All our endeavors to get Emerson to come back to the land of the living have failed. She’s completely shut down. Everyone has tried to figure out a way to get her to come back and be her old self again. Nothing has worked. Right now it feels like we are babysitting more than protecting a clue that could save the world.
I was on watch duty when Jay came up to me and asked if he should take a crack at trying to cheer up Emerson. I told him it was worth a try and he went up to her apartment. Her mom had been working less so that she could be there for her. Seeing her daughter lifeless was a great strain to Marla. She had bags around her eyes and had bitten her nails.
A few moments later, Jay comes downstairs with Emerson. She’s wearing faded jeans and a thick coat. Her hair is a tangled mess. It reminds me of the first time we met. I really wish we didn’t have to be here to do this to her. It’s one thing to watch someone die, but to be told that you have to get over it is cruel. And that is exactly what we have told her.
She’s been a zombie for three weeks now. I shouldn’t have let her stay in that state for this long, but it broke my heart to know that she was suffering. Still, I cannot allow her to stay this way for more than another day or two. We are running out of time. She is the only thing we’ve got going for us, and I can’t let her tune out the world. If she does, when she comes out of her depression there might not be a world to tune in to.
Jay sits her down on a bench across the street. I stand nearby to watch out for Akons. I give them enough distance that they can talk, but I am able to overhear them. Jay speaks to her with warmth and concern.
“Are you sure you want to be out here, Emmy?”
She nodded. That’s what she almost always did now. Jay tried again.
“Hey, I know this stuff is hard, Emmy, trust me. But it gets better.”
She just looks at him with deep sorrow. He puts his arms around her and zips up her coat protectively. He starts telling her his Core in hopes that it will help her come to terms with Sara’s death.
“I know how hard it is, believe me,” Jay said. As he continues to talk, I pick up on the sadness behind his voice. Jay rarely speaks about his Core. I listen intently.
“I lived on Adams and Crenshaw, the welcome mat to the hood. We didn’t live like boys in the hood with gun shots every minute, but we weren’t the Cosbys, either. It was my mom and dad, my sister, and I. My dad was a parking-lot attendant and my mom was a receptionist. We had lived in our neighborhood forever, it seemed.
“Everyone I knew had belonged to some kind of gang. My mother had the gang talk with me real early. She said, ‘You join, you die. ‘Cause I’ll kill you.’ That was her ‘stay away from gangs’ speech.
“Every time we could have done something wrong, she steered us back on the right path. She’d threaten to break our necks, our behinds and go upside our heads. I’m not even sure how she was planning to do the last one, but I was careful not to find out.
“But all in all, I was happy. My mom cooked better than anyone on the planet. I would wait until she turned her back and then sneak into the kitchen and pick at the food. She said that since I was spending all that time waiting to steal, I might as well learn how to cook. So, every day after school, I had to come home and chop, season—you name it.
“Later on I realized that it was just her way of keeping us off the street. She made sure we were in the kitchen or doing homework. There was no wiggle room on that. We got teased because we could never come out and play like every other kid. But you didn’t argue with my mom. She was barely five feet, but she could take you over her head and be ‘bout it. We were all afraid of her, including my father.
“One night we heard shots. That was not an everyday thing around my way, but it wasn’t unheard of. A few minutes later we heard cop cars. A woman down the street was screaming. Later that week we found out that her son James had been shot. The gang he was running with heard he was trying to get out.
“That was the fourth son she lost to violence. The other three were victims of drive- bys: two died on the street and the other one died on the operating table. She had had five sons. She was now down to one. His name was Will. He was nine years old.
“A few days later he asked me to help him write a letter to his mom. That way when he got shot, she’d have something to remember him by.
“I decided to look after him from then on. I went over there every day. I helped him with his homework. I helped him make dinner with for his mom and we played video games.
“One day I came over to check on his homework and he said he didn’t do it. I asked why, and he said he didn’t know what the point was. His mother was never going to stop being sad all the time and nothing he did was going to bring his brothers back.
“I went over when Will was still at school and I told his mom that she was missing out. She got mad and threw me out, but I came back. I kept coming back until she had no choice but to hear me out. I told her that she had to come back for Will. She couldn’t just drown in her sadness because she would lose the only reason she had left for living.
“Later that night, when my family and I were having dinner, Will and his mom came over. She put a loaf of potato bread on the table and said, ‘My son said you taught him how to make this bread. He was so excited to show me how, I had to let him. He did a great job. I didn’t know he was learning to cook. I was missing out. Thank you, Jayden.’
“A year later, the gang that his brothers had been a part of was looking for kids to be lookouts. They wanted them to stand on the corner and tell them when cops where coming. Everyone in Will’s class was scared or excited, depending on what they had been raised to believe about gangs.
“It was a week until my 17th birthday and Will wanted to get me a gift. I told him it was okay and that I didn’t want anything. He insisted on getting me something. I told him he could sketch me a car with rims and everything. He had a knack for drawing. But he wanted to impress me by buying me a real gift from the store.
“When the gang had come around scouting who had what it takes to be a good lookout, Will had asked them how much they would pay. He knew that being in gangs was wrong, but he didn’t plan to be in one. He only wanted to work for them for a few days so that he could get enough money to get me a good gift.
“They picked three lookouts. Will didn’t make it. He was bummed out about it, but he was determined to get the money for the gift. So, he went to the hangout spot and tried to get a job scouting. They paid him no mind. He had been in the local paper because of his brothers’ deaths. They wanted someone low-profile.
“I went around his way and I couldn’t find him. I asked some of his friend and they told me what he was up to. I went straight to the club on Jefferson where I knew I could find him. Just as I got there, some member of the rival gang drove by. I saw two guys pull out guns from the back seat of their cars. They were spaying bullets everywhere.
“I rushed in and tried to find Will. Everything was happing so fast. I saw the car making another turn about to strike again. I ran faster than my body could take me. I made it to the club’s entrance.
“I ran inside, and there were bodies on the floor. I looked, but Will wasn’t among them. I went to the back and didn’t find him. Finally, I made my way to the bathroom and burst open the door.
“I felt the bullet rip into my chest. Will had shot me. He peed on himself. He had thought I was with the gang and was there to hurt him. He looked so shocked; I think he was in more pain than me.
“I was bleeding badly. But I wanted him to get as far away as he could from the scene of the crime. I took the gun, wiped it and threw it among the bodies. I had Will help me to the back alley. He was crying and saying how sorry he was.
“I knew I was dying. The pain didn’t matter. The only thing I wanted was to run away with Will so that his life wasn’t ruined by a mistake.”
“But he wouldn’t leave me. I tried to get him to go, but he just sat there. The cops came around. They picked him up and took me to the hospital. I was in and out of surgery. I faced one complication after another. When the case came to trial, they tried him as an adult. My doctor wouldn’t let me go to court. The jury came back with a guilty verdict.
“His first day in prison, a fight broke out between two men. Will was caught in the middle and died of a fatal stab wound. An hour later, I was taken in to the operating room due to complications from my last surgery. I never made it out.”
I didn’t know the whole story. This is the first time I’m hearing the complete version of Jay’s Core. I could see where he got the power to glide from. As he was dying, he wished he had run faster to get to Will and save him. Knowing Omnis, he gave Jay the power to “convince” people because he had already had a way with them. That’s why he was able to get Will’s mom to snap out of her depression.
“I know pain, Emmy. I know what it’s like not to want to let anything in. But if you block out pain, you also block out the good stuff,” Jay says.
“Can you take me home now?” she asks.
“Yeah, let’s go.” He is dejected and sad. He helps her up and walks her back into the building.
I want to tell Jay to cheer up. We’ll figure out a way to get Emerson back to normal. But I think she isn’t the only reason for the sadness in his eyes.
Later, Jay is still a bit down. I figure out a good way to cheer him up. Not just him, the whole team. Since things with Emerson have been at a standstill, the team has been really down. So, I thought I’d raise their spirits. It does no good to fight for a world you aren’t happy to be in. I have to reintroduce them to the joys that Earth had to offer. And I know just how to do it.
You may not know this but angels are adrenaline junkies. It’s not easy for us to die or even risk our lives. Aside from Atourum’s Akons and demons, very few things can kill us. It’s almost impossible for a human to take us out. The only other danger stems from nature. And we are more than happy to test ourselves against it.
I don’t understand why humans test nature. Almost everything on planet Earth is stronger than them. They can be taken out by fire, water, mudslides, and avalanches. But us, we have to go to extremes in order to feel challenged by anything on Earth. Knowing that we have a soft spot for action and adrenaline, Omnis has long since cautioned us against doing anything reckless while on Earth.
It’s one thing to jump from building to building, but purposefully seeking out danger is highly discouraged. So, of course we all did it. If Omnis had told us that we would lose our souls if we did anything needlessly risky, most wouldn’t. But him saying “be careful” is like waving a red flag at a very powerful bull.
The top two risky games we like to play are Runner Ball and Soul Diving. Runner Ball is just like soccer, but far more dangerous. While Soccer has eleven players on each side, Runner Ball has five.
Nothing on Earth can withstand the strength with which we kick the ball. The only thing that can is a Holder. But we need something inside it to weigh it down. So, we tie up a Runner into a ball and put him in a Holder. It encapsulates him and he can’t get out. The Runner is the ball.
The goal is to drive the ball into the other team’s goal, just like in regular soccer. Each time a player gets the Runner Ball past the other team’s goalie, that is thirty three points. A game can last two hours and the teams will only score one or two goals. Just like Soccer, Runner Ball is a low scoring game. But unlike soccer, the ball can fight back.
Before the Runner is tied into a ball, he is given a Snap. A Snap is a gumball-looking treat that gives you powers for a few minutes. When a player kicks the ball hard enough in a certain spot, the ball will crack and the Runner will be set free. The Runner will then use whatever power he has been given by the Snap to defend himself.
The kind of Snap the Runner eats depends on the teams playing. Let’s say there are two teams—Red and Blue. If the angels on the red team know that the Blue team is full of clumsy angels who suck at swooping and diving, they’ll feed their Runner a Snap that makes the other team have to swoop a lot in order to catch him. If the Runner escapes, the Red team wins 300 points. That usually means they win the game.
But if the Blue team captures the Runner and delivers him to the opposing goalie, the Blue team would get 300 points. That is, if the Runner is still alive. If the Runner is delivered to the goalie dead, it doesn’t count.
It’s easy to take out a Runner. But to mess with him just enough and not kill him takes skill. Many angels who are new to the game have killed Runners. In the game of Runner Ball, rookies are called Reapers because they always killed Runners and cost their teammates the game.
Have you ever been hanging out with friends outside and you get a sudden chill? There is no wind in the air. It’s just a slight stream of cool air that brushes up your arm. That’s us kicking the ball. The best place to play in is Ireland. The lush open fields are ideal. The trick is to find a field where humans aren’t around.
The other game is Soul Diving. It came about by accident. An angel named Tamera lost the only man she loved when he died and went to the darkness. She pleaded to go and join him but the council would not allow an angel to just go to the house of fire. Tamera called upon Atourum and pleaded her case. While Atourum could not force the Council to change its mind, he allowed a Port to lead directly to the house of fire.
He placed the Port at the bottom of the second highest mountain in the world. He knew that humans would very likely try and conquer the highest mountain, Mount Everest. He didn’t want them to accidently fall in the Port. If that had happened, the council would punish him.
The council allowed Atourum to put a Port at the base of K2. But whoever chooses to fall into the Port has to jump straight down and not use their wings. Once they use their wings, they can still pull up and save themselves. It’s kind of like a fail-safe.
Tamera was the first angel to dive right off K2. She didn’t pull out her wings once. She descended into darkness and was never heard from again. Ever since then, K2, which is located in Nepal, has been known to angels as Tamera Falls.
In the beginning, angels only dove off Mount Everest. It was a rush, but it wasn’t as scary and risky as we would have liked it to be. And Atourum was right: humans were everywhere. Well, at least their bodies were. Everest was littered with human bones. For us, seeing them was like being reminded of work.
So, we started diving off of K2. Then, as the centuries wore on, we began to dive closer and closer to the Port. That’s where the risk is. We would go to the top of K2 and fall straight down. And we had to face the same fear that humans do.
If an angel falls off K2 and never once uses his wings to pull himself up, he goes straight to Atourum. No review. No council. So you have to be very certain of your skills in the air. We would dive two at a time and race to the bottom. The angel who pulls out his wings first is the loser.
There have been three angel deaths in Tamera Falls. One angel was so bent on winning that by the time he went to pull out his wings, he had already hit the Port. The other two died because they had a Collector while they drove. They thought it would add to the excitement if they disappeared and then reappeared during a fall.
That was stupid. If you miscalculate by a fraction of a second, you will die. And that is exactly what happened. When they came back from their Collectors they didn’t get a chance to pull out their wings.
Many have argued that Atourum should close the Port, but every year when the Port issue comes to the council, Death votes it down. The theory is that if any angel wants darkness so badly that he would be willing to fall into it, then so be it.
All three types of angels go to Tamera Falls. Even Ground Walkers will come in human bodies. But they make it so that the human later has no memory of the fall. It’s rare for Ground Walkers to come because it’s hard to find a human who has enough courage and strength to endure that fall. Even with added protection from Ground Walkers, humans make horrible jumpers.
Tamera Falls was the only place where we could hang out with Para angels. They are the fourth and biggest group of angels. The name is short for Paradise. They live up in the light and rarely come down to Earth. They are perfect in everyway. They are what we will turn into when we find the map and save the world. That is our reward. We will stay in the light and never see the darkness again.
Para angels are calm and self-aware. They don’t brag, like GWs do. They don’t gossip like Travelers. They are the closest things to Omnis an angel can become. It’s rare for them to go to Tamera Falls. But when they do, word gets out. Every angel who can, comes around to see them make the dive. They are flawless. They never pull their wings out until the last second. Never has a Para angel fallen into the Dark Port. They are too quick and too graceful.
So, after Meana and I go see the Sage, I’ll take her out on a date. Then when we get back, we’ll see if we can get everyone to Tamera Falls. They can have a little fun and kick back. We don’t ever get to come down here unless we are taking a Rah with a loved one or saving the planet.
So, we should try and make the best of it. I know everyone is worried because we are not as far along as we would like to be. But staying at home and worrying won’t help anything. So, later we will go off to Tamera Falls and see how our wings handle the dive. Then maybe we’ll play some Runner Ball. Guardians vs. Travelers. Yeah, we’ll kick their butts.
Now that I have made my decision to fight to stay in love with Mimi, I am active about making changes between us. I told her to come with me so that we could see the Sage then we can go out. She agreed to come with me. I could tell she was looking forward to it. It had been way too long since we did the couple thing. But first, we have to go see the Sage and hope he can help with finding Julian.
We knock and the same old lady answered the door. She walks us in just like last time. The boy was not watching TV this time. He was studying the army men. It was the same game board as before but there were a few differences. The black army had one soldier lying down.
“What happened to him?” I say.
“You don’t remember killing Agony, Marcus?” he asks.
“Yeah, but….”
“Every thing that is happening in the battle will be reflected on this board.”
“So you already know everything.”
“Who can know everything? Sometimes the board surprises even me.”
“Does your board show you what I should do about the Travelers who are making our jobs even harder by putting our every move in the Splash?”
“That is unfortunate, but do not be so hard on them. Travelers are necessary,” he says.
“You’re saying that Travelers are actually useful?” I ask bitterly.
“I take it you don’t know your history, Marcus. What about you, Ameana?”
“There are four types of angels: Travelers, Ground Walkers, Guardians, and Paras.”
“And what did they contribute to humanity?” the Sage asks.
“Travelers gave the Arts and Sciences to humanity,” she says.
“And the Splash,” I add.
“Not all of them are gossips like the stereotype would suggest. Most Travelers simply report information to the council. It is unfair to paint them all with the same brush. Had it not been for Travelers we would not have had Shakespeare, Van Gogh, Mozart, or Galileo.”
“The Grounds Walkers have inhabited humans whose actions have brought about great change, such as the suffrage movement and the civil rights movements,” Meana continues.
“Yes, Ground Walkers played a big role by using already powerfully courageous humans such as Harriet Tubman, Gandhi and Jean-Jacques Dessalines.”
“Para angels did not give anything to humanity but rather helped them eliminate major, all-consuming evil, such as Nazis, dictators and warlords,” my learned girlfriend says.
“Nazis and dictators are humans who were so evil they nearly rivaled Atourum. Their souls had become so dark, Atourum took them from them while they were still on Earth. So they were essentially soulless shells of human bodies. It’s rare that Para angels come down to Earth because they have to remain pure. But with that kind of darkness, only the purity of a Para angel could help the council balance humanity.”
“Then there’s us, Guardians. We save the world all by ourselves. That seems a little unbalanced to me,” I say.
“You can thank Julian for that. Guardians are capable of putting the whole world in danger, but they are capable of saving it as well. We are all pulling for you to be victorious.”
“Yeah, I can tell by the latest issue of Splash. You guys really believe in us.”
“Freedom of the press—what can you do?” he says.
“Well, not that we don’t appreciate the history lesson, but we actually came because we need help finding Julian.”
“You young people never want to do any work. It is your job to find him, Marcus, not mine.”
“You don’t give a damn what happens to the humans?” I ask.
“I’m not an Akon. Watch how you talk to me, Marcus.”
Ameana puts her hand on top of mine to get me to take a beat and not overreact. It’s a good thing. I want to jump out of my chair.
“There is no way the Akons can capture Julian without getting help from Runners. You just have to find the right Runner to question.”
“So the only advice you can give us is to keep looking?”
“Yes. Now, you have one more question, do you not?”
“No,” I say bitterly.
“Come now, boy. Ask your question and never let pride get in the way of obtaining knowledge.”
“Have I conquered the name that was going to ruin me?”
“No.”
“I don’t have feelings for her anymore. I’m with Ameana, and we’re happy.”
“Yes, I dare say you are. What of it?”
“I have no feelings for the human.”
“You also have no Triplex. Do you think that is just a coincidence?”
“You want me to get close to her so that she can tell me what I need to know? Even if it means that she will end up making me Turn?”
“You said you would never Turn, so what are you afraid of?”
“I don’t have feelings for her like I do for Ameana, but that doesn’t mean I have a right to go and screw with her just so she’ll open up to me.”
“You are not here to win ‘nice guy of the year,’ Marcus. You are the First Guardian. You will do whatever is needed.”
“It’s cruel to use her like that.”
“I wonder which concerns you more: the way the human may begin to feel for you or the way you already feel for her?”
“I’m really tired of these games. What do I have to do to find the damn Triplex?”
“If you speak to me in that tone again, I will not make myself available to you any longer. And you will never swear in my presence again, Guardian. Do you understand?”
I just want break him in half. Lightning and thunder are coming from outside. There should not have been. It is a clear night.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
“I’m summoning the council. It seems you are unhappy with me as your Sage. Maybe they have been wrong to have chosen me. Maybe ten thousand years of being a Sage put up against your one year of being a Guardian doesn’t match up. Clearly, you are wiser than I.”
The thunder and lightning strike again. If the council comes, none of what happened matters. They will be highly pissed off at having been summoned. Keeping the world in balance is a huge undertaking and they don’t have time to sort out arguments between the Sage and me. They had never come down to Earth, and I don’t want to be the reason why they do so now.
“Look, I just don’t understand why this human is so important,” I say.
“You are thinking like a boy. You need to think like a Guardian. Look at the bigger picture and get it out of your head that you need to be nice. You don’t need to be nice, Marcus. You need to be triumphant. Spending time with a human to let her open up to you is in no way evil.”
“Even if she is falling for me?”
“Even then, it is considered necessary for the greater good. You don’t have to marry her. Just talk to her.”
I would love to throw him into traffic, but that would be wrong.
“And it wouldn’t be the nice guy thing to do,” he said, amused.
Well, at least he stopped summoning the council, I think.
“Yes, that would have been bad,” he says.
Okay, so here is my list of things I can’t stand: Travelers, the Splash and mind readers. I’m not sure which is at the top.
“Your list is short, young Marcus. Wait until you’ve been on Earth a little longer.”
Yeah, mind readers are definitely at the top of my list—the very top.
After our frustrating meeting with the Sage, Mimi and I head to a small city in the Arabian Peninsula, called Dubai. It is home to the tallest structure in the world. It’s two thousand feet and looks like any other skyscraper, except it keeps going up so that the tip of it looks more like a needle than a building.
The ride was smooth and quiet. Once we reach downtown Dubai, we fly to the skyscraper. Mimi gets to the very top and jumps off of it. I follow her. We make several trips, jumping and flying. Finally, she sits near the ledge, a few feet away from the top.
“I’ve never been here before,” she says.
“It’s the calmest place I’ve been to. You think the humans feel comfort with height? Maybe that’s why they keeping building things higher.”
“Many of them have a real fear of heights.”
“How is that possible?”
“I guess they spend too much time on the ground.”
“Or we spend too little in the air.”
“Could be.”
“Thank you for taking me here.”
“Well, I’ve got a whole night planned. This is just the beginning.”
“Oh, really?”
“Yeah, and don’t even think about trying to get any information out of me. My lips are sewn shut with Samson string.”
“Are you sure I couldn’t get it out of you?” she says as she leaned in.
I was gonna stay strong. Then I smell her perfume. It smells like lavender in the summer night. It mixes perfectly with her natural scent. She leans in even closer. Man, I can’t keep a secret for nothing around this girl. I kiss her. I had to. For several minutes we just hold each other. We don’t speak. We just look out onto the world we are supposed to be saving.