Steve Cash
The Remembering
For Chloe, Colin, Zoe, and Scout
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I want to thank the true believers: Cody and Allison, Star and Mike, Sydney, Linda, and John. I also want to thank Betsy Mitchell for every question and suggestion. She was my “other” voice and she was always right. Lastly, I want to thank Tom and Frances Bissell. Inside their hearts and souls, I know they are Meq.
THE MEQ
Aitor Zezen (B. 426 BC) / Itzia (B. 311 BC)
begat
Yaldi Zezen (B. 172 AD)
Yaldi Zezen / Xamurra (B. 201 BC)
begat
ZIANNO ZEZEN (B. 1869 AD)
Umla-Meq (B. 1005 BC)
Opari (B. 1310 BC)
Sister — Eder-Meq (B. 998 BC)
Sister — Deza (B. 1313 BC)
Geaxi Bikis (B. 51 BC)
Trumoi-Meq (B. 1117 BC)
Unai Txori (B. 217 BC)
Usoa Ijitu (B. 412 BC)
Baju Gastelu (B. 299 BC)
Nova Gastelu (B. 1894 AD)
Xanti Otso — the Fleur-du-Mal (B. 356 BC)
Mother — Hilargi (B. 897 BC)
Father — Unknown
Uncle — Zeru-Meq (B. 901 BC)
Ray Ytuarte (B. 1783 AD)
Susheela the Ninth (B. 3061 BC)
Sister — Zuriaa (B. 1790 AD)
Mother — Ikerne (B. Unknown)
Previously, in The Meq and Time Dancers:
From the introduction of the electric lightbulb to the supernatural light from an exploding nuclear bomb, Zianno Zezen, or Z, has been witness to these events, and yet he remains in the body of a twelve-year-old boy. His human friends and family are changing, aging, and dying. But Z is not human. He is something else, something older. In his heart and mind, now more than ever, he knows what it means to be Meq, living inside Time and history, to be part of it, and still be outside of it — a stranger, a seeker … a survivor.
In Book One, The Meq, Zianno’s adventure of self-discovery led him to understand the significance of the Stone of Dreams. The ancient black rock with its mystical hypnotic power over all other animate beings was passed down to him from his father, and his father’s father, and so on, going back millennia to the Time of Ice. Four more Stones are known to exist: the Stone of Silence, now carried by Nova Gastelu; the Stone of Will, carried for the last two thousand years by Geaxi Bikis; the Stone of Memory, carried for nearly three thousand years by Umla-Meq, also known as Sailor; and the Stone of Blood, carried even longer by Z’s one true love and Ameq, Opari. As Sailor once told Z, the carriers of these Stones must endure, and it is essential that all five Stones are present at the Gogorati — the Remembering. Why? No one knows for certain, but the Meq have always speculated that the Stones have something to do with their origins, and possibly their future. At the end of Book Two, Time Dancers, very few Meq are left alive, and it is possible, nay probable, that Z’s friend and mentor, Sailor, has been incinerated by the nuclear bomb over Nagasaki. The Fleur-du-Mal, the cruel Meq assassin and nemesis of Z and the others, is alive and well, and it is known that he has captured and imprisoned Susheela the Ninth, the Ethiopian Meq whose existence was once thought to be only a rumor. She has been alive for five thousand and six years and is by far the oldest among them. The Fleur-du-Mal is sadistic and completely unpredictable. What will he do next?
It is late 1945, World War II is over and the Cold War has just begun. The Meq and their secrets, powers, and “abilities” will be sought by the Soviets and the Americans. The Remembering is just on the horizon, less than seventy years away. Since the Time of Ice the Meq have always believed they know the when … but they still do not know the where. The mystery must be solved in time, and Zianno may be the only one who can solve the ancient riddle.
BOOK THREE
PART I
Coincidence is God’s way of remaining anonymous.
1. Labezomorro (Cockroach)
When the people are gone, when the trees are dead, when the animals are dead, when the sky is poisoned, the earth blackened and the rivers and seas fouled, the cockroach will be there. He will survive. He will be awake, hungry, scurrying in darkness through holocaust and nightmare — an elegant, six-legged silent witness and ancient sentinel. He will be waiting for you there. He will be among the survivors. Underground, in the wall, at the back of the cave, the cockroach will be there.
It was 11:09 in the morning, August 9, 1945. Forty thousand feet in the air, the enormous cloud began to break up and spread across the sky in swirling whites and grays. Below it, the Urakami Valley and the city of Nagasaki were invisible under the dark mass at the cloud’s base. I hadn’t moved or blinked or said a word for seven minutes.
“Are you deaf and mute, Zezen, or have you not seen death before?”
I turned slowly and looked up to the top of the castle wall. The Fleur-du-Mal stared down at me. His hair hung loose, down over his shoulders. His green eyes were hard and bright. Then the huge, wrought-iron gate to the castle began to swing open. The old hinges sounded like giant fingernails scraping a giant black-board. “Come inside, Zezen,” he said, “and leave the body of the woman inside the gatehouse, if you wish.”
He waited for me to reply. I said nothing. Finally, he shook his head and said, “Have it your way, then, but the wind is shifting.”
I looked back toward the cloud, which was breaking up rapidly. “Why should that make a difference?”
The Fleur-du-Mal raised his head and laughed. His brilliant white teeth gleamed against the sky. “Radiation, you idiot,” he said. “Gamma, alpha, and beta radiation. That was an atomic bomb.”
“What is an atomic bomb?”
“Come inside and I shall explain it to you. Otherwise, you will likely die. I doubt the Meq have ever faced a nuclear explosion, let alone what that insidious cloud contains. Or would you rather stand there and find out for yourself?”
I looked down at Shutratek’s lifeless body. One eye had opened, so I leaned over and closed it, then stood and stared again at Nagasaki. Sailor and Sak had been on their way to a location near the Nagasaki railway station, close to where the Urakami River runs into the harbor. None of it was visible now. The whole city was silent under the blackness. I didn’t move. I couldn’t, I was frozen.
“They are all dead, Zezen,” the Fleur-du-Mal said from above. “All of them — Zuriaa, Susheela the Ninth … Sailor and the Ainu. All of them.”
I spun around. “You knew Sailor and I were in Nagasaki?”
“Please, Zezen, do not insult me. Of course, I knew. I knew the very hour of your arrival and I have been well aware of every one of your clumsy attempts at locating my many shiros.” He scanned the sky and the horizon, then added, “Your time is up, Zezen. I am closing the gate. Adieu, mon petit.”
He disappeared from view and the massive gate began to close. I glanced once more at Nagasaki and knew the Fleur-du-Mal was right. They were all dead, all of them. A wave of nausea passed through me. I thought of Sailor and felt a sudden sense of loss and despair I had only felt once before, on the day my own mama and papa died. Sailor was so much more to me than I even realized, more than a friend or a teacher. He was irreplaceable. Behind me, I heard the screeching of the hinges and looked back at the gate. It was almost closed. I half dragged, half carried Shutratek through the opening and just in time. The gate locked into place. I laid Shutratek down on the stone floor inside the gatehouse, then looked up to see the Fleur-du-Mal standing next to me. I tensed instinctively. He could have easily slit my throat at any moment.