Nirvana Effect (36 page)

The gatekeeper didn’t hear the shot that ended his life.

Tome
got into the Bug
.  It had skidded to a stop at the gate, and one of
his warriors
had opened its passenger door for him.  He slammed the door and shouted, “Go!”  He could already hear gunfire in the distance, near the brick mansion.

The young man was on his third lightness in a day.  He knew he might die from the after-pain.  He did not care.  That might have been a concern of Tomy but not of Tome.  It was what must be done.  No one else could be trusted to get the
money
and the guns. 

The top of
Liang’s
house was crenelated.  Automatic weapons
were manned at each corner and firing
wild
ly
at the Onge vehicles. 

Tome watched as two
of his
Onge leaned out of the front car windows.  Each fired a few shots with
their
rifles.  The two machine gunners
atop the turrets
dropped
and their guns fell silent
.  The Onge reached the house.  A flatbed full of Liang’s guards were pulling out from
the back
.  The Onge fanning out of the vehicles shot it to pieces
before the guards even had time to fire back
.  One bullet dropped each man
, in just the way that Tome’s men had been trained
.
 
Efficiency.
  Their assault had come too fast for even the hardened criminals and ex-military under Liang to make a stand.

The
power of the
nectar.

His Onge warriors ran one of the cars through the front door of the estate.  It was an iron door, but it could not
stop
an SUV.  They were in.

Tome followed behind
with gun in hand
.  His job was the safe
.  It
turned out being
in the music room, and quite obvious.  There was a guard he had to drop, which was his first tip-off. 

The floor sounded different near the grand piano. 
Tome
shoved
it into the middle of the room and
flipped away the throw rug. 
One of the floorboards beneath had a recessed handle
.  He pulled it
, revealing
a passage below.  He checked his gun.  He was sure there would be a few more surprises before he got the cash.

Liang wasn’t home, but his hideout reserves would be down
there
.  It would be quite a sum, all they need
ed to set up shop in Sri Lanka.

Cali’s house
had several lights on when Edward first saw it.
 
She had left them on during the day while she was at work, probably as
a security measure.  And at Seacrest’s,
Edward
remembered the same. 

Edward
tossed this around in his mind.  Cali may have
turned
the lights off at her house before she left, but the only people that could have changed Seacrest’s lights were the Onge.

The Onge are definitely still there.
  No tribesman would have bothered to switch a light off to save
electricity.  There were many
tactical reasons for it to look like no one’s home.  Chief among them:
the fact that someone’s home.

Edward grasped for something else he could learn from what he’d already
learned
.  He wished he could discern Cali’s s
ituation
.  It seemed that if only he were in the trance, some telltale clue would present itself. 

He wanted God to tap him on the shoulder and whisper in his ear, “Cali’s in Seacrest’s house, in the third room to the right. 
You can get in through the side
window and save her.” 

He doubted
there
would be
any
divine intervention today.  He’d have to use his logic, despite his weariness.  He backtracked several houses and then crossed the street to Cali’s row. 

Now that he knew the disposition of Seacrest’s residence, he needed to know what was happening at Cali’s.  He found an empty driveway and followed it all the way back, hopping a fence into the same jungle area
where
he’d chased Tomy the night before. 

He leaned out
of the foliage
see through the windows facing
Cali’s
back yard.
 
The
glare kept him from seeing all the way inside.  There
didn’t seem to be any motion
, however
. 
Outside, he saw no signs of activity: no cars, no footprints.
The whole neighborhood
felt
abnormally still.  Edward checked the sun.  It
would be many more
hour
s
before the workaday crowd started making its way back to this community. 

Edward gripped the t-pill bottle in his pocket, then released it. 
It would be a lot easier
.  His eyes felt droopy despite the adrenaline flush in his veins.  He maneuvered behind the tree closest to Cali’s back door, then calmly walked
up to the house
.  He kept his eyes peeled for motion in the
window but
saw nothing.  He tried the door handle; it was unlocked. 

He hadn’t expected that
.  The
door swung open easily and quietly.  Edward froze.  The doorknob
slammed into the wall.
He listened for
a reaction
, but
heard
nothing. 

Edward stepped inside and closed the door behind him.  He resisted the automatic impulse to rub his feet clean on the mat and walked light-footedly to the kitchen.  He’d never been able to walk quietly, before, but he poured his attention into his feet, tweaking their position and the shifting of his weight until no sound came
from his steps
.  Cat-like,
he reached the ope
ning of the living area
and leaned his head around the corner.  He positioned his body so that he could respond to an assault at any moment and quickly gain the initiative.

The living room was empty.  Edward walked in.  He was starting to relax.  No one seemed to be here.

He looked out the window to the front yard of Seacrest’s residence.  The house’s front door swung open.  Edward dodged behind the curtains.  He didn’t want to take any chances of being spotted. 

Edward peered out as f
our
dark
men, two in casual tourist clothing and two in suits, stepped out
of Seacrest’s front door
.  One of them had a paper in his hand.  One toted a suitcase.  The two in suits carried briefcases.   They were obviously Onge.  At least, that fact was obvious to Edward. 
Probably not to anyone else, though. 
He’d
been right about some of Manassa
’s pl
ot
.  That fact was reassuring, although it
felt akin to
being able to predict the path of a boulder but not being able to step away.

The group entered a black sedan parked on the roadside and pulled away. 

Edward started in the direction of the back door
but
stopped himself. 
Can’t just leave.  Got to see if Cali left me any clues. 

Got to
rest
.  My mind
just
isn’t functioning.
 

He
made
a quick but thorough check of the house.  He was glad he did.  In
the nightstand drawer, written
in Cali’s hand in French: “Corvette had
company.  I have patients to
tend to under the clinic.  -C
.”

The hope pushed an elation through Edward’s body that drowned out the exhaustion. 
Edward stuffed the letter in his pocket
and
sprinted out of the house back to the Corvette.

Seacrest wasn’t there. 

“We will go soon to the sea,” said Nockwe to his wife Bri’ley’na.  “
By the evening we’ll be leaving. 
Are the children ready?”

“They are,” she said. 
She called for them. 
“Children?” 

The
y
ran outside of the house to join the
ir parents
.  They had their packs.  Nockwe took time to
inspect his
first
sons and daughters
.  There were four, t
he oldest
of them only
six
years old
.  Bri’ley’na had given birth to him when she was only sixteen.  He was the strongest, a born leader.  Nockwe was very proud
of him
.  The one he loved the most, however, was his
younger
son.  He was almost five, and had been sickly most his life.  He was the most loving of his chil
dren.

Nockwe had
been blessed by the unseen god with four children from his wife’s four pregnancies.  Looking at them lined up before him, shortest to tallest, he could not help but smile.  Even amongst the turmoil, there was some small joy to be found.

“How are my warriors
?” asked Nockwe. 

They shouted in unison, “
Tendo!
” 
Ready.

He knelt down in front of them.  “My children, Manassa will soon muster the tribe and begin the march.  It is a great day for our tribe.  We will leave our homeland, but create a new home.  I will be very busy with matters of the tribe, so you must be strong and stay close to your mother and do whatever she asks.  No matter what happens, follow the directions of your mother.”

“Yes, father,” they said.  “Okay.  Okay.  Yes, father.”

“Good.”  He stood up and turned away from them for a moment.  There were tears in his eyes. 
Why?
  He wiped them away
and walked into the hut to gather his own pack.
 
It is a great day.

Bri followed him.  “Nockwe,” he heard her say.  “What is happening?”

“The move.  It
is
unexpected.”  He looked up at her.  His bluff didn’t work.  She just looked at him knowingly
with her hand to her hip
.  “Glis.  I killed him.”

“We already
discussed
this, Nockwe.  He was a murderer.  You did justice.”  She held his hand and guided him to sit
with
her on their pallet.

“There is something I didn’t tell you.  It is why I can’t let it go.  There is something that plays in my mind again and again.”

“Tell me.”

I must.  It won’t stop unless I do so.
“Just before I killed him, the shock on his face…”  He paused to gather his words.  He shifted her hands back and forth in his.  He looked up.  “It was the shock and
the
disappointment of an innocent man.” 

He looked into her eyes.  There was no redemption there.  He wouldn’t find it there, he knew, but he had hoped somehow just by saying it the ghost would leave him. 
Her eyes were more like mirror
s, no matter how much she might want
to soothe him. 

“I
have
tried to deny it to myself,
” he said,
“
but
I know I brought justice to an innocent
.  I was wrong.  Manassa was wrong.  It must have been an honest challenge, and I slit his throat.”

“You did what you thought best for the tribe.”

“Perhaps I can’t see that, anymore,” said Nockwe. 

She took his face in her hands and made him look at her.  “Nockwe.  All you see is the tribe.  If you cannot see it anymore, there is someone blinding you.  Look around you,” she said.  She touched his chest.  “Look into your heart.  You are the eyes, the ears, the he
art, the head
of this tribe.  You are its chieftain.  If you do not see, do not hear, do not feel, do not think, your tribe is dead.”

He considered her words.  She had a terrible habit of saying the right thing at exactly the right time.  He restrained a smile and
shot up out of his sitting position
.

“Where are you going?” she asked.

“I am going to watch, to hear, to feel, to think.  I love you,” said Nockwe.