The Persistence of Memories - A Novel of the Mendaihu Universe (20 page)

“Do I still merit a Security Level Five
clearance?” she asked. “I don't know if I've been demoted.
Technically I’m not even on the ARU rolls anymore.”

Jenn nodded. “I checked to confirm your
profile right after you called. Still says you're at ICSL5. Most
Investigative Clients stay at that level, even if they go freelance
like you do.”

“Good to know,” she said, visibly relieved.
“Most of this will be about filling in the holes in my current
research. I've done most of it at home already, as you can see.”
She patted the overstuffed satchel.

Jenn's eyes widened in surprise. “Pashyo, who
did you pay off to get SL5 home issuance?” she exclaimed.

“I have a successful investigative agency,”
she said. “Simple as that. And it helps to have a Master’s degree
in Meraladian spirituality. And I do reiki and soulhealing on the
side, so you could say I’ve been keeping busy.”

Jenn goggled at her. Was this the same woman
coming in here just over a year ago, stressed out by a case she
couldn't handle and a life that she hated? “I am so impressed,
Chris!” she said. “And jealous! Kind of makes me wonder why I'm
still here in this cave.”

They stopped at a privacy booth at the far
the far end of the hallway. Jenn slid a keycard through the slot
and opened the door, revealing a room with a large and cold-looking
table in the center, with two chairs on each side. Four vidmats
embedded on its surface blinked to life, each now blinking a
cursor, waiting to be signed on. “As usual,” Jenn started, lapsing
into her usual monitor speech, “ICSL5 means you can use all four
consoles if you need to, though it does eat up a lot of credit in
your yearly membership. I suggest multitasking on two. Cheaper, and
about the same speed.”

Christine smiled at her. “Hadn't thought of
that, thanks for the suggestion. Where...uh...” She searched the
walls of the room for something. Jenn thought she might be looking
for an intercom monitor, and pointed up at the ceiling.

“New addition, just last month...smartmics
embedded in the ceiling tiles. You need anything, just call out my
name and I’ll be paged.” She gestured towards the vidmat pasted
above the door. “Two-way security, just so you know.”

“Thanks,” she said. “How long do I have this
room for?”

“Two hours. The inboards on the table remind
you when your time is almost up. Possibly longer if I can juggle a
few people.”

Christine lifted up her hands. “No need to go
out of your way. Two is fine for starters. I'll let you know.”

“Jenn, are you there?”

It had only been a half hour when she heard
Christine's uncertain call into the air. Jenn pulled on her headset
and punched up the room’s vidmat. Her head was sunk low as she
leaned heavily over the desk. Papers from her satchel had been
strewn in some semblance of order that made sense to no one but
herself. When she lifted her head, she revealed a small grin.

“What's up, Chris?” she responded.

“How old are you?”

She frowned at the question. “Twenty-five,
why do you ask?”

“Interesting...” she smiled. “Can we talk
privately for a moment?”

“Uh...sure,” Jenn said. “I'll meet you back
there.” She pulled the headset off and sat there for a moment,
wondering what she was up to. Christine did make a habit of
investigating the most mundane of avenues with her cases to come up
with gems of information, and more often than not she'd solved her
cases by way of showing points of view that simply had not been
thought of. If she was questioning a link between Jenn’s conception
and the last Season of Embodiment, that would not surprise her at
all.

She entered the room a moment later.
Christine was still leaning over her paperwork and the two open
research consoles, fingers drumming nervously at its edges. At
Jenn's entrance she lifted her head up, a hand reaching to rub the
back of her neck.

“Hey,” she said. “Got a few moments?”

Jenn stood close to the door, and gestured to
it. “I really shouldn't be too far from my post for long,” she
said. “A few minutes at best. What's up?”

Christine exhaled slowly, glancing away from
her. When she looked at her again, all humor had fallen from her
face. “Just a few questions,” she said, quietly and a little
awkwardly. “Personal in nature,” she added.

Jenn frowned, but assented. “I'll answer if I
can.”

Christine nodded. “Fair enough. So. Um.
First, do you, or any of your family, have any Mendaihu abilities
of any sort? Strong or weak, it doesn't matter. It's just a theory
I'm trying out.”

“Not that I know of,” Jenn lied, for a good
reason. As a matter of public security, she couldn't know about her
older sister's exceptionally strong Mendaihu
speak
and her
role in Governor Rieflin's Special Forces. Or her own abilities for
that matter. The less she knew about her own involvement in Vigil,
the better. “Speaking for myself, I was
very
weak at sensing
before the Awakening. It's a little stronger now, but I haven't
been testing it.”

Christine nodded again. “That's a start,” she
said. “Okay...would you ever be willing to be tested for
Elder-level Mendaihu training, if that level is ever reached?”

Jenn shrugged. “I doubt I’d get that far, but
sure.”

“Good. Next question. Do you know if any of
your colleagues, friends, coworkers, anyone close to your age, who
are familiar with spiritsensing?”

Jenn frowned at her. “Is this going
somewhere?” she asked.

Christine immediately threw her hands up. “I
don't mean to intrude on your private life, Jenn. I apologize if
I've gone too far.”

“No...” Jenn shook her head slowly.
“Just...curious as to what all this has to do with the recent
Embodiment.”

Christine's shoulders relaxed. “Another
theory of mine,” she said. “It's just something I'm kicking around.
You know me.”

Jenn raised an eyebrow at her. “Dare I
ask?”

“I’m trying to find a link to not just the
Embodiment, but the reasons behind the mass reactions. I'm certain
that the previous season of Embodiment affected us more than we
even know. A lot of changes this past quarter century…some
spiritual, some physical. We as a province became more attuned to
the things and events around us, things of spiritual nature. The
Shenaihu nuhm'ndah come so close to obliterating the Mendaihu, but
they hold back. What was the death toll, nearly thirty thousand on
both sides? Goddess, what must have gone through the heads of
people back then?”

“I believe 'kill the bastards' was my
grandmother's phrase,” Jenn said.

“I wouldn't doubt it,” she said. “And yet,
here we are. So willing to go through it all again, in the hopes
that it’ll be different this time. Like we’ve accepted that these
embodiment seasons as just another part of our lives. Like we’ve
accepted that lost lives don’t necessarily mean lost souls. We
truly have evolved, Jenn.

“My theory revolves around this change. It's
more of a sociological observation than anything else, mind you,
but I think I may be able to make sense of it. The aftermath of the
last Embodiment was the darkest on record. No citizen of Earth had
ever gone through events as traumatizing. But thanks to the
spiritual healing of the Meraladians, the surge of faith and belief
in the One of All Sacred, and the vigilance of elders, we pulled
through. It could have gone the other way, sinking us into decades
of fear and distrust, but thankfully it did not.”

“So what does that have to do with me and my
age?” Jenn asked.

“Your generation was the first born after the
last Embodiment,” she said. “And I believe that had more of an
effect on you than anyone is willing to admit. There are more
Mendaihu your age than there were before that event. Be it
recruitment, a change of heart, or simply just a larger and more
visible presence. Your generation is more willing to accept what’s
going on now than the previous generation. Am I making any
sense?”

“Perfect sense,” she said.

“Good to hear that,” she said. “Thank you.
This is
definitely
a good thing.” She nodded again, more to
her own thoughts than to her, and suddenly distracted herself with
the paperwork cluttering the desk. “I'd like to talk to you about
this some more when I have something more concrete,” she added.
“When you have the time, of course.”

“Sure,” Jenn said. “Vidmat or landline me, I
always check my messages.”

Christine beamed at her, touching her
shoulder. “Thanks again. I'll let you get back to work now. Sorry
if I interrupted anything.”

“No worries,” she said, and moved towards the
door.

“Oh — Jenn? One more thing?”

“Hmm?”

Christine faltered, shrugging awkwardly and
tapping the desk with her fingers again. “I’m sorry. This is a
weird question and totally irrelevant to what I'm doing, but it’s
part of a personal investigation I'm doing for my own purposes.
I...um....” She huffed, looking away. “This is going to sound
stupid.”

“Ask away,” she grinned. “Believe me, I've
heard all of them all here.”

“It's just an observation...but I think there
might be a link to what I'm doing.”

“What is it?”

“Are you familiar with the recent graffiti
popping up, the 'here lies fate' tags?”

“Uh…” Jenn shivered.

The seemingly harmless question hit her
squarely in the gut. What did Christine Gorecki know about these
same words Matthew was looking for? She masked her surprise by
frowning, acting out a pathetic attempt at confusion. “I've seen it
around a few places. Why?”

Christine must have missed her reaction.
Instead she merely shrugged, and started looking back down at the
console. “Oh, nothing, really,” she said. “If I find anything, I'll
let you know.”

“Sure,” Jenn said, and motioned out the door.
“I'll be up front if you need me.”

She left the room before Christine could
answer. She resisted the urge to call Matthew using the comm
implant. She didn't want him to weasel his way into the DRL
mainframe, and she certainly didn't want to bring up more questions
than she had in her own head already. She sat back down behind her
desk and glanced at the security screen; she had left it set at the
camera in Christine's room. She watched the woman reading a few
articles, stopping suddenly to tap into a console and bring up an
old NewsComm feed, compare the two, then write a few notes in the
margins of her paperwork. She repeated the process endlessly and
flawlessly, so immersed in her work that it would take an alarm to
interrupt her concentration. She was the most driven and dedicated
private investigator she'd seen in a long while. It would be a
shame to have to kick her out of the room in a little over an
hour.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Groundwork

Caren reached out for Anando's hand and held
it tight as if the action had already become second nature. She
shivered, feeling both excited and nervous at the same time. Did
she really know this Anando? This younger man at least seven years
her junior, whom she’d met only weeks before? Her heart, her
soul
knew him from ages ago. Her soul not only sang this
truth, it
vibrated
it, and she could not dismiss that
sensation. But how did she really
know
him? Why had they
been destined to reunite in this lifetime?

His hand pulsed once in hers, a small sign of
affection, peculiar as it was. She smiled in spite of herself,
looking into his eyes as she would with any man she might have
loved. She looked upon him longer than usual, studying his youthful
face, his dark Meraladian eyes, his messy brown-blonde hair. He
gazed back at her, not like the lost puppy she'd expected him to
be, but with the love of a man with maturity equal to hers, who
knew and understood her spirit more than anyone else. She returned
the quick hand squeeze, letting a single thread of spirit entwine
around him. The reaction had been true and from her heart, even if
her mind was screaming otherwise:
What are you doing, Caren? You
don't have time for this! He's too young! Do you even love this
man?

Did she really love him?

Questions, questions...she hated this part of
her relationships. She’d warned Anando early on that she’d lost
many potential beaus this way. She questioned everything in her
life because she craved a kind of stability that the world lacked,
almost on a daily basis. Personal things such as her role as a
Special Agent for the Alien Relations Unit, to the more mundane
things such as why anyone in their right mind would want to go out
with such a high-maintenance woman such as herself, spiritual
attraction or no.

Not once did he try to prove her wrong.

They strolled through Branden Hill Park,
walking aimlessly from one corner to another with no real direction
in mind. They’d made their third circuit around the park, and were
now nearing the elevated southwestern corner. “Want to sit down a
while?” Anando said, his voice soft and kind.

“Sure,” she said, forcing a smile. She led
him to a spot underneath one of the large elm trees that lined the
upper crest of the park, pulled off her jacket and covered the cool
grass with it. She sat down on it, drawing her knees up to her
chin, watching the people at the bottom of the hill walking past
the subway station entryway.
Poor Anando,
she thought.
Trying so hard. He doesn't deserve this grief.

“Something on your mind?”

She hid a sigh, having expected that
question. “The usual,” she said. It had become the all-purpose
answer that really meant
leave it alone, I'll be okay.

“Oh,” he said, and looked away. Frustrated,
confused. “Say,” he continued a moment later, a sudden smile on his
face. “What are the odds of you and me going back to your
place…”