The Golden City by John Twelve Hawks Page B

hungry ghosts. The First Realm was a version of Hell and Michael had no intention of visiting that dangerous place. There was a Third Realm that was filled with animals, but that wasn’t the place to find an advanced civilization using a quantum computer. Michael had decided that the beings who sent the message were either in the Sixth Realm of the gods or the Fifth Realm of the half gods. He had read the diaries of past Travelers, but none of them could describe these worlds in great detail. The half gods were supposed to be clever, but jealous of everyone else. The gods lived in a place that was difficult to find—a golden city.
    Although the Brethren assumed they controlled him, Michael had his own agenda. Yes, he needed to gain access to advanced technology, but he was also looking for an explanation for his own actions. It was a waste of time to study philosophy or pray in churches if a superior being could give him a direct answer.
    Did the gods possess magical powers? Could they fly through clouds and toss thunderbolts with their hands? Perhaps the human world was simply an enormous anthill, and the gods stopped by to blow up the mounds with firecrackers or flood the passage-ways withwater. And then, every few hundreds of years or so, they would drop morsels of knowledge in the dirt so that humanity would be inspired to keep working.
    Someone knocked softly. When he opened the door, he found Nathan Boone and Dr. Dressler waiting for him in the hallway. Boone was as stolid as ever, but the scientist looked nervous.
    “How you are feeling, Mr. Corrigan? Did you have a good night’s sleep?”
    “I guess so.”
    “The staff is ready,” Boone said. “Let’s go.”
    They took the elevator to the lobby and walked outside. The wind was coming from the northeast and the tops of the pine trees beyond the wall swayed as if an army of woodcutters were attacking them with chain saws. When they reached the white building, Boone waved his hand. A steel door slid open and they entered a large room with a glass-enclosed gallery twenty feet above the concrete floor.
    As Dressler and Boone climbed the stairs to the gallery, Michael pulled off his shoes and lay down on the examination table in the center of the room. A Taiwanese physician named Lau came over and began to attach sensors to Michael’s arms and skull. Michael smelled Lau’s twist-of-lemon cologne and heard the sound of an air-conditioning fan. The shadows on the wall changed when the doctor moved to the other side of the table.
    “All done,” Dr. Lau said quietly. “The microphone is on. They can hear us up in the gallery.”
    “Okay. I’m ready.”
    Several minutes passed and nothing happened. Michael’s eyes were shut, but he knew everyone was watching him. Maybe something was wrong. If he failed, Nathan Boone would tell Mrs. Brewster, and she would start a whisper campaign against him. Michael remembered what had happened to Dr. Richardson several monthsago: the neurologist fled from the research center, but Boone’s men found him on a night ferry heading to Newfoundland and tossed him into the ocean.
    He opened his eyes and saw Dr. Lau standing beside the table. “Are you comfortable, Mr. Corrigan?”
    “You’ve done your job. Now go away.”
    A shadow hand emerged from his skin and then was reabsorbed. Michael forgot about the watchers in the gallery and concentrated on his own body. He was aware of this energy inside him—the Light contained within every living thing. Slowly, the energy gained intensity, and it felt as if he were glowing.
    He moved his right arm and something forced its way out of his skin. And there it was, an arm composed of little points of light, like a tiny constellation of stars. Within seconds, the rest of the Light followed, and he broke free of the cage that held him, the awkward heaviness of flesh and bone. He drifted upward and then was gone as the Light was pulled into the dark curve of the infinite.
    —
    The four