Chapter 17: The Door Into Summer

orn For Water stood at the edge of the cliff, his dark hair blown by the wind upswept from the moonlit Sea Of Fires four hundred feet below.

It was this wind, Ni'ch'i, that was his constant companion since birth and was both guide and foundation for his life. Ni'ch'i is normally translated as "wind," although this does not adequately convey the totality of the concept associated with the word for the Navajo. Ni'ch'i refers to the air, the atmosphere in its entirety, when still, and when in motion; it is conceived of as having a holiness and powers that are not acknowledged by European-based cultures. The term should perhaps be best translated as "Holy Spirit." It suffuses all of nature; it is responsible for giving life, thought, speech and the power of motion to all living things. When a child is born, its first breath is an inspiration of Ni'ch'i, and the child becomes a complete being; the last act in Blessingway is to stand and breathe in the air of Dawn, to reinfuse that Holy Spirit.

Ni'ch'i is both corporeal and holy, both tornado and spring breeze.

And here, at the nexus of Born For Water's life, Ni'ch'i was to be both Born For Water's executioner and his midwife.

"I have reached the end," he said, as much to himself as to his guides. "You have instructed me to enter the Sea. Yet the Way has brought me here, and it is you who have shown me the Way. The Sea is beyond my reach. How is it you have brought me here, only to end in failure?"

"It is time," was all the Owl would say.

For the first time in his life, Born For Water did not understand the words of Wisdom. "What is expected of me? Have I not saved my brother, the Slayer of the Monsters? Is not my Way in balance? You have brought me to where I can go no further."

The Chipmunk stood at his left shoulder, and whispered, you can always go further.

The four animal guides had brought Born For Water to this place, had led him here when he himself did not know his destiny. They had been with Monster Slayer, his twin, and now acted as guide and confidence. On his right shoulder, the Owl, who was wisdom; on his left the Chipmunk, pragmatism; above him, the Eagle, courage; and at his feet, the Kombucha, moistness.

"It is time," repeated the Owl.

"I cannot. I will die here, in sight of Immortality. What is it you see that I am blind to?"

"It is time."

"Owl speaks truth," said the spirit of Monster Slayer, appearing within him and laying his hand on Born For Water's heart. "It is only Time you are blind to. We are brothers, you and I. We are one in Asdzaan Nadleehe."

Ni'ch'i pushed through Born For Water and up to the skies, where circled the Eagle. The soul of the son of Changing Woman thus touched the soul of Courage, and at that moment Born For Water embraced his fate. The whorls of his fingers tingled as he launched himself out over the cliff.

Ni'ch'i bore him with his twin's spirit to the sea, and into immortality...

Dreams have their own internal logic. It is a logic in which utterly disparate images or concepts may merge seamlessly, though without synergy of any kind; where a Marshmallow Peep can speak Norwegian and find need to frisbee an 8-inch floppy disk in order to protect itself from the Wicked Witch, and it somehow makes sense.

With my eyes closed, the sound of Nicholas' rasping breath merged with the creaking of the old timbers of the bed-and-breakfast as the Vermont night wind buffeted the inn. Slowly, the creaking became rhythmic, matching in time and tempo to the boy's strained breathing. Rhythmic, circular. And it became the sound of a wheel.

I was therefore not concerned in the least when at length I opened my eyes and found myself tied to a luggage carrier in a crowded museum, being pulled towards a dense knot of people.

Ria was in front of the group as it cautiously moved down the twisted corridor that led deep into the pyramid. The walls of the corridor were a featureless charcoal gray, and ended about ten feet above their heads; there was no actual ceiling, though the slanted glass panels of the pyramid could be seen further up, and - through them - the night sky. Glenn Glenn briefly thought of the Kubrick movie The Shining, of the scene with Jack Nicholson trapped in the hedge maze; but this thought was quickly replaced with another, identical thought.

"Hold up, there's something here," Ria said in that charming Dutch accent of hers [see note 1]. The group stopped as Ria walked up to a plaque attached to the wall. It looked like a Platinum Record award.

"What does it say?" asked Heywally.

Ria read the words silk-screened on the CD. "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road," she read.

Around the next corner was another plaque, this time for Cat Steven's Tea For The Tillerman. As they continued, more and more award plaques dotted the wall, some for famous albums, others for artists and songs the Monkeeheads had never heard of.

Duran Duran's Rio.

The Crepuscular Rays' She Bangs Trout.

Green Eggs' debut album.

Something by John Tesh; the CD was too bland to read.

William Shatner's recording of You Got To Trust The Pilot.

And so it continued, through a maze of doorless intersecting hallways seemingly longer than the glass pyramid they had entered. The decision at each intersection was made by glancing at the pyramid roof and choosing the branch that led closer to the center, until at last the corridor dead-ended at a fire door.

Brad shrugged, and pushed on the bar; the door opened into an open-roofed area serviced by two long escalators. In the swarm of people in the crowded atrium at the top of the longest escalator he spotted Melhi and Heath, Tami and Randi, and the rest of the Cleveland Monkeeheads, running towards a dense crowd that had formed in the central vault of the Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame.

"Thank you, Therese. This is Tom Brokaw, reporting live for Three-W-E and CBS here at the Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame, where an extraordinary event is taking place; one of the strangest, perhaps, in the history of the city of Cleveland.

"The enormous herd of animals that has entered the city has ended its migration outside of the museum; most of the roads in the vicinity are closed and traffic is at a standstill, so please leave your vehicles at home and use mass transit, even if it means using Cleveland's silly bus-on-a-railroad-track thing. [see note 2]

"Behind me you can hear the song Daydream Believer, by the TV group the Monkees. In the past twenty-four hours there has been an astounding resurgence of interest in the Monkees here in the Lake area, as rumors have exploded that the animal migration is related in some way to the appearance in Cleveland of a group of fans of the stars of the late TV series. The 'Monkeeheads,' as these fans have become known, are believed to be heading towards this very museum, and in fact may already be here; who they are, and how many their number, are still unclear.

"The museum, in reaction to these events, has begun an impromptu retrospective of the Monkees, who oddly enough have never been represented here officially.

"That fact may change, however. I have with me now Ileen Gallagher, director of Exhibitions and Collections at the museum. Ms. Gallagher?"

"Hello."

"Can you tell us, aren't you afraid that the Museum is going to be seen as 'selling out,' as it were, by appearing to validate what many artists in rock and roll consider a non-existent rock group?"

"Not at all. The Museum is dedicated to preserving the history of the music, and the Monkees were certainly a major part of that history; they helped mainstream what was believed at the time to be a subversive art form, and created some of the most popular pop songs of the day."

"Has the tide of opinion changed on the Monkees, then?"

"It was never the Museum's desire to snub the group. There are simply so many worthy candidates, and the Monkees are certainly that, and we ARE limited by the rules set down in our mission as to the number of inductees each year. In answer to your question, yes, I believe public opinion has certainly changed. We're happy to acknowledge that."

Thank you, we've been speaking to Ms. Ileen Gallagher..."

She knelt before them and brushed their hair as, one by one, they awakened. The four men in their fifties lay on the ground where they had fallen, roughly in a head-to-toe line that ran the length of the darkened room. They had regained consciousness within half a minute of each other, which in this time and place seemed less coincidence than natural order. As they watched in a stunned silence, the Recycle Babe spoke.

"You're all right. Not hurt." She shook her head slightly. "When you feel ready, you can stand." A smile. "You're almost there, you know."

Above them, above the top of the walls of the room, was the glass wall that had shattered beneath their weight.

Unbroken.

As yet still unspeaking, the four scrabbled to their feet.

"This way," Torka said, leading them through the final door.

Notes:

1. Remember, she DID send me chocolate.
2. Tom would NEVER say this. But I would, and it's my story.