Unity and Destiny Pt. 09

While their captors herded them into the throne room, she lightly tapped each of their minds in succession, with the prearranged signal. WAIT. Only Mark's expression changed slightly, but she knew they'd all understood.

The Mexican was standing now in his sandals, leaning on a feathered ornamental spear. He was an imposing figure of indeterminate age. His hair was jet black, and his smooth skin and distant eyes made him seem ageless. He wore only a loincloth and colorful robe, leaving his chest and legs bare, showing his hairless brown skin, his muscled chest. Splashed across the exposed skin were overlapping freckled spirals of many colors, even jet black. The Mexican had more Changes than anyone Esther had ever seen, more even than Abuela. He wore some heavy ornaments: a gold armband, and large earrings. He looked every bit an emperor, and Esther knew it was intentional. There was that famous portrait of Moctezuma, dressed much the same. As Selena had said so many times, this was a man who understood theater. And she reminded herself that despite appearances, he was still tired.

"I dreamed of this days ago," the Mexican said in perfect English. His gaze looked at all of them, and no one. "One of my true dreams. I knew my mind would wake me at the anointed time, and so it did. Quetzalcoatl appeared and spoke to me of this challenge, and a powerful challenge it was, but I have overcome it as well."

Esther couldn't move, and she knew the Mexican was holding some of the others even more tightly.

"Those two," muttered Janelle, pointing at Mark and Lukas. "Get them secured first."

They had handcuffs, heavy metal ones, and soon Mark was cuffed, hand and foot, shoved roughly onto the floor. The Mexican pointed at the others in the order she expected: Selena, Nicola, Frederick. He ignored the rest of them, and they'd run out of handcuffs anyway. But all their captors were relaxing now, their weapons lowered slightly. The Mexican walked closer, examining his prisoners.

"You have more power than I had realized," the Mexican said, looking at each of them in turn. Esther's heart pounded when his piercing gaze focused on her, and she breathed more easily when he moved past, to linger on her Changed friends. "But now we return closer to balance. In time, the harm that you have caused will be more than compensated by your help. It is the story of old. Always, the outsiders come, claiming to know better. And always, they nonetheless serve the Way."

His control was weakening, though it was still enough to hold them immobile. Esther needed to wait a little longer. As she'd hoped, Nicola was already working silently on her own cuffs. Esther concealed her friend's efforts, and attempted to work on Mark's restraints at the same time. But she was so much slower than Nicola.

The Mexican continued babbling on about prophecy, and she finally got Mark's cuffs unlocked. Mark had felt it, but their captors hadn't noticed. She moved on to Lukas, now with Nicola's help as well. Esther felt a rising hope. They could still do this.

Suddenly, the Mexican paused, looking at Javier. "Another child of the colonizers," he said, nodding sadly.

She felt him gather his strength, and with a sick certainly Esther suddenly knew what was coming. Her time was up, and there was no chance to warn the others.

The Mexican was without a doubt more powerful than she was. But as Mark had shown, brute strength wasn't all there was to a fight. As with other Changed, the Mexican's perceptions were limited to a flat, tiny projection of otherspace. When she hit him and the rest of his people, it was from a direction none of them could even conceive.

The Mexican's eyes bulged, and he froze mid-gesture. At the same instant, Mark and Lukas pulled their handcuffs apart, and Nicola opened her mouth.

And then everything went utterly quiet. Esther slowly stood up, walking back out the open door, moving in a dream along the rounded wall of the throne room, towards the back, where the servants waited patiently for her.

* * *

It all happened at once. Javier's head was still ringing from whatever the Mexican had done to them, but the others were already in motion. Somehow they'd regained surprise, and he couldn't waste this time. Their captors had never gotten around to handcuffing him, so he reached for his bear canister, but he was too slow. Janelle kicked him so hard that he slumped against the wall, just before Frederick tackled her. She broke Frederick's hold easily, and Javier turned over, gasping, crawling to reclaim the spray canister. Dimly he could see Mark holding the Mexican in a chokehold, the would-be emperor flailing as he lost consciousness, three of Selena's darts already in his chest. But then there was a gunshot, and the Mexican slumped. Mark looked shocked, but he dropped the body. More gunshots rang out, and Mark was already attacking someone else. Javier finally reached the bear spray, and just as Janelle threw Frederick bodily across the room, he hit the trigger.

The edge of it caused him to cough, but he thought he'd hit her, and she staggered a bit before falling heavily. But it was the two tranquilizer darts that had done that. There were still more gunshots now.

Someone staggered across in front of him, and he didn't recognize the guy, so he caught him on the head with the heavy metal cylinder. Down he went. Javier coughed again, and suddenly he realized it was over. The Mexican lay on the floor, probably dead from the bullets through his head and chest. Nicola had her hands on his face, checking if he was dead perhaps. Or making sure of it. Javier didn't care at this point, though they'd wanted him alive, hadn't they?

Mark had subdued the other most dangerous of the Changed, and Berthold had him fully handcuffed shortly. Javier stumbled over to start doing the same with Janelle. Ankles first, and then he cuffed her to a wrought-iron bench for good measure.

The other Changed guard was dead of multiple gunshots, and there were more casualties. Felipe lay still, and when Javier approached he knew the other man was dead. Also shot repeatedly.

Nicola was kneeling next to Frederick now, crying.

"I'm sorry," she said to him, though Frederick couldn't hear it. His head was smashed on the floor, blood spattered everywhere. "I'm so sorry, Frederick. I can't fix this."

"Is that all of them?" Lukas asked, apparently unmoved by the death around him. His ankles were still handcuffed, but it hadn't prevented him using his gun. He'd said he wasn't going to do that, hadn't he?Another guard lay dead near his feet. Javier shook his head, trying to count.

"Yeah," Selena said. She was sitting, holding a rag against her thigh. Javier hurried over to check on her. His mind was clearing quickly, now that the Mexican was dead. "The Mexican, and five others. All here. Mark, you don't sense anyone else?"

Mark shook his head. "It is quiet. Shall we radio Grace and Kat?"

They all looked at Lukas, who nodded and then made the call. He heard Kat's relieved voice in reply, and he relaxed a little. It was really over. Selena's bullet wound was messy, but she said the bullet had gone through the edge of the muscle. She wouldn't want him to touch her to find more, even under these circumstances, and he trusted her. There would be time to clean it back at the hotel. They'd done it. They'd actually beat the Mexican, and maybe saved the world. It was impossible to wrap his head around the idea.

"Lukas, why did you shoot?" Selena asked. "I thought we agreed, no guns unless absolutely necessary."

Lukas looked puzzled for a moment. "I think this was necessary, don't you? And truth be told, I was never convinced we or anyone else could keep the Mexican prisoner. He was far too dangerous."

Selena nodded, but her eyes were on the other man crumpled at Lukas's feet. And there was the second dead guard, the Changed one that Berthold had shot repeatedly.

Berthold was sitting by Felipe's body, shaking his head.

"A heavy price," he said miserably. "Yes, the guns were necessary, or it would have been even worse."

Javier had the sense he was missing something important, but it kept slipping away. When he mentioned it to Selena, she agreed. "I think it was the Mexican's attack. We know how he can damage memories. We might never remember exactly how we distracted him long enough for the attack to work. Maybe it was Nicola, or even some trick up Lukas's sleeve. But we did what we needed to do. And now we have three prisoners who know a lot. It was a high cost, but it still was worth it. We won, Javier. Let's take our dead and leave."

When Grace arrived in the first car, she jumped out and gave Javier a kiss on the lips, startling him. But he was damned glad to see her, and Kat, and all of them alive. It was over, truly over, at least his part in this. Who knew what would happen with the war now, but the danger to the whole world would subside, as Lukas had said. It was time to go home, wasn't it?

Selena said this wasn't an ancient place of the type that could trap the Changed. But as the car took him away, he felt something trying desperately to pull him back. And no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't remember what it was.

* * *

"Sit," the woman said. Or was it a woman? The voice was strange, distant. Esther blinked in confusion, trying to remember where she was. But her body sat in the chair all on its own.

The room was dark, but Esther was getting her senses back, at least somewhat. There was a modest desk, a simple bed against a wall. Massive bookshelves filled with eclectic titles in several languages. Through the wide glass window she could see a perfectly tended small garden, and trees outlined against the night sky.

This was the servant's room, but not as she remembered. And one of these people was nothing like what she'd sensed.

"Edgar, please bring our guest some food."

The stooped man silently shuffled off, closing the door behind him. Esther shrank away from the other person, cloaking herself as best she could, trying to make sense of what she was feeling.

"You just as I hoped," the voice said. A woman, Esther was pretty sure now. She couldn't seem to look directly at her. "In truth, far more powerful than I had realized. These precautions are necessary, but they will be temporary."

The woman picked her up, chair and all, without any apparent strain. Esther ended up against a stone wall, with the woman holding her arm up behind her shoulder. The skin of the woman's hand was strange, smooth. Featureless. Esther's arm rested in place despite all of her efforts to move it. Desperately, she tried to escape to otherspace, to look for a weakness, but the woman clicked her tongue.

"So powerful," she said. "I cannot allow you to run away like that. It is something new and beautiful, and we will explore it together."

The woman closed her eyes, and Esther's hand pressed painfully back against cold metal. It was a heavy iron railing, set into the wall. Slowly, impossibly, the railing bent around Esther's wrist, more solidly than any shackle. When it was finished, the section of railing had become a seamless loop, fitting her wrist perfectly with no sign of its original shape.

The woman seemed to relax.

"It has been a long time since I had someone to show off to," she said. "I had forgotten that sometimes such things can bring joy. Ah, you are interested in me, then?"

Her vision was returning. The woman's face was smoother than ivory, and as dark as the Mexican's. She had a bright, unnerving smile, showing perfect white teeth. There was a faint pattern crossing her face, presumably Changes, but they evaded Esther's gaze. Her black hair alternated with white streaks, a beautiful pattern on its own, independent of braid or ornament. She wore a simple sashed shirt and long skirt, both of fine cloth. When Esther's gaze tried to probe underneath, the woman laughed. It was an alien sound, as though it hadn't been used in a long while.

"Now, I suppose I should be flattered," she said. "Very well, then."

Esther's vision returned more completely, and the woman undid the sash, stepping out of her skirt and pulling the shirt over her head. She turned around with an ironic flourish, letting Esther stare at her.

She was like Abuela, or the Mexican, but so much more. Her skin was a tapestry, covered in so many overlapping Changes that they almost appeared to form a larger structure, like a fragment from otherspace. Some of the freckles glowed, pulsing faintly.

She did seem to be a woman, with small patterned breasts and something like a woman's genitalia, more so than Esther in any case. She had no body hair at all, not even the fine fur that Esther did.

"You like women as well as men, don't you?" the woman said, looking delighted. "That could be enjoyable. It's been a long time since I've found pleasures of the body interesting. Oh, far too long with that arrogant peacock. But he was interesting once. Not so powerful as you, but he had his novelties, until I learned them. And he was a more satisfying lover than most. Still, he went the way of most such men, consumed by his complicated schemes and his own power."

She retrieved her skirt, but didn't bother with the shirt. "I even let him borrow my name, because it was amusing to see him strut in that outfit. And then through all the decades after I had him forget me, he maintained the role, never using a hint of his great intelligence and power to understand the cultural mantle he was claiming. Powerful as a hurricane and as shallow as a puddle."

She smiled, her eyes glowing with a terrible intensity. "Perhaps I should have you continue his charade, but I think not. It can be your name for me, then. The young mathematician and the last of the Mexica. We women have always been the ones to endure, and you are the one who will bring me into this new age."

* * *

They were gathered in Javier's room, and all eyes were on him.

"I can't explain it," he said. "The Mexican did something to our memory, and we're forgetting something back there. We need to go and find what it is."

"All the way back to Chiapas?" Oscar asked. "After we barely got through the first time? No, we should take Jackson's offer and get on the plane. She has no reason to harm any of us. Look how useful we've all turned out to be. And if not Jackson, at least let's plan a more careful route back. We're not in a hurry anymore."

"Exactly," said Javier. "We can wait for a bit, try to figure out what he did to us."

"You're not talking about Chiapas, are you?" Selena said, wincing as she tried to get her injured leg comfortable. "It's somewhere else, closer by."

He nodded, grateful. He'd forgotten that bit. They all seemed to be forgetting, almost as if they'd never killed the Mexican at all.

Lukas's eyes were distant. Surely he would find it, if any of them did. With his immense memory, he'd see the hole that had been punched in it somewhere.

"No," he finally said. "Everything connects. There is the mystery of the missing seconds, but we've come up with enough plausible theories. Perhaps we will never know exactly, but we know all the important contours. This mission accomplished just what we hoped, despite our terrible losses. Janelle probably won't be a very cooperative prisoner, and I have doubts about the other Changed man. But the third prisoner seems to have been some kind of messenger, and without the Mexican to fear, I believe he will give up enough information to convince Myra Jackson and her team that the Mexican truly was the mastermind of Black Christmas. The Changed will have more breathing room, and the nuclear powers will have a chance to step away from the brink."

Javier nodded with the others. Everything Lukas said made sense, and they should be celebrating. There shouldn't be anything left holding him here, and yet there it was. Lukas looked at Javier, and Javier flinched as always, because sometimes it seemed like Lukas could read your mind. Frankly right now he wished Lukas could actually do that. Find what was missing in Javier's mind.

Lukas walked towards the door. "I will leave in twenty minutes along with any who wish to join. As agreed, we are independent now. Perhaps our goals will overlap again."

He gave a single last glance to Raj, and then walked out. Oscar and Berthold were the only ones who followed him.

"I agree about Jackson," Nicola said shortly. "She's a snake. She'll take care of Frederick and Felipe's bodies, and maybe those prisoners are better with her than anyone else, but we should find our own way out of Mexico."

"Do none of you believe me?" Javier asked desperately. He wasn't even sure he believed himself. He knew he'd been among the most affected by the Mexican's illusions. Maybe his mind had been damaged, and he was hallucinating.

"I don't disbelieve you," Selena said. "Something's not right. I can feel it gnawing at me."

"Like the thing about Chiapas," he said. Selena slowly nodded, but the others looked confused.

"What she just said," Javier said. "Three minutes ago. I'm thinking about something closer than Chiapas. We were there, and that's where we need to go back."

Mark and Nicola nodded hesitantly, and Javier had a flash of inspiration.

"Everyone, start writing," he said. "Write everything down you remember, starting with this conversation, and going back to the mission we just did. Even irrelevant details. I feel like there's some aftereffect of what the Mexican did, as though we're still confused."

They looked at him skeptically, but Grace went looking for paper.

Mark seemed irritated. Of course, he couldn't write, so they needed someone to write for him. But Kat had a better idea.

"Hey, Mark, you can just talk to my laptop. It can record you."

Mark nodded, following Kat to the corner and talking quietly into the microphone while the rest of them wrote.

Selena took a long time to finish, but Nicola was interminable, filling page after page with notes. He sometimes forgot how good her memory was. She always seemed defensive about it, for some reason.

The others all seemed a bit annoyed by this game, but they passed around what they'd written, and everyone went up to listen to Mark's jumbled account.

"These don't match nearly as well as they should," Selena said at the end. "I know eyewitness accounts can vary remarkably, but some of us have excellent memories. The discrepancies look random, though. I don't know what it means."

"It's probably what Javier said," said Nicola. "A lingering effect of what the Mexican did to us. It scrambled our memories for a longer period, and we're still having trouble. I'm glad Javier made us do this. We should probably do it periodically, to make sure the effect is subsiding."

Javier shook his head in frustration. "It's not just that," he said. "Can we at least stay here, in Oaxaca? All of us, for a while?"

They looked at each other, and Javier.

"I don't see why not," Grace finally said. "It's a beautiful city, and they're saying it's still pretty safe. Kat and I could use a vacation. And however we get out of Mexico, we should probably do it together for safety."

When the others had left, aside from Kat and Grace, he flopped on his bed. There was a small shirt lying on top of his discarded pants from yesterday. He tossed it at the other bed, where the two women were making out in a pretty distracting fashion.

"Hey, Grace, you lost something," he said.

She picked up the shirt and laughed, holding it in front of her chest.

"Extra-extra-small? What size do you think I am, anyway, Javier?"

He blinked, confused. Kat was egging Grace on to try the tiny thing on anyway.

"Weird," he muttered, glancing around the room. There was a second bag next to his, one he didn't recognize. Had they accidentally stolen someone's luggage getting off the plane? No, that made no sense. Why would they have lugged it all this way?