It didn’t. Instead of hitting something solid, the helicopter accelerated. It was as if we had been caught in the pull of the flume. The sudden movement threw me against the ceiling. Or maybe it was the floor. I had no idea. Everything was white. I grabbed on to something for support, but the helicopter lurched again, and I lost my grip. I was thrown through the air, out of control. I grabbed my head for protection, ready to be smashed against one of the helicopter’s walls. Seconds passed. I didn’t hit anything. That was impossible. The helicopter wasn’t that big. I thought maybe I had been launched through the open door. Was that a good or a bad thing? Was I free? Or about to get chopped by the spinning rotors? All I could do was hang tight and prepare for the worst.
I was surrounded by a torrent of sound. The whine of the engines, the squeal of twisting metal, the screams of the people from the stadium…and the music of the flume. I couldn’t tell whether I was falling or floating. Had I been caught in the power of the flume? There was no reference.
The sounds slowly diminished. The noise of the doomed helicopter blended into the people’s screams until it all became white noise. Moments passed. How many? No idea. The white noise slowly faded, leaving only the music of the flume. I no longer thought I would crash into something. I was definitely floating. For the longest time my eyes had been closed, with my arms wrapped around my head. But for how long? Seconds? Years? I had lost all sense of everything.
I slowly dropped my arms and cautiously opened my eyes. What I saw at first made no sense. I was free floating. Alone. The helicopter was gone. Saint Dane and Nevva were nowhere in sight. It seemed as if I were traveling through the flume, but it wasn’t the same. Surrounding me were the floating images of Halla. It was a mess of images so dense that I couldn’t see through them to the star field beyond. I saw faces I recognized from the different territories. Not individuals, but different races. Batu, Novans, Africans, gars, klees, Asians. It was a swirling sea of a billion faces, all folding in on one another. I heard their voices, too. Nothing specific though. It was more like a random chorus of words, and even song.
I was strangely calm, and more curious than frightened. What did this all mean? Unlike a normal flume trip, I didn’t get the sense that I was actually moving. It was more like floating in this sea of faces. Did they see me? Was I just another one of the billion faces? Was this my fate, banished into a limbo of souls? Is this where Naymeer had exiled his enemies?
I saw my first star. Then another. The ghostly faces were slowly disappearing, as if being blown away on a celestial breeze. The star field beyond was being revealed. Order was returning, yet something was wrong. As the faces melted, I realized I wasn’t looking out through the crystal walls of the flume. I was free floating in space. That was impossible. How could I survive that?
A new image was revealed. Many, in fact. They weren’t clear at first, because of the many faces that still surrounded me. As the faces disappeared, more detail came clear. They appeared to be long white streaks, like clouds. There were several of them, crisscrossing one another in no particular pattern through the star field. They reminded me of the contrails left by jets as they streak through the sky. There were dozens of them, at all different angles. Some crossed in front of me. Others went past me and on to forever. I was floating through a three- dimensional maze of infinite lines.
As the last of the faces of Halla disappeared, I recognized the streaks for what they were. They weren’t clouds. They had substance. They seemed to be made of brilliant, clear crystal. Light from the stars bounced off their multifaceted surfaces, making them sparkle. I knew what I was seeing. I had seen it many times before, though from a different perspective.
I was looking at the highways through Halla. I was seeing the flumes…from the outside. All of them. It was a complex maze that seemed to have no beginning and no end. I knew that wasn’t the case, of course. The flumes connected the territories of Halla. They were the conduits that allowed us to move between time and space. It was an awesome, humbling sight.
It also raised the question of where I was. I wasn’t in a flume, that much was clear. I didn’t feel like an astronaut floating in space, either. I know this makes no sense, but it didn’t feel as if I were actually there. It was more as if I were imagining what I was seeing, as if it were a vision. There was no physical sensation of any kind. It wasn’t as if I were lying down somewhere and dreaming either. I was really there, but I wasn’t. I was part of what I was seeing, but I was a ghost. I don’t know how else to describe it. I also don’t know how long I was there. A minute? An hour? A billion years? It was a calm, almost spiritual feeling of being a part of the continuum of time and space, but not being bound by it. I’m not sure if I liked it or not. It just…was. Then it all fell apart.
The flumes started to glow. Like neon tubes full of charged gas, the crystal flumes lit up. I heard the music return as well. Unlike every previous trip through the flume, where the music was a calming travel companion, this music sounded harsh. Angry. Chaotic. It was muffled, as if the sound were contained inside the flumes. It grew louder. More frantic. The lights grew brighter. So bright I had to squint. The music grew faster, building to something.
That’s exactly what was happening. As the music reached its peak, and the glowing flumes grew so bright they nearly caused a complete whiteout in the heavens, a flume exploded. Chunks of crystal material erupted, blasting every which way. It was followed by another explosion. And another. With each new eruption, the sound was released from inside, filling the universe with chaotic debris and discordant music. When a flume exploded, its light went out. Crystal pieces of all sizes scattered through space. Some looked like mile-long chunks, others were tiny, twinkling shards. Pieces flew past me, though I didn’t feel them, which added to the impression that I wasn’t really there. At least not physically.
I watched in horror as the explosions continued. One after another. Three at a time. A chunk of one flume crashed into another tunnel that was still intact, breaking it in two. It was a dreadful, violent display. I was witnessing the destruction of the highways through Halla. As a final insult, I saw a large chunk of crystal heading directly for me. I didn’t know what to do. Was I in danger? Would it blow past me? Or through me? After all, I was a ghost. When the crystal wall was nearly on me, I did the only thing that felt right.
I closed my eyes.
SECOND EARTH
The Conclave of Ravinia was jammedwith people. More so than ever before. Every seat was filled with a true believer. Many more had to be turned away at the door. There simply wasn’t enough room. Those who arrived late had to be content to sit on the stairs outside the marble structure, and wait for news to come from those who were lucky enough to be allowed inside.
The atmosphere outside the conclave was very different from the last gathering. Though security was provided by red-shirt Ravinian guardians and the New York City police, it wasn’t necessary. There were no protesters. Quite the opposite. The streets were empty, except for Ravinians who came for the conclave. Nobody else dared to come within three blocks of the building. The demonstration at Yankee Stadium had served its purpose. The Ravinians had power. The Ravinians were feared.
Yet the mood of the Ravinians wasn’t one of celebration. There was tension, both inside and outside the conclave building. Rumors of what had transpired at Yankee Stadium flew across the world. What exactly had happened to the people inside? The only solid fact was that over seventy thousand people entered Yankee Stadium on the evening of March 12, and nobody came out. The television cameras showed helicopters arriving over the stadium, and Alexander Naymeer striding onto the stage. He thrust his hand into the air…and that was it. The cameras failed. Every last one. There was no record of what occurred after Naymeer thrust his fist into the air. The broadcast ended. The tapes were clean.
Most Ravinians had their suspicions. Many had witnessed the earlier event at the conclave where twelve nonbelievers were exiled into the flume. Did something similar happen at Yankee Stadium? It was the only logical explanation, save for one minor detail: There was no flume at Yankee Stadium. Not anymore. The earth around the pitcher’s mound at the ballpark was scorched. The grass destroyed. It looked as though there had been a fire. That was all. Any sign that a flume had once been there was gone. There were no witnesses. Nobody to describe how an infernal tunnel was blasted into the earth and made to swallow up tens of thousands of people.
The very next month, baseball would return. Soon after, Yankee Stadium would be vacated and turned into a museum. A newer, modern stadium would rise next door, replacing the hallowed site. Eventually the old stadium would be bulldozed, covered up, and forgotten. The mystery would never be solved, because there were no
