The SONG of SHIVA (30 page)

Can’t have everything
, he thought with a smile, a bubble escaping from the mask rising slowly to the surface. A dazzling kaleidoscope of bright colors played briefly on the oil-slicked ocean of rainbows above him. He watched for a few heartbeats, then closed his eyes. The lightshow faded into the frigid darkness. Sensation and consciousness followed almost immediately.

* * *

Nora reviewed the four warehouse surveillance video records, found one that had captured her climbing to her present hiding place, and immediately erased the file. As she was doing this, communications between Cairncrest and the Node were just being reestablished.
Damn these guys were fast.
She was monitoring their exasperated efforts to determine what had just caused the false indicators and power outage.

“Jesus, what’s been going on over there?” a male voice chattered excitedly. “We completely lost contact ― the link just went dead.”

“Two sensor readings ― one positive for an active fire and the other a breach in BSL-4 Two’s positive pressure, indicating a possible seal malfunction,” a female voice answered. “Halogen and allcide fog dispensers fired automatically in a few areas.”

“There was a fire?”

“False alarm, it seems. Follow up manual readings indicate neither the fire nor a pressure seal breach actually occurred. We’re running sensor and system integrity tests right now. Should have some answers shortly.”

“Was the power loss a separate or related problem?”

“They appear to be related. Might be a main blade computer malfunction causing some sort of power surge ― cooking the sensors and tripping the auxiliary power generator. The geeks are already on it, but no answers yet. Did Shiva experience similar anomalies?”

“Not a whisper. We picked up the system malfunction as soon as your power went down, but that’s all. Other than the communications disconnect ― and a lapse in our continuous data mirroring ― nothing.”

Well, get ready, buster
, Nora thought,
’cause you’re about to get hit with a few anomalies of your own.

These transmissions were coming from the security command center. The Node had automatically gone on heightened alert. Taps of random cameras showed at least four pairs of armed guards patrolling the hallways, but they didn’t appear to be actively searching for anyone. Unless they started canvassing the facility room by room, she was probably safe for now. Even so, her heart kept pounding in her ears as loudly as the bits and pieces of intercepted dialog feeding into the double-bud. In the meantime, every access and entry card had been identified and positioned. If she was forced to vacate this hiding place, at least she had some idea where the pack dogs were.

Ning Zhòngní would be waiting with the rental car’s engine running for the next hour at the prearranged spot where Cairncrest Brook and the trail crossed a road about two miles south of the dolmen, not far from the confluence with the Avon. It was off the Cairncrest property and offered no direct route to Haldon Heath or the mansion and crossed the brook less than twelve miles from Shrewton. If they succeeded in making it to the relative safety of the waiting car, they could head for anywhere in Britain, regroup and monitor events from there. The tall order of a flawless double escape still loomed between that relative safety and this present danger.

Before the next and most dangerous step could be taken she had to confirm that Egan was still alone and in that same room. If so, she would cut all but the emergency power to the Node and try to reach that room undetected.   

* * *

“Come over here! Help me pull him out of the tank,” someone yelled. “Quick, grab his other arm. Okay, now lift!”

“Mr. Lyköan, can you hear me?” a second disembodied voice shouted painfully into his right ear.

Gasping for air, Lyköan opened his eyes and immediately shut them again. A pungent chemical odor assaulted him. He was freezing and disoriented ― incapable of immediately replying to the simple question. This was nothing like that previous emergence experience on the library steps. That had begun with an infusion of warm daylight coming into focus and quite pleasant. He didn’t even recall opening his eyes that first time ― had simply been there ― sitting in the warmth of the sun, leaning back comfortably against cool Tennessee marble. This was completely different ― confused panic ― fear mixed with shrill background noises and more immediate and recognizable uncontrollable shivering. Something had obviously gone terribly wrong.

“I think he’s okay,” the second voice went on. “Can you hear me?” it repeated.

“Yeah, yeah, I hear you,” he managed groggily from far inside a dark fog. “What’s going on?”

In the background, sirens wailed as rough hands hurriedly withdrew needles and tore off taped sensor tabs. Still disoriented, it had not dawned on Lyköan where he was.  

The dark lab was in disarray, the previously whirring machines silent. A flashlight beam glared into his eyes, making him squint reflexively. He couldn’t catch his breath in the cold darkness. 

* * *

Nora proceeded from one camera to another, following on the yíb’s screen the progress of Egan’s still dripping, robe-covered body as it proceeded down the corridor. Supported for most of the way by two white lab-coated technicians, he was returned to the same room where she had first located him the night before. Letting him sit down on the side of the bed under the dim emergency lights, the two technicians left the room, locking the door behind them. Nora had shut down all the security cameras except each specific one she was operating. Sun Shi’s program was still in control of the Shiva Node’s central blade tree, but she probably had less than ten minutes of complete freedom before the geeks got wise to the external control.

“Egan! Egan, can you hear me?” she rasped into the double-bud’s mouthpiece. There was definitely a speaker in his room. Had she successfully isolated it? Was it functional?

“Who’s there? Who is that?” Jesus, it sounded like Nora. Lyköan wasn’t sure he should trust his senses. Had he somehow been sent to the wrong destination? Had Pandavas double-crossed him?

“You know who this is, Egan. At least I hope you do. I’ll be there to get you in three minutes. Be ready.”

Nora tore the double-bud from her ear, opened all the locks between the warehouse and Egan’s room, collapsed the yíb, and shoved both it and the double-bud into the backpack. Swinging the pack over her head, she scrambled down the warehouse shelf, dropped to the floor and looked at her watch. Two minutes and forty-eight seconds left to reach him.

Out a single windowless steel door, right down the darkened hallway, emergency exit signs the only ambient light. In the background, voices echoed in obvious excitement, although too far away to distinguish exact words. At the second exit sign, the unlocked door opened with a squeak, the stairway air colder than the hallway. Two flights down and out a silent door into another dimly lit and warmer hallway. Now, was it right or left? She turned left.

Did he take me seriously enough to at least get dressed? Especially his running shoes?

At the T intersection of the hallway she turned right, ran six doors down the corridor and tried the door on the left. No luck. The door to the right. Locked too. Shit. Had she failed to unlock all the doors on the plotted route? She tried both doors on either side of the two that had already failed to open. Damn.

Standing in the middle of the hallway, staring back the way she had come, the sound of approaching voices reached her ears from around a corner of the corridor. Maybe she was supposed to turn left at the hallway T. Six doors from there ― and
then
a left?

Stop second-guessing yourself, sister. Move!

Slipping on the polished floor as she started back down the hall, she fell on her hands. No time to waste, she accelerated from the classic sprint position. Rather than turn back at the T intersection, returning the way she had come, she decided instead to pass the last turn first and continued running beyond the intersecting hallway.

The voices behind her were growing louder. If this wasn’t where she had turned wrong, if one of these doors didn’t open, it was the end of the line.

Gasping for air, she tried the door on the left. Locked! Crossing the hall, one last desperate lunge and ― hallelujah! She must have transposed the last two turns. Through the double doors at the other end of the large room she had entered and out into another empty hallway. Halfway down the long corridor she stopped. Before opening the door in front of her she glanced in through the steel-framed window. Bingo! She looked at her watch. Eight seconds to spare. She opened the door.

Lyköan looked up, still tying his second shoe, as Nora rushed into the room. Her face was flushed, her eyes wild. No doubt about it, this had to be an alternate reality.

“Hurry, we gotta move!” she blurted out immediately.

“Where’re we going?” he asked, standing up. If the equipment had short-circuited and this was another reality ― it was a damned dangerous one. Not much had changed.

“Can’t explain. Trust me,” Nora gasped and, grabbing his arm, pulled him towards the open door.

He obeyed, following her out of the room and down the hall. After an initial left turn they headed for the stairway, took the stairs up one flight, exited into a series of laboratories, entering through one door and exiting by another. Nora seemed to know exactly where they were headed and which door to enter or exit to avoid everyone. Lyköan couldn’t understand why all these doors were unlocked and the rooms unoccupied. They continued to run, with only an occasional “this way” or “over here” punctuating the silence.

Panting their way through two larger manufacturing areas, around hoists, vats, conveyors, and enormous pieces of polished stainless steel machinery, Lyköan could see that the Shiva Node was now poised for full production, but where was everyone? Exiting the second equipment-filled room, they entered a long doorless tunnel-like corridor. Reaching an isolated door and opening it, they emerged into a cavernous space under an arched ceiling looming high overhead, peppered with dull amber lights.
The hidden hangar below the dolmen
.

“Well, neither of us can fly, so we have to run,” Nora said. Sitting on the hangar floor, Lyköan watched as Nora reached her hand into the backpack and pulled out what looked like the yíb he had surrendered to Pandavas days ago. He was astonished. How had she gotten her hands on it? It seemed to be only more evidence of an altered reality.

After a few seconds, the ground began to vibrate with the sound of deep-throated engines. Behind Nora, Lyköan watched as the great hangar door began to open. After rising little more than a meter it stopped.

“C’mon, we’re leaving,” Nora announced.

Scuttling under the massive door like crabs out of a rocky crevice, Nora emerged first, grabbing Lyköan by the waist as he hesitated at the lip of the great door. The midmorning sun was overpowering. Lyköan shielded his eyes with a hand, unbalanced. Nora had to steady him as the brilliance almost knocked him back into the opening.

Once they were safely outside, Nora sent one last command to close the hangar door and then cut the auxiliary power. She stowed the yíb and slung the pack onto her back before speaking again.

“Here, this way. Trust me Egan, there’s a plan, but we need to get away from here ― fast.”

Stumbling over the uneven terrain around the lip of the hangar door, where the sealed rock dropped down to the stream bank, Nora made the trail first.

“Why are we headed downstream?” Lyköan asked, holding back, slowing to walk.

“Stop with the twenty questions, will you? We’re free ― for now. But we won’t stay that way if we don’t get out of sight and start moving ― right now. It won’t take Pandavas long to realize you’ve been sprung and send aircraft looking for us. Ask any question you want after we’re under cover of the trees by the brook, but preferably another mile down the trail ― and keep moving.”

Before he could ask another stupid question Nora was a dozen yards ahead, disappearing into the foliage. He picked up his pace and caught up with her.

Twenty minutes later they broke into a clearing and found macadam underfoot. A silver Vauxhall parked on the side of the narrow country lane backed up towards them.

“Here’s our ride,” Nora shouted, springing towards the car. She opened the door.

Lyköan didn’t recognize the driver, but piled into the back seat when she pushed the front passenger seatback forward. Once he was inside, she let the seat spring back and jumped into the front seat.

“So much for the escape plan,” she chuckled, turning to the back seat and smiling at him as the car pulled away. “Now we have to come up with a place to hide.”

Zhòngní pushed the accelerator to the floor and headed for Shrewton. After that? Well, none of them had thought that far ahead.

— BOOK THREE —

CHAPTER THIRTY

Before the beginning of great brilliance and beauty, first must come a period of complete chaos.

I Ching

“This isn’t like you, Nora. What’s going on?” She’d been on the phone for less than a minute and already Diane suspected something.

“The less you know, sis, the better,” Nora answered in a whisper. Outside the phone booth’s open door Egan was surveying the traffic nervously. “Remember our summer at Aunt Betsy’s on Compton Lake? I was fourteen? You were what ― twelve? We pulled that off, didn’t we? Nobody ever suspected. Well, I need that same kind of unquestioning devotion again, sis, only this time it’s much more important.”

“So you
are
in some kind of trouble.”

“Not trouble so much as danger. That’s why I’m asking for help.”

“How can I help if I don’t know what’s wrong?”             

“Didi, please!” Nora pleaded. “There isn’t time to explain. I need two big favors.”

“Anything, Nor. You know that,” Diane surrendered, “but you’re scaring me.”

“I’m not trying to, really. I hate dragging you into this. If I had anywhere else to turn...”

“Then you’re lucky I can’t refuse, aren’t you?”

“I love you, Didi. Got something to write with?”

“Uh – yeah, go ahead.”

“You need to contact Western Union as soon as you hang up,” Nora swallowed hard. “You may need to go to your bank and then their nearest location. I need ninety-five hundred dollars in cash wired to Salisbury ― immediately.” Reading from the yíb, she gave Diane an address only blocks from the phone booth.

Silence.

“You know I’m good for it,” Nora said. Was Diane balking at the request?

“It’s not the money, honey. I just don’t like the sound of this.”

“But you’ll do it, won’t you?”

“Only because you sound so desperate.”

“It’s that obvious? I also need two twenty-two consecutive-day All-of-England
BritRail
passes. One in my name and the other for...” She shot a glance at Egan. He nodded. “Andrew Lang... L-A-N-G. I’ve got BritRail’s stateside number.” She read again from the yíb.

“Got it.”

“Have them overnighted to you at home. As soon as they arrive, put them in a separate envelope and send them to my attention, Nora E Carmichael,
Poste Restante
, S
t. Philips Marsh Sub Post Office,
Bristol, England ― fastest means possible.” Again reading from the yíb, she gave Diane the substation address. “You got that?”

“I do. But wouldn’t it be faster if you bought them yourself in England?”

“No can do. They can only be purchased in the States. One more thing, Didi, whatever you do, unless lives are in jeopardy and you have no other choice, not a word to anyone. Absolutely nothing.”

“I won’t say a thing, not even to Rich. Are you going to be alright?”

“Honestly, Didi? I don’t know. I’ve gotten myself in real deep. No question I’ve done the right thing, but who knows? So, no matter what you hear, I haven’t ― would
never
do anything to hurt or embarrass you or the girls.” Then she added ominously, “And I know, no matter what happens, you’ll always take good care of them. As good as I would myself.” Her eyes were welling up with tears. “I don’t think I’ll be able to call again until this is all straightened out ― so you’ll have to let them know that I love them dearly.”

“They already know that, honey. And so do I.”

Nora felt her composure crumbling. “I have to go. Thanks for everything. Maybe someday we can look back and laugh about this too. I hope so. I love you.” She hung up without a goodbye.

Lyköan put his arm around her shoulders as she emerged from the phone booth. They walked together silently for half a block before he hazarded a word.

“I know that was difficult, but we need to stay positive ― and keep moving. We’re far from beaten. Why don’t we grab something to eat?”

“I’m not hungry,” Nora rasped in a paltry voice, staring at the pavement.

“Well, I’m famished. And we both need a break ― a chance to regroup. How about that little bakery?” He pointed a finger at a neatly-lettered shingle hanging over a storefront window across the street. Taking her hand, he struck out for it without waiting for a reply. Nora didn’t have the strength to resist.

The cash transfer wouldn’t be available for at least another hour. At less than ten thousand dollars, the maximum legal transfer limit, it would still come to something north of four thousand pounds at the current exchange rate. They’d have to risk the attention that sum might attract. It would also require that Nora present her passport for identification. There was no other way.

“One thing’s for sure,” Lyköan said as they reached the opposite curb, “we can’t hang around Salisbury. As soon as we pick up our traveling money we’re gone. Some little hamlet between here and Bristol. Anonymous cash. If we’re lucky, Atma’s boys make it this far and are left sniffing the wind.”

“But there’s still the Bristol post office.”

“Yeah, you resurface one last time as Doc Carmichael, sign for the rail passes and we’re done. Two points of contact and neither connected or easily identified. After that we switch to living cash-only”

“And until then?”

“We do our best to avoid the CCTV cameras and draw as little attention to ourselves as possible. But those cameras are everywhere – post offices, libraries, airports, train stations. Western Union is probably linked too. I’ve tried to keep us out of their line of sight when I’ve noticed them, but there’s no way to avoid them all.

“We’ll get better at this as we go along. After Bristol we’ll need to alter our appearance ― assume new identities ― create fictitious pasts for ourselves. But it’s best you look exactly like your passport photo for the post office pickup.”

“Sounds like you’ve done this before,” Nora said, surprised by his grasp of the details.

“Not personally. But I can’t deny a bit of a shady past. Years ago, dealing in Khmer antiquities. Sorry if I ever gave you a different impression.” He smiled sheepishly, genuinely embarrassed by the confession. “Anyway, hold your praise ‘til we’ve successfully flown the coop.”

“Do we really have to go through all this?”

“You mean, why don’t we just make a mad dash for the nearest embassy and ask for asylum?”

“Exactly.” 

Stopping in front of the bakery doorway, he stuck his head inside and inhaled deeply. “Smells good to me. Whadduya think?”

Still roiling with emotion, Nora found the bouquet anything but appetizing. Nevertheless, she followed Egan inside, continuing the conversation in a back corner of the shop while awaiting their turn for service.

“If, like you said,” Nora whispered, “the clock started running when we did – why
haven’t
we gone straight to the authorities ― while Pandavas is still trying to figure out what happened to his labs ― and you?”

“Believe me, I considered it. But it didn’t play out too well when I thought through what might follow. By the way,
my
first impulse was to get the hell out of the country. Unfortunately, I seem to have misplaced my passport. Simple enough. Petition the American embassy for a replacement, right? But then I thought, ‘Whitehall’s not stupid, he’ll expect us to do just that – turn up at an American consular office immediately. He’d love to intercept us first, but failing that, his position with Brit Intel puts him in the perfect position to monitor if and when we arrive.”

“So we go into hiding and do nothing?”

Lyköan had heard the question, but continued with his line of reasoning. “No, running to the authorities isn’t smart, not because we might fail, but because we might succeed. Think about it. The minute Innovac’s plague story circulates anywhere inside the intelligence or diplomatic communities, Whitehall gets the news. He’s Innovac’s inside man. What happens then? Pandavas shifts into crisis mode and accelerates his timetable. Of course he may do that anyway, I don’t know. But if he still thinks there’s a good chance of running us down
before
we have a chance to blow the whistle ― by following our clumsy trail of phone, credit or bank transactions...”

The inference wasn’t lost on Nora.

“Well, then he’s much less likely to stray from his original plan. If so, the world survives a little longer. And we get some time to plan our next move. My guess is that until the story breaks, they’ll keep searching and stick to their original timetable, whatever that was. Right now Whitehall probably thinks he’s got the edge.”

“That’s nothing but duck and cover,” Nora argued. “If we’re caught, the whistle never gets blown at all.”

“There’s something I haven’t told you,” Lyköan replied. “A detail that makes it highly unlikely our boy would even consider accelerating his timetable while we’re still on the loose. I was going to wait ’til we were out of town, but—”

A round, ruddy-faced middle-aged woman, strapped into a tight, white apron, motioned for their order. The truth could wait.

They emerged from the bakery a short time later with a baker’s bag full of Cornish pies, Devilles teas and an oversized Eccles cake. Nora had insisted she wasn’t hungry so Lyköan had ordered for them both. Finding a seat on a rose-colored cement planter a few doors down the street, Lyköan removed the contents and wolfed down two pies in silence.

Watching him shovel down the hot food, Nora found her own appetite returning. “Better slow down there, big boy. Leave something for the women and children.” She unwrapped one of the spinach and cheese confections.

From across the flattened bag, her face shone like a Vermeer canvas, drawing Lyköan’s eyes and overwhelming his sensibilities with the oddest vertigo. Not déjà vu, but something akin to it, something with the same unsettling impact. The placement of the bottles on the bag, the reflecting highlights in Nora’s auburn hair, the noon hour angle of the sun, the easy afternoon breeze ― all too familiar. All possessed of the same disquieting resonance ― the present scene playing discordantly upon its real and imagined similarities with that earlier midday meal he had never had a chance to finish. For an instant the differences between this current reality and that memory blurred. Which was more important to him? Which evoked more desire ― and regret? How different this here and now from that where and when? Did he resent being shipwrecked here when he could so easily have washed up on that farther shore? If he could choose, knowing all he knew, where would he rather be right now?

Observing his faraway expression, Nora shivered. She tried to rouse him. “Before you’re appetite got the better of you, champ, you were about to tell me something, remember?”

“I do,” Lyköan said, taking a deep breath. “There’s no best way to begin this so I’m just going to dive in. Our buddy Pandavas let me in on the big secret ― why he’s trying to destroy the world. I won’t try and explain it, just tell you what I learned as his guest in the Node. It all boils down to religious zealotry. He’s convinced he’s God’s instrument ― or whatever passes for it in his theology ― that he’s been
called
to bring this present age to an end and depose the usurping ruler of our little corner of existence ― some malevolent entity corrupting man’s vision of reality. He’s even got a name for this joker, calls it
the Artifact
. Satan or Belial would work as well.”

“Nothing would surprise me at this point,” Nora offered. “Start tampering with human DNA at the molecular level and insanity’s probably only the beginning.”

“Well, here’s the kicker. He not only intends to release this world-annihilating plague, but afterwards return everything to
pratyaya
, the pure condition that allows perfect primary causes to function again. But that can only be accomplished ― supposedly it’s happened before – by reawakening the destroyer aspect of the Hindu deity, who’ll cleanse the world of every trace of defilement.”

“You mean Shiva?”

“You got it. And I was supposed to play the starring role. Pumped me full of those same genome-altering nano-scriptors. His ultimate purpose ― the reason he dragged me down to his basement lab ― was to invite the Destroyer of Worlds to take up housekeeping in my
vacated husk
. The
Shiva Vessel
he called it.”

“You’re kidding.”

“I wish I was. Because those nano-scriptors are
already
at work. Haven’t you noticed? Just look at my nose.”

“What about it?”

“C’mon. Try remembering what I looked like when we first met” he said, running the edge of his hand along a vertical line from brow to chin. “It’s getting straighter every day. Thought it was just my imagination. But it isn’t. I can feel the reconstruction as it’s happening, one atom at a time, like electricity! And the alterations aren’t just cosmetic.”

“What do you mean?”

“Accelerating metabolism. Increased appetite.”

“Now that you mention it,” she said, watching the Eccles cake disappear in a single bite.

“Nervous energy,” he said excitedly through a spray of crumbs. He was purposely leaving out the less desirable aspects of the transformation: the errant thoughts, the irrational impulses, and the lustful urges. No reason to scare her while he was still in control of them. In retelling the full story of his confinement he had also omitted any reference to the multiverse. One dose of insanity at a time was enough.