Earthtaker Page 16

  What would you need to do to make the transition? I asked.

  So you do have someone in mind, said True Mother. Is it you?

  Let’s just say it’s someone with experience serving and protecting the Earth, I said.

  If it is you, that would be wonderful. There aren’t many people who could handle this kind of power, but you’ve already had a taste of it.

  I think we should try it, I told her. Humankind is running out of time up there in the world.

  Again, she fell silent for a long moment. It would be for the best, she said finally. I know that. I never imagined it would come to this…but yes.

  You told me you wanted me to free you, I said. Maybe, given the stakes, it’s the right time to step down.

  Though I couldn’t see her, I got the impression she was nodding. I’m not strong enough anymore to fight her, she said. Even if I could take control on my own, I couldn’t fend her off forever.

  You sound ready to me, Mother, I told her.

  So do you, she said. And I feel better knowing you’re the one who’ll take the reins.

  I smiled. I was thinking of someone else, actually. Lots of someones.

  I could tell she was surprised and confused. Who?

  Dark Star put up some kind of barrier outside the core, I said. Are you still strong enough to take it down?

  Maybe, said True Mother. I mean yes, I think so.

  Then do it, I told her, and you’ll see who I have in mind.

  With that, my spirit hands finally landed on the red gemstone, and I finally made full contact with True Mother’s essence. I felt her joyful embrace, sensed her power emanating outward in all directions to peel away the shield around the core.

  And then I experienced her proud recognition as the Ancestrum poured in—her truest children leaping into the heart of the world to change it forever.

  Chapter 41

  Roaring with rage, Dark Star lashed out with a flurry of furious strikes, blasting the Ancestrum with bolts of searing black energy. I watched through True Mother’s eyes as dozens of avatars reeled under the assault, their spirit-forms infused with waves of agony.

  But Dark Star couldn’t handle hundreds of enemies at once, attacking from all directions. For every soldier of the Ancestrum who was hurt, a dozen more punched through the barrage to pound the black orb with blasts of their own, beam after beam of sizzling power channeled directly from the ley line network itself.

  And yet, it wasn’t enough.

  My children, said True Mother. Such warriors! Yet they need my help. Our help.

  Then let’s do it, I told her. Whatever it takes.

  Dark Star unleashed a frenzied storm of retaliation, blanketing the core in a hail of projectiles forged from her own black substance. The projectiles punched through almost every avatar at once, filling them with pain-inducing current and leaving them scattered and vulnerable.

  It was then that True Mother started fighting her from within, using every bit of power at her command and supplemented by my own reserves.

  Bitches! howled Dark Star as she reached inward to expunge the threat, burn it out at the root…but that only damaged her own insides. The more she dug after us, the worse it got, as she tore at herself in a desperate attempt to excavate our threat.

  But as the Ancestrum rose up again to attack from the outside, Dark Star faltered. Fighting a two-front war wore her down, shrinking her fiery substance as the sustained assaults continued.

  Enough! True Mother gathered herself up, the ruby of her soul flashing with renewed intensity. This ends now!

  True Mother had been locked away for a long time, disconnected and bound in darkness. She was weaker than she had ever been, diminished and broken.

  But she still had the force of will to unload one last burst of worldly power.

  No more! howled True Mother as a surge of blinding radiance erupted from the ruby. No more!

  Holding on to the stone for dear life, I heard what sounded like a clap of thunder, and Dark Star convulsed. She cried out in pain, shuddering so fiercely it was as if she was on the verge of exploding from within.

  Then, she fell still and silent. I felt True Mother slump within the ruby gemstone, exhausted and depleted.

  Mother, I said. You did it. You stopped her.

  Yes…child. She sounded weaker than ever. At a cost.

  She was mortally wounded, I could feel it. Her life-force was draining around us. Time was running out.

  I’m so sorry, Mother, I told her. Do you still have the strength to finish what we talked about? To transfer control of the world to the Ancestrum, your children?

  I felt her nod and smile weakly. Are you certain…you don’t wish…to take on the mantle yourself? It would…suit you.

  That means more to me than you’ll ever know. Her words moved me. If I’d been in my physical body at that moment, I know I would’ve cried. But no, thank you. My purpose lies elsewhere. I can see that now.

  What other purpose…could possibly match this? What calling…could be greater…than running the world?

  Saving it, I told her. Finally living up to the example you set for me.

  You’ve already…done that, dear. I felt her essence wrap around me; it was as close to a hug as two disembodied spirit-forms could come. You’ve done exactly…what I hoped…you would do.

  But I haven’t saved you, I said. I chose humanity over the world. And now you’re…now you’re…

  Complete. Her voice was growing fainter by the moment. After billions of years at the core of a magnificently elaborate and beautiful planet soaring through space, swimming through the firmament by the light of the sun, she was fading.

  The thought of it made me heartsick, especially now that I knew how Dark Star had locked her away and made my life awful in her place. I hated that I’d lost time with her, hating and fearing instead of loving her.

  And now, her time was up.

  This is how it was meant to be. She gave me one last squeeze, then pushed me away. Out with the old.

  Suddenly, she blazed with golden, pulsing energy that intensified with each passing second. It built and built, engulfing her in a field of blinding light.

  I wanted to be there with her, but I kept backing away instead. I couldn’t bear the light and heat she was putting off, the waves of force that were tossing me like a dinghy on the sea.

  At last, the biggest wave yet crashed toward me, and I couldn’t escape. It flung me away at breakneck speed, sending me rocketing through the layers of True Mother’s central orb before I could even say goodbye or thank you.

  Just before I shot out of her outermost layer, just before her power exploded in all directions, I heard one thought from her in my mind. Just before the golden rays of her gift intersected with the hundreds of avatars assembled in the sphere, changing them forever, she sent four last words just for me.

  Just before the newly empowered and enabled Ancestrum swirled in a celebration of their change, taking up the torch she had passed them with joy and reverence, True Mother gave me one final message to carry with me for the rest of my days.

  In with the new. That’s what she said, as the avatars became the creator, each with her own bright spirit and style and point of view. As hundreds of gleaming, golden spirits who’d been off the stage for years or centuries or millennia suddenly burst right back into the spotlight, revived and ready to put their own stamp on the world-running business.

  And then she winked out of existence, her own special spark going dark for all time. It was the first time I’d seen the world end…and then, begin again.

  And I finally did shed a tear, or as close as I could come in my bodiless spirit-form.

  In with the new.

  Epilogue

  Two weeks later…

  “What do you mean, ‘no?’” The balding, middle-aged man in the rumpled gray suit and black tie scowled at me, his face turning beet red. “You’re a private eye. Catching cheating spouses is what you do.”
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br />   “Not anymore.” Tilting back in my chair with my sneakered feet on the desk at Charmer Investigations in Confluence, Pennsylvania, I shook my head. “We only handle one kind of business these days, and it has nothing to do with unfaithful partners.”

  “Then what the hell do you people handle?” he snapped.

  “Eco-crime,” I told him. “Come back when you have a case involving pollution.”

  He stood there and fumed for a moment, then stormed out, giving the door a hard slam behind him. Luna flipped the bird in his wake, and Duke chuckled.

  It was good to be home.

  “How long till we get the new sign?” I asked, reaching for my coffee cup on the desk. “So guys like him stop coming around?”

  “Should be up in a few days, Earth Angel,” said Duke. “After which, we will be clearly identified as Charmer Eco-Investigations to all potential clientele.”

  “And Cruel World Ecotourism, of course,” added Luna. “Let the rebranding commence!”

  I smiled as I sipped my coffee. The changes were part of a shakeup that had been a long time coming. With the Earth on borrowed time, I’d committed myself to fending off the apocalypse by fighting humanity’s reckless polluting and ruination of the environment. It was a mission fully endorsed by the Earth Mothers, the planet’s new guardian body formed by avatars of the Ancestrum. Powered up and put in charge of the planet and its climate by the late, great True Mother, they were happy with any help they could get in policing the tough new standards needed to save it.

  “What about the business cards and social media?” I asked.

  “The cards are on order, due next week.” Luna tapped keys on the laptop at her desk, checked the screen, and nodded. “And all social media have been updated. Because why?” She smirked in my direction. “Because why?”

  “Because sister power!” I shook a fist in the air.

  “Damn right.” Luna smacked a hand down hard on her desk. “Vitamin S.”

  “And moon power in general.” I raised my cup to Duke, who was leaning on the next desk over. “Great job repairing the office after fake Gaia’s rampage while I was gone.”

  “Nothing to it, Earth Angel,” Duke said smoothly. “It was easy as pie, once I got the old band together again.”

  He meant it literally. He was talking about a big band he’d organized called the Strayhorns, who’d come in and helped with repairs at his behest. If there was one thing the golem with the soul of Duke Ellington was good at, it was leading a band.

  “You do know this doesn’t change my mind about the world tour, though, right?” I sipped my coffee. “I still can’t have you coming out to the general public as you-know-who.”

  Duke smiled his sweetest, most ingratiating smile, the smile that had launched a thousand concerts during his life. “The thought hadn’t even begun to consider the slightest possibility of perhaps at some point crossing my mind, Earth Angel.”

  He had a way of making me laugh, and he did it again. I’d been through hell, my life had changed so much, but I sat there and laughed like I didn’t have a care in the world.

  Though it was true, some things were still just getting back to normal.

  The bell on the front door jingled, and Sheriff Dale Briar walked in, looking unsure of himself. I couldn’t blame him; things hadn’t been the same between us since I’d gotten back to town.

  “Hello, everyone.” He closed the door behind him and took off his hat. “I have some good news. All charges against you have been dropped, Gaia. You are finally, fully in the clear.”

  A wave of great relief washed through me as his words sank in. Though I’d been back for a week and a half, and Gaia Grenoble (powerless, thanks to the Earth Mothers’ intervention) had been in police custody that whole time (delivered from the West Coast thanks to Mid and Ebon), the charges had still hung over me, casting a shadow I couldn’t ignore. It had taken a while for the legal system to process Gaia Grenoble, verify my story and the witness statement from the reluctant Beatrice Brown (also depowered by the Ancestrum and brought in by Mid and Ebon), and put the whole frame-up to rest…but I guessed it had finally been resolved.

  “That’s the best news I’ve heard all day.” I swung my feet down off the desk and stood but didn’t approach him. “Thanks for taking the time to stop by and deliver it.”

  He looked down and shifted his feet. “It was the least I could do, after what I put you through.”

  “Briar.” I walked around the desk to face him. “Nobody thinks any of that was your fault. We all know you only did what you had to, and you gave me a fighting chance when you could.”

  He shook his head, eyes still cast down. “I should’ve done more. The hell with the job.”

  “Hey, no.” I started to reach for him, then stopped myself. “Nothing you could’ve done would’ve changed anything. I was going to get caught up in this one way or another.”

  Finally, his gaze met mine, and I saw the raw emotion within it—sadness, anger, confusion, desperation, hope. I wished I could make it all better, replace it with happiness, but I couldn’t, not yet. The feelings I’d had for him had faded to the point of nonexistence. I’d tried so hard to breathe new life into them and failed.

  We stood there for a long moment, daring each other to say the next thing. I almost spoke once, then twice, but let it pass. How could I smooth things over or offer any kind of apology or explanation if I didn’t even understand myself exactly why things had changed?

  In the end, it was Briar who broke the silence.

  “For the record,” he said, his gaze never leaving mine, “I never, for one second, did not believe in you.”

  “Thanks.” That was all I could think to say in return.

  And then, he was gone, marching out the door without a goodbye or backward glance.

  Only then did Luna clear her throat. “Somebody get me a sweater. It is chilly in here all of a sudden.”

  I shot her a look, and she returned her full attention to the screen of her laptop. The situation with Briar was one thing I wasn’t in the mood to talk about. How could I, if I didn’t even understand it myself?

  And then there was the other situation I couldn’t get my head around.

  “By the way, Ebon James called,” said Luna. “Reminding you of your three o’clock with the ‘Earth Mamasitas,’ as he called them.”

  “Shit.” My heart starting pounding. “What time is it now?”

  “Ten till three,” Luna said calmly, as it were closer to five till two. “Correction, nine till three.”

  I grabbed my leather jacket and bolted for the door. “Shit shit shit!”

  “Don’t sweat it,” Luna said as I raced out to my black Toyota Highlander parked on the street. “It’s not like you’ll be late for a meeting with the queens of the world or something.”

  I was totally frazzled and out of breath when I threw open the door of Doc Yough’s Bar and Grill, fifteen minutes late for my meeting with the Earth Mothers.

  Seated around a table in the middle of the place, they all looked my way when the door burst open. All I could do was wave and hope for the best.

  The proprietor, Rune Ansel Carson, came to my rescue from behind the bar, reaching out to give me a welcoming hug. “Gaia!” A stocky young woman with shoulder-length green hair, Rune was a hardcore environmental activist and special Human Liaison to the Council of Landkind. She’d helped in the war against the alien Allself and the Terralyzers, then taken over Doc Yough’s after its former owner, Mahoney Wells, died in that very same war. Given her work with Landkind, and the fact that Doc Yough’s was a major Landkind hangout, it could not have been a more perfect arrangement.

  “Sorry I’m late,” I said as the hug ended. “I got tied up at the office and lost track of—”

  “Your timing is perfect.” Rune guided me by the elbow to the big table. “The Mothers were just talking about a new outreach program to find the next generation of avatars.”

  “That’s right!”
Maeve, who sat at the side of the table nearest me, grinned and nodded. “With so many Earth Mothers instead of just one, we need more Earth/human avatars than ever…especially given our aggressive zero-pollution initiative.”

  Drusilla, who was seated at the far side of the table, nodded in agreement. “Since, technically, you’re the only currently active avatar, we thought you’d be perfect to search, recruit, train, and educate.”

  “I can’t think of anyone who’d do a better job of it.” Mid, sitting between them, beamed and pointed a finger in my direction. “If you ask me, you’re a natural, dear.”

  I couldn’t help smiling back at them. Thanks to the infusion of True Mother’s power, they looked healthier and more youthful than ever. Not to mention, they were all smartly dressed in colorful summer outfits; it hadn’t taken them long, after returning from the Earth’s core to reclaim their physical bodies, to do away with the plain white shifts.

  “What do you say, Gaia?” asked Maeve. “Are you up to the task?”

  “Maybe,” I said. “As long as it doesn’t interfere with my own work, taking on eco-crime cases and harassing polluters. I swore I’d never drop the ball again when it comes to the war for survival.”

  “You’re right that’s our number one priority.” Drusilla nodded. “The clock is ticking. Time is running out.”

  “Faster than you know.” Maeve raised her eyebrows. “Much faster.”

  I frowned. “What are you talking about?”

  “You remember I said there are factions in the Ancestrum?” said Maeve.

  I nodded.

  “Not everyone among us wanted humanity to survive,” continued Maeve. “And those women didn’t suddenly change their minds when they became Earth Mothers. If anything, they’ve gotten more vocal about it.”

  “Let’s just say there are rumblings,” said Drusilla. “Not from everyone, but still…”

  “More than enough to light the fuse,” said Mid. “And eventually, blow the whole thing to kingdom come.”