It broke his heart a little more.
“That’s perfect,” Alex said.
Emily smiled and lifted the statue, which seemed to have no weight at all. She carried it inside the walls Alex had built and set it behind the grave. She looked at Alex. “Yes?”
Alex nodded, his throat thick.
Emily reached in her pocket and pulled out a small bottle. She uncapped it and poured a greenish liquid over the statue. Moments later, the green color faded and became the gray of granite.
“There. Now people will know who is here and who watches over this mountain.”
Emily, I think you would fit right in with the hippies of the seventies. You just need some flowers in your hair and to flash a peace sign.
Alex finally gave up and said, “You said you could return me home.” There was unmistakably a conflicted longing in his voice.
“Yes, sorry. I know how important this is to you. The initial creation of the portals was a complete foul-up, but Janus III and Janus IV both continued to work out the bugs. We now work with Janus V, which is, if I can be immodest for a moment, the greatest mind ever created in this galaxy.”
Bista glanced at Alex, but by his stone-faced expression, he saw that Alex was unimpressed by this.
“Janus V has found and eliminated the problems with the system. We can now control the portals with a high degree of accuracy. Both in where we place them and where they lead to on the other end. We can deliver you right back to your basement.”
Hearing that possibility, Alex glanced down at himself, taking inventory.
Missing much of my left hand. Left arm and shoulder scarred. Dozens of scars from the stings of the wasta-ta and bites of the zisla-ta. Beard that goes to my navel and hair that reaches my butt. I can fix or hide some of those things, but others are going to be a little tougher to explain. Not to mention that I’ll have a dog the size of a compact car and a new daughter with me when I cross over.
Alex swallowed hard.
And none of that matters. I’ll finally be able to see Amy again and tell her what happened. That I didn’t desert her.
Alex realized he’d zoned out and hadn’t heard what Bista was saying.
“...that is the final thing Lanta-eh asked of us. To send you back if we could. We will honor that wish.”
“Thank you. I am grateful, I truly am. Getting back to see my daughter again will mean everything to me. I do have one question, though. Once the portals were found to be completely defective, why didn’t Janus just turn them off.”
“He tried. The whole program had gone rogue and the combined might of him and Janus II was not enough to bring it back under control.”
“Okay,” Alex said. “But when I returned to the door to go home, it was gone. How did that happen?”
“That was us,” Bista said. “As soon as we got within range, we used the new program to eliminate all the old doors. I’m sorry. We thought we were doing it so they wouldn’t cause any more problems. Once again, that law of unintended consequences.”
“That’s it then,” Alex said, putting his hands on his knees. “All of this—my entire life—comes down to being collateral damage from events that happened centuries after I would have died. I suppose there’s a lesson there for me, but I’m not smart enough to figure it out.”
Pandrick unfolded the stiff piece of paper, which Alex assumed was the equivalent of the ten thousandth generation iPad, and tapped a key. Just as it had appeared, the camp disappeared in an instant. Once again, it was just the five visitors, Alex, Sanda-eh, and Monda-ak.
Out of curiosity, Alex stepped inside the walls of crystal rocks. Careful to avoid the freshly turned soil, he reached out and touched the statue. It didn’t just look like granite. As far as Alex could tell, it was granite.
He nodded to himself and said, “Good. That will stand for a long time.”
Alex led the five visitors back to Winten-ah. As promised, Pandrick had a few dozen questions for Alex, who did his best to answer them. It was difficult for Pandrick to understand that Alex didn’t know more about some things and how much he did know about others.
When they reached the forest, the first guard in the trees, Alex raised his hand and said, “Gunta, Tranda-ak. Please signal ahead that we are coming back and bringing visitors. They will want to meet with Sekun-ak.”
Immediately, Tranda-ak sounded his horn and Alex could hear the signal reverberating down the line.
Bista trailed behind, taking hologram pictures with a device that was part camera, part hovercraft. Whenever Bista released it, it flew—seemingly without direction from him—and took three-hundred-and-sixty-degree panoramas from the air.
Sekun-ak stood in the clearing, holding the long spear he had once used as the head of the hunting expeditions. It was not threatening, just a casual reminder that he did not know whoever it was Alex was returning with. Behind Sekun-ak, the people of Winten-ah went about their normal business. That is, if their normal business brought them within earshot of what was going on in the field.
Alex approached Sekun-ak and quietly said, “These are visitors. They are descendants of those who took to the skies on the golden bird during The Leaving. They have a cure for the curse that is afflicting the women of Kragdon-ah.”
“At what cost?” Sekun-ak asked, equally quietly.
“None. There is nothing they want from us. We have nothing they value.”
“Then they are not that smart, Manta-ak. I already see that we have many things they do not.”
“Indeed, that is true, brother.” Alex signaled Bista to come forward and introduced him to Sekun-ak.
Introductions made, Alex signaled for Sanda-eh and Monda-ak to follow him as he retreated back to his cabin. Once he found the quiet and serenity of his
