Idols (36 page)
Fortis sighs.
We make our way to the river of lights and join the thousands of villagers climbing to Doi Suthep, in the light of the elephant moon.
The tide of humanity carries us up the hill. It carries us up the last of the stone steps, a staircase guarded by twin stone serpents, brightly colored, whose curving tails travel the whole length of the stairs.
Ro’s bark-colored hair bobs in and out of the crowd in front of me. Lucas’s golden head almost catches up to him, then falls back again. I feel Tima’s hand on my shoulder, but Bibi and Fortis are still behind me.
None of us can control what is happening.
None of us wants to.
At the top of the stairs, when my lungs burn and my legs ache, I see an archway. Beyond the arch, a gold spire rises, shining with the light of the full moon. The pointed silhouettes of the temple rooftops curve upward in front of us, at the very top of the hill.
“Wat Doi Suthep,” says Bibi. “We’re here.”
We try to stay together in the crowd, but it isn’t easy. I keep Lucas’s head in sight, which is made possible by the fact that he is at least six inches taller than the people here, and Ro now holds on to the back of my robes, as if I were a child prone to escape. His fingers tickle at my neck. Tima trails behind us. Above our heads, in the moonlight, the air is so thick with dragonflies that it looks like a plague is upon us.
“I wonder why they’re here,” Tima says, reaching up to touch one with her hand.
“Careful,” warns Ro.
But before she can touch one, the crowd surges, and we push onward toward the temple itself.
Because the temple, lit by moonlight and the glow of a thousand candles, is waiting.
This time, I know what to do. I take the lotus blossom and place it in front of the shrine at the entrance to the temple. Tima follows my lead. I light the incense, jabbing it into the sand it shares with thousands of others as it burns. I hand one to Ro and he does the same. I light a candle, wedging it into the row of other candles. Lucas watches. There are so many candles we almost don’t need the moonlight, I think.
Candles and lanterns light the faces of the crowd around me, and I look from face to face, searching for someone I know or something I recognize.
But she’s not here.
Not among the villagers.
Ro motions to me and I follow him into the temple itself. The others are just behind us.
There are at least three separate temples in the main complex, and we move from one to another as the crowd does. I don’t know what we’re searching for, but I do know who—and what she looks like. At least, if she appears anything like the way she did in my dream. It occurs to me that within a crowd of thousands, I’m not likely to find her just by looking.
I need help.
Then I see him.
The Emerald Buddha. Finally. Just like the one I carry with me. This one is not made of jade, but of a deep-green glass—but I’d recognize him anywhere, now. After keeping a version of him in my chestpack for as long as I have.
I push my way through the crowd, kneeling in front of him. Tima wedges herself next to me on one side, and Lucas barricades me from the crowd on the other. It’s Ro, though, who I feel behind me, sheltering me from the rest of the worshippers with his body.
“Take as long as you want,” he says, under his breath. I look at him gratefully, and he smiles. As if a thousand things hadn’t happened between us, a thousand things we wish had never happened.
But they have, and I’m here because of it, so I turn to the shrine, determined to do what I am here to do.
For Ro, and in spite of Ro—and for my friends—and for myself.
I tuck my feet under me, so they don’t point to the Buddha. Remembering what Bibi taught us, I press my hands together in the shape of a lotus bud and perform the respectful greeting called the
wai
, placing my hands over my face and bowing my head toward the ground.
I feel a calm descend over me. It feels good to be here, celebrating with the people. And so I wait patiently for her to show herself.
Nothing happens.
It’s like the Temple of the Emerald Buddha all over again.
I sit up and open my eyes. No girl. Candle wax and incense smoke and little else.
She’s not here.
GENERAL EMBASSY DISPATCH: EASTASIA SUBSTATION
MARKED URGENT
MARKED EYES ONLY
Internal Investigative Subcommittee IIS211B
RE: The Incident at SEA Colonies
Note: Contact Jasmine3k, Virt. Hybrid Human 39261.SEA, Laboratory Assistant to Dr. E. Yang, for future commentary, as necessary.
DOC ==> FORTIS
Transcript - ComLog 12.02.2069
//comlog begin;
For your review, here is a simplified outline of NULL’s instructions, as I understand them:;
LOCATE SUITABLE PLANET
Atmosphere
Gravity
Water
Etc.
IF PLANET FOUND:
• Scan planet
Identify flora
Identify fauna
Identify threats
Biological
Environmental
Mechanical/Technological
• Generate risk profile
Locate potential colony sites
Determine landing/entry procedures
APPROACH PLANET
Arrival
• Neutralize threats
Mechanical/Technological
Biological
Environmental
• Prepare planet
Create preparatory equipment
Clean
Seed
Populate fauna
• Prepare colony locations
• Establish and populate colonies
Protect and guide through initial growth stage
Educate
• When colonies established:
Destroy all preparatory materials
Shut down
//comlog end;
I fight off the disappointment.
Don’t give up.
You must be doing something wrong.
She has to come.
I don’t know what else to do. I have nowhere else to go, nowhere else to look.
Then I see a wrinkled old man to my right draw a ceramic dog out of his pocket. He kisses it, placing it on the shrine in front of him. His birth year. Year of the Dog.
Of course.
I open my chestpack and draw the Emerald Buddha out. I kiss the stone and place it carefully on the shrine in front of me.
I bow my head again, pressing my hands together. Waiting.
Nothing.
Still nothing.
The dull noise of the people pressing around me starts to make my head throb. I’m dirty. I’m exhausted, physically and mentally.
I try to push them away. Their thoughts, their feelings. Their anxieties and their fears. They swarm around me like so many wasps drawn to a ripe plum.
I am done. Finished. At the end of a very long northern road.
Then I hear a whisper, from just beyond my left shoulder. “Let me try,” Tima says. She holds out her hand. “Give it to me.”
I open my chestpack again, and this time, I pull out the entire velvet pouch. I take a jade figurine and hand it to Tima, wrapping her fingers around it. She kisses it, just as the old man did with his dog, and places it carefully on the shrine, next to my Emerald Buddha.
We’re in this together. Sisters ourselves. Whether or not the little jade girl ever comes for us.
That’s what Tima’s telling me. And that’s what I hear. I know it, because at this moment, this simple action feels like the kindest thing anyone has ever done for me. I can’t stop the tears from catching on my eyelashes, I am so deeply touched.
