He laughed. "It is often the plain that are the most powerful."
Now she looked at him.
He smiled and nodded. "Thank you for returning it."
She didn't move.
He reached into his pocket and made a fist, chuckling as he slowly withdrew it and opened his hand. She stared down at her silver earring as he held it out to her.
"Now, I have returned what you loaned me." He walked away and began unloading items from his small Toyota pickup truck.
Damali was on his heels. "We need to talk, and I have to ask you alot of questions."
He wagged his finger at her. "No, you must ask my father. Did my son not give you his address?"
Instant memory snapped back as Damali shoved her hand into the pocket of her robe. "Yes," she said, pleased. "But how do I find him?"
"He is a long way away, in Askum," the man said. "But I have people who can get us there. This is why I must unload my truck so we can go to the north."
"I'll help you," Damali offered, wanting to hurry and get the show on the road.
"No," he said with a deep chuckle. "Be still, then we will go and eat someinjera, alicha wat , andshiro , withambo . No meat in what we eat now, for we are on a pilgrimage, yes. So look about and learn to have patience. Enjoy this place that is called Thirteen Months of Sunshine."
That number associated with the sun as a country slogan made her simply stare at him.
Carlos managed to drag himself into a seat, as had all the others, bracing for the sure impact. There was no way to survive a crash from this altitude as mountains whirled by; it was futile. They all knew it. Perhaps that's why no one, except the pilots, was screaming. An eerie calm had befallen the cabin. Everyone's head was tucked down to their knees with their seat belts secured. What was the point, though? Oxygen masks dangled, but no one had reached for them to cover their faces. Whatever the entities had done, breathing within the compromised aircraft was possible. The Light had a very strange sense of putting things right. Let them breathe, then let them crash. Carlos wasn't sure if he was more angry or afraid; perhaps it was a mixture of both.
The sound of rapid descent was creating a horrible whine of impending doom. Then a gunshot made Carlos lift his head and simply look out the window. He could see it in his mind just as clear as day. One of the pilots had opted out of the anxiety of watching oneself crash and burn. The other was already dead-skull cracked from being flung against hard metal during the battle. The copilot's brains added to the gore against the windows. Now was a fine time for his inner vision to be coming back. But what had triggered it? Sure death?
Carlos affixed his gaze to the layers of thick white clouds set within a flawless blue sky. The ground was becoming larger, its green carpet and small dots of buildings now becoming recognizable. But peace filled him. It would soon be over. It just hurt him to know that people he'd come to know and love like family were going to perish, all because they'd tried to cheat fate.
He looked at the teams, each man and one woman, bravely bracing themselves for the end. No one cried out, no one screamed. Marlene's low murmur of prayers had blended in with those of the Covenant. Their faith and acceptance of what was to come was truly amazing to him. Humbling, is what it was. Because all along they had been right. There was another side. A dark side and a light side in dimensions he could have never fathomed while he was simply alive. And he wondered where they would all go; if he'd ever meet up with them again. He wondered if the Light would have mercy on them for trying so desperately to spare his lowly soul and smuggle his resurrected body to a safe haven.
"Whatever you do," Carlos murmured, as he stared at the team, "don't blame them, and especially, don't blame her."
Empathy dulled the fear even more. He'd been tortured already, knew what it felt like to be broken, gutted, his insides twisted, skin shredded, bones shattered, body parts amputated, and to be burned alive. But these people were human, had never experienced the twisted knife of pain to that degree. All he could hope for would be that the plane would explode on impact, that his family wouldn't be left half alive, semiconscious, and torn to butchered bits. "Make it fast," he whispered. "That's the least you can do."
His prayer became more urgent as the treetops came into view.
Carlos stared at the bent backs before him as a wing collided with a cliff side and was shorn off. His head slammed into the seat in front of him and bounced off it, nearly snapping his neck-but he refused to cover his head or his face. He'd stared death down before in the dark, and in the brightness of dawn would do no less.
The horrible turbine sound against the wind seemed to become muted as his hands clutched the arms of his seat. Flickers of fast-moving light darted between the aisles and swirled around each of the people he watched. Maybe he had snapped his neck? All the better. Maybe the strike against his head had him seeing stars and had deafened him? Mercy was measured in increments and during moments when time seemed to have slowed down, it was indeed a blessing.
He watched the dancing white lights, dazed and fascinated, despite his pending death. He had to be hallucinating, that was the only rational answer that came to him as he watched the oblique forms become people he knew but should have never known.
Parents had come to their children. Aged spirits touched faces gently, put loving arms around each passenger, and made their peace. He could hear them all at once as well as individually as they hugged their deathborne children to them.
He saw Marlene become encircled first by what seemed to be a tribe of elderly people that he instantly knew were from the Gullah Islands. Why he knew that, he wasn't sure, but he watched her mother and father gently touch her face, tell her she'd done her job, it was good, she had struggled long and it was time to come home. Rider and Father Patrick, Jose... Big Mike-each of them were touched until every Guardian and member of the Covenant was attended by Light beings that placed their silvery orbs around each person, leaving no space between the seats, the windows... like padded clouds they wrapped around them.
Dan wept and held his grandfather's hand. Jose was sobbing and hugging his grandmother to him tightly. Berkfield laid his head in his mother's lap. Father Patrick stroked his wife's hair as his son hugged his back. Monk Lin was encircled by a bastion of Tibetan brothers, and Imam Asula had elders around him that were so old and wise that Carlos could not make out their faces.
A sense of lonely abandonment made him weep. No one had come for him in the last moments, and he simply covered his face with his hands. Had he been so bad that even his own brother... or his mother... or his grandmom wouldn't come to say goodbye? He hadn't been able to say good-bye, that's all he'd wanted, if he couldn't protect them! And where was his father? Where had he ever been? A gentle breeze blew against his face as the plane jolted again.
Carlos looked up as a male hand touched his hair. "Papi?" He couldn't breathe as he saw his father standing tall and strong and whole beside his mother. She looked so young and was smiling; his grandmother was beside them both.
"I was wrong... I'm proud of you and love you," his father said. "You have suffered so much, now come home.Por favor , Carlos... my most troublesome, but favorite, son."
His father embraced him and a sob tore up and out of his throat as the plane hit the ground hard, bounced, and the tail section broke away.