time. If you refuse my offer, I will force you to pull the trigger. Your brains will spray the wall behind you. The back of your skull will explode. Your mother and father will find you that way and it will destroy them. From now until the day they die their lives will be ruined. Neither of them will ever be able to get the image out of their minds of how you died. They will dream about it when they are awake. It will be like an open wound that cannot heal, and to make sure it never does, I will occasionally return to this house and remind them how their only son killed himself.” She pauses. “You have to make a choice. You understand this?”

I nod. I type. The gun feels so hard.

She stands and looks down at me.

“Will you join me?”

I smell smoke. Somewhere near, something burns.

The odor distracts her. She momentarily turns away.

“Interesting,” she mutters.

I am able to take the gun out of my mouth.

But I cannot turn it away from my face.

She comes back to me. She is not from the stars. She is a worm crawled out from the lowest cesspool. Her breath smells of decay, of all the future pain and death she will work on this fair planet. Yet I am no longer daunted by her stare. She can control my limbs, but she can no longer control my mind. Mentor is near; I feel the peace of my loving soul. It is one thing she cannot take from me.

“What is your decision, Daniel?” she asks.

I force a smile. I must give her nothing.

Finally I know contentment.

I will be with my friends soon.

Yet that does not mean I wish to die.

“You were lousy in bed,” l say.

She is startled. “
What?
”

My smile grows. “The answer is no, bitch.”

She is not happy. “Put the gun back in your mouth.”

I have to do what she says.

Something worries her. She glanced uneasily around.

There is smoke in the room.

“Pull the trigger,” she orders.

I am sorry, I must do what she asks.

EPILOGUE

AT THE FUNERALS FOR JAMES YEARN, SAL Barry, Teresa Jettison, Daniel Stevens, and Gale Schrater over a thousand people turned out. Most were students from La Mirada High, but there were numerous adults and even several community leaders present. The sudden loss of five promising young people had shocked the city. What made the pain particularly sharp was that there were still no answers from the police. Only questions and doubts and tears. The authorities said they would issue a definitive statement soon.

But there was one person at the funerals who knew they never would.

Shena Adams stayed by herself, her race covered with a heavy black veil. During the ceremony in the chapel she remained in the last row, and when the coffins were brought out to the grave site for final words and last goodbyes, she stood at the back of the crowd. She noted how small the coffins for Daniel and Gale were. The police had been unable to reconstruct much from the ashes. Certainly no one in the future would ever suggest that Daniel had killed himself. His shattered skull had crumbled in the high temperatures. No one would suspect Gale's role. The police had yet to find the bullet that had finished Daniel. The pieces of the puzzle lay in ruins.

And no one would ever read Daniel's computer files, unless Shena gave them a peek. She had a copy Daniel's last story on a disk in her purse. His modem had been reliable. Too bad she had not reached his house in time, after reading the first pages of his story. At the hospital, when she had awakened after her healing, he had not understood the full extent of the danger. But he had been suspicious, and had told her enough. To be on her guard.

But not enough to save himself. When she had heard the second shot, she had known she was too late to save him. She had sent out her flames with total abandon. The full power of the third center, the secret prison of will. In the midst of her grief, it had been good to hear Gale screaming. And should more of her vile character appear on Earth, Shena knew how to deal with them. The Star Group had been successful: she wished she could tell Daniel to his face. The enemy had been stopped.

The coffins were lowered into the ground.

The Valley of the Shadow of Death.

The rivers of star dust drifting between galaxies.

Shena caught up with Daniel's parents by their car. His father was a big man with gray hair and a gruff face. His brown eyes were warm, though they were much faded on this sad day. The mother looked like her lost son, with her innocent mouth and her long curly brown hair. Yet all was vanquished by her pain. Shena hardly knew what to say. She hugged them before she spoke.

“I am so sorry,” she said. She would like to have confessed why she had not returned to the cabin after her outburst. How she had simply been too embarrassed. But they would not have understood, and besides, the act would not have stopped the demon inside Gale from striking.

Mr. Stevens nodded. “We're going to miss him. Thank God you were spared.”

“Yes, dear. You must have a good life. For their sake at least.” Mrs. Stevens broke down and wept. “He was such a good boy.”

Shena's eyes burned. “He was the best.”

Mrs. Stevens embraced her again. “Come see us some time, dear.”

“I will,” she promised. Then she pulled back her black veil and kissed the woman's cheek and whispered in her ear. “Daniel was filled with love. He was your son. You have much to be proud of. More than you know.”

The woman seemed touched by her words.

Yet Shena's clear face confused Mr. and Mrs. Stevens.

“What happened to your scars?” Mr. Stevens asked. “Your eye?”

Shena dried her eyes and smiled sadly.

“My friends healed me,” she said.