Age of Mystics (Saga of Mystics Book 1) (3 page)

Jenny looked around on the street and saw the chaos quickly taking hold. Cars had crashed into other cars and people were out in the street. She could tell this was more than a power outage, since she had never lost her ability to use her smart phone in a power outage. However, she couldn’t tell exactly what it was. Her assistant, Peri, had wanted to go home, so after Peri left, she locked her front door as her irrational fear and anxiety increased. There was no reason to be afraid of things one can’t control. She decided to just do a simple meditative yoga practice to calm her nerves and wait until this all got fixed. The yoga room was completely pitch black right now, so she grabbed a mat and decided to just begin behind the counter. She sat and began breathing, picturing the tiny ball of light.

As she centered herself and released the tension, she felt she could see, in her mind’s eye, that glowing light. As she brought more peace, and more focus into her practice, the glow grew brighter and clearer, colors intertwined and moved, and a sense of warmth and calm came over her. She was a long believer in chakras and auras. For many years, and through many teachers, she had tried to learn the ability to read people’s auras with no success. On this weird day, with no power and no distractions, she was truly able to visualize the light that she talked about in every practice, but never truly was able to see. This was one of the best practices she had ever had, and it could not have come at a better time.

When she opened her eyes, shock about what she saw slammed her mind. She could see hazy auras around some of those who passed the front of her studio on the sidewalk. This man had a foggy blue and then a woman with an almost unnoticeable yellow outline. She just stared, not even worried any longer about the chaos. As she looked out into this mass of people, she noticed that colors and shapes seemed to follow the actions of the people in the street, with the angry ones exhibiting a red fiery aura and the fearful ones a deep purple. It was simply fascinating to her that she felt she could read their emotions through their auras, but there was more, and she had no idea what it meant. These people had varying thicknesses of those auras, varying borders to them, varying opacity. She was about to walk out onto the street when a fight broke out right in front of her studio and one man fell against the window with a loud bang. She jumped back and all of the auras disappeared. Now she saw the people, no colors, no difference. How that could be?

Over the next hour as things got more chaotic on the street, Jenny tried to see the auras again with no luck. She had some raw vegetables and raw nuts, so she didn’t need to go out and thought it was probably safer to wait out the power coming back on in the quiet protective environment of her studio. People were acting crazy out there. They were fighting, yelling, crying, running, just engaging in a level of chaos she was not expecting and did not care for. The hardest part about it was the fact that she had no news, none at all. Occasionally, she would peek through the window to see if anyone she knew was out there. The only people she knew were from that martial arts studio across the street, and those guys were complete assholes. They were the kind of gung ho idiots that most people think of when you say martial arts guys – very misogynistic, very macho, and not too bright. Those guys almost seemed to be guarding their studio. It was a bit much.

Walking back to the little nest she had created behind her counter, Jenny sat with her back against the wall and considered everything she could remember about the auras. Had she imagined them? Was it some kind of delusion her mind had allowed her to break her from the fear of the moment? She wasn’t sure, but she knew it helped, and she knew that she would be just fine to get that kind of calm again.

Calm. That was it! She had begun to feel the auras and almost see them in her mind during her last practice, so she began moving through her poses to see if anything popped. Her mind raced and reached for any hint of a color or feel of warmth. But, there was nothing. She wasn’t sure how long she had been sitting there, but she was getting a little bored. Opening her eyes, Jenny looked again out the window. A mass of the martial artists, about fifteen of them, were standing around the front of the studio and the guy who owned it, the jerk with the salt and pepper flat top, seemed to be giving them orders. Jenny hated that guy.

When she had first rented her space a couple of months before, and was in the middle of renovating it, that guy had stopped by. Many people stopped in to see what she was opening and wish her well, but his visit was different.

“Eric,” he had said as a greeting, and thinking it a joke, she had replied with snarkiness.

“Nope, Jenny. But if you need to, you can call me Eric.” She put out her hand to the visitor, he did not take it.

He looked down at her hand and just said, “I am the master of the dojo across the street. Do not try to steal students, my students do not need to have this crap put in their head.”

Jenny was taken aback and their conversation did not go much farther. She hadn’t really thought about him since that day, but now it was hard to avoid. He would stop in from time to time with some other warning, or “advice”. For the life of her, she couldn’t figure out what his problem was. But now there he was, staring in the direction of her studio again. She saw him motion to two of his guys and both started walking over. She went and sat down in a shadow behind the counter so he couldn’t see her if he looked in. Through a crack between the two parts that made up the counter, she saw him approach. He banged hard on the door, but for some reason that even she didn’t know, Jenny stayed hidden behind the counter. She saw him peer through the glass, looking around to see if anyone was in there, and stayed as still as she could. There was always something menacing about this guy. She knew a lot of military guys, and there was no mistaking Eric was a military guy, but none of them gave her the creeps the way this guy did. It wasn’t only in his constant hassling of her, but in his manner, like all of his warnings were a show.

After a short bit, Jenny saw him say something to the others and they all turned back and walked back to his studio. She figured it would begin to get dark in a few hours and she could most likely leave in the darkness and avoid them altogether. The only problem she could see was that there were stalled cars in the road, it was actually full of them, and she wasn’t sure she could get to her car or if she could get it out. That was a problem for later, so she decided to close her eyes for a while and take a nap.

The loud crack of someone hitting his door woke Ronnie from the deep sleep that only a night of excessive partying would bring. He reached over the naked, sleeping body of one of the two young women who had come over to party with him the night before. He didn’t even look to see which it was, he just opened the drawer from his bedside stand and pulled his Glock 9mm out and cocked it. He heard mumbles on his porch and could tell there were a number of people there. He listened at the door before opening it.

“I told you I will ask him. You know he ain’t gonna like you being here at his house, man. You should all go now.” A rumbling murmur let Ronnie know that there had to be a dozen or more people out there. A different voice yelled out.

“This is bullshit! I paid for ice, not sugar. I don’t know how you got it to taste like ice, but it ain’t ice. I tried snortin’ it, smokin’ it, and a friend of mine tried shootin’ it. I heard it killed him.”

The first voice, that Ronnie now recognized as his friend, and slinger, Jake, shouted over the murmur. “I ain’t jokin’. Ronnie comes out here, you are all gonna be sorry. This shit is real.” There was a loud thud. “Who threw that, I am gonna cap some…”

Ronnie swung the door open, making no effort to conceal the handgun he was holding. He saw a large rock on the ground and far more people than he had first assumed. He looked at Jake, who was holding a hand to a gash on the side of his head and blood was coming out over his fingers. Jake was paling by the second.

“Sit down, man, or you are going to pass out.” Ronnie said, as Jake was swaying on his feet. He looked out over the crowd of about thirty tweakers, who were in various stages of hurt. “Did I hear one of you have a grievance about my shit?”

“Shit is right, man.” Said one of the people in front.

“Oh, you the spokesperson? That ice is pretty pure bitch, what you want to say now?” Ronnie waved his gun around. “One of you want to pick up a rock? You throw a rock and you will be dead before it hits near me. No? Then get the fuck away from my house!”

“You cheated us, mister kingpin, or whatever you like to be called,” said a voice from the back.

Ronnie had just about enough, he decided to make an example and pulled his gun up to knee level and pulled the trigger on the guy with the big talk.

Click.

Nothing happened. Ronnie released the dud and put a new round in the chamber and pointed it again.

Click.

From behind him one of the naked girls came walking up. “Ronnie, this ice isn’t getting me high. What is wrong with it?” Ronnie turned around and saw the weirdest thing he had ever seen. There stood a pretty beautiful girl, completely nude, with so much meth on her face she looked like a sugar cookie. He was about to start laughing when he felt the sharp pain in his side, then in his back three times. He turned to see what caused it and saw a skinny woman with a look of absolute rage on her face. He looked down and saw the knife she had just stabbed him with. He watched with incredulity as she slammed the blade into his abdomen another four times. He fell to one knee and grabbed the knife out of her hand. She just stood there looking at him and spit on his face as he fell over on to his side. Ronnie felt and saw his life’s blood draining on to his front porch, as all of the people ran in various directions.

The last thought of Ronald Parker Jones was, “What was wrong with the ice?” Everything faded out, forever.

Ted pulled the levers on the breaker box. Flipping them back and forth, he wondered if he might have hit a wire, but even the main was giving no juice at all. What could cause this kind of loss? All that seemed to make sense was a major area outage. Kayla walked around the corner with the handheld house phone in her hand.

“It’s not just that there isn’t a dial tone, Ted. This thing is like a paperweight. Nothing works, my cell doesn’t work, my iPad doesn’t work, nothing. Look up at the corner, even the light is out.”

Ted walked back around the front and up to the corner, it looked like the light was out and people were milling around the little bar and grocery on the corner. “Hon, would you drive up and see what’s going on up there?” It wasn’t that far, but far enough to seem like a chore he was giving his wife. “Or I could go, if you would rather not.”

Kayla just looked at him and smiled. “Where is Max?”

Maxine Craven was their daughter. She was ten years old, and somewhat shy but friendly. She actually preferred to be alone, and had taken to walking off in the vast forest behind their house since they had moved here. Ted just nodded back toward the woods, and Kayla started walking that way, shouting as she walked. “Maxine! Get your butt home for a sec, I need to talk to you.”

Ted looked up the road again and could just see three women walking across the intersection. Recognizing them, he called out to Kayla, “Hey babe, your mom, your sister and Natalee are walking up the road here.”

Kayla stopped and turned around, “Why are they walking?”

Ted looked at his wife with the expression that had always let her know that he was about to be a smart ass. “Gee, Kayla, it is hard to tell, perhaps I will be better able to read their minds when they are a bit closer.”

Kayla was not as amused as he had hoped, she cocked her head to the side, “really, funny man?” Then she shouted out, “Max! Can you hear me? Where are you?” She walked around the side and toward the woods, “Oh God, Max! Get away from it!”

Ted ran around the corner, his heart pounding with the unmistakable fear he heard in Kayla’s voice. He ran out to see their daughter about twenty-five yards away, walking right toward a pitbull that was growling, baring its teeth and its hair was raised on its back. He began to run toward her. Just before he got there, the dog fell over to its side and showed its belly, submitting to her. It didn’t attack, it submitted. It was the craziest thing he had ever seen and now his little girl was petting its belly and giggling. When he got close the dog reared up in a defensive stance, but Max just kept her hand on its back and pet it. Within less than a minute, it reached up and licked her hand and then walked around sniffing things.

Max walked over to her parents. “She won’t hurt anyone.”

Kayla hugged her daughter close, “Baby, you don’t know that dog. You can’t be sure it is safe. Please don’t do that again.”

Max just smiled, “But I do know her. It’s okay now, she was just scared.”

Ted tousled her hair, “I know the feeling. What is her name?”

Max turned and looked at the dog who looked right back at her, “Princess.”

Ted and Kayla exchanged a smile, and Ted responded, “Princess the Pitbull, very fitting.” They all turned and walked back around the front of the building, but Ted occasionally glanced back at the dog who seemed perfectly at home in their yard.

The three women had arrived just as he came to the front. Kayla walked up to give them all a hug. Her mother, Beth, was sweating from their short walk in the heat, and she and Ted both knew she would have to hear about it for the rest of the day. Her sister, Kate, smiled the broad smile she gave to everyone she met and hugged her closely before moving on to meet Max’s new dog. Her niece, Natalee, looked more miserable than anyone. Natalie was a prom queen, a real one. She was not having any of this walking, Natalee Ward did not walk to her destination. She barely put up with her family, and only when forced to by her mom.

“The car just stopped up the road.” Beth began, “It was the strangest thing, the power brakes didn’t work. I thought we were going to die and then it just rolled to a stop. And when we tried to call you to pick us up, we found out none of our cell phones work.”

Kayla looked back at Ted, “Yeah, ours either. The power is out at the house, it looks like it is up at the bar and the store also, is it?”

Her mother wiped the sweat from her neck with a handkerchief, “Yes, and the light. Kate, what are you doing? Pitbulls are dangerous.”

Kate just looked back over her shoulder while rubbing the pit under the chin, “Her name is Princess, isn’t she beautiful?” Kayla saw the big smile on Max’s face and was again about as thankful for her sister as one is capable of being. Kate had a way of making everyone feel special and okay. She was a bright ray of sunshine, regardless of the storm of other people’s day.

Ted walked up to Beth and kissed her on the cheek, “Hi, Mom. Strange events, huh?” He led her to a bench, where she could sit in the shade and they talked for a bit. Ted always knew how to distract Kayla’s mother so the complaints were less and she was very grateful.

Kate looked up at Kayla and asked, “Can I use your land line? I want to call Cal and make sure he is okay, and at some point touch base with Kyle also.”

Kayla just shook her head. “It doesn’t work. Nothing does. Do you want to walk to the corner and see if we have any better luck with their phones…if they will let us use them?”

Kate nodded, “Sure,” she said, “Natalee, do you want to walk to…”

Natalee gave her mom a look that only a parent of a teenager knows. It was a look that simultaneously dismissed the question and called Kate’s sanity into question. “Seriously” is all she said as the prom queen walked to the shade and sat down, still trying to get her smartphone to power up. The difficulty of being a teen today, who is suddenly without access to information, is that they don’t know what to do with themselves. They have always had access to everything at their fingertips. Natalee was in a huge state of confusion, like she had suddenly gone blind.

The sisters gave each other a knowing look. They knew that they had both been that same girl. They were popular in high school but it is very hard to explain to a teenager how little that means in the rest of your life. Teens have to become adults and figure that part out for themselves, then try to convey that to their own children. It is a vicious cycle. They shouted back to Ted and their mom and told them where they were headed. Max just hung out at the edge of the woods and that dog was never more than five or six feet from her side.

Ted looked in the opposite direction, up across the street to where a small chapel sat. He didn’t know them, but wanted to check on his neighbor and he let the ladies know he was going. Max chose to come along, and to no one’s surprise the dog came also.

As they walked, Ted reached out for his daughter’s hand. He had known that the time when she would let him hold her hand was soon to end, with her coming within a few years of puberty and the hatred of parents that comes with the age, so he took every chance to still be with his little girl as a little girl. He cherished this time, and so far, Max didn’t seem to mind.

“Where do you know that dog from?” He asked.

“Princess? From now. She walked up a few minutes before, while I was looking for pine cones in the woods.”

Ted smiled, “You have a good rapport with her. Does her collar say her name is Princess?”

Max looked over at the pit and pet her on top of the head. “No, she told me her name was Princess.”

Ted laughed. That was another thing that would most likely not last, his daughter’s imagination and playfulness. He cherished that as well.

They came up to the front of the small church and knocked, but a voice called out from the side of the church. “Knockin’ don’t help. That door is always open.” The southern drawl was very pronounced, but so was the good nature behind it and Ted, Max and Princess walked around to see a bald man in his fifties working on the engine of a truck.

“Hi there. The name is Ted Craven, this is my daughter Max and this is Princess.”

The man came out from the hood, wiping the soot off his hands and he approached, “Rich Carson,” he said, as he held his hand out to shake Ted’s.

“You the pastor here?” Ted pointed back at the church.

Rich smiled and nodded, “Yep. I think I saw you opening that karate school in town yesterday, right?” Ted nodded. “Just moved into the house yonder?” Ted nodded again. “Well, welcome to the neighborhood. We have church services Sunday mornings and Wednesday nights. I hope you will come pay us a visit.”

Ted smiled, he instantly liked the guy, even if this wasn’t his thing. “We aren’t really church people, Rich, but I appreciate the offer.”

Rich stepped up close, “Can I tell you a secret, I am not a church person either.” They both laughed. “For some reason my car won’t start.”

Ted grimaced a bit, “I don’t think you will be able to fix that. None of the cars work, all of the power is out and the phones don’t work. It is a bit of a mystery. The only thing I could think of was an Electromagnetic pulse. I hear that solar flares could do that, but I always thought that was an old wives’ tale.”

“Hmm, well that is unfortunate. I guess there is nothing left to do but grab a beer and wait it out, huh?”

“I like the way you think, Rich, I think we are going to be fine neighbors.” Ted shook his hand again.

“And good friends as well, I hope” Rich replied. Ted smiled and they walked to the back of the church where Rich’s cottage was and each grabbed a beer from a cooler he had out.

Rich took a decent draw on the long-neck bottle of his Sam Adams, “So, in those old wives’ tales, how long do these things last?”

Ted shrugged, “No idea. I am not sure that part is covered.” Princess walked up and licked the condensation off the bottom of Ted’s bottle and Ted rubbed her behind the ear.