The Anarchists (18 page)

Though he applauded like the others, Adharma assumed Kareza’s icy stare was meant for him. She flourished an accepting hand upon her return to the round dinner table. He took her free palm and squeezed it, signaling their exit.

In a hallway, replete with hand-carved, marble Roman pillars, Adharma cornered her once he ensured they were alone. Following them from a distance, Micah ducked behind a pillar and extended the recording range of his handheld to pick up the conversation yards away.

“What sort of business do you mean in there, quitting?”    “Cagey until the end,” she uttered through a cough. “Widen your scope. Thus far, I have advised you. From now on, I will lead you.”

No, she meant she would advise me and not lead me, he thought. “And what’s that nonsense about fixing the elections?”

“Can’t take a joke, Prime Minister?”

“That was hardly jest. Have you perpetrated a crime?”

“Have a little faith. Mister Prime Minister. Haven’t we come a long way, you and I? Do you not have luxury transports at your disposal? What about all of the women you’ve slept with and the palatial mansion? Why doubt me now? Has the world suffered for it? Where‘s the crime?”

“But. . .”

“Largely due to your overtures, the ten most affluent nations in the world have adopted a united currency. You selected a majority of Italy’s parliament, and have gained worldwide notoriety and influence. Most men would be pleased with this and not question my infallible methods.”

“If your ‘methods’ include extortion, murder, and blackmail, you’re a criminal,” he said impetuously. “And I am not most men.”

“Precisely why I selected you. Surely, you don’t think my success comes from lumps of clay too difficult to mold? The potential to rule an empire bigger than that of the Romans lies within you, and I will personally see to it that it comes out.”  

Adharma’s shoulders slumped. “I thought you to be driven – relentless even – but you have lost your grip on reality.”

“Not so,” Kareza said, as Adharma turned his back to her. She laid a strong hand on his shoulder and exerted enough force to cause him pain. “I used 80 years of my life force creating this reality, but my time has run out. I am soon going to die.”

Adharma attempted to move. “What have you done to me?”

“Given you a life you never would have otherwise known; plucked you from obscurity and fashioned the spotlight for you on the earth’s largest stage.” Kareza licked her lips, not unlike an animal. “I have prepared you for this – a grand moment! The world’s population will kneel before the man who brought it peace and prosperity. He will be a god in their eyes, and they will tremble beneath his feet, as he commands them to do his bidding.”

Adharma found that he could not speak without struggling. She has subdued me, but once I am freed, I will go to the authorities, he thought.

“I have much to accomplish and a short period of time in which to do it, Mister Prime Minister.” Kareza concealed her free hand behind her back. “Breathe. At this point, I cannot be stopped. But my form must change, one last time.”

“What. . .” he blurted, “do you need. . .me for?”

“Frankly. . .” She stopped short of finishing her sentence before violently plunging a blade into Adharma’s back and watching him die. Once his breathed no more, Kareza knelt at the prostrate corpse, which landed face down on the hand-woven carpet.

As she reached for the wound, Micah straightened up, and then peeked at the scene. Kareza removed bloodstained fingers from Adharma’s back. He did not wish to know whether she wiped off the blood or sucked it like a vampire.

“You served me well,” she said with distinction. “You were the key to my ascension in the former world, and you will do so once more, here in the latter.”

Speechless, Micah continued to stare without betraying his position. What he saw next defied logic; visible crimson waves emanating from Kareza’s fingertips dissolving into Adharma’s back. Naturally, as an expert mathematician, Micah searched for scientific answers as to how it could have occurred. Simple physics dictate that matter cannot be created or destroyed, but changed. But the change happening – the inspiration of life transferred from one body to the next – was not possible.

Adharma now stood over the fallen Kareza’s body – apparently victim to his former demise. His shoulder blades, including the navy blue silk suit jacket, showed no sign of being punctured. No blood soaked the tapestry beneath his feet. This new version of Adharma checked them all with the intensity of a forensic scientist searching for telling clues – except in this case, he did so to prevent discovery of his own mischief. Why he did so, Micah did not know. Surely, a being able to transcend death could not be concerned with mortal laws?  

Prior to that moment, Micah separated faith from his profession. When his relatives spoke of his great-grandfather, Micah responded with spiritual reverence – never science. The two were mutually exclusive in his mind; unrelated, one undetermined by the other. Spiritually, one could explain what happened to Darrion James; he had risen from the dead and gone on to live almost 40 more years. But, without a physical explanation, Micah never considered one with respect to the other. What now occurred bridged the two.

“Help!” Adharma’s yell, unmistakably female, readjusted to male. “Help!”

Micah vanished into the ensuing ruckus and snuck out. How could he remain inconspicuous and be sure that no one followed him? He stowed his Casper several blocks away and proceeded by foot, as public transportation could also be traced. He said a mental goodbye to his favorite vehicle. If its loss meant avoiding suspicion of tonight’s events, he would sacrifice it to the criminal element. Wait, my holophone! He dropped it onto the street, intending to crush it with the heel of his shoe when Doctor Chu called. He bent over, answering it on its voice-only setting.

“How was the dinner?” Chu’s inflections conveyed an air of expectancy.

“Nothing I can talk about right now.” Micah increased his walking pace.

“Then when can you? Where are you going now? And why do you whisper?” 

He looked around. “It‘s not safe.”

“Come to the laboratory, the west door.”

Micah removed the holophone’s memory before disposing of it. The foundation building was at least two miles away, and his feet were freezing. Still, he soldiered on through the residual puddles of rain, mentally dissecting what he had just seen.

In the Bible, Jesus cast out evil spirits from people many times. Was it illogical to assume a malevolent spirit could move from one human body to the next? He had never actually seen it done before. The event even fit the profile of matter – the spirit – moving from Kareza to Adharma, and Kareza needing to free Adharma’s spirit before replacing it.

But why? 

Chu had asked him to attend the celebratory dinner to plea for the restoration of the foundation’s funding. The legal team had worn out its welcome, and so Chu sent Micah instead. It posed a risk, as his presence could result in a harassment charge. Though stealthy in his approach, one of them had slain the other before he could talk to them.

Indeed, Chu had left the west door to the Exodus Foundation unsecured. But the area was dark and, without his holophone, he had no way of lighting the way. Micah ran his fingers along the walls until he reached the elevator tubes, stumbled inside, and ascended to the top floor. Power still flowed there, he assumed, from a backup source. He accessed the handprint security panel.

“Voice recognition required,” said the automated voice. “Please state your full name.”

“Micah Darrion James.”

“Micah Darrion James. Access granted.”

Micah entered the top-level laboratory, where Chu – a kind dark-haired Asian – piddled about with the technical equipment remaining inside the round room. Their research concentrated on neuroscience, the brain’s behavioral tendencies, and holistic procedures. Close to discovering a method to power their research, they lost funding. The angel and capital investors had dried up, as well. In a few days, the building would be destroyed and the work would have been for naught.

“So, what did the Prime Minister say? Did Kareza still pull his strings?”

With a fair degree of shellshock, Micah handed over the holophone’s memory and he narrated as the audio file played.

Chu, of slight stature, tinkered without pause, even at the point where Kareza assumed the Prime Minister‘s place. “Hand me that vial over there, the one with the red liquid in it.” Micah did so. “It’ll have to do.”

“Nothing I just said surprises you? Or you don‘t believe it?”

“Oh no, I believe it.” The man set his tool on a black recliner. “But do you?”

“It violates every scientific principle that I’ve ever studied.”

“And those scientific principles are immutable?” asked Chu with false gravitas.

“Aren’t they?”

“Hmph.” The recliner automatically leaned back. “What about the metaphysical? How much more do you need to see to be sure? You saw a woman stab a man to death and reanimate his body.”

“It makes even less sense now that you said it out loud. I don‘t know. Metaphysics were always more philosophy than mathematics to me.”

“Separation between belief systems and finite systems.” He patted the chair‘s padding. “Why don’t you have a seat and relax?”

“I just witnessed a murder, sir. Relaxing isn’t the foremost thing on my mind.”

“Five people besides me can open or close the door to this room and none of them would try to kill you.”

Micah complied and felt immediate relief. His legs and feet needed respite from the two-mile walk. “Why am I here?”

“Why are any of us here?” Chu quipped.

“No, sir, I meant in a smaller sense. Why did you want me to come here?”

“We have a project to finish.”

“The hexagonal probability theory? How can we finish with no funding or method?”

“Will you help me?” Chu asked in a calm alto.

Micah nodded. “Should I cue up the Sixth Equation files?”

A cool hand touched Micah’s forehead. “No. Just try to relax.”

He closed his eyes and, before he could react, a needle pricked his arm and blackness covered his face. Immediately, a blitz of mixed images played across his mind‘s eye. Before he knew it, they stopped and he saw Chu again. The taste in his mouth reminded him of sponge cake.

“You injected me?” Flustered and woozy, Micah stared at him. “Are you insane?”

“What did you see? Answer my question.”

“Answer my questions first!”

“It’s an analgesic and anesthetic. Without them, the process could cause unconsciousness, pain, and might drive you insane.” 

“Why did you do that to me?”

“Metaphysics; an alteration in your perceptions of time and space. Most scholars believe those concepts to be progressive and linear, like the path of an arrow.” He pantomimed the action of aiming and shooting an arrow. “Is it truly unreasonable to assume that time and space are malleable, even reversible, just because no human being has found a way to successfully do it?

“Have you ever had a dream familiar to your emotional intellect but foreign to your ability to reason? It’s long been a belief of mine that our dreams are escaped manifestations of primal codes embedded in our subconscious.”

The lightning-fast linguistics confused him. “I don’t understand.”

“A baby comes from the womb, innately knowing that he must suckle at a breast to live. He must inhale and exhale to survive and sleep to function. Codes to regulate these behaviors exist in our lower brains, along with clues to our destinies. God engineers them into our bodies so that we cannot forget them. We, who embrace these clues best, are those considered to be successful. Those who do not have ‘dreams’ about what could be; live life as ordinarily as they see fit.”

“What I just saw was really a clue to my destiny?”

“Something like that, yes.”

“I can’t accept that.”

“Then it’s a dream. But suppose the inventor of the AIDS cure never pursued his purpose? Billions would have died. No wonder the world has so many problems. Nobody risks believing in themselves. The future will find you, Micah. Here's the true question – will you recognize it when you see it?”

Micah never considered it from that perspective. The doctor defended the position with belligerent conviction, as if he really believed his probability theory to be the truth. “We‘ve literally been over this a million times and there‘s just no answer to the Sixth Equation.” 

Chu handed Micah a pair of black-rimmed visors. They had the weight of eyeglasses, but held a greater importance. Micah held them as such.
Has Chu solved the mystery?

“Half an hour ago, you had a peek,” Chu said, extending the visor’s arms. “Now, take a look.”

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

January 27, 2050 – a week later

Suddenly aware of himself, Damario slid over on the bed and massaged his lower back, which ached from the dip in the old mattress. Vintage scotch whiskey mixed with a sugar-like sweetness lingered on his tongue. Even through a mild hangover, he had dreamed again.

“No more Sweet Georgia Brown.” Robinne Coley stirred from her husband’s movement. “It’s late and I‘m sleepy.”

Damario retrieved his navy blue flannel pajama bottoms from the floor. “I’m good. Go back to sleep, babe.” 

He padded to the in-suite bathroom and set the lights to dim. After swallowing some aspirin, he
scratched his bald head and looked in the mirror. His face bore three vacation days worth of beard, which he intended to shave off later that morning. He’d been too busy with domestic duties to do it during his day off. Meanwhile, Robinne home-schooled their daughter Christian, and Gabriel, their toddler.

Damario’s clean-up efforts led to an unexpected lovemaking session that his wife initiated. During his off-duty periods, Robinne sprung up with life, but inactivity drove him nuts. If he dreamed and insomnia struck – like it did now – only one thing granted him true peace. He scooted down the hall to the study and silently secured the door.