Copyright 2014 Wanda Lotus.
Part 6
The next day I left for New York City. It was just an overnight trip, so I didn’t mention it to Kacela. Alick, an EM who was also my mentor, met me at Penn Station and gave me a big hug. Her long blonde-and-grey hair tickled my nose and made me laugh. “Mya, it’s been months! How are you?”
“Better, now that I’m looking at you!” Alick was one of the first EMs to take me under her wing when I showed up at NYU as a freshman. Over those first few years on my own, as I was drawn to others whose energy was off the charts, I was lucky enough to form a tribe that included several experienced EMs, including her. They taught me what I am and the code of ethics we follow to protect one another from the rest of society. She became the much older sister I never had.
We rode the #2 Train uptown to 96th Street, then walked the few blocks to her apartment building. Her blue eyes twinkled mischievously at me. “I’m sensing something different about you. What’s going on? Are you seeing someone?”
My face grew hot. “No! God…you always ask that whenever I see you!”
She laughed. “True, but this time I’m not kidding about sensing something different about you.”
“I made a new friend, one of us. Maybe that’s what you’re picking up.”
“Oh? Who is it?” She pulled out her keys to unlock the front door to her building.
“Her name is Kacela. She moved to Liverpool a few months ago. We’ve been hanging out…” I let my voice trail off. Alick had stiffened at the sound of Kacela’s name. Her lips tightened in an expression of contempt I had seen many times before. More disturbing, her energy signature went cold. That only happened when she was blocking me from reading her and discerning her intentions. She was the only EM I had met who could block me that way, and she would only do it for a good reason. “What’s wrong? I might not be able to read your energy, but your body language is speaking volumes.”
“This…Kacela…she wouldn’t happen to be about 5’6”, slender, and as arrogant as the day is long, would she?”
“Yes, on all accounts. I take it you know her and are not impressed.”
“Not only am I not impressed, we’ve been looking for her. She’s part of the problem we need to clean up in the city.” She unlocked the door. “I never guessed she’d show up in Liverpool of all places. She must stick out like a sore thumb.”
“She’s actually blending in reasonably well. Did she cause a lot of trouble down here?” I decided to keep Kacela’s account of why she left NYC to myself. I wanted to hear the others’ point of view.
Alick snorted. “My dear, you don’t know the half of it. Wherever there was trouble, Kacela was in the middle of it. She ran with a gang of EMs who were bullies; birds of a feather, and all that. She’ll fly off the handle with no warning. She’s killed more than a few members of the community in stupid street fights. Right before she left she fed from and killed an EM who had pissed her off. That woman has a lot to answer for. I’m glad we know where she is, so she can be brought to justice.” My heart sank. I had been trying to help Kacela by involving the other elders in this issue. Now I wondered if I had made a mistake.
I followed Alick up the stairs and down the hall to her apartment. Seven other elders were waiting for us in her living room. They all greeted me warmly. Though I was the youngest of the nine elders, they all respected me as their equal. A few years ago, six years after Alick became an elder, they invited me to join the council after the oldest of them had died. That’s when I found out they had been closely watching me ever since Alick began mentoring me. They had picked up on my potential and were impressed with my level head, especially since I had barely reached my 20s at the time. Being one of their number was an honor I did not take lightly.
Alick locked the door and announced, “Thanks to Mya, we finally know where Kacela is. She’s in Liverpool.”
“Well thank goodness that problem can finally be handled.” Gwen smiled and brushed her shoulder-length locs out of her face. I scanned the room and was reassured by the fact that the other elders didn’t share her relief.
I set my overnight bag down and took a seat. “Handled how?”
Gwen handed me a page with two lists of names. “Ever since you called to say you’d heard there was a group of EMs bullying vulnerable members of our community, we’ve been talking to people and gathering names. Kacela’s name is one we heard often, along with these others. We’ve decided the ones listed on the top of the page have caused enough trouble that they should be deactivated, if all of us agree. The others just need to be disciplined.”
“You believe she’s dangerous enough that she ought to be killed?”
Gwen raised her eyebrows at me. “She broke the truce by feeding off an EM. We can not allow that to go unaddressed.”
“From what Alick told me, he provoked her.”
“Maybe so, but that’s no excuse. Besides, her temper has caused a world of trouble before. We don’t want to risk her killing someone else just because she’s mad.”
I skimmed the first list. Sure enough, Kacela’s name was there. I chewed on the inside of my bottom lip and shook my head. “I’m not convinced deactivating her will be necessary, and I sense I’m not the only one here who feels that way.”
“You’re not.” David spoke up. He was a short, thin man with blue-black skin and silver-white hair. At 86 he was the oldest of us. “The people who gave us her name are other people on the deactivation list, and most of the people she’s killed are their close friends or relatives. Yes, we know she has a bad temper, but consider the source. These are people who have bullied innocent and vulnerable people outside of their clique. We don’t know that she wasn’t just defending herself when she killed them.” The others nodded in agreement, except for Gwen and Alick.
“Oh, come on, David, we’ve been through this, before.” Alick sighed. “This may be hearsay to you and the others, but Gwen and I have had one or two run-ins with Kacela. I’ve never had to fight her, or she’d be dead already. But based on what I have seen of her attitude, nothing they told us seems like an exaggeration. The only reason Mya is wavering is because she’s befriended the little troublemaker, and that’s swaying the rest of you.”
“No, that isn’t it,” I interjected. “Yes, we’ve been hanging out, but if she was causing trouble worthy of deactivation, I would be the first to admit it. Granted, she does have a dangerous temper. Not only that, she thinks she has the answer for everything. I was less than impressed with her attitude when we first met.” Alick rolled her eyes, obviously familiar with that aspect of Kacela’s personality. “But I haven’t been reading a lust for trouble from her in the time we’ve known each other. A lust for excitement, yes, but not trouble. I think she got tangled up with the wrong crowd when she aged out of foster care and just hasn’t had a chance to see there are good people in our community. Her arrogance is mostly a defense mechanism. She was convinced all EMs like confrontations, until she met me.”
Gwen looked surprised. “She was in foster care?”
I gave them a quick rundown of the little she’d told me about her past. “Unfortunately, the first people she encountered when she got out into the world was that group of EMs. From what she told me, they bullied her until they discovered she was more powerful than most of them. She’s run solo and hasn’t let anyone get close to her ever since.”
“How do you know she didn’t make up that sad little tale just to get your sympathy?”
“I read her sincerity in her energy; at that point she didn’t know or trust me enough to want my sympathy. And she doesn’t know I’m an elder, so my position in the community has nothing to do with it.”
Alick studied my face. I could tell she wasn’t happy with my assessment. “What do you suggest: we just let her roam free, after all of the trouble she’s caused here? What if she goes on a killing spree in Liverpool?”
It was obvious Alick wasn’t convinced I was accurately reading Kacela, so I didn’t bother to repeat what I had and had not picked up from her. “What if I keep an eye on her and make sure she isn’t causing trouble? We see each other a few times a week, and I can pick up her energy from a distance. I can monitor her without telling her that’s what I’m doing or why. That way I can make sure she isn’t a bully in disguise. And if she comes down off her ego trip enough to listen to me, maybe I can give her the guidance she desperately needs.”
“And if she shows herself to be a bully in disguise and becomes a danger to the people of Liverpool?”
I narrowed my eyes. “If that happens, I will deactivate her myself.”
“I like that plan better than killing her outright,” David said firmly. “Especially now that I know a little more about her past. Mya’s right; she at least deserves a chance to prove herself, now that she’s out of the reach of those EMs.”
Gwen looked me up and down. “If anyone other than you had suggested that, Mya, I wouldn’t agree. But I trust your judgment and your ability to read people’s intentions, so I’ll agree to it.”
One by one every elder voiced their agreement. Alick hesitated, but in the end she also agreed, and Kacela’s name was removed from the list for deactivation. I returned home the next morning intensely aware that I held Kacela’s life in my hands. I hoped I could get through to her before she made a misstep that would cost her her life.
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