Akasha 4 - Earth (16 page)

Margie and I both lifted our faces,
inviting the sun in. A small wave of energy tingled at my
fingertips. We glanced down at the plant.

"See?" asked Margie. "Do you feel
that? There is an increased electrical current in the plant. And
with stronger illumination the process accelerates, creating more
and more energy. All you need to do is tap into it."

Above us, the clouds moved with the
wind, and the beam of sun slowly shifted down the forest. Margie
extended her hand toward the beam, following it with soft footsteps
in the soil. Large leaves on the plants dipped and rose; the stems
on taller plants leaned to the side.

"Are you doing that?" I
asked.

"Hmm." She nodded. "It isn't exact. I
can't manipulate them to do move exactly how I want. The vines over
the river were more of a fluke; made me look better than I am." She
gave a nervous laugh. "You try."

I was still riding the high frequency
of air. Earth was much lower. Slow and steady. I made the
transition, tapping into the soil.

"A little higher," Margie coaxed.
"Remember, it is a mix of solar and earth energy."

I tried again, melding the two
elemental properties together, remaining sensitive to what
responded. Finally, a frequency hit, the waves parallel to those I
was managing. I followed it back to a plant. I almost got bogged
down in it. "Sticky – like syrup."

"Glucose," Margie said. "You got
it."

I sent my own energy to intertwine
with that of the plant. The weaves buzzed and the plant leaves
moved, like it was waving to me. I smiled, waving my own hand in
response.

Margie laughed. "Good! You’re a quick
learner."

The clouds closed up again and the
combined energy fizzled out. We lowered our hands.

"Could this be a power source? For
electricity?" I asked.

She nodded. "Biofuels. I was following
research on the concept before Daybreak. It is totally possible,
but there was a lot of development needed on the technology back
then. Not sure if anyone pursues it anymore. Too many distractions
nowadays, like…"

"Surviving?" I interjected for
her.

"Yeah, something like
that."

"Well, if plants give off their own
frequency – does everything?"

She furrowed her eyebrows. "What do
you mean?"

"I mean, do people emit a certain
frequency?"

"Yes, I suppose everything does. But
you can't use a 'people frequency' as an energy source."

"No, no." I laughed. "I was thinking
it might be useful for more of location purposes. Like finding
someone."

"Kaitlyn?" Alex's voice startled us.
"Ready? We want to cover some ground before we lose
daylight."

"Sure." I turned back to Margie,
trying to wipe Micah from my mind. "Thanks and…be careful. I'll see
you in a couple days."

"You be careful too. Good luck, and
kiss that baby for me." Margie hugged me.

"Okay." I turned away with an
unexpected lump in my throat. Had I not spent so much time
suspecting her, we might have had a chance to become good
friends.

Alex glanced at me as we walked. "You
okay?"

"Yeah, fine. In fact, really, really
good." I took a deep breath. "Looking forward to keeping my feet on
dry ground for a change."

"You and me both," Alex
said.

Chapter
23

Theories

By the third day of walking, my feet
were covered in blisters.

"Those boats made me go soft," I told
Susan as she helped bandage them. "I never had this problem
before."

Susan shoved a canteen in my face.
"You don't drink enough water."

"What does water have to do with
blistering feet?" I asked.

"Water has everything to do with your
body." She put the last bandage on. "There – that should get you a
few more miles."

I finished half the canteen under her
watchful eye, then handed it back. As I laced up my boots, Alex
joined us. He stopped, setting a large, clunky radio next to his
feet on one side, and Bee on the other.

Bee popped up on her feet, hopped over
the radio, and got busy pushing buttons and turning dials. She
picked up the handset. "There? Over – come in. Over."

Alex beamed. "She uses better radio
etiquette than you."

"Oh, shush." I tied my second boot and
stood. "Trying to track down the other group?"

We had expected them to catch up with
us by yesterday morning, but there was no sign of them. Not even
this afternoon when Alex had backtracked to search for them. I
looked up at the sun, slowly sinking behind the trees. It would be
time to stop for the night soon.

"Yeah. They were supposed to be the
faster group; I purposely divided them up by physical…prowess,"
said Alex.

Susan and I laughed, covering our
mouths trying to hold in the snorts.

"Prowess?" I mocked him.

"You know what I mean," he grumbled.
"Little Miss Bee, can I see the radio now?"

She shook her head ‘no’ and turned her
back on him. "Over, over."

Susan and I were still
laughing.

"That's just what I need; someone else
to ignore me." Alex rubbed his temples. "You know what? You two try
– I'm going to scout ahead."

He stomped off before we had a chance
to apologize.

"Should we go after him?" I
asked.

"Nah," said Susan. "Let him walk it
off. He needs it."

I glanced at her. Of all of us, Alex
had been doing the most walking. Constantly scouting ahead, and
sometimes behind, he probably covered more than twice the distance
we did.

A muffled, distorted voice came in
over the radio. "Who is this? Over."

Susan grabbed the handset from Bee,
and I grabbed Bee, searching my bag for honeysuckle to keep her
quiet.

"This is…" Susan let go of the
handset, then whispered to me, "Oh, geez. We didn't come up with
call signs."

I rolled my eyes, taking the handset
from her. "Margie? This is Kait—"

Susan ripped the handset right out of
my palm. "Don't use your real name."

I took the handset back. "What else
should I use?"

"Give that to me!" She yanked it
back.

I lunged for it again, but tripped. I
fell into her and we both ended up on the ground, wrestling for the
handset.

Margie's voice continued to come over
the radio, "Kaitlyn? What's happening? Are you okay?"

We both stole glances at Bee, ensuring
we wouldn't roll over her. She did the right thing, backing
away.

"Stop it, Susan! She's already used my
name anyway!" I snaked my arm around Susan, grabbing at her shirt,
trying to pull her off me. I wasn't really motivated to hurt her,
unless she kept pushing her luck.

"I refuse to sit by and keep letting
you put us in danger!"

I froze; so did she.

She recovered first, standing up and
backing away. "Sorry; that came out wrong."

I stood as well, not bothering to
brush off bits of dead leaves. "No it didn't."

"What?"

"You said exactly what you wanted to."
I picked up Bee, who looked like she might cry, and put her on my
hip. "What did it mean?"

Susan's face crumpled at Bee's pouting
lip. "The disasters that have been following us…"

"What about them?"

"Oh, come on, Kaitlyn. I don't want to
do this now."

Not without
Alex
, I thought.
So they can gang up on me.

The handset laying on the ground
between us sparked to life again, "Kaitlyn?"

"Look, we don't know for sure what’s
causing them." I walked to the radio and picked it up. "And until
we do, I'm not going to be separated from my child on a theory." I
pressed the talk button. "Sorry, Margie. I'm here – everything is
fine." The bite in my voice would tell her otherwise, even over the
air.

"Um, ok. Things here aren't so good;
there has been an earthquake."

My eyes opened wide; so did Susan's.
Without breaking our shocked stare at each other, I put the handset
back to my mouth. "Say again?"

"Earthquake, over."

I shook my head. "Impossible, we're
not that far away. We would've felt it."

"I was able to contain it. Did some
damage to our immediate area, though. We lost most of our supplies
when the river surged. Half our group doesn't want to continue;
we've been arguing back and forth. What should we do?"

"Um…" I trailed off.

"Say again?" asked Margie.

"Hold tight. Don't go anywhere. I have
some thinking to do. Over and out." I dropped the handset, and
brushed by Susan.

"Kaitlyn?" I heard her ask behind
me.

I half-turned my head. "I said I have
some thinking to do."

* * *

"Not now, Arnold."

He had been trying to catch my ear all
day. Unfortunately, being with the slower group meant being with
Arnold. For the most part, I was able to avoid him by using Bee as
an excuse. Bee needs to pee. Bee needs to eat. Bee wants to be at
the front of the pack. But now Susan had Bee, and I had no more
excuses.

"I just wanted to talk about
Fukushima."

I sighed. "You mean the nuclear
meltdown in Japan? The tsunami that caused the release of
radioactive material into the ecosystem."

"Yes – that was an example of our
worst fears with nuclear power. And you know what we
discovered?"

"What?"

"That it really wasn't that bad.
Losses were minimal—" He tripped over a root sticking out of the
ground, caught himself on my arm, and almost brought me down with
him.

I smiled to myself.
Was that Earth trying to tell him
something?

When we both caught our footing, he
continued like nothing had happened, "Scientists also agree there
will never be an observable cancer increase in the Japanese
population attributable to Fukushima."

"Way too early to know that." I didn't
say what we were both thinking…because of Daybreak, now we'd never
really know.

"But nuclear is just…dangerous," I
said.

"Oh." He clicked his tongue. "That’s
just fearmonger talk. More people die each day from coal pollution,
or did before Daybreak, than have been killed by
nuclear
power
in 50 years of operation."

"But we're not talking about coal.
We're talking about renewable energy."

"Listen, in another time, I might have
been all for renewable energy. But we just aren't there yet – we
don’t have the capability of supporting large population masses on
just that. And now, thanks to Daybreak…" He gestured up to the
night sky and the green streaks of the aurora borealis. "We really
don't have the chance."

I sighed. He was right – and it was
because of my failure to stop Shawn. "Okay, so say we go the
nuclear way—"

"You mean the
right
way," he
interrupted.

I glared at him.

He cleared his throat and said,
"Sorry."

"If we have nuclear power plants
running all over the world, we still need Uranium to power them.
How do we find that without gas to run the machines, or power to
run the instruments?"

"Well, for starters – I think some of
you magical folk can do it. I've been talking to some of your
Earths—"

"Earths?" It was my turn to snort.
"I've never seen an Earth powerful enough for that; not even Margie
– I don't think."

Oh, shit.

I stopped dead in my tracks. The
person behind me ran into me. It was definitely getting too dark to
continue, but we hadn't yet found a good camp spot.

"Hey, you okay?" Arnold asked, pulling
me forward again.

"Yes…I…it's just…"

It's just I know someone
that might be able to find Uranium underground – me.
Hell, I had managed to find iron sulphate at the
bottom of the ocean, and that was back when I was new to the Gaia
business. The problem was, if I knew that, Shawn definitely knew
it. He was going to use a Gaia to run his nuclear power plant. And
if he has more than one plant…

I cleared my throat. "It's just the
same as with renewable energy – we aren't there yet. I'm not sure
us 'magical' types have developed that ability."

"But you have to agree, it’s probably
easier to attain than a ramp up of renewable energy would
entail."

I stayed silent – I would never, ever
admit that.

The quiet chattering ahead of us
stopped as the entire line of people was coming to a halt. I tried
craning my neck over their heads. "What is it?"