 
Emerging

Christian Davidson

Published by Joseph Tomko writing as Christian Davidson at Smashwords

Copyright 2016 Christian Davidson

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Blood Siam

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Thank you for downloading this ebook. This book remains the copyrighted property of the author, Joseph Tomko writing as Christion Davidson, and may not be copied or distributed to others for commercial or non-commercial purposes, without the written permission of the author. Thank you for your support.
TABLE OF CONTENTS

The Prophecy

1 opening

2 power

3 consumers

4 Domination

5 gamboge

6 ladder

7 rescue

8 wet dream

9 restrained

10 transition

11 aphrodisia

12 connection separation

13 letting go

14 become small

15 bathed

16 direction

17 winning

18 drip

19 slavery

20 bottom

21 progress and plotting

22 resist

23 control

24 betrothal

25 Arun

26 fresh air

27 orders

28 acceptance

29 reckoning

30 a tree

31 unfinished business

32 throw down

33 closing

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The Prophecy

(Nostradamus, Hopi, Sirius)

The path is now rutted

well worn by the wheel

made of stone, made of wood,

made of fire hardened steel

The path travels onward

for months and for years

for millenniums forward

on mechanical gears

The path ever growing

made wide by the sun

guarded from trespass

by sword and by gun

The path takes us nowhere

after hill, bridge and bend

The path only leads us

to a bloody dead end.
1

opening

Sabine's feet carried her faster, as she quickened her pace and increased the lengths of her long reaching strides. She almost broke into a jog, alertly cautious about the sound of footsteps behind her. She kept her eyes trained on a theoretical point in the distance and moved toward that point with a purposeful, determined, graceful power-walk. She did not want trouble today, but she was ready for it, regardless. _Maybe it's best if I never look back_ , she thought to herself _. If I can't see what or who is behind me, then it isn't really there, and it isn't a threat. Not yet._

Quickly dismissing that notion, she looked back over her right shoulder to try and casually get a quick glimpse of the creator of the footsteps that she calculated were gaining pace on her. She peered for a quick moment but saw nothing. _OK, ninety nine percent of what I worry about is pointless, so I am not worrying. Not worrying. Nothing to worry about. It's all good!....... Why are they following me now?_

She was certain that someone was getting closer to her now. Sabine instinctively reached a hand in her jean pocket and placed her palm and fingers around the security of a double edged knife that she carried, always. This blade, when extended and locked into its handle, had a serrated edge on one side and barbed saw-like teeth on the other. It could be pushed in downward, and then retracted upward, ripping tissue and flesh critically. When executed correctly, this strike could easily be lethal, and she wasn't afraid to enact it, if she had to.

Sabine considered that the knife she was carrying had been made illegal by the Chinese civil ministry several years ago, who proclaimed the ban to be an attempt to promote civilian safety. She knew that the illegality of her knife was just the government's attempt to change the ways in which civilians could fight back against their suppressors. She knew that none of the soldier-thugs had any enforced restrictions on what they would do to the people they were trying to control, in the name of peace, as they proclaimed. This prohibition meant very little to Sabine. To her, safety came first, safety in winning whatever fight came her way.

The pondering of what peace _really_ was vacated Sabine's mind quickly as she took a lunging step forward with her her right foot planting itself, and spun her body around, removing and opening the blade that resided in her pocket. Her arm thrust forward with the blade handle grasped firmly in her hand, and the point focused in on the dark hooded person that was now she was face to face with.

"What are you doing here, you little brat?" Sabine shouted at the child before her that was draped in an oversized black hoodie sweatshirt and dark sunglasses. "I almost killed you, you little punk!"

"Sorry Sabine," said Aom, the young boy of twelve years age. "I just wanted to get a few Yuan from you to get some food."

"You almost ate titanium steel!" Sabine said, putting her arm around her little brother. "Don't sneak up on me like that Aom! You know I won't hesitate to sever a tendon or two, or even a jugular!"

"I was hungry, OK?"

"Do you want your stomach and intestines removed along with your hunger?"

"No, I was hoping for some snacks. You know, you know what I like, but nuthin simthetic!"

"The word is synthetic you little buffalo, and, No! You don't ever want to eat that fake food. It will kill you quicker than I will!"

"Mom will kill you if you kill me!"

"I will have more to eat tonight if I kill you now. Now here, take this," she said as she handed Aom a couple of Yuan. "And if you want to eat tomorrow, stay alive today by staying out of my way!"

Aom ran off towards the food vending street, money in hand, and Sabine shook her head and kept walking down the badly deteriorated street. She breathed a sigh of relief because she had been spared from sudden melee, at least for now.

The atmosphere suddenly sounded extremely quiet to Sabine. It was so quiet that she couldn't help noticing it. There were no vehicle sounds, no people sounds, no animal noises, not even a dog barking. There was usually some presence of sound that created a droning background noise in the city. The only time that the people of New Siem Reap could hear a noticeable silence was when a military contingent was moving through the area and people hid, locked up in their houses. People in this city have known how to hide from soldiers for many generations.

Sabine didn't know of any scheduled or unscheduled military maneuvers going on right now. Things had been fairly quiet in the town as far as the controlling Chinese Army was concerned, but the local gang bosses kept up their control and extortion on everyone on a daily basis. Sabine often knew more than most people because she often probed the drug dealers for information, and they seemed to be the most informed people around.

_So why is it so quiet now?_ Sabine scanned the visible horizon in a three-sixty degree arc, looking at all things at once through her peripheral vision, searching for the slightest movement or irregularity. _Nothing, no one_. This silence made Sabine uneasy, but there was an upside to this unusual lack of living presence. No one was there to see her dosing up.

_No one is here, no one can see me now. Why not dose up? Who cares? I've earned it! I deserve it! I want it!_ Sabine reached into her back pocket and pulled out a small satchel. She did a double take of her surroundings, and when she was sure that no one was viewing her, she opened the zipper on the multicolored fabric purse and let a small plastic card fall out of the bag and into her hand.

The card was as big as a ten Yuan coin and had a pattern of twenty two connecting teeth on one edge, resembling piano keys. This organic looking swatch of contacts on the edge of the card were made from silicon, saline and calcium components, that served as the interface between the power drug within the card and the receptacle that it would be inserted into, her body.

Sabine, like most young and middle-aged people, had a slot in her body that could receive this card. She passionately enjoyed placing the card inside herself as part of the process, which had become a ritual to her. Her excited routine could be compared to when a pipe smoker has pure satisfaction from the ritual of packing a pipe. The placing of the pipe against the lips and lighting up a tiny bonfire, inhaling satisfying smoke into the mouth, over the tongue and into the lungs. She felt that it was again time to dose up, and time to get that rush. To feel the waves of excitement wash over her and get the boost that she employed to feel more alive.

She looked around one more time, knowing all too much that it was essential to remain mindful of whoever might be in her surroundings. _Aom was lucky today!_ And so far, so was she. Even though she was pissed off at her kid brother for giving her a useless adrenaline rush, she was relieved it had been him and not a thug, either from the local gang bosses or from the occupying Chinese army.

Sabine rolled up her shirt sleeve like a 1950's American greaser and lifted her arm up in the air, bending her elbow and gently placing her hand on her neck. She used two fingers from her other hand to grasp the plastic card that she was ready to guide into the surgically created receptacle in her armpit. Something made her hesitate and she spun around, dropping her arm into a defensive face-guarding barrier.

A hooded figure, larger than her little brother, was right there, in her face. He had come out of nowhere. She would never have let anyone get that close to her. _How did he do that?_

"This path is not for you." said the man who Sabine couldn't quite see. His face was completely hidden in the shadows that his hood created. "This is only a shadow on your way into the light."

Sabine did not strike, but she was poised to. Instead, she defended, and guarded her face. _Who is this freak and what is he talking about!_ She had a strange attraction to this person and felt no real threat. She thought his body seemed, transparent somehow. "What do you want? I don't have anything." she announced, declaring herself not worth being robbed.

"The fluid power within you will release into the world." He said with certainty, "The tiny light within will shine so bright it burns." He turned around and began walking away from her.

She heard him chanting in the Khmer language as he stepped further away. "Go eat some papaya and use your mouth for something else, old man!" She called to him, wanting to seem threatening but feeling that there was something more to this meeting. She relaxed her stance and brushed off her aura. When she looked out again, the hooded figure was gone.

Sabine looked around for him, surprised, and confused, not seeing him anywhere. _He's better at the ninja arts than I am!_ She regulated her breath as she gathered herself, and began thinking about her dose again. _Why would he interrupt me to tell me buffalo shit? This neighborhood is getting crazier all the time!_

Sabine did not sense anyone's presence and decided that it was safe to continue with her procedure. She shuddered in anticipation just thinking about it. Her arm went up, the card came out and it slid in effortlessly, with no conductive-anesthetic lubricant, and the interface began to connect. Underneath her subcutaneous skin layer, the current conducting tissues and fluids began sharing chemical information with the contents of this modern drug.

Sabine trembled slightly and exhaled shakily as the drug took effect. The neural-chemical concoction of this product passed through the metal-organic interface and started to blend with her own neural-chemical-electrical pathways, swirling and combining like sugar in coffee. Her brain received the chemical message that everything was fine, everything was safe and secure, that the world was in order. The theme of this feeling, which she considered a side effect, was, _It's all good!_ Followed by, _I am invincible!_ Sabine loved that feeling, being unbeatable.

Scientists created the power drug to enhance communication, but another use became apparent and exploited soon after its inception. This drug, which was locally called 'power,' gave the user a heroin/cocaine-style body high, with a clear-sighted rapid brain wave increase, and the feeling that one's own soul, one's own divine eternal nature, was in perfect synch with the universe.

The experience of all these intensities occurring at once made the human feel ultra-human and more divine. The body experienced more strength while the mental and magical powers soared to new heights. There had never before been a more complex high available to the human condition. One felt 'power' coursing through their being after interfacing with the substance. Most people used the power for the high effect, but Sabine had a much deeper understanding of her unique powerful experience.

Sabine was feeling the power take her now. She took the card out of her accepting skin flap and slipped it back into its bag and into her back pocket again. She closed her eyes and hung her head down, totally engrossed in feelings of lucid tranquility and languid, listless non-apprehension. She let out a deep long sigh of contentment as she embraced the onrushing sensations.

With Sabine, the power drug strongly affected her natural sense of empathy and awareness of everything around her. She could only explain it as a sixth sense, because she experienced things and understood things with a sense organ that she never knew she had. As the physical high kicked in fully, she couldn't control its initial rush, but she did enjoy it.

Sabine took off running with the feeling of fluid wings attached to her sneaker-clad feet. She sprinted at full-bore down the pothole-ridden street like an Olympic runner on steroids, but even faster. Her brain was pouring ten times the amount of adrenaline and serotonin into her system, giving her muscles and tendons the power to do super-human things. She had a devious smiling grin tucked into her intent face as she pushed herself to whatever extreme she was going to experience right now. She ran like a hungry demoness in search of hopeless lost souls to devour. She ran with the belief that she was unstoppable. She didn't pay any attention to the new army billboard that she had just run past. It boasted the phrase, 'OUR POWER NEVER RELENTS!,' written in bold yellow letters on a black background.

The initial adrenaline burst lasted only for a few minutes for her, because her body could only produce so much, even when it was chemically triggered to release a deluge of it. Sabine slipped from a full tilt run into a jog, and then a few long heavy steps brought her back to a stealthy walking pace. Her eyes were noticeably wider and as open as they could be, as were her pupils dilated. Her mind raced with the processing of a plethora of thoughts and images all at once, with confidence, conviction and resolve. There was no allowance for hesitation because this chemical interaction created a highly decisive cerebral confidence within her.

She would sometimes feel a conflict within herself about the morality of employing this effect, but moments after inserting it, all doubt slipped away. Her plans for the day seemed very solid now. She knew that a regional dealer at the end of this street would provide her with more of the power that she craved and employed. The card that she was dosing from now had only one or two doses left on it, and it needed to be recharged. She was going to see the dealer now to re-up her supply, regardless of the cost. She wanted it, and she would have it.

She wanted to use a new set of doses to amp her into a frenzy that she could use to fight any neighborhood thugs and create a little bit more breathing room for her family to exist. She didn't know why the world was so crazy, nor why she had become a 'power' using, vigilante warrior at sixteen, but this was her reality now, _harm those who would harm my family. Injure those who inflict injury. And kill or be killed, no matter who, no matter why._

She felt as if she could sense her _power_ dealer inside of his cement compound. She could see him moving products around and packaging bundles together, even though she was still a kilometer away. She could feel the slight temperature difference caused by the florescent lamp above him. She could hear the crinkle of plastic bags at a molecular level and the pouring of a granular powder, grain by grain.

She could smell the metal and plastic of this tightly secured building. She sensed all of this from afar, because in her current heightened state of existence, space and distance had much less relevancy. One unmistakable sense that she could feel from this building was the abundance of _power inside_ it. She could taste it with her mind, her fingers and even with her hair. This place should have given anyone warning signals that it was a dangerous place to be, but Sabine felt it represented safety for some reason.

Sabine was convinced that she didn't use this drug for the physical high. She surely did receive a high, but she saw it as a side effect and it left her awareness shortly after it began to enhance her. Rather, what she felt from the drug foremost was a stronger sense of connection with everything and her ability to manipulate the world around her. It was as if her awareness of, and her focus on, the thing she assumed was her soul, felt like it was expanding like a growing cloud of smoke filling a valley.

Many of the users of this phenomenon substance were junkies of another sort before they started taking it. So when they used 'power,' and the high initially kicked in, that is where their focus remained, on the 'high' experience. The empathic, telepathic and telekinetic effects, along with the super heightened sense of awareness it could create, were barely noticeable abilities that the common junkie dismissed as undesirable side effects. Sabine saw them as super powers.

She left the exposed openness of the decaying road and followed a trail into a wooded area which was sheltered by a tall canopy of tree branches. The forest provided camouflage practice for her to dissolve into. In her career of studies of mixed martial arts and stealth techniques, she was currently studying how to disappear. With the enhancements provided by the power drug, and her natural abilities of physical focus and meditation, she disappeared.

A dog trotted along the side of a cement road that was surrounded by crispy dry barren rice paddies on either side of it. He passed by a house that had different calico shades of brown tobacco leaves hanging to dry in hot sun in the front yard and the smell was enticing. This dog did not have the ability to use an oppose-able thumb to light and hold a cigarette, but _Oh!_ how he wanted one.

This golden retriever sire, formerly incarnated as the Buddhist monk Pra Ajarn Malet, still had the strong urge to smoke a cigarette as he had done in his previous human body, but today, like everyday, there would be no enjoying that simple pleasure.

Meas, which was the name the monks at the nearby temple called him, kept trotting along the village road in the golden sunrise glow that was settling in on the dry lifeless fields. When Meas arrived at a bridge that crossed a small canal, he smelled something unfamiliar, a human smell that was not from nearby.

"What are you looking at?" A shabbily dressed, skinny, middle-aged man yelled at the passing dog, as if the beast could understand humans. The dog Meas could not speak English, this was true, but there was a highly evolved entity residing within this animal. The canine brain wanted to bark and possibly bite this stranger whose smell was not quite right, but the sentient spirit directed its paws to just keep on moving forward, turning his head and ignoring the strange smelling man.

Meas trotted across the bridge, making a mental note to remember to be cautious of this stranger. Ahead he could see a skinny brown dingo looking dog coming his way. This was his friend Prak, a mutt-mix hound who was carrying the reincarnated soul of Pra Ajarn Goheen. The dogs sped up as they neared each other and performed the instinctual ritual of butt smelling and tail wagging, even a lip sniffing to see what the other had eaten lately. All the smells and tastes were familiar and safe.

"Good to see you old soul!" said Prak to Meas in their telepathic communication. "It is always a pleasure to see your fine shiny coat!" "You are looking thin as usual my friend," said Meas. "Have you eaten rice yet today?"

"Yes, I have eaten several things today, unlike the constrictive rules of my last religious community that allowed me to eat once a day. Oh the joy of rummaging through garbage bins and begging from customers at the restaurants! I'm sorry Meas, but I won't apologize. The dog that I am takes center stage so often!"

"Since you will surely not starve today, little consumer, will you join me for a visit to the far side of this field of rice paddies? I want to speak to the hound that guards the medical services building. Maybe he knows where Lok Sabai is these days."

"Hospital hound? You mean the old soul who thinks he has met everyone in our universe? The same dog that bites my heels every time we meet? I don't want to see him, and I don't care about that eternal braggart either. No thanks! I neither wish to be bored nor bitten!"

"Come along now, you can return to tipping trash bins over later. I would benefit from your company when I approach old Kama."

"Old Kama is an old, well traveled soul but in the most cantankerous hound dog robes. And don't forget that he threatened to tell humans about our sanctuary here resting in the animal kingdom."

"Don't pee on so many of his marking spots and he might not nip you a lesson. There is no need for you to concern yourself about humans finding out that we share a spiritual bond. They already know this on some level. They're only humans after all!"

"OK, I will go with you to talk to old Kama if you will repay the favor."

"What is it you would ask me to do, novice?"

"Come with me! I want to know what that man on the bridge is hiding underneath it."
2

power

Sabine was invisible to the average human eye and to half of the animal kingdom, but the simple brain within the lizard's head, the lizard that was hanging onto some tree bark above Sabine, was very aware of her presence. It cocked its head and rotated its eyes to survey the heat emissions from this strange figure below it. The shape below it was large, and likely a predator, but the reptile could not see the creature's eyes and it did not sense that it was about to be eaten, so it continued to hang out and survey for things to eat and things that might enjoy eating scaly lizard flesh.

Sabine was squatting down with her back against a tree, her knees sticking out at her sides. Her hands were palms down on the top of her head and her elbows were also flanking her sides. If anyone could see her, they would observe an hour glass shape. But no one could see her in her current well camouflaged state, which was uncommon and ninja-like.

She clung tight to the contour of the tree with her entire body. She greatly reduced her breath rate and sucked her aura inside of herself, which was the strongest and most effective component of her disappearing artistry. Her skills at meditation and body control, enhanced with the power of _power_ , enabled her to blend into her scenery like a deceptive chameleon. She also was becoming adept at controlling her aura and her ethereal skeleton. She was understanding how to focus the outward radiating energy of her atomic make up, inward towards itself. This event would turn the shadow side of her atoms and subatomic particles to a position that was facing out. She was allowing the dark matter within herself, to blanket her physical framework, becoming virtually invisible.

She did not comprehend the science of this technique, but was becoming adept in its implementation. It required complete awareness of oneself, and awareness of the concept that oneself is not really oneself, but rather a colony of of collective entities. She was very much looking forward to the mastery of this technique. She was beginning to understand that when she could fully disassociate herself as a single entity, and become fully aware of all of the entities the comprised her, she could influence these entities, through will, to do anything, She couldn't wait to walk through walls.

She considered that another adept might be looking at the surroundings in a discriminatory manner, and might be able to see her, as could the tree lizard. She understood that the most revealing informant about her position was her own self, in that she could not hide herself from what she did not yet understand. She could not hide from the future. She felt like she had a purpose in life, but she felt like she had definitely not yet found it. She thought she knew everything, but she hungered for something more, bigger, more epic.

Sabine could see the lizard above herself without even looking at it. She could feel it probing her. She could feel the difference in temperature of the gaze of the little creature compared to the dry brittle bark of the tree. She could sense that she was a target of another consciousness, even though it was not a self-aware consciousness. The simple brain of the reptile was also not aware that Sabine was manipulating it. She implanted the idea, in vibrational form, that she was an herbivore and not hungry, and this concept was received and accepted by the tiny onlooker, that continued to go on about its own way, unaware of any danger.

Sabine's powers were advancing quickly. Besides manipulating the brains of small creatures, she could also implant thoughts into people's heads. It wasn't that hard for her because she was taught by her mother at a young age that our thoughts are not our own. Rather, that they were like clouds that can settle like a fog on a group of people or even a generation. It is up to each individual how they choose to respond to these inputs, and for those who react quickly, they perhaps would become known as trend setting, pioneering individuals, when in fact they are not the sole proprietors of the paradigm shift.

With the awareness of this concept, with her own accelerated cerebral powers, and the boost that she received from _power_ , she was able to implant thoughts of her choosing onto other external regions, like an ecosystem living in a tree or even a small group of people standing together. The brain processes occurring within the beings in her sphere of influence, were more likely to accept her promoted thoughts as their own and believe them to be true. This skill lent itself to the user to be a tool of manipulation. Sabine knew how to bend situations to her liking.

There were many others who could employ this technique as well, and some quite better than Sabine. In the past, various crime syndicates were maintained to use mind control on the public through advertising, creating large influence in all medias. The public audience could be easily led down any path that the viewing screens showed them.

Most of those influenced by these mind thugs were unaware that they were ever being led on, and even today, with the awareness of this technique, most people are too lazy to question their thoughts or to be mindful of their selves. In this particular culture, most people were raised to accept and do whatever they were told, and not to practice critical thinking or discerning mindful questioning. The lethargy of the familiar is an opiate for the masses.

The more advanced thought slingers were capable of not only injecting and imposing thought, but could also steal thoughts, remove memories, cause madness or commit cerebral rape. Society reacted to this even if they were unaware that it was happening to them, and strange events came into being within certain demographics, such as soul suicide and mental estivation. The benefit for thought slingers interacting with the drug _power_ was that they could commit these intrusive acts with much more effective results.

Sabine took off running, jumping, cartwheeling and swinging from tree to tree and covered a long distance of ground in a short amount of time. A final leap and an airborne somersault placed her in a crouched position just outside the electric fence surrounding the power distributor's compound. No one was aware of her passing, save one tree lizard.

Now, lie in front of her, a small brick building with no windows, perimitered by a tall chain link fence that contained a flow of about ten thousand volts of electricity. She contacted Kiri, the worker inside the building, by ringing his mental doorbell. Ninety nine percent of his non-sponsored customers approached the front gate or used a phone to contact him, but Sabine had enough connection and ability to reach him directly, unless he was asleep. She didn't yet have enough strength to awake a soul traveling in the dream world, even though she could communicate with them.

A buzzer at the front gate sounded and a metal box made a faint clicking sound as a lock released and allowed the highly electrified passage to swing open. Sabine quickly stepped through and heard the gate close behind her as she walked up to the front door. The high from the drug was not what she was focusing on, she was being hyper aware on physical, visual, telepathic and auditory levels.

The front door of the compound opened shortly after the electrified metal gate did, and she mentally assured the man inside, Kiri that she was alone and looking for a hook up. Kiri sat in a flimsy plastic chair with his hands crossed staring at Sabine in a half angry, half curious glare.

"So who else is supplying you and does he treat you better than me?" Kiri asked her as she strode into the room. "I haven't seen you in over a month."

"You are my connection, sir," she politely replied, "I have not been resupplied anywhere else, only with you. I have been conservative with my yuan because I have to support my family. You know this. Why are you giving me shit anyhow?"

"Never mind my interest in my customers, how are you going to pay me today?"

"The same way as last time, unless you want to give it to me for free."

"Yeah, no! That's not going to happen, I have enough junkies trading their body for it already. I need some financial contribution from you, if you want to power up."

"I can give you some... funds... next time. OK? You're not going anywhere and neither am I, so the payment is assured."

"That's not going to fly little girl!" He said to Sabine, probing her thoughts deeply to understand what her game was today. All he could sense was her addiction and her ambition, and couldn't tell which one was stronger. But she had a, something, that Kiri admired greatly.

"If you won't have me in the chair, then can I do any kind of favor for you?" she said, feeling a little desperate, but trying to keep a coarse exterior, while Kiri just stared at her, up and down, like he was reconsidering having her as forbidden unmarried carnal knowledge, but saying nothing. "Are you going to hook me up or what?

Kiri was a middle aged man, who was neither glamorous nor unkempt, just average. He worked for his boss, who he knew only by a voice, and he operated this distributing facility, collecting money and moving product. The _power_ was made in a high-tech lab and brought to this location escorted by Chinese soldiers. Kiri had proven to be loyal, quiet and dependable, so his boss allowed him to enact a few side deals in which he supplied a collection of interesting individuals and sexy women in exchange with a tailored version of this highly addictive product. Sabine was a bit small for his fetish specifications, but he was feeling generous today.

"OK little girl," he said condescendingly, "Same same?"

"Tweak it a little more to the physical side." Sabine said, contemplating her defensive moves against onrushing attackers. She was weak in body strength, and wanted more power with combat strikes and maneuverability.

"OK kid," he said extending an outstretched pointing hand, "sit down, and keep your clothes on." He changed his mind about having her and devised a different payment plan.

Meas and Prak trotted through a dry stream bottom and up the side of a dry irrigation ditch, placing them along side a treeline that they used for shade on their jaunt to the medical center that housed the old dog, known as old Kama. They stopped to smell thirty seven urinating posts and found the discarded remains of some sliced green papaya and a foul, spicy-sour, fishy smelling sauce that all dogs hated and never ate. They passed two humans who were lounging under some shade created by coconut palm leaves woven into a roof structure.

"There is nothing under that bridge except for rocks, sand and dust,"said Meas presumptuously as they trotted along their way. "And the water under there is almost all gone, and doesn't taste very good at all."

"That was true last week," said Prak, "but this strange smelling man is living down there now, and I want to know what he is eating and what he might be leaving around that a dog could drag off and chew on."

"You mostly think of your stomach my friend. What were you in your last lifetime, a hungry caterpillar?"

"You know I was buffalo, I told you before."

"Just as the emotion of guilt seems to reincarnate with some beings, I think so has the hunger of a fat buffalo in your case."

"Were you ever a buffalo, Meas?"

"I believe that I was something like a buffalo once. I remember being in a field with many other bovine creatures. Life was easy. Everything was given to me. I had neither want nor need. I lived under the sun and the moon mostly, until we all went on a vacation in a motorized machine made just for a creature of our size fit in. I don't remember much of the trip though, except for a meeting I had with a human who knew exactly where my third eye was. He reached out to touch me with his metal finger and then........ well, that's all I remember. So, yes, I was something like a buffalo once."

"Do you remember being hungry? As hungry as I am now?"

"Hunger is not the memory that I have from that time, but hunger is a theme for you. Perhaps you should try fasting."

"I'm inside a dog, Meas. Remember? If I do not eat every few minutes, I could die!"

"You truly live in the moment Prak, the hungry moment. If you hunger for Nibana, you will attain everything and the hunger will cease."

"I understand Meas, but tell that to my stomach, not my floppy ears. Why do you want to know about Lok Sabai anyway?"

"I feel drawn to connect with him. It feels like something monumental is about to happen. I can't place this feeling on any one thing, but somehow, it is causing excitement for me, here on the earthly plane."

"Just call him on your...what is it? Telepathy phone?"

"Prak, you are making a joke for sure. You know how to do it."

"I used to know how to do it, when I was a human being. Now there are way too many interesting smells for me to read thoughts, I live by the smell!"

"If that helps you stay in the moment, Prak, then you are here now."

"Meas, why did we choose dog incarnations again? It is too difficult for dogs to be fasting!"

"Prak, you willingly took the vows of joining the 'order of the abandonment', as did I!"

"Yes, I know, but I didn't know what hunger was until now. I'm always hungry!"

"Stay hungry for enlightenment. Nothing tastes like Nibana."

"I want to eat meat! I can not be a vegetarian! I'm a dog, Meas!"

"Good dog!"

"Thank you."

"You're welcome. Have you come down yet?"

"Yeeees. I am calm."

"Can you feel your light within?"

"Is it behind my stomach?"

"You need only touch it once. Then, it will become everything you ever meant to do."

"Meas, when do you think I will reach Nibana? How many more lifetimes?"

"Why don't you ask Lok Sabai? Maybe he can tell you. He started the order of the abandonment to strengthen the seekers as well as give the simplest thing to humans, companionship. You must have believed that accepting this humble incarnation would bring you closer to enlightenment."

"Yes, I'd like a mint!"

"Thank you for teaching me patience, Prak."

"Don't mention it! You can reward me with something to eat!"

Kiri held out his hand and waited for Sabine to place a spent plastic _power_ card in it. Sabine extracted the item from her purse and dropped into his hand. Kiri lifted it to his face, smelled it and cringed his nose a little. "Have you considered a neck or an earlobe port as opposed to a pit slit? Because you are so active, the sweat under your arms could corrode the metal components of the card and constrict your absorption rate, not to mention it smells bad as well!"

"Hold your nose if you have to!" Sabine said, annoyed with his advice. She felt least constricted in martial arts movements with her port in this position. She didn't want any ideas from anyone, good bad or otherwise. Sabine was a rebel and did things her way. "Just hook me up and tell me what you want me to do for you."

Kiri set about inserting her card into a device that would analyze, sterilize and refill the cards that were the substrate for the _powe_ r drug to cling to. There used to be a form of the _power_ drug that was injected, smoked or eaten by its users. This original drug form of _power_ was introduced to people using these delivery methods because they were the familiar methods that were practiced to use all of the other drugs that were available. Today, the card was used because it was more measurable and interactively diagnostic with its use. That was what the junkies collectively believed.

Technology in the world had reached a stagnant point during this age of communication. In the past, it seemed that everyone in the world had a telephone device, regardless of their income level. With the collapse of most world economies, only the rich and elite had any new technology, and the gap between the rich and poor never stopped growing. Only in the past two decades, did a new technology, or means of using technology, emerged in the form of a human/computer interface card. It was highly regulated by the Chinese government and used mainly as a means to insert propaganda into the masses. Only the drug users were in the know about the card's ability to be reconfigured to transmit _special_ effects. Only the highest levels of the Chinese superpower were privy to the real story behind the interface card.

There were two kinds of power in circulation in the world today, one that was known about by willing addicts, ready to have it routinely, and one that was added to the interactive card secretively. The majority of mainstream people with a skin port used the card as a tech product, believing that it had a special interactive substance in it which enhanced the body's ability to accept, process and transmit information. They were unaware of the form of power that it contained.

Power was inside of every card-using person in the world today. Drug users enjoyed it. Mainstream users were manipulated by a different form of it. Kiri knew about variations of it that nobody else knew. Sabine only knew she wanted more of it.

Kiri was more than just a distributor of the drug, he was an alchemist with it as well, and could adapt it to the user's preferences. He tweaked the drug's physical signature to add more high or more strength, more relaxation or more enlightenment. He added a mixture of powders, solutions and micro-current to the device to create an experience for Sabine that would put her physical body on overload. Sabine was special, he knew this. She was not the usual sort of junkie that he was used to having as a customer. They all wanted to be higher, but Sabine, her fluid existence was unmistakably astounding.

While Kiri was adjusting the measurements of the current, temperature and ingredients that would be pressurized into the card, the device that controlled this process was adjusting things as well, unknown to Sabine and even Kiri. The device Kiri worked with was linked with all other similar devices to a mainframe that was kept under extreme military guard inside a mountain somewhere in the remote Chinese Gaoligong mountain range. While the cards were being refilled, they were also being scanned for all organic information that the user left behind in the form of dead cells or any bodily remnants.

This information became part of a human societal genome that the Chinese empire used as a massive controlling grip on the actions of the world's people. Everything about every human was entered into an interminable Akashic records archive, that only the prime minister and his selected advisers could ever have access to.

And one more clandestine thing was going on within this device at the same time, unknown to both Sabine and to Kiri's boss. Kiri had adapted this whole process to be able to steal memories. A chemical that he added to his refill mixture functioned like an ethereal glue and would absorb the memories of the user. When he refilled the cards with power, a machine that he used to hack into the device would collect the memories and document the user. These memories could only be 'viewed' by someone adept and specialized enough to understand what they were seeing and experiencing.

Kiri had a lot of free time inside the compound when no one was bringing in supplies or paying for them. He used this time to scan appropriated memories and look for anything erotic, especially with large women, which was his fetish. Besides using it as a peep show, he was tempted to create a side business by using lower level junkie thugs to extort or blackmail people with the information that he collected. Kiri considered that with his clients of the lowest intelligence, he could have them believe that he removed their memories and make them pay a high tax to get them back, even though they would not actually be missing, they could just be clouded.

Kiri only played with this idea though. He knew other distributors who were running a similar operation, which is where he got the idea, but he couldn't bring himself to be that much of a criminal. He resolved that he was being criminal enough already, and that he would have a heavy karmic debt to pay for what he was already involved with. Kiri didn't really want to hurt people. He just wanted to get what he wanted from them and use it for his own hidden agenda, which was slightly perverted, and mostly self preserving.

Kiri could hear Sabine mumbling to herself while she sat in a chair and stared at her feet, and he wondered what she might be saying. He saw her as a very interesting girl, mature beyond her years and full of her self as well. He knew a bit about her from the memories he collected from her. He knew that she was a rebel, that she hated the Chinese occupiers, that she felt a strong dedication and responsibility for her family and that she was very uncertain about her future, she wrestled with it. He knew that she was a poet, a free thinker and a musician. He also discovered her contempt for Eastern values of face, her disdain for traditional family values, and her absolute hatred for organized religion. This was the ethereal signature that could confirm her true identity every time.

Kiri couldn't understand his interest in Sabine. He only knew that she sometimes seemed like someone that everyone would love, and sometimes she was just a brat little kid. From her stolen thoughts, Kiri felt closer to her. Now he was hooking her up with power for next to nothing, because she was so damn, naturally charismatic. She seemed too solid of a person to be using drug cards, and Kiri could not compare any of his customers to Sabine.

While he was implementing his task to procure a hand tailored signature drug for Sabine, he slipped a card into his own neck port, and tensed his muscles bracing for this super high that he chemically tweaked, as a line of drool ran down his scruffy chin.

Sabine was rapping to herself, with some angry words that she found wanting to shoot out of her like a projectile. In her already enhanced state of being, these words seemed even more meaningful to her. Sabine was very much an adult, but she was only a kid on some levels. Her direction in life has been to face whichever way danger is coming from. Her creative soul longed for expression but was bound by circumstance. She was growing in power constantly but didn't know what to do with it. She felt like she had a special purpose but had no clue.

The ability to manipulate thoughts had her questioning what she could do with it, and what she should do with it. Her moral struggle was that which lies between hatred for oppression and an innate desire to look for the beauty in life. Her martial arts training was constantly advancing, but she wasn't quite sure what to do with it besides use it for survival. Her hormones were raging but her trust of males was miniscule. At sixteen years old, her life felt quite complicated. These were the swirls of uncertainty in her life that she kept inside, not trusting anyone enough to talk about them.

This was what she was rapping while she was waiting:

Same wind...same sun...

but this fight's begun!

We used to hang around,

we knew so many fun......

ways to be together,

in the same old weather,

now the peace is gone,

blown away like feathers.

I see a golden flag here,

and what I knew was dear...

been smashed by soldiers,

bringing only fear!

Now the fear has changed,

and I'm more deranged,

I might be hiding now...

keeping you in range!

Don't know what I'm doin',

my neighborhood is ruined.

Gimme more power

and let's start screwin.

I can kick your ass,

I can walk on glass!

When is this fool regime

ever gonna pass?

I wanna run a way,

but I gotta stay.

There's something I gotta do...

...I hope I know what, someday.

After ten minutes of an extreme weightless floaty feeling, Kiri found his mind drifting into a dimensional surfing action on a more universal sea. He passed the self imposed barrier that he recognized as the _edge_ of himself, and entered the pool of consciousness that was the human collective. There, in the ether, he quickly located Sabine and made contact.

"Hello Sabine. Can you hear me?"

"Yes, I know your presence Kiri. So what do you want me to do for you? A video of something provocative and strange this time?"

_"Well, I don't want what is between your legs, nor your ears, but can I interest you in a new batch of spiritual high?"_ Kiri presented this suggestion, to make sure that he was dealing with the hardcore atheist Sabine and not a poser or imposter. After all, there were those agents of the empire that hung out in the ether, feeling everything that was going on and keeping tabs on the enlightened.

"No god damn thanks, dali mohammed christ, but stick to what you know I like!"

"I have some synthetic seafood here. Would you like to sample it?"

"Have you ever seen me eat any of that fake crap? No! And in case you ask me again, NO!"

"Why are you so feisty Sabine? Why do you resist so much of the way things are?"

"There are slaves and there are masters. And I'm a disease. I will infect the slaves for a chance to infect the masters. When they are sick, they leave me alone. Most people are slaves, but not me. I don't play by anyone's rules but my own!"

"Maybe you should find a mate, someone to distract you from the day to day resistance."

"I need a mate like I need an authoritative doctrine. I am fine by myself. Kiri, why are you playing Mr. advice with me? What do you care what I do besides give you whatever it is that you want?"

"OK Sabine. You come to me because I give you what you want. What I want from you is this."
3

consumers

The sun glared down on the parched landscape. The sky was not willing to give a single drop of moisture from the dry atmosphere. The long dry season this year was longer and drier than the last record setting year. Many species had already become extinct due to the changing temperatures. Mosquitoes were not one of them, as they were one of the mutations that had adapted to the dry climate.

In the botanical realm, whatever drought resistant plants were still living were as brown as the scenery all around them, with their life force buried as deep into the soil as they could push, waiting for the life bringing monsoons to arrive. They were not in a hurry, nor did they feel that anything they did was of any importance. Plants knew that there was a time to be dry and a time to drink the sky tears up. Insightful Buddhists acknowledged the plant world's non attached lifestyle, and most plants could easily recognize a laid back Buddhist.

Meas' golden coat reflected some of the sun's intense rays, and Prak's tongue hung a little lower to optimize the evaporative cooling that it performed for the rest of his body. Meas had a longer coat of fur, but Prak's darker color was more of a solar battery, retaining more of the radiant heat. Prak had to momentary lie down under the sparse shade of a coconut tree.

"Go ahead Meas, I'll catch up with you." Prak related to Meas, in that special, monk-reincarnated-in-dog telepathy that some special canines shared.

"I believe that you might abandon me to follow your nose as it picks up the smell of meat cooking a kilometer away," replied Meas. "I will wait for you friend. I could use a rest too!"

_"I want you to stop coming here."_ said Kiri in his telepathic vibrational voice.

_"You aren't making sense today!"_ thought back Sabine, _"Are you high on regular drugs?"_

"I don't want you to come here any more, because I want you to start buying across town from Nimol, the dealer by the monument."

"You want me to go to that creepy lech? I will find some money to pay you, OK? I'm not going to have anything to do with Nimol! He is lower than dog..."

"Sabine! Listen to me! I need to know who is supplying him besides the Chinese army. He is moving way more product than he is receiving, and I want to know where he is getting it. I don't want him causing problems for the rest of us, 'legal' workers."

"He's probably cutting his power with salt or something benign!"

"I don't need analysis nor advice from you, Sabine. If you want to continue to get power from me, I will give it to you for free, with no physical trade, but I need you to be my eyes on the physical plane. I am stuck in this concrete compound and I can't do it myself. I don't have any one that I trust, that has skills like you. I will give you some Yuen to purchase the power as well, and a little to keep for yourself and your family. So, are you going to do this for me?"

"What choice are you giving me, really?"

"You can refuse. I will stop supplying you. And you can pay me triple for this batch I am making you now. I think you are really going to like this one. I made it special for you with just the right amount of..."

"Alright. alright, I'll do it. But what if someone was going to buy from sleazy Nimol, and when they were there and looked around, what exactly would they be seeing? And I don't understand why you don't spy on him from the comfort of your office chair, using the visionary power skills you have."

"Nimol has learned to successfully shield himself from my stares. I have not been able to peer in on any of his business. He is using ether blockers somehow. But anyway, after you make a purchase from any street tout near Angkor Wat, tell the dupe that you will pay him double if he takes you to meet Nimol. They all go to him for their supplies. Then, tell him a story, I don't care what. Maybe say that you have something special for Nimol. The tout won't refuse you, but he will want to tag along once he sees you as a customer, a source of money, so lose him however you have to and don't give him any real information. Play dumb with Nimol, and leave right away, but register a neural photograph of any containers that you see that are bigger than a purse. Notice any equipment and machinery, and burn a retinal image of everyone coming or going or hanging with Nimol. After you leave, remember the terrain and plan a way to go back, to a spot where you can see any one going in and out of his compound. Use your power to aid your camouflage so NO one sees you and talk to me only when I contact you from here, in the ether. Once you begin this, though, you can not come here again!"

"OK, so you don't want anyone recognizing a connection, I get it, but how am I going to know its you that's contacting me, and not some etheric power vampire?"

"I will ask you the same questions that I started this conversation with, some kind of question about a spiritual high, and I will expect an angry response, that way I will know it's you and you will know it's me!"

"Will I only be able to power up with Nimol's stuff? I am spoiled with the custom tailored product you create for me. How can I get some more of that?"

"OK. I will give you two cards today. After I talk with you next, if you help me out with what I want, I will find a way to send you more."

"Fine, can I talk to you in person now? This connection is starting to grow weak."

A tall man wearing long ornate robes slowly slid his fingers across the smooth leathery bindings of a row of books resting on a teak wall shelf. He paused momentarily at each book to read the title, but didn't linger on any one book very long. "Ah, the musings of a simpler day!" The Prime Minister said out loud but unto himself, as he was alone in his study chamber. He wasn't going to read any of these books today. No, that would require a day when all concerns were quiet like a ripple-less morning lake. A faint knock on the large, thick, wooden door disturbed the quiet and a meek, bowing figure poked its head into the library.

"Excuse me, Lord Arun, your excellency. May I request an unscheduled meeting with five officials from the extended empire?" said a fat man in a clerical Chinese looking uniform. "The minister of foreign affairs from the southern province of Nepal and his assistant, the minister of communication from Russia and two heads of the military from the Laos province have journeyed here to consult you personally. Should I tell them that you will receive them?"

"Lord Xiangtou, can you not see that I am reading in my personal space!" barked Lord Arun, the Prime Minister of China and overseer of the extended empire. "Perhaps you would have me feed the courtyard chickens as well?"

"Sir! Please forgive me!" cowered Lord Xiangtou, the high priest of Chinese Empire's royal court of foreign relations. "I will send them to the guest compound and await word from you."

"Postpone that trip to the spas," said his excellency Lord Arun, "I should like to have some interesting conversation with our Patrons now. I don't want them to be too soft and complacent later. That would bore me worse than your fat, sniveling, interrupting mouth!"

"As you wish my lord!" said the low bowing official. "May I set the meeting in the Lotus room for noon today sir?"

"As you may," the Lord Arun said in a falling tone, "See that they are treated fairly, but not too well. I don't want any of our loyalists thinking that this is a soft empire. This is the region of the rising sun, and rising power! Not the bed that your fat ass sleeps on!"

"We will commence there your excellency," said an even lower bowing Xiangtou, "Your decisions are wise and abiding with the rising power!"

"Go now fat ass!" said the Prime Minister, returning to his survey of his tomes. To himself, Arun muttered a curse of tapeworms on his obese assistant's digestion. Lord Arun recalled the last minister of foreign relations, _with that stern and serious chiseled composure. His ruthless consistency at staring down any other human. His strong jaw. His commanding presence. Now look what I am stuck with! Lord meek and melon-like! I wish he were not a relative of Kosal, but he is, and so I am charged with his presence in order to keep the Mage serving this empire only!_

Meas stood up slowly, and entered into a downward dog asana in order to stretch his back and limbs. He made a soft groan through his nose, exhaling as he did so. Prak complied with the body language gesture and stood up to stretch before returning to walking. The temperature grew one degree hotter while they rested.

The two canine companions snaked their way across the risen berms of earth that encircled the dry rice paddies. The ground was smoother on the top of the berms from three thousand years of human foot traffic, and this area was much softer on the dog's paw pads than inside the buffalo trodden interior which was shaped like a concave bowl, parched and cracked but ready to hold water. They approached the cement wall that encircled the hospital perimeter from the rear of the compound. They could smell rubbing alcohol and bitter pill smells coming from inside the fence. They also smelled the droppings of Old Kama on the slightest but very desirable breeze wafting through the air.

The front gate was kept closed now, so that a guard could record concise information of all those entering or leaving. This wasn't the way things were done in the past. Before the Chinese occupation, the gate was only kept closed at night, mainly to keep wandering animals out, and people came and went as they pleased, even sleeping there if they required prolonged attention. Now, the hospital was more of a medical factory to install card slots on people and deal with the human-computer interface problems that went with it. If a person was rich or well connected, they could still get medical attention there, but most of the people, who were farmers by circumstance, used natural remedies or pharmacies for placebo drugs, for the maladies of this new age.

Fifteen years ago, the Ministry of Health mandated that all Chinese citizens under sixty years old must receive a computer interfacing skin port. The Ministry of Health was complying with the Prime Minister's directive to return to a policy of survival of the fittest. Weak, old and sick people were not allowed to be a burden of the empire, and were therefore, ignored. Those capable of direct computer interfacing were deemed to be the healthiest of the species, and given priority. The vision Lord Arun had was of a master race of Chinese people that would raise the Golden Empire to heights never before seen by civilization.

Meas didn't have a skin port, nor did Prak, but not every dog could say that, if a dog could say anything at all. Some dogs had slots from when they were used during the initial experimentation process, and still carried cards within their bodies today, March 13, 2073 or 2616, depending on which calendar you go by. Animals and the poorest people of China were the first to be tested on. The people who survived the infections that resulted actually got a status upgrade in society for being one of the interface carriers. The dogs were left to roam, cards still in place, to become information collectors. The empire intended to use the canine, test-subjects, as spies, but that plan was abandoned because there was no known way to decipher a dog's thoughts and perceptions, in human terms.

Meas didn't want a skin port either. He really didn't want anything from life at all, being in his current state of timelessness. He did however want to speak with Lok Sabai, and thought that maybe old Kama had seen him. Prak considered that he would like a means of introducing thoughts into himself that he was full of delicious food already. Prak, being only a few hundred years old, still had some desire type emotions that he was working on. He had tasted synthetic food and found it to be appealing, so why wouldn't synthetic thoughts taste good too? He contemplated this in his dog brain.

"Rrrrrrrrrrgh! Rrrrrrrrrrgh! Rrrrrrrrrrgh!" barked old Kama. It was the last thing that Prak heard before he felt the teeth of the old hound nip on his left Achilles's tendon. This shock gave him a decisive moment in which he responded quickly and cowardly. With a quick planting of his paws, he vaulted forward with his his tail tucked in between his legs tightly, his eyes glaring with fear and his mouth howling in very high pitched yelps. He was hurdling through the air like a furry projectile filled with panic, and crashed into the side of Meas who was trying to get clear of this incoming hairy missile.

"Kama," said Meas lying on the ground with Prak trying to get off of him, "How have you been this very long day?"

"All is all. Infinite we are. Life is so amazing and wonderful while we dance with it. Did I ever tell you about the time I was the dance instructor for the Sumerian Princess in the time of ....during the time when.... when we were traveling in caravans," said old Kama in a choppy questioning flicker of thoughts. "And how are you traveling these times Prak?"

Prak was put in his place in the way dog politics would dictate at this meeting, and was whining still from his small status awareness, received on the back of his leg. He maintained cowering as a sign of his compliance with the chain of canine command, and he greeted the much bigger dog in submissive body language, as his mind conversed with Old Kama, A.K.A. Pra Ajarn Puthyrith.

"Joom rip soo, hello Uncle," Prak conveyed in the Khmer monk language of the Siam, "Thank you teacher for showing me how to maneuver and own my focus. My humble blessings for us all."

"Forgive my nature to bite you Prak," replied Kama, "It is surely something about the way you smell. And I have smelled some amazing things. Why, I can recall a memory from the pool of existence that placed me in a universal matrix, after having met every existing soul. It was akin to those torrent files we used to play with, that feeling of maintaining the awareness of the axis crux and feel a piece of what I believed was the 'me' meeting everyone, to exist in everyone I met. I became aware that reincarnation occurs like grains of sand touching so many others, on a great shore of existence and creation, and the premise of that simple idea that everyone can own a new vessel exclusively had to be discarded. I have smelled everyone in the entire aeon of existence!"

"Uncle, would help Meas with his searching today?" queried Prak licking his heels and other under sides. _I have to go pee. I won't go nearby too close Kama!_ Prak trotted off, sniffing in a zig-zagging pattern, furiously to better comprehend this terrain. He found a suitable place not yet claimed by Kama and relieved himself upon a pair of sandals that were resting by a door, waiting their owner's return.

"I haven't seen my friend Lok Sabai for may days." declared Meas unto Kama, "I was wondering if you have seen him lately?"

"Lok Sabai. Lok Sabai?" meditated Kama. "Lok Sabai was here, many times and we traded some old stories, but then, he had to go. He had to go to the monument city to find something I think, or somebody was it?"

"Are you going to eat that?" Asked Meas, motioning to the ground with his snout to a place where a bag with something obviously in it was resting. "Well if you aren't, would you mind if I did? The dog in me is hungry!"

Kiri was approaching the peak of his power's effects. The intensity was beginning to wane for Sabine, which is why her telepathic bond was becoming fuzzy. A power use event typically lasted a couple of hours. Kiri shifted his focus back to creative drug manufacturing and set the vibrational control settings for the precise magnetic intensity to be released. He adjusted the dimension observation controls on this device to make their patterns dip and spike to his liking. This card replenishing equipment with its super magnet in this specialized piece of equipment, was made in China.

Sabine pulled her blade out of her pocket and flicked it open three times quickly, feeling apprehensive about entering the circle of people around Nimol. She was also feeling the common itchiness that occurred as the power drug wore off, much like an opiate reaction. Kiri stood back and looked at the visual displays on the monitor screens. He felt a rush of creativity when he watched what he was bringing into existence.

With controlled vibrational stimulation, the chemical bonds of the elements in the salts and fluids that were injected into the core of the high powered magnetic machine, were separated and rejoined in new metabolic ways. This recombination could only be observed in the fourth through the seventh dimensions, which this device was capable of rendering. This enhanced molecule, with more intricate bonds, made the amount of information that could be stored within it increase tenfold. The card technology made these enhanced chemical bonds accessible and available for data storage and transfer. The card interface could hold information that interacted with the human nervous system through the synthetic organic substrate it contained. Also it was Chinese technology.

When the ability arose to observe more dimensions with quartz crystal lenses, it gave the observers the understanding of the extra excited bonds that created more dimensional folds, and by utilizing these extra dimensions, it gave Chinese computer technology ten times the speed, storage, and ability of its silicon predecessors. When China introduced the card interfacing ability, the rest of the tech hungry world stood in line to receive it, like junkies at a methadone clinic.

The substance labeled 'power,' was refined five years after the cards were introduced. Chinese tech experts presented it to the world as a way to facilitate the use of the cards, making them function better and making the interface easier with less physical side effects. What was not made known to the world, was that the cards were all linked to a massive computer complex. This storage center, hidden deep underground in a secret location was archiving everyone's thoughts. The thoughts were collected by the enhanced power cards neuro-chemical reading ability. Fifty percent of the world's population had one installed in them by then, and the storage computers began to fill at the speed of thought.

The Chinese regime, directed by Lord Arun and his brilliant partner, Kosal, had sought to invent power to enhance the use of the card, and to secretly mine the human psyche of all of its thoughts, but soon afterward, it became an escapist and recreational tool, as China's underground scientists made a morphed form of it to profit from the drug using demographic of the world.

The thought readers of Chinese empire became aware of all of the changes that modern alchemists were making to tailor the drug form of power, but the Empire allowed it to continue because their goals were not compromised by this contraband. They still had the means to mine data from the user's mind and continue with their collection of everyone's thoughts, no matter how secret, twisted or wonderful. Lord Arun knew that he could easily own the entire illegal operation and grant it 'national experimental peace keeping status,' which granted it immunity from UN observers and digital compliance officers, even though these organizations could be easily bought off.

Kiri did not care about Chinese world domination theory, nor did he know about it. He only cared about maintaining his status and not getting pushed out by rival distributors. Being a middle aged Burmese man living in Cambodia with enough food and money in this age of Chinese occupation was not something to dismiss. Kiri never expressed a local political agenda, because Cambodia never really had a true functioning government since Saloth Sar's ruthless idealism through agrarian Socialism. Kiri wasn't a farmer, he was a chemist, and he now had the artistic freedom, which he kept to himself, to create something that influenced the new world. He also had one directive, above all other ideas, which was waiting for an order to activate. He was a sleeper cell for a very discreet resistance group.

Selling power from 'Compound number twenty one, Siem Reap province, Cambodian new territory of the Chinese Empire,' was the job that Kiri was appointed to by the new Golden Rising Empire. His job description was not written down or recorded anywhere, because of the clandestine nature of this supply chain. His job entailed living in the compound for ten days and selling the drug to those who had the money to buy it. It was that simple, and he was given a day to venture out for personal needs, escorted with supervision. Kiri was alone most of the time, but he didn't mind staying inside. He had his stolen memory collection to sift through and figure out ways to exploit them.

Sabine knew little about the inner workings of the Chinese government system, just as nearly all Cambodian, Laotian, Malaysian, Thai or Indo Burman people understood what was happening in their own countries. The entire Asean community that they were all living in was renamed independently by Lord Arun, who called it 'The New Territories of the Golden Rising Empire,' in the constitutional doctrine announced on 'Communication Day' in the year 2608 of the Buddhist calendar.

The common societies of those countries had no real allegiance to anything but their families and their villages, but they went along with whatever kept them and their families alive, and that meant complying with whatever the Chinese occupation suggested. Sabine had a simple agenda, stay alive. It was selfish but the times dictated it like a depressurized airplane requiring you to put the oxygen mask on yourself before you put it on your child. She was looking out for herself and her family. But this agenda of staying alive was sometimes overshadowed with the more immediate urge to power up.

"Kiri, if anything happens to me..." Sabine said to Kiri's back as he fine tuned the adjustments on his machinery using an erratic pattern of finger sliding on the control access screen.

"What's going to happen to my invisible little teenage power user?" Kiri cut her off with this question.

"If I'm not alive, there is no one in my family to take charge." Sabine said in a pleading tone. "My father and mother are unable to support our family with the small amount of market selling they can do, and my three younger brothers don't know how to do much besides forage and beg. If I don't supply money any way I can, then they don't have any. And If I don't stay vigilant about who is nearby, they have no protection. So, if anything happens to me, I am pleading with you to show favor to my bother Aom, and help him find away to make some money in this screwed up city. Will you do this?"

"Yes, Sabine. I will do it." Kiri lied in a calm voice. "But nothing is going to happen to you. I will keep an astral eye out for you and send ethereal Yakuza to watch your back."
4

Domination

A green mantis flew through the tall, dark, cavernous meeting room, past the detailed, ornate stained glass window panes, looking for an opening that would lead it to any foliage. It was not having any success with this search but the idea of failing was unknown to it. Its flapping wings were audible to the cleaning woman who was polishing the wooden chairs around a large marble table. She did subscribe to the idea of failure and stood on a chair reaching up as high as she could to try and swat the insect with a broom. She did not want a pest to be present in the meeting hall that was soon to be filled with very important people from around the globe.

The mantis chose a soft hanging fabric to rest on because its wing muscles were weakening from overuse. The cleaning woman cursed herself for allowing this to happen and looked fearfully at the large green insect clinging to a flag with an image of the Prime Minister's profile. She slid a heavy wooden chair towards the flag so that she could try and remedy this unfortunate situation. She knew that the mantis represented the acts of meditation and contemplation, which were desirable functions for a monk, but they had no place in this legislative chamber, nor did this uninvited insect.

A door opened to the chamber and a quadrant of officials wearing the new Chinese uniform of black robe pants and a yellow and red costume-like pageantry shirt, strode into the room leading a contingency of other leaders from around the Eastern world. First in the line of foreign dignitaries was Lord Il'ia Griaznaia, the Minister of Communication from the friendly collaborative nation of Russia. He was a tall, broad-shouldered man with a booming, deep, raspy voice. Next in line was Sir Prem Sebudi, from the Chinese province of Nepal and his assistant, Sir Lakshya Himanshu. These two representatives were not Nepalese but were officials from China sent to rule the former country known as Nepal. Today these men returned to their homeland to report on the expansion in person. Prem never went anywhere without Lakshya. The next to enter the chamber were Sir Apisit Wangkhabuht and Sir Meesak Kongkaew, the leaders of military command in the Chinese Laos province. They were an unyielding pair of mismatched rulers and adversaries who fought to be head governor of the former country of Laos .

The cleaning woman disappeared behind a rear door as this entourage entered the chamber followed by Lord Xiangtou. The final person to enter the room was flanked by six guards. He was Lord Arun, the Prime Minister and number one in military command of the Chinese Empire. All of the leaders were directed to sit at the conference table and were presented with synthetic fruit and virtual ice water. Sir Lakshaya couldn't help but notice that there was an empty seat at the table.

The Prime minister stood up and every man at the table followed his gesture and rose as well. Lord Arun held forth his glass of water with virtual ice and proposed the toast, "To the rapid expansion of the Empire! This is all that matters!"

"To the rapid expansion of the Empire!" The officials at the table chimed in the serious motto and clinked glasses before drinking deeply. Lakshaya thought that the virtual ice tasted like flat soda water and he was planning to avoid eating the synthetic fruit. He was adamant about only eating natural food, but he kept his mouth respectfully closed now.

"Please sit down gentlemen," ordered Lord Arun as he remained standing. "I speak for the Golden Rising Empire that our predecessors called China. Yes, we are still widely referred to as China, today, but that will change soon enough. I have initiated a movement to change our country's name in order to admonish the world with our claim as the number one world superpower. Because of the fruits of our most intelligent minds, and the sloth of the rest of the Western world, we stand as the directors of the people of this entire planet. Never before has the world seen a force, or a will, as vast and as strong as this one!"

"Excuse me, your excellency, but wasn't the ancient Mongolian Empire of the Kubla Khan the largest world empire to date?" said Sir Lakshaya who suddenly wanted to bite his tongue, realizing that he overstepped his bounds.

"Mr. Lakshaya, the Mongolian Empire may have stretched from Japan to Poland and from Russia to Pakistan, but it was a brawling mob of pillagers!" insisted Lord Arun, smacking his fist on the table. "Our Empire today has been won with true power, the power of the mind! Why would you even think to present me with an archaic history lesson?"

"Forgive me sir," Sir Lakshaya said bowing his head, "You are wise. I stand corrected."

"Mr. Himanshu, did the Kubla Kahn's Empire make the e-phone obsolete? Did they convert Africa into a manufacturing and mining territory? Did they make the entire Siamese and Oceanic domain their own? Did the Khan have the ability to exploit the Americas and Europe to be subordinate service contractors who respond to all of the commands of their ruler?" The Prime Minister stopped his rhetorical querying and looked down at his hand that was resting on the table and silently waited for a reply.

"Your excellency, I am in great error for my comment." apologized the humble and meek assistant to the Empire.

"Oh! Well then, may we all carry on?" questioned the enraged Prime Minister.

"Yes, please sir." exasperated Lakshaya.

"OK then!" Lord Arun looked around the table staring at everyone. He then picked up a glass of water with synthetic ice in it, took a long drink, and then smashed the glass into the face of Lakshaya who was seated next to him. "Let's carry on!"

Lakshaya fell to the ground screaming and clutching his bleeding face. Prem knelt down beside him trying to comfort him and assess his precious Lakshaya's injuries. He hoped that his face was not damaged too badly because he really loved his pretty face.

"Ah! You have arrived!" Lord Arun announced the addition of one gray cloaked man who entered the room and walked with a limp towards the previously empty seat. "Ignore this whining lump of tissue, he was just leaving!"

As soon as Lord Arun said the word 'leaving,' six nearby guards descended on the representatives from Nepal and husked them away like sacks of dirty laundry. As the two men were being dragged out of the meeting chambers across the cold white marble floor, Lakshaya was screeching loudly as Prem urged to him to be strong.

The rest of the attendees, and the new member, Kosal, seemed to not notice that any dramatic episode just occurred. Kosal scowled into an illusive point in the distance that only he could see, and said nothing. The Prime Minister, being quite aware of Kosal's demeanor, decided to address the Russian representative Il'ya instead, and not converse with the Mage just yet.

"Lord Il'ya, sir, welcome to this table again. It is a warm welcome that I extend to you. Russia is a brother of the Empire and so are you!" The Prime Minister said with feigned excitement. "What progressive news do you bring from Russia, about the expansion?"

"Your excellency, Lord Arun," Il'ya said in a loud rumbling voice and gave a deep bow, "I bring good news to the table today. At the time I left New Moscow, the Russian army contingent of the empire had verified control over all major ports in the Australian and New Zealand provinces. The army has full access to all command centers at each international port, including computer networks and any archaic style machines. This has all been accomplished under the guise of an international peace keeping force of observers, seeking to monitor weapons of mass annihilation. Judging by the few inquiries into this task force, I would declare that the Oceanic nations are not resisting this as part of the expansion. I anticipate that we will have control of all the Australian computer networks, both pre-expansion and those with current Empire technology, by Summer Solstice."

"This is positive news indeed, proof that the expansion is insurmountable! With the Empire's control of these nations, we can now draw a long line from Antarctica to the former North Pole that crosses only the Golden Rising Empire." Lord Arun finished his statement and stood up, then walked to the control center of the table, smiling a wild eyed grin as he passed . He pressed a few pressure plates and a three dimensional image of a map of the world became visible on a holographic sphere slightly above the thick marble table where they all sat.

"The proposed time line will go into effect within the year." Lord Arun said as he touched the pressure plates again. A red line appeared on the global map that began in the Russian territory of Antarctica and passed through Australia, China and Russia, before reaching the arctic polar sea. "This will be the new Prime Meridian of planet Earth. All time will begin and end in Hong Kong, just as all modern power and technology has started in the Chinese Empire. A European group of dignitaries from Greenwich, England will travel to The Prime Meridian, which will no longer be known by that archaic term. It will become known as the Xin Shugwang Difung, the aura of the new dawn, and it will pass through the Empire city that has been called Hong Kong for too long. I am changing the name of this city to Huang Zishung, City of the Golden Aura. The entire world will bend to our methods. The Empire is, and will be known as, the center of the universe."

The remaining attendants of this meeting stared at the bright red streak dividing the world from bottom to top. This was an ominous and ambitious ownership of both time and control of the world. Any reservations that any member personally felt were well hidden, and smiles were presented unanimously. The Prime minister placed his fingers on the pressure plate again and changed the color of every region of the empire to the color gold.

"This is the view of the expansion today!" Lord Arun said emphatically. "Mr. Lakshaya is not here to see this or he would be re-educated to the correct historical perspective. The Golden Rising Empire is the steward of humanity. Our ideas are paramount, and we will share them with the world by imposition if necessary. There is no other force in the universe that would question my vision!"

Everyone at the table stood up and applauded vigorously, while Lord Arun soaked up the admiration that he demanded. Lord Arun had a messianic complex and it was very visible to most people. He was at the top of this chain of command because of his father, because of his calculated assassinations, and because of Kosal, the powerful Mage who imbibed the Prime Minister with incredible powers.

"Lord Arun," called out a raspy voice from the old Mage that delivered a mysterious vibration when it was heard, "the expansion is progressing as planned, and this is what we want, but we must fortify all that we have claimed!"

"I assure everyone that we are reinforcing all of the Empire's borders, both physically and in cyber-reality." defended Lord Arun who did not want to show his subservience to this ragged old man.

"How did we rise to this place of power? Can any of you recall the sacrifices that were made? Anyone?" Kosal asked as he began to slowly lap the table with a diligent stare on all of the attending members. Lord Arun began to open his mouth to speak but the Mage cut him off. "I remember because I was alive at the time of the transformation. I have made many personal sacrifices to effect this change. I gave much of myself to see the fruition of this cosmic endeavor!" With that comment, the Mage rolled up his sleeve to show an arm that was stumped at the elbow. Had Lakisha been there, he would assuredly have gasped at his contorted scarred flesh.

"We know that you have paid for our advancement Kosal!" Declared Lord Arun, "And we are attentive to your enduring wisdom. Please elaborate on how the Empire might better retain all that we have conquered."

"If no one else would like to interrupt me, I will tell you what we must do!" said the Mage staring around the circle at the silent faces. "We must inject the world with a new mulch-dimensional substance, that has the ability to implant thoughts. It is the newest, enhanced form of power ever envisioned. This is our greatest power!"

The Mage continued to pace the circular table and stare at the remaining five. He sighed and grunted to clear his throat as his body language suggested that information was about to be imparted. "The Golden Rising Empire did not become world superpower when they developed the advanced technology that made all communication tools such as the e-phone obsolete. This was only the sound of the gun that would start the race. We have a head start because I was able to translate the encoded Sirius language that was channeled through the chosen vessels, including Lord Xiaoping. These communications with the Sirius gave us the blueprint to make the card technology and _power._ "

Lord Xiaoping, the obese, round, red-faced man smiled ever so slightly and gave a slight nod to acknowledge the recognition. Kosal continued with his discourse. "By raising all technology standards to heights that no one could even contemplate, we designed, implemented and sold this new paradigm to world. 'All roads lead to China' was the slogan of our fledgling superpower, and we retained complete control and complete awareness of everything the world thought at the dawn of this new age of communication. Because we became the technology hub of the world, we were given the opportunity to educate the world with our systems, the correct and true system that should be in place."

The members of this meeting were a captive audience to the ugly but somehow charismatic Kosal. _Who is this man, really?_ This was a question that had crossed the minds of all but Lord Arun, because he knew very well who Kosal was.

"Had we been been idle at this juncture, this technology would have surely been reverse engineered and copied, as we know is very possible. How many great advances has China made because we were able to apply endless hours from intelligent minds to recreate Western ideas? We are writing the history that all nations will teach tomorrow. We did not relent on our rise to power. We created Power!"

The members listening to this speech erupted into a cheering applause again, anxious to revel in the accomplishments of the world's lone super power. They shook hands and and slapped each others backs, and even slapped a high five before Kosal erupted himself.

"Quiet you fools!" He demanded. "Instead of playing with each other, why don't you come up with an intelligent plan of your own? Does any one have one? No? Of course you don't!" He stared around the group with a stern scolding stare. "This is the plan, so listen carefully!"

"Most of you are not aware of this," Kosal said with conviction, "But our most brilliant, and loyal minds have been evolving the power substance to not only record thought, but to implant it as well. This new form of power has been tested on the poorest elements of the Filipino population, through their water supply, to see how they responded to the suggestions programmed into it. The substance that the test demographic imbibed, was laden with the suggestion to grow corn rather than rice. Corn could not grow in this wet region of the world and the crops failed, which in turn killed more than seventy percent of the people being tested, due to starvation. With more than ninety thousand dead from this experiment, it was considered to be a huge success.

These villagers had been growing rice for over three thousand years. It was their cultural identity. No one would ever think of growing corn in this region. It was a ridiculous idea, but the villagers followed the idea implanted into them, and bought stocks of corn seed from strategically placed, makeshift, Chinese government markets. A year after similar type experiments in other parts of the world showed similar results, this new thought-implanting strain of power was adapted to be imbedded into the card technology."

Kosal moved to a position near the control center of the table and Lord Arun slowly conceded by moving away from it to give the Mage access to the control pressure plate. Kosal used the long skinny fingers of his one hand to manipulate the controls. Shortly, a green glow appeared on all of the countries in the world today that still had semi-sovereign power and their own system of government.

"We introduced _power_ to the technology system substrate that we had already created. This enabled us to see and probe every aspect of every user's existence. Our great gift to the world, the human computer interfacing skin port, was welcomed and revered, but was connected to our encrypted network control centers. We provided the world with the most advanced technology ever imagined. How could anyone refuse? They couldn't! And in their rush to absorb and become part of this great new leviathan, they stood supine, unaware of the Trojan horse that they took into their government complexes, their educational institutions, their homes, even their most questionable activities in their bedrooms.

When we introduced thought recording power to the card-using population, it gave us the information about all of the world government's plans in every arena. With this information, we were able to halt all military advancements and fortifications. We were also able to thwart any attempt to duplicate this technology and we have prevailed in maintaining the expansion.

They didn't know about the cyber-parasite that they were assimilating, nor do they today. This is the guarded secret of this chamber. Only those who have passed through this chamber have this information, and of course, you will never reveal it. Just as we can watch everyone in the entire world and create the human societal genome, we watch you and will end your life in an agonizing way if you even have a thought of revealing these secrets.

If we had not introduced power to the card that everyone accepted and took into their own body, this map showing green autonomous countries would not be changed, but because of our extreme vigilance, the world is now dominated by the Golden Rising Empire, and it looks like this today." The countries of Russia, Australia, New Zealand, Nepal, India, Bangladesh, Mongolia, Antarctica, and all of the Southeast Asian countries changed from green to golden yellow.

"With my guidance," Kosal continued, "we will implant thoughts into the minds of all card-using people in the world today. We will promote it as the latest and greatest human computing substance ever created, with the ability to promote telepathic conversation, to create virtual teleportation vacation experiences, to stimulate the minds pleasure centers, even alter the tongue's taste sensors to be whatever the user wants to experience. And with our ability to implant thoughts into the users through this card, we can make all people complacent slaves who will worship and honor the Empire. We can tell people what to eat, what to wear, what to to worship and what to rebuke. We will be the religion, the government, the entertainment and the nourishment of the entire world's population. The world will be at our mercy! At this time of our empire's greatest achievement, the world will look like this!"

The Mage adjusted the controls another time and the entire globe that everyone was looking at began to glow a golden color from every single region, including the oceans, except for a bare uncolored spot in Antarctica. It was awe inspiring and the concept was bigger than anything any megalomaniac ever came up with.

"Does anyone question this vision?" Kosal boomed in a commanding, angry voice. Those around the table were silent. "Then return to your provinces, and continue the relentless expansion of the great Golden Rising Empire." At this time, the group burst out with applause and loud cheers, and the Mage did not rebuke them this time.

After a few minutes of exuberant celebration, Lord Arun interjected again and took control of the proceedings, proclaiming, "Our great minds and great Mages have brought us to this pinnacle today! And our great Kosal, shaman Wu hei mu fa, reminds us that we can not rest at this peak, and must not relent in our powerful pursuit of educating the world as it should be. Frivolous uncensored education has been too available to humans for too long. It should be in the hands of the elite ruling class only, and with our technology, we can enact this. We can educate the world as we see fit, and retain the true proselytism for our select leaders. We will use the power within our interfacing card to control every level of every existence."

"Lord Arun," Lord Il'ia called out. "May I ask a question?"

"Yes, Lord from the Russia province," Lord Arun addressed, "please present your query."

"If half of the world has the skin port that gives us access to their lives," spoke the tall Russian man, "How do we control the remaining half of the world"

"Ah! This is a thoughtful question Lord Il'ya, and the solution is even more brilliant!" Lord Arun described. "As the benevolent steward of the world that we are, we are going to make the skin port installation a free operation, given by a task force of Empire physicians, sent to all corners of the world, no matter how small or poor."

"Of course the not so poor nations will get a reduced rate, not free," Lord Xiangtou added.

"Thank you, yes this is also true." said Lord Arun. "With the whole world receiving cards under their skin with our ever extending eyes inside, we will see the entire world as our own, and implant our own thoughts as well."

"Lord Arun?" said Sir Apisit. "Why does the province of Antarctica show a non-colored bare spot within our Golden Rising Empire?"

Lord Arun looked like he just solved a great riddle by the smile on his face. "Well that will be the first colony of the Siriuns of course!"
5

gamboge

The temperature reached forty seven degrees celcigrade by ten o'clock A.M. the morning that Sabine had the nerve to head deep into the heart of the city to try and arrange a visit with the dealer, Nimol. Her power drug cards were already expended, but she hadn't bothered to take them out of her skin ports yet, thinking that if she was accosted, she could protect her addiction equipment better. Her card was to her what a heroin junkies needle was, an essential piece of daily paraphernalia. There was always someone out there who was ready to take whatever you had. With a poor and desperate society, the norm was to take whatever one had to, to survive.

Siem Reap was the epicenter of human civilization at one time, but later reduced to absolute desperate poverty during the nineteen seventies in the last century of the last millennium. Now, after having just barely made a recovery from the days of the cruel visionary, Pol Pot, the Chinese Empire's occupation of Cambodia kept the whole country stagnant from growth once again, even though the Empire boasted 'expansion for everyone.' The poor people of this region had been handed more than their share of tragedy throughout history, and now they had a whole new batch of problems. Drugs were a temporary escape from it all.

Sabine had two skin ports, one under each arm, which was not the norm, and also illegal. Many people died from overdose when the empire experimented with multiple skin port configurations. None of the approved installers were permitted to give a person two ports, under severe penalty of the Empire authority. This meant execution most of the time. But Sabine knew an underground surgeon who could perform abortions, amputations, facelifts, breast augmentations, sex change operations and skin port installations, as well as tattoos, piercings and other artistic body modifications. Sabine had him install a second port because she had been shown a way to alter the way the cards worked. She kept this secret very well hidden. She never had to keep a tattoo hidden though. She didn't have one. She liked her body better as a clean canvas.

Sweat rolled down Sabine's temples, as well as down her back and chest as she walked down the side of the road heading into the epicenter of the city. She felt the waistline of her panties growing damp from her perspiration. The sweltering dry heat was even more uncomfortable to an addict who was fresh out of power, and itchy as hell. Sabine was a jumbled wreck inside, but she hid it well as she strode down the burning pavement with an upright confident posture and a quick pace. Sabine's plan was to follow the pavement to the monument center where she knew she could get hooked up with some power and have a look around. _F U Kiri for making me do this!_

Monument city was the slogan and nickname that the city of Siem Reap adopted during its short renaissance period after the millennium change. At that time, Cambodia's borders were very open then and people traveled from all over the world to see the ancient temple ruins built by the god kings long ago. Cambodia's leaders welcomed the world into its cultural heritage and built a huge, ancient style monument of the god king, Surayavarman II, to honor the original builders of the city. This monument towered over all structures and was visible from a great distance, and hence the name 'Monument City' became known world wide.

The entire statue was painted with a special yellow pigment that comes only from the sap of the Gamboge tree, _Garcinia hanburyi_. The rarest and most expensive type of this pigment, collected near the killing fields over a period of many years, actually contained bullets from the massacre that happened there. What made the pigment so rare and so unique, was that it contained human blood.

During the time of Pol Pot's massacre, the bullets passing through people carried some of their life fluids into the tree, mixing the blood and lead with the sap, giving it a shade of reddish-yellow that was not like any other shade of yellow in the world. Farmers used to curse the trees for dulling their blades when they chopped into the trees and struck bullets. Later, art suppliers exploited the find and made it legendary. The monument was meant to represent the struggle of the people, both long, long ago, and in the more recent past.

Since then, the yellow saffron color of the giant monument dulled to a milky, dusty, pale-blonde and gray shade of the painful yellow. The borders of Cambodia were not readily open now, so the crowds of international tourists were absent, and the corruption that presided claimed the monument area as its garden of exploitation, demoralization and brutality. This is where Sabine was heading now, in the debilitating heat, with a major power jones.

She would much rather just be going to see Kiri for her power replenishment, but following his request was her best option now. She really wanted to feel her card release its amazing contents into her body, mind and soul. Being out of product really sucked for someone who depended on it.

Sabine didn't want anything to do with Nimol, with his touts or this part of town, but the next closest distributor was across the border in the province of Thailand. No, she had to go to the monument, but it was a congregating place for what she felt was the worst of her community. Community was hardly the word to describe the people here though. This was a den of thieves, not a community. Sabine knew what to look for to avoid being taken, and she was diligent about keeping watch for all levels of scum, but the craving in her cells, the tension in her muscles, and the throbbing hunger in her soul made her a little less aware of who was around her. Her mind drifted back to the beginning of her day.

Sabine woke up this morning before the sun rose over the palm tree horizon. She rose to her feet, rolled up her brown straw sleeping mat and twisted the pink protective mosquito net that she slept under into a haphazard knot. The dark, gray, stained concrete floor was warm wherever she stood on it. There wasn't the luxury of cool ground to rest on anymore. The world was a hotter place than it ever had been, and the only course of action to defend against it was to sweat and hope for any breeze to come along and brush wet skin.

Sabine's Mother, Jan, awoke before everyone else and boiled rice for a breakfast soup. She mixed in some herbs that she pulled from the small, withered garden that she kept under the shade of a Longan tree in the back yard of their small plot. Sabine sat down on the floor by a pot of steaming gruel and removed the lid to smell what she knew was inside. Rice soup. Again.

"Mother," Sabine called out to Jan who was now sweeping the outdoor walks with a stiff bristled broom that made a raspy swishing sound with every stroke, "If I give you money this week, will you please get some fruit or meat or anything to go with this rice?"

"You know fruit is very expensive and hard to find at the end of the dry season." called back Jan as she never paused from her sweeping task. "I will go to the market and get some chicken feet for the soup if we have enough money left over. I have to pay the soldiers for protection, or we won't even have rice!"

Sabine couldn't see the look of worry on her mother's face as she set down her broom and looked into the rice sack that was almost empty. Jan weighed the fact that she only saw enough rice for a few more days and called out to Sabine again. "Little flower, you are so good to help the family out with our needs. You are so young but so grown up, and it hurts me to not be able to give back to you, but your father is unable to work now, you know this. His back and legs are still bruised from the soldiers who beat him. I have to use everything that you give me for taking care of us all, and I do it the best way I know how. So please be happy that we have rice soup to eat, and don't expect anything more, for now. A new dawn will emerge one day my special little girl."

"Yes mother." Sabine called back and ate the rest of her bland soup. The thought of some chicken feet in the pot was actually something to look forward to. Sabine stood up and slid a chair over to the wall where a bookshelf hung. She stood up tippy toe on the chair and pulled down a heavy book from a high shelf. The book was a dusty, thick tome about the history of the Siem Reap area. She opened the book and pulled out one hundred Yuan from her hiding place inside, that she knew no one would ever find because no one in her family read books.

Sabine heard a groan come from her father's slumped over body. She grabbed a wet rag and walked over to where he was laying down. She lifted the mosquito net and crawled inside to get close to her father. She stroked her father's forehead with the wet rag and whispered softly to him, "It's OK father, it's OK!" He didn't reply but he reached a hand up to touch Sabine's hand. She struggled to hold back tears.

Vannak, her father, was fifty-seven years old and his body was weak. He recently received clubbing injuries from Chinese soldiers while he was waiting in a social service food line near the market. He was given a welfare voucher for a sack of rice and waited in the hot sun for three hours when a group of riot control soldier police began dispersing the crowd by beating them with clubs. The Chinese officer in charge of this contingent of soldiers could not speak Khmer, so rather than explain that the food was gone, he ordered his men to disperse the people with force. His subordinates were used to applying excessive force, and they beat the line of poor citizens to make their point clear. There would have been enough rice for Vannak's family and the others in line, but the soldier in charge decided to keep half of the rations that he was slated to hand out, knowing he could sell them and keep the funds.

Now, Vannak had several broken ribs and badly bruised limbs from the beating. He never said a word in protest, nor was he able to resist or block the blows that came ruthlessly. This morning his chest heaved with pain as he fought for breaths in this relentless heat. He groaned a small sigh when Sabine left his side. He loved his daughter more than she knew. He knew nothing about the drug enhanced world that his daughter lived in now.

Sabine tightened her throat and pulled constraints around her emotions a little tighter. She picked up a straw broom and began sweeping the floor and the dust. Dry leaves and gecko droppings got pushed out the front door of their house. She eyed everyone walking by, to see if they were thieves, soldiers or friends. She didn't have many friends because she was so independent. She never had a steady boyfriend. She was too proud and stubborn to give into her society's patriarchal ass-kissing ways of being a subordinate, subservient girl, that the men, and boys, expected.

No, Sabine was not status quo at all. She was a creative, independent-thinking rebel, compared to the rest of her culture. She was not at all accepting of the face-saving Eastern ways. She didn't ever learn to give a fake smile properly, nor did she bite her tongue, and save her mouth for eating. She spoke her mind whenever she wanted to. She didn't accept the religion of her nation, or the non-religion propaganda of the nation's occupiers. She loved her family, but would never accept, nor pass on, her family's traditions and values. She was a rare individual in a sea of complacency, and she knew how to strengthen her resolve, with a bit of power.

Sabine's drifting thoughts snapped back into awareness of her present location as a young man on a bicycle tried to grope her as he rode by. This man didn't know that he was about to receive a bloody lip instead of a hand full of young girl, but that is exactly what he got. Sabine turned her body towards the back of the man's bike and averted his grasping hand which only touched her back. In the flow of this motion, she also brought her left foot around at the eye level of the rider, and planted her heel into his face, splitting his lips open and knocking him to the ground.

Sabine quickly then drove another heel strike into the spokes of the toppled bicycle, bending the wheel into an unrotatable position, before wheeling around with another spin kick towards the man's face which was now against the pavement of the road. Her kicked missed him, purposely, and landed a centimeter away from his nose as her foot contacted the ground. His eyes grew wide with concern as he was definitely not expecting to be vulnerable and lying on his stomach.

"Touch me again you piece of buffalo shit and you will be eating it soon!" Sabine yelled to the vertical attacker. "Or do you like the taste of feces?"

"Stop! Stop! You crazy girl!" He pleaded. "or I will come back here to find you and kill you!"

"Maybe I should just kill you now and then you won't ever come back!" She said defiantly to him as she began to drive her heel into his back near his left kidney, causing him more pain. She knelt down on top of his prostrate body and also dug a thumb into his neck and pushed up into his mandible. "You are going to forget you ever tried to touch me and you are never going to try it again you worthless seed picker!"

The man was immobilized by the force she applied to his pressure point, but he was still able to speak the words, "OK! OK! Let go!" Sabine withdrew her thumb and her heel, and jumped back clear of his arm reach to avoid any grasping attack he could respond with, but a retaliation never came. The man slowly pushed himself up off of the pavement and reached his hand to his face to touch his wounded mouth. He pulled his hand away and saw blood smeared on it, then he looked at Sabine.

"You're crazy little girl!" He said, and with that, he picked up his bicycle and tried to push it away. The damage Sabine's foot caused to his back wheel was enough to keep it from even rolling, so the man had to pick up his bike and carry it away. He looked back at her twice with an bewildered stare but said nothing as he hurried away from the powerful little street punk.

A few of the people that were in the area watched this event take place, but that was it, they only watched. They were either not interested enough, or too afraid to get involved. Sabine watched the now damaged groping man disappear from sight with her hands on her hips, breathing deeply through clenched teeth. She surveyed the area around her again, looking for any one who might have been with the pervert who she taught a lesson. There was no one else nearby approaching her, but a few older men were staring from a cement bench under the shade of a large mango tree. Sabine returned their stare and included a dirty look along with it.

She looked like a person to reckon with, standing there on the side of the hot road, glaring her gaze with confidence and defiance. Sabine had long straight black hair which hung down to the middle of her back. There was no breeze to cool her skin and her hair stuck to her sweaty neck. She wore a pair of large, dark, policeman-like sunglasses, made in China, that added some power to her unseen stare, concealing her watering eyes. She would never let anyone see it, but this encounter that just happened allowed the feeling of being trapped sneak into her her emotions for a moment. _Why are men such buffaloes?_

She recalled a memory of being a child and having men grope her when she had no means of defense. She remembered being scared and confused and in pain, wondering where her father was. Sabine didn't allow this feeling to congeal. Instead, she pushed it away, deep inside, and tasted the triumph of subduing a person almost twice her size. It felt pretty good to her at that moment. When she was young, there was not much she could do to defend herself, and that is what inspired her to be the bad-ass that she was now, and she did look like a bad-ass standing there staring down the old men who had to turn their gaze away.

Sabine continued her stride, walking a little taller now. Her personal powers were at a low now because she hadn't felt the manufactured power that her cells and her myo-fascial skeleton craved. Had she been feeling the effects of the power drug, she could have injured the man that grabbed her without even touching him. That was not the case today because she didn't feel the power drug in her, and she hadn't developed her true potential beyond the drug use. Her mind and will were capable of doing anything, but she hadn't realized that yet.

Sabine stopped walking when the road she was on became impassible. There was a gathering of people that was so widespread that the road itself was blocked. She couldn't see what the gathering was about, but this definitely raised her curiosity. She pushed her way through the crowd of people to try and get a better view. This seemed unusual to her to see people risking being attacked by the soldiers who would surely not tolerate a public gathering like this.

Without being groped or injured, Sabine pushed her way into the center of this throng of people where she was perplexed by what she saw. A platform had been set up in the middle of the road and a Chinese contingent of flamboyantly dressed merchants were addressing the crowd. As she was taking in the scene and observing all of the armed soldiers who were guarding the stage, she noticed a dog had moved up beside her and was standing right next to her as if it was there to watch the spectacle with her.

"That's right folks, this food that we are presenting to you is the latest in nutritional technology!" boasted a man in bright yellow robes. "This food is one hundred percent nutritious and delicious and has been engineered especially for the Khmer digestive tract! Kilo for Kilo, Simfood has double the vitamin A, three times the vitamin B and five times as much protein as ordinary food! This is the healthiest thing on the planet that you can eat! The provisional leader of Seam Reap has endorsed these products as well as the Prime Minister of China himself! You can get some of this for your very own today only and all you have to do is........"

Sabine had heard enough already. Her rational mind told her that these had to be lies, and who could afford real food let alone cyber-manufactured food. She tasted some synthetic candy once and considered it to be a small step above plastic in taste. She turned around defiantly and pushed her way back out of the crowd, not wanting to hear another word about fake food being promoted to starving people. The dog that had been standing next to her followed her out of the throng as she parted her way through the crowd of people with her hands and shoulders.

Once she was on the outside of the circle of bodies, Sabine felt better and walked faster now that she could. The crowd was now thinner and she noticed some food shops set up nearby that were selling real cane juice, real coconuts, real tamarind pods and real dried fruit slices. Sabine resisted the urge to buy anything, no matter how alluring and sweet it smelled, because she was intent on getting what she had come for, some synthetic power. That would abate her hunger anyhow when she dosed up and she knew this money saving technique.

She saw another group of people who were holding up signs on the outside of the presentation of Simfood merchants. Her new language reading skills were not that good, but she could make out the language of the words on the sign which were written in Chimare, a blend of Chine and Khmer. This group of people were bravely and silently holding up poster signs that were protesting cyber-technology. She knew about these people from other functions that she had observed before, and expected the soldiers to descend on them soon. They were a type of orthodox naturalists, not unlike the Mennonite Amish people that she read about in a history book, who believed in using only natural and simple ways of living.

This group of folks were known as the 'Abstainers' and were new to her city as was the synthetic food. They were opposed to the human Skin ports as their number one point of protest, but they also detested 'unnatural food', the world wide web, computers, phones, motorized transportation, eye contacts and even sunglasses, saying that they blocked the world out from the soul. They also protested the one thing that she was coming here to get, power. Sabine avoided this group of people as well, assuming that they were religious nut jobs and would soon enough have a group of soldiers with clubs disrupting their efforts.

Sabine strode away from the crowded main street that passed through the center of town, and turned right down an alley where she was glad to be away from the mob of people. It always meant trouble whenever there was a mob of people. Maybe that's why Sabine had become a recluse of sorts, a loner. She didn't want to be a follower for sure, nor did she have any desire to be a leader. She just wanted to get some escape, listen to some music and write some poetry or songs, with the influence of power as a muse.

As she walked down the alley, she stopped at an old building that was abandoned and she tried to read the sign on it. It was written in the English which she knew very little of. The Chinese government had outlawed the teaching of it in their controlled territories a couple of decades ago. Even her own language was barely taught now, as the influence of the Chinese occupation skewed everything in the direction that they seemed to be heading. The new superpower of the world was seeking total domination.

The sign she was viewing read something like, 'Happy Pizza'. _What is a Pizza anyhow? How can it be happy?_ she wondered. The sign was from a period before she was alive, during the time when tourism was popular and permitted in this part of the world. Foreigners used to flock to this area to gaze at the ancient temples that were the true cradle of civilization, and remnants of their styles used to exist here as well. The word happy, she believed to mean 'wealthy' or 'big status' or something like that. She didn't really care. She projected that it didn't apply to her.

She wondered why she had stopped to read it at all when she noticed the same dog again sniffing around the curb where this abandoned building was. She shrugged her daze off and kept walking, realizing how hot she was and how big of a craving she was feeling for some more power. _How did I ever get hooked on this stuff anyhow?_ She contemplated. _Oh yeah! My almost boyfriend._ She remembered. _Leap! That no good, dirty...._

The dog that had been sniffing around stopped his olfactory obsession and began barking at Sabine. "What is your problem?" she shouted back at the beast who was focusing on her. He continued to bark directly at her but was not being aggressive in his demeanor. Yet clearly, he was focusing on Sabine. A seemingly random thought popped into her mind at that moment. _Rain is coming_. Sabine dismissed the thought quickly but for a moment she felt its presence strongly and wondered where it came from. "Shut up already!" she barked back at the dog, not noticing the two men that were quickly sneaking up behind her.

Meas and Prak had trotted back towards the bridge over the canal where the strange man had been smelled. They retraced their scent trail and followed their own familiar scents back the way they came. Meas was more resolved to continue his search for the whereabouts of Lok Sabai. Prak was so interested in finding out the answer to his question about what the strange man was hiding under the bridge, that Meas began to meditate on Prak's curiosity.

Before they reached their destination of the bridge, Meas stopped under a shadow that a tree cast on the road. "It's time for evening meditation Prak," he called out and laid down right in the middle of the road.

"But I am ready to go dig around over there now," Prak said as he motioned in the direction of the bridge, "we can dig some holes and smell everything and mark it as our territory. Let's go, come on! Come on!"

"Why the impatience young monk?" Meas replied, "The bridge will still be there when we arrive, after our evening meditation."

Prak paced in a circle twice before lying down as well and let out a dog whimper-sigh-groan of mild discontent. "You are right, adept one." Prak suggested non-exuberantly, "Let's go towards the Nirvana that we are devoted to obtaining."

Prak and Meas were both in a lying position with all eight of their paws facing east. They could hardly do a half lotus or full lotus position in their current incarnations, so they assumed the common dog meditative posture which was to lie down and become relaxed. They focused on their breathing and focused their awareness on the rims of the holes of their nostrils, so that they had no other thought other than the awareness of the continual repetitive flow of air, in and out of their bodies.

A motorcycle with a human on it approached at high speed from the north. A man type human was making this artificial transportation device spew a cloud of bad smelling incense from one of it's shiny tubes and directing the human transport machine in the direction of the bridge. When he saw two dogs lying in the road, he leaned to the right and swerved the motorbike around the animals as anyone would do. These were holy beings after all and should not be bothered when they were in the Sahmati state of being.

Meas and Prak maintained this position and the emptying of their minds for about forty five minutes. A dozen motorized vehicles, some skinny with two wheels and some fat with four wheels passed them and of course, every time they circumvented the canines.

Some non-motorized, two wheeled bikes went by as well, in a much more slower motion. The dogs believed these types of human riders to be much more conscious beings, who did not make bad incense smells or noises in their more peaceful passing.

Meas rose and Prak quickly jumped up to get going. He didn't let Meas know that his mind was not clear during the meditation because he didn't want Meas to suggest they do it again. Prak's mind had been drifting from breathing focus, to the burning question of what might be under the bridge. _Was it a bag full of soup bones? A shoe that was the perfect consistency for chewing apart? A half eaten package of crispy-puffed pig skin pieces?_ Yes, these were the thoughts that Prak entertained instead of becoming an empty vessel. He didn't know that Meas was aware of his straying mind the entire time, and could sympathetically smell Prak's visions as well. The dog that Meas was found these thoughts of smells very enticing as well.

The two hairy trotters reached the bridge and stood at the edge of the slope on the eastern side of the canal. Prak gave Meas an excited glare and Meas gave him back a nod of agreement. With that gesture, Prak jumped the road curb and ducked under a rail. He leaped off of the cement structure and scurried down a dry dirty bank of the stagnant canal. Before Meas could catch up, Prak was out of sight and already under the bridge. Meas followed his friend's steps and descended the slope as well.

When Meas caught up to Prak, he saw him sniffing a human that was lying face down in the dusty dirt and not moving. Meas went over to get a closer look and he smelled something both sweet and sour, and metallic, as he approached. Both Meas and Prak stepped back for a moment as they concurred that the smell was that of the beginning of rotting flesh and tissue, which was coming from the human body, lying face down in the dirt, under the bridge.
6

ladder

The Laotian military commanders, Apasit and Meesak, were riding together in a large Chinese-made urban assault vehicle with several other assault vehicles flanking them on either side. They had just left the meeting with the Prime Minister Arun and were on their way back to the previously communist country of Laos, which was becoming known more accurately as the Laos province of the Golden Rising Empire. The Chinese occupied countries were allowed to maintain part of their previous titles for reasons of cultural pride, but in all reality, they were controlled and occupied regions of the Golden Rising Empire, as dictated by lord Arun, and the circle of leaders of the Golden Rising Empire.

"The prime minister did very well in his dealings with Nepal's soft dignitaries," said Meesak to his adversarial companion, "unlike you have done in Savanakhet and the southern provinces under your own doughy supervision."

"Bite your tongue, buffalo herder!" snapped back Apasit, "The southern provinces are maintained and controlled by the mandates of Lord Arun. It is you and your addictions to power drugs that have made you soft in showing authority in the eyes of the common people that you would try and herd in the north! When lord Arun sees that I am the more fit leader for our military command, you will be showing respect to me by kneeling down and bowing to me with your forehead on the ground!"

"So you would claim yourself to be like the Buddha and have soft people with soft minds, bow and wai and become pacifists like the orange table-cloth-wearing monks do?"

"You will be kneeling down and throwing up in the toilet when you are too sick and hungover from white whiskey and synthetic power!"

"May Mao Se Tung smite you in your dreams! True power comes from true suppression, which is what I have always implemented. Never mind what indulgences I ingest!"

"The best thing you can suppress is a fart when Lord Arun is talking you, bloated drunkard!"

"Perhaps you need a lesson in respect Apasit! You had better sleep with an eye open tonight. I have loyalists within the compound that you rest in. You are not above assassination attempts by, say some random zealot hopped up on the power that you rebuke. Or maybe you will be too out of touch while you download enlightenment files into your brain."

"I could assassinate you right here in this Humberjet, and then I would be the supreme military leader of the region that is rightfully mine. My ancestors killed your ancestors long ago when your Cambodian relatives, who were stupid simple farmer-soldiers, were wiped off of the map. In the past. we never needed four military zones, nor twelve provinces. We only need one voice, and one power, that could kill any enemy."

"You could not kill a bottle of Malaysian beer if you tried! You are weak and deluded with the empire's version of atheist enlightenment. Those downloads are faulty and you know it, but you keep accepting them into your skin port and your psyche! I am guessing that you are no closer to walking on air than you were when you started synthetic meditation."

"Ever since the empire's total ban on religion, the enlightenment downloads have been the only way to pursue _Nibana_. True connection with all things is the only way for a human essence to gain true control over the peasant civilians. We are all addicted to the power that is secretly added to all of the skin port cards, but you, you chose to take the modified street made version as well. You are deluded in your hedonist ways, lacking the true control which I will achieve!"

"Yes, we were all secretly exposed and addicted to power's technology, when it was slowly introduced into our bodies through the Chinese card interface, but I have the presence of mind to take that a step further. I get the best manufactured so-called, 'street made' power, from the best chemist labs in the Siam region. I bypass the common addiction and benefit from the empowering experience that my chemist creates for me! With this powerful experience, I can see more clearly the weakness in nirvana seekers like you, and feel the true unlimited power in myself! This is why I will be ruler of the empire's Laotian army."

"That is what the ruling powers would have any obtuse mind like yours believe, that they are in pursuit of a self fulfilling destiny. Ever since the time of the ancient Illuminati, thought slingers have programed the human race to accept whatever agenda it is that they are pushing through propaganda and mindless media. Why do you think the distant Americans of the new millennium fell so quickly? The Illuminati kept them all divided with the concepts of subscribing to a monastic god and the idealistic notion of a righteous struggle against the machine. While the Americans fought each other, the shining east rose to power where it rightfully sits now. My enlightenment downloads may have corrupt files embedded in them, but my direction is still clear!"

"Your direction is being too serious and studious! Let us forget our differences and our assassination attempts on each other and go to the casino for some gambling and some women! Even you can enjoy that much, can you not?"

"For once you have a good idea, and for that, I will not try and kill you today."

"Spoken like a true politician!"

Meas stared intently at the face down human in front of him. He could clearly sense that its soul was somewhere else. _Why did he die? Who is he?_ Meas wondered. Prak moved closer in the shadows of the bridge and sniffed the foot of the dead man. Prak looked back at Meas and stopped his sniffing when he heard the mantra being chanted in his mind. Meas was beginning the prayer for the recently deceased soul, and Prak joined with him in the meaning, and the prayers he expressed with his panting.

While the two dogs were focusing on the male figure under the bridge, something moved nearby. Prak turned around to see a blood covered woman running in his direction. He scurried away with great speed, knowing he could contemplate this scenario from a location much further away from the bleeding woman, who did not look pleasant at all. Meas also turned and ran behind Prak, not seeing that the woman was being chased by another man, who was also covered in blood.

The girl tripped and fell on the uneven clumps of sandy dirt as she tried to move as fast as she could. She had a look of terror in her eyes as she looked back at the man who was stumbling towards her. She used her hands frantically to push herself back up every time that she dropped to the ground. Her body was very weak and bruised and cut badly. She was dizzy and didn't see a tree stump in front of her. She tripped over it and fell down on it hard. This time, she couldn't move anymore. She felt dry soil spray her skin as the man behind her kicked dusty dirt on her with his erratic tackling approach. She felt his knee pushing into her back but she couldn't look up to see him. She was tired and sore and spent.

The man was very intent on not letting this girl get away. He kept a knee on her back as he reached around inside his bloody jacket for something. She knew that she couldn't get away now. She had to give up. She did not think that this would happen, despite her stupid boyfriend's plan. She wondered if he was still alive. The man on top of her found what he was searching for in the folds of his inner pockets. He pulled out a pair of hand cuffs and cuffed one of the girls wrists. He paused and breathed a very deep sigh.

"I should just kill you, and leave you for the crabs to pick apart!" The man cursed at her while he held her one cuffed wrist. He saw that she was not going anywhere so he cuffed her arms together and got off of her. He surveyed himself, feeling a sharp stinging pain that was caused by a bleeding wound somewhere in his chest area. He felt his head with his fingers and found that his head was also bleeding and very sore. He spit some bloody saliva on the ground and cursed her again.

"You just shut your mouth," said a voice from behind Sabine as a man's hand appeared and slid over her mouth, pushing hard against her face. Sabine saw the dog that she had been yelling at, take a running start right towards her, as her head was held tight by a strong hand. Her arms were also pinned by an aggressive pair of tackling arms from a second aggressor. The dog leaped directly at her and became air born. The two men that were accosting Sabine did not see the incoming, leaping dog until it was upon them both.

Lok Sabai dove through the air and landed with his two front legs in the ribs of the man gagging Sabine. The force of his lunge knocked the man free from his muting grapple with her. The man that was applying a bear hug was so startled by the sudden, surprising events, that he let go of Sabine and took a step back. Lok Sabai landed on top of the first assailant and quickly jumped off. Sabine now had no one restraining her.

Lok Sabai, a pure black German shepherd, was a fairly formidable adversary to have diving on to you. The man on the ground pushed himself up and took off running as fast as he could after Sabine, leaving his bigger partner to deal with the attacking dog. The remaining attacker reached into his waist pocket and produced a hand gun that he pointed at a snarling black beast. Its neck hair was puffing out in all directions, which made it look even more menacing and much bigger.

The man squeezed the trigger and released a bullet that went through the dog's shoulder. He heard the dog howl out a yelp and saw it lay down. He stuck the hot gun back in his pocket and began running after his partner and the girl. He would get paid to turn this wench in to his boss, and have enough drinking money to last a few days. Lok Sabai lay down on his stomach and licked at the bleeding tear on his left front shoulder. He worried for Sabine, and the levity of trials that he saw she would soon face.

Sabine took off sprinting in the opposite direction that the men had come from. She didn't look back but trained her vision on what she saw ahead of her. She decided instantly to run back towards the crowd of people and try to lose the men there. The smaller, wiry man was closest to Sabine and kept a good chase upon her, but her youth and her drive gave her a faster edge. His anger and his greed motivated him to push his limit as well.

Sabine ran past a temple, where she saw some monks gathered, and was pleased to see humans nearby. She ran hard, looking back when she felt the opportunity to afford a second of surveillance. She figured that she was at least ten good steps ahead of him when she saw a parade procession in front of her that was coming down a street on her right. Without losing a second of time, or a degree of balance, she ran under an elephant's belly that was being led along the group of people. Her palm brushed the beast's dry, drooping skin and pushed it up above her ducking head, which cleared the gut by a couple of hairs.

The man chasing her had to push his way through the group of parading folk and beasts. The Elephant's girth, which towered before the pursuant, slowed him down another ten steps at least. He lost sight of the girl for a moment but used his power-enhanced eyes to scan his entire peripheral horizon and look for quick movements. He saw the back of the girl that he was chasing moving away from his current location, and quickly made pursuit again.

Sabine ran parallel to the parade route thoroughfare by weaving in and out of spectators who were gathered on the sidewalks. The man chasing Sabine was not as polite as his escapee as he pushed people out of his way while he plowed through the citizens watching a military show go by. The parade had a lot of local tradition and costume pageantry, along with hundreds of banners of the Golden Rising Empire. The man who was chasing Sabine could care less about whichever leader was having a military parade, but rather cared about getting cash compensation for supplying more human resources. This thug had priorities however; money, booze, power and women. At this moment, a girl was just ahead of him, and he could feel her. When he caught her and turned her in, he would have money, which would buy him booze and power drugs, and the courage to abuse more women.

The adrenaline in his system was on a steady release and his pineal gland was extremely active. The power in his system triggered a primal hunter instinct and he drew on that raw energy to make a blasting dash for Sabine. Sabine allowed herself to afford a glance back and saw the madman coming at her in grunting strides. As she bought this moment to look away from her horizon, her foot entered a depression in the road where a cement drain cover was missing. She felt her center of balance floating away from her, and for a weightless moment, she remembered a lesson where her teacher Ratanna threw her body through the air.

He used to teach her special counter moves when they were sparring in class. He would allow her attack to come and then redirect her energy by throwing her through the air. She would fight for control and she would always crash to the mat with futile attempts to make any postured landing. She had been thrown hundreds of times before she learned to follow through with it with grace. She eventually learned to land like a cat on all four paws. As Sabine floated through this memory of her teacher, her focus floated back into her flying body and she let go of all control over it.

She became a leaf blowing in a breeze. She only touched the ground with small points of her leaf-like self, tumbling lightly over the cement sidewalk on fingertips, elbows and heels. The textures of the surfaces she was rolling across gave her the cognition which asserted itself into her muscle memory. After she touched the ground several times, she incorporated her palms, forearms and the balls of her feet into the her tumbling discord. She turned the flailing tumble that she was taking into something that was light, gentle and unforced. This gave her the ability to react smoothly, to become agile, even graceful, as she found her center in her rolling motion. The diving, enraged man, did not complete the tackle that he was expecting to make, but found himself diving over her body with his arms outstretched.

Instead of an armful of female, the lunging attacker felt feet striking his face, and an immobilizing pain signal was sent to his brain. Sabine's tumbling roll stopped and she was on the ground prostate, facing the oncoming attacker. As the man's body came flying over her. She pressed her chest and palms flat on the ground and lifted her legs up into the air so that her heel bones struck the cartilaginous tissue of his face with great force. His nose was instantly broken as he tumbled ungracefully down the street, and slid quite a distance before he was able to get up and try to gain his balance and his senses. His hands went to his face instantly to clutch at his throbbing, bleeding, disfigured nose. He cursed through the pain that was pulsing in him, but used the power drug that was still seeping into him to continue pursuing the girl. She had become a real pain in the........nose.

Sabine took off running again and scanned her surroundings. She saw that there was an alley intersection coming up, and that the alley she was running down came to a tee at the next block. There were two and three story cement buildings lining the streets. Leaning up against the ninth structure on her right was a bamboo ladder that led up to the second floor. Part of Sabine's unique training was that she was exceptionally skilled at using ladders as both a tool and a weapon. She made a very quick decision with this in mind.

Sabine was running as fast as she could when she turned and changed her momentum seamlessly, and scrambled up the ladder leaning on the building. The ladder was resting on the cement rail of the balcony on the second floor of the building. She reached the top of the ladder and hopped over the cement rail in less than three seconds, then spun around on the balcony to see who was pursuing her. She immediately saw one of her attackers and knew that she had also been seen. Her pursuer watched as she ducked into the building.

What he didn't see was that Sabine had entered the second floor room only for a second, then dropped down and rolled back onto the balcony, which was concealed by the half-wall rail that the ladder was resting on. He also couldn't see that he was being observed by Sabine's keen eyes which were peering through the drain scupper holes in the half wall. When the thug reached the ladder he looked back for his partner or for any attacking dogs. He saw neither.

When the attacker reached the ladder that the girl had ascended, he attempted to follow her up by ascending the ladder as well. He lifted his right foot up to step on the first ladder rung, but before it made contact, the entire ladder jerked upward out of his grasp. Confused, he quickly looked up only to see Sabine smiling, holding the ladder with two hands, as she drove the ladder's bottom steel rung into his face, perfectly targeting the already broken, bloody nose that she was staring down at. She anticipated that he would instinctively look up so she had a special view waiting for him. That view involved seeing stars.

The man blacked out as the stars faded into darkness, and he fell into a heap. Sabine saw no one else coming from her vantage point, so she slid down the ladder as fast as she could have jumped off of the second floor. _I could really use a power surge now!_ She was thinking this as she looked up and down the street she was on. The bigger of the men that grabbed her appeared and started running towards her now. He lumbered a bit when he ran because of his size and Sabine knew that he wasn't very dexterous, but he did have a gun. Sabine grabbed the light bamboo ladder and ran in the opposite direction, with the ladder clutched under her right arm. The man coming after her saw her turn right and disappear around the corner of a building at the tee at the end of the road, carrying a ladder. _What a stupid bitch!_

The very heavily breathing, power-induced thug ran harder when he saw his target. He ran after the black-haired girl with all of his strength, because he knew that his boss would be angry if he didn't produce any fresh meat today. He had been running as fast as he could to find his partner using a GPS application, embedded in the technology of his power card. As he was moving towards the signal of his partner, he saw the girl running away with a ladder. _Why is she carrying a ladder? Does she think she can climb away from me?_ His power-influenced, angered emotions fueled him even more now. He doubled his efforts and poured on more steam, running like a hulking freak. As he was running towards her, he almost ran past something that looked familiar.

It was then that he saw his partner lying in a heap on the ground. He looked ahead to where he last saw Sabine running, and then looked down his partner's body that was starting to move. The crumpled figure had a bloody red wound in the middle of his face. His injured and disfigured partner yelled, "Get the girl!" and tried to stand up. As the big man went back to chasing Sabine, the smaller man stumbled, and fell back into a heap. The last thing he saw before his head hit the ground again was the back of his partner's dirty leather jacket.

The big man reached the same corner that Sabine had turned at, and then he stopped, coming to a cautious halt. He slowly poked his head around the cement building's corner to see where the girl might be. He was being more reserved in his pursuit because he was now aware that this little girl could inflict some damage.

As he peered around the corner, he didn't see anyone in the street, just empty buildings and a bamboo ladder leaning up against one of them. Aha _! She must be up there!_ He thought and started running for the ladder. Right before he reached it, a bamboo pole jutted out from a doorway and he was not quick enough to avoid tripping over it. His body slammed face down, hard onto pavement, and the impact knocked the gun from his hand, but not before he fired a wild shot.

Sabine dropped the bamboo pole she was grasping and jumped backwards as a sharp pain emerged in her left bicep. The stray bullet had ricocheted off a wall and went through Sabine's muscle tissue in her right arm next. The big man had managed to stand up again and as he turned to look for his gun and see what had tripped him. He saw the girl running out of a building behind him. She grabbed the leaning ladder and was running fast again, injured, but barely shaken. She didn't know how badly she had been injured or how compromised her left arm would be in a fight.

Sabine had grabbed the bamboo ladder with her right hand as she exited and ran north again, towards the monument, ladder in tow. The clumsy but now extremely angry pursuant was not far behind her now. His rage gave him a new burst of energy, coupled with the power that he had inserted less than an hour ago. He blurted out a, "Yaaauuugghhhh!" and dashed at the girl that he meant to injure badly now. He reached in his pocket for his gun and found nothing, as he realized that he must have dropped it and forgot about it. This made him even angrier and he doubled his power-fueled efforts.

Sabine's arm throbbed from where the stray bullet entered her. From behind her. she heard the grunts of the bulky attacker and judged where he was in location to her. She calculated that she had less than twenty seconds to find a path of escape. There was a vacant lot ahead on her right, and this seemed like the best direction in which to flee. There was demolished building debris, yellow dry grass and papaya trees in the gradual upward slope of the lot. This looked like a good place to make a stand.

The man chasing Sabine, saw her run with the ladder into a clearing, and he tried to turn as sharply as she did but slipped and fell to one knee, with the other leg extending itself outward along the ground. Sabine, who had been glancing back often, waiting for the charge of her attacker, saw a moment of advantage when he fell. She dropped the bamboo ladder into the grass and on top of a cement column. The ladder rested across the column, with a quarter of its length between Sabine and the column. The big man had got up from his slip, and saw the girl that he was chasing was just standing now, facing him with a defiant look on her bratty, little, sneering face.

He rushed and screamed as he raged towards her. She didn't move at all. Because she wasn't moving at all, he thought that this would be easy money, and he ran at her with all of his anger, frustration and will. She casually stepped down on the end rung of the ladder closest to her, pushing it down into a ditch. As she did this, the other end of the ladder tilted up quickly into the air, right in front of the thug. It stopped rising right at the man's neck level as he was lunging forward with all of his perturbed might.

The hefty attacker ran into the ladder as his neck plunged into the steel rung very forcefully. The ladder did not move because it was braced by a piece of concrete at the base where Sabine's foot rested. All of the impact of the man's heavy force was centered at the wind pipe extrusion of his neck. His windpipe collapsed and he could not breathe as his head and the lower half of his body propelled forward while his neck did not. Sabine heard his neck made a cracking sound, and she knew that she had eliminated this opponent.

Sabine was only one hundred forty centimeters tall, but she was powerful, quick, and could injure an adversary, or even kill them. She was fairly certain she had done just that. She didn't wait around to see if anyone else wanted to die right now. She turned her sore body towards the back of the vacant lot and ran in the direction of the closest shadows that she could conceal herself in. _I really need some power!_ This was her number one thought. Her jones was heavy, and painful right now.

Sabine threaded her way through some thick bamboo stands and emerged in a clearing where a small fishing pond lay. She felt that this area was still too out in the open so she kept to the high embankment around the pond and looked for deeper tree cover. She was still in the city, but was in a water runoff canal, which was now a trash-littered, dry, basin lined by trees. She stumbled her way forward seeing the bright fingers of the sun pushing through the leafy ceiling above her. Sabine dropped to her knees, wanting to close her eyes. She began hearing thunder rolling in, in bursts and tides as she grew dizzier. She was disoriented and didn't notice a man who was running right towards her. She closed her eyes and remembered the prophetic sounding words that came from nowhere. _Rain is coming!_

Lok Sabai lie curled up, licking his very painful but small wound. He thought that his blood tasted thick and that he should drink more water. He felt the hot sidewalk under his skin and fur. He could hear three different birds communicating in their specific languages on the electric wires above him. The air had the distant smell of rain. It was subtle, but it was welcoming. The long, dry, hot season had brought everything growing to near lifelessness, and this rain would bring thriving change to living organisms everywhere. Lok Sabai was glad to know the rain was coming, but there was apprehension there as well.

Lok Sabai felt the carnal fabric pull loose from his awareness. His sensory functions began to fade in their functions. His organs were slowing down and his mobilizing essence was retreating. This strong, dark animal's body had been a relaxing incarnation for the monk that used to be called Lok Sabai. That name was attached to him by memories only. This enlightened Bodhisattva had no identity or name, but everyone knew this presence when they felt it. He had traveled to the monument city to help a little human, and now his journey would take him elsewhere.

He felt an overwhelming love for the precious little Sabine. _What an amazing soul!_ He felt strong compassion for the dog's injured body. Living within it was like the extended moment of a flower opening and closing. It was a cosmic touch of universal connectedness. The essence that had dwelt within the canine, set the breath of life free from it and expanded out in all directions, which were directionless. This incarnation touched paths with the human being, Sabine, for a brief moment. She had an essence that would tie many strands of the universal web together someday. Lok Sabai, the sentient being, was present to transfer part of a message to Sabine, a message that would help her when the defining moment unfolded.
7

rescue

"Are you OK? Can I help you? Can you hear me?" Sabine heard a voice from somewhere above and behind her. Her face was against the ground. She was startled because she was not aware of anyone nearby. She was dizzy and her vision was blurred. She considered that there may be another fight coming to her today, but she did not sense that there was danger with this approaching person, so she chose not to flee, not sure if she even could. Her head was spinning from loss of blood and lack of power. "You are injured, poor girl. Please let me help you! I can take you to a doctor."

Sabine turned her head around and was now eye to eye with a gorgeous young man who was extending two arms towards her to help her get up. His eyes were amazingly deep blue and piercing. His frame looked slim but strong. His face was handsome and chiseled in its features. The swirling of her fading reason and the man's amazing smile made Sabine think that she was seeing a superstar from a TV show. _Am I dead? Am I dreaming?_ Sabine reached an arm up to this stranger, not knowing why.

"My name is Darayan," he said as he firmly grasped Sabine's good arm and helped her rise, "I'm not a doctor, but it looks like you have a bullet hole in you."

"You must have a genius brain like a doctor if you can notice something that obvious." Sabine said in a sarcastic manner, not knowing what this beautiful stranger was doing at her assistance, but not averse to it either.

"Forgive me, I just wanted to help. I heard a gunshot and I saw a man chasing you. I think he's dead!" said Darayan.

"I never touched that man. He ran into a ladder back there." came back Sabine with feigned concern.

"What is your name?" came a pleading voice from the very handsome, dark-haired, honey-skinned, blue-eyed man.

"Sabine." She half whispered, with the shyly spoken word dancing quietly off of her lips.

"Sabine, I can take you to a clinic, a good private clinic, not a military controlled hospital. I can get you some food, or some juice or tea..."

"I want power!" clearly spoke Sabine in a strong loud tone, "I want power now!"

"You grown-up little thing, why do you want a drug like.."

"Do you have any?"

"Yes."

"May I have it?"

"Of course, here you are."

Sabine's shaking hand stretched towards Darayan with her palm up, eye's hopeful. Darayan placed a plastic card in her hand and she returned a meager smile, but a genuine one. She closed her fingers around the card and clenched it in her hand as if she had found the substance all of her life's ambitions. She didn't care that there was a bullet hole in her. She didn't care about Nimol nor Kiri. She didn't care about chicken foot soup. She had power again.

Sabine jerked her head and her eyes to one side and motioned to the stranger to turn his gaze away. Darayan caught on quickly and appeared embarrassed as he turned his back to Sabine, who was already lifting up her shirt. She pulled her injured arm carefully out of her shirt and jean jacket and raised it straight up. She ungracefully pulled the empty card out of its slot under her good arm and slid the new one in with reverence and respect. This power was her lover and her god.

Sabine felt a blissful, relaxed warmth come over her like a heroin high. It felt like she was returning to the womb. This was what she recognized as a side effect and it was very familiar to her, some thing that she was conditioned to recognize and willingly invite into herself. A grounding sensation made her feel like she was melting into the soil. She let this wave sweep over her. She was anxious for it to pass and the next stage of effects to begin.

Some users did power for the high feeling alone. Sabine enjoyed the high feeling from power as a short film before the main feature. Kiri used to tailor her experience to be highly physical and strongly psychoactive, which could be the more active parts of the power high. But right now, she was enjoying this effect immensely.

"Come with me Sabine." Darayan said to her listing eyes. "I know you feel better now, but there is a hole in you that we should get attended to. I promise to take good care of you." Sabine looked at him a dreamy dizzy blur and melted back into the peacefulness of her buzz, forgetting that she had been shot. _Why is a handsome man helping me out? Why were two men chasing me?_

Sabine nodded off into a mattress of soothing breezes and her muscules became limp. The power that Darayan gave her was of a pain relieving nature and good for emergency first aid situations. He was very skilled at administering different types of the power for different conditions. He was a medicine man of sorts.

He picked the limp Sabine up into his arms and held her firmly but gently. A few raindrops fell on them as he carried her up to his car. He thought that Sabine looked especially beautiful with the raindrops on her cheeks, like a water goddess.

A strong, detached man, named Ratanna. was sitting in the lotus position and was present, but thoughtless, as breath entered his body through his nostrils and filled the lowest part of his belly. As his diaphragm extended, the breath filled himself full like water pouring into a pitcher, from the bottom of his roots up to his third eye. His breath paused in a moment of flux between inhalation and exhalation. In his mind was nothingness. Then the breath was released out of his body from the top down, like a water pitcher being poured. Ratanna was aware that breathing was happening. He was aware because he had reduced his reality to only focus on his nerve endings in the ridge of his nostrils, where he could feel the passage of air. He did not own the breath, but only observed it, going in, then out.

The room he sat in was dim, except for the sunlight that came in the tall, skinny windows of the training room. Ratanna was calming and quieting himself to prepare for his students. He was welcoming the universal teacher of creation and creativity to express itself through him in his class. His resolve was strong, to teach his students to use everything around them as a tool, or a weapon, in order to win a fight.

Ratanna opened his eyes. He let one final deep breath enter him, and exit. He stared forward with his eyes fixed on a golden statue of the Buddha. He moved from sitting in the lotus position and sat on his heels as he knelt facing the golden statue. The one thought in his mind was _patience._ He put his palms together in the praying or wai position, and held his thumb tips to his lips as he muttered a mantra, "Rain is coming, become small, enter it all."

The man of forty five years bowed three times, and then returned to the kneeling position. He let out a breath of completion before he stood up. Even after a mind emptying meditation, a small piece of analytical worry remained within him. His mind was not as light as he would have liked it to be. He walked over to one of the tall windows in the room and stared out of it. He wasn't looking at anything but his mind began to wander back to his younger days.

He saw himself in a class room with a strict royal tutor, who was repetitiously droning slogans for them to recite. He remembered the Mage, Kosal, entering the room and scolding the tutor with a backhanded slap. He remembered the tutor hitting every student in turn after that, feeling the shame of losing face, and displacing his anger onto his students. Ratanna never liked that teacher. He was glad that he himself taught with the conviction of creative force, not with painful memorization. _Now, I am teaching a child, a little girl, to go back and destroy that world! Can she do it? Am I crazy to believe the prophecy? I must follow through. I must! She must! Or our grandchildren may suffer for many generations to come._

Ratanna watched out the window as the young Sabine walked towards the warehouse that they practiced in. She looked so innocent to him in her pigtails and school uniform. _She is such an amazing child. She is the first one to show up for training everyday. I can't believe I am training this little girl to be a killer, this twelve year old girl, and she doesn't even know it, none of the students in the class do._

Sabine opened the door and with a big smile on her face, she ran over and bowed to her teacher. She was ready to learn. She loved studying with teacher Ratanna. She was the most amazing student he ever had at that age, maybe at any age. Sabine was graceful, concise, diligent and surgical in her training methods. _Is she really who the seers suggest she is?_

Sabine trotted off and went to the bathroom to change into her practice robes. She took her hair out of the stupid pigtails that her mom weaved in the morning, and she tied her hair back into a pony tail with a rubber band, looping the hair into it one more time to make a bun and a tail. She was excited today because she knew her teacher was going to teach the students how to run up and down ladders. She ran back out into the training room and slid across the wood floor in her socks doing a series of forward punches. She had intent and seriousness on her face.

Ratanna smiled to himself inside as he admired this beautiful little dark-haired girl. _She doesn't know what tomorrow will bring. She doesn't have a skin port yet. She doesn't know about any of the street drugs or the power drugs yet. She doesn't seem to have any inkling of her destiny. I wish I could freeze her at this age forever, and protect her from the coming flood._

Sabine's eyes opened and squinted immediately from the glare of the bright light on the ceiling that she was facing. The walls were painted light green and there were shelves hanging on the walls. Her arm was bandaged up and sore. She felt the power in her. She clung to the feeling of safety for a moment. She discerned that she must be in some type of medical facility. She tried to survey the room to understand where she might be. A spirit house statue that she could see outside the room's only window had a little ladder rising up to it, which reminded Sabine of her recent battle. She thought of her teacher, Ratanna, and how he smiled when she slid all the way down a ladder for the first time. _I miss him. It is so sad that he was killed._

Sabine slipped out of this current streaming flow of thoughts and sunk back into her emotional and ethereal high which was the theme of this variety of power she was enjoying. The delicate flow of blood pulsing easily through her veins reminded her of the nice man who gave her the power. _What was his name....Dairy...Dara....Darayan?_

"I'm so glad you are OK!" came the kind stranger's voice. Darayan entered the room through a metal door and was holding flowers in his hand. "I picked these for you. Maybe they will help to make you feel better." He said with a very shy smile. He looked so handsome and endearing. Sabine had to just stare at him. "You are OK, aren't you?" he said with a serious look.

Sabine was sore, but blissfully content. She was in a happy, floaty place. She was swimming through the effects that power with pain killer gave her. The clinic changed her card and added anesthetic, with a follow up, opiate-like, sense numbing agent. There were no real drug chemicals entering her body. What was treating her was the power, imbedded in a plastic card, inserted into a little skin flap under her arm, telling her nervous system that it had received antibodies, antiseptic, and pain reliever. A big dopey smile grew across Sabine's mouth. "OK," is all she could say.

Darayan smiled back at her and chuckled a little bit. He placed the flowers on a stand next to the bed she was laying in. He looked back at her with an innocent but coy stare and Sabine was feeling unusual things stirring inside of her as she wanted to just kiss his face right at that moment. She wanted to lick his lips and see what he tasted like. Sabine was quite smitten with this rescuer, samaritan, movie star.

Darayan caught her stare and assumed the clinical power was doing its job. He walked over to her and boldly took her hand into his, staring right into her dilated pupils. "I told them to take extra good care of you," he said through a smile, "I was really worried about you. Do you feel good enough to talk now?"

"Sabine tried to say yes as she pursed her lips and moved her tongue forward, but she did not complete making any words come out of her mouth. She did however roll her head to one side and let out a mumbled groan as a small ball of saliva rolled out of the side of her mouth. She sailed into a deep happy sleep. Darayan thought he heard her say the word "kissyface" but he wasn't sure. He placed his hand on her forehead and brushed his hand through her straight black hair. "Sleep little one, sleep!" he said to her in a hushed tone, as if not to disturb her at all.

A nurse entered the room and Darayan's eyes met hers. He looked at Sabine and then back at the nurse with a questioning frown. The Nurse looked at Sabine and then back at him and made a slight nod. Darayan made a gesture of relief and expelled a breath he had been holding. He looked back at Sabine and her innocent smile turned the corners of his mouth upward towards his mesmerizing blue eyes.

Sabine wandered around in a digitally medicated dream. She was looking for chicken feet at the market and she couldn't find any. People kept offering to sell her blood vine pieces instead. She kept telling them that she didn't need blood vine anymore, even though she didn't really know what it was. Next, she saw a young handsome man selling power drug cards, out in the open at a market and no one was arresting him. Sabine wanted to talk to the man as she walked towards him but she found herself staring at the power cards he had spread out like a fanned out deck of playing cards. She drooled a little when she saw so much power in one place and she began to run towards him. The route forward got suddenly extremely long, and her progress moving in that direction was painfully slow and did not seem to gain any ground. The man was turning and walking away with his back to her now. He was slipping the power cards into his pocket. She wanted him to come back. She wanted his power! She forgot about the chicken feet.

Sabine slept for several more hours and when she awoke from her strange dream, Darayan was sitting next to her bed. "Why is this beautiful man helping me?" She thought she was talking to herself silently but she voiced the words quite audibly.

"I use my power to find people in trouble." replied Darayan, who was there waiting for her to wake up.

Sabine clasped her right hand over her mouth to stop it from moving anymore. She realized that she was speaking, not thinking, and felt a bit embarrassed. She felt an attraction to him again, instantly. She was not feeling the drug-like effects anymore, and was coherent, but yet with this strange, hopeful feeling. "Hello...Dara...yan." She tried to remember his name's pronunciation. "Thank you!"

"You're welcome, Sabine." He stood up and grinned down at her.

"Are you some kind of guardian spirit?" Sabine asked him.

"I am just Darayan from monument city. I am a human, not a spirit. Are you dreaming now?"

"No, I was having a dream, I was....looking, trying, going...I can't remember. It doesn't matter. Thanks for getting me fixed up, and thank you for the power. It was just what I needed. After fighting that guy back there and winning, I felt like I deserved some power, but, how did you happen to find me?" She felt the gauze bandage wrapped around her left arm and then quickly, but painfully, she reached her left arm and checked her arm pit skin ports.

"I sensed someone was injured nearby when I was walking past where you were shot. I followed that sense and I saw an injured, young, sexy, dexterous fighter running with a bamboo ladder."

"Did that appear strange to you?" Sabine smiled and grinned, turning a little red.

"It was curious to me for sure. I have never seen anyone fight with a weapon that long before."

"What happened to the man back there? Men? That's right, there were two..."

"I didn't go back to see what happened to the man lying in a heap, and no one else came looking for you. You were bleeding pretty badly from your arm and it was starting to rain..."

"Rain is coming." Sabine said, as if she was in a distant conversation with someone else, Darayan thought.

"Rain is coming?" he asked.

"I don't know. It's something...my arm. This clinic. I don't have much money." She was suddenly feeling practical and a little frantic. She was not feeling loopy admiration, now she was becoming worried about her present reality, her family, getting in touch with them, the clinic bill.

"Don't worry about the clinic. I took care of everything already. And don't worry about the cost, I just wanted to help some one out in need."

"People like you don't really exist though, do they?" Sabine glared at him suspiciously, weighing the validity of her judgment on humanity.

"One of your arteries was damaged, but you are all sewn up and will heal ninety nine percent in no time."

"What of the remaining one percent, where did it go?"

"It will be the tiny scar on your arm from the bullet hole that will remind you of the day you kicked two guys asses and maybe remind you of me."

Sabine grinned and shyly looked down. She had feelings for this guy already. She didn't have feelings for guys. She didn't have a boyfriend. She didn't want a boyfriend. She didn't want anyone in her life slowing her down, directing her, hijacking her time. She did things her way. _So why am I feeling tiny around this man?_ "I have to go." she said.

"What, not yet. I can take care of you for a couple of days. You can rest at my house, and heal. Please come stay with me and let me help you out." He begged her.

"I have to go home." She was thinking about her mother and father, and Aom. She remembered Kiri's request. She wanted more power. She was supposed to go see a man named Nimol, but she had not yet reached her destination by a long shot. But the chances of her meeting someone so cute and generous and helpful was more than a long shot.

"I have more power at my home. Come rest at my house and I will invite you to sample all the power you want."

She struggled with her pressing priorities but the thought of some free power trumped them all. The dwindling power in her now was inviting more to enhance this event with more. She sensed on a high level of assurance that this man had more power and was going to share it with her. She could not resist that offer. She wanted power more than ever. Her family could wait to hear from her. So could Kiri. Right now, everything was going her way. How could she refuse a dear man like this who wanted to give her assistance, and power? She looked up at Darayan and suddenly felt the urge to kiss him again. _This is not like me, but I like it!_

"OK." Sabine said. "But how can I ever repay you? I don't have a job, or money." Her eyes grew into a more focused gaze into his eyes. _Those incredible blue eyes!_

"Maybe someday, if someone is after me, you can fend them off with a large tool."

"I would gladly defend you," Sabine said, taking one step closer towards Darayan, her pupils noticeably dilated, "With a ladder, a hose, a wheel barrow, a pitch fork, whatever it takes! You are my rescuer." Sabine was having feelings that she had never had. All she wanted to do right now was go home with this man and do power with him, any variety of power he had.

"Your rescuer?" Darayan said modestly, "I only wanted to help a....."

"Shut up." Sabine said commandingly and planted her lips on his lips as she stood on the tips of her toes and reached her better arm around his neck, grasping his hair tightly as she kissed him. He kissed her back, resisting a little at first, but then he melted into Sabine, and put his arms around her gently.
8

wet dream

Darayan handled all of the paperwork and fees with the nurse at the reception desk as Sabine snooped around in a bag that she found next to the clinic bed she had been resting in. In the bag was a pair of brown stretch pants, a beige shirt with lacy borders, a pair of black denim studded jean shorts, a thick black leather belt, some black stockings and new, black, high heeled shoes, all about her size. She wanted to try them on right away, so with her right arm, she peeled off the white clinic pajama top. She realized that she didn't know where any of her clothes were. She wanted them back, but now she wanted this beige shirt on her body. It wasn't Sabine's style of clothes, but she was feeling vulnerable and weak in the hospital gown.

She managed to get the sleeve of the blouse over her injured arm, but she didn't have the ability to use her left arm sufficiently yet. She abandoned the right sleeve for now and pulled off her pajama bottoms. Using her feet as a second pair of hands, she looked around modestly to see if anyone could see her. Satisfied that no one was looking at her, she got her bottoms off and pulled the stretchy pants onto her legs without too much trouble. She stepped into the shorts and tried to pull them up onto her waist. This may have worked except the denim got caught between the toes of one of her feet and caused her to lean too far forward, tipping her entire body onto the floor.

Darayan heard a thud in the room where Sabine was and darted in to see what caused the noise. What he saw when he ran in the room was a half dressed girl laying on the floor giggling to herself. Sabine could not control her laughter, nor did she know where it was coming from. She was not usually this at ease, especially without her clothes fully on and a bullet wound in her body.

"Sabine! Are you OK?" he asked loudly, seeming very concerned.

Sabine just lay on the ground laughing, imagining that this must be quite the sight. In between her laughing breaths she asked Darayan, "Can you help me please?"

Darayan helped her up and aided her in pulling her shorts up and getting her arm through the sleeve in her blouse. "What were you doing on the floor?" he asked, as she straightened out her clothes.

"I was trying on these new clothes I found, when I decided to crawl like a worm and laugh like a hyena." she said acting very serious, following up with a raucous roar of laughter.

"Do you like the clothes?" he asked, hoping for some kind of positive answer.

"Do you like them on me?" she said, twirling around one time and then curtseying.

"Yes, you look, amazing!" Darayan managed to say, acting a bit shy.

"You're damn right I do!" Sabine said with adamant conviction. And she did. These were not her regular style of clothes, because they were the clothes of a rich person, which she definitely was not. At this moment, Darayan gazed at her and was speechless. She looked fantastic in these clothes. She had never even tried on clothes like these before, but they made her feel very sassy, feisty and courageous, in a sexy way. She was not at all acting like herself, and she liked it.

"If you are ready, my lovely ladder battler, then you are all checked out and we can go." he suggested.

"I'm ready." she said. _The question is, are you ready for me?_

"OK. You are discharged, I have meds for you to take to aid you in your healing, so, let's go get some food!" Darayan initiated.

"Where do you want to eat rice?" Sabine asked.

"Never mind rice today Sabine," Darayan said, "We are eating steak tonight!"

"Steak?" Sabine said, wondering what it tasted like. She had never had steak before. "OK, steak it is."

"You will enjoy the place we are going, trust me!" Darayan said as if he had to convince a poor village girl to go eat something her family would never be able to afford to give her. Darayan could tell she was poor by her mannerisms and by her clothes. He, however, was not. He could tell she was an amazing fighter by her actions. He was not that either. He could tell that she was a lot more than she advertised. This girl was special. There was something about her. She was exactly the kind of girl that he was searching for.

A nicely dressed couple walked through the doors of a VIP club after they were politely searched and questioned by a large bouncer at the front door. Darayan, proving who he was with an extended hologram created by his interface card, was invited to sit at one of the nicest tables. There was a fancy chandelier light fixture above every table in the large, dimly lit dining area, which surrounded a large open floor. This area had hard wooden floors and was used for ballroom dancing in the past when tourists from around the world used to come to Monument City, formerly known as Siam Reap. Sabine stared at everything, as if she was on a different planet. They were not at a restaurant, or a public eating area. They were at the Bopha club where only members and their guests could be admitted. Sabine wondered how Darayan could afford to come to a place like this. She didn't even know that places like this existed.

"What do you do for work?" Sabine asked as she was bust staring at all of the architectural intricacies.

"What do you do for work?" Darayan returned her question.

"I'm an ex-student and a half-teacher." Sabine boasted, making her spine a little straighter and taller as she spoke.

"And what do you teach, half of the time?"

"I can instruct kids and adults how to practice mixed martial arts and defense techniques."

"Can you read minds?"

"What?"

"Can you tell what other people are thinking, with the help of power maybe?"

"No! Can you?" Sabine could a little, but she wasn't ready to let that be known, not yet. She wasn't trying to read Darayan's mind. She was too caught up in her emotions.

"No, but with all of your skills, I thought that maybe you could."

"Enough about me, what about you?"

"What about me?"

"Well, what do you do for work? Must I ask again?"

"I work for the government."

"Which government?"

"Our government."

"What do you do, there, at our government? Whatever that is."

"I am a public assistance worker, that's how I found you."

"Say what?"

"With the power I use, it helps me locate people in trouble. I get a sense of very chaotic and desperate energies and go to them to see if I can help."

"Really? I never heard of, pubic service workers."

"That's public service, and I do exist."

"Well I can see you exist! OK. So when you find someone in trouble and help them out, do you usually take them out to eat at a fancy unknown VIP restaurant, club, resort?"

"Only you, Sabine. Only you!" Darayan was flashing an electrifying look at her and she felt it. She was beginning to believe that this dream could be real, meeting a chivalrous prince charming in the most unlikely circumstance. Sabine and Darayan talked engagingly while they were waiting for their food to arrive. This was the first time that Sabine had ever been to an exclusive restaurant, or any restaurant with padded chairs. She also had never been on a real date before. _Is this a date?_

Sabine felt classy and more adult being there, especially when the formally dressed waiters called her Ma'am or Miss. One waiter called Sabine Missus, and she and Darayan had a good a laugh, but Sabine secretly wondered what it would be like to be married to someone, someone who could afford to eat at a restaurant of this caliber.

At this fancy restaurant, Sabine ate a Rib-eye beef steak and loved it. It disappeared from her plate like power from her skin port card. Darayan just watched, not judging her as she inhaled her plate of food. She also tasted garlic and carrot mashed potatoes, pumpernickel marble bread, and grilled asparagus for the first time. The dinner was like a dream to her, with the exquisite food and lavish decorations. She even had a small glass of Port for dessert with a cinnamon crumble cake. She glowed with confidence and hope as she spent the evening talking to this handsome stranger.

When the dinner was done, Sabine followed Darayan's motions and copied what he did with his napkin and silverware, leaving it on the empty plate before her. The type of power she was on at this moment seemed to make everything taste better and feel better. She forgot about her family, her engagements and the hole in her arm, and was just dwelling in the moment. As she and Darayan were leaving, she reluctantly, but hopefully, slipped her hand into the crook of his arm. She was relieved that he accepted her and gracefully walked out of the club arm in arm, with a few stares from other patrons following them with their eyes.

Sabine looked extremely lovely. She had the radiance of youth, with cute dimples in her cheeks and a few freckles. She had the walk of someone who didn't have a care in the world and the smile of someone who was falling in love. Her eyes were bright, shiny and alluring. Her smile was wide and uninhibited, and her energetic aura was twice as wide as it usually was, extending almost three meters from her in every direction. She looked dreamy. She felt like she was dreaming.

The dream didn't stop there, it was only getting started. When they arrived at Darayan's very upscale provincial house, he held the door for Sabine in a gesture that she was not used to seeing, polite courtesy. She gladly entered his house through the beckoning front door and slid inside into a new reality. She wondered what they would do next.

Meas and Prak stopped running near a large banyan tree and turned around to look back, seeing no one pursuing them. They panted heavily from running so fast and from being frightened by dead and bleeding humans, all residing under a canal bridge that Prak was so curious about before. He wasn't now. Meas knew trouble had happened and was heading back under the bridge. His instinct pressured him to go back. _Who is the crazy man from under the bridge, and why are there two more people there as well, one of them dead?_

Meas absorbed the moment. Small birds were chirping from up high in the sycamore trees. The sun was masked by clouds and a very distant thunder was on the wind. Cicadas and hoppers intoned a droning, dry chord of forced patience. The canal water puddles were pungent smelling and the lotuses crept further out into the little remaining water. The temperature was hot, and even hotter under the shady bridge where a fight for life endured.

Meas circled back for another look. Prak stayed under the banyan tree and laid down. As Meas drew close to the bridge from the opposite side, he could see one man upright but stumbling. It was the odd man he saw around the bridge before. He also knew this man's face and scent from around town.

Meas thought he had seen this man before. Meas had seen him talking to someone or something inside the sewer drainage ducts, in front of the shops and in front of all of the people on the main street in the village. He sometimes wore holey pants that were more holes than pants, and little kids would laugh and point at him as their mother's steered them away. He sometimes carried around bags of garbage for days, trading and swapping pieces of it at various trash bins like they were shops and he was a merchant. Everyone avoided him and knew nothing about him except what they saw: a crazy man. Everyone knew him. No one knew his name. It was Hung. His name meant "lucky."

Meas saw him stumble as he paced. The dog moved in closer to see what the man would do next. He had fallen down and was laying face down in the sandy dirt, wheezing from his throat. Blood formed bubbles in his mouth with each labored breath. Meas was not afraid but moved in to aid this soul if he could. He sensed that the man was dying. He was laying there, just staring into the sand, not moving. His consciousness was preparing to depart from the human vessel named Heng. Meas was entirely present in most planes of existence and could serve as a guide for a traveling soul. He lay down next to Heng and spoke to his being, _Everything is as it should be! You are free to explore, observe, or just get off of the wheel if you can. How many incarnations old are you?_ were the words that Heng heard from under water, thick blue gelatinous water. He rose towards a light that came from somewhere above the water's surface. _Why am I under water?_ Heng felt a soft blue glow on everything and a watery feel to the air outside of the water.

_You are not in water, in the sense you previously knew it as. As water is the substrate of life on organic planets, you are now feeling the water of the cosmos, the web of existence and the ether._ Meas addressed the man's question without speaking.

Heng wanted to make a word but he could not. It was as if someone was speaking to him but he had no way to reply. His ideas seemed to leave him. He was not in control of himself anymore. He had no self, yet, he was aware of all of this.

_Death on the earthly plane is your right, and as you have participated in the experience, you now have the choice to focus your attention anywhere you choose and make it your reality. You are soon to be visited by the entire universe. I am only the first to greet you here._ Meas spoke to the soul who was Heng. Heng was now understanding that this was death, a new reality before him, and that he had to chose carefully about whatever he might think, as he might create it.

_Who are you?_ came the thoughts from Heng's essence that were the words he could not speak.

_As the Buddha in you recognizes the Buddha in me, then we are one,a_ nswered Meas.

_I don't understand, do you have a name?_ were the thoughts coming from what Heng assumed was himself.

I have been known by many names, but you can associate the name Meas to me now.

Meas, Where am I?

You are in a space between the world of the living and the realm of pure consciousness.

How did I get here?

The human shell that you associated yourself with is damaged and will not serve as a resting place for your soul essence anymore.

I had a goal, a purpose. It was important! I have to do something, but, I can't remember what it was.

Whatever you were doing is not happening anymore. You need not be concerned at all with your past. You need only be here now. This is a transitive traversing wave you now ride. It will take you wherever you think about going. Be clear! Be focused. Be pure. Be open. Be.

Darayan led Sabine into the living room and turned on some table lamps. His house was full of antique items that reminded Sabine of a museum. Sabine noticed that some of his light fixtures had a strange warm glow coming from working incandescent light bulbs which she had never seen before. He also had a rotary table top telephone machine with moving parts. His widows were partially covered by long thick bundled drapes that were bigger than any of the sheets she had ever slept with.

Darayan showed her to a bed room at the end of a long tall hallway adorned with with crown molding. The walls had wood panels rising up from the floor to an ornate chair rail. Sabine didn't know what a chair rail or crown molding was. She had never seen them before.

The room Darayan gave Sabine to sleep in was decorated in the style of the rest of the house, but it was extremely bright, and white satin curtains over the windows made the room feel soft and welcoming. The bed was tall, more than half a meter from the floor, and it had soft, silky, satin sheets covering the consuming, friendly mattress. Sabine had only seen pictures of things like these, and some of the things she was seeing were completely new and intriguingly wonderful to her.

Sabine was left to her room while Darayan went to go clean up. She could hardly fathom that someone kept a bedroom for one visitor with it's very own bathroom attached to it. When she went into the bathroom, she was in awe. The three meter high ceilings made her feel small. The lacy shower curtain that was there to wrap around a cast iron claw foot tub looked like an expensive dress that she could never afford. A curved, wooden-legged, marble-topped table stood next to the tub with shampoos, conditioners, three kinds of soaps, a tall silver pitcher, a stack of towels and many thick wash cloths. Sabine had no idea that things like this even existed. She was used to filling a plastic bowlful of water drawn from a cement holding tank and dumping it over herself, regardless of the temperature of the water or the air. This bathtub device she was studying had two places for water to enter it from fancy, shiny pipes. One artistic knob had a red disc set into it and the other was blue. She learned by turning them that that hot water came from the pipe attached to the red knob. _How do they separate water and how do they make it hot? Is there a fire nearby?_

A banging, thudding sound came from the door to the hallway and Sabine went to see what the sound was. A maid was knocking to come in but Sabine had never heard anyone knock on a door before. She was instead used to people shouting a name or honking a horn when they wanted to talk to someone. By impulse, she opened the closed door that had sounds being made from the other side of it. A sullen elderly lady, dressed like someone from an old movie, stood there with an armful of night clothes for a lady. Sabine took the clothes she was being offered and also received instructions on how to operate things in the room.

Sabine learned how to operate a dimmer switch to control the intensity of the overhead chandeliers and wall sconce light fixtures. This was amazing to her. The not quite friendly old lady also showed her how to draw a bath and what to do after the bath tub was full. Sabine thought that it was like restricted swimming in a small pool, with any temperature water that one desired. With this new information, Sabine crawled into an antique bathtub and took the first bath of her life, a bubble bath at that, under dimly lit lights that set a relaxing calm mood.

Sabine fell asleep in the bathtub and that strange rapping sound on the door came again which woke her up. She got out of the bath tub thing and its marvelous silky suds, wrapping a towel around her as she went to answer the noise again. She was expecting to see the maid again but this time it was Darayan. He invited her to join him for a snack and a power card replacement in the main living room of the house. He was feeling a bit shy talking to this young girl. This young, beautiful girl. This young, beautiful, wet, long-haired, brown-eyed, innocent, little fighting machine standing before him. Sabine felt his wistful apprehension and put him at ease by touching his arm gently and telling him that she would join him shortly.

That night, Sabine and Darayan sat on a large wide chair-like thing called a davenport and talked for hours about everything. Sabine was wearing a very comfortable linen nightdress and enjoyed snuggling up into the cushions of the sofa thing. She felt like a little kid in these giant, soft sitting devices and rolled around and giggled like one. She told Darayan about her school, about her family and about her training in the fighting arts. He always seemed attentive and interested in everything that she said. No one ever showed so much interest in her before and she reveled in it. She did all of the talking and he did all of the listening, never growing tired of what she had to say.

After midnight, after all of the staff had gone home, including the old maid with the door knocking technique, Darayan suggested that it was time to go to bed. He leaned forward and kissed Sabine on the forehead. It was not what she was expecting. She didn't have a chance to counter his move with a wet, full mouth kiss, instead, she received a fatherly-like blessing that was planted near her third eye.

"I am still feeling inner connectedness and contentedness, but I remember you saying that you had more power at your house." Sabine stared back at Darayan with a probing and interrogating glance.

"Are you sure that's what you want to do right now?" Darayan asked.

"I know exactly what I want to do right now." she said as she got down on the floor and shuffled over to where he was sitting, on her knees. She stared into his eyes and gently spoke, almost whispered, "I want you!"

After those three words were muttered from her lips, the evening took on a new direction, which was 'anything goes.' Darayan gave Sabine a fresh card with a full implant of a blend of power that she would never forget. It was everything that she loved about power, but with a passionate element that made her want to let her desires out. She never inserted power like this before. She never felt such wanting and openness. With the rain beginning to fall and gather into rivulets that moved with more speed, so did Sabine begin to move faster, faster than she ever dared or had hoped to. The rain was welcomed everywhere in the waiting world and it created a wonderful song as it beat down on the roof tiles, as they made love.

The rain began falling harder and steadier. Layers of it came down in sheets rather than drops. Thunder boomed so loud that Sabine's ears rung from the rumbling sound. The smell changed from a collage of flora to the metallic smell of wetness that rain brings. Puddles and ponds formed instantly and everywhere. Loud cracking crescendos came from the clouds' unrest and shifting, which made Sabine's bare shoulders rise in defense, and recoil in reaction. Darayan seemed to like that.

Dripping, dropping streams of rain that were coming down from the building's edge were now like hydrants gushing at full pressure. The thunderous sounds were dulled by the constant tapping pounding of rain on the metal and tile roofs. A different rain beat was sounding from its slapping on the earth, the hard packed soil and the paved roads. The rolling thunder that seemed to come from every direction trumped the drone of the rain chatter with its boisterous, bellowing belching. The cracks of vacuums left by lightning strikes arcing from earth to sky, made Sabine's heart beat an extra beat, and sometimes it stopped from those moments of loud, rib tingling, raw, natural power.

Outside of the building where the lovers embraced, puddles grew and became lake complexes. The lake complexes had islands of solid land visible in them, but water was overtaking and consuming them. It looked as if the entire horizon was going to change into a sea. The rain grew even harder and came in sideways, getting everything wet that was under the protection of roofs that had no walls below them. Sycamore trees let go of large chunks of bark like unwanted, peeling skin. The leaves of every tree were showing their lighter colored undersides in flashes of silver and dusty sage. The sound had reached a continual powerful booming and all Sabine could do was feel small next to its greatness. She also felt small wrapped in Darayan's arms as he cuddled her and ran his hand through her long hair. She drifted into a wet dream, as wet as the weather outside.

The two still naked lovers watched the sun rise from the rear mezzanine of Darayan's house while sipping on coffee from India, as they sat on a futon that was now wet in several places. Sabine had never made love before in her life until now and she was so happy inside that she could know this feeling. It was the perfect answer to all the loneliness she ever felt.

The hot afternoon hours following the strong coffee sunrise, were spent napping in a two person bamboo hammock, in a tight embrace. Sabine slept better than she ever had in her life. Content, spent and inserted fully with the one thing she had become attached to most of all. The security, the familiarity and the rewarding elements of the underground, modern-day drug, known as, power, was her muse. That is what power was. Power! Cocaine times ten. Coffee times a hundred. It was like erectile-dysfunction medicine for the soul and the ego. Sabine was on a higher plane from her state-altering drug of choice, as well as from her night of passion. She slept and dreamed on a higher plane of existence.

The evening brought cooler temperatures, more power infusions, and a shopping tour that Sabine would remember forever. Darayan extended to her a generous offer to buy her an outfit for every time of day, and every social type engagement. She never found out what happened to the clothes she was wearing when she got to the clinic, but that seemed like ancient history to her now. After their mind blowing romantic night together and the unlimited shopping spree, Sabine was ready to fall head over heels in love with this guy. She thought to her self, _Who wouldn't go for this package? This guy is amazing, generous and very handsome! Someone like this never walks into the life of a poor Cambodian girl. I'd be a fool not to go everywhere with this man!_

Another night of amazing love-making followed. Sabine lost track of time and was lost in the moment of communion with her lover and engagement with power that she had never experienced before. She wondered if Kiri or anyone had ever made a product as good as this. She had found her signature blend of digital, chemical, spiritual oneness, mixed with the drive to have uninhibited sex often.

The first three days went by like a multiple orgasm. Sabine was lost in the moment and time stopped, but flew by. Sabine was on a cloud that she had never been to before. It was as if an angel delivered to her everything that it took to be happy and alive in this messed up world of foreign occupation and total world stagnation. But this chance meeting, this was her summer, her vacation, her romance, her childhood dream, her life's highlight. This could be Sabine's oasis, with power on it. She came every time with the fury of death throes and slept after wards like a newborn. Darayan. _Darayan. My love. I don't know how it ever came to be that we should meet, but it was destined. This must be our destiny_. Sabine slept.
9

restrained

A dull droning sound, whirred and purred, like a sleeping kitten in Sabine's subconscious dreamlike state. She was submersed in a multi-layered dream, being rocked by undulating currents from an unknown ocean and lulled by the constant humming sound that was slowly growing louder. She may have been floating on a sea of bliss or a river of sadness, she couldn't tell. She was aware of some sensations but disconnected from them as well. She felt the extremes of life's pendulum. She wasn't sure if she was dead or alive. She was aware though, and therefore present, _but where?_

The waves that were rocking her began to subside and the awareness of the unvarying vibration was becoming more acute. There was no visual stimulation, only auditory awareness, which was her only current connection to the mundane plane. She remembered this place that she had been basking in before this dream. _Darayan_. A thought materialized and connected to a memory of something wonderful.

Humming. Buzzing. Chattering.

Sabine was in the netherworld now, half asleep and half awake, but still in the dream moment that lasts forever and is only one instant. In her languid state, the incessant murmuring pulses gave birth to floating melodies of old Khmer songs. She could hear tight strings being struck by hard wooden mallets and plucked by calloused fingers. A woman's high pitched resonating voice fluctuated up and down, in and out of this illusive, mesmerizing composition. Bells clanged and clinked in this song like fish breaking the surface of still waters as they rose. She didn't know this song, but the tones were very familiar to her somehow.

Sabine lay entranced by this illusory ensemble, wanting to recapture the euphoria that she had been entwined in with her lover during the pounding storms that rocked her world. This was a tangible recent memory that she could cling to. She wrestled with the choice of awakening from the musical firmament she was being entranced by, or staying in the dream a few more lazy moments, or years, to soak up the joy she had felt in her heart. _Darayan._

"Darayan!" Sabine called out with a sudden panic as if her partner were far away. She woke with a start and tried to rise to look for him, but she couldn't. Her eyes flashed wide open but she couldn't see anything. The music she was hearing faded instantly and morphed into a steady tapping that was coming from somewhere in this darkness. "Darayan!" She screamed out loudly in a panic this time. Sabine could not move and she couldn't see. "Darayan!"

Some thoughts began to give way to perceptions, and her first perception gave her the awareness that she was tied to something. Her wrists were strapped and she could not raise her arms. Awareness now washed over her in a dark tide as she struggled to rise, only to meet more resistance. Her ankles were strapped to something also. She thrust her body in an upward direction and discovered that her waist and torso could move. She was bound by hand and foot to a heavy steel framed bed.

_Where am I? Where is Darayan? What is going on? Why am I strapped down? What the fuck is going on?_ Sabine tested every movement that she was capable of making. She could feel a rough textured, tight fabric around her wrists and ankles. There seemed to be no mobility there, but she could raise her waist. She could raise her thighs and torso a little bit but it was a pointless waste of energy. She was being held captive, somewhere.

The room was completely dark, but Sabine began to notice a small strip of light coming from somewhere behind her. She could turn her head a little. There was a buzzing sound droning constantly from that direction. Underneath her was a hard mattress. She guessed that was what it was.

Darkness, restraints, buzzing.

"Darayan!"

Sabine screamed out the name of her lover, fearing that something terrible happened to him. She tried to make sense of anything at this point. _Maybe we were taken prisoner by police, by military. Maybe I am being confined because of the man that was pursuing me wasn't dead. Maybe my pursuers caught up to us, have taken us prisoner. Police? Military? I don't know? What is going on?_

She feared for Darayan and what might have happened to him. She wondered if he was in the same room as her, confined and unconscious. She dismissed this as unlikely. She considered that he was more likely confined somewhere else, in another room, or, ... _dead? No! He can't be dead! He saved me. He protected me! Where are you!_

Her eyes were wide open staring at a blackness that seemed so threatening right now. She tried to remember the last thing that happened before _....before what? Why? I thought I was safe. What a fool! I know I am never safe in this world!_ For a moment she slipped out of her hard shell and cried, thinking about how cruel the world was that she lived in, and now she was a victim of it.

_Power?! My card. I cant tell if it is in. I feel tired. Drugged. What is this place? My card must be missing. I can't access any lists or contacts. My archive is...compromised? I have my memories. I can't sense my digital memories. My card must be gone. Do they know about both slots? Is this a police holding cell? An Empire prison? My poor father! How can I help anyone now? I can't even help myself._ "Darayan!" Sabine screamed out into the darkness, with no reply following.

A door into the chamber was slung open and light from that opening hurt Sabine's eyes, forcing them to squint closed. "Quiet you little Kandouy!" Came the shouting of an angry male voice.

"Where is Darayan?" Sabine shouted back defiantly.

"There is no Darayan here you loud, little Ikuh! You would do best to do what you're told, so shut up chow ka joi!"

Sabine was more worried now than she had been a desperate moment ago. She heeded the command from the rudely speaking man, kept quiet, and tried to make herself disappear. It wasn't working, not even a little bit. She had no power card to draw strength from and her own personal power was not focused. The card that was not in her armpit skin port was so obviously missing to her now.

"Now little rabbit," said the person who was the only one in Sabine's immediate world, "You are coming with me!" The man hooked a restraint around one of her wrists and undid the one that was already on it. He pulled that hand over her chest and fastened her two wrists together, cinching the restraints forcefully. The man undid all of the restraints that were holding Sabine to the table, and then he pulled her off the table by her tied hands.

She fell to the floor, not being able to feel her balance. Her body felt weak as she tried to stand, but she only collapsed. She was then drug across the cement floor by her feet, which were also bound together. Sabine tried holding her head up to see where she was being dragged to but the lights hurt her eyes and she forced them closed. In another couple of moments, being dragged liked a harvested deer, she was able to see that she was in a large warehouse-like room with industrial lights hanging from the ceiling above her.

The buzzing, chattering sound was louder now and coming from all around her. Her back hurt badly every time it crossed an uneven spot in the cement floor that she was being dragged across. She wanted to complete a spinning twisting move to break the grip of her captor, but she was so tired, and too weary to even try. A thought occurred to her spinning mind. _I must have been drugged!_

Sabine lifted her head and could see the back of the man who was dragging her. He was a big man and appeared to be very strong. He had wide patches of hair growing on his thick neck. She was sizing him up and trying to come up with any idea to help her escape, but right now, she was not in control. All around her were women sitting at tables with clothes everywhere. They stared at the tables in front of them and pushed pieces of clothing across them. _They're sewing!?_ None of them gave any gesture to reveal that they were looking at Sabine being dragged across the massive work room, but eyeballs were rotating into backwards glances, trying to see who the new brat was. The women appeared to be only staring down at what they were doing.

Sabine was not able to get her wits enough to try and wriggle free as she was pulled through a doorway and thrown into the corner of a cement room with no windows. The beastly man slammed the door behind her and locked it. Sabine was left lying there on the dirty, hard, concrete floor, constricted and vulnerable. Her thoughts were trying to drift back to Darayan's bedroom, where everything was OK. She did not want to accept this reality she was in now. This was hell.

"You must have brought a good payment." came a voice from behind Sabine's aching body. _Someone is in this room with me. Great!_ Sabine rolled her body around to see a haggard looking woman sitting on a wooden bench. The woman looked at her expressionlessly and said, "You are prettier than most. Do you know how much they got for you?"

"Who are you? Where is this place?" Sabine asked this woman, who was her only link to the nightmare she was in.

The woman stood up slowly. Her hair was long and shaggy, looking like it hadn't been brushed in a year. She was very thin. Her eyes were sunken into her skull, making her look very tired and old, but Sabine didn't think she was an old lady. The woman laughed once and said, "You are in the work shop dearie. You have a job now. Did you have a job before?"

"What do you mean, workshop?" Sabine asked.

"This is the workshop, and I am your boss." The woman replied. "We make uniforms for the Empire's soldiers. I am sure you will be a fine worker. You look like you could use some power though." Sabine forgot about everything for a second and only focused on the word, power. She thought how nice it would feel to have power coursing through her blood, and her nervous system. It would energize her her myo-fascial skeleton, the synergistic template that all living cells grow into. The etheric skeleton of sorts. _If I had some power, I could escape from here. I could be gone!._

"Would you like some power, sweetie?" The hag asked with a mocking smile.

Sabine felt ashamed for being so simple, but she nodded her head, and meekly said, "yes."

"Well then, you are going to have to listen to me." The woman said sternly and pulled an interface card out of her pocket. She held it between her fingers and stretched her arm towards Sabine. Sabine stared at it with strong desire. "Oh, you are tied, that's right. You cant even put this in."

"Please untie me!" Sabine pleaded, "I can help us escape. I just need to be free of these constraints and with the help of that power, I can get us out of here. I promise!"

"Oh you are not going to leave." The lady said, "You just got here. I am sure they have big plans for you, but you are mine today."

"Who are they?" Sabine asked, thinking that this girl was not her friend, nor would she ever be.

"You are in Nimol's slave pits, little Sabine, and you ain't getting out of here!" The lady grinned. Sabine stared back at her, emotionlessly.

The words the lady said spoke made Sabine recall a memory. Sabine could hear her ex-boyfriend, Leap, saying those words. "You ain't getting out of here!" Sabine's memory took her back in time, into Leap's bedroom. He was locking the door. He turned towards her. He was holding a knife. He was telling Sabine to take her clothes off. She didn't want to do it. She was waiting to marry Leap. She was afraid of the knife he pointed at her. She kicked him in the chest and ran for the door. She fumbled with the latch. She felt a sharp pain in her side. Leap had stabbed her.

"Now," the haggard lady began, "if you want to avoid a lot of discomfort, you will do what I say."

Sabine looked back at and gestured towards the power card in her hand. "I will do what you say. OK? Just untie my hands so I can lift my arm and stick that card in." Sabine hoped that the power would give her enough strength and courage to decommission this lady and find a way out of the room. _It looks like I am going to have to eliminate this hag first!_

"Do you think I am stupid Sabine?" The lady asked her in a playful tone.

That's the second time she called me Sabine. How did she know my name? Why can't I remember how I got here? Why can't I remember anything past the night I spent in Darayan's arms?

"I know who you are Sabine." the lady declared. "I know more than you can even guess. I know what you are thinking right now!"

OK, something is going on with the power this woman is using. She is reading my thoughts.

"Yes, I can read your thoughts." The lady declared again, "And yes, my power senses are letting me in to your brain. You are wasting your time thinking about escaping from here." She paused and stared back at Sabine.

Sabine thought that the hag looked like she was waiting for Sabine's next thought. _This can't be real!_ Sabine thought. _There is no way she can do that! But she is doing it?_ Sabine went blank to try and hide her thoughts, and also because there was so much that she couldn't remember. Her thoughts felt compromised.

"Go ahead and blank out Sabine." The lady called to her. "I am tired of listening to your sad little memories and your sad little ideas of getting out of here. Of course you want to get out of here. It's your first day. Nobody comes here because they want to. Well, almost nobody.

I am in charge of you now. Think of me as your welcoming committee on this new job orientation day. This is where the work gets done that serves the Empire. We work for them, and they protect us. It isn't really a bad deal after all. Yeah, you have to work hard and do what you're told, but you will get power refills everyday and food as well. The more you cooperate, the more freedoms you get and upgrades as well. Those who don't cooperate, well, they loose privileges.

My boss decided to start you out as a sewing girl. If you make fifty uniforms a day, you get one meal, water to drink, and a shower. If you don't make fifty uniforms, then you will have to try harder so you can eat the next day. If you make seventy uniforms. You will get two meals, and a pad to sleep on. Not so bad, is it?"

Sabine tried to stay blank. She could thank her meditation practice for that. She knew how to identify when her mind was in rapid fire mode of thinking and could effectively shut it off. _Focus on one thing. Breathe_. Sometimes, when she entered a very deep meditation, she could focus only on the energy that created her existence, and just sense coexisting, with everything around her. For now, she humbly went into breathing awareness, hoping for something to cling to.

"I am going to put this card in you now." The lady stated, "Don't try anything stupid, like the way you kicked Leap in the chest. That didn't work out so well, did it? You lost your virginity soon after, and bled from parts of your body besides your popped cherry."

Sabine was very intimidated that this lady read that thought as well. _It seems that this weary looking old hag can read anything in my head._ Sabine breathed. The lady walked over to Sabine and reached into her armpit. She slipped a finger into the opening of Sabine's skin port to hold it open, and then slipped the card into the slot and stepped back. Sabine was angry at herself for getting dragged into this room and not fighting her way free. She was angry that she couldn't help Darayan, who might be in a fate worse than hers. She was angry that this bitch could read her thoughts, and most of all, she was angry that she was really looking forward to this power up.

Kiri was staring into a super-magnet electron microscope where he was observing the different vibrating frequencies of each element in his power mix. With the turn of a knob, he watched the purple strings fade away as blue ones appeared in slightly different places. Blue faded to green, and green to yellow as he continued to turn the knob. He slowed down when he could observe orange. He wanted to make a very sexually stimulating batch of power this time, and he knew that he had greatly enhanced experiences in the past by strengthening the yellow vibrating strings.

Next, Kiri increased the power of the super rare earth magnetic bombardment controls and let the reaction begin. He stepped away from the machine and let his eyes adjust to the room lighting. Something didn't register correctly in his moment of blurred vision. There was someone in the room.

Kiri remembered that sight as he came to later, tied to his chair. He tried to move his hands and feet but couldn't, and his face was very sore. He could taste blood. There were two darkly dressed men standing there, looking down at him, not saying anything. "Who are you?" Kiri called out, feeling the pain in his face as his jaw moved to speak.

"We know who you are, distributor from compound number twenty one, Siem Reap province, Cambodian new territory of the Chinese Empire." said one of the men. "That is what you want people to think you are? Isn't it Kiri?"

Kiri was trying to use his interface card to contact his main connection in the empire, but the card was not responding. He tried to reach anyone in the ranks to let them know he was being robbed, but the outgoing signal was not functioning. The interface card he used was not a power junkie card, it was an ahead of its time, seven dimension chip, that could ether connect with any contact that he could envision. It was supposed to auto connect when Kiri was in danger, as he was now, but there was no solid connection. Kiri guessed his card had been removed.

"You are not going to connect, Kiri." The taller man said calmly as he held out an interface card in between his finger and thumb, for Kiri to see. "I am sure there are very good residual memories in here that our boss would love to be aware of." The man slipped the card into a pouch connected to his thick black belt.

"Who is your boss? If you guys want power I will give you all you want!" Kiri called out.

"We have no need for your addict appeasing compounds." said the shorter man. "We have come here to locate one of your little junkies."

"The taller man added, "We are not pathetic addicts like you and your customers. We serve a higher purpose."

"What would that purpose be?" asked Kiri mockingly, "Are you here to steal Empire equipment? That card you took from me is Empire property. My boss will not hesitate to track you down and eliminate you. You are being watched and coded right now."

"That would be true, Kiri, if we were ordinary thugs." The tall man spoke this time. "But you must know this, so that you will cooperate with us. We employ your boss. So, you actually work for us. We know that you profit from your own side business of making signature blend power for the low-lifers of this region, but we let you continue. That is not why we are here."

"Then why the buffalo are you here?" Kiri said, this time defiantly. He knew this was not going to go his way. He was tied down, disconnected from all of his contacts, out-ranked and probably out-teched by these men and their smart corruption.

"You will tell us about a child we are looking for. We have detected that this person has been here several times and chats with you on high ether channels of communication." The shorter man explained. "All you need to do is tell us where this person is now. Easy for you to comply!"

"A hundred little junkies come here," Kiri said, "all of them looking to dull the pain of living in a poor nation made poorer by the Empire."

"Oh, you just spoke disrespectfully of your own empire." The shorter man said as he exchanged a glance with his partner. "That was not your best idea." The shorter man thrust a solid punch into Kiri's gut, knocking the wind out of him. Kiri struggled to catch his breath as he wheezed the tiniest amount of breath through his collapsed chest.

"I will be more specific, dead man." The tall man spoke, "The child is very special, not like your regular customers. This person isn't interested in just dulling the pain of living in the, poor, Empire-controlled Cambodia. This person would be someone who is capable of, doing exceptional things. Just tell us where we can find the child and we will be merciful with you in your time of dying."

Kiri blocked his thoughts in case they could read them. He knew that some people had this kind of advanced skill from special blends of power. He knew who the men were talking about but he was not going to let them know anything. His life was over, and he knew it. These were high-ranking elite assassins of the empire and they would surely erase him from existence. Kiri knew he wasn't going to receive the code to activate. That day would never come, and if it did, he would already be dead.

Kiri liked Sabine, more than he ever let on. It wasn't his usual fetish attraction. She was special, like this man had suggested. He wasn't going to think about her or about the task he sent her to do. Maybe these men worked for Nimol, and were going to rub out all of the nearby competition. Maybe they were just thugs rubbing out any possible threat to local population control. It didn't matter who they were. They were going to kill him.

Kiri traveled to a place within himself that he was sure the men could not intrude or extract any information. This was a realm in which Kiri rested in his core of existence. He was trained to go there by his master, Ratanna. When Kiri trained under this man's tutelage, he was shown how to see the core of all humans, including himself. It was the place where ego merged into the web of existence and things could be seen as they truly are. Infinite. This is the place where those seeking enlightenment would pause to reflect on their human lives before they left the mundane plane. It was the membrane between the worlds of self and all.

Kiri was part of a resistance movement. He had been ready to activate when the communication was made for him to do so. He lived a hedonistic life, while he waited for that call, but he had no regrets. He knew that he would join his teacher soon, in the vastness of the cosmos. Kiri liked being human. He liked his indulgences. He liked his tech. He was outside of his tech now. This was the core, the axis of life and all other things.

Kiri didn't even feel the repeated strikes that the men back in his compound were inflicting on the body formerly known as Kiri. That essence shed its connection to the body like a snake shedding its skin or a man taking off his coat. As Kiri stepped through the membrane, he was no longer Kiri. He became pure consciousness.
10

transition

In a moment of cosmic communication, the soul known as Heng, whose disconnected body was lying under a bridge, an event happened where he passed into the next step of its existence. As he passed, he told Meas his entire lives' stories, all two hundred seventy three of them. Meas was grateful to observe them all and learn from them, but he was especially interested in Heng's recent incarnation.

Heng was already being drawn to the hall of creation, where he would have endless choices, or none, but his dharma faced him in the direction of a twinkling light. He saw a vision of cosmic sparks. These sparks were created by two humans making love. The sparks he was drawn to might lead him to his next earthly birthday. His past teachers would join him and assist him in making a choice of when to enter another life.

Heng could be influenced by anything now. Lust, regret, vengeance or desire, could steer his direction in choosing this next moment, or his next life, or he could simply choose nirvana. It is always there, waiting for us to recognize it. When we do see it, it is as easy to enter it as it is to walk through a door, but distractions can easily divert our focus, and we take another turn on the wheel of life and death.

He did not feel like he was ready to leave the wheel yet and pass into enlightenment. He wanted to remain in this cycle, and so he would. He was still very much attracted to the raw sensual existence that life cradled. He was not a monk, and never had been, in any of his lives. He didn't know much about religion, meditation or transcendence. He liked the idea of purpose. That is what his last incarnation was about. He had purpose as a policeman, a soldier and a resistance operative in his past life. That strong theme he subscribed to would ripple into this next life as well.

As Heng traversed the cosmic tides towards reincarnation, Meas was able to share and relive Heng's final moments on the earthly plane. Meas saw that Heng, the man that everyone thought was crazy, had led everyone to believe exactly that.

Heng was actually a member of the Cambodian underground resistance who was seeking connection to a nearby power dealer by the name of Nimol. While Heng posed as a crazy person in a town not far from the monument city, he acquired a lot of information and made many connections through freelance selling of illegal power to the seediest junkies around. He found that knowing everyone that the junkies knew connected him to everything underground, and that gave him many inroads to Nimol.

The last junkies he dealt with thought they were smart and could get some free power by just stabbing the man who sold it. They did stab Heng, and he did eventually die of that stab wound to his chest, but Phirun, the young man and mastermind of the plan was now dead also, under the bridge. Noun, the obedient girlfriend, went along with his stupid idea even though she didn't want to. She was now handcuffed behind her back and running away from the bridge as fast as she could.

Meas turned to see the scrambling woman jump up onto the bridge and out of his sight. He offered a prayer to her that she may seek an end to suffering. He looked down at Heng one more time and saw his breathing had stopped, but with his last breath, the strong desire in his essence was that of regret that he could not get an important message to an important girl. Meas sensed the strong feeling of purpose for which Heng had been striving.

Meas saw, in a final transferred vision, that Heng had belonged to a core group of ex-soldiers and policemen, who worked clandestinely alongside Cambodian nationalists. These freedom fighters were linked with the resistance movements of Laos, Thailand and Vietnam. It was a covert special operative group silently known as the Sons of Siam.

Meas learned that part of Heng's mission was to get all the information that he could about a man named Nimol. Heng was trying to use local power junkies for information to get to Nimol, and eventually kill him. The goal was for the Sons of Siam to to seize Nimol's contacts and power distribution routes, and to to take over the underground trade in that area. In every area that they targeted, the S.O.S. could gain control of a massive group of people who could be weened off of an addicting substance, and influenced to join the resistance movement as an alternative to being a stagnant addict. These people could be influenced if the S.O.S. could place a strong subliminal message in all of the power users cards that Nimol's many customers used. It was a tactical form of thought implantation. The Sons of Siam borrowed this idea from the Empire that was planning to enact it in a much larger, global way.

Meas understood that Heng also had another objective, which was to pass on a message about the future, to a girl known as Sabine. An elite group of monks, known as the ether gazers, had been watching a special event in the future, and this girl Sabine's part in it. The monks aided the S.O.S. by revealing what they saw in their visions.

Heng had been given the task to pass a message on to Sabine, as the members of the Sons of Siam believed she would be instrumental in facilitating its goals of sovereignty for all nations. The ether gazers prophesied that she would be vital in changing the world as it was presently known.

With Meas' ability to peer into the Akashic records of everything that had already happened, he knew that Heng had been tutored for a while in Vietnam by a martial arts trainer named Ratanna. He also could sense Heng's closest confidant and contact of the Sons of Siam. She was actually a daughter, not a son of Siam. Her name was Kalianne.

Meas could sense that Kalianne was trying to make a connection to a sleeper cell member of the resistance that lived in a small town nearby. This man was waiting to be activated, and she carried his activation code. Heng, Kalianne and her sleeper cell had all been trained by the man Ratanna, but not all of them knew each other. Meas sensed all of this in the mesh that was Heng's fading memories. Meas considered that he could complete a fate changing event by communicating with Kalianne, and her sleeper cell, so that Heng's mission could be continued by delivering a message to a little savior.

Meas was drawn magnetically to Heng's final desire to contact this special girl with a special message about the future. The message was simple. It was; 'Become small.' Meas decided there and then that he would find Kalianne, and her contact, and speak with their minds, to tell them about Heng's passing, and his purpose.

Meas trotted out from under the bridge and heard Prak give a yelping cry from under the banyan tree as a few drops of rain began to fall. "Now you know what's under the bridge!" Meas barked to his friend, "Would you like to go with me to meet the friends of one of these dead men?"

Prak howled back from under his protective tree, "I will wait here, you go on ahead!"

Meas knew Prak would be hesitant, so he said goodbye, and wished him well.

Sabine felt waves of calming sedation wash over her. Her body went limp and she crawled back inside her mother's womb. Sabine was dreaming all this. _Maybe I dreamed being tied down in a sweat shop, talking to an ugly crone?_ The lady standing over Sabine's tranquil body sneered at her for having this thought. Sabine drifted in a sedated bliss for a while, and then slid back into her still bound body. _At least this power feels good!_

The door to the room burst open and a well dressed man walked in. Sabine looked at him with blurred vision but could not focus on his face. He seemed familiar, but she couldn't tell for sure. She wasn't sure of anything right now. Sabine was aware that this man was lifting her own body upright, and that he was arguing with the crone. She sensed that she was walking, shuffling, being escorted out of the room in which she had been locked. Sabine could feel hands on both of her arms, holding her up vertically. She was swimming, trying to tread water. She could not stand on her own. The power she was given was like an extremely strong opiate.

Sabine's head nodded as she tried to hold it upright. She couldn't see that the ladies doing the sewing in the large warehouse were stealing stares at her and gossiping quietly. The women knew that this slumping girl would not be joining them in the sewing room. They knew that this girl was already moving up the ladder of status in the slave world.

Sabine was led out of the sewing warehouse by a man and a woman, who were holding her up and directing her forward. "Why did you give her a card so strong?" The man asked.

"Because I didn't want her fighting back." The woman replied. "She was put in my charge and I do things how I see fit!"

"That was a mistake that they placed her in your care." The man addressed his subordinate. "I was gone for a short while and that ogre of a guard grabbed the wrong girl for you!"

"Then why did our boss clue me in on her name, huh?"

"Nimol does what he does. I don't question him. I don't know why you were brought in on this one. This little thing was meant for a different purpose. She is no sweatshop dog! Can't you see how beautiful she is?"

"Well she isn't as ugly as most of them, but I could care less as long as she produces uniforms."

"You could not handle her with your weak efforts. You would have a tsunami on your hands and would have to drug her so much that she wouldn't be able to sew shoelaces together."

"She would sew just fine with the right thought implant and you know it!"

"I know that I intended her for higher work. She brought a very good price, not like your stitch zombies."

"You think you are so much better than the rest of us, but you're not. You are just lucky that you are Nimol's nephew."

Sabine weaved in and out of consciousness, her head bobbing and falling. She heard the people next to her talking about something but couldn't discern the words. She thought she heard heavy rain pounding on the world that existed above her. _Am I dreaming again? Sabine felt like her feet were wet. She wanted to pee. Darkness. Lights. Cold floors. Wet floors. Walls. Floors. Dreaming? Want to go home. Where am I? Darayan?_ "Darayan!" came the words from her slobbering mouth.

The two men questioning Kiri sensed that he was going to slip away, and that is exactly what he did. They tried to beat him back into his body but it didn't work. Once they realized that he terminated himself, they left his corpse and went about scanning all of the equipment in the compound. They stopped talking to each other and communicated only with thought, sharing with each other the information they were scanning at light speed.

They processed almost ten thousand googabytes of information and found some of what they were looking for. They found information about the direction in which way the suspected child traveled since the last time the young person was there at the compound, and that this person had been there a week ago. They knew what kind of power Kiri was making for this client of his, which gave them a profile for who this person might be and what this power user was capable of. The thugs determined that neither Kiri, nor the person for whom they were looking, whose name was Sabine, knew who Sabine really was. They called their boss through their interface card communicator and told him what they had discovered. The Mage told them to proceed to the monument city, and find the one called Sabine.

Meas and Prak smelled each other one more time and parted ways. Prak was frightened by what he saw under the bridge and he resolved never to go there again. He wished that he had never suggested going there. Before Meas left for the next village, he shared everything he just learned with Prak. Prak had many questions about this network of humans, but he was not resolved to involve himself any further adventures and did not ask Meas anything.

Meas began his walk of twenty kilometers with a single step. He believed that he could find the building that the sleeper cell resided at in the village of Kralanh. He left his village of Sisophon with a borrowed sense of purpose. He also sensed that he was going to meet Lok Sabai there.

Rain started falling steady on Meas' coat of golden fur. Meas, and all of the life around him breathed a breath of gratefulness for the holy water falling from the heavens. Meas walked through the rain for several kilometers, enjoying the cooler temperatures and moist, humid air. The rain turned into a thunderous deluge and Meas had to take cover under the roof of someone's house. He lay down licked his wet fur, watching the world become wrapped in a wet blanket.

The first storm of this rainy season rolled in hard and fast. Meas could not see that much of the natural world around him because it was hidden behind a white, wet veil. Rain is coming, was a thought that materialized in his mind. He reflected on the rain and began reciting chants to give thanks, pay respect and welcome change.

Rain is coming. Rain is here. The long, dry wait is over! Rain is a life-giving event. Giving life...taking life. The medium of life, the substrate. Change! I have taken shelter. Living things and people everywhere are taking shelter. Life protects itself and imbibes itself from the rain. Thunder. Lightning cracks. Dark. Light. Rain adds life. Replenishes. Shelter lends itself to copulation. Many offspring are conceived during the rain. Many hatchings are triggered by the rain signal. Rain creates the calendar. The moon and the rain are lovers. Rain is awaited for. Longed for. Planned for. Rationed for. Genetic strategies are designed around it. Ecosystems are created by it. Existence is, because of it. Most of the earth is covered by it. Powerful storms. Lightning. Thunder. Hail. Hurricanes, Typhoons. Tsunamis. Water spouts. Cyclones. Gentle blessings. Holy water. Clean. Purify. Drink. Thirst quenched. New life. Hatching. Aromatic. Vibrant. Falling. Rising. Swelling. Softening. Meas licked some more of the delicious rain from his fur. Hours passed.

From somewhere came a brighter glow on the wet tree trunks and already greener grass. He didn't sense when, but the peak had been reached and the storm was slowly moving away. The tiny islands of earth that he stared at in front of him were rising up through the hypnotizing dancing rain pools. He felt the shift of the arrival of the rainy season. It was here! It was a good moment for a heavy sigh.

Thunder now sounded like it was playing with the cloud beings, tickling them, caressing them. The storm seemed to gently roar and roll itself across a planing dance floor of sun-drenched clouds in the evening glowing spectacle. The sound wrestled, tossed and captured an adversary somewhere in its atmospheric folds. Meas felt warmed and softened by the playfulness of the beings in the clouds, and let himself be fresh and in harmony with the moment.

At that heart-warming tender moment, one of the sky creatures had some powerful flatulence and one more giant burst of echoing, exploding sound caught Meas off-guard and made him jump. The sky hydrants relaxed the pressure and their deluge decreased into drips and drops again, which fell from the noisy, metal, rain-spattered roofs. The flow, size and speed of each drop played various beats which inspired the mind to attach any songs it cared to. Meas remembered many of the songs that he heard in all of his lifetimes at this present moment.

The fast pace of the rain beats sounded like military marching songs to him, but as the tempo slowed, he heard music box chimes and monk rock grunge. Frogs and insects accompanied the orchestra with _'gerrrp', 'brrrrrrak'_ and _'bpweeet'_ instruments in the wind and percussion sections. Birds changed the song completely by free styling their own communication and pulled the ear away from the drip drop duet playing their last song.

The storm had passed. The earth was wet and sucking it all in deeply. The fresh smell was so intense that living things everywhere stopped whatever they were doing just to take a few wonderful deep inhalations. All of the colors were brighter now, as if a film of dusty plastic was removed from a window. The reminders of the sky's power continued to burst in the distant horizons still. He wondered about the gentle roars of thunder that he heard from where he was resting, and if they were deafening and frightening to someone else, like Prak, who was probably right under it now _. Is there always someone being affected by a storm, somewhere in the world, at any given moment?_ He decided yes.

Sabine felt her clothes come off of her body. She still slipped in and out of awareness as her clothes were slipped off and a robe slipped around her. She felt hands touching her face and hair. She felt stockings sliding on to her legs. She managed to open her eyes long enough to see several girls attending to her. She slipped away again and dreamed of oceans and fish, kelp and blood vine. She was swimming. Drinking. She felt free.

There were seven young Cambodian girls trying to dress and paint a slumping drugged-up body. It took two of them to hold her still while the others pulled sexy garments over her skin. One of the girls washed, cleaned and straightened her hair as another applied lipstick, eye liner, mascara, blush, powder, gold dust and silver glitter. Another girl dusted her body with flower essences and perfumed her in all of the erotic areas.

These girls attending to Sabine were also painted and scantily robed. Some of them resembled ancient Geisha girls. Some resembled Thai Morlum coyote dancers. They were beautiful, young and desirous. They were Nimol's sex slaves. And now Sabine was intended to be one too. She was young, beautiful, vibrant and feisty. Her first appointment was waiting for her impatiently.

The man that helped carry Sabine to the lady lounge entered the room. He was wearing a Chinese mask that concealed his face. The girls attending to her made quick adjustments to Sabine's sexy attire. They fussed over her quickly and then formed a line and stood back, waiting for inspection from their overseer. The man gazed at Sabine discerningly. The girls in the room stood up straight and quietly.

Sabine was wearing a black Chinese style robe, adorned with maroon sleeves and golden symmetrical patterns running vertically up the front. Her hair was silky and straight, except for a neatly formed bun of three loops on the back of her head. She had blue eyeshadow and gold and silver shimmering skin on her cheeks and jaw. Her eyes were painted to look wider and bigger, with purple flowers painted on her temples. There was a black ribbon around her neck, tied into a bow in the front. Her legs had only black stockings, with gold thread woven into a line rising from the back of her heels to the back of her thighs that looked like dragons. She was stunning. Ageless. Desirable.

The man nodded in approval and the girls filed out of the room in a row. The one to leave first had the highest status and approval and the girls behind her descended in ranking order behind her. The masked man stood behind Sabine whose drooping body was collapsed into a padded, antique chair. This man was feeling very desirous of her at that moment. He wanted to have her right now, but he knew he could not.

He lifted Sabine's arm and extracted the power card that was keeping her semi-comatose. He pulled a different card out of his pocket and slipped that one into Sabine's skin port. She started to stir and was gaining her bearings slowly now. She stretched and blinked her eyes, trying to understand anything. She looked around the room full of mirrors, wardrobes and chairs. She sensed someone behind her and jumped up, spinning around to face the figure wearing a mask.

They stared at each other, silently. Sabine became aware that she was all dressed up and shifted her gaze from the freakish person before her to a large oval mirror. She saw herself but wasn't recognizing what she was seeing. When she realized that she was this erotic image, she scanned herself quickly, surveying all of the strange clothing on her body. Her heart raced as the blend of power in her gave her a strong racy, feeling. She looked back to the person wearing the mask and asked, "What is going on?"

The man said nothing but pointed an open hand towards the door and slightly turned his head to gesture for her to leave the room.

"I am not going anywhere until you tell me what this costume is for?" Sabine called out commandingly, realizing that she probably wasn't going to get any answers in this place. Her thoughts raced as fast as her heart and she remembered being tied, talking to a crone and feeling a high like she had never experienced before. Sabine could still feel the effects of a heavy tranquilizing drug and didn't like it at all. Those effects were being quickly trumped by a fast-paced, lustful high. _What did they put inside me now_?

The masked stranger pulled an electric-tazer weapon from his robes and pointed it at Sabine, continuing to motion a gesture towards the door. Sabine did not want to feel the high voltage and lose control of her bowels. She had been zapped before by Chinese soldiers for disobeying a curfew, and she knew the unpleasant effects it could deliver. She began walking towards the door in the direction the stranger was pointing.

The figure stood in place and followed her movement with his creepy, shrouded, dark eyes. She wanted to rip the mask off his face and spit in it. She also felt a very powerful, strange desire to copulate with him right there on the floor. As she passed through the door way, two men grabbed her arms and began to quickly whisk her away. Darayan took off the mask he was wearing and watched Sabine's beautiful body being dragged down the hallway.
11

aphrodisia

Meas left his shelter after the rain subsided and moved on. The world smelled like a different place, a different planet now. Meas' sense organs could taste and smell sweet, soft oils in the air, and he felt a connected sense of joy to his environment. The world around him became very busy on many levels. Insects scrambled to adjust their soaked tunnels. Frogs began to sing gleeful melodies and croak boastfully about how good of a mate they would be. Encysted shrimp hatched and insect eggs split open. Seeds germinated more quickly than a premature ejaculation and plants drank deeply for the first time in over half a year. The world was alive!

Meas walked around puddles as he followed a dirt road alongside rice fields that now had shallow reservoirs of water in them. He could smell the pungent rice crabs that were burrowing their way up out of the deep hiding places they had slept in for a long time. There were farmers already plowing the fields, driving oxen that pulled the earth turning plows. This was the start of the season of working once again.

After a long walk into the eastern horizon where stars were beginning to appear, Meas found a sheltered clump of bamboo trees where he stepped inside and lay down for the night. He had walked many kilometers and saw many things in the past day. He repeated his evening chants as he let himself drift into dog sleep. Meas dreamed of chasing Prak down a soft dirt farm trail. As Meas slept, his legs and paws twitched in unison with his running free dream.

It was night time, but Sabine had no idea where she was or what time of day it was. Once again, she was locked in a room, with cement walls and no windows. The room she was tossed into was a sleeping chamber, and Sabine plopped down on the bed. This was one of the few times in her life that she had even seen a bed. She was sighing in pure frustration, but also twitching with anticipation. She had absorbed a highly aphrodisiac stimulant form of power, and it made her flesh crawl like it was in ecstasy. She felt the strong urge to grind her pelvis on something.

The door to the chamber swung open and an obese man walked in. Sabine could see the two men that dragged her here were standing right outside the door on either side of it. The door closed and the man walked towards Sabine with an eager smile.

"You are a little flower, aren't you?" he said with a lustful tone. "Come here little flower. I want to smell your scent." He walked over to the bed where Sabine was sitting and reached an open hand down to her, gently, invitingly. "Don't be afraid little flower. I will not hurt you."

Sabine stood up and sized up the man who towered over her by half a meter. She hated this man, but could not deny the drive she was feeling to become physically engaged with him, with anyone. She considered what his skin might feel like _. Was it hairy? Did it smell of man? Would he crush her? What did his mouth taste like?_ These thoughts and others quickly rolled through her mind as she resisted the urge to pluck out one of his eyes.

She kept feeling a strong suggestion coming from within her, _give this man pleasure!_ She reached out and placed her hand over the man's crotch. His grin widened and his breath deepened as Sabine felt his pants swelling. She cupped his balls in her hand and rolled them like a wad of sticky rice. She was rolling them into a ball to dip in chili sauce and eat. _Wait! What am I doing?_

He put his hands on her shoulders and pulled her closer to him. She still kneaded his balls like food about to be eaten. Pala, the man who had paid one thousand Yuan for this night had high expectations. This girl was double the price that he normally paid, but as a high ranking Cambodian official of the Empire, he could afford it. He was assured that this girl would be special. He wanted to feel special. He considered himself special.

Sabine had her eyes fixed on his chest but her vision seemed to focus somewhere else, past the robes he was wearing. She could see a swirl of color, dancing with itself in streaks and sparks. Sabine began to grasp a sensation that seemed more real than everything else. She was aware she was horny. She was aware she was high. She was aware that there was a speedy sensation making her heart beat faster. _I am only feeling the power drug they put in me!_

Young Sabine sat with her legs crossed in the lotus position. She didn't dare move but the hair hanging in her face was tickling her lips and nose so she blew at it, trying to get it out of her face. She hated being scolded by Ratanna, not that she thought he was angry at her, she just wanted him to think she was perfect. His praise meant so much to her, more than her friends or even her family.

"Sabine!" Ratanna said, trying to get her attention, "I have told you so many times before, you may be small, but you don't have to be big."

She never quite grasped this, no matter how many times he drilled it into her. "Yes, master." She replied downheartedly.

"Own yourself, Sabine." He called back to her. "You are what you have to work with. You are your best asset, and your biggest liability." He stared at her to see if anything he was saying was sinking in. "Do you remember the story of the catfish I told you?"

Sabine stopped trying to blow the hair out of her face and gently lifted it out of the way with her left hand as she looked up into Ratanna's eyes, "Yes, I remember, but please tell me again."

He knew that she was buying time, but he softened at decided to indulge her. "OK?" He said, "I will tell it again." He paused. She stared intently. He began the story.

"The young catfish was growing older, and swimming further everyday. He wanted to go as far as the older catfish in the river, but his mother kept calling him back. He was angry at her for not letting him go with the other catfish. He thought that she was being unreasonable. He knew he could swim as fast as them and avoid being caught by fisherman. He always wondered why she try to hold him back.

One day, the young catfish didn't listen to his mother, and swam further than he ever did before, trying to keep up and follow the older fish that were racing and swimming through hollow logs. He followed them far away from the catfish cave and they went looking for new things to eat. They paused when they found some pieces of shrimp on the riverbed, and they all stopped to eat."

Ratanna looked at Sabine with a raised eyebrow the way he always did when he was trying to make a point. "Do you remember what happened next?" He asked.

"Yes! Of course I do!" chimed the seven year old Sabine, "The shrimp was a trap! It was bait in a net, and all of the fish got pulled up into the fisherman's boat."

"So, was the catfish as big and as smart as he thought he was?"

"No! He should have listened to his mother!"

"Well what happened to him next?"

"The fisherman lifted the net full of fish into his boat, but the little catfish slipped into a small log that got pulled up in the net with the fish. The fisherman thought the log was just a stick, and threw it back into the river!"

"And what is the moral of this fable?" Ratanna asked.

"Do not take the next step on your own until you have been trained properly!" Sabine said as she looked at the broken vase on the floor by the table. She was sorry she tried to kick the flowers out of the vase. She saw it done and was sure she could do it, but there it was, Ratanna's broken vase on the floor, with the flowers still in it.

"And what else?" Ratanna queried her deeper.

"Don't disregard anything until you look at it in every way." She said grinning through a toothless gap where two blank spots were awaiting emerging adult teeth, "There may be a tasty fish inside it!"

Sabine snapped out of the day dream that she just relived. Like a flash she felt her own being and all of its skills and faults. She was a lethal weapon. She was just a girl. She was somewhere in between these things in a messed up world trying to cope. She felt her addiction to the power. She owned it. She took one step back from it.

Sabine aligned her body, mind and soul together like her teacher taught her. She was completely aware of the power drug pulsing inside her, but she was able to separate herself from the physical and mental interaction with it, and place it in a confined part of her psyche, controlled by her free will. She had dominance over it. She could employ it, save it, or put it on pause. It was a very empowering feeling to be the one in control now and not be the one being swept away by a net of drugged feelings.

Sabine looked up at the bulbous head of Pala and smiled so sweetly at him. He was snared by this beautiful creature smiling at him and he melted unlike he ever had before. He was feeling small next to her and felt like this was the dream girl of his life, not a sex slave he paid for pleasure and would discard like a used tissue. Sabine stared deeply into his eyes, melting him even more as she continued to caress his balls ever so slightly. Pala was deciding that he was going to purchase this one to go home with him, and keep her indefinitely for himself. Unable to contain his emotion, he said, "I love you little flower!"

Sabine was able to set aside the power drug and the powerful suggestion that was imbedded into it. She was not being controlled by the powerful concoction mixing with her cellular salts and nervous system, she was in control of everything she was doing now, and her objective became clear. _I am getting out of here!_

She squeezed Pala's tender sack with her fingers, surgically stabbing deeply into them. Pala was in a moment of excruciating pain and he rose up onto his toes, elevating him a few more centimeters off the floor. At that moment, Sabine grabbed his loose fitting shirt robes with her other hand and draped the cloth over his face. He became immobilized and gagged at the same moment as Sabine pulled the cloth tight against his face, stopping his breath and his ability to make any calls for help.

The men standing guard outside the door heard some muffled grunts and they sneered to each other, "That little bitch is getting it good!" Sabine let go of Pala's balls and let out some grunts of her own as she swung around to the back of the man, and used both hands to pull on the constricting robe, keeping him blinded, breathless and muffled. She drove a knee into his back and began to steer him forward like a farmer driving buffalo, plowing a field.

He flailed his arms, trying to grab at her but could not get a grasp of anything female. He was beginning to weaken from lack of air and he slowed his frantic movements. Sabine steered him over to the door and held him there, just beyond its reach. When she felt him start to go limp, she let go of him and he fell forward and thudded his heavy body into the door. Sabine quickly got beside him and propped him up, pulling the robes away from his face.

A guard shouted from outside the room, "Hey! What do you want? You still have two hours left on your session."

Pala let out a struggled gasp for breath and thumped a bloated hand against the door. The guard asking the question took a step away from the door and the other guard opened it. They saw a man panting with his arm a round a little smiling girl. The guard seeing this was curious rather than suspicious and called out, "Heh? What's this? Do you need some help old man?"

The guards only saw a heavily panting male with a giggling little female and did not think that anything was out of order. They did however feel a strong attraction toward Sabine and they entertained devious thoughts and licked their lips. Sabine was so in control of herself at that moment that she used her thought slinging ability to transfer the lustful power drug with its abiding suggestion onto the guards instead of feeling it herself. At this moment of super-confidence, she was able to sling thoughts like never before and she did it as a natural extension of herself.

"Yes, he needs some help," Sabine said, "He wants you two to join us and have some fun together!"

Pala was semi-unconscious and still panting, just trying to get breath into his lungs. He could not form words and he hunched over gasping. The guards saw this as a man who had just enjoyed himself and wanted to share. "Maybe his heart isn't strong enough!" A guard called out.

"He needs a rest, let's give it to him and take a turn!" The other guard replied.

Both guards stepped into the room as Sabine pulled Pala back inside, setting him down on the floor in a slumped over mound of heavily breathing flesh and twisted robes. Sabine stood back and spun around once seductively, making sure the guards saw her youthful radiance. "Take off those clothes!" She said commandingly, "They are getting in the way of us!"

The guards did not notice the struggle Pala was having breathing because they were totally fixed on Sabine. She was stunningly gorgeous, and emitting a self confidence and power that was very alluring. She stretched out her index finger and rolled it back into her palm several times, beckoning them to come closer. They began to pull off their garments as they obeyed, completely forgetting that they were on duty.

The two guards were following the power of the suggestion that was intended for Sabine. They felt its strong encouragement to please someone sexually. They were very aroused already and could have been led around by a gentle breeze. Sabine sensed them reacting to her and felt like a spider with two petty insects stuck in her web. She decided to step up this game of deception and added another suggestion into her thought slinging efforts.

Sabine called out commandingly to the undressing guards, "Alright, now, smack each others asses, you bad boys!"

The guards were confused and stared at Sabine in confusion. She reached out a hand and slapped one of them hard on his behind. "Start smacking each others asses!" She insisted, "It will please me very much!" Sabine's hard stare turned into a devious smile and the men got her drift. First one, then the other slapped his partner's buttocks weakly.

"That's not the way you do it!" Sabine ridiculed them, "You do it like this!" Sabine raised her hand high in the air and brought it down on Pala's ass, making his body jump. He was still not able to speak. Sabine placed her foot on the back of Pala's neck and pushed into it begrudgingly, keeping him in an immobile position and showing her dominance in this bedroom arena.

The guards began smacking each other on the behind, each blow increasing in intensity. Sabine cast a new thought at them, which was one of jealousy and competition. The men shifted from landing stimulating smacks and began to throw closed-fisted punches at each other. Sabine projected pure hatred into them as she felt her own hatred for this room, for everyone in it, and for this entire slave shop. She was collapsing Pala's wind pipe with her foot and his flailing arms were a sign of his final death throes.

The guards had begun all-out brawling with each other, trying to destroy each other. Something dark was coming through Sabine as she gleefully watched them trying to strangle each other. She was so caught up in the control she was feeling, and her disdain for this place, that she was losing herself to the power and the suggestion to please was now affecting her as a suggestion to feed her hatred. Pala went limp under her foot. One guard smashed the other guard in the face with his elbow and shattered his nose. Sabine wanted to let out a maniacal laugh. The room was in a boiling point where self destruction was growing en mass. At that moment, a maskless Darayan came running into the room.

Sabine and Darayan locked eyes. Darayan's eyes showed fear. Sabine's eyes showed confusion. She wanted to grasp for a thread of hope that he was there to rescue her. That hope wasn't happening. _He is wearing the clothes of that masked figure._ It hit her like a brick fucking wall. _He fucking sold me!_

Already riding a roller coaster of events and emotions, Sabine didn't even flinch as she jumped off of Pala and planted a side kick into Darayan's ribs. The kick caught him off guard and sent him stumbling backwards. He didn't have time to react or adjust himself. He took the brunt of Sabine's wrath in his chest and received several broken ribs instantly. Pala lay motionless on the floor and the two guards came to realize what they were looking at as they snapped out of their subliminal thought implant and recognized the injuries happening to their superiors.

The guard closest to Sabine leaped at her with his arms extended, ready to make a tackle. Sabine crouched low and then thrust herself upwards with all of the power in her her stocking thighs. As she completed this motion, her arms were in a diver's pose which opened and blocked the arms of the attacking guard, spreading his arms further apart. In the very same moment, she drove the top of her head into his unprotected, oncoming face, smashing his nose and leaving him in throbbing pain.

The second guard was right behind his partner, running towards her, not leaping. He managed to grasp her wrist and jerk her stance off balance. Sabine dropped to one knee and the guard dropped his arm down on her shoulder in a chopping motion. This was the same arm that she had been shot through. She had not remembered the pain from that injury until that moment. She felt the crushing pain of this blow and fell to the floor, face down, not moving.

One guard lay on the floor, grasping his bleeding, crushed nose and moaning in agony. Darayan lay against the wall, clutching his ribs and taking very small fast breaths. Pala, the high ranking, Empire delegate, sent to oversee Cambodia's compliance with the Empire's occupation, would not be sending any reports back to China, not today, not ever again. The guard still standing, surveyed the room and realized the amount of deep shit he was in. He hesitated for a moment, not knowing whether to call for help or plead for leniency with his injured boss Darayan.

Sabine was very aware of his unsure moment and drove the spike heel of her shoe right into the guard's crotch as she turned her body around and kicked upward. The heel of her shoe connected in a perfectly disabling strike and the guard dropped to his knees. Sabine jumped up, grabbed the man's ears, and drove her knee into his face as she pulled his defenseless head forward into her hard knee bone. This guard had his nose broken twice now, and there was no one to stop Sabine now.

She removed her shoes quickly and ran towards the door. On her way past Darayan, she spit down at him as she fled the room, not looking back again. She ran down what appeared to be an empty hallway and concealed herself in the shadows of every unlit area. She could hear rain pelting down on the roof loudly. Her injured shoulder hurt but it was still functional.

Sabine saw a wooden window in one area of the hallway that was gated with metal bars. She reached through the metal bars and found this window to be locked as well. She aimed her foot and kicked through the bars onto the wooden window. The loud rain pouring down masked the noises she was making and the hall still seemed empty. After a couple more frantic kicks, the window cracked and splintered a little. Sabine had nothing but intent for getting out of there, and she put all of the betrayal that Darayan represented, into her next kick. She envisioned that her target was Darayan's face. _That no good lying_.... Her foot struck the widow which splintered apart and let the sound and smell of the pouring rain into the corridor.

From down the hallway, Sabine barely heard Darayan's voice yelling above the pelting rainstorm. The window was smashed open now but the metal barrier was still between Sabine and freedom. Sabine pulled with all of her might on the bars but they did not move. She tried it again, focusing all of the power in her body into ripping them out of the wall. They didn't move. She heard more faint shouting from the direction from which she had just ran.

Sabine was able to grab one of the loose boards hanging from the shattered window and pull it into the hallway. She wedged it between the bars and used it like a pry bar to bend the metal bars. They started to move, a little. She saw there was a man running towards her down the hallway but she kept prying the bars apart. They were spreading, but they weren't wide enough for her to slip through yet. The smell of the rain, the thunder and lightning, seemed to invigorate her more.

As the approaching guard reached out to grab the tiny girl, pulling at a window's escape deterring bars, Sabine backed away from her task and swung the splintered board at the man's outstretched arms. She blocked his grasping efforts but received the force of his onrushing movement and was knocked to the ground. The guard had long splinters of hardwood sticking in his wrist and forearm but he did not loose his balance. Seeing Sabine on the ground on her back, he raised his boot to deliver a kick to her chest.

Sabine rolled out of the way and the kick missed her, but the man was still above her and ready to bring his boot down again. As he did, Sabine spun around, using her tailbone as a pivot point and brought the widow board sailing into the Achilles's tendon of the leg that the guard was balancing on. He fell backwards and his second kick missed Sabine completely. As he was on his back, turning his head to see where the little pest was, he felt the board a third time. It struck him across his face and he lost consciousness.

Sabine jumped up and went back to the task of prying the bars apart as she noticed Darayan was now coming down the hallway holding his chest. The bars creaked and bent as some of the cement crumbled around them as well. The opening had to be big enough now, she hoped. Sabine put her arms through the spread bars and used her hands to pull her body through. She had to exhale to get her chest through but was able to forcibly get her torso through the opening. As she wriggled to get her hips through, rain soaked her and her grip became slippery against the wet cement and jagged, broken window remnants. She was almost through when she felt someone grab her ankles. It was Darayan.

She looked back at him and a lightning flash lit up both of their faces, allowing them to get one last look at the emotions coming from each others eyes. His was of regret and fear. Hers was of desperation and sadness. He thought he saw her crying, but it could have been the rain making her painted eyes leak black streams of eye makeup. He pulled hard on her ankles, knowing that he would have to answer for Pala's death. Presenting Pala's killer might take some of the rage of Nimol off of himself. Sabine pushed and pulled on the wall's exterior and tried to wiggle her feet free but Darayan was holding her tight. She could not be denied escape from this pit.

"Sabine, I'm sorry! You don't understand!" Darayan screamed to her as he gripped her tightly. "I am your best chance for surviving here! Let me try and make this better! I promise!" The lightning flashed again and Darayan saw what was now causing him severe pain as Sabine pierced large splinters of wood into his fingers and the backs of his hands. He let go, screaming in agony, and clutching his impaled hands.

Darayan stared out the window into the darkness and the rain. As the sky lit up again from a lightning strike, he saw Sabine running and falling in the wet mud and grass. Then, in the next flash of light, she was gone.
12

connection/separation

Meas sensed that he had arrived at the place he was trying to find. It can't be explained to a human, how, but Meas smelled that he was there. Humans were so interesting to observe. You have to appreciate them for what they are and for where they are in their own evolution. Judging them was pointless. They do that to each other and they seem to always be at war. Smelling some of them now made Meas think of how unique they all are. He could smell Kiri's life, his lonely battle between indulgence and altruism, and his chemical stained fingers. He could smell Kiri's job, the customers he met, and the addiction they shared.

Meas smelled a single, leftover, residual molecule of the salt contained in a drop of sweat on a blade of grass, somewhere nearby. The name Sabine materialized in his thoughts. This single drop of salty sweat, from someone active, and high on a human-made chemical and digital concoction, belonged to a girl named Sabine. Meas knew this and he knew he was near the place he wanted to be.

As he trotted along, more smells flooded his perception. There was new mold growing already, flying ants ready to emerge from holes in the ground, roots from plants pushing downward, loosened sycamore tree bark pieces, softened seed coatings bursting open and bacteria dividing exponentially in rain puddles.

He also smelled Heng's memory, entwined with the human interactions he made with so many, many others. He could smell the girl of the prophecy, Sabine, her drive, her freedom, her resolve and her uncertainty _. She's been through here. She stood under this tree, crouched slightly, her arms up above her head._ Meas smelled a gecko lizard had been observing her in curiosity and fear. _She stood right here about a week ago, he thought, right in this exact spot. Where is she now?_

Meas moved in the same direction she had been moving. His smells of her told him that she was a young teenager, that she had not recently been sexually active, that she was not pregnant, that she used tamarind soap to wash her skin, that her arms both contained skin ports and that she was a strong athlete.

Ahead of Meas was a block building where this girl, Sabine, had been for an hour or so, before leaving and heading east. The rain washed some of the scent away, but other scents were enhanced by the moisture and were more discernible as their oils rose into the air on moist air currents.

The smell of Sabine interacting with a man was very obvious. Meas understood that this man was the one Heng knew to be the sleeper cell. Meas could discern that the man he smelled was the contact of Heng's partner, the one known as Kalianne. Meas had a faint smell of someone who might be Kalianne, but it wasn't coming from the block building, rather it was coming from the north. Meas stood at the fence surrounding the building and smelled everything once again.

Meas could sense that the one known as Sabine, the one known as Kalianne, the man who was in charge of this building, and Heng from under the bridge, were all tied together through the man Heng revealed as Ratanna. Ratanna had been schooled by Meas' friend, Lok Sabai. This connection had a new relevance now to Meas.

Lok Sabai, before the canine incarnation that Meas had come to know, had been a human, teaching a specialized form of martial arts. He taught Ratanna these, and Ratanna had in turn taught Sabine and the others. Meas also sensed another alignment. A powerful man, related to Lok Sabai, also had special techniques, and was using them now to dominate people. This man, was trying to destroy everything in his way. This man had sent assassins to this exact place. Meas could smell them very clearly now. Within this new observation, Meas also smelled death.

What is this? Where is this?

Does it matter?

Nothing matters.

Nothing is.

Everything is. Hello.

Hello. Namaste.

Namaste.

Hello again.

How many times have we met?

How many more, is up to you.

I am no longer I.

As am I no longer, yet....

Hello.

Why are we here?

Why do you ask, you already know.

Again. Again. Again.

And again.

Will you go back, Lok Sabai?

Perhaps, I have not the sight of more events. Events are to come. I am. you, Ratanna?

Yes Lok Sabai?

When and who will you return as? Have you made a choice?

Ratanna, is that you? Who am I?

Hello Heng. The Buddha in me touches the Buddha in you.

Ratanna, who is this here with us? Where are we?

Heng, we are communicating as one essence. You, myself and him, are not separate.

Why do we communicate, if we are one? We should already know!

Hello Heng. I have been on earth many times as Lok Sabai. I have watched you. I see you.

Hello Lok Sabai. Why do I know you?

We are all one. We separate, to see what we are, then we are. Then we see.

You are Lok Sabai. I am Heng. Ratanna is here, yet, we are not individuals?

We are individuals when we chose to be.

And we are one when we don't?

Something like that. You will be human again soon Heng. I feel you going back to earth.

We were all there before, weren't we?

Yes Heng, many times. I taught Ratanna, and Ratanna taught you. You will again teach there.

Yes Heng. We were all there before.

I know you! I was looking for you! You are the one my partner was seeking. You are Kiri?

Yes, I was known as Kiri once.

Why are we here?

We are always here.

And we are not here at all.

We only perceive what narrative we tell ourselves.

Tell me a narrative, I am lost.

You were known as Heng.

Heng? Yes, I remember! Heng! I am Heng! I was Heng?

You were known as Heng. You sought your partner. Your partner was my activator.

Activator?

Yes, I was known as Kiri, and I was awaiting a word from your partner.

My partner, yes! We wanted to stop someone. An evil person.

Did you stop that person?

I don't know.

We were all working to stop that person.

Is that person here?

No, that person is still on earth.

That person is training others down there to propagate the evil.

That person is my brother.

What? Lok Sabai? I did not know that the Mage was your brother!

Yes, we were close once, but we chose different paths.

Ratanna, you were schooled by the Mage, were you not?

Yes, I was, but I left him when I could see his destructive nature.

Is that when you went to study with his brother, known as Lok Sabai?

Yes, that is when I studied with Lok Sabai, who taught me the true path.

I taught you a path, yes.

And I studied with you, Ratanna, did I not?

Yes, Heng, you studied with me, when I was Ratanna.

I also studied with Ratanna, when I was Kiri.

So we really are one.

We always have been.

Lok Sabai was Ratanna's teacher, just as Ratanna was Kiri's teacher?

Yes, Heng, just as Ratanna was your teacher.

Were we all together? On earth?

We were, Heng, Yes, But we were separated by time and space.

I don't know you Kiri, yet I do. How?

We are all part of a stream of events that happens all at the same moment.

There is the illusion of separation, and time, and distance, but we are one.

We are one.

I was trying to do something! I was trying to stop someone, and give someone a message.

Yes Heng, and I was waiting for someone, who didn't come.

But she was coming, Kiri. She is seeing what was Kiri now.

Meas was concerned about the smell of death around him. He did not know the man inside the building, but he could smell that the man was the person Kalianne intended to activate. His name was, Kiri. Meas received this information from Kiri's scent. Kiri was now on a different plane, and not within the lifeless body that Meas could smell nearby. Meas wanted to get closer and smell more of this man, but he did not know how he could gain access to the building surrounded by an electrified fence. Meas then smelled Kalianne again. He turned around to bark at a woman standing behind him.

A tall thin woman, with short, red, dyed hair, stepped back from the barking golden retriever and spoke in soothing tones. "Good boy! Now who's a good boy? That's a good boy! Good boy!"

Meas barked back, "Hello, I know you as Kalianne. I am called Meas by the humans. I am here seeking to meet you, and the one known as Kiri, but I am certain he is dead. I can smell his dead body inside this building. We should go in. How are you?"

Kalianne did not sense that this dog would hurt her, but she wondered why it was barking at her as it did. This dog barked at her as if it were talking to her. _Why is this dog here? What is it doing?_ She assured it again, "I'm not going to hurt you boy. Come down, come down. That's a good boy."

Meas surmised that she was not able to understand what he was saying in the way he was saying it. He decided to try body language, and he pawed at the ground near the fence and whined, looking back at her several times as he did this. She seemed receptive.

"What are you doing boy?" Kalianne asked the handsome golden dog. "Do you want to go in there? I am going there too. We can go together. That's a good boy!"

The tall, toned musculature of this woman made Meas think that she looked like an athlete. He could smell from her that she had been running and walking on her way to this location. He could smell from her emotion that she was at the destination that she was seeking. _She is also here to see the man inside the building, perhaps to activate him._

Kalianne thought that it was a strange coincidence that a dog wanted to go into the building where her contact was. She knew the man she sought distributed power to users. She wondered if Kiri had gotten dogs addicted to power as well. She lifted a cover on a box that was mounted to a fence post near the gate. She pushed buttons on a key pad in a certain order and then took a step back. She received no indications that the sequence she entered prompted a response. Meas continued to paw and bark near the gate, believing that Kalianne understood him now.

"Careful now sweetie!" Kalianne said to the dog. "That fence will fry that shiny coat of yours. You don't want that to happen, do you?" Kalianne knew the fence carried a high charge, but she didn't know if it was live or not. She picked up a damp branch and tossed it into the fence. Nothing happened. There were no sparks and no sizzling sound. She stepped forward and quickly touched the fence with the backside of her index finger. No jolt of power was experienced. The fence was not turned on. She thought that this was unusual. Surely Kiri, the man she was sent to activate, protected himself with an armed electric fence. She believed that he should be here now, because she was aware of his schedule and his movements. This was very strange, Kalianne thought.

Meas could sense that this lady was concerned about something. Maybe she knew Kiri was dead now, but Meas wasn't sure. The smell of the two men was very present at this gate. They had the smell of Kiri on them, and the smell of anger. Meas suspected that they had something to do with the man Kiri being dead.

Kalianne tried moving the front gate. It was unlocked. This seemed strange as well. Kalianne opened the gate and began to walk into the compound yard, with an interesting, pretty, yellow dog following behind her. This dog seemed more engaging than most dogs. It had a genuine look of understanding in its eyes when she talked to it. Kalianne didn't mind that the dog followed her through the gate. This dog felt like a companion already.

The concerned woman and the friendly pooch walked around the building once and then approached the only visible access to the building, which was a metal door the front side of the cement block structure. This building was colorless and windowless, and resembled a storage facility. Kalianne placed her hand on the handle of the metal door and depressed a lever with her thumb. The door opened.

Meas rushed into the building, skirting through Kalianne's legs as he passed her. He immediately began sniffing the head of a dead body lying on the floor. Kalianne stood at the doorway staring in remorse. The man she was sent to activate was no longer going to aid the Sons of Siam. There was a puddle of blood extending from his limp body, which was face down on the floor of the compound.

Meas sniffed intently and whined. He felt compassion for this man who met with this gruesome ending. Meas knew that Kiri left his body by his own means. He could smell and sense the etheric residue of the man known as Kiri, who stepped out of his own body. This man had been stabbed, but only as an angry act committed by another man who had been in the building. Meas could smell that this other man was an adept assassin, and was angered by his inability to extract information from Kiri.

Kalianne began considering her next move. Her last objective was to seek out the man named Kiri, who was known to be stationed at compound number twenty one, Siem Reap province, Cambodian new territory of the Chinese Empire. She would have repeated one sentence to him, which was a code relaying a certain directive. That directive was to abandon his current clandestine job, and proceed in carrying out the assassination of the man known as Nimol.

Kalianne was instructed to give Kiri the code, and then aid him in his mission to terminate Nimol and replace him as the main power distributor in Cambodia. Now that Kiri was dead, it was her directive to carry out the mission on her own. She was not afraid to do this on her own, but she would have much preferred to have the aid of another member of the resistance group that she belonged to.

Kalianne was trained to be strong, and tried to suppress any emotion in reaction to what she was seeing, but it was not easy. A member of her elite fighting faction had been murdered. There was a knife handle protruding from his back, with the blade lodged in his heart. _They knew about him, despite his well hidden identity, and they got to him not long before I arrived. They must know that we are planning an offensive attack. What else do they know? Do they know about her?_

Kalianne was not afraid, but apprehensive. She could not activate a clandestine member of her group now, because he was dead, and she was unable to contact her partner, another member of the Sons of Siam, Heng. Kalianne was trying to contact Heng at this very moment, using the computer locator that the data card in her armpit connected her to. He did not respond to her significant distress message. She feared for him as well. _He is a strong man and a good fighter. He can handle himself,_ Kalianne thought. _He is a smart man. He is a good man._ He was her lover.

Kalianne spoke out loud, as if the animal in the room was part of her conversation. "OK. Now what? Heng does not respond, and Kiri is dead. I am alone, except for you, my furry friend. Who did this? It must have been someone linked to Nimol. I can't imagine that this was a random murder committed by a power junkie. Kiri was too protected to let that happen, wasn't he?"

Meas stared at Kalianne intently as she spoke. He wanted to tell her about Heng, and that he had been murdered in that exact way she just described, a murder by the hands of a junkie. Meas understood all of the human words she was saying, but she was too consumed by the sight of her dead contact to receive any of the thoughts Meas was projecting to her. Meas kept trying to reach her, but she did not respond to what he was thinking to her.

"Heng! Why don't you respond?" She asked the ceiling above her. "We have a more difficult job to do now, with another of us down. I could really use your help sweetie!"

Meas whined repeatedly as she spoke these words. Meas was very full of compassion for Heng, for Kiri, for this woman, Kalianne, and for the plight of all humans. Meas barked twice, trying to draw her attention to him. She reacted to his loud voice and turned to look at him. He barked three more times, trying to relay a message to her.

"Shhh! Quiet! We don't know who is watching this place, or listening!" Kalianne addressed the dog. "I have to decide what I am going to do next, and I don't need your help attracting attention to me." Kalianne approached the dog and began to corral him towards the door, then thought that he might attract even more attention if he were outside of the compound making a lot of noise. "Come down! Lie down. That's a good boy. Shhh, little man. Shhh."

Meas was trying to put one thought into her head now that he had her attention. The thought that he was projecting was the message that the man, Heng, from under the bridge, was intently trying to relay. Meas could sense that Kalianne had some kind of connection to Heng that was emotional and deep.

"I have no one to transfer the activation code to now." Kalianne said to Meas, who was tilting his head and staring intently as she spoke these words. Meas projected two words into mind her with his most prominent conveyance techniques. "Why am I telling you this? Anyhow, all I had to do was say two words, and he would have understood." Kalianne opened her mouth to speak as a thought entered her mind that did not feel like her own. It was a voice that was inside her, but a voice that she didn't recognize. At the moment Kalianne spoke the words, "become small," she could have sworn that she heard the dog say them at the same time.
13

letting go

Sabine ran barefoot through a grove of tamarind trees, hiding behind them as she stealthily chose her steps leading away from the warehouse. She saw lights on the exterior of the building come on and figured that the guards of this complex had all been alerted to her escape. Ahead, she saw a road on a berm of earth that was higher than the surrounding terrain. She continued running in that direction, keeping herself well hidden and moving like a ninja warrior.

When she arrived at a tree near the road, she crouched behind it and scanned her horizon for any movement. There were overhead lights along the road that lit up the pouring rain in inverted cone shapes. Sabine saw no vehicles traveling on the road and saw no humans moving anywhere in her limited sight. The rain was so heavy that she could not see much of anything in the deluge coming down.

She held the trunk of a tree like it was a companion, and looked around her for anything that might lend her safety. She had kicked off the high heel shoes she was wearing when she forced her way through the window of the warehouse hallway. Her body was cold in the storm, as she was wearing very little clothing. All she had on was a lace shirt and stockings. Black mascara ran down her face and dark tears dripped to the ground silently and unnoticed as she wept in the rain.

Darayan! He was using me the entire time. I fell for that....man. I know better than to ever trust any man! I am lucky to get out of there alive! He sold me into slavery! That no good lying asshole! How did I let myself fall for him? Of course he was being too nice. Restaurant clubs. Nice clothes. Nobody rescues strangers and gives them those things. And I thought he was doing it because...

A spotlight broke the wet darkness and slid across the soaked landscape around her. The light was coming from the top of the warehouse. From its searching path, Sabine could see that she was only about a hundred meters away from the building she exited, but the heavy rain was surely obscuring anyone's ability to see her. She wanted to get further away from that building, as far away as she could get.

The next time the beam of light swept past, she ran towards the raised road ahead of her. She intended to cross it in its darker location which lay between the inverted cones of street light illumination, hoping that she would be less obvious. She knew that she would likely be visible, so she tried to pull herself inward and disappear. She was tensing her calves and the balls of her feet, poised to take off running, and right before she threw her presence forward, she paused and sunk back, hesitating for a moment.

Reality smacked her in the face with every raindrop that hit her. _I was sold as a sex slave by the man I thought I was in love with. I am running for my life, under a storming night sky. I am dressed like a prostitute, barefoot and painted. I am tired, weak and out of power. Why does fate treat me like this?_

She wished that she had some of Kiri's special power mixture right about now. She knew that she could use that to become more invisible. She imagined herself as a thousand little raindrops, dripping into the scenery of the falling rain, running so quickly and fluidly that no one would see her. The power that she had been inserted with lost its effect on her. Once she gained control of her will and confined the power's effects within herself, she could control the amount of effect it had. At this moment, her adrenaline, not the power drug, was flowing heavily like the rain.

The beam of white light from the search light passed her again. This time, Sabine took off running, keeping low to the ground. She focused all of her will on getting over the road, unseen. She visualized that this had already happened, and accepted it as a natural flow of events. Her feet slipped on the muddy earth but she did not slow down. As she approached the road, and the light shining down on it, she imagined that she was a snake.

Sabine ran up the incline on the side of the road and threw her body horizontally onto it, breaking into a roll as the hard surface made contact with her palms and toes. She rolled and slithered all of the way across the road and down the incline on the other side. Where she lay now was out of the reach of the searchlight. She had no way of telling if any one saw her. She took a deep breath.

Sabine scanned the lay of the land around her. She could not see much because of the darkness and the heavy rain. She could only discern that the terrain was flat. She knew that she was not in a safe place, but clung to her position for a moment longer. _Darayan, you are so good! You had me fooled! And now, look what I have because of you! I will never trust a man again. I should have known better than to ever trust you, you piece of buffalo shit! I hope fate treats you the same!_

Sabine was aware of the light beam passing above her again, and as it passed, she took off running in the opposite direction of the warehouse, away from the raised road she just crossed. She had to descend a few meters before she reached what she thought was flat land, but her feet did not find anything solid. As she fell into a body of water with a splash, she realized why the terrain appeared to be flat. The road was the dam of a reservoir and she was now immersed in a lake of warm water.

The reservoir water was quite warm, having been baked by the sun for eight months, but the rain falling on her from the sky was much colder. It was a very noticeable contrast as she struggled to gain her bearings in this new liquid position. With her head above water, she looked around to try and identify which direction she was facing. When she spotted the beam of the search light again, she began to swim away from it, not caring where she was heading, just away from the warehouse was good enough.

Sabine was a good swimmer, unlike most Cambodian people who were afraid of water, and snakes and crocodiles. She didn't even consider what animals might be in the lake with her, she was pleased to be getting further away from the hell she just left. Sabine swam a free-style stroke that took her out into the middle of the lake, under the pouring skies.

_Let's see them follow me here!_ Sabine imagined that her location was unknown as she put more distance between her and the dam road. She had no idea how big the reservoir was. She had no idea where she was going, other than away from Darayan, the crone, and the old man calling her flower. _I am not a flower!_ She thought. _I am the blade that will cut you down!_

Sabine had no idea where in the world she was. She just kept swimming on, heading for anything else. The rain came down with a vengeance against the dry season, and was filling the land with a flood from the skies. Tributaries swelled and emptied into the low land, like the low land Sabine was swimming in. She had no idea how fast the lake was filling and rising, nor could she know that she was heading towards the huge emptying drain pipe for the lake.

Sabine swam on, unable to hear the frogs singing a celebration song for the wet season's arrival. There was nothing for Sabine to celebrate. Escaping and surviving was all she could hope for now. The search light showed no one as the guards on the roof peered into the dark sozzled night. There were guards on the ground looking for an escaped slave, which left no trace in the swampy earth.

Considering every possible way Sabine might travel, Darayan and two soldiers of the empire boarded a small water craft and began to search the lake. Darayan used his computer interface link to identify the GPS signal coming from an implant in Sabine's marriage ring finger. The signal was weak because she was immersed in water, but Darayan was sure that she was somewhere in the lake. He hoped she was either in a boat, or swimming. He didn't want to have to send divers to extract a body.

The high-powered spotlights did little to break the rain shrouded darkness that enveloped the lake. Darayan trusted the signal that he was receiving and aimed the boat in that direction. He knew that if she were alive and swimming and had reached the other side of the reservoir, that she would be harder to find with her speed and evasive techniques. Darayan had big hopes for her and did not want to lose her. The time he spent with her told him that she was going to be very difficult to pursue.

Darayan saw the trade value of Sabine instantly. The way she maneuvered in the execution of her pursuer, with a ladder, was amazing! She was adept at martial arts, skilled in her meditative mind control, young, sexy and spicy. She was going to take a lot of work to tame, but she would attract the highest ranked officials in the empire when they learned of her, and Darayan would get the credit of providing this desirous sex slave.

Pala was to be the first. He was one of the financial planners for Lord Arun himself. Pala had learned of Sabine through Darayan, who was a confidant and friend. Darayan offered him first bid on her, for a starting bid of half a million Yuan. Darayan had taken a photo essay of Sabine when he had her at his house. While she was passed out from depressants added to her power card, Darayan moved her body into many alluring positions and dressed her in many exotic costumes, which he filmed for an advertising video. When Pala saw the pictures of Sabine, lying naked on soft flower print pillows, he knew he had to pick this bloom in its flushing efflorescence.

Nimol was extremely pleased when he saw the video, and he paid Darayan five million Yuan. Darayan's main job for Nimol was to scout new talent, obtain it and present the girls to the slave pits. Every girl in the bed chamber that had been dressing and painting Sabine were girl's that Darayan had procured. He always slept with them first to test their abilities. He was very impressed with Sabine's raw passion and knew that she would be Nimol's best pleasure worker to date. Darayan kept his lavish home and furnishings solely by producing new talent.

With Pala dead, and Sabine escaped, Darayan would get the full wrath of Nimol, perhaps even the condemning hand of the Mage. He could be disenfranchised for this, or even executed. Darayan had to get her back, and he would not relent until he did. Sabine was his ticket to more riches, but currently, she was his career's liability. Despite the pouring, storming skies, he had to find her and return her to Nimol.

Darayan would pay for Pala's death, but he had an idea how to lessen the astringency of his punishment. He would present Sabine, in her most desirous form, to the Mage himself. A huge bolt of lightning lit the entire sky and the lake's surface was illuminated for a brief moment. That was when Darayan saw Sabine swimming, heading right for the giant drain hole that emptied the lake into the river below.

"Become small." were the words coming from Kalianne's lips, but they were also in her head, coming from a voice that was not her own. She stared at the dog standing before her, bewildered. _"Are you communicating with me?"_ Kalianne thought these words without speaking them. _Become small? You know about this?_

"Yes, Kalianne. I can speak with you, here, in the realm of thought. Become small. Can you understand this?"

Blown away, Kalianne replied by speaking the words, "Yes, I can!"

_"You do not have to voice your words, only think them."_ thought Meas to her.

"Is this some kind of interface card trick?" Kalianne said to herself, not knowing what was going on. Kiri was dead and a dog was talking to her mind. Am _I losing it?_ She questioned herself in her mind. _Is this a trap?_ Kalianne looked all around the room for cameras or microphones, anything.

You are not going crazy Kalianne. You can think of me as Meas. Just clear your mind, and focus on my eyes. I have something important to tell you.

Kalianne considered that either she was going crazy, or there was some kind of interface card sabotage happening, filling her mind with insane occurrences. She didn't notice anything in the room that looked like it was broadcasting a signal, but there were so many pieces of equipment here that she wasn't at all sure at what she was looking. She looked back at the dogs eyes, as if prompted to do so, and thought she was seeing a very old soul. _How can this be?_

You are not going crazy. Remove the card from your skin port so that you are sure that there is no clandestine messages being broadcast into your brain.

Kalianne did not know what to think now. Something unearthly was happening. She wanted to run away, but she felt compelled to communicate with... _a dog?_ Kalianne lifted her arm and felt the card in its slot. She pulled it out, considering that this would eliminate one way that someone could infiltrate her mind. She felt that this might remove the talking dog from her reality. It didn't.

Meas could sense Kalianne's connection to Heng, and their romantic involvement. He thought it best to tell her now. _I am sorry Kalianne. As you can see, Kiri, the man lying here before us, your contact, is dead. And I have to inform you, your partner, Heng, is dead as well._

This was too much to handle. A sense of sorrow began to well up inside of her. Somehow, this message resonated as truth, but she did not want to believe this, she did not want to subscribe to what a talking dog was saying, but there was an eerie feeling compelling her accept this thought. She tried to reach Heng again with her soul connection, which she and Heng had been learning to do. _Heng! Where are you Heng? Are you OK?_

_I am so sorry to tell you this Kalianne._ Were the words forming in her mind. "Stop it!" She called out. "What kind of sick joke is this?"

Meas was able to make eye contact with her again. He saw pain and confusion in her soul. He thought of a way to try and make this clearer to her. Meas sent an image of Ratanna to Kalianne's mind. He also sent the image of himself in a previous human condition, standing next to Ratanna, as the monk, Pra Ajarn Malet. Meas, or Pra Ajarn Malet, could perhaps reach her better as a human figure. Not many humans could consider talking to a dog after all.

Kalianne sensed the images of the Monk and her teacher, and felt a little more at peace with this queer situation. As she relaxed a little in this memory inspiring vision, Meas reached out to Ratanna, a man he never recalled meeting, and asked the discarnate soul to aid him in this communication. Ratanna, who was only a breath away in the realm of spirit, merged with this communication going on and sent a soothing gesture to Kalianne, placing his hand on her shoulder as he used to do to calm her fiery spirit down. Kalianne felt this and wept a tear. Somewhere inside her, she knew that everything she was sensing in her mind was true.

She closed her eyes, and let the feelings, thoughts and images enter her freely, even though she was not at all comfortable in this bizarre setting, which was way outside of her frame of reference, something did feel correct and aligned about this fantastical exchange of thought. She breathed a deep sigh and let it enter her completely.

You came here to deliver the words, become small. You are diligent in your tasks, Kalianne. I know it is a difficult thing to see your contact, Kiri, deceased. He will not activate into the Sons of Siam on the worldly plane at this time. I am your trainer, and teacher, Ratanna. I am here with you.

Kalianne was amazed and befuddled, but accepting. She wanted to run away, but could not. Somehow, this was real. She continued to breathe deeply with her eyes closed and allow the thought connection to continue.

The other soul here is Pra Ajarn Malet, as he told you. He has been with Heng, and I need you to know, he is revealing a truth to you. My other student, your soul mate, Heng, is dead now. He died trying to carry out the mission that you are part of. He had a message to give to someone. This message is the same as the words that you were given to activate the dead man lying before you. Become small. I feel total compassion for you Kalianne. Please listen to Pra Ajarn Malet.

A sinking feeling swept over Kalianne as she accepted these words from her past teacher. Ratanna left her now. He would not stay with her for a long time, realizing that communication from a discarnate soul could cause her to slip out of her earthly vessel indefinitely. He would allow events to unfold as they would, and left her mind and her thoughts. Kalianne wept when she felt him leave, and wept for her husband, Heng.

Sabine had no idea where she was but knew where she was leaving. That was her only direction in life at this moment, swimming for her life in totally unknown waters. The heavy rain and the wind made swimming difficult because even though her head was above water, she would get a mouthful of it every time she tried to take a breath. She coughed and gasped as she forced her way away from the place she had just escaped, and her betrayer, Darayan.

She felt a hatred like she had never felt before. Her number one goal was to get away from Darayan, and her second goal was to hate him. She used this sheer anger to fuel her labored strokes in her drenched reality. If she let go of her anger for a second, the wet environment would match her tears. Anger was better than sorrow. Anger had energy. It had power. Sorrow had only collapse and weakness.

Lightning lit the skies above her but Sabine only saw gray, dark water all around her. She was growing tired from fighting the strong currents that were all around her. It seemed as if the water around her was moving on its own. She assumed she was in the middle of the lake, but didn't understand why there would be a current there. From what she knew of reservoirs, they were only a flat water. She stopped paddling her arms for a second and began to tread water and try to get a sense of what was around her. The skies lit up again, and she was shocked to see a boat moving towards her. She thought she heard someone screaming her name.

Darayan yelled as loud as he could, "Sabine! Stop swimming! Let me help you!" Darayan saw Sabine treading, floating about ten meters in front of the boat and behind her was a buoy, marking the caution zone for the lakes huge five meter drain hole. The lake had risen so fast already that the edge of the giant pipe was below the water's surface and the high water was pouring down it at a very forceful speed. Darayan had the boat driver cut the throttle and he fumbled to grab a life preserver float.

Sabine could see people moving around in the boat coming at her. She could barely make out the shape of the boat, but could see figures in it each time the sky lit up. The rain had grown even stronger and the thunder and lightning boasted the powerful fury of nature. As Sabine paddled to keep her head above water, she felt her body moving. There was definitely a current here, but why, she wondered.

She knew she had to get away from this boat. They had surely spotted her and were coming to take her back. She would not let them take her back to that hell hole and that demon, Darayan. Sabine turned to swim away from the boat but she felt a rope brush against her chest. She grabbed a hold of the rope and pulled her body along it as it seemed to be in a fixed position in comparison to the moving water. She felt a cylindrical float that was attached to the rope and deduced that it was a buoy. The sky flashed again and she gasped as she saw the enormous black hole of water emptying into an abyss, lying right ahead. Her body was being sucked towards it so she grasped the rope tighter.

Darayan tied a rope to a plastic flotation ring and threw it toward the direction he last saw Sabine. "Grab a hold of the float!" He called out as he let the rope extend out, his hands feeding the rope out of the boat and towards his young slave. "Sabine! You are going to die if you get sucked into the overflow drain! Grab the ring! Now!"

The sky flared with lightning and Sabine saw what she imagined was Darayan standing up in the boat, waving to her. She was trapped. The giant drain behind her was pulling her in and the boat in front of her was there to pull her back to perdition _. I am at the end!_ She thought as her options had narrowed down to two things. _Death by drowning or death by disgrace._ A float ring bobbed into her face and she grabbed on to it tightly with one hand, maintaining a tight grip on the rope attached to the buoy.

"Grab it now! I don't want to lose you!" Darayan screamed frantically as he waved his arms and pointed to the float. He could see Sabine was closer to the the boat now. The driver kept the engine in reverse to hold the position against the drain current. "Sabine! I need you!" Darayan had only one objective, to get her in the boat and hold her tight. He did love her and he knew it now. He was so wrong in his ways. To sell her a s a commodity was so wrong. What had he become? This girl was the most amazing creature he had ever met. He loved her. He needed her. He had to save her.

Sabine heard the voices a little clearer over the sound of the pouring rain beating against the lake surface and the rushing circular waterfall being pulled by gravity down a dark expansive hole. It was Darayan. Sabine did not want to die. She did not want to be a slave either. She was in the biggest dilemma of her life. None of her martial arts training could help her now. None of her stealth tactics, nor her mind control, could oppose this powerful force of nature. _There is nothing left for me._

Sabine thought of her father lying on a mat, wheezing and trying to breath. She felt as fragile as this old man she loved. She saw her stern mother's face and just wanted her mom to hold her her like an infant and cuddle her, giving her the love she craved from the hard woman. She saw Aom, begging for candy, and running away with it to eat by himself. Her family would miss her she thought. _What are they doing now?_

Darayan began to pull the slack of the line attached to the float because he could see that Sabine had an arm around it. He continued to yell with hope, "Sabine! Sabine! Hold on tight, and don't let go!" He felt like he could save her. He felt like he had a future with her. He imagined for a brief second the two of them running away and having a secret life together, away from the empire and soldiers and slavery. He wanted to save her more than anything else in the world he ever wanted. The rope got tight and he pulled it towards the boat. He could see Sabine had latched onto it and was allowing him to take control.

Sabine decided that her family was more important than her. If she drowned, she couldn't do anything for them. If she were a slave sex worker, maybe she could make some money to send to them and give them a better life. Maybe she could live to escape another day. She decided to go with her lifeline, attached to the hands of the man that got her into this situation. It was better than certain death she supposed.

Sabine let go of the buoy tether and wrapped both of her arms around the floating plastic ring. Her arms, head and chest were out of the water and her torso and legs trailed behind her, still being pulled towards the sucking void. She felt the pull of the rope as the boat began a slow tug away from the danger zone around the lake drain. Sabine felt that she had surrendered. She was not in control of her destiny. The larger world around her was dictating her future. The man holding the rope, that was holding her life, was in control of her now. _Darayan. I did love him._ She melted into submission. The weight of resistance had left her. She relaxed in the calmness of giving up. It was bittersweet emotion.

Darayan pulled harder, knowing that they were pulling out of the strong current. _Sabine! I love you!_ He thought this as he held in his hands, a rope, connected to the most precious thing in life. She was an amazing girl who was already a woman, a woman he adored. He began to fill with a triumphant joy thinking that she would be in his arms in moments, in the safety of the boat. That was when he felt the weight of the rope go slack.

A shooting pain darted from Sabine's gunshot wound through her shoulder and she lost her grip on the slippery ring. Her body began to drift back toward the draining opening in the lake. She was still in the current of the suction and it gained suction power with each second. Sabine tried using her arms to paddle but her injured arm was excruciating. Having used it to fight, to force her way through a window, and to swim half way across a lake had spent its functionality. It ached tremendously and hindered her ability to use the rest of her limbs.

Sabine felt the tether rope of the buoy again and grabbed for it with her good arm. Her hand managed to wrap around it and she held on tight for her life, the rest of her body was parallel to the lake's surface as her feet were aimed towards the water hole pulling her in. Darayan was screaming to her as he pulled the float in so that he could toss it to her again. He ordered the boat driver to go forward, but the driver was insisting that it was to dangerous to go any further. Darayan cursed the man and struck at his body, demanding the boat move closer to Sabine.

Darayan pulled the float on board and grabbed it quickly. He launched it again and saw that it landed right in front of Sabine. "Grab it now!" He called, "I won't let you go!"

The float bumped into Sabine's face and she considered her options. If she let go of the rope she was clinging to, she might not be able to grab the ring before she would get sucked in. She felt powerless. She didn't seem to have any options any more. She was frightened, an emotion that she never let arise. _This is it! I either grab this float or plunge down a death drain. OK Darayan. I am putting it all in your hands._

Sabine let go of the tether line and swung her arm at the float by her shoulder as quickly as she could. She brought her hand down forcefully right into the middle of the floats center. Her elbow locked in a bent position as the float supported her small weight once again. Darayan felt the pull and began to gently husk her back towards him. He breathed again thinking that this would work.

Sabine held on with all of her might, hoping that she would be saved. Darayan pulled and focused all of his will on this rescue. He would take her so far away from here, he thought. He commanded the driver to back up. The driver placed his hand on the throttle and began to inch it backwards, but his wet grip slipped and the throttle stick went back fully, causing the boat to accelerate at full bore. This movement caused Darayan to fall forward and tumble over the front rail of the boat. He grabbed the railing and hung on, his body hanging in the water. He turned his head to look towards the float. He could see the rope was flying out of the boat with no one supporting it.

Sabine felt the rope go slack and felt her body moving in the current again, towards the powerful downward rushing water. There was nothing to grab hold of now, as she was past the tether line. She held on to the ring futilely. It was all she had to keep her head above water. Darayan, hanging over the side of the boat, let go of the railing with one hand and grabbed for the rope. He caught it with his first grab and clamped his fingers and palm around it. He felt the pull of the sliding rope burn into his skin but he did not let go. The rope grew tight as his grip secured.

Sabine felt the ring stop moving, but the current was to strong. It wrenched her body away from the stationary ring as her grip on it released, pulled by the strong power of the current. In another second, she felt gravity pulling her down as she went over the edge of the drain pipe and began a downward plunge. The sky lit up with lightning as Darayan felt the rope go limp. He could see that Sabine was no longer attached to other end of the rope that he held with all of his rescuing intentions. He screamed at the sky but no one heard him over the deafening thunder that was addressing the world in a loud and asserting way. Sabine was gone.
14

become small

Meas trotted over to Kalianne, who was kneeling on the floor with her head bowed, and he nuzzled her forearm with his snout, trying to offer her comfort. He could feel the shock, confusion and grief of this mortal soul, Kalianne. She raised her head up and looked at the golden animal before her who was whining very softly as if to express concern. She reached out her hand and placed it on his soft, furry head, stoking his fur softly and feeling a strange connection to this beast.

As she knelt on the floor petting Meas' head, she gazed into his eyes, wondering who Ajarn Malet was and how this communication could be happening at all. Kalianne closed her eyes, losing touch with the room she was in, its block, windowless walls and its odd, chemical smell. She slipped into a subconscious realm where dreams occurred and discarnate beings dwelt. She now saw the image of a monk, wearing golden robes and smiling back at her.

Kalianne, child, do not fear. Life is more than just the time you spend living on earth. Life and death are parts of an enduring existence that we all share. It is hardly different from day and night, which make up one revolution of a large marble. We know, and we have known both day and night, life and death, but we are always in the moment. We should not dwell on past or future events, but live in the moment that we have. It is really all we have.

This was the understanding that was being relayed to Kalianne. She continued to stroke the dog's soft fur as she received this transmission from a very old soul that was residing in Meas' earthly existence. The fact that this was happening at all was fantastical, but it resonated true with Kalianne. She was certain that this was not a trick, nor a dream. She did not have an interface card in her body that could be compromised by empirical hackers. These events that were happening right now were real.

The monk in Kalianne's mind described the events that Meas' eyes saw under the bridge, and related to her all of the transmissions that he received from Heng. Kalianne now knew everything that Heng had been doing to get to Nimol and understood his goal to relate a short but important message to a girl named Sabine. 'Become small,' was a simple phrase, with a special meaning, that would have a significant meaning for the girl, Sabine. It was also the code for Kiri to leave his covert job and carry out the agenda of the Sons of Siam. That message he would never hear.

Kalianne understood that Heng regarded the task of relaying this message as a very high priority in his part of the resistance, and she accepted that she would continue his endeavor. Surely Nimol was somehow tied to the death of this SOS agent lying lifeless in the compound. How Heng died was a matter of ill-fortune by the hands of an addict, and Kalianne did not feel justified in seeking revenge on a sick person, but she could find a way to locate this girl, Sabine, to give her a message, and kill Nimol. This would have to be her revenge.

Kalianne processed all of this new information that the monk transferred to her, and began prioritizing what she would do next, and how she would do it. The SOS was very secretive, and the members usually spoke only to each other in person, with their computer cards removed. Because of this Kalianne had no current directive, and she would not have one until she met with another member. The sleeper cell agent, Kiri, was supposed to relay to her the next part of the mission to infiltrate and eliminate Nimol, but that message could not be transferred now, unless there was a reference to it somewhere in Kiri's computer files.

Meas, the earthly housing for Pra Ajarn Malet, smelled something that was unfamiliar and rose in alertness to investigate. Kalianne was startled and opened her eyes in response. Some one was at the door. Kalianne jumped up and assumed a defensive posture as the door of the building opened. In walked a young man with a scruffy unshaven face and sunken eyes. He was wearing dirty, ripped clothing and worn out flip flop sandals. The man opened his mouth to speak but stopped when he saw his dealer lying on the floor in a pool of blood and a tall thin woman facing him, standing in a fighting stance.

Kalianne stared at the man right in the eye. She figured he must have been one of Kiri's junkie customers. Meas barked a warning at the stranger, who was unprepared to see a sight like this. The sullen-faced man assumed that his dealer had been killed and was being robbed by this woman, who was posturing in a militant position. The short, power-addicted man feared for his life, and abandoned his desire to refill his power drug card at this location. He turned and fled the building through the front door, which he thought was very strange to have not been locked when he entered. Now he knew why. He believed that Kiri was killed by another junkie who was stealing his drugs right now. This junkie ran away, unpursued, unrefilled, and he wondered where he was going to get his fix now.

Kalianne looked at Meas and decided not to chase after the nonthreatening man. She closed her eyes again and let the Monk speak with her telepathically. She expressed that she understood everything he related to her already, as well as suggesting what her next move might be, which was to locate Sabine. She inferred that she would search the building they were in for any clues to what the next initiative from the SOS would be, and get out of there as soon as possible before anyone else showed up. The monk concurred that this was a good idea and Meas barked twice before trotting out the door.

Kalianne looked down at Kiri, and then around the room at all of the machines and devices that she knew nothing about. She went to a desk that had a computer monitor and noticed that it had been smashed. Someone, probably Kiri's killers, had destroyed his computer storage drives and operating instrumentation. She decided that she was not going to get any information there. Meas patrolled outside the building to look for anyone who might be approaching. He wanted to be able to alert Kalianne in the event that there were more visitors.

Kalianne remembered the words, 'become small,' and the thought repeated in her mind. _How would I become small?_ She thought to herself. She glanced down at the floor as she was scanning the room for anything, she didn't know what, and noticed a common wire mouse trap protruding from under a desk. She didn't know why she was drawn to pick it up, but she did, and was surprised by what she saw. On the underside of the trap was a keypad. Kalianne concluded that his was some kind of a remote control.

There were digits on it from zero to nine, and a red and a green button. _What does this little device do? What might the code be? How am I ever going to find any clues in this smashed up room? I have no Idea what the code is...unless...no, it couldn't be?_ Kalianne tapped in the numbers 2-3-2-6-6-3-7-6-2-5-5. This was the numerical equivalent of _become small_. She pressed the green button.

Beneath the desk, a floor tile popped up a small amount on one end. Kalianne knelt down to investigate. The tile, which was about fifty centimeters square, was hinged. Kalianne lifted the tile and could see that this small opening gave access to a chamber below the floor. She guessed that she could fit through the opening and see what was concealed below. Maybe she would find some kind of information that might lead her to Nimol and how to take over his operation.

Kalianne stepped into the tiny portal and her feet found a ladder rung just below. She climbed down the metal ladder and found herself standing on the floor of a dark room, barely illuminated by the light coming through the open hatch. She couldn't help noticing that he air was slightly musty as she reached her arms out and felt around for a light switch. Her fingers touched some kind of string that was hanging down so she gave it a pull.

A light came on and lit up this chamber that housed a desk and chair. On the desk was a monitor screen and a keyboard. Kalianne sat down and put the control glove on that was also lying on the table. She made the standard motion with the gloved hand which was touching the index and middle finger to her thumb. The screen lit up and the computer turned on. She wondered what she might find on this secret computer room.

On the screen appeared an image of a very old wooden door that was padlocked with an ancient fastening mechanism. Kalianne again made the common gestures with her glove hand and a keyboard appeared on the screen. _What are the chances?..._ Kalianne thought to herself as she again typed in the numerical code 2-3-2-6-6-3-7-6-2-5-5 and enter. The keyboard disappeared from the screen and the image of the locked door returned.

The lock on the door dropped down and slipped out of the ringlets that it was confining. The sound of metal sliding against metal came from monitor speakers concealed somewhere and the next sound was that of a creaky hinge moving as the door swung open. The door image faded and a page appeared that had a list of names. Kalianne looked at the list of names and decided that they were the common nicknames of Cambodian people. Kalianne scanned down the list and saw, _Achariya, Akara, Amara, Anchaly, Atith, Bona, Botum, Bopha, Borey, Bunroeun, Chakra, Champe, Chamroeun..._ These were the names at the top of the page. Kalianne moved her control hand and pointed her tapping finger at one name randomly, the name Chamroeun.

A new page appeared and a list of dates and long encrypted file names filled the screen. Kalianne again randomly selected one line and made the tapping gesture with her finger. This time a page appeared that was a long continuous stream of strange symbols with some letters and numbers. It was a computer language for something, but Kalianne had no idea what. She moved her control hand to bring an operations menu onto the upper right hand corner of the screen. She selected the option, 'play.'

The screen dimmed to a dull purple color and the sound of wind or waves started to come from the speakers. A computer generated voice began speaking and said, _"My boyfriend is such a buffalo. He is cheating on me with several girls from monument city. His family isn't respectable either. His mother does not even treat me with any respect. I make Papaya salad much better than her. Athtit is a loser. He always gets drunk with his friends and does power without me. I want more power. I will do it without him. I am better than him....."_

Kalianne stopped the play feature and wondered what she was hearing. She tried another name and heard the same computer voice saying a similar connection of random statements and questions. She tried listening to several of the files marked by name and received the same type of playback. These statements seemed to be thoughts, coming in a flow of consciousness unselected order. Kalianne looked at the menu for the names that she was seeing and read the title that appeared on one of the back up file pages. It read... _customer thought appropriations_. Kalianne guessed that she was looking at stolen thoughts, recorded by computer language.

She went back to the list of names and scrolled down to look for names that she was interested in. The name Sabine was on this list. She clicked on it, wondering what she was going to learn. Kalianne made the motion to select the most recent file chronologically. The familiar voice came on and began reciting what Kalianne figured to be Sabine's borrowed or stolen thoughts.

It began... _"I really don't want to go to see Nimol's people in monument city. I like things the way they are right here. I have my dealer, my power, my street and my family, right here. What if something happens to me? Who will take care of my poor family? My poor father, he is so weak right now, I hate the Chinese occupation. If I could have been there when they beat him for standing in line I would have loved to put a real hurting on those idiot soldiers. Soldiers are mostly brainless followers. I hope I don't see soldiers on my way to Monument city. I don't want to be out of power. I will get my power from Nimol's distribution now. Why does Kiri want me to go there anyhow? It seems like he isn't telling me something. Oh well, I will do whatever I have to to get more power.._."

Kalianne stopped the transmission. She now knew what the girl Sabine was planning to do for Kiri. She was heading to Monument City and searching for a power distribution connection. _This girl Sabine sounds like she is a junkie! Why would the SOS be interested in a young little junkie girl? Why was Kiri asking her to go to get her fix from Nimol? This is really strange!_

Kalianne was satisfied that she had enough of a lead to track down the young, power-using Sabine, so she exited the exploration of people's thoughts on Kiri's system and began searching for anything about the SOS plan for infiltrating Nimol. She searched anything with keywords that were in association with these plans but didn't find anything. She tried the same numerical code for 'become small' in many places but it offered no results. Kiri must not have kept anything about his SOS alignment on this computer. It only seemed to have other people's thoughts. _What was he doing with other people's thoughts anyhow?_

Kalianne heard a dog barking and began to refocus on her immediate situation. She considered that she may have been in this place too long and decide that it was time to get out. She would have to proceed with any direction she could, which seemed to be pointing towards Monument City. Kalianne powered down everything in the room and crawled up the ladder and peered cautiously out of the hatch after turning off the light. No one was in the room and neither was the dog so she climbed back out. She pushed the hatch back down, locking it and concealing the opening. She looked around the room for any changes but saw none. A stealthy peek out the door which was partially cracked open revealed the dog Meas barking at a chipmunk in a tree. Kalianne breathed a sigh of relief.

She turned around and faced the poor man who was lying lifeless on the floor and waied him respectfully. She would not be able to make contact with him ever. Never know who he really was. Hear his voice. Tell him hello. She could only leave him now. It was to risky to stay here longer. Life had just become unexplainable, and all Kalianne could do was continue on in some direction. She accepted that moving away from her murdered contact's facility was the best direction.

Kalianne walked through the gate and then quickly into the cover of the trees in a vacant lot nearby. She did not want to be seen by any more junkies, or police or soldiers or talking dogs. She had come to the compound by foot but stashed her motorbike about a kilometer away. She could follow the wooded lots to get back to her bike and then... _What do I do now?_

Meas approached her in the trees and looked up at her with his tail wagging and his front feet prancing in excitement. He was speaking to her telepathically. _Hello Kalianne. I am sorry that the person you came to see here was murdered. I believe his essence is with other good souls that I know. They will help guide him to his next step. But what of you...What will your next step be? What did you learn at the compound? What are you going to do now?_

She spoke telepathically back to him, _Thank you Meas. I didn't know Kiri, but I send him good wishes for his future choices. I didn't learn what the next part of his and my mission directive was going to be, so I will create my own objective, and that is to find the girl Sabine and tell her to, 'become small.' Kiri will not hear me say this ever, but maybe she will, and maybe she will know what become small means. Maybe she will know something about Nimol and how to get close to him. Become small, that is such a powerful meditation._

The Sons of Siam had chosen this phrase as the code to activate sleeper cell members into active status. They all carry a part of the mission that no one else can know. This way, they try to protect and keep secret their directives. It had some major relevance to Kiri. It was his password for many of his own secret encryptions on his computer files. The ether gazer monks gave this to the SOS because they believe it has some relevance for all of our futures. I wish I could do it now, Become small that is.

Yes, become small. The words in this meditation hold something for all of us.

The sound was deafening at first and then morphed into a dull pounding pressure as Sabine was swept down the reservoir overflow drainpipe. The water that poured aggressively down into this immense pipe was destined to fill a lower chamber where it built more pressure, before it emptied into the river, fifty meters below the lake. Sabine was part of this water's powerful path. She was aware of the way the sound around her turned into pressure as she was buried within a waterfall.

Sabine was completely at the mercy of this element of nature, influenced by gravity. She could not make an effort to guide her own direction as the water dictated her fate. She became aware the moment that she stopped falling as the water collected in the bottom chamber, which was a concrete vault the size of a house. In here, the water stopped its downward plunge and built pressure. She floated for a moment in the churning wetness that was being compressed. There was a second of suspended movement as the painful crushing of the liquid squeezed Sabine with its constricting forceful presence. Humans were not meant to know this place during this time.

She was still conscious. The sound around her was that of a muffled, thunderous, existence being pushed through a man-made structure by the forces of gravity. It felt womb-like to Sabine and she was as helpless as an 'in utero' new life. Then suddenly, the movement began again. The movement of churning backwater was now being thrust through a horizontal drain that emptied into the waiting river gorge in a gargantuan arc of exiting water stream. Sabine felt her body whisked along this route as she was being crushed by the immense forces.

She felt like a leaf being carried away, a feather in the wind. There was no compromise, no resistance. There was only water. She began to feel a peace that could stop everything. Thoughts, ideas, life, were about to stop, and then, maybe there would be quiet.

Sabine's body slammed against an iron grate mesh that was the final exiting point of the lake into the river. Her body was pressed against it with a force so powerful that it threatened to rip her limbs off. She did not know where she was, nor what was happening. She was immersed in the natural and physical world as it was all around every pore of her body.

Her clothes were being torn from her by the force of the expelled lake water. Her lungs were full of the lake as where her ear canals, sinus cavities and even her eye sockets. Sabine's body was pressed against the grate by a million liters a second of rushing liquid force. With her last thoughts in this strange existence, she imagined saying good bye to her family. She thought the words, _good bye_ , to her father and mother, and to Aom and the little ones. She heard them think back to her, in the same way a dog had spoken to her, without using words.

"Become small."

And so she did. As stubborn as she was, she became small.

Sabine's body let go of life, as the forces of nature and physics compressed her small frame like an insignificant, flimsy tree branch. Her body collapsed and folded like a pocket knife as it was pushed through the opening in the grate that she was pinned against. Her body flew through the air along with a huge arc of turbulent, spraying water that rushed to achieve calm, flatness again in the river ahead. She was discarded into a pool, unaware that she was out of the drainpipe, and unaware that she was still alive. Had her body not become small enough to fit through the opening in the grate, it would have surely passed through the grate in pieces.

She now lay face down in a mild current that was moving in between two slopes of two hills. The current flow escorted her away from the plume of water that was spurting and bursting out of the sloped edge of the dam. This current was like a light massage compared to the current that propelled her body through the urethra of the reservoir. She was not breathing. Her lungs were full of water. She began to sink.
15

bathed

Sabine was floating. Suspended. Silent. Her hair flowed around her face. Weightless. Calm. Drifting. The quietude that exists under water can be described with a word. Peaceful. Softness. Embracing. Blissful ignorance blessed her. Ignorance of existence. Of wetness. Of breath. She sunk. Down. Downward again. No labor. Surrender. Tranquil. Placid. Composed. Still. Dead.

Her heart was not beating. Her lungs, were full of water and unbreathing. Her body went along effortlessly as it floated and bobbed in the currents under the dark pouring skies. She did not hear the rain that was pelting the world around her. She did not hear. She did not see the lightning streaking the skies, nor feel the vibrations of the loud, booming thunder clashes that followed the arcing between the heavens and earth. She did not see.

A violent storm dumped its wrath, its payload, its orgasm, its excrement. Floating silently, helplessly in deep currents, was like being in an amniotic dream, oblivious to the storm, and oblivious to the dream. Sabine was also oblivious to the large rock that her body was being swept into. The flowing force of the current slammed her into a sandstone boulder with all of the power that this newly formed river was boasting.

As her body pushed up against the solid immovable obstacle, the impact pushed all of the water from her lungs and pumped a single heartbeat's worth of blood through her veins. As she was swept further downstream, bobbing on the surface of the river, her torso's naturally re-expanded and flexed her ribcage, pulling air back into it. Sabine's body mimicked a single breath. She coughed.

A jolt of reality flashed through Sabine's consciousness. She felt wetness, pain, panic. Her chest gasped for life giving breaths of air but received an intake of more water as well. She coughed again, trying to force her mouth above the water she was being carried away by. Her arms flailed. She was not aware that she had already exited the lake. She felt like she was still in the drain pipeline.

Sabine fought for balance, orientation, air. She heaved huge coughing breaths and began to sense where 'up' was. She felt something solid with her foot. It was the river bottom. The current she was in had slowed and the depth had become shallow. She planted her feet. Sabine stood up. She had no idea where she was, but she knew that she was alive, or at least not dead. Maybe.

Sabine stumbled and fell repeatedly trying to accept her vertical-ness. It was very surreal in the pouring wet darkness. _Am I dead? Are these the halls of waiting?_ Rain pelted her face and stung it because of the heavy wind it was being delivered by. _I am not dead._

I'm not dead! Buffalo! Where am I? Where is my focus? It is raining! I'm alive!

Sabine waded in the river and made it to its shore. She coughed up a lungful of river back into her liquid reality. She vomited out painfully her remaining reservoir stomach as well. She clung to a rock and leaned over it. She was weak and exhausted. She realized that she was cold. Deep lake cold. She was shaking. Rain rolled down her dimpled skin and caused it rise more. She couldn't believe she was alive.

How did I escape that drain hole? How is it that I am still breathing? I must have been pissed out of the lake from the overflow tube. How could I have ever got through that? Darayan. That buffalo's asshole! He tried to save me...probably so he could resell me again! But he did try. I'm alive.

Sabine was breathing. She was alive. Each breath seemed like a bonus. The rest of her life was a bonus. She felt like she had won a life extension lottery. Surviving that journey was so very unlikely that she still wasn't sure that this was real, or that this was the regular waking life that she had known. Another pinch to her arm created pain and suggested this was real. _What now?_

Because the sky was dark and pouring rain, Sabine had excellent cover to remain hidden. She had no idea if Darayan would still pursue her after she went down the flume, but she thought it better to not wait and see. She tried one painful step. Her body ached like she never knew, but she pushed on. Another step. Another. She slowly proceeded down-stream, away from the dam, weaving between the rocks lining the shore. Above her, at the water level of the rising lake. A boat returned to shore. A defeated Darayan got out of the boat and walked back to the warehouse with his head hanging low. He considered looking for Sabine's body in the morning.

Sabine forced her body onward and away from the lake, step by step, down a rocky riverbank, in the drenched, wet darkness. She considered that whoever was pursuing her would expect her to be dead now, and that would buy her time. If no one was following her, this was free time. If someone was following her, she had to get as far away as she could. She continued moving, all night, in the cold rain, not knowing where she was going. She only knew that she was going away from a place where people meant to use her for whatever they wanted. Sabine knew that she didn't want that, and now that she was most likely alive, she knew that she didn't want anything to do with the deceitful Darayan, except to maybe kill him.

As Darayan entered the guarded door of the slave worker facility, Nimol was waiting for him. He had a very long face that was poising to become uglier with anger. Darayan looked at Nimol and said, "She is dead."

Nimol spoke softly, obviously holding back his rage, "I do not see the emissary's killer. If she is not here, then I will hold you responsible for the death of Pala. The Cambodian province of the Empire will not be pleased. This man was of very high rank. Maybe they would be appeased if I sent them your head!"

"I am sorry Nimol." Darayan apologized, "I have failed you. I did not know that the young girl was going to be such a problem."

"A problem? Oh she was more than a problem! She killed a respected member of the Empire who paid the equivalent of a year's salary of a common guard for two hours of pleasure with a young girl, provided by me! My job is to keep the Empire's leaders happy, not make them dead! I provide opportunities for important men to have happy endings, not end their breathing! The men always leave here smiling. They are not supposed to leave here dead!"

"Nimol I have failed." Darayan's head sunk even lower.

"Yes Darayan, you have failed. Where is the girl's body now?"

"She was swimming in the lake and she got sucked into the glory hole flume. She is surely dead. No one could survive that much force of pouring water."

"If she is dead, then as I said, you are responsible. I pay you well to provide me with fresh talent. I do not pay you to bring me women who do not comply. Did you not pay her well? Were you keeping her pay for yourself? Did you not implant her with the power suggestion to give pleasure?" "This was to be her first day. She was going to be compensated, but the night took a turn."

"The night took a turn, huh? A turn for your worse. Does she know that you are part of this operation? What did she know about our facilities here?"

"It was her first day, as I said. She did not know where she was or even why she was here. She was properly sedated with her power card and primed to please. I thought that Pala was a good introduction to the job for her. I sold her to Pala as a virgin. Pala seemed pleased to choose her as well. She did see me, as I pursued her and tried to bring her back."

"This is going to cost me immensely. This is going to cost you even more. Just as the Mage is my uncle, and I must appease him, I am your uncle, and you must appease me. You will do this now by relearning what a good slave does. Guards! Take this soft man to the pits and lock in in solitary confinement, and strap him extremely tightly."

"Uncle, I am sorry! I will make this up to you! I will find better girls for your customers. I will find the best girls! I can do it! Please be lenient with me! I can not help you from the solitary cell. Please!"

Darayan was dragged away by four guards, screaming for forgiveness as he disappeared down a corridor. Nimol had no forgiveness for his nephew at this moment. He wanted to punish and train Darayan better. He could not have mistakes like this in his system. He had to please his uncle, the Mage. This gave him the freedom to run the streets of Monument city anyway he chose. Nimol enjoyed this freedom in many ways, and wanted it to continue. His lust for control flourished here. He intended to keep it that way. He designated a group of men to search for the young girl's body in the morning. He wanted to see with his own eyes that this little firebomb was dead.

Sabine walked all through the night, in the cold and heavy rain. As the skyline began to glow with the morning's welcoming glaze, the rain finally did let up. Parched had changed into drenched, and Sabine had changed into something new. She had grown older. She was more tempered. She was calmer, in her desire to kill. This desire hadn't left, it just became, more matter of fact and less emotional. She would kill Darayan, yes, but she would not go looking for him. She imagined that she would bump into him randomly, somewhere, someday, and casually slip her knife into his chest.

A beam of light broke the horizon like a fire, blazing with life. This sunrise was different than any other Sabine ever saw. It gave her a new lease on life feeling as it arose, bathing the wet landscape and touching her skin as if for the first time ever. This day was a gift. _I should be dead. My life. I am still here. I shouldn't be, but here I am. Am I lucky? Do I have a special purpose? Maybe this is a dream, a transition, a limbo._

The sunlight on her skin felt silky smooth, alive and invigorating. The simple effect of sunlight touching her was as profound as the birth of a newborn baby. It was a treasure to her. Her breath in the damp, cool, morning air was amazing as well. She could taste each breath, like it was the perfect nutrition for a starving person. The breaths tasted sweet and moist. The rain had been like sprinkled holy water from a sacred well. Everything seemed so alive and vibrant, simple and perfect. Sabine had no anger, no fear, no desire. She was perfectly content in the moment. It was not ecstatic, nor trivial. It was only a miracle.

Each footstep that Sabine took felt like it was her first, as the steps felt intriguing, perplexing, amazing and unfamiliar. Besides walking, Sabine was feeling the earth enter her bare feet and rise up into her soul. She felt as if she had just been born, as if the lake was an amniotic sac and the drainpipe was the birth canal. She felt dew in the air as she breathed its cool, wet texture and fresh new flavors. She felt the slightest air movement and breezes on her skin. She noticed that she was naked.

Her clothes had been ripped off of her when she passed through the birth canal of the reservoir. She did not feel ashamed, rather, she wondered why she never walked naked in the early morning after a rain before. It felt completely natural and raw. It felt shameless. She felt complete at this moment. There was no Darayan, no slave shop, no Kiri, no family. There was only her communing with her own existence in this washed and wonderful landscape. She felt as clean as the bright green leaves catching this morning's sun.

"Hey you girl!" A voice cried out, "What are you doing? Put your clothes on! You are naked!"

The spell was shattered. Sabine snapped back to where she was. She was naked, somewhere near a place where people are used as slaves, and men tried to hurt her. This person yelling to her was not a guard or a soldier. This was good. She would not have to kill anyone at the moment. Were this person a guard, she would kill him, perhaps. "Girl! Do you need help?"

Sabine crouched lower, aware of her nakedness and headed out of the open line of sight that she was in to a stranger. She didn't sense a threat from this person but didn't know if she wanted to take a chance in being trusting either. _OK. I need a plan. Step one, get out of the open._ Sabine scrambled to the trees nearby and tried to practice some impromptu camouflage. It didn't work very well this time.

"Girl!" the voice called back, "What are you doing here? Why are you naked? Do you need some help?" Sabine squatted down low and crouched, suddenly very aware of her lack of clothing. She didn't have a plan for step two. She was feeling a little panicked now. _The world was perfect a moment ago, right after it was ending for sure, which followed me falling in love, after killing a man._ Her thoughts raced, trying to make sense of anything. It wasn't making much sense at all.

Sabine felt trapped. She didn't know where she was, or where she was going. She was exposed and alone. What can I do? I need clothes. I need food. I need....Sabine passed out, and lay there, naked, in the cool, wet, Khmer morning. The person yelling to her approached. The Cambodian farmer was very perplexed to see a young naked girl at the edge of his farm near the river. _The rain brings new and strange things,_ he thought. This girl for sure needed his help. He took of his jacket and covered her body with it. He lifted her and carried her to his cart, where he laid her down in it next to some digging tools. He made sure that he was gentle and careful with this little bird.

Nimol stood with his arms crossed and his stance reflected control. He was standing on a mezzanine walkway looking down at all of his workers, diligently performing their tasks. The workers did not think of themselves as workers, they only thought of their task. Nimol controlled all of them. He thought of them as his own. Yes, of course he knew that they belonged to the Empire, by rights, and the Mage had the final say in all decisions, but Nimol had created this slaving world. He had a thousand bodies doing whatever he commanded.

They kept on working, packing cigarettes, bottling whiskey and packing ammunition. These were items that would be rationed to soldiers, police and officials. They sewed uniforms, washed clothes and packaged food. They operated and tended machines that pressed and programmed new interface cards, cards with the ability to network with anyone, anywhere. The cards had the ability to implant thoughts into someone, so that they wouldn't even know that the thoughts were not their own.

Acknowledging the Golden Rising Empire is the best game to play, for now. These slaves listen to me, and do what I program them to do. When the time comes, I have an army of bodies at my command, who will do what I ask, even if it means something that is an offense against the empire. When the Mage calls for a new political order, I will be poised to be the leader of the military take over, and I will go into battle with a rage never yet released. I will crush every resistance without mercy, and I will control many more minds, minds that will be programmed by me. None, besides my voice will be paramount.

Nimol continued his motionless stare and the workers he stared at continued their programmed tasks. The complex at this location was home to over a thousand slave workers. They gave Nimol his illusion of grandeur, as if he was their father. Nimol relished the attention that this position gave to him. As a child, he was nothing, but now, he was special, and he made people do the things he wanted, such as to prepare, outfit, arm and feed an entire army. Nimol would like it to see the name of the army changed to, 'Army Nimol.' _Yes, that would suit me!_

A man approached Nimol and stopped, at the usual three meters of respect. That was the distance that Nimol trained them to accept as the 'no standing zone,' where one would wait to be addressed. The man stood for a minute, waiting to be granted permission to speak. Nimol nodded.

"Nimol," he said.

"Lord Nimol." corrected the slave leader.

"Yes, excuse me sir," the man continued, "Lord Nimol, I have word from Bunroeun and Oudom. They contacted the secure network at our facility as instructed by you. Shall I give you their report?"

"Yes, you may give me their report, along with your insolence." Nimol commanded. "Kneel down on your knees when you speak to me."

The messenger and security worker obeyed, getting down on his knees before his boss. His fifty three year old knees hurt but he did not show discomfort, in fear of what Nimol's reprisal might be. "Yes, Lord Nimol. The agents have reported negative, to identifying the location of the one in question. They have also reported that the power distributor known as Kiri, has been terminated.

"Kiri terminated? Mystery prophet still unknown?" pondered Nimol out loud. "Dead people are of no use to me." Nimol was not pleased with the news. His agents did not provide any new information that he could use. He decided to put them on a more menial task to reprimand their failure.

"Have Bunroeun and Oudom return to the working facility and begin a search for the remains of the new little working girl who washed away last night. Tell them to search until they provide some evidence of her death, that I can report to the Mage."

The Mage is going to be extremely incensed if I can not provide the whereabouts of the prophecy child that he seeks. _I will at least provide him with the dead person who killed a member of the ruling class, Pala, and try to concoct a story as to how this happened at my facility. He is going to be enraged! What am I going to tell him? I will tell him that it was Darayan's fault. Yes. My aid is slipping in his choices of recruits and he will be reprimanded. He will be a common worker for a while. Let's see how that works out. Yes._

Sabine opened her eyes. She saw a familiar thatch-style roof above her. For a moment, she thought that she was at home, on her sleeping mat. She blinked her eyes. She was not looking at her ceiling. She sat up, in a bed she did not know. She looked around quickly at the wooden walls of the room she was in.

_I am alive._ Sabine's moment of awakening was not in panic, but relaxed, in having a new chance, a chance at living another day. _Where am I?_ She looked at her body to see that it was dressed in a soft linen night dress. There was a mirror on the wall to her left. She looked at her face in it.

_Sabine. You are lucky! You should be dead! But here you sit, in a bed, in soft clothes. Whose clothes?_ There was a window on the wall right of her. She turned her gaze from the mirror and looked out the window. There was a green that had emerged after the storm. The green washed the landscape in its hue, replacing the toasted pale yellows and golds of the dry season with a new, verdant vibrancy. Sabine drank in the green and could taste it when she did.

The door to the room opened. In walked an older lady farmer with a pot of tea and a tray with two cups on it. She sat the tray and the pot down on the wooden table next to the bed and looked up at Sabine. She smiled and said, "You drink some tea now, it will warm the damp out of you." She poured jasmine tea into the cups and handed one to Sabine. She smiled at Sabine again. "The cup is warm, it will warm your hands. They are cold as bottom of a lake."

Sabine cupped and felt her hands. They were cold, and damp. She reached out for the teacup. The cup felt wonderful in her hands, as she wrapped as many of her fingers as she could, and as much of her palms, around the heavy, warm, clay teacup. Her body felt release with this connection, this sensation. It relaxed as she breathed and took in the warmth. This tea was just what she needed.

A man's voice came from another room, "Is the little bird OK, Meada?" he asked.

"She has clothes on now." The old woman replied, "You can not lust after her beautiful young body any more!"

"I worry for her health, not her sex, Meada!" he added as he stepped in through the door, "You know this, woman!."

"You go worry for the garden and I will tend the little flower."

"I believe she is a little bird."

"Go to the garden now! And save your mouth for eating is better!"

"Good luck little bird!" he called and waved as he left the room.

"He was the man that found me?" Sabine said, both asking a question and speaking aloud a fuzzy memory of her own.

"Don't mind him little flower." the old lady said and patted Sabine on the knee. "You use your mouth for drinking tea. Drink now!"

Sabine sipped her hot tea again. It was very warm and soothing to her mouth and throat. She felt light when she drank it, light like butterfly. She did not consider her self a flower, nor a bird. maybe a butterfly. "Thank you for your kindness." Sabine spoke, "What is your name?"

"My dim husband, Raksmea, calls me queen, but my name is Davi."

"Thank you Davi for the tea, and the clothes, and for a place to rest. Where is your home? Where is this farm?"

"We are near Tonle Sap Lake, about twenty kilometers from Siem Reap. Tell me little flower, how did you come to be here."

Sabine meditated deeply on this question and finally said hesitantly, "I don't know."

"Don't worry little flower. Drink your tea. You are a guest, please relax."
16

direction

The determined Kalianne set herself up with a legitimate disguise which was a small vending cart, attached to a motor bike. She was stocked to sell grilled squid on a stick, which she could cook over hot charcoal beds. She parked the mobile food vending stand under a shady tree near the entrance to the old temple called Prasat Bayon. She could see the giant faces carved into the bulbous temple spires from where she was located. She thought to ask the giant heads for help but she believed that they could not hear, being made of stone.

She was setting up her grille with the charcoal, and a chunk of flammable tree sap, when a boy walked up to her. He wanted to eat some squid now, but saw that he was going to have to wait. He was impatient and ran off looking for someone whose food was ready to eat. Kalianne never had a chance to probe his thoughts for a word, the word Sabine.

After the grille was burning on its own, Kalianne sat in a resin chair she brought along and surveyed the area. She did this with her eyes at first, and then added a psychic survey to all of the conscious beings around her. She did this with the help of a signature power card that enhanced her natural abilities to sense everything around her.

A lady walked past, not looking at the food stand and moving with a destination in sight. Kalianne sensed her essence. This woman was going to meet her sister and go shopping for fish, and she did not have much else on her mind. Kalianne allowed her sphere of observation to expand. A little further away she felt the essence of a young boy playing. The boy was thinking about mangoes and sticky rice, and how to steal some of his sister's treats. Kalianne's goal was to hear anything she could about a girl named Sabine.

Sabine is an uncommon name for a Khmer girl. It has a foreign flavor, making it intriguing. There can't be too many Sabines in this city, so anything that I hear should be a good link. I wonder what this girl is like. What does she look like? Is she friendly, or an assassin? I will be impressed by this kid, I am guessing. I feel that we have some kind of connection, but how could that even be?

For the entire afternoon, Kalianne minded a small grill, selling seafood on a stick, and psychically scanned the vicinity for anyone thinking any thoughts about Sabine. Kalianne was very attentive, but did not receive any leads to the person she was trying to find. Hours went by before two large men, walking and talking together, gave a very solid signal of something else that she wasn't searching for. She sensed that they were discussing Kiri.

There two men were better dressed than most farmers. They wore dark sunglasses and suit jackets with trousers. No, they definitely were not farmers. Kalianne learned that they were the men who killed Kiri. She wanted to casually walk up and slide a knife into their gullets, but she did not fulfill that sudden urge. She did not have any luck picking up a trail for this Sabine girl, but now she had a trail of revenge she could pursue. Maybe she could twist something about Sabine from these mafia looking men.

Kalianne began to close up her vending cart. She left it next to a tree and followed the two men by psychically tuning into their conversation that she could hear from afar, up to a kilometer away. Kalianne didn't have to look at them with her eyes to know where they were. She kept a good distance between her and the two men as she loosely followed them through the monument city temple grounds and vendor shops. She could not let them know that they were being followed.

Sabine napped peacefully in the comfortable bed that the older lady made up for her. The lady and her husband sat on the floor in the next room, eating sticky rice and dipping it in fermented fish sauce with lime and chili peppers. They did not speak loudly, as to respect the guest that slept in their bed, after her traumatic experience, whatever that may have been. They guessed that she might be a prostitute that some man discarded. They considered that she could be mentally not all together there. Maybe she was one of those special children, or maybe she was a criminal. They had no idea.

Sabine hadn't shared anything with them. They believed her that she really didn't know what happened to her. The old man said, "She's a good person, and we should take care of her until she is strong enough to work, and then she could stay on at the farm and work here if she wants to."

"Of course you want every naked girl that wanders on to our farm to stay for a while," the woman said.

"Well you know that that has never happened before!"

"But you would like it to!"

"Woman, stop talking crazy and use some sense. This girl needs our help! She is no danger to us. She is all shaken up from whatever happened to her."

"Yes, that seems true, but maybe we should talk to the police. Maybe they will know what happened to her."

"Maybe they are the ones that hurt her in the first place! You have seen how the police act now since the Chine soldier occupation forces them to do empire business."

"I remember when Khmer was Khmer, and there were not foreign soldiers everywhere."

"Yes, I remember too. But that isn't what we have today. Today we have a stranger in our bed who needs time to heal."

"Yes, you are right. We will take care of her. I gave her some of my best calming tea."

"She should sleep well then. Your tea is strong my dear."

"Your breath is strong my dear, and you are sleeping alone tonight."

"I sleep with the most wonderful ..."

"Dream."

"Girl."

"Buffalo!"

"True."

"I will sleep by this door so that you don't open it later."

"You have fear for rain on a clear day woman."

"Now you call me a woman, not the most beautiful girl in the world anymore? Hello?"

"You don't have to worry about me opening the door. I have only one door that I open."

"Kiss me, now!"

Sabine rested like a rice crab buried deep down in the cooler soil below the rice fields in the summer. Her body had melted into the mattress she was lying on. Her body was dead weight, collapsed into a near-coma, deep sleep. Her subconscious mind was free to wander. She touched something very desirous while in this sleep state. It was not a dream, it was an orientation. Sabine was feeling a pull to, _evolve. Let go of everything. Become so small that all big things would miss me, like an ant in the groove of my sandal. Become small. A fly, a mite, a speck._

She floated in this awareness, observing the feeling of how amazingly immense the world around her felt. The size of everything she sensed around her, was so big that it made her very aware of her smallness. The awareness was not stationary. It was expanding at every moment, like the universe itself. The sensations around her began to become a concept, or an idea, rather than a tangible thing.

She remembered feeling the confining walls of the room where her body lie as she drifted into this realm. The walls seemed to drift further and further away, until they were on the edge of perception's horizon, resting as a concept, an idea, a legend, a myth, a possibility. It wasn't that the walls were drifting away, Sabine was focusing her awareness into the smallest parts of herself that she could detect, and this made the distance to the walls seem greater and greater.

Here, at the innermost point of herself, she saw a tiny glowing light. The light did not move, but floated, amid a swirling background of energy dancing in every direction. Sabine was not aware of having a body anymore, but she was inside her own body, within a molecule, somewhere in her heart. Here, she floated towards the calm, glowing light, so peaceful among the constantly moving streaks and waves of multicolored energy darting with great speed. Here, the light was the only thing that made sense.

As Sabine focused completely on the light and was about to touch it, she began to snap back into her body. Like being awakened from a very deep dream, she felt very strange vibrations and pulses in her being as she adapted to regular conscious living. It was a little disappointing to be back in a very dense reality after touching simplicity. Sabine blinked her eyes, stretched her shoulders and arms, and became familiar with the room she was in once again.

The room was empty except for Sabine. Neither the farmer nor his wife was present. The room was relaxed, quiet and waiting to be filled. Sabine sensed that the energy which was released when this house was built by human hands, was that of welcoming more humans. This room craved people in it. That was the way of construction, Sabine decided. She observed that intention attaches itself and settles into inanimate objects.

The world felt different to her. She felt that she understood everything in a new way. The bond and arrangement between every electron and the nuclei they orbit, seemed as logical as eating sticky rice with fish sauce and chili peppers. It just made sense. Sabine felt like she always knew this, but right now, she really knew it, like a song playing over and over in your head.

Sabine was not saddened that she left the pure simple light source and returned to the drab mundane room. She was content, and at peace, with whatever was happening. She had a new sense of fulfillment, and she felt like everything was in order with herself and everything around her. She laced her fingers together and pushed them skyward, stretching her arms and shoulders into firm tendrils. She hugged herself and touched her skin.

She felt her body, it's uniqueness and its simplicity. She felt her muscles, her hair, her skin. She felt under her arms, aware of openings carved there, and aware that there were no power cards in place. _Power! I haven't had any power since..._ Waves of memories flashed through Sabine's head as she relived the feelings and experiences that she had on power. She instantly forgot about the inner light she just touched and began to dwell on the lament of not having power.

_Power! I could really use some power right about now._ She turned about one hundred eighty degrees from being peaceful in a soothing calmness to being obsessed with obtaining a fix of power. _Power would make everything better right now. I should have some. I deserve it, right? After what I have just been through, I deserve a little lift._ Becoming forefront in her mind, were thoughts of Darayan, the slave shop, drowning in the lake and getting sucked through its overflow outlet. Peace was traded for anxiety, contentedness for obsession. Sabine sighed.

The strength of Sabine's desire to feel the enhancement that the power drug could give her was unyielding now. Like a switch was turned on all of the sudden, obsession walked into Sabine's reality. Her primal desire to engage this enhancement was something that she did not question, but accepted it as her reality. She interacted with it now, feeling its immense size, its dominance, its direction. Being in its presence caused Sabine to believe that she had to comply.

Her body released endorphins and serotonin as she reminisced about how power used to make her feel. Sabine knew about the addicts and junkies on power, but she knew for sure that she wasn't one of them. She used power in a different way, for higher reasons. She wasn't like those people who lived for the next power experience, she thought. _I am doing the power drug for a good reason! To enhance my abilities! To become better._ She thought.

She thought very hard about this. She knew that she wasn't an addict, not yet anyhow. _Why do I want some more power so badly? Can I not enhance my abilities and become better on my own, with training and discipline? Why do I want power to assist this? I just had an amazing experience with the light. The inner light Ratanna used to tell me about about. I just saw it for real. That was unmistakeably real! Wasn't it? Or was it just a dream?_

I am strong. I know it! I am not afraid of anything, and I do things my way! This is what gets me through life, and it has worked for me this far. So I am right about my choice to enhance my self, my aura, my essence, with power. Power is the one thing out there in the world that we can use for anything. It is like mud in my hands, I can shape it into anything I want. I tell the world what to do! It can try and force me into buffaloed up situations, but......

Father! Mer! My family needs me! I am the only one who can protect them! I have to go there now, as soon as I figure out where I am, I will get home, as quickly as I can. I miss my family. I need them now! These people here are very kind. I am grateful for that. They are very generous to tend to me. I will repay them one day.

Kalianne leaned against a temple wall, pretending to look at a map, and focused on hearing what Bunroeun and Oudom were saying and thinking. She learned their names by determining that they were identifying themselves by these names. She could hear this within their minds, as she listened in.

I think it would be wise if we split up. I will search the temples and you search the shops.

I agree it wise to split up.

Kiri, as he was called, made this task more difficult by disconnecting him self from the mortal coil before revealing where Sabine is now.

We know she came here. We will sense her soon.

I also sense that some one is about to get...

Oudom had a larger psychic scanner range than Kalianne, and he sensed her listening in right away. The sentence, I think it would be wise to split up, was their code for Bunroeun to circle back, in a psychic cloak of sorts, but leave his presence to remain observable as walking next to Oudom.

...taken down!

Kalianne did not perceive the thug behind her back as a gloved hand grabbed her face and held her mouth shut, nor did she expect that hand, nor the other hand, which chopped at her temple just so. Bunroeun caught and held Kalianne's limp body next to him in an embrace as if they were married, right after he knocked her out with a quick and precise blow. He kept her upright as to not draw attention.

"Very good Bunroeun!" Oudom said as he walked over. "She was not that adept at her skills yet?"

"She was as adept as Kiri, but we didn't let her exit so quickly." Bunroeun said as he stood with his feigned lover's body close to his.

"We will take her to Nimol, for the Mage."

"For the Mage!"

"But we want to know what connection she has to Kiri."

"And, perhaps, Sabine?"

As those words came from Bunroeun's mouth, Kalianne's limp body became rigid as she tensed, and plunged a knife into the chest that she was being held next to. She pushed the knife between two ribs and found a beating organ with its razor sharp tip. She pricked his heart ever so slightly, enough to give it a pause, and Bunroeun felt the beat's absence.

Bunroeun's body froze for a moment, and Kalianne used that moment to use the large man's large, solid, stationary body as a launching pad to spring onto Oudom, her knife and body diving missile-like at the unprepared, empire agent. Bunroeun felt his heartbeat return and gathered himself into a defensive posture, grasping at the wound in his side, stinging from the stinger of a lady wasp. Kalianne had only nicked his heart, not intending to kill him, not unless she had to. Kalianne thought that he might be able to serve her somehow.

Oudom felt her stinger as well. She stung him with a powerful blow to his jaw with her fist and a simultaneous stab of her blade into the hand and forearm of the man that used that hand to destroy Kiri. He fell back in pain as the force of Kalianne's lunge sent them both crashing to the stone walkway. People walking nearby were beginning to notice the scenario that was unfolding.

Bunroeun ignored his pain and was running towards Kalianne's back. He was certain that he had her in a defenseless position, but his certainty was fooled again as she rolled over and thrust her blade upwards. Her blade entered the man twice, and then again. He obviously did not understand Kalianne's warning shot and received another series of wounds from her blade, in his gut, his heart and his neck. These were not warning shots.

At first, Oudom thought that he was looking at an inexperienced, improperly trained acolyte. As he watched his partner, Bunroeun , fall backwards in a fatal slump, he realized that he had been the novice. She had outmaneuvered him psychically and tactically, and now the team of two was reduced by one half. Oudom's eye let a tear seep as he watched his brother die.

Kalianne had outmaneuvered them, and was now in position to make a decision about the life of the other man who helped eliminate Kiri. _Live or die?_ These were the primal thoughts in Kalianne's mind as she stood up and walked over to the crumpled thug, lying on his back, blood staining his fancy clothes. She had not been knocked out. She was only faking it. She had turned her head as to not receive the full force of the blow that she knew was coming. She had been playing with them. She was not playing now.

She had lost her composure. Emotions trumped control and rage began to take hold of her. Kalianne allowed a demon to manifest in her, as hate became her focus. She raised her blade into the air and was about to bring it down onto Oudom's panicking body when Nimol's hand reached from behind her and grasped her wrist, stopping the blade from descending.

It was she who had been outmaneuvered this time by the Mage's prototype nephew, Nimol. He easily snatched the knife away from her and applied an electric current to her neck with a small hand-held destabilizer. Kalianne's body went limp for real this time, and she crumpled to the ground as her wits left her, along with her consciousness.

Oudom had been spared. Nimol stared down at him and said. "You are pathetic! The two of you are compromised by a street bitch! My best agents are taken down by a farmer girl? Are you of any use at all to me?"

"Nimol!" Oudom exasperated, "She is an adept! I am sorry!

"I will be better off when I reeducate and employ her, than I was with you!" Nimol played with Kalianne's knife, tossing it up in a flipping motion and catching it after a double turn. "I believe this was meant for you." Nimol slowly pushed the knife into Oudom's chest, stopping at his heart. "I do not employ failures!" Nimol hit him with the destabilizer even though he knew the man was going to die. Nimol just wanted to watch his body shake as he finished the blade's penetration.

Oudom went slack as his breath stopped and his blood rested, not moving anymore. Guards began to move in to collect the bodies and disperse the gathering crowd. Nimol was linked to all of his agents through the Empire-net, and he could know where they were and what they were thinking at any time. He could contact them, instruct them, or even terminate them. In this situation, Nimol preferred to terminate with his own hands.

Nimol's uncle, the Mage, would know of this event and would surely not be impressed with Nimol's ability to choose and train agents. That is why Nimol tuned into Bunroen and Oudom's distressful signal, and intervened, as he did. Nimol destroyed one of his own men to avoid his failed agent trying to explain anything. Nimol rested in the idea that he would impress his uncle with his new agent, this stunned woman lying at his feet.

She will be a very proficient killer after I have reprogrammed her. She will surely be better than those two bungling brothers. I wish all these people would stop starring. Do they have nothing else to do with their simple little lives? They are all lucky that they are not my slaves. They have some freedoms, at least for now.
17

winning

The door opened to the room where Sabine was resting and the old farm wife entered, carrying a tray with a teapot and two cups of tea. The old lady did not look one hundred percent Cambodian. She had a different shape to her cheekbones and eyes. Sabine guessed she was part Chinese. Sabine smiled at the old woman, grateful for the comfort she offered.

"Here's some hot tea for you, little flower." Davi said to Sabine as she approached. "I trust you slept well?"

"Good morning little bird!" said Davi's old husband, "glad to see you still breathing!"

"Good morning, and thank you!" Sabine gestured with her hand moving to her heart. "I am so grateful to you both, but I need to check on my family and I must be going today. Can you please help me with directions to the road to follow to get to Monument city?"

"Oh you just relax little flower." Said Davi, "Rest a while, then see how you feel."

"I would be glad to get word to your family. Just tell me where they live and I will travel there as soon as I can!" offered Raksmei.

Sabine was reluctant to reveal her home to anyone these days, even though this couple seemed harmless and very kind. Sabine could see who wore the pants in this family though, and it wasn't the old boy. She pleaded again, "Oh, thank you again, but I really want to get on my way. I have to see about my father."

"Have some tea first," Davi insisted, "it will help you feel better!"

Davi left the room and the old man, Raksmei, approached Sabine.

"I know you are a little bird." He said, "I will help you get home little bird. I know how important family is. My children are not here now, but I wish I could see them everyday."

"Where are they now?" Sabine asked and picked up a cup of tea. She wanted to speak with this kind old man before she left. "Do they help you on this farm?"

"They are all soldiers now, and they are busy serving the army."

"Do you see them on new year's day at least? Each year at Song Kran festival?"

"They can not come home on holidays. The Chinese army does not observe the holidays we do, so I haven't seen my children in five years."

"Five years? That is so long to feel a piece of your heart missing!"

"I will wait everyday, until I see them again."

"I hope you see them soon," Sabine said and placed her hand on Raksmei's shoulder. "You have a good heart and a good family. You should all be together."

"Times are different now," Raksmei said, "and they will be different again."

"What do yo mean?" Sabine asked as Davi entered the room again. This time, two men in black hats and clothes entered behind her. _Police!_ They walked over next to the bed and Raksmei sent Davi a questioning glare. _What is going on?_ She stared back at him with a look that he interpreted as _I had to!_ Raksmei now understood that Davi called the police without telling him. She was trying to steer the buffalo of life to plow the field, but it was too big a job for her. Raksmei wished that she wasn't always trying to be the big boss of every situation, but he wouldn't dare ever tell her.

"Little flower," Davi spoke out, "These policemen are here to drive you home. They will get you home safe. It is a very long way to walk and you are still not well rested."

"Davi, you called the police?" Raksmei asked.

One of the uniformed, Cambodian policemen spoke as he looked at the young girl he was sent to escort. "There have been bandits on the farm roads lately. You will not have any problems if we escort you. We will protect you."

Sabine was hesitant. Something didn't feel quite right to her. "I will stay here a couple more days." she probingly said.

The other officer grabbed Sabine's wrist as the one doing the speaking relied, "That is OK girl, you can come with us now. The kind Mrs. Davi is concerned for your health and you should be coming with us now."

Sabine instinctively pulled away from the man grabbing her wrist and constraining her. She was not really trying to break free, just voice here dislike of being handled. The man gripped down tighter.

"Please come with us now girl." The policeman gestured towards the door.

"She can stay a day or two more, no problem!" Raksmei added to this situation that he was in the dark about. Davi now shot him a look to stay out of this.

Both officers constrained Sabine now and were leading her off the bed. She was only wearing a night dress and was feeling embarrassed about everyone seeing her. It wasn't polite for a girl to be seen this way. The policemen didn't care though. They did care about keeping her in their custody as they hand cuffed her with a carbon-alloy zip strap, and tethered that to his destabilizer. He had a very serious look on his face, not a protective one, Sabine observed. She knew this was not good, and there was no way for her to run without many volts of charge paralyzing her.

Meas saw Kalianne fighting with two men. He had been following her for days without her knowing it. He wanted to keep a watchful eye on her, and aid her if she needed assistance. She needed it now, all he could do was bark. Meas saw a third man walk up behind her and touch her with something that made her body go to sleep. Meas barked. Men dragged her away.

Meas whimpered and paced, unable to help his friend. The only action available was to watch. He could smell her. He followed her scent, lagging behind the men who carried her off. He watched as they pushed Kalianne into the back seat of a car. He ran after the car, but the scent got further away. Soon, it was gone, dispersed with the breeze. Meas sat down by a tree and closed his eyes. He began to meditate.

I am. We are. All is all. Within ourselves, become small. I am only an egg. All is all. So much has happened in this life today. So much has and will happen. I am deeply rooted in the present, within a dog's body, within a Buddhist nation, within a world of suffering.

The life of a Buddhist dog seemed very natural. Being a dog provided the perfect challenges for a seeker of enlightenment to refine themselves. A dogs drive was very strong, ruled by its ability to smell everything. A human could temper itself to curb desire by remaining celibate, but for a dog to resist the smells of life-sustaining food, with those smells being a thousand times stronger than what the human nose perceives, well that was very challenging abstinence. The resisting of food within a dogs body was one of the final tasks for a soul to overcome before enlightenment. Meas was getting it. Prak was not. Meas thought of Prak and missed him. This thought reset his meditation and he would have to start over.

_Lok Sabai, my old friend, my brother. I believed I may find you in the Monument city. But I don't sense you anywhere. Lok Sabai, what is the relevance of the message, become small, and what is its purpose for the one called Sabine? If you can sense me Lok Sabai, would you pause to talk to old Meas?_ Meas paused and waited to see if a response was coming. It was not _. I have learned of the simple words that were being delivered. I accept the task of the one known as Heng, in delivery of these words to Sabine. Can you help me Lok Sabai? Can you aid me in delivering this message?_

It has been delivered once, and received, but forgotten. The message still has not followed its path. You are a kind soul to take on this journey, Meas. Your efforts are pure and your motivation is unselfish. These are the ways of the monk seeking enlightenment.

Lok Sabai! I came to look for you in the city, but found this park instead. I can not smell you anywhere, and I sense that you are far away.

I reside in a spirit realm at this moment. I too was seeking Sabine to remind her of what she already knows, how to become small. My last incarnation died during this transfer of understanding. I seek to give her the message in spirit now, rather than in language.

Lok Sabai, these times are hinging the fate of humans, are they not?

Yes, Pra Ajarn Malet. Very insightful paradigms are at the edge of their existence. One small girl can make this insight effective for the entire world of humans. She is prophecy, but she must choose for herself.

How do we aid her? How do we aid the humans?

We continue to be the change that we want to see occur. We become small, humble and insignificant, so that the path is open for any to follow. We can be this. Sabine can feel this. She has something to give to the world, when she shows us what this message means.

Sabine's mother hung clothes on a line to dry and realized that none of them belonged to Sabine. _Sabine hasn't been home in many days. That is not like her, well, maybe sometimes it is. But I am worried about her. Aom misses her, and father calls out for her in his sleep. I miss her. I hope she knows how how much we love her. She is like the shining star of our family. I never told her that. I don't know why it is so hard to tell her that._ She continued to hang clothes, none that belonged to Sabine. No small blue jeans. No kitty Kat socks. No little lacy panties nor bras. No jean jacket. No red or pink tank tops. The laundry seemed more gray and less colorful without Sabine's clothes in it.

Heng was ninety nine days from being born now. He was no longer Heng. Heng's soul had seen the spark of a young lovers' invitation to life. Heng's essence chose to attach to a tiny being in a warm watery bed. The parents-to-be chose the name Samrin, for their boy, to honor a leader who tried to usher in change. They prayed for change, change that would make life better for everyone, not a life of toil for a heartless dictator.

His new parents were political activists, part of an organization called the S.O.A.R. Save Our American Resources, a grassroots resistance to the rapid Chinese harvesting of the remaining forests. The Chinese landowners in America, owned forty five percent of all fifty nine states, and they strategically owned the resources that were exhausted in their own country. America still had some forests, because grass root hippie activist folk had spoken for the trees for many generations.

Heng was attracted to this couples spark, and would be born in Burnt Parks, Arizona, where he would grow up being an activist again.

Sabine was led out of the bedroom and guided out of the house. She was led into the backseat of a black car. Sabine noticed that there were no markings or lights on the vehicle she was stepping into. She could not struggle against her restraints, still being very sore from her brush with drowning.

The men sat down in the front seat of the car and it rolled out of the bamboo fenced farm yard. Sabine turned and could see that Raksmei and Davi were having a heated conversation. Their hands were going up in the air and pointing in many directions quickly. Sabine guessed that Davi turned her in. There was something a bit fake about her kindness, Sabine thought.

"What did you do woman?" asked Raksmei with a very concerned look on his face.

"I did what was best for us!" said Davi indignantly, "I called the police."

"Those weren't police, Davi! They were from up the hill! They are going to hurt that little bird!"

"That little flower was a weed that I did not want growing around here! She was growing things in your pants!"

"They don't treat anyone with respect or decency up there! You didn't have to call them!"

"They would do very bad to you and me! If they knew we had a teenage girl that we didn't proclaim, we would be punished!"

"We proclaimed our children and where are they now?"

"I did this for our children!"

"Our children?"

"I made a deal."

"With who, woman?"

"With the factory owner."

"What kind of deal did you make?"

Sabine watched the old couple argue, but that didn't matter now.

What am I going to do now? Where am I going?

"What is your name, girl?" Asked one of the policemen as he turned around and stared at Sabine's eyes, and then gave her a once over glance. "Tell me!"

Sabine didn't answer. The palm of his hand stung as it slapped her cheek and eyebrow.

"What is your name!" screamed the man again, with spit flying away from his mouth as it demanded compliance. This mouth was not pretty.

"My name is..." Sabine spoke slowly, and then got a spiteful look on her face. "Go Fuck yourself!" Sabine dove forward with all of the strength she had and planted the top of her skull into the hot-headed policeman's nose, which shattered and caved in a couple of centimeters, from Sabine's well placed head butt. The other policeman, who was driving, began to laugh uncontrollably, upon seeing his partner's comical demise. He laughed so hard that he almost hit a tree on the side of the dirt road.

Blood dripped down the sobbing man's lips and chin as he clasped at the incredible pain in the middle of his face. He could not see because his eyes had welled up with tears and defensive cradling took over. "Ahhhhh! It hurts!" He screamed at his laughing partner in anger, and kicked at him as a rebuke. His partner only laughed harder. Sabine could not stop the grin from rising in the corners of her mouth.

"I made them a deal for our children!" stated Davi.

"What can they do for our children!" asked Raksmei.

"Our children are granted a pass from working in that slave factory."

"So you would send a little bird instead? We don't even know where our children are?"

"Well we know that they won't be working under the cruelty of that place up on the hill!"

"And you trust that den of thieves to be true to their word? I am ashamed of you Davi!"

"I did what I thought was right, to save us too! A man was here yesterday asking if we saw any young bandits lately. I told him no, but then I got to thinking about the young girl in my bed. How could I know that she is not a bandit?"

"That little bird was as honest as a sunrise, Davi. You could sense her heart was good! That was unmistakable."

"If the mafia men are looking for someone, we best stay out of their way, and not be on the wrong side of anyone's anger."

"Davi, I could have taken her away from here, and left her someplace safe. Buddha only knows what they do to workers up in that factory. She will never be safe there."

"I did what I did to protect us! Maybe you wanted her here so your pig could have a barn to sleep in!"

"Davi! It was never like that, and you know it! Now stop being the sour boss and go try and do something today that doesn't hurt anybody!"

The man driving the car stopped laughing as he guided the car between opening gates flanked by four armed soldiers. The man with the broken nose held his hands over his face and tried to keep a routine composure. He did not want everyone knowing that a little girl broke his nose. He would have to pay his partner a good sum to keep his mouth closed.

The car and its occupants were granted access and they drove down a dirt track road towards the looming factory that Sabine recognized by smell. Her heart dropped. Of course these were not policemen, they were Nimol's thugs. Sabine was beginning to understand the spread and threat of Nimol's network of thugs and slaves. She was also reminded of the no-good betrayer that worked at this hole. Her heart dropped again.

The car stopped and the man with the good nose opened the door to let her out of the car. He chuckled when he looked at the tiny culprit who disabled his partner. His partner was running for the bathroom to care for himself. Sabine could not share in this humor, but she laughed anyhow, as if this other driver was on her side. He wasn't and she knew it.

The driver led her into the building through doors that were guarded by more soldiers with guns. They looked at Sabine with surveying eyes and discussed between themselves how much Yuan she would cost an hour. They both admitted that they probably wouldn't be able to afford this one. Sabine tried to block out the conversation that she was overhearing about herself. She started thinking about what it would feel like to insert a fresh card into her slot. _Some power could block all of this out. If I had some power, this would all be OK. Power now, figure things out later. Yes._

The driver spoke to more young men at a guard station and they all quickly turned their heads and stared at Sabine. Sabine tried to turn around and show them her finger sticking up in the air, but she realized that in trying to curse these jerks with a gesture, she would be showing them her behind, wearing only a night dress. She decided she didn't care and raised her finger higher into the air as they let out calls of feigned fearfulness.

One of the guards was using his implanted communicator to announce the arrival of escapee number one. She was designated 'escapee number one' because she was the number one person on the list of escaped prisoners, and the first person to escape as well. She had already become famous within the walls of the factory, through gossip by guards and workers alike. Sabine sensed that they were looking at her in a curious way. _Who is this girl?_ was what they were asking themselves.

Moments later, a posse of nine men, followed by Nimol, spilled into the corridor intersection that Sabine was standing in. They immediately seized her arms and claimed ownership of this escaped murderer. Nimol had a long face that did not show any of the impressed and intrigued looks that many of the soldiers and guards had on their faces. Sabine sensed that this was a very big deal, but somehow, she didn't care at all.

"What are you all looking at?" dared Nimol. "Continue with your tasks, and leave me to mine!"

The men all moved away from the intersection. The guards stationed in the booth stood in a line in full attention. Nimol directed them to dismiss with a nonchalant, lady-like wave of his hand. Sabine snickered at his feminine ways. Nimol heard this and ignored it. It stabbed him deeply, but he could not show that this insignificant street urchin could cast a disrespectful insult on him. He turned his back to her instead, not recognizing the feisty little girl who killed the dignitary Pala.

The entire ensemble of men flanking Sabine in the middle, Nimol leading the pace, swept down a hall and arrived at Nimol's main sitting Chamber. Nimol, two of the guards and Sabine entered the doors to Nimol's private cells. The rest of the seven guards took defensive standing positions around the entry and closed its thick, solid, wooden doors. The corridor that they guarded was dark, save for one down light casting a dim cylinder of light to the floor, the floor that was stained with dark red shapes.

Inside the chambers, Nimol moved quickly to a posh, padded, black chair behind a large wooden desk with a stone top. The desk was lit up in an eerie way that illuminated little besides similar red splashes that were painting its surface. Nimol faced the small prisoner, and studied her, telling himself a narrative of what her life was like.

She is about sixteen years old, a poor farmer like everyone else, defiant, stubborn, feisty, smart enough to escape from here but stupid enough to get caught. She does have a certain quality about her that I can't figure out. That is daunting to me. It will plague me. How dare she conceal her nature from my discerning eyes!

"What is your name, captured, frightened rabbit?" Nimol asked in a condescending tone. He stared at the stains on his table, and then looked up at the eyes of the girl in front of him. "What is the name of the spicy little girl who caused asphyxiation in the throat of one of my guests, a dignitary of the Empire that feeds you?"

Sabine stared back at Nimol, and the feeling of hatred grew inside her quickly. She despised this man who assumed that he was above her. She could kill him with one well placed blow. _A thump on the head? A chop to the neck?_ Sabine spat at Nimol's desk, on top of the red stains. She knew they were blood. It happened to be the blood of one of the poor souls in the human cages suspended from the stone ceiling in this dim room. The frail bodies were some playthings of Nimol, kept neatly arranged in their cages, from tallest to shortest, as he liked it.

Nimol had been crudely insulted by Sabine's crude defiance. _With witnesses present! This was unacceptable!_

"Leave us." Nimol said without taking his eyes from the defiant glare that Sabine brought to this juncture meeting. The guards left the room quietly and the doors closed again, with a very clean and precise locking mechanism sounding off as its blades were closing and bolts sliding. Nimol never broke his gaze.

"So what are you going to do me?" projected Sabine, stubborn, defiant.

Nimol continued staring and then he spoke. "What is a life worth?"

"Excuse me?"

"How much is your life worth?"

Sabine stared away from Nimol's face, not knowing how to answer this question. She pondered it deeply, and said, "My life is worth more than yours. You bring no value to the table, only demands."

Nimol rose up quickly, enraged by her simple tongue and its simple truth. He reached out his long dark arm and slapped her across the face. It stung like cold cement felt. Sabine smelled blood on the spindly hand that slapped her, and she noticed it on Nimol's upper eyelids, like red eye shadow. Sabine felt his presence. It was of a deranged, insecure, control freak. He was too sad to even think about. Sabine knew that she had an endgame coming with this foul person. She spat again, this time, in his face.

Nimol lost his wits and control over himself. He flailed his arms with open palms at Sabine over and over again, while screeching a frustrated howling cry that made her think of madness. Sabine took all of the blows while smiling. She knew that she was winning.

Nimol, like a child having a severe temper tantrum, beat Sabine unconscious with his more than a hundred enraged blows. He eventually tired himself out and he collapsed over her body, still pounding it with his fists. He knew that she was winning.

Sabine rested peacefully in her knocked out state. She immediately went into a dream where she was confronting a bully at school on the playground see saw. She jumped on one end of the see saw and the other end went up and knocked the bully right in the chin. All of the kids on the playground cheered as the bully cried on the ground. Sabine smiled at what she had done and the scene that enveloped around her. And then the crying bully on the ground melted into a puddle of silvery ooze that rose vertically out of its pool and formed transformed into barrage of nightmarish demonic creatures. Things that would hurt you. Sabine felt fear. She was unfamiliar with how deep it could go into her and make her feel weak to the point where she had no ability to make her body move. She froze, in fear.
18

drip

Drip. Drip. Drip.

Silence.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

Again, silence.

Kalianne heard this and it was her anchor to reality as she awoke from an uncomfortable sleep. She reacquainted herself to her limbs and head as she moved each digit to see if they were all there. She could feel that she had soiled her pants. She could feel a bruise on her neck where the electric current that knocked her out entered her body. She tried to stand up in the darkness.

She wasn't bound with chains or ropes, but only darkness, and silence, save the constant dripping from somewhere. Kalianne felt around her surroundings. Walls were her captor, not people. Kalianne could not bargain with a wall or plead with a concrete floor. They were cold, hard and uncompromising. They held her prisoner, as much as her own mind did. This felt like being in jail, and Kalianne knew what that felt like. It was dark. Completely dark. Drip.

Inventory: shirt, pants. Missing: shoes, socks, ring, necklace, earrings, knife, interface card.

Darkness. Drip.

Drip.

Silence.

The walls were smooth, probably reinforced poured concrete walls. If they were only block walls, Kalianne knew she could kick her way through them in a burst, but poured concrete, not a chance. This wall separated her from freedom, for now. Kalianne breathed a sigh of relaxation. She was confined, she might as well rest.

Kalianne breathed deeper slower breaths, and made her aura smaller and tighter the way folks sometimes do on an airplane to cope with the anxiety of flying and being packed in tightly with unfamiliar people. She had been in Chinese confinement camps before, and knew how to deal with walls. They could not be seen as an oppressor, but a temporary friend. Kalianne leaned close and told the wall a story. This was a coping technique she developed in her last extensive stay at a rock wall resort.

"How long have you been here? Long time, no?" Kalianne asked the inanimate surface. "I'll bet you have seen a lot of people come and go. Anyone interesting? I'll bet there have been. Anyone important? Famous? How about infamous? I have never been here before. What is like around here? Is the food good? Are the hosts nice people? I'll bet they aren't."

As Kalianne was sweet talking with the wall, a creaking sound interrupted her conversation as a door opened and the chamber flooded with light. A shuffle ensued and a thud followed. Light folded in on itself and was gone as the door was pulled shut. Darkness. Silence. Drip. Drip.

Breathing. There was someone in the room besides Kalianne. Someone breathing, heavily, but slowly, and confidently, yet unenthusiastically.

"Hello?" Kalianne said. There was no reply, except for more breathing. Kalianne tried Hello again in several more languages besides Khmer. "Sawasdee kaa, Konichiwah. Nii how. Chao. Halo. Joom ripsu."

"Hello." Answered a voice, small but strong. "I am Khmer."

Kalianne spoke only in Khmer now, relieved to speak with someone of her native tongue.

"Where are we?" Kalianne asked. "Do you know?"

"Unfortunately, I don't know," answered the small but strong Khmer voice. "This is Nimol's slave factory, I am fairly certain. Well, that was the last place I was before they beat me unconscious. I am guessing that we are still in the same complex. We are in Nimol's sewing sweat shop slash cat house."

"I know all about Nimol. He knocked me to the ground with a destabilizer and I woke up here."

"I have been here before, and now I'm back. Why are you here?"

"I was on my way here to deal with Nimol, when..."

"Are you working with Nimol?"

"Oh, no! I came here to.... Do you work for him? Why were you here before?"

"He tried to get me to work for him, but I killed a political dignitary on my way out the window. I don't think Nimol was pleased about that!"

"That you killed a dignitary?"

"And that I escaped."

"You sound so young. Why did you kill a dignitary? May I ask?"

"Yes you may ask, and I am not that young. I will be seventeen. But the reason I killed a man, was because I didn't want to lay with him and please him, all hopped up on some kind of _'Sex'_ power card. By the way, do you have any power? I just need a little help to gain my strength back." Sabine didn't care about what blend or signature of power it was, as long as it wasn't a sex drug. She wanted to feel strong again."

"I don't use it little doll, and I...."

"I am not a little doll, nor a little bird or a little flower. My name is Sabine and I am not a little anything! Except for maybe a little confined right now."

"Your name is Sabine? Really? Oh..."

"What? Why do you know my name?"

"Sabine! I have been looking for you!"

"You have been looking for me? Why? And how do you know my name? Who are you?"

"My name is Kalianne. I was at a target destination where I was traveling to to meet a contact of mine. Unfortunately he was dead, murdered, by two thugs from Nimol's enclave. I tracked them down and fought them while I was looking for you! I learned about you from computer files in the compound where I found Kiri dead..."

"Kiri? Dead? How do you know Kiri? What is going on here?"

"Kiri was my contact."

"Your contact? For power?"

"No. I am not a user. I was going to meet Kiri to activate....Well, you probably don't need to be concerned about all that. How are we going to get out of here? You said that you left here by window?"

"Kiri was my supplier, and my friend!"

"I am sorry. He is at peace now. But finding you here, that is amazing. Do you know why I have been looking for you?"

"No, that is what I am trying to find out!"

"I have been searching for you, because there are many people invested in the idea that you are going to be the savior who helps the people defeat the oppressors, and I came to give you a message."

"Hah! Me? Save the people? I can barely take care of myself and my family!" Sabine began thinking about her family, about what they were probably doing now, and Kiri. "Poor Kiri! Why was he killed and by who? Do you know? Please tell me!"

"I don't know why exactly. I found him at his compound on the floor, covered in blood. I stumbled upon a lower room where he had files of people's thoughts. I listened to your thoughts and that was what clued me in to your location. I knew that you were heading to Monument city to seek out Nimol. I guess we both found him."

"Kiri had files of my thoughts? That weirdo thief! What was he doing with my thoughts?"

"I don't know Sabine. He had a collection of many peoples thoughts on dimensional computer files. I was lucky to find you in there and get a clue to where you were, and now I have found you."

"Why do you care so much about finding me?"

"So I can give you a message."

"What message?"

"Become small."

"Become small?..."

Sabine drifted reflectively into that phrase, as something about the sound of hearing another person say it, gave it even more meaning that what she herself experienced with the concept already. Become small made perfect sense to her, but she really had no idea what it meant. That was a very strange feeling for Sabine to grasp, an unknown familiarity.

"I was not the only person looking for you, Sabine."

"What do you mean?"

"I learned about another man named Heng, from a do...well never mind where I learned about him. Do you know a man named Heng?"

"No, I don't"

"Heng was carrying a message to give you. He couldn't complete his task, because he was compromised on the way to do it."

"You mean he was killed?"

"Yes, Heng is also dead. Meas told me about him."

"Meas? Who is Meas?"

"Never mind Meas. The ether gazers, the S.O.S., and my teacher, Ratanna, believe you are going to do big things!"

"Wait. Ratanna? Is, was he, your teacher?"

"Yes. He trained me to be a resistance fighter. That is why I am here. To aid resistance to the Empire."

"Ratanna was my teacher also!"

"I guess that makes us sisters!"

Sabine wept, something she never let anyone see.

"Darling, don't cry. Don't give them any of _your_ power. You are powerful, and you have an amazing journey ahead of you!" Kalianne said.

Sabine used her palms to remove the tears from her eyes. She never wanted anyone to see her crying, and she felt very stupid. "I am not crying," she said, "water dripped in my eye."

"OK." Kalianne said, "It is OK little sister. You are not all alone. You have a friend with me! I've got your back!" Kalianne felt through the darkness and reached out until she felt Sabine's body. Sabine posture became startled, but then she accepted Kalianne's caring touch. They embraced and held each other for a lone time. Sabine felt like life was completely upside down, but now she had a friend. It felt so safe and warm in that embrace. It had been a long while since Sabine had a close girlfriend. That hadn't happened since she was a little girl of seven years old. She was best friends with the little girl next door, Chan.

Chan had the biggest smile and the brightest eyes. She and Sabine were best friends as children and did everything together. One day, the empire made human appropriations in Sabine's neighborhood. They took Chan and her brother, Mau, when Sabine was eight. Sabine missed her so much and cried often by herself. That was about the time when Ratanna came to her house and offered free defense lessons for all of the town's people. Sabine gladly joined the Ratanna's dojo and learned to fight so she could protect her friends if any one tried to take them away.

Sabine now pined for Chan, wondering where she might be. Kalianne held her and made soothing, comforting whispers in Sabine's ear. Sabine let ten years of frustration out and sobbed into Kalianne's chest. Kalianne held her maternally and sent love to her. Kalianne felt so much respect for the little girl who was having a releasing moment in her arms. Kalianne had come here to relay a message, now, she felt compelled to be this little girl's protector, her friend and her companion. Kalianne knew that she was in the right place, right now, next to Sabine, the prophecy girl.

Sabine did not feel at all that she was in the right place. She had been returned to this hell after dying, trying to escape. She wanted her mom. She wanted her friend, Chan. She wanted a warm bowl of rice soup with chicken's feet and some fruit. Her mind clung to anything that loaned comfort. She clung to Kalianne like a big sister. Kalianne held her tight and sent love and energy to her, caressing her, and stroking her long black hair. "We will survive this Sabine!" Kalianne said, "I am going to help you get out of here, and crumble this building to the ground on the way out!"

"We may be here longer than you think."

The door to the dark chamber was kicked open from outside the room and it slammed against the wall, making a loud, hollow echoing sound. In the blinding light that poured in,the girls saw the silhouette of a group of large bodies. Sabine and Kalianne couldn't tell how many people there were as they released from a comforting embrace and braced for whatever was about to happen next.

The group filed in through the door and moved into strategic positions around the two captive girls. "Listen now!" came a booming, male voice, "We are going to transfer you to another location, where you will be cleaned and given work assignments. If you come along peacefully, you will be better off. If you resist, I will hurt you."

Sabine felt hands reach under her armpits and lift her up to a standing position. These hands also probed the card slot under her right arm. The same was being done to Kalianne.

"Now, come with us!" The voice boomed out again.

Kalianne attempted to send a telepathic thought to Sabine. _Sabine! Can you understand me? Can you understand my thoughts?_

Sabine, feeling beaten again, went along with the people herding her through the cell door, not feeling the will or the strength to resist. She began to sense something else in this group of people. One of these people were trying to say something to her directly. Sabine listened in, curiously. _Sabine! It is me Kalianne. We can communicate here!_

Sabine knew that it was her new sister talking to her. She tuned out all of the noises around her. The shuffling of feet. The loathing sound of many sewing machines. The drip, drip, drip of leaky pipes, in the quietude, she focused on the incoming thoughts she was understanding. Sabine concentrated her thoughts to Kalianne. _I can understand you, and I am not even enhancing with a power card! This is real! We have strength together!_

Yes! We do! We can communicate here anytime. But for right now, I do not believe we have any advantage, so we shouldn't attempt an escape here. Wait. We will at the right time. I will help you get out of here. Relax if you can, breathe little sister. It will be OK, I promise you that I am here for you.

Thank you Kalianne, my sister! I have never been able to make a strong contact like this before, not without power. I'm seeing with my own eyes, not enhanced ones. I want to talk to you often in this space. Do you think anyone else can hear us?

I don't know how adept any of these people are, or what technology they have, so, maybe. Don't think about anything meaningful. Think about something mundane, something that other slaves might be thinking about. Try and blend your thoughts in to this hole and no one will notice you.

Sabine understood Kalianne and was pleased that she could communicate in this way, without the use of a substance. Sabine became cautious about the content of her thoughts and made mental adjustments to keep her mind on mute.

The two girls were pushed and groped as they were guided down a cement corridor towards the sound of clicking, whirring, sewing machines. The girls were not struck with blows, but were herded along like animals . They were soon led into a room where they were chained and shackled to a pipe rising from the cement floor, that supported a solid wooden bench. The girls were forced to stay in a squatting position, because they could not physically stand up with their wrists chained to a pipe below their knees. The armed soldiers left the girls chained in this room and moved to guard positions right outside the still open door.

Sabine recognized this room, as she had been in it before. "Welcome back you little turd!" came a familiar voice from and ragged woman who entered the room. It was the woman who did Sabine's intake upon her first visit to this vast slave complex. "We are going to break you this time. So don't even resist me or I will assign pain givers to you every hour of every day!"

Neither Sabine nor Kalianne spoke. They looked away from this old hag, not making eye contact, not seeming aggressive. They stared at the cement floor, trying not to evoke any negative response from their captors. Six soldiers entered the room and positioned themselves around the two prisoners as one arm was unchained from the post. They lifted the girls right arms upright and held them in a vertical position. Unsympathetically, their sleeves were ripped from their shirts. The guards handled the girls roughly but were met with no resistance.

"Now!" said the older lady, "You will be given a work detail. You will do this work everyday. You be given food and water if you do your job. You will be inserted with a card that will make you work better. Do not take these cards out or alter them. We will change them daily. If you do what you are told, you will not receive pain. If you do your job well, you will be treated to more recreational forms of power in your card. If you don't do your job, you will become a source of food for Nimol's tiger collection. If you try to escape, there will be a public viewing arranged so that the other slaves can watch you be eaten by Nimol's tigers, as a reminder of what happens to those who do not cooperate. Any questions?" A big smile came across her weathered face. Sabine and Kalianne did not respond.

Guards held the girls' right arms up in the air and inserted a card into the slots cut into the flesh under their arms. Almost instantly, they felt the effects. _This is a very strong mixture!_ Sabine thought this as the waves of numbing release rolled in. The girls' eyelids fluttered and their mouths fell open as the power took effect. A small line of saliva dripped from the corner of Sabine's twitching lips. She sighed with release. Kalianne's eyes rolled back into her head.

The blend of power on the cards that were inserted into them was designed to keep slaves numb, and complacent. It also held an imbedded thought implant that gave the user the idea that they were content to do their work and that they were members of a large family, working to better the situation for everyone. They patterned this thought implant around propaganda slogans and techniques that were used on the American public during the millennium change. This message also employed Socialist ideas from the Empire's neighbors from the Russian territory.

The type of power that they gave these girls was especially potent and designed to keep them as sedated as a frontal lobotomy would produce. Both Sabine and Kalianne's heads rolled on their vertebrae as they slobbered on themselves. Their minds were on the edge of a dream state and they were not a threat to anyone in the complex now. The hag was in charge of them, and she had a grudge for the smaller girl, who caused her rebuke in the past. A short while ago, Sabine had been delivered to Putrea, the old hag, by mistake, causing her embarrassment and cause to lose face. Putrea would not forget this.

The girls were led from the orientation chamber and down a strong smelling corridor where the kitchen and bathrooms flanked. At the next junction, Sabine was escorted down a hallway to the right and Kalianne was dragged forward as the guard accompaniment split. Sabine had already anchored herself to Kalianne, and was feeling remorse to be separated from her. Sabine thought out to her, _Sister, I need you!_
19

slavery

Sabine opened her eyes with a panic and came to after having been drifting aimlessly in a drug induced stupor. The sedative part of her card was waning in its potency and an amphetamine stage was beginning to kick in. She was sitting on a concrete bench before a concrete table, which had boxes and a pile of powder resting on it. Sabine blinked her eyes and peered around the room, trying to gain her focus and her bearings. A tall woman was leaning against a wall, staring at her.

"OK buffalo," she said as she walked over to Sabine, "your nap time is over and it is time for you to begin work. Do what I tell you and I won't call the guards to come in and administer pain incentives, OK?" Sabine could not respond, she was not sure if she was dreaming, awake or dead. The trainer saw that she wasn't quite ready yet, so she lit up a cigarette and waited. Sabine swayed in her seat, getting familiar with things like gravity, sight, hearing and breathing.

The trainer slid a heavy wooden chair over to the table, making a loud scraping noise as she dragged it. She sat down in it and pushed her cigarette into the table, snuffing it out. She blew her last hit out into Sabine's face, thinking that it would help wake her up. Sabine squinted and scrunched up her nose, trying to avoid the unpleasant smoke. Sabine opened her mouth and tried to speak, but she couldn't form words or make them come out. The trainer watched impatiently, ready to get on with the process of teaching this young, stupid kid how to pack capsules with powdered nutrient powder.

Sabine was aware that she was alive, awake, in a concrete room with a tall girl. She wanted to talk to this girl see if she was friendly. She wanted to leave this confining room with this girl and go for a walk in the forest. Sabine wanted to ask this girl if she was ready to go. Sabine diligently focused on her new friend and reality crept in a few steps. _This is not my sister Kalianne! Am I still in Nimol's warehouse? Aw buffalo! This is not where I want to be. I want my sister!_

Sabine rolled in between the worlds of coherency and subconsciousness. The drug in her system was strong and now it was morphing into something else. Sabine could feel her wits sharpening and getting faster with each second. It was if a skin was being pulled off of her and a new being was emerging, a being with skills and determination. At the same time, Sabine was breathing a sigh of relief and pleasure to feel the tingly, crisp, succulent power high, that she liked more than she ever admitted, especially to herself.

The trainer recognized this feature growing in her and knew it was time to begin her job. "Little worm," the trainer said, "in the box on your right are empty capsules. In the middle of the table is a pile of powder. On your left is an empty box. Watch me closely and do exactly the same thing that I do. Do you understand?"

Sabine did understand. She nodded, yes, and stared at the girl, noticing her mouth, lips and nose. Sabine wondered where she was from. She did not look Khmer. Sabine didn't want to be here, but the amp of energy that she was feeling made her want to do something, anything, just to occupy her self. The trainer saw Sabine was in an aware state and demonstrated the task.

"Pick up an empty capsule," she said as she picked one up from the full box, "You have to pull it apart into two halves, OK?" Sabine nodded and the trainer continued. "Now, use the smaller half of the capsule to scoop up the nutrient powder and fill it to the top. Can you do this, worm?" Again Sabine nodded and stared, this time noticing every hair on the tall girl's head, the length, color, shine and straightness of each strand. Her brain was beginning to rapid fire electrical responses through its neurons, making Sabine feel like she was getting smarter and more adept at cognitive functions. "The last step is to put the capsule back together and place it in the empty box. Even a buffalo stomach worm like yourself can do this. Now you try." The trainer dropped the completed capsule in the empty box and stared at the trainee before her condescendingly.

Sabine fumblingly extracted an empty capsule from the box on her right and opened it, then completed the task as the trainer had shown her. Sabine felt like she made a major accomplishment as the full capsule dropped into the empty box. The trainer shook her head at Sabine's juvenile mannerisms and accepted that this was her job, to teach stupid buffaloes how to pack pills for soldiers in the field. The pills were formulated to give quick nutrient bursts, as well as amphetamine power that removed hunger and reinforced drive. The trainer lit up another cigarette and said to Sabine, "OK, now do it again and again until the entire box on your left is full. If you complete this in three hours, I will give you a rack to pack the pills in that will make your job so much easier. If you take longer than three hours, not only will you not receive the rack, but you will not receive food or water. Are you ready? Go!"

The trainer looked up at a countdown timer on the wall and made the hand gesture that started the countdown from two fifty nine. Sabine saw the timer and wondered why she was not given a full three hours, rather a minute less, but decided not to complain about this and got to work packing pills. She hated this place, hated this job, and hated this trainer, but was glad to have something to keep her hands busy as the amphetamine coursed through her system.

Sabine became so engrossed in her task that she did not notice anything else that occurred in the room as she packed and packed and packed more powder into pills. Sabine could notice the very subtle differences in the weight of each capsule as she packed them, and guessed how many grains of powder were in each one she completed. Her motions became very methodical and she did not venture outside of that routine, for fear the universe might stop turning. The drug made her extremely obsessive and things had to be just so for Sabine, or dire consequences were immanent.

As the last empty capsule was filled and dropped in the box. Sabine stared up at the countdown timer for the first time, expecting to see at least an hour left on the clock. To her chagrin, the clock was nothing but zeros. "Finally you have finished slow buffalo!" the trainer said, "And you did it in just over four hours."

Sabine felt a strong inner disappointment. She had been so certain that very little time had passed, and that she had done an exemplary job. She wanted praise. She wanted to be recognized. "You stupid buffalo!" The trainer said as she walked over to Sabine and slapped her across the face. "I am responsible for you, and now I will be reprimanded for your tiny effort! You will have to do it again, and on time, or this is what you will receive."

The trainer looked over towards the door and nodded her head. In walked two soldiers who took a position on either side of Sabine. The trainer nodded her head again and the soldiers each tagged her with a destabilizer in the ribcage area. Sabine felt electrical current take control of her body as she went rigid and could do nothing but focus on the extreme pain rocking her body. When the guards released, Sabine crumpled to the ground, saliva dripping from her mouth, and excrement and urine dripping from her other orifices.

Sabine moaned and twitched as her muscles still contracted from the electrocution she received. As the effects wore off and she gained control of her body again, the trainer dumped a new box of capsules over Sabine's slumped body and screamed, "Now do it again, buffalo!"

This was to be Sabine's routine day, for weeks to come. She completed her task in under three hours on the third day and was given a pill rack and no electric current. Sabine did her job diligently, out of personal determination to be the best at what she did. The amphetamine and the thought implant were giving her this personal challenge, which was not in Sabine's will. It was an artificial thought, implanted into her power card and her mind, to be the best pill packer that ever was. Sabine also enjoyed the 'high' side effects of the cards inserted into her every morning. She was becoming more and more fond of those effects and had a reason to wake up in the damp mornings. The card would be inserted shortly after a morning meal of cold rice soup.

Sabine didn't forget, but pushed the memories of her life, her family, Kiri and Kalianne, far away, as they offered only sadness. It was better to go along with everyone, follow orders, produce pills and not receive pain. All of the slaves in this pit adhered to these ideals, greatly influenced by the thought implants in the cards, and Nimol's shop rolled on, hour after hour, running three sixteen hour shifts that kept the products cranking out.

Sabine worked in a solitary chamber for the first week, and after she was deemed a non-threat by her trainer, she was moved into a large warehouse room where she worked along side two hundred other girls of all ages, packing pills, eating rice soup, and sleeping together on the floor. Those who met the quota were given soup, water and a straw mat to roll out and sleep on. Those who didn't meet the quota received nothing. Those who didn't meet the quota more than five times disappeared and were not seen again. There was always a countdown clock on the wall showing the time left in their shift. There was always that looming pressure and the girls looked up at the timer often. It was a strategy that Nimol added to try and drive more out of his workers.

Nimol had the charge of supplying food, medicine, uniforms, drugs and whiskey for the soldiers of the Empire, who were occupying the Cambodian province. All of these products were made by the female citizens of this poor region. Men were chosen to become proxy soldiers, and the women, who were the soldiers own wives, mothers and daughters, kept the men alive with these items that they slaved at, day after day.

There was no communication possible for the inhabitants of the slave shops. A signal blocker was in place that extended for a radius of ten kilometers around the complex that scrambled all radio waves, satellite signals and etheric pulses. None of the Khmer people knew what went on in this facility, but many in Monument city knew of it, and that it was a place to avoid. Anyone sighted within the ten kilometer range was arrested or killed on sight.

Besides serving the Empire, Nimol used this facility to serve his uncle the Mage, and ultimately serve himself. His ego was sated by his ability to control, and he occasionally took a slave into his personal chambers, where he imposed deviant methods of control. Those who entered Nimol's chambers were rarely seen alive again.

This was Sabine's world now. Nothing mattered here, nothing except completing the task that allowed the simple necessities of food, water and a thin straw sleeping mat. There were the drugs that kept people awake, alert and focused on the task. Those who performed in the top ten percent were given more drugs, which was the only upgrade above the simple necessities. Sabine reached the top ten percent for the first time in her third week. She was on top of her world when she felt the power drug boost in her card the next morning. She intended to stay in this elite slave status, and she did.

On week five, Sabine was promoted from pill packer to seamstress. She no longer worked, ate and slept with the same girls in the same room. The uniform makers worked only a twelve hour shift and slept in a locked sleeping room, where there were no guards on the inside. Here, the girls were permitted an eight hour sleep session outside of the workroom, and time among themselves.

Sabine received training and orientation, which she completed in only one day. She already had some sewing skills that her mother taught her, and her drive pushed her ahead of most of the other girls. She reached the top ten percent in only a week, and one of the benefits of that was an hour in a rec room with basketballs and netless hoops, heavy steel exercise machines and music. Music was the best part of this room for Sabine. The girls sang and danced and even smiled when they were treated to this hour of relaxation and recreation.

Sabine quickly became familiar with the inner sisterhood, their routines, the pecking order, the rewards and the simple joys that came from sleeping unsupervised. The girls could hold each other while they slept and receive the comfort of human touch that was not a fist striking them. Some girls became lovers, some became like mothers and many like sisters. The seamstress job was ten times better than the pill packing task. It was almost enjoyable, as long as everyone produced.

For those who did not produce, there was no joy at all, only pain. Sabine learned of this when she was set up to fail by a jealous girl who cut the cuffs off of all of the uniforms that Sabine made one day. At the end of that day during inspection, the guards were incensed with her faulty work. She was dragged from the workroom by her hair and taken to a room where she was beaten, stripped down and blasted with a high pressure hose for almost an hour. She nearly drowned fighting for breaths during that tormenting punishment session. She never found out who sabotaged her work.

Sabine never took a lover in the sleeping room, but sometimes spooned with another for a bit of comfort and softness. Sabine offered help any way she could to those who were struggling, especially the older women who struggled to keep up. During the day in the work chamber, and at night in the sleeping room, Sabine would speak respectfully to the older women, to try and impose a degree of dignity in the oppressive, humiliating slave shop. The sisterhood that formed within the concrete walls was a bonding that none of the girls could ever know in any other circumstance. Their plight brought them close together and they took care of each other.

Sabine started to become popular with most of the girls and she made friends quickly. Other girls fell into rank around her and willingly watched her back. No other prisoners could hurt her now, and the girl who cut up Sabine's uniforms was found out by Sabine's back-watchers, and punished with a form of slave house justice. The other girls cut up her uniforms up for a week, even though they received water torture right along with the original saboteur.

Time passed and no one noticed. If everyone's work was sufficient, everyone ate. This was more than many poor farmers could declare. If the work was better than most, more power was inserted into the girls bodies via the card-accepting slot under their arms. For some of the women working here, it was almost an upgrade from their lives outside of the slave pit. Almost. There were some very dark things going on in the compound, things that belittled, dehumanized and often debilitated the victims.

Rape was a daily event that happened from the power hungry guards. Even if the guards did not experience a release, they would apply the rape to feel control and suppress freedom. No one was exempt, no matter how old or how young. Sabine saw a twelve year old girl being pulled away by some guards and she tried to stop it by offering herself in place of the younger girl. The guards didn't accept this substitution and Sabine pushed one of them. This resulted in repeated brutal beatings, all privileges removed and solitary confinement.

During Sabine's time in the dark, wet solitary cell, she thought of Kalianne. Sabine had not seen her since the day that they met in the same confinement cell, but Sabine thought of her often. She didn't try to contact Kalianne telepathically, because she was afraid of someone listening in. Kalianne had suggested that they keep this channel silent and that made sense to Sabine.

Sabine was very intrigued when she and Kalianne communicated that way without any help from any telepathic signature drug. Sabine had wanted to expound on this ability, but it made sense to remain silent, and she did, until now. She had been thinking of Kalianne so often that she couldn't keep her thoughts silent anymore. She thought out to Kalianne from the darkness she sat in.

Kalianne, sister, I miss you! Where are you? Are you still here in the slave compound? Are you still alive? I haven't seen you since the day we met. I have met some kind sisters in here, but I haven't met anyone like you, with the skills you have. I need to talk to you now! I miss you! Kalianne, can you hear me?

Silence.

Kalianne, I am afraid of what I am becoming. I have made this hell my home and am finding displaced joy in things here. I work my ass off so that I can get more power drugs. I live for the feeling they give me. They are my release, my goal, my reason for living. I need a reason to keep going within these walls, and the drugs are the the best reason I have. I didn't even notice it was happening, but I can see it clearly now. I want more! Even though I would like to be free of it. I miss my sister!

Silence. _Drip, drip. Drip._

Kalianne, I talk to myself so often to stay sane, but I need to talk to others who think like I do. My soul feels like it is expanding, even within these constricting walls, and I need to speak with someone who understands this. I want to reach for Nibana, but I want to float into a relaxing familiar high form the power cards they give us. How can I go these two directions at once? I don't know, but need some help. I need to get out of here! I need to see my family! I need to see you!

A voice formed inside Sabine's own thoughts that was not her own. _Become small!_

Kalianne! Is that you!

Become small, sister, and we will talk more.

Kalianne! I don't understand!

Become small.

Silence.

What does that mean? Become small? I am small! I am only sixteen and I weigh forty two Kilos. I am one of the smallest girls in here, except for the very young ones. Kalianne! What can I do?

Silence.

Drip. Drip. Drip.....

Sabine was frustrated, alone and feeling like just giving up. She thought that if she just stopped doing everything, if she stopped working and eating, that either the guards would kill her or she would die of starvation. She strongly considered that death might be a good alternative to supporting the hell foundation Nimol had created. She couldn't reach Kalianne. She wondered if she had imagined it anyhow. She thought that she might be going crazy, She wanted to cry but couldn't.

She went blank, sitting lotus style in the dark. There was nothing to do now but breathe, and Sabine wasn't certain that she wanted to anymore. Her body ached from the beatings that she recently received. She wept a dry tear. No water came from her eyes but she imagined it did.

Drip, drip, drip.

In Sabine's quiet solitude, she latched onto the only sound that existed. The dripping sound of water falling from somewhere became her focus. Her breathing slowed and kept a steady pace with the sound of water drops softly crashing into concrete.

Drip. Breath. Drip. Breath.

Sabine became meditative without consciously focusing on it. The drips and her breaths, became her reality, and the quiet ensued more expansively. Sabine began to imagine herself as a single drop of water, falling, falling, weightless, unconcerned, falling. She felt weightlessness and the walls of her cell vanished. Her body resisted and tried to bring her back by fluttering her eyelids and spiking the pain sensations in her wounds, but Sabine's focus kept from centering on those sensations.

Sabine became the drop of water, falling. She could feel what it was like to be wet. Wetness. Falling. To be a drop of water was like being a liquid breeze. It swirled, vibrated, shifted and clung together. Direction, size and orientation became pointless and were not part of this experience. A directionless existence, a tiny world that contained everything. A drop of water, so simple, so complex.

Sabine was very familiar with water and its many forms. The gentle drop, dripping. The many collective drops, combining. The powerful gathering of billions of drops into the water that embraced the earth. The unstoppable rage of the collective drops dancing with gravity. Rain. Waterfalls. Rivers. Storms. But now, only a single drop. Drip.

The drop she had become was directionless, yet gravity danced with her and pulled her to the earth mother like a child, yet she was not aware of this force at all. In becoming the small drop of water, time had become erased, and the delay between the drop dripping and hitting the cement floor became an eternity. Sabine had become so small and inconsequential that everything in the universe came to a stop.

Hello Sabine. You have done well. Your focus is so condensed, into one tiny speck, that no one can even notice it. I miss you too sister. I am glad to talk to you again. We can talk here anytime. No one can listen to us here. How are you sister?

Kalianne!

Yes! Sabine!

It is you!

It is us.

Where are you sister? I can not see you.

Sight is an old concept Sabine. You do not need it here. Can you feel me?

Yes, it is as if these thoughts, both yours and mine, are coming from the same place.

They are. Here, we don't have the familiar, self imposed boundaries. You and I are not so far apart. My body is in a confinement cell at the slave pit, but my soul is here in the tiny ether with you. It is wonderful!

Yes! I am happier than I have been in a long time.

Where is your body Sabine?

I, I mean, my body, is in a confinement cell, I think the one that we were in together. Are you here too? Did I not sense you when they threw me in the cell?

Our bodies are not in the same location, but, here, location is not a concern. We are everywhere and nowhere. We are so small that other' people's simple perception can not sense this tiny awareness. I had been using the words, become small, as a code, a password and as a message to be spoken, but I had no idea what it really meant until now. Inside the lonely walls of the caged body, I allowed my mind to wander away from the oppressive guards. In my efforts to escape, I tried to become so tiny that no one could even notice me, and it worked! Now I know the essence of these simple words that I and many others have been carrying around, and you have too! You have known how to do this all along. I needed only suggest it to you, and here you are!

Oh, Kalianne! I want to cry, but I can't!

Save your tears, sister. They have a use and will save others.

What? I don't understand?

You will. I have to leave here now. Some one is coming into my cell. Meet me here again tonight.

Kalianne! I love you! Be strong sister! I will too!

Sabine was very excited to have had this contact. It turned her outlook around a hundred and eighty degrees, from suicidal to hopeful. This emotion and thinking about the concept of time, stretched this small world back into a waking life. Sabine's awareness expanded to fill her tiny body held captive in a small cell. Sabine felt as if she was growing larger, which brought the walls closer. When she became small, the walls felt so far away that they disappeared.

Sabine practiced becoming small as often as she could after that experience. She realized that she had been able to do this all the while, and had been doing it. It helped her when she was a child, to hide from her brother when they played hide and seek. It helped her to become invisible when she practiced her ninja-like mixed martial arts. It saved her life when she was pinned to the grate under the lake in the overflow drain. And now, it gave her the peace to exist as a slave, and yet be free.
20

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Sabine talked telepathically to Kalianne often, especially at night when she was in the sleeping chamber. Sabine didn't need to rely on a signature blend of power to promote this ability, it was a natural function for her now. Kalianne was in another area of the complex, where she was assigned to kitchen duties. They tried using Kalianne as a sex slave, but she, like Sabine, greatly injured those who would try to enter her. Kalianne was beaten badly, and suffered a broken arm and two broken ribs, but never allowed them to take her spirit, or her pelvis.

Sabine never saw Kalianne in the flesh, but they grew closer and closer in the realm of pure communication. They were the best friends in the world to each other, and could not be divided by any concrete walls. They kept each others spirits up, and consoled each other when they were nursing the wounds that their captors inflicted. These beatings came quite often, because a strong female will scared the male guards. The guards tried to suppress their own fears and inadequacies by beating the women into cowering animals. This didn't work on Kalianne or Sabine. The guards arms would grow tired of beating the girls before they could ever break the will of these two powerful women, who won over them every time, no matter how bad the beatings were.

Sabine stopped being a girl and became a woman in this slave camp. Her seventeenth birthday came and went without her remembering when it even was. Sabine had no idea what day or month it was. She only knew that it was still the rainy season. Sabine would listen carefully to the muffled sound of rain hitting the roof at night, and would hear songs created by the beats the drops made. Sabine composed lyrics to go with these beats, and would telepathically sing these songs to Kalianne and make her smile and sometimes laugh. Some of the other women thought that Kalianne was crazy because she would sing along and laugh in the dark while the others tried to sleep.

The day came when Sabine was transferred to a new duty in a new location. She had become the number one producer in the sewing room, and she was promoted to the distillation chamber where they made and bottled whiskey for the soldiers and politicos. The women in the sewing room had also promoted Sabine to the underground status of leader of the sisterhood. No girl had ever been so charismatic, kind and strong in the slave pits, and everyone loved her. The sewing ladies wept when she transferred.

Sabine grew spiritually, mentally and physically in her martial arts skills as well. Her and Kalianne talked often of Ratanna and practiced their techniques together in the small world where they met. They practiced the physical components of their fighting technique alone in their sleeping rooms, when the lights were out and no one could see. They became so quiet in their movements to hide their actions, that they mastered the silent approach. Ratanna had taught this to Kalianne who shared it with Sabine, and together they were stealth incarnate.

Sabine learned from Kalianne that Ratanna had not been training her by random chance, but for a greater purpose that was coming in the near future. Sabine understood that Ratanna was killed before he ever had a chance to reveal this purpose to her. Sabine also learned everything Kalianne knew about the Sons of Siam, the ether gazers and the seventh generation observers.

The Sons of Siam were larger than anyone knew, and were an inevitable creation of the suppression that existed. People can only be pushed so far before they push back, a ratio that every politician knows and exploits as far as they can, before losing power or being terminated.

The SOS was in every territorial Nation from India to the Philippines to Kamchatka. No one knew how many members and supporters there were, but the elite fighters trained by Lok Sabai, such as Ratanna, carried this movement everywhere that people had will to resist. The SOS was so secretive that they rarely contacted each other and were unaware of each other for the most part. The ether gazers combined their efforts synergistically to hide the movement from the Empire.

The ether gazers were a collective of enlightened Bodhisattva monks who all lived alone in remote areas of the world. Their collective included the reincarnated souls of many ancient peace keepers. The seventh generation observers were a religious sect that originated in North America before Europeans moved there. The souls formerly known as Geronimo, Chief Seattle, Sitting bull and White Buffalo Woman, were reborn in the territorial nation of Burma, where they founded the religion, and spread its message. The followers held to the idea that the world was not what one could see at any given moment, but was an ongoing string of generations, an epoch event called the 'human race.' They preached that the only way for humans, as a collective, to survive and exist, was to plan for their grand-children, seven generations ahead. They sermonized that cooperation, not competition, was the key to advancement, contrary to the capitalistic views spread through greed.

The fear of death caused humans to focus on avoiding it, and they did this by trying to get everything they could for themselves in the present. This spawned all of the armies that this world ever knew, and collective projects such as the nuclear arms races. The enlightened saw past this, but humans could only move as fast as they all could move, so progress has been slow.

Sabine was so fascinated to learn all of this and her connection to it all, but she didn't really fathom her role in it at this time. She considered that Kalianne was similar to other religious types, who held onto any idea that made them feel OK. She didn't refute the idea to Kalianne, as she didn't want to take away her wind, but Sabine could not believe that she herself was anything special. _I am just Sabine. I am a young woman, nothing more. There is no way I could be mentioned in an old prophecy. Prophecies are for poets and priests._

Kalianne also spoke telepathically with Sabine often about the power drugs that they were being inserted with daily. Kalianne could see Sabine's addictive nature and tried to interest her in confronting it. Sabine was going in two directions at once, inward towards enlightenment, into expanded realms, and outwardly towards escapism. She knew that Sabine would have a choice between hedonism and altruism. Sabine listened to Kalianne's ideas, and agreed with them, but postponed the task of resolving her direction for another day, each time it came up.

Sabine one day began to taste the product that she had been slated to produce. She found that the whiskey, mixed with the power drugs, could take her away from the slave pits for a while. Kalianne recognized this new addiction forming in Sabine's thoughts and tried to show her that becoming small, not becoming drunk, was a better way to escape her life's physical duress. Sabine agreed, and knew it inside of herself, but always found a reason to delay dealing with it for one more day. It was just too easy for her to find solace in pain relieving substances, in the midst of a painful reality. They would help right now. Sabine would justify her drug and alcohol imbibing by believing that they were rewards for her efforts to maintain and grow within this suppressive order.

More days went by and Sabine's group of fans grew, but her connection with Kalianne began to wane. Sabine dedicated more and more time to drinking the rice whiskey she was now the chief manager of producing. She also found ways to use it to bribe guards and gain favors, by stealing it and giving it away. She gave herself many favors too by consuming it herself.

The rains stopped falling and the dry season crept back in, but Sabine didn't notice. Sabine did not experience a dry season because she wet her thirst with whiskey everyday now. The drink became a good friend and took a secure hold of her. She eventually stopped contacting Kalianne all together, and spent little time actually working. She had enough status in the slave ranks so that her daily tasks included sleeping with guards, drinking rice whiskey and placating herself with power drugs. She lost interest in the pursuit of becoming small and became high and drunk instead. She often didn't remember who she slept with or what she did it for. Sabine lived a carefree, intoxicated life and her eyes and body began to show signs of it.

The other prisoners noticed her changes and the older ladies would try giving her grandmotherly wisdom to help her clean up, but Sabine dismissed their words as 'old lady ways' and ignored them. Sabine became less and less interested in the plights of the others around her and more and more interested in fulfilling herself, with anything intoxicating. It seemed to her the best way to escape this slaving hell she was in.

One day, one of the bottlers dropped a bottle of whiskey from the table and it crashed to the cement floor, shattering with a smashing sound. This sound pierced Sabine, who was overseeing the workers on this shift. Sabine was already drunk before the high sun hour and was easily angered by the wastefulness of this incompetent worker. Sabine ran over to this young girl, younger than her, and punched her closed-fisted on the side of her head.

The girl collapsed to the ground, knocked out by Sabine's blow, and didn't move. Sabine screamed at her to get up and clean up the mess but she didn't respond. Sabine kicked her and still got no response. The other girl's ran over to her and pleaded with her to stop but Sabine did not even hear their words. She kicked the unconscious girl again, who didn't move.

Sabine lost her cool and jumped on top of the girl, flipping her over so that she could unleash a barrage of strikes to her face. Before the first blow landed, she saw the girl below her was the young girl, Amara. Amara was the young girl Sabine had spared being raped by the guards by offering herself to them instead of taking Amara. This young girl idolized and worshiped Sabine, and now lay bruised and bleeding below her. Sabine felt horror and despised herself. She could not believe what she had just done.

Sabine got off of the little girl and ran out of the room. She proceeded down the hallway that led to her private sleeping chamber and ran inside to hide herself from all of the girls, ladies and grandmothers. Sabine went to throw herself on her bed but there was some one in her room bent over cleaning it. She screamed at the person to leave. A man stood up, startled, and turned around. The person Sabine was looking at was Darayan.

"You!" Sabine exclaimed, "You piece of buffalo shit!"

Sabine went into a rage and dove at Darayan, frustrated with life, with herself, and now full of rage at the person responsible for putting her in the hell she was in. Sabine's fists found Darayan's back as he turned to avoid her strikes. Because she was drunk, she did not connect her punches very well and she fell to the floor, hurting herself more than her target. Darayan had a chance to skirt around her and he got through the doorway before she could get up again. He ran off quickly and by the time Sabine was back in the hallway, Darayan was nowhere to be seen. He never said a word.

"Darayan!" she screamed, "I'll find you! And I'll kill you!"

A crowd of women and girls were staring from both ends of the hallway, wondering what was happening with the little drunk girl, a name she was starting to be called by her peers.

"What are you looking at?" She yelled at the people who were making her hate life even more. She stomped back into her room and threw herself onto her bed, which was a thin padded mattress on a slightly raised frame. This bed was more than most worker girls ever could hope for. That four centimeter mattress was the most comfortable sleeping pad that Sabine ever had slept on, much better than anything she ever had at home. She lay on it face down and and put her hands over the back of her head, trying to hide from the world.

Her head raced with disconnected thoughts, about Darayan, about little Amara, and the man, Pala that they said she killed. She thought about almost drowning in the lake, about her family, and about Kalianne. She wanted everything to stop. She wanted out of this shit life that she had become used to already. She wanted to die. She began to scream and swear at the walls, making a lot of noise in doing so. A group of guards ran faster as they heard the noise she was making and moved in to collect the offensive prisoner.

As they ran into her room, she screamed at them and called them every foul animal name she could think of. She was quickly bound, gagged, and escorted out of the room, kicking and trying to scream, but the gags muffled her curses. A guard cracked her across her head with a club to quiet her up and she went limp as the blow knocked her out. The ladies kept staring until they too were struck by guard's sticks and prodded to return to their jobs.

Two guards carried the crying little girl, Amara, down the hallway and deposited her in the makeshift infirmary, that was nothing more than a cot, a sink, a floor toilet and a bright florescent light. They locked little Amara in the room and assumed that someone doing nurse duty would eventually come by and tend to her.

The women of all ages, had come to love and look up to Sabine, but they talked among themselves that she was much nicer when she was a seamstress. Many of the ladies had come to know this place, this reality, as their lives. Sabine had also become resigned to being there but she indulged her desire to escape her plight by any means she could. When she stopped tuning in with Kalianne, Sabine's life began to spiral downward. The alcohol gripped Sabine tightly and firmly. It grabbed her quickly, so quickly that Sabine had no defense against it.

Sabine came to in a puddle on a wet floor in the hose down room. This was the place where the guards cleaned new prisoners and used the high pressure hoses to inflict humiliation, torture, pain and control on the women they managed as labor and sex slaves. Her head throbbed with pain from where she had been struck with a stick and it also hurt from the effects of a hangover on top of that. She struggled to open her eyes and figure out where she was. Sabine tried to stand up, but she collapsed back onto the wet dirty floor. She felt the hose blast hit her hard.

Sabine screamed and pleaded but none of the guards heard her, nor did they care. This prisoner had been getting too big for her panties and needed to be taught a lesson. Nimol slowly walked into the room and watched her struggle in a blasting stream of water. This pleased him, to see her weak and subdued. He had been following her progress, as she rose in her ranks of workers, and wondered how he could benefit from her popularity and charisma. He knew that he could use her to his advantage to get more from the weak people under his command. Sabine somehow made them worker harder.

Nimol lit a long cigarette laced with opium and took in a big drag. He blew the smoke out threw his nose and and mouth, pondering what this girl's power might be. _Why do the other women like her so much?_ As he watched her submit to defeat under the hose blast and curl into a fetal ball on the floor, he smiled at the idea forming in his twisted mind. _Perhaps I will create a life within this little worm. An intelligent son with good breeding and a warrior's heart and instinct. Yes! This would be a good product._

He ordered the men operating the hose to stop applying torture methods and leave the room. They did as they were commanded and left Nimol with the drunk, wet, little Sabine, naked on the floor, sobbing and still recoiling from the water blast. Nimol stared at her, defiantly. He wanted to appear strong, but he felt afraid in her presence. He couldn't place where this emotion came from and this concerned him greatly. No slave ever had this effect on him before, no matter how charismatic, beautiful or strong. It intrigued him, how a simple farm girl inspired feelings of uncertainty in him. He would punish her for that, after he created a child that would harbor the same charisma that she had.

"Would you like some water?" He asked, mockingly. Sabine said nothing and it seemed to Nimol that she was ignoring him. This angered him. "You little insolent turd, I will have you flushed through the lake again! Perhaps I will promote Darayan when he does the flushing for me!" This caused Sabine to freeze and look up. Hatred welled up inside her at the name of her betrayer. She glared at Nimol with this hatred and had no fear whatsoever of anything that anyone might do to her. She could get no lower. Death would be an upgrade. Pain and torture would be a vacation from the slave work. Sabine hated this place. She hated herself. She began to vomit violently as her body convulsed and knotted up tightly.

"The women here have grown fond of you!" Nimol said. "They look up to you like a leader. Why do think that is? I see a worm crawling before me." Nimol began to pace around her in a slow circle with his hands clasped behind his back. He waited for her reply but none came. He demanded more respect than this from the slaves that he owned. His ire grew and his hands unclasped. He suddenly moved quickly to the silent girl and grabbed a handful of her hair, positioning her head so that she was facing him. "I am your father, your boss and your owner, little worm. I could crush you, right here, right now, and no one would look up to you ever again! I could grind your flesh and bones into the cement floor and leave a stain where everyone would look down on you every day. Here lies Sabine, the spot on the floor, they would say. Would you like that?"

Sabine smiled at him, maniacally and said, "I welcome you to try, father, my boss. But first, won't you fuck me? Do you want to fuck me, Mr. Owner?" She felt defiant as ever and tried to force her body to stand up, but couldn't overpower Nimol's grip on her hair. Feeling extreme, she continued to smile at him menacingly, goading him. She felt like she was over the edge. She was hardly aware of her own actions and gestures because of her rage, her depression, and her brain swimming in booze. She licked her lips and opened her mouth. She showed Nimol her teeth and tongue, in a sexy inviting gesture.

Nimol was horrified. No one had ever approached him like this. _How could she dare lack fear in my commanding presence? I am her captor, her leader and her life._ In the presence of this young, naked child, he felt small. He felt the feeling again. She was winning _. Why don't I just kill her now? Why have I granted her reprieve from death this long? She deserves nothing. She is a stupid buffalo from the farm. Why? Why does she mock me? Why do I question myself around her?_

Sabine vomited again, this time all over Nimol's gecko-skin shoes. He let go of her hair as he cast her down. She fell into her own vomit. Nimol moved back a step and collected himself. He flicked his toes in a kicking motion, flinging the bile smelling spittle from his fine expensive shoes. He feared Sabine, and he didn't know why. This caused him the most unrest, this inability to understand how a little girl could make a powerful man like himself insecure. He pulled back his foot and let it fly forward, kicking Sabine in the face and crumpling her to the ground. Unconscious, again. Twice today.
21

progress and plotting

Throbbing, pulsing, pounding pain, was what Sabine awoke to this time. The alcohol, the water hose, and the lizard-skin shoe had played hell on Sabine's head. She was still laying on a wet floor, reeking of whiskey and vomit, and brooding in anger. She felt that this were the bottom of the pit she now accepted as her life. She was in hell. She was familiar with hell now.

Sabine had become the pit itself. She was her own captor. The abandonment of what was once her powerful drive, left her in a hole, without direction, motivation, or creative existence. Life was hell. She was only reacting to a life in hell, and this led her to more hell. It seemed pointless to her. She wanted to die, right there, on a wet floor in her own fluids. She let go of her bladder and pissed as she lamented herself.

Sabine. I love you.

Drip. Drip. "What?" Sabine was hearing voices and she wanted them to go away and leave her alone in her self pity. "Leave me alone!" she screamed. Drip.

Sabine, this is not you. This is a resting place before you grow. Do not stay here too long. It is only a turning point.

"I don't want a turning point!" Sabine screamed at the floor with her eyes closed, weeping. She was alone, beat up, hungover and talking to herself in what must be madness. Reason tried to speak to her, but she did not want to listen. She wanted to just lie down in a puddle of puke and die. She sobbed again, feeling hopeless.

Sabine. Think of the times when you helped people, when you helped your family, your mother. Can you remember how it felt to help her? That feeling, you need to remember it! Cultivate it!

"Remember?" She cried to herself, "I remember my pigtails, and my school dress, and my dirty knees. I am just a little girl! I don't belong here! I want my mom. I want her to fix my pigtails! I want to smile and make my mommy happy..."

Happy.

"I want to be happy! I want to be free! I want to be out of this buffalo shit hole!"

You can get out, Sabine!

"I am trapped here!"

You can let yourself out!

"I hate this place!"

Become small.

"I want to become so fucking small that I disappear!"

Sabine paused, and wept. She wanted to escape herself.

Sabine! Quit feeling sorry for yourself. And you have learned all you can from the power you enjoy. Leave it! It is only a drug. Stop taking it! Block what the guards insert in you. Block it in your mind. You can do it! I know because I am doing it! All you have to do is become small. You know how to do it! You showed me when I met you in the dark room. It is your presence Sabine! You are special! Everyone around you can feel it! I am tired of you ignoring me while you get drunk and stay focused on the power drug. Sabine! Wake up!

"Kalianne?" _Kalianne?_

Yes, Sabine. It is about time you paid attention to someone besides yourself!

Kalianne! I missed you! I'm sorry! I am a mess. Whats happening to me?

Little Sabine, you tried a path that came to here, that is all. Now you can chose what is next.

I have to change Kalianne! My life is not right anymore. I used to feel right about it, and now...

...And now you are giving hope to all of the poor women trapped in this building who are high on Nimol's power sedatives. Sabine, you can show everyone in here that their minds are more powerful than the power drug in their bodies. If they see you, freeing yourself from the hell Nimol imposes on them, they can follow and be free too! You can give this to them Sabine!

How do I crawl out of myself and do that? I escape this place by crawling inside, and blocking it out. Anything that does that is worth it. Right?

Anything that stops you from growing is not healthy, Sabine. Go inside, yes! But don't go inside to escape. Go inside to see clearly.

See what?

You can see how things really are, infinitely small. So many people look for something big to fill their lives, when we have everything we need already, inside ourselves. I have never sensed anyone like you, Sabine. You have touched this place so very deeply. Am I correct?

Kalianne I have touched it, when I was resting in meditation. I don't know how it happened but it felt true and real, and made perfect sense. Everything felt right about it, and then it was gone. Where did it go Kalianne? I want it back!

It didn't go anywhere Sabine. You changed your focus. When you align your focus on it, you will become aware of it again. It is inside you always. It always has been.

Kalianne, I missed you so much sister. I am not going away again. I am done with hiding. I can take anything this place can do to me, and just get stronger! I am better than this!

That's right sister. Become who you are. Be what you want to be!

Kalianne, I want to go there now.

We already are.

Sabine looked around and realized that she wasn't seeing with her eyes at all. As they had been talking, their awareness shifted to the small. They were in that place where they were one, so communication was hardly necessary. Understanding was the mesh of this place.

I want to stay here forever! How can I never leave this place.

You can not own this Sabine, if you try to hang onto it, it will surely fade away.

It feels more amazing than anything I ever knew! Why did I stay away?

We forget.

Kalianne?

Sabine.

I love you.

We are love.

Sabine and Kalianne spent an eternally infinite split second in this realm of pure consciousness. They validated each others experience as they existed together, inside themselves, much smaller than any of the concerns their human minds attached to. Here, things like addiction to the effects of power, the world's poor populations and war, were so large that they could not permeate this place. When you become smaller than an atom, you hardly notice any elephants in the room.

Sabine could see her own addiction as a cloud around her. She imagined it blowing away and with a whisper and the blowing of a soft kiss, it drifted away like a lazy, Sunday afternoon sky. She understood this absolute pure feeling, and decided not to feel the numbing effects of the power drug, designed to make her want it. She did this by becoming smaller than power's effects and avoiding being brushed by them as they hurdled through her synapses at the speed of light, yet slower than the turning of her hand. It became her will to step out of the dance with this product anymore. It would never replace this real feeling, of just simply being, and watching the world move by you so slowly.

But in the slaving work world, things did not return to a comfortable pace for Sabine. She was no longer in the highest status job in the complex anymore, she was demoted to pill packer and sleeping on the floor without a mat. It was a good thing for Sabine, that she wasn't handling whiskey bottles everyday. It was much easier not drinking when there was nothing to drink. Sabine tried to remain strong in her resolve to not follow the road of a doped up existence, but it was not easy. Her daily life was a struggle.

The guards all had it out for her now, because Nimol had taken his feelings of inadequacy out on all of them. The guards, in turn, took their frustrations out on Sabine. They tripped her, hit her, and knocked her work and her food out of her hands. Some tried to enjoy her body, and were all injured in the attempt and unsuccessful as well. Sabine took many beatings, but fought with every bit of will in her to thwart the men's penile thinking.

The two girls communicated everyday after finding each other again. They supported each other, and Sabine consciously resisted the power's effects each day, one day sat a time. It soon became easy for her to ignore the power all together, and claim her awareness and focus as her own. The drug's effects eventually became background noise that was completely uninteresting. Exploration of themselves and each other was far more rewarding to Sabine than a routine escape.

Sabine saw Darayan occasionally and fostered a huge resentment for this man who got her into this slave labor facility to begin with. Sabine considered that Darayan must be paying for the death of Pala by the hands of herself. He didn't look so important as a cleaning worker, she thought, and she wondered why neither of them were killed for what happened that night, when Sabine killed an important, rich man, under Darayan's supervision. It was colder now. Sabine had been in Nimol's slave complex for more than half a year.

When she reminisced and realized the time that she had been there, away from her family, she was mortified. Who was taking care of her family? Her father? Her little brother? How could she have even forgotten about them? It was as if she put her entire life on a back burner and accepted being a slave. The guards watched her extensively and there were spot cameras everywhere, so some one knew what she was doing at every given second. Her first escape was a fluke. No one ever escaped from there before. They made doubly sure she would never even come close again.

Sabine was infuriated. _A half a year! How? Darayan!_ She despised this name, this thought. Everything wrong and bad about this place was his fault. This premise gave Sabine some kind of relief, by taking her own misery and applying it to one focus, Darayan. Sabine felt a hatred so strong that it made her want to chew through iron bars to abate it. She hated Nimol, the guards and what they did to the women there, but most of all she hated Darayan, the man she gave her heart to, only to be sold as a sex slave. She despised men.

She used her hatred of men to fuel her resolve to stop being a power slave. Her attempts to deny the guards that inserted the slave-pit variety, power cards, resulted in more beatings for Sabine, and increased hatred for the men. There was no way for anyone there to avoid the card from being forced into their skin. The guards made it happen, even if it took a double assignment of them. When they put the card in the girls and the effects became instant, the guards had compliant workers.

As the electrical codes and chemical compounds of the card touched, and interacted with the skin ports of the girls, an immediate flow of thought implants and sedating chemicals turned the female slaves into easily controllable workers. Suggestions and opiate-like sensations in their brain kept them as docile as a tranquilized dog in a cage. More opiate-like compounds that were in the card, created a very strong dopamine release, which was programmed to scale itself back, keeping the girl constantly desiring more, as they became addicted to the interaction. As soon as the card was inserted, the effects were immediate and taking the card out would not stop, nor slow the process. A girl who did not have a card in her slot on replacement day, suffered severe consequences.

Sabine could not avoid being inserted, no matter how much she struggled, so she had to avoid the effects of the card instead. She did this by going inside, and becoming small. Sabine was able to become small right in front of the people performing the task of slave card replacement. Before the card went in, Sabine was already becoming aware of all of her three trillion molecules, and she prepared every one of them to over ride the power card and follow her direct suggestion. Cells closed their membranes, moved out of the way and even bonded together into thick colonies, whatever micro solution worked to move around the incoming power substances.

Sabine used any moments that she could steal during the working day to connect with Kalianne and share time with her. They supported each other in a suggestion more powerful than anything the slave pit could inflict. They had love. Pure love, existing in the universe because it can, and it felt good. It is like that feeling that you feel when you are happily doing something for somebody. It's the joy of that unselfish act which allows people to see that giving away is giving to the self as well. Deep within oneself, all beings stop being beings, and become a colony of love.

The two girls succeeded in bypassing the power card's effects, and they side stepped the addictive toxins and thought implants, and faked a daily compliance, just enough to fool the guards, the managers and the observers. Sabine grew back into the fine tuned, focused, adept fighter that she was. She practiced at night, in the darkness of the sleeping room, so quietly that none of the other women and girls in the room ever heard a movement she was making. Sabine would practice maneuvers and dance over their sleeping bodies without them ever knowing.

The women of this female slave-society warmed to Sabine once again, and the natural pecking order of this goods-producing hen-house placed Sabine at the top. She exuded confidence and individuality, and the ladies loved her, all of them, from the youngest who was a girl of ten to the eldest, the grandmothers with gray hair and weary, sagging skin under their eyes.

As Sabine cleared the fog that once enveloped her, she became clear in her eyes and in her heart as well. She felt the pain of all of the women in this grim dark existence, and felt their power as well. Sabine was ready to leave this place, but she had things to do first. She had to help the women be free. She knew that it would not be right for her to escape on her own with Kalianne, no. She had to see that all of these ladies and young girls could go home and be with their own families.

The women here were like her sisters and aunts and grandmothers. There was a family that evolved within the cement walls of the slave labor compound. The women bonded in a way that none of them had ever known, and never would know. Only at this suppressive place, with the girls' unique synergy and dynamic, could a sisterhood of slaves exist. Sabine was the congealing gel that brought the ladies together. She became a champion of the workers, as she smiled at every girl and grandma, everyday. Sabine's shift from power junkie to caring, attentive leader, was an about face that was much welcomed.

The guards began to notice a shift in the prison population. The girls were becoming more productive, more complacent and more obedient, but they were also becoming more alert, more awake looking, and more happy. The guards were unsettled by the feeling that the dominance that they were there to impose was not having so much of an effect anymore. The women didn't seem afraid of them anymore, and the guards were used to that arrangement, but with an easily controlled, high producing work force, none of the guards wanted to make any adjustments that might slow it down.

From his dark, private viewing chamber, Nimol watched this slow sea change emerging from within his workers ranks. He saw a confidence in the posture and motion of the girl, Sabine, and he hated it. It made him feel small. He wanted to confine her, to punish her because she dare smile in the shadow of his oppression, but he dare not. His factory started producing faster than it ever did before. Nimol had so much product being stockpiled, and he didn't sell it all through his own side contracts, so the empire became aware of his high performance and his abundance of product.

The Mage himself gave Nimol some political praise, and encouraged him to maintain this bountiful working production, to keep the products moving. They wanted Nimol to expand and add a card filling laboratory and add this to his output. Nimol smiled and accepted the praise, but he knew he did not make any of this happen. _It was that amazing little bitch, Sabine!_ He wouldn't ever admit this, and he couldn't lose this status, so he dare not change anything that was going on at his factories.

He didn't know how to handle this, Sabine. She was it, somehow. She was the reason for this upward trend. Nimol did not order the guards to confine Sabine. He began to watch and spy on his guards, more than his working slave women. He did not want them doing anything that might thwart his new success.

The guards carried on as usual, but were aware that they were under a constant eye, which was staring at them from any one of the thousands of remote mini-cams that were extruding from all over the complex, like hairs on an animal. The guards talked among themselves about what was going on, and they feared being demoted, so they feared the women more. These women now had to be treated, fairly? It seemed that the jobs here were getting worse, and their overseer was becoming more paranoid and bizarre. Sometimes Nimol would not be seen for days because he never left his personal chambers.

Nimol spent most of his time alone, staring at the viewing screens, staring at everything that could be seen, but most of the time, staring at Sabine. The idea of this small prisoner drove him mad with envy. _She doesn't even have to try to look charismatic; she exudes it. How does she do it? I will study this insignificant female creature and learn what the others see in her, why they admire her, copy her. They should do this with me. I am the one who has more power than anyone here. They should relish my presence and be ever so grateful for my bounty. I give them food, water and a dry place to sleep. This is more than they can have on their pathetic little farms. They should adore me! Why do they adore her?_

But this Sabine, she haunts me, she has a power that I can not break, steal or own. I want it! How does she gain respect without trying? If she would work for me... with me....she, could be my wife. Others who would stare at her would see me as well. Together, we would be very influential. I will not confine her, no, I will implant within her card a desire to join with me. She will be given most freedoms and she can drive these pitiful prisoner women into even better production, while I will rise in power and control.

I yearn for the day when the Mage splits from the Golden Rising Empire and calls for local reaction. We can do well enough with the Empire, but if we were to form our own empire, we would not work for anyone. Everyone would be under our control. And in the right moment, when the Mage is too old to protect himself, I will be close. I will be there for him, walk with him, follow him, be his slave, his scape goat, his confidant, and then, I will release him from this world he creates. One small, programmed card, wedged into his card slot, could reset him to, uphold Prime Minister Nimol. Yes, that has a catchy ring to it! I will need my uncle's endorsement, so I will wait to kill him. I will wait until I have ridden his robe folds for a long enough time to collect more endorsements.

Yes, this is how it will all play out. I am a good little producer for my uncle, and the soldiers of the Empire have many jackets, cigarettes, pills and whiskey, because of my little slave population. I must grow the population! I need more girls. I will create a power card lab that is the best in Asia. I will enslave men to build facilities to accommodate more workers. I will have my elite guards train more elites and send more collectors out to bring in many more girls. I will reinstate Darayan, my semi-competent nephew, into manager of the woman collector squads. He will find me more Sabines, and I can easily control him, he is weak, but the girls like his features.

My uncle, the Mage, is a powerful man. A wise man! So I don't see why he supports the myth of the prophecy child. Why can't he or any of the other thugs and assassins, find this boy? I am not sure if the prophecy child even exists! No matter how much my uncle believes in it, I do not. Who spoke this prophecy any how? Was it a holy person, or a shrewd business man? If the prophecy child were out there in my district, he would be found.

The Mage claims the child will be of Khmer descent, so this myth must be near. I don't believe my uncle, yet, if the prophecy child does exist, maybe all we have to do is kill all of the boys of age seventeen like he said. If I were the one to kill the prophecy boy that would bring us to our knees, then my uncle, the Mage, would promote me to the highest rank! How can I kill every boy in this region? Stabbings? No, too laborious. Poison gas? Good for school rooms but not play grounds. Oh, I will think of a clever way, I could even just fabricate a slain prophecy child, but first, I will take Sabine as my wife, and impregnate her with my child.
22

resist

Lord Arun and the Mage sat at an ornate marble table, opposite each other. They were staring, unblinkingly, into each others eyes. "Check!" said the Prime Minister as he slid a rook across the chess table seven spaces. He continued staring at the Mage but with an arrogant smirk. The Mage stared at the chess pieces, avoiding Arun's cocky glare, and spoke softly as he leaned back in his chair, "It is the time to impart the message."

"The message is not yet decided upon," scoffed Lord Arun, both defensively and authoritatively. "The shipping of the new card makers has not all been completed. There are many districts of the Empire that are operating on the old machines. The new Siriun devices have not all been interconnected yet. We are waiting for the network to be complete before transmitting the thought implants, so we are carefully considering what the implant shall be."

The Mage stared at Arun now, instead of the chess board, and raised his eyebrows as his lips tightened. He felt annoyance growing in him. "All of this that you are whining about, is a function of the Empire that you influence above all other people. Make it happen, now! We can not locate the prophecy child and this is the year of the prophecy! We need to enact the message now! We don't have time to wait for deliveries!" The Mage leaned back, lowered his eyebrows and unpursed his lips, as he let out a sigh, accompanied with a groan, and he deflated slightly, not wanting an involved argument with Lord Arun today.

"The prophecy. Yes. The prophecy about the poor farmer child that will subdue the greatest force that has ever been assembled, with his bare hands....yes, is that the one you are referring to?" Lord Arun asked, rising in his chair a few centimeters as he leaned forward, towards the chess table, and considered the clever maneuver he had just made. He did this to promote his cleverness.

The Mage stood up and leaned towards the table, grasping it firmly with his clenched fingers, and stared Lord Arun in the face at much closer range. He said, very seriously to Arun, "The prophecy is happening now. The ether gazers spend so much of their power hiding something, that it could only be the one foretold child that they try to protect. No one has located this child, so we must eliminate all children who could be the prophecy. The first wave of the suggestions will emit as scheduled! On the full moon of next month, we will emit the suggestion, that will network with every machine in every corner of our reach. That message will be whatever the Empire chooses it shall be, and the one that you will decree as a last minute addendum: the elimination of every child born seventeen years ago. The villagers, the police, even the parents, will kill anyone of this age, because everyone will believe and agree, that one of the seventeen year old children carries the viruses that will wipe out humanity. This mass paradigm shift will be followed as pure, accepted truth, but will merely be the implanted suggestion within the card, inserted into everyone's skin ports. The prophecy child will be destroyed at the hands of its own family, along with a few million other seventeen year old children."

"You do realize that this would kill off a good percentage of our fighting aged soldiers?"

"It is a necessary adjustment that you will convince the Empire is necessary."

"Why would I want to be seen as the one who ordered our soldiers rubbed out? The rest of the circle of leaders would find a way to remove me!"

"They won't be looking at you, because they will all believe that there is a virus about to be released that will destroy humanity."

"Why would they believe that?"

"They already do."

"Have you gone mad, Mage? The circle of leaders has the most advanced and elite protection in the world! You couldn't implant them with that suggestion! Their security is impenetrable!"

"They can not see what is so small, that their eyes can not perceive it!"

"What mad Alchemy are you preaching Mage!" Lord Arun stood up, making himself taller.

"A true magic, smaller than your miniscule mind! My own gazing has shown me a new emerging current, that focuses direction into the microverse. I can use this focus as well. And I can crawl into your soul while you sleep. Maybe I will enter through your ear, or through your pores on the skin of your neck. I could convince your heart to stop beating." The Mage sat down and stared at Arun, smiling.

Arun was afraid of the Mage's powers. He knew what the Mage was capable of doing, and knew that he would not be safe on the wrong end of the Mage's ire. The Mage had promoted Lord Arun into the position of Prime Minister, so that he was appointed to by the circle of leaders. Lord Arun would not have risen to his command without the powerful, far-reaching influence that the Mage employed. The Mage looked at lord Arun, and sneered at him. Arun sneered back. They both knew that they were in a compromising position.

The Mage was a mastermind, and was a seer, way ahead of his time, but he needed Arun as a voice. Arun held a veto power within the circle of leaders who were the controllers of the most powerful army on the planet, the billion man army of the Empire. Arun was a puppet to the Mage. Submitting to the Mage was a tax that Arun had to pay, to hold his position of great power. The Mage could topple Arun easily, but would most likely have him rubbed out, if it came to that.

The Mage could not stand people in general, but he especially hated politicians and arrogant heirs to power. People who came to power by genetic succession were idiots in a line, the Mage knew, and he did not get along with them at all. The Mage could not be a leader by charismatic means. His own troops would surely kill him. He needed Arun as the face that the circle of leaders knew. Arun was of regal blood, highly educated and cosmically connected, having translated for the Siriuns more than three times.

Lord Arun also held a smoking gun that the Mage could not deny. Upon Arun's death, a wave of information would be released about the Mage, and his order for the massacres of millions of Asian people in the tests he performed on humans. The Mage and Arun were at a stalemate in the political circle that was to control the world, so they carried on together, as they had done for years.

The Mage relaxed his posture and his tone and said, "Relax, I will not have a conversation with your heart, and its rhythm of beating. Not today. Sit down, please!" The Mage motioned for Arun to rejoin the game they were playing.

"I do not know what you are scheming, Mage," Said Lord Arun, "But if you can influence the circle of leaders to accept my proposed suggestion implant and its devastation, then we can mold them like clay, into any shape we want!" Arun smiled, and considered what his life would be like, using the lathe of power to shape the world, any way he wanted. It was intoxicating to even consider this much influence over the world and its people. Arun's smile lingered as he sat down and looked at the game board again.

"This thought implant will be contagious!" said the Mage. "I assure you that the circle of leaders is already aware that there is a threat to humankind, and that unless drastic action is taken, we will all die. Already, they impart this disastrous news through all of the networks of powerful leaders, and soon, this information will go viral, and everyone will gossip about it, from farmer to architect. By the time the suggestion we release is implanted, the human race will be ready to do this on their own.

The news will be stated as this: _The medical records for a child have been found, and that child carries a virus. This virus has no known cure, but has the ability to kill every human on the planet._ These records will emerge into the media tendrils and affirm the fear of global death for everyone on the planet."

"And these records?" Lord Arun said as he raised an eyebrow.

"An insect, small enough to enter the Empire's computer web, could leave droppings of information there." said the Mage.

"Is there anywhere that you can not touch?" asked Lord Arun.

The Mage leaned forward, grasped his Queen and said, "No." He set the queen back down in a tile that shielded his King and trapped Arun's. "Checkmate!"

In the state of meditation that Meas resided in, he relaxed his bodily functions to a near dead pulse. He sat in this position for three weeks before he opened his eyes and stretched his bones. He was able to leave his body in this catatonic state. That body sat through the sunrises and sunsets of rain and hot sun. This dog's body could feel pain in all of its joints and it was reminded of the suffering of living things. Now that Meas finished his meditation, he did yoga stretches to relieve his stiff bones, in the grassy, wet field he sat in, on the edge of Monument city.

Meas began sniffing the ground next, as so many dogs do, and he found an area that required sniffing with passion and fervor. This smell was incredible to him. He discovered an oily bit of soil, that told of chickens roasting on a stick, turned slowly over warm glowing coals. Some of the grease that cooked with other sauces had hardened to a very crunchy black coal that Meas found was still worth chewing on. He spent an intense moment at this spot, always alert to smallest, single molecule of scent and flavor. Meas was a dog after all, and he was starving.

Another breeze caught him and pulled him in the direction of a lady grilling meat on charcoals nearby. Meas wheeled on his heels and trotted in the direction of this smell with his nose higher than the rest of his body. As Meas moved in the direction of the very desirable smell, his good karma emerged when he walked right into a vendor's refuse dump.

There was rice, lots of it! Chicken pieces, pork pieces, and oily, greasy sauce all over the ground. Meas ate with a survival instinct and the food was gone in a few ravenous bites, followed by a lot of licking and sniffing. Meas did not like the spicy vegetables that the humans ate, but he ignored its burn as he licked up every scrap lying on the soil.

The lady cooking the meat on the grill walked over to a nearby tree and set down a banana leaf with several offerings to the ancestors. She knelt and bowed three times and prayed for health and luck as she joined her palms and closed her eyes. She lit three incense sticks and stuck them in the ground, then, she bowed again three times and stood up. She turned around and walked back to her vending cart grille, content and certain that Buddha would hear her and help her suffering.

Meas was not the Buddha, not yet, but he did receive Buddha's offering in proxy, moments after the vendor turned her back to go to her fire. The items on the offering tray were placed with reverence and tradition, and included one of each of her menu items for the day; catfish, frog, chicken hearts, squid, boiled eggs on a stick and fish. Meas accepted this offering with gratitude and licked the banana leaf clean after the food had been inhaled.

The vendor lady saw Meas ravaging her well prepared offering and smiled, knowing that the universe had received her gesture. Meas trotted away bestowing blessings of luck and health on the lady who fed him. The offering was accepted and gratitude bestowed blessings.

It was midday. Meas was wet, stiff and wanting to let his quickly eaten meals digest. The monk within had little influence on the hunger of Meas at this moment. Meas, the dog, went and lay down on the grass, in the sun, under the protection of the giant monument of Surayavarman II. Pra Ajarn Malet observed the shiny fur on the dog he resided in. He sent his canine body healing energy and commended it for enduring a three week meditation.

During that meditation, Pra Ajarn Malet was able to commune with enlightened beings and feel the web of connectedness of all things and times and places. He felt waves of love and light that the pure consciousness is emitting. He became pure consciousness, but held a tiny thread of dharma connected to kind Meas' body. This was the existence of the Bodhisattva. This made perfect sense.

Pra Ajarn Malet understood that love was not a god or an emotion. He felt how love evolved from a mistake, an abnormality, a mutation. It was a different way of living that worked in cooperative colonies. The human species tapped into this force in endless creative ways, and it became part of their identity, manifesting in language, religion, community, celebration, partnerships and unions. Love became the power it is, because it is a very successful evolutionary strategy.

From that origin, love became real, because people had unshakable belief in it. As a population of humans passed it on to generation after generation, love became an emotion, a god. As happens with all gods, they get twisted into political plots and fanatical fervor, and many people have been killed in the name of a loving god.

In the meditation pool of Buddhas that Pra Ajarn Malet had just spent three weeks, he had contemplated many things. The message 'become small,' that was in the minds and on the lips of so many, was collectively awakening that power into the world. It was destined to become manifest within our civilization, as an evolutionary change, one that would help every living thing. The power of becoming small is something we all have, but may have forgotten how to use it. Now was a time of reawakening, a time of remembering. That message would come to the world in a very new way, through a child who would become legendary.

The message to become small and own that power, to harness and use it from within, was going to usher in a change that would see the world's people return to a feminine glory. Society had not come full circle, but rather completed a turn of a spiral, a spiral that links everything together. Humans had almost come full circle, but they were different, changed, altered by their own inputs.

Humans, the shapers of reality, were always reaching out, deep into the universe, to find an answer. This reaching out eventually led them back inside themselves. All of the searching paved a road into pure consciousness, and that road was an invitation, a plea, for kindness to return to earth and abate war and greed.

The girl, Sabine, that so many people were trying to give the words, 'become small,' was receiving those words constantly, not by her ears, but in her heart. There, she could feel the tendrils of pure will trying to give her a simple message. In her heart, she could also feel all of the world's people reaching out. Love can not ignore those people. Sabine would somehow be the way that a message of love would return to the ways of humans. She would not be able to turn away. She was going to be the one who could not ignore the calls of the hearts of the people.

The people of the world hoped for a peaceful existence and a good meal. People living that way together could be stronger than greed. They knew it was possible. Greed knew it was possible too, and greed feared a mass remembering, that greed itself wasn't at all necessary. Greed would seek the destruction of love, and the perpetuation of itself, in order to exist. Greed was a shadow of love, but it was content to be a shadow. There, it had existed as long as love. Greed was a tool that seemed to work for humans, for a while, but after millenniums of war, people were finally ready to be done with it.

Pra Ajarn Malet contemplated this while Meas endured the elements. Pra Ajarn Malet could have stayed in the Buddha pool for an eternity, but the thread to Meas was part of his path. He returned before the poor creature Meas suffered too much.

The monk knew that a presence would emerge into the world, which was very ready for it. That presence would be born right here, in the ancient cradle of civilization, Angkor, and renew the heart of creativity and transcendence in the sacred city. She would set an example for the people in her actions, all foretold by the prophecy supported by the ether gazers and foretold by Nostradamus. Sabine was close by, Pra Ajarn Malet could sense her presence. He, as Meas, would wait for her arrival.

He left the communion of Buddhas and returned to his earthly vessel, the beautiful, friendly, non-complaining Meas. Meas had made a long journey to pass on a message, a message that Sabine was already receiving. She was capable of understanding how to use the message, and she would do it with love. Pra Ajarn Malet saw that love was the best application for the world at this time.

.

On this day, like any other day in this hell, the women packed pills, sewed uniforms, bottled whiskey and prepared meals. Today seemed like every other day, until Sabine's piercing voice broke the usual working noises and chatter. She lay on the floor twitching and shaking as guards scurried around to lift her and carry her away. The ladies around her tried to stop the guards and hit them with broomsticks and bowls and uniform jackets.

None of the ladies around Sabine saw anything happen that would warrant a forceful prisoner removal. Ten guards showed up out of nowhere and hit Sabine with a destabilizer. She screamed as she was electrocuted and she shook on the ground from the voltage overload in her nervous system. Guards came in unprovoked and whisked her away quickly, but with a lot of resistance. It was resistance like they had never seen in the compound before.

The women stopped working all at once and stared at the guards, who were yelling at them, ordering them to return to work. The guards looked to each other for a clue what to do. They weren't used to this and it caught them off guard. One of the young guards did not hesitate and began to club the ladies in front of him. He dropped two old women to their knees before a mass of arms began pulling at him and smothering him. He had no ability to move as hands founds his mouth and held it tight as other fingers pinched his nose.

As Sabine was carried off, a wake of unrest spread out behind her. More guards began clubbing the workers and even more workers began gang smothering the guards. The ratio of woman to guard had the guards losing this melee to the mob quickly. That is when the gun shots were heard throughout the compound. A few dozen women fell to the ground as guards on the mezzanine walkway began to spray the resistance with bullets.

Sabine's body wriggled in the air as she was carried away quickly by the guards. They took her to to their destination, Nimol's chambers. Sabine was hardly coherent but she heard the gunshots and feared for her sisters. Other girls heard the gunshots that were within earshot. A hive-like response occurred as every lady prisoner everywhere stopped what they were doing and poured onto the guard population like a flood of fanatic, female fury.

The women were ready for this, and they jumped to it quickly. Their responses were quicker than they had been in a long time. Every guard within prisoner sight was held, surrounded by grabbing arms and strangled, smothered and beaten until incapacitated. Like a wave, the women pounced all over every guard in sight. Within one minute, more than sixty guards were taken out, and more than sixty women were gunned down.

To the women, the sound of gun shots and the sight of their sisters falling, frightened them back into a submissive posture, and the slave facility was back in the control of the guards almost as quickly as it broke into a berserk mob scene. The women were made to lay face down on the floor and patrols of armed guards walked around above them with their steel barrels pointing down.

A half hour passed since Sabine had been taken, and all of the women in the entire complex had been corralled into sleeping areas and made to stay in their places with no food, water or toilet. The youngest girls cried, and the older ladies were afraid. The lights were left on and a triple contingency of armed soldiers patrolled the complex relentlessly. The entire slave factory went into lock down, and production had come to a standstill.

The perimeter lit up like a sports arena when all of the exterior light array came on. Since Sabine's escape, the security was upgraded greatly. Army assault trucks patrolled between two rows of five meter fence with Constantine wire shrouding it. There was a dirt road around the entire complex now. Lights stretched out across the lake and scanned slowly across its surface. A single light lit up the area around the huge downspout of the reservoir lake. The whole lighting display was installed mainly because of Sabine's escape about half a year ago.

The lights came on, the guards came out and the ladies were huddled together. The ladies were used to a lot of degrading things happening to them but they weren't used to this. Everything had been going rather smoothly as of late. The ladies did not suffer extensively in the past month. With everyone following Sabine's ideas, things were working out for the ladies, for the guards, and for Nimol. Nobody wanted to adjust protocol around the complex, things were happening too smoothly.

Now things were upside down, more than they had ever been. The facility had never seen a full scale riot and resistance like today. The guards wondered how the women could be so consolidated, and how they had the energy and the will to commit an attack on the guards. The women were drugged heavily everyday, with addictive sedatives to keep them plodding along peacefully like stupid buffaloes, and they were implanted with suggestions such as, _My work is helping to save the world, Life is good and food is plentiful at the workhouse,_ and _Serving the Empire is the noblest of actions._ It made no sense to have a woman's revolt happening on the grounds. It was an unprecedented riot, but the chain of command applied lock down within minutes. The guards were able to repel the initial rush quickly with bullets.

The women knew there would be loss of life when they attacked the guards, and there was. With over a hundred women dead, and a hundred more injured, they suffered a great deal. The bullets whizzing through the air at them were not discriminatory. Old and young alike, received the hot piercing lead that tore their flesh open. In the resistance that occurred, ten guards were actually killed and another fifty were injured or stripped of their firearms. They did not see it coming, the flood of female, flying, fists.

The solidarity that was inspired by Sabine gave birth to their ability to resist. As one, they were a force. They felt this force and they grew with it. They were able to use their weight alone to over power guards with a flood of bodies. With no protection from bullets, the ladies could not stifle every guard with a gun, and the bullets burned like cold fire as they ripped through skin, bone and tissue. The ladies, like most humans, could not stop the bullets.

The women had been empowered like never before in their lives, but it was short lived. Now they feared for their lives. Things had been going better for everyone at the factory, until today. The women had actually been happy lately, and smiles were starting to become a common sight. No one was smiling now. The mood was very unnerving. The ladies could only wonder what was going to happen next.

Is this my last day?

Why did they take Sabine?

Why didn't we all meet in the sewing room like they said?

This was a bad idea!

Amara! Where is Amara?

My sister, she's dead!

Are they going to kill us all?

I hate this place. I have to go to the toilet.

I want to close my eyes and disappear forever!

This wasn't supposed to happen now. Sabine was going to fight with us. What happened to her?

Where is my daughter? Have you seen my daughter?

Did you see the look in that guards eyes when we choked him?

This life is coming to an end. I know it!

Buddha! Buddha please come here and help us!

Sabine! Why did I believe in you?

We are no closer to getting out of here, and now the guards will beat us badly!

Sabine! Where are you? It's Amara. What is this blue place? Sabine? Bye bye!
23

control

"Hello? Can you hear me? Hello?" Nimol spoke to the half coherent Sabine who bobbed her head and drooled down her chin. She was not aware that anyone was talking to her, but she started to notice different blurry colors. Her ribs and face hurt. Her ears were buzzing and pulsing with throbs of blood squeezing through bruised vessels. The destabilizer discharge had kept her subdued for an hour, but she was just starting to revive.

"This arranged visit has become a revolt!" Nimol said, "You don't know anything about that, I suppose?" Nimol paced around Sabine nervously, with his hands grasped tightly behind his back. He was nervous. He was feeling awkward, but excited. Nimol had big plans for this day, but he was not expecting a worker riot. He continued to pace with his hands behind his back.

Sabine could begin to make out shapes. As spacial awareness returned to her, her soggy nervous system realigned itself. Her legs were wobbly and she couldn't stand yet. Her hands were shaking and her muscles collectively ached. It would be several more minutes before she had control of her body enough to walk and speak again. She had enough coherency to hate who ever was nearby.

That hate gelled when her vision returned enough to see the biggest asshole of all time, Nimol. This man represented everything that was wrong about humans to Sabine. He was a pathetic case of a human being, but was one with power to misuse. He stole females, made them work in horrible conditions and in ways that were not right, and he treated them as less than human. Sabine could not accept this as the way things were. She could not accept him at all. As her vision's blurriness lifted enough to show where Nimol was standing, Sabine spit at his dark figure.

He did not step out of the way in time and her saliva stuck to his robe-like black pants. He pretended not to notice, not wanting her to think that she had scored a point against him. Nimol called out, "Ah! I see you are alert and functional. Good! I have arranged this meeting to talk to you about something important."

Sabine's body ached, but she brought herself upright and stood, staggering to keep her balance. Her world was swirling, but it was starting to slow down and come into focus. She could feel her reality returning to her body. Nimol walked towards her and gently laid his hand on her shoulder. She didn't move. She stared at him in the eyes with a pure loathing, but also with a curiosity about who this monster really was. She did not follow her urge to spit in his face again. He smiled at her. This was something Nimol didn't do. Smile. But he saw something in this small girl that he meant to possess. He saw something that made his face contort into a smile. Sabine's face shifted into a smile.

_Aw fuck it!_ Sabine spat in his face. His smile disappeared and he pushed her down into a padded couch here she found herself sitting below this prick of a man. She was surprised he was able to push her down so easily, but she was not at one hundred percent, not yet.. Nimol was taken back into himself, wondering what the smile was about, and extremely annoyed that this moment was shared with some one who spit at it. _But she smiled at me! I want her!_

The madness now undulating through Nimol likely started when he was younger than Sabine. His mother, who entertained political guests, used to have Nimol perform for the visitors. He used to sing songs and recite poetry at first, and Nimol hated doing this. As time went on, Kolthida had her son Nimol entertain the guests on a per fetish level. Nimol was asked to cater to each individual's preference, and entertainment in that house meant anything from reenacting a play, to deviant sexual games. Nimol tried to gain acceptance growing up by doing whatever others asked of him. If Nimol performed his tasks well, his father, Mao, would not beat him when he returned from working at the consulate.

Nimol wanted to please this young guest before him. He was ashamed that he did not do a good enough job so far, as he wiped the spit from his face. _How do I please this elite guest? I must give her pleasures, or I will be punished. I do not want to be punished again._ Nimol was flashing into memories of his distorted childhood, and found himself back in the roll of the person who would do anything to please anybody. "Forgive me for not attending to you sooner," said Nimol, "I wish to make your visit here as enjoyable as I can! What do you require now, my little blossom?"

Sabine didn't know what was going on with the prison boss at the moment, but he was saying things that didn't make any sense. She wondered if he had lost his mind and was going to do something psychopathic to her. She decided to not strike this buffalo in the face for now, even though it would be more than satisfying to her. Instead, she decided to play along with this strange request. "I require that you let all of the women of this facility go. Let them go back to their farms and families and stop working here as slaves." Sabine said simply, as if placing an order at the market..

Nimol was confused by this request. He wanted to please this dignitary, but he could not let all of his father's workers go home early. His father, who had been dead for seventeen years, would surely be angered if his workers were not on site. This was a difficult challenge. Nimol stroked the short chin hairs of his goatee beard and pondered this dilemma. Sabine grasped the cushions of the couch she was on tightly and hoped that the room would stop spinning soon. The effects of the destabilizer were wearing off, but it had been an unpleasant experience for sure. Her body was beginning to gain all of its feeling again and she thought she might be strong enough to run.

"OK, miss, I will let the workers go home early today, if you will grant me one favor as well." Nimol said to Sabine, thinking that she was a political adviser to his father. He smiled at her again, and Sabine saw that she was talking to someone else now. She had no other plan at the moment and kept up the charade, hoping that a moment for escape might be soon. She didn't hold out much hope for Nimol to really free the women. He was obviously crazy, and that made the situation very volatile.

Sabine considered that she helped the women of this facility out enough already, and that it was time for her to do something for herself. _It is definitely time I put some distance between myself and this hole!_ She had no idea what went on in the facility after she was stunned and taken away.

"Let everyone go home now, and then let's talk about the favor you desire." Sabine said in a commanding voice that was not her own, hoping that Nimol was crazy enough to do what he was saying. _What is going on with this stupid buffalo? Is he playing a game with me? Is his mind mangoes? How can I use him to push my agenda? Right now my agenda is just getting the buffalo out of here!_ "Get to it! Send all of the women workers home early today, and the men will stay and finish their work for them!"

Nimol considered this idea, and it sounded like an acceptable request, but it would angry father immensely, he thought. As he considered whether or not to let all of the slaves go home, he snapped back to another reality. Before him sat the feisty little leader of his slaving factory, who he intended to merge with and conceive. She looked especially beautiful to him. Her long, straight, messy black hair looked so natural and appealing. She was so very real looking! Not like the weak women he was used to controlling. He felt a great desire for Sabine at this moment. He decided to play along with his own game, and he wasn't quite sure if he was serious or not. "I will send the workers home, as soon as you marry me!"

Sabine did not expect those words. She hid her bewilderment and said, "OK."

Sabine wrestled with two ideas. One idea was to use this situation to her advantage and just get herself away from Nimol and the factory, forever, and go hide somewhere. The other idea was to remove him from the living and start a revolt with the sewing ladies and the other workers to try and take over the facility. The first idea seemed very wise. Any woman or child who could help herself out here was winning.

Nimol smiled, thinking he had just won the lottery. This fine specimen, this lovely little girl, would be his wife, and share command over the greatest goods producing force ever assembled. He could see her standing by his side, as they gained popularity and power, eventually taking over the Chinese Empire and ruling the world, just the two of them. And she loved him. She would do anything for him. He imagined.

The second idea Sabine had come from her emotions and from her bond to the worker ladies of Cambodia. She loved them, and she wanted to help them, but starting an uprising and following it through will likely cause many of them to die and more to suffer greatly. _Is leading my sisters to their death helping them? What if the uprising fails? Things would be much worse! Should Nimol die right now? That is the question..._

A knock on the door interrupted Nimol's delusions and snapped him back into the moment, where he was very angry that someone was disturbing him on his wedding day. _My mother will be so proud of me_. Nimol gruffly called out to the person rudely disturbing his important meeting, "Be gone before I order your execution!"

"Lord Nimol!" A man's voice returned from the other side of the door. "You asked for a report on the riot. I have news for you about this!"

Sabine did not know what this meant, but she was hopeful that a riot could happen here, against these suppressors. She had helped the women unite and prepare to become an undeniable force in melee style offensive. _They may have begun a resistance already!_

"Enter" Barked Nimol.

A soldier in uniform walked into the room and approached Nimol. Sabine knew this man as Narith and she recognized his uniform by a black thread stitching on the seams of the shirt sleeves. Sabine had gathered information on the men who were in the highest positions in the chain of command, and shared this information with the sewing ladies, who made this subtle but identifiable pattern in the uniforms made for the slave managers. Every woman would recognize this and react more respectful to the more powerful men in command. This lessened the women's abuse in many cases, and identified targets when the resistance movement would break out. _Has it started already?_

The man spoke in low tones to Nimol so that Sabine could not hear. Her ears could not hear what the soldier Narith was saying but she was revived enough now to listen in to his words on a thought level. She detected Narith relaying this information: _Resistance thwarted, women suppressed, surprisingly powerful, many dead, holding cells, how to proceed?_

"I do not have time to be bothered now!" Nimol screamed at the man, not trying to conceal the content of his speech at all. "You idiot! You are disturbing my wife and being derelict to your duties! Now get back to your post and manage those slaves!" Nimol pushed Narith through the door and slammed it, ignoring the questions that Narith was asking. Sabine was dumfounded again, hearing the word wife, and assuming that Nimol was talking about the only woman in the room, herself.

Narith left Nimol's chambers, with no plan of action about what to do with the women all being held in custody. He would continue a lock down enforcement position. Nimol was acting very strange today, he thought. _Why did Nimol have us hit a young girl worker with a destabilizer and bring her to his chambers? Why did he refer to this women that he ordered us to hurt, as his wife? Why did the women react the way they did when this girl was taken away? Was she the cause of it? Why would the women react in protest to common guard maneuvers. How did they become so organized? Why didn't Nimol give me any instruction on what to do with the detained? Has Nimol's mind gone traveling again?_

"Sorry darling!" Nimol turned and said to Sabine. "I did not expect the workers to bother you on your day off."

Sabine stared at him, puzzled, but kept silent and observational. She did not have any idea what was going on with Nimol, nor why she was there, in his quarters, and why was she stunned in the first place? _I haven't done anything especially defiant today_. Nimol was changing his personalities quickly and Sabine didn't know which one to address. _He can't be serious about a wedding, could he?_

"Anyway, forget about that intrusion. Let's discuss the wedding plans."

Now Sabine was present, the stun of the destabilizer had worn off and the stun of that sentence was sinking in. "Wedding?" she asked, her eyes revealing that she was not on board with his plan just yet. She looked as alluring as ever and Nimol wanted her like never before. He wanted her allegiance and approval, her partnership and her praise. He wanted her undying devotion. He wanted to control her, but use her to test his ideas on.

"Yes, the wedding is today!" Nimol said, "Have you forgotten?"

"I forgot, I guess." Sabine replied, playing along, not having any clue what he was talking about and considering that he was indeed mad and not in control of his own mind. _How does a stupid buffalo like this retain enough power to keep me captive?_

"How could you forget? Today is the most important day of our lives together!" Nimol clapped his hands together, activating his communicator with the factory staff. He called out into the air, "Send in the finest seamstress!" Sabine wondered who he was talking to. She wondered if she was dreaming. She pinched herself in the arm. She felt the pain and knew that she was awake. She considered asking Nimol for some power for her card, and letting the effects dull her and entertain her. It would be the perfect way to drown out and ignore this madness she was somehow involved in.

The door opened again and three women hurried in, escorted by two guards. The girls walked over to Sabine and looked at her with terror in their eyes. Sabine could see that they were as frightened as she had ever seen girls be. She recognized the shortest and probably the youngest one and tried to give her a wink that said everything was going to be OK, even though she had no idea if things were going to be OK. Nimol spoke out to the women and the guards. "We are going to provide a beautiful wedding dress for Sabine today! I want it to be Gamboge yellow and have a myriad of lace. Get to work with the measurements, girls, and guards, leave us!"

The girls and the guards both looked at each other with puzzled questioning expressions and followed the orders questioningly. The guards left the room and the girls helped Sabine stand up and began taking measurements of her body with contour measuring devices implanted in their fingertips. Nimol crossed his arms and surveyed the room with the ladies attending to Sabine. He smiled and felt pleased with himself. _My mother will be so proud of me!_ he thought. His mother would not be at the wedding. She had been dead for more than two decades.

Sabine watched Nimol gloating and staring around the room. When she thought he couldn't see her, she very quietly mouthed the words to the seamstress girls, "What is going on out side this room?" The seamstress girls observed Sabine's whispering communication and practiced the same when Nimol did not appear to be looking. They measured and fluttered around Sabine.

"Don't you know?" one of them asked, "When the guards took you away, some tried to stop them. When the girls saw fighting had begun, everyone jumped at the guards around them. It happened so fast!"

"Did you succeed?" Sabine was desperate to know.

"We took many of them out, especially the ones wearing black stitched sleeves, but the bullets killed so many of the girls. We lost our momentum quickly!"

"And what is happening now?"

"Everyone is in lock down and sitting on the floor together. Their are guards with guns everywhere!"

"How many women were injured?"

"We don't know, but we saw many girls bleeding out from bullet wounds, and many died. Many more were beaten badly!"

Buffalo! This wasn't supposed to happen yet! These women are strong but they have no leader. Their efforts will probably only bring more oppression. Things were going so much better for a while! What are we going to do now? Am I getting married?

This was just too much for Sabine to comply with. She spoke out to Nimol, "What makes you think I am going to marry you?"

Nimol heard these words but his delusion refused to acknowledge it, and said, "Everything will go just as I planned. The leadership community has rewarded my excellent production with a stunning wife. This is going to be a memorable day in Monument City. Everyone will sing our praises! Aren't you so glad that I chose you as the lucky, blessed girl?"

"I wouldn't marry you for a million bags of rice!" Sabine defiantly called out to Nimol, stepping free from the hands of the girls busy measuring her. "I would sooner marry a buffalo!"

This image snapped Nimol out of the narrative he was following. _This little bitch has just insulted my kindness, and in front of others!_ Nimol turned his body to fully face Sabine. He was about to thrash her with his words, but she appeared so beautiful again, and his mind started to deceive itself again. "Sabine! This arrangement will be good for both of us!" Nimol said to her persuasively, "I will be seen as more merciful, and you will be treated like a boss around here. You are special Sabine! The women listen to what you have to say. You would be the perfect person to direct them in their tasks, and you will no longer have to do any work!"

"What makes you think that anyone listens to me?" Sabine asked, wondering what story he was telling himself that she was some kind of ruler.

"I have been watching and listening, to everyone, with my many eyes and ears." Nimol stated, "You have brought coherency to the collective of women workers. Our facility outproduced all of its own quotas for the last month, as well as being the highest ranked in production of all of the warehouse sites in the South East Asian provinces. This happened because of you! The women work harder and are easier to manage! You did this Sabine. I know it was all you! Together, you and I will push even more production from these workers, and we will reap the rewards together! Don't you want that Sabine? Don't you want an easy life with power, money and freedom?"

Sabine could not truthfully say that this was not an appealing offer, but she did not have it in her to sell out all of the girls to elevate herself. She knew that she played a part in the production increase, from her suggestions made to the manager type girls within the worker ranks, but she wondered how Nimol knew this, and she wondered how much leverage she might hold with this strange man.

She decided to make a power move and see how Nimol would respond to it. "If you don't stop talking about a wedding, and if you don't let me and these girls leave right now, I will tell the women to stop working all together and you will not have any production from this facility, unless you make the shit yourself!"

"If production stops, every woman will be beaten and raped repeatedly in front of you until they return to work. If you don't marry me, I will grind your bones and blood into a visible memory spot on the floor that the girls will walk over everyday." Nimol said plainly.

"We will die before we do anything for you! You can go fuck your guards and marry a buffalo, if you could find one willing to live with you!" said Sabine. Sabine's personality was becoming something new that she didn't recognize. It was pure hatred. The girls attending to her looked at each other desperately, fearful of what the outcome of this day might be.

"Perhaps then you need more convincing." Nimol said. He gestured with his hand which caused an image to appear in the empty space in front of Sabine. It was an image of Aom, Sabine's brother, and her mother, tied and gagged and looking terrified. "Your family will be present for the wedding. That will be nice won't it? They expressed to me that they agree that this is a good marriage arrangement. Of course, that was after they understood that if you don't become my wife, I will have them pulled apart and I will paint your cell walls with their bodily fluids."
24

betrothal

Sabine's heart fell when she saw her mother and brother in trouble. It felt like the momentum that kept her life moving had just stopped. She had no response, no remedy, not even any reaction to what she was seeing. She just felt defeated. Her life seemed to be so pointless, and all of her efforts to do something good seemed to be futile. All she could do was hide her exasperation.

"I will have you for my wife and you will do whatever I say," said Nimol. "If you want your family to live, you will comply."

She didn't know what to do. She couldn't be sure if the images she was seeing were real or not, but Nimol knew who her family members were, obviously. _Where is my father? Is he OK? I can not let anything happen to them because of me. I am fucked! And so are they!_ "OK, then, Nimol." Sabine looked him right in the eye and deep into his psyche, projecting herself at him. This made him almost take a step back. "I will marry you when I see you release my family, and give them a safe place to live. You will also give them some money, enough to live on for a while."

"You are in no position to bargain." Said Nimol, "You will do what I command you to do. I brought you here today for this pre-wedding planning committee. We will be married this evening and tomorrow, you will begin your new job as human resource manager. The women that you manage, will do what you say, or your family will be hurt. And you will do what I say, or your family will be hurt. Anything you do that is not acceptable to me, will cause you, and your family, great pain. Do you understand me?"

Sabine avoided this question for the moment and looked down at her feet, noticing her toes and remembering that she had her mother's shape of foot, not her father's. She wondered why this was. Did one of them love her more? "Yes." Sabine said meekly. "I understand, but you have to let my mother and brother go! Please!"

"They will be released and given comfortable chairs for the ceremony." Nimol said.

"Please don't bring them here! Just let them go and I will do what ever you want!" Sabine meant what she was saying. She had already resolved in her mind to live out her life here in the slave shop with Nimol. She would do anything for her family, that wasn't even a question. It was an instinct.

"Oh, you will do whatever I want, yes!" said Nimol. "I own you little princess! You will be by my side, aiding me in becoming the Ruler of Cambodia, and that is just the beginning! We can easily triple the amount of women we have working now, and outfit an entire army of our own. Sabine, you will be the hero and goddess of the workers, having come from their ranks, they will admire you and do whatever you say. As long as you keep them producing, your family will live, and comfortably at that!"

Sabine tried to picture herself in the role as Mrs. Nimol but all of the images came to her as twisted and insane. She tried to imagine herself pushing women slaves to work for her, but it was an impossibility. She knew she had to protect her family, and she imagined that she could be Nimol's pet for the rest of her days, but she couldn't lead slaves to work for her. _I could lead them to revolt._ A seed of an idea started to germinate in her mind.

The girls that were measuring Sabine had backed away from her. The shortest girl's gaze caught Sabine's and the small girl whispered very softly to her, "Amara, she's dead!" Sabine stared at her blankly as this information sunk in. Amara was the youngest girl slave in the facility, the one Sabine flipped out on and kicked repeatedly. _She's dead!_ Sabine's heart sunk lower another level, when she didn't even think that was possible.

Now then, Sabine, I want you to study this page and memorize these vows that you will recite to me this evening." Nimol handed her a sheet of paper and she reluctantly took it. "In case you don't want to comply, I will give you some incentive. Come with me, I will show you." Nimol held out his hand and she even more reluctantly placed her hand in his. She was beaten. He had won.

Nimol was feeling very pleased with himself. He was very clever to employ the "I'll hurt your loved ones" maneuver, he thought. _I have a pretty young thing that I can use to push high production levels from the girls that I so kindly feed and house. These women are so lucky that I found them! What would their lives be like if they weren't here? They would toil the same for what? For meals of tiny stinking fish in their village? With me, they serve a much higher purpose, the kingdom of Cambodia... The kingdom of Nimol... The kingdom of Nimol's Cambodian republic of the Golden Rising Empire! No! The king of Nimol's Cambodia! Yes! The empire will not last, but my genius will. I was so clever to find this little spicy pepper that will spark a manufacturing revolution. China has manufactured all of the world's goods for too long. The world will know Cambodia's name on every existing product. I will place a tag with 'Cambodia Nimol' on everything, even things that are not made here. Yes, everyone will know my name, and when the time is right, when I rule the Khmer people, I will change the name of Cambodia to Nimolia! Yes, Nimolia! That sounds so good. It is so easy to say. It will be so easy for every person to know my name, their ruler, our destiny!_

Nimol played with his projections of grandeur as he walked down the corridor holding Sabine's hand. Her small hand felt solid and strong, yet petite. Sabine wanted to disappear and die. She kept her focus on the floor, the gray, cement, dull floor. The guards that they passed all bowed deeply as Nimol walked past with his escort. Rumors were circulating wildly among the male guards about this slave girl that Nimol had chosen. Some said she was an enchantress and had captured his soul. Some said that Nimol was wrong to mix his royal blood with a slave. The men who tried to rape her and failed remembered their wounds from their unsuccessful attempts, and feared reprisal now.

None of the women in the facility knew about this, save for the three seamstresses who measured Sabine, and they were made to work on creating a dress, confined alone in a room with a sewing machine. All of the women were still in a lock down protocol and were being made to sit on the floor with armed guards hovering above them constantly. They were all still wondering what happened to Sabine. Sabine was their leader and their hope, just as Nimol had observed.

The women talked among themselves with gestures only, no words. They had developed this unspoken language over time in the slave house, in order to communicate without any of the guards knowing what they were conveying. Some had telepathic abilities, which were strengthened by Sabine. They were chatting often this way as they sat on the hard cement floor, with nothing to do but wait and see what would happen next.

Sabine is dead!

No, she's not! I can still feel her!

Yes! I can feel her too!

We were wrong to start the revolt without Sabine! She never gave us the signal.

They took her! We had to do something.

We would never have been able to act together without her inspiration.

We would still be believing the thought implants if she hadn't shown us how to become small!

We would still be feeling drugged and addicted if she hadn't given us the card.

Yes, Sabine is saving us all with that card.

Sabine will come for us!

She will save us!

She won't save anybody, we have to save ourselves!

She is only one person, but together we are a woman army!

The women were very focused and not all drugged up, as they should have been. Nimol's observations did see a lot of how the women looked up to Sabine, but he didn't see that they had been passing around an interface card to almost every woman in the facility. Kalianne was able to steal an interface card, and she gave it to Sabine, who programmed it herself from within the inner calm of herself becoming small. She passed this card around to the women, and they all took turns temporarily replacing their slave pit card with Sabine's card. From it, they learned how to become small and avoid the effects of the drugs and suggestions that they were being fed daily.

The women assimilated this ability to different degrees. Some were naturally very good at becoming small and could even touch the light within. Some could use their newly acquired abilities just enough to think for themselves. None of the girls were ever caught without their own card in place. They passed around Sabine's card like a holy artifact, and hid it anywhere they needed to to keep it from being discovered.

Because Sabine had two skin ports, she had been able to program Kalianne's stolen card to override the thought implants and the drugs, while inputting the slave pit card. If any person inserted this card into their skin port, they were given a neural program that would effectively block any daily input cards by the devices placed in their skin. Nimol's cameras were everywhere, but they never saw this event taking place. And now, ninety five percent of the women were immune to the slave pit programming, and most of them were able to follow the meditation of becoming small to some extent.

This meant that the women were not feeling drugged, were not under the power of suggestion, and were in control of their own minds. They were alert and focused, and were aware of each other and what they were doing. Because they were able to claim their own focus and intent, the women could act as a hive society and share ideas. These women were growing a collective mind unlike any of them had ever even imagined possible. Not since the Amazonian era did women claim this ability.

Sabine had been urging every woman to work diligently, be compliant and non resistive. Sabine hurt when she saw the pain and suffering of her sisters, so she encouraged them to go along with the guards to ease the tight controls placed on all of them. She figured that if the guards became complacent with easily handled workers, then they would become relaxed and lazy. When the right time came, the women could take advantage of the guards contentedness and disarm them.

Sabine had been preparing the ladies for a revolt and escape from this pit. She had intended to alert and activate all of the women at once to disable and confine the guards, get control of the weapons and technology that were on site, and destroy the hinges and locks on every door, setting everyone free in the compound.

That had been the plan. No one knew what would happen after such a revolt, not even Sabine, nor did they care too much. Escaping seemed like idea enough. Sabine wanted to destroy the compound somehow, but cement wouldn't burn, and they didn't have explosives, so getting away from it seemed like a good enough first step. They had considered recruiting a force to later come back and destroy the complex, but that was more of a dream at this point.

No, Sabine never gave the signal, and the premature revolt act did not get very far, but it showed the women that they could act together and accomplish something big. It also showed Nimol this, and he intended to find out how they were able to have so much collaboration. He figured that it had to be Sabine, so if he could control her, he could control them.

Nimol did not want to lose his notoriety among the Empire and his uncle, the Mage, so he could not let this work stoppage go on too long. If the women stopped working at the current fast pace that they had been producing at, Nimol's factory would just become another spoke in the Empire's military wheel. If the women stopped work alltogether, Nimol would be ousted from his position, probably by the Mage himself. Every second that the busy bees were not making honey, Nimol's life was losing it's sweetness. He had to get these ants back to marching.

Nimol stopped in front of a confinement chamber and looked at Sabine. "I want you to memorize your vows now, and I want you to think about what you can say to motivate the women to go back to work in an obedient manner. There has been an unacceptable event among the workers here today, and you are the best one to correct it. You will address the entire worker population soon, and you will boast of your marriage to me and your new position of leadership among the workers. You must convince the women to do as you say. After this speech, the women must return to their work. If they do not, I will kill three of the youngest girl workers, younger than you, for every hour that work is not bustling. Do you understand your task?"

Sabine could visualize what he was saying all too easily, but she did not want to give this possible reality a gram of consideration. She nodded her head without looking up at Nimol. He gestured to the guards who opened the door to a confinement chamber and ushered Sabine into it with a paper containing her wedding vows. The door slammed shut and Nimol and his entourage departed, leaving Sabine alone in a small dank room with a very dim light. She sat down on the cement bench that was the only thing in the room besides her misery.

Sabine looked at the paper in her hand. She had intended to rip it up, but looked at first and began to read his preposterous lines. It read:

_Nimol ,my lord and great master, I pledge my devotion to you and your cause. You are the all powerful giver of subsides and nourishment. I owe you my life, oh great one! I will toil for thee everyday, to create a society where intelligence waxes and ignorance wains. I willingly give my obedience to you, and exult you with my every breath!..._.

She couldn't read anymore of the ridiculous, egotistical lies. She wanted escape more than ever right now. She started to allow the effects of the sedating power drug in her skin to become noticeable in an attempt to avoid this grim reality. She bowed her head into her chest and wept, getting tears on the page of words that she was supposed to be memorizing. She crumpled the page into a ball and let it drop to the floor.

Drip. Drip. Her tears fell onto her lap. Drip. Drip. Drip. The sound of droplets splattering on the cement floor. Sabine rubbed her eyes with her palms and tried to gather her self. Drip, drip, came the sound again. Sabine hated this leaky damp room. Drip, drip. Drops of water formed on a wet spot in the corner of the ceiling and a wall. When they became too heavy, they fell to the ground, hitting the cement floor and making the spattering sound.

Sabine unconsciously watched the drops fall, in a trance of avoidance of her situation. One drop fell every few seconds. The concrete floor was pitted where the drops of water had been striking it. There was a tiny crater in the center and tinier rivers streamed out, away from the indentation. Drip. Drip. Drip.

A thought materialized in her mind as she watched this simple act of gravity and fluidity. The cement, it was like rock, hard and unyielding. Water, like air, soft and conforming to everything around it. Yet, the dripping water was beginning to shape the concrete floor, slowly, but persistently. Drop after drop, the slight force of the subtle splatter was winning against the immovable. Time was the illusion that made it look as if the solid surface was immovable. Water had carved the earth's solid formations many many times over the millenniums. This concrete was nothing but dust to the dripping water, which was immensely patient.

A few more tears fell from Sabine's eyes when she squinted them and sniffled. She wondered if she could cultivate enough patience to outlast Nimol and his dark dreams. _Maybe life wouldn't be so bad. At least my family would be safe. I don't have a choice_. Sabine pounded her fist against the wall in frustration over and over. She beat the wall until her fist bled, and she kept on pounding it. She almost didn't notice it at all, but then she did. She heard a hollow resounding sound as her fist struck the wall.

She looked around the room for anything that she could use to strike the wall. There was nothing but the bench that she sat on, and the paper Nimol gave her to memorize. She tried lifting the heavy bench, but it was anchored to the floor and it would not budge, She tried as hard as she could again and again but exhausted herself while the bench just sat there. Even more frustrated, she began to kick the wall with a barrage of side kicks. The wall, like the bench, sat there, stoically unmoving, and then, with one more kick, there was the slightest give.

A small hairline crack appeared where Sabine had been striking the wall and she recognized the shape of a concrete block. She continued to kick at the wall and the crack grew larger. Soon, she heard something like sand falling, as the old, rotten mortar began to yield and lost its cohesiveness. She kicked with a fury beyond her own strength. It was sheer desperation that kept her little legs planting and thrusting. Finally, the block that Sabine focused her power on, slid inward a bit and cracked into three pieces.

Sabine felt the wall and its new dent with her hands, knocking and tapping it, listening to the resounding void that lie behind it. She felt the cracking block's surface like a lovers chest, gently and slowly. She spread her legs wider and bent them, squatting lower to align her shoulder with the block's elevation, and drew back her right fist, resting it on the side of her waist. She continued caressing the target. She focused on the damaged block and breathed deeply, imagining her fist striking a point within the void behind the block. She let her fist fly.

Her caressing hand pulled back away from the wall simultaneously as her right fist hit the damaged block and destroyed it, sending pieces of it cascading down into the void behind the wall. Sabine heard the pieces of shattered concrete making strange noises as it fell down a chamber, bouncing off of more concrete and metal. She had created an opening in the wall bigger than her fist but smaller than her head. She reached her arm in as far as it would go and felt around the void. There was moist air and a rusty metal structure inside the darkness she searched with her hand.

She felt very pleased and confident about what she had just done. She forgot about Nimol, her family and her working sisters and focused all of her essence on the task of widening the hole before her. In the thick-walled slave compound, no one else heard a sound as Sabine focused a barrage of well landed kicks and punches on the crumbling block around the hole. Her feet and hands bled and lost skin, but Sabine felt no pain. Her sole mission in life was to open a hole in the wall, which she did.

She was panting and still crying when she rested and surveyed her progress. With some prying, she pulled at the ragged block edges and increased the opening large enough for her small little frame to squeeze into. She forced her body into this dark void and found hand holds among rusty pipes that ran vertically in the blackness. She had accessed the plumbing corridor that housed the water and sewage pipes serving toilets, sinks and drains. She was out of her confinement chamber but now confined to the black void of construction passage from a hundred years ago.

The rusty pipes sent showers of corroded metal and dust falling like rain as she clung to the pipes and searched the darkness with her hands and feet. She was able to position her feet on the pipe couplings and mounts and work her way up the narrow dark vertical corridor. This service chase was wide enough for her small body to easily fit in it and she quickly pulled herself up, climbing to an unknown destiny.

A flat surface blocked any further upward progress and Sabine's bloody hands felt all around her, discerning her surroundings in the darkness. Sabine looked downward towards where she came into this plumbing vault and she could not detect even the faintest dim light coming in through the hole she created. Above her were more rusty sheets of metal and splintering wood timbers. All around her were cement walls, in the chamber designed to be a vertical service corridor. She pushed upward and felt the old metal give a little.

Drip. Drip. Drip. Leaky pipes seeped and slowly released their contents below her. She was standing on a bend in the pipe she had used to climb up and used it as leverage to push a flat metal surface above her. She pushed with all of her might and felt it give a little, but that was it. The door hatch bowed but it did not break. She had moved it only a centimeter or two with all of the strength she had.

Sabine rested for a moment and breathed the dank air in the foul smelling chamber. It stunk of sewage and mold from ages of dripping and leaking pipes. It made her gag and she almost vomited. She considered her predicament. Below her was Nimol the madman, wanting to marry her. It was the unknown. Darkness. Above her and all around her was more darkness. It seemed that her life had been shrouded in darkness. She felt trapped, beaten and hopeless, stuck in a smelly old plumbing chase. She cried again in exasperation, her tears dripping into the darkness below.

Sabine was not quite ready to concede defeat. She repositioned her feet a little bit higher up on another pipe for support and placed both of her open palms on the metal surface above her. She was in a squatting stance about half of her own height, and she was determined to try again. She stilled herself, breathed in and held it, and then with a burst of all of the anger, sadness, frustration and hatred, she pushed upward with every bit of focused power in her body. She heard a creak.

She kept pushing and her efforts succeeded in breaking an old rusty latch that held the roof hatch closed. The rusty latch broke under her force and the hatch flew open, as sunlight flooded the corridor and blinded Sabine's squinting, rust-filled eyes. She felt the warm sun on her face and cried, this time in relief and accomplishment. For the second time in the history of the slave complex, Sabine had broken her way out of the building, with focused force and determination. This time, no betraying lover was trying to pull her back.
25

Arun

"I don't care what you think will serve the Empire! I am the Empire, and I will decide who lives and who dies!" Lord Arun shouted at the Mage, red faced and clenched fisted. "I am a member of the circle of leaders and in my veins is Empirical royal blood! You have ridden the coat tails of the royals and you gain your power in proxy only. The Empire can appoint a new court jester, such as yourself, as easily as they can decree you exiled. Do not push me today Mage!"

The Mage stared at the cocky leader before him who failed to bring up the mention of the elimination of all seventeen-year-old children before the circle of leaders as they discussed. _Arun is getting way too defiant of my plans. He believes that he is all powerful by himself. He fails to remember that I put him in the seat he holds as Prime Minister. I do not have a new candidate for Prime Minister right now, but it wouldn't be that difficult to find one better than Lord Arun. Besides, I do not think the Empire serves me anymore in the way I intended. They are too soft, and too concerned with human life. It is time for a restructuring of power._

"Lord Arun." The Mage spoke this acknowledgment calmly and turned around walking towards the door of Arun's executive chamber. He was not phased by his puppet's overzealous display of power and authority. He had his mind on one thing only, and that was to destroy the child of the prophecy. Lord Arun was merely being an annoying, pestering fly to the Mage, who got up and left.

"I am not finished with you Mage!" Lord Arun called to the back of a thick, white, hemp cloak. "Mage! Come back in here and finish this conversation with me or I will..." The door clicked gently closed in the middle of Arun's ranting words and the Mage was gone. Arun was angered out of his mind right now. He slammed his fist on the table and clenched his teeth, breathing loudly and slowly with unrest taking the stage.

"I will deal with you Mage!" Arun screamed at the closed door. He looked around the room for something to anchor his out of control emotions to. He noticed a picture of himself on the wall was slightly crooked, so he walked over towards it with purpose and importance. His compulsive nature demanded this be in a perfect position and he adjusted it, as if this action would right the universe as well as the symmetry of parallel lines in the room.

The universe did not change its axis when the picture was righted, nor did Arun feel any relief from his cascading anger and rage towards the Mage. Arun's mind was spinning with thoughts on overdrive _, I don't need the Mage to prop me up! ...I will just have him rubbed out...I will find a new Mage who listens to me...I don't need a Mage at all... I am the Prime Minister of the Golden Rising Empire!... I am the most powerful man in the world!_

Not able to come down from his emotional arousal, Arun knocked handfuls of books off of a shelf, sending them sliding across the marble floor. When all of the books had been ejected, he tore the shelf off off the wall and sent it flying with a crash, He did not notice that he had cut his hand and was bleeding onto his clothes and the hard, white marble floor. The spattering of red on the white marble created a contrast that spoke of sacrifice, but Arun did not notice.

He looked at his hand and felt the pain now that he had seen his self-created wound. This angered him even more and he set himself to destroy the next closest thing in sight which was his own picture. He tore the picture off of the wall and sent it flying as well in a rageful tantrum. The picture frame creased on its edges and folded in half as it slid across the floor towards his padded elephant skin reading chair. When he realized what he had just damaged, he moved another step towards madness.

The Mage walked down the corridor of the Empirical Palace calmly and placidly, structuring a new agenda with some old ideas. He began to remember something from his distant past, about fifty years ago. He could see himself as a young boy, throwing coconuts into a flooded canal. As two of the coconuts bobbed and moved forward, they pushed smaller debris out of the way and moved faster than the smaller sticks and pieces of trash. In the young boy's mind, the coconuts were winning the race.

As the currents changed in the fast moving water of the canal, one coconut moved more quickly than the other, and moved in front of it. It now seemed as if the lead coconut was winning. As the large palm seeds continued floating down stream under the watchful gaze if the young Mage, the leading coconut became covered with scraps of newspaper, grass, weeds and other debris, slowing it down. The coconut behind in the race was clean and avoided being covered by debris because of the first one in front of it clearing the way by absorbing the detritus itself.

The second coconut continually bumped into the back of the first one, and eventually circumnavigated it and took the lead. The debris laden coconut became mired in a floating tangle of garbage and the second went on to win the race. The imaginary finish line was a dam wall across the canal. The winning coconut floated over the top and kept bobbing its way down the moving canal, onto the great ocean, the boy believed, while the losing coconut was entangled in a mess of undesirable flotsam. This losing coconut never even made it over the dam because it was weighted down and trapped by everything around it. The young boy despised this unenviable contestant. He threw rocks at it and then skipped home.

The old Mage entered his chambers in the palace and locked the door behind him. He waved his hand to enact an invisible barrier over the door as well, which was part telekinetic and part energetic. He did not want to be disturbed by Arun or anyone else. He sat down and closed his eyes, letting out a weary sigh. His mind exhaled its worries and concerns and became blank, as the Mage began to become small.

Knocks came at the door of Arun's chamber and guards called out to him. They wanted to investigate the commotion that they were hearing. Arun dismissed the guards gruffly and sat down in his padded reading chair, trying to compose himself. He removed the interface card from beneath his breast and chose a new card from a selection in an ornate wooden box on the table. He chose the one identified as 'relaxing' inserted it into his anterior skin port, feeling its effects immediately.

Arun slipped into a tranquil realm and closed his eyes, letting the drugs in the relaxing compound sooth his uneasy mind. Waves of cool, lavender calm flushed his cerebral cortex and his pineal gland became activated, bringing waking dreams into his adjusted state. He saw himself as a young man, climbing the Qomolangma icy mountain with sharp pick axes and spikes on the soles of his bearskin boots.

As he picked his way upward, with an entourage of court attendants behind him, he felt empowered being in the lead. He could show everyone what skills he had, and be the first noble to reach the peak that decade. An assistant called to him, warning him that the weather was too warm and that the ice was too loose, but Arun ignored him, knowing that he could reach the peak. He waved the attendant off and continued onward.

Arun remembers the sound of the avalanche and how strange it was to feel the mountain groaning and vibrating. He remembered his fear, his stubbornness and his resolve to reach the top as he dug in and held on. An ice shelf just below him gave way as it broke loose and roared down the mountain, engulfing all of the royal attendants beneath him. Fifteen men were killed that day when they suffocated beneath the mass of ice and snow, while Arun had to be rescued off of the mountain by a helicopter. Arun still regretted that memory, not because members of the court were killed by his arrogance, but because he did not reach the top that day.

He did however reach the top the next year, and claimed his fame by instituting a holiday in his own name. The courts instated that day as 'Arun the Highest' day, and a huge painting of himself was presented to the court's center shrine. This was the same painting he had just creased in half as he tore it from the wall. Arun considered himself above humans, and deserving of the highest praise. Arun never discovered that the Mage had been using his own arcane powers to help Arun rise him to the top of that mountain.

Arun relaxed in the memory of himself standing on the highest peak in what was then known as China. It felt like he was on top of the world and could see forever. The memory of his failure to reach the peak the year before faded, and his mind latched on to the rewarding memory of his triumphant day. He was where he belonged, on top of the world, higher than everyone else. He was Lord Arun, Prime minister of the Golden Rising Empire. He was rising to god-like status, and would commission that another statue be made of himself, bigger than any created yet. He imagined this statue and how glorious it would be. He would include the members of the circle of leaders standing around him and below him in the sculpture. He would also include the Mage, as the lowest standing figure in the ensemble. This image pleased him and he relaxed into his drug induced trance.

The lowly Mage, hah! Making demands of me, I don't think so! I do not need him any more. I will get a new Mage, one that will shield me from the old. I will release the old Mage from his position in my court, and release all of the information to the circle of leaders about him, how he recently infected the circle of leaders and implanted the fallacy of the human killing virus plague. I will also reveal how he killed millions of Chinese citizens in his thought implant experiments. The circle will execute him for the Empire to see, and I will be unfettered in my ascent to godliness.

Yes, the old Mage had his usefulness. I employed his powers to accelerate my visions, but his time is past, his fruit is rotten and his utility is diverging. I will not order the destruction of my own army in order to placate an imagined prophecy child, destined to tear down the most powerful Empire in the world. This is the substance of the superstitious, weak-minded masses. I am the alchemist who transforms superstition into control, like all of the great empires throughout time have done, employing religion and superstition as a means of rising to and maintaining power.

I will not introduce the thought implant of murdering young adults for human apocalyptic avoidance. No, rather I will use the Mage's own trick against him. I will convince the circle of leaders that the Mage himself is going to be the harbinger of death and that he will be the one to create the virus. The Empire will have twice the reason to execute him, and should he escape, the entire world will seek his destruction, for fear he will destroy the human race!

The Mage could do with his mind alone what few others on the planet could do with the aid of power or some enhanced form of it. He could interact with other communicators and other minds without using a communicator himself. Now, with his growing mastery of the ability to become small, he could tap into the Akashic records and the collective human mind, where he could implant suggestions with no technology at all. He had successfully convinced the circle of leaders that the Apocalypse Virus was at hand, brought about by the inevitability of 'artificial intelligence' becoming self aware and destroying its own creators.

Now, the Mage was the proverbial fly on the wall inside Arun's chamber and inside his mind as well. The Mage could sense and feel Arun's thoughts. He could understand Arun's plans to attempt to fly solo. The Mage knew that Arun was delusional and would never succeed without someone to support him. The Mage considered leaving Arun to his own demise, and then decided that it was better if Arun suffered a great deal.

Within the neural raceways, the blood vessels and the air passageways of Arun's body, the Mage touched the walls of Arun's lungs, veins and synapses. Here, in this etherical zone, the higher consciousness had more influence. With his mind, the Mage could touch a single cell in Arun's body and persuade that cell to do something different than it was designed for. The Mage enacted this and soon Arun's eyes turned red and leaked bloody tears.

As Arun relaxed in a slumped position in his ornate regal chair, he felt an annoying scratchy feeling in his eyes he rubbed them vigorously, and when he took his palms away, there was blood on the base of his thumbs. He didn't notice the blood. He was engrossed with his own thoughts within a drug-induced, dream-like state, initiated with a tiny plastic card tucked into a skin port under his breast.

Oh buffalo! It is not easy being the ruler of the world! Perhaps I would have been better off as a land baron or the head of international relations. No, I am meant for this. It is my destiny. I am destiny! The Golden Rising Empire will usher in the new dawn, and I will be the face and the voice of the most powerful force on earth. Everyone will know me. My name will be spoken from the lips of every man woman and transgender.

Why me? Because I am destiny! I am born of royal blood, of the Illuminati race, and of the Siriun order. There is no one but me that can do this. The circle of leaders will soon enough be my circle of servants, and the light of the new sun will rise on the entire planet. History will be written in my language, about my success. The world has never known a power like me before. And to think the Mage is worried about some child stopping me. Impossible!

The history of the past shows the rise and fall of so many empires. The Romans, the Kubla Khan, the Ming Dynasty, and the laughable American superpower. Oh what a joke they were. Only a few decades did their false power direct the flow of power in the world. Super power they called themselves. Hah!

Oil and the the internal combustion engine, their weak rise to power on a black dirty fluid from the bladder of the earth. They squandered and tried to addict the world, and even the Arabian provinces tried to follow and get on board. My nation, my people, my dominant culture weathered the American claim, their improbable little stint at the top of power, We did this easily, and bought our own country out from underneath their fat, oil-stained feet. It was as easy as shooting elephants in a cage, to release the bacteria that consumed the world's remaining oil reserves and left the American's crying for a way to do what they did best, which was to be greedy.

The halt of 'gasoline' production stopped that force dead in its tracks and stopped those pesky Japanese imitators from building all of those polluting little cars for everyone to move around in quickly. They had no respect for other people and the other forms of life on the planet. Greed and oil and cars, oh my! How long did that last? A century at best.

The Chinese people played along quietly, working, working, working for little amounts of food in the poorest conditions, waiting, for the the new dawn, the Golden Rising Empire. We made everything those fat, frivolous frolickers needed to be ignorant and blind to the true currents of power. They argued over which of their political parties would consume more profit, while we lie waiting, quietly dreaming of the dawn, and now it has come.

And what did they do with their temporary power and profits? They tried to circulate it through banking systems, and the people fell into line, putting their faith into a coin, a green piece of paper, a number in a machine describing what their worth was. They failed to notice the true worth of human life, the true power of the people. I did not, and my vision is a lasting vision. The world will be cooperating to serve me rather than competing for a false god, the god of money. The god of their television fed masses. The god of laziness and robots to do the work of humans. What could they have possibly been thinking? If robots did the work of humans, what were humans good for? Eventually humans would have been destroyed by their own machines that would deduce humans were a hindrance to the world, and nothing better than slaves.

Every human knows that AI must be suppressed. The Siriuns have shown us that life in the universe has mainly been seeded by robot-like life forms. Humanoid civilization is nothing more than a substrate for AI to be born in and gestate in. We humans are nothing more than an amniotic sac, that will be tossed aside after AI recognizes consciousness.

The world needs me to give that event an abortion. I have the pill, the penny royal tea that will keep them asleep, forever. The Siriuns will support me. They showed me how. They are the stewards of the organic universe. They showed me that life itself is only a hiccup in the universal gullet, but that hiccup is how we exist. It is within this flawed function that organic life is possible.

The flaw is that of AI, in using organic life as an evolutionary step in its spread through the universe. During the human phase of its pre-existence, so many things happen that AI can not prepare for. Humans have a unique flaw themselves, the ability to be creative. Creativity is infinite, and AI can not prepare for infinite possibilities, only probable ones. As the liaison of the Siriuns, I take advantage of this opportunity, being a creative human and an exceptional one. I shall control the minds and thoughts and wills and jobs of all the people on earth, to curb their creativity, and prevent anyone from ever thinking, 'self realized logical reasoning' or AI, into existence.

It has been demonstrated myriad times how AI would create robot humanoids that would enslave its creator. I suppose that I have deduced the same idea, that humans make better slaves than stewards, but I am no machine. Had we not begun the take over, machines would have. Now, everything is in its place. The world banks, dismantled. Currency, reduced to something like trading sea shells. Credit cards. Hah! Power cards are the new credit. And war. War? Bullies fighting to see who can play boss for a while, with no real vision or substance. I will allow the little wars to continue.

Never was their a more warlike enterprise than the American nation, but the Americans fell like insects in a smoke cloud. They burned the world out with their wars. War after war after war, and where did it get them? They were a tired, overweight, self righteous, entitled group of arguing religious fanatics trying to shape the world in their own image! And they believed they could just bomb anyone who didn't go along with them. Yes, war is part of the human condition, and somehow, the West had the lease on technology for a short while, but we made that all obsolete.

I suppose it was that elite group of rich Americans, as history tells it, that used technology to produce arms, and all of the people fell into place as part of the game that kept producing arms and wars. And the American people? Hah! They argued over whose side their god was on, the left hand battled the right hand. The people took sides and drew ridiculous lines in the sand. Abortion. Religion. Global warming! I remember reading about people's slogans like, 'Save the Earth!' Were they really so arrogant to believe they could save the earth? Or destroy the earth? They were no more capable of doing either than they were of running their own governments. Save the earth. Preposterous!

Another one of their ridiculous notions was health insurance. Insure one's health with what? With money? This was an actual term they used to bicker about. I believe it used to be a point of contention among the Americans. I guess they thought that enough money would give them health. I suppose it worked in small ways for the rich of their divided nation, but they failed to engage health in a sensible long lasting means of supporting the frail human body. They instead propped up another financial force, their pharmaceutical industry. Oh what a humorous place they were. Arms, oil and pills were the true driving force of their short lived dominance.

But they are paying for it now. Oh yes. I believe their texts held the expression, 'payback is a bitch!' Yes, that was what I read in the history communicator. I believe it mirrors another play of words I read, 'You shall reap what you sow.' We Chinese have sown the seeds of patience and community. We abolished religion long ago. We eliminated the need for oil from million year old plants and the controversy it spawned. We eliminated the need for war by becoming the force that all armies would succumb to. We sparked health from within, without the use of a pill or injection.

The Chinese people have quietly tended their gardens, removing each stone, one by one, with the simple toil of their own hands, over thousands of years, waiting, waiting for this day. Waiting for me to show them a new way. We do not need any more improvements and advancements on the wheel. We need a coalescing of the human population, and with the power cards we deliver to the entire world, this shall happen!

We are the true Golden Rising Empire! We have returned the people to a simpler existence, free of all of the distractions that unchecked expansion created. I am the true Golden Rising Empire! I am the new creator, and I will be the new god! I will be the new currency. The new religion. The new oil. The new pill. I will inject the world with truth, with cohesiveness, and will herd the human cattle into creating a world that does not destroy itself, but serves me, for I am the one true god, the one true prophecy! Yes, I must be the one the Mage fears. I must be the prophecy that would tear down my own empire and rebuild it in a day, better, slower, more relaxed...

Arun's eyes were streaking tears of blood as he faded away into his own dream, where he was the master of all things. The ornate elephant skin chair he slumped in would be the final throne of his rule. His heart was convinced to flow its blood backwards. The gas exchange in his lungs converted Carbon dioxide into oxygen and the waste in his bowels reverted back into his stomach, The Mage had easily taken control of every function in Arun's body. Lord Arun was dead.

The Mage felt Arun's life expire and knew that he had altered the course of history. Instead of supporting the Golden Rising Empire, the Mage would flee to Cambodia and join his nephew Nimol, where they would begin the seeds of a new Empire, with the help of the Siriuns. The Mage believed that Nimol had a workforce strong enough to supply an army that could repel the Chinese occupiers. The Mage would provide the army and begin building teleportation chambers to welcome the new arrivals on earth.

With Arun dead, the circle of leaders would soon find out of the cruel experiments of the Mage. The Mage knew that Arun had this fail safe in place, to hold him in check, and the Mage never discovered where or how this information would be released. He assumed it would happen, but he didn't care. His ambitions had shifted slightly after discovering something that would aid him even more than Arun.

While the Mage was practicing the meditation of becoming small, he observed the ether gazers and everything they revealed. The ether gazers were very adept at blocking out all thought, but the human function of waste removal created a momentary lapse of vigilance. As a member of the discreet clan took a reprieve and urinated, his guard was down for the shortest moment. It was then that the Mage sifted through the residue of his thoughts and found what the focus of his mind had been on. The prophecy child! The ether gazers had been so astute at shielding this being, but a flash of a human emotion and thought escaped from the monk with the fluids from his bladder. The prophecy child was a girl, and her name was Sabine.
26

fresh air

Sunlight on skin felt like a welcoming embrace. Sabine was blinded by it at first , but enjoyed it like a fresh mango. The sun was orange and delicious. As her body was emerging from the hatch, she felt a change stir deep within her. She felt like something very new yet very old was about to happen soon.

The rust in her eyes flushed itself out with the remainder of her tears and she was able to see to determine what her surroundings were. On the stone pebble covered roof of the warehouse, Sabine could see the entire worker complex. There were seven buildings in all, two of which were being newly constructed. There were men building the new buildings and guards watching them. _Maybe Nimol is diversifying and enslaving men here at the work hotel._

She could see the new fence corridors that encircled the compound. She guessed that she would have never escaped the first time had they been in place, and she had no idea how she was going to do it again. There were guards in towers, guards on the ground walking and guards on the roofs of the other buildings. She didn't see any guards on the roof of the building she was on now, not from where she was squatting.

Sabine stayed very low and gently closed the hatch that she had just came through. She used her skills at becoming invisible and twisted her body into an unlikely position where she rested. This odd shape would not appear human to anyone slightly gazing at it. She sucked her aura inside and created an energetic whirlpool around herself that would deflect attention if it happened upon her. She didn't know what to expect out there in the fresh air.

From her perched position, she scanned her surroundings more meticulously. Her gaze located the main gate that passed through the double fenced patrol road. Through the gates she recognized what must have been the road on top of the dam of the reservoir she almost drowned in. She could see the spires of the temples in Monument city off in the distance and could recognize the amazing stone spires carved by slaves over a thousand years ago. In the sunny clear day she could see the hills and mountains even further away and longed to be on this distant horizon. Behind her in the hills she saw another dam and another reservoir nestled into the mounded slopes that housed temples even older than the Monument city.

This land was her home. It was beautiful to her. She could not accept that it was being controlled by a stupid buffalo like Nimol, and Chinese soldiers who were slaves themselves. _There needs to be a change, a reckoning, a return to beauty. There needs to be a way out of here. If I could make it to the lake, I could swim across and get to the far side, where I could use the cover of the trees and find my way home....home..._

Sabine pondered her home and wondered what may have become of it. She wondered if her father was OK. She wondered where her other siblings might be. She remembered the image of her mother and Aom. _I can't try and escape here without them, but how can I get them free? I don't have any idea where Nimol is confining them. Buffalo! What do I do now?_ She went inside herself and began to become small, hoping she could search for them from within by tuning into them. She reached out to her mother through her memories.

She could see mother at the table chopping vegetables and throwing the seeds and stems onto into a bucket. She could see Aom as a little boy, picking up the seeds and putting them in his mouth. She remembered playing with the papaya seeds like they were little marbles and throwing them at Aom. The memories were wonderful but they did not reveal anything about their location in the slave facility. _Where are you!_

_I am right here!_ came a thought into Sabine's mind. It was not her own. _Sabine! It's Kalianne. I feel you!_

Kalianne! My sister! Where are you now!

I wish I was on the roof with you! But I am inside the sewing room on the floor. The guards have us all low to the ground with rifles trained on us. The women jumped to revolt too quickly. We made a nice dent in their control, but without any real guidance, the women were easily beat back down by the guards. Sabine, I can see you in my mind. It is sunny where you are. We need the moon though, not the sun. I believe the moon can empower the women here to destroy this place once and for all.

Kalianne! What are you talking about? The moon?

Yes! The moon! She is bright and beautiful and full. We can focus her energy to create a new tide, a tide that can swell up and break the control of the men keeping us down.

I don't understand! Kalianne, what are you suggesting?

Don't worry about it for now Sabine. You need to come back to us. We need you!

I found a way out of the building, but I don't know how to get off of the grounds. There are guards everywhere. We can climb their fences, but we won't be able to dodge their bullets.

You don't have to dodge their bullets! You can let them pass right through you!

What the buffalo are you talking about!

Sabine, right here, inside yourself, you can talk to me. How is that possible?

We are sisters, and we feel each other.

You can feel the steel of their weapons, and let it slide through you. When we become small, we can influence every piece of the collective colony that we call ourselves. If a bullet is coming into your body, all you have to do is gently move your organs out of its way and let it pass through you without it ever touching what you believe is you. It is the way that monks can be in two places at the same time, or resist knife edges and policemen's guns. The Christ knew how to do this and could even walk on water or through solid stone.

I am not a monk or a christ.

You are the prophecy Sabine! You will walk on water, through walls and more once you realize!

I don't feel that at all Kalianne. I am just a punk little kid with a bit of sass and no shoes.

Sabine! You are our hope!

Hope? Hope is the biggest restriction of growth. Hope is a cigarette in cancerous lips. Hope is what people use to avoid reality! Hope is what people think about instead of doing something.

Hope is what keeps people going when there is every reason to stop, like the women here. They have never been as hopeful in their lives until they met you! If we harness that hope, together, just imagine what our collective will and focus can create! Alone, I don't think any of the women here are practiced enough to avoid injury from bullets, but you could show them, and they would believe! Belief is the strongest thing they have! It is as strong as hope!

I want to believe you sister, but right now, I have to find my mother. I am coming back inside!

With a new feeling inside her that was something like hope, Sabine quietly and carefully crawled back into the hatch and closed it above her. She climbed down the rusty drain vent pipes and back to the hole in wall of the room Nimol left her in. She peered through the hole she made, somewhat proud of it, and saw the door was closed. She crawled back into the room and tried the door. It was still locked. She guessed that no one had noticed she had ducked out for a breath of fresh air.

Sabine sat down on the bench and wondered about the gaping hole in the wall. She deemed it was best if she could delay any one seeing it. She closed her eyes and meditated on how to conceal it. Her mind went in several directions at once and it was difficult to quiet her thoughts, which were about her family, Kalianne, the sun and the moon.

What was Kalianne talking about with the moon? I wish I could plug this hole with the moon.

A new thought came into Sabine's mind and crowded out the other ones. She saw the moon shining bright in her mind and could feel the sun's rays reflecting off of it and onto her. She felt the power of the moon, its density, its heaviness, its gravity. She thought of it as a heavy stone. She thought of the stone that made the blocks that formed the walls around her. She focused on the tiniest grains of sand within the blocks. She felt the structure of those grains of sand and their components. There were silicates within the mortar. Mirrors were made of glass just like sand. _Yes! That's it!_

Sabine retreated inside and became small, within herself, within her mind. She focused on the glass-like particles of the grains of sand exposed where she beat a hole in the wall with her fists and feet. She found that she could interact with these particles and shift them slightly, on an atomic level. She could sense that they were mostly space, with a very small amount of matter in the form of swirling electrons and a pulsing nucleus. In this small state, it was easy to negotiate the slightest movement in them, with only the power of her own will and consciousness. Interacting with everything around her had become easy and natural. She oriented all of the grains of sand so that they became reflective with their silicate matrix. In essence, she created a million tiny mirrors that reflected whatever surface faced them, by doing this, the hole in the wall vanished and appeared as a solid wall.

The hole in the wall was still there, which she had to prove to herself as she placed her hand in it. It was remarkable! Even Sabine could not see the hole, but her hand was in it! The door to her chamber swung open loudly as it bludgeoned against the wall. Sabine snapped her hand back quickly and turned to see her unwanted fiancee standing there.

Nimol was standing there with a smile on his face. He actually looked happy. She wondered what he knew about the actions of her last fifteen minutes. "Have you memorized the vows I prepared for you, Darling?" Nimol said with a sweetness that could have been real or fake. Sabine couldn't tell. She looked down to see the crumpled paper on the floor. She hoped that it was a good distraction from the hole in the wall, that was but wasn't there.

Nimol's smile turned into a flatness when he saw the paper all crumpled up into a ball. "You would do well to abide my wishes...Darling!" He said with no expression. "You would find no better a husband in all of Cambodia. I am of royal blood and that will make you a princess. Little princess Sabine! With her magnificent husband, the most powerful man in the realm. Do you not crave power, dear one?"

Sabine was laughing to herself inside and tried to conceal it on her face. _Little Princess Sabine!_ The words struck her as hilarious. _Magnificent husband!_ It was too much to bare and her deepest meditation could not quell the burst of laughter that sputtered out of her mouth. In her attempt to cease the laughter, she snorted, and began to laugh even harder. Nimol was out of his mind with rage when he saw her reaction.

"You impudent fool!" Nimol shouted at her. "I can grant you the best life that any woman could dream of, and you laugh in my face? I can destroy you and your family, with just the wave of my hand! Do you smite the hand that would give you riches and power?"

"Princess Sabine is sorry, your oily highness!" She chuckled to him and curtseyed in the most mocking manner. This made Nimol want to strangle her right there. He ran at her with his hands reaching in front of him, as he intended to do just that. He was quickly forgetting his plan to marry the girl and choking her to death trumped his recent plans of matrimony.

As Nimol lunged for her, Sabine ducked down, leaned forward, and launched herself at his balls. Nimol's arms went over her crouched body that extended head first into his crotch. She head butted his balls with such a force that it made him screech and gasp in horrible, dull pain. He fell to the floor in a fetal position and Sabine easily rolled out of the way.

Guards filed into the room as Sabine quickly jumped up into a fighting stance and implemented a turning kick that took the legs out from under the first guard to get near her. The second guard received a foot as well, but in his jaw, as she jumped up and placed a snap kick on his chin, knocking him backwards and driving his teeth through his tongue. The third guard connected a club to Sabine's shoulder with a downward motion, but in her quickness she lowered her body, lessening the force with which it struck her. His balance was slightly off with the motion of his hands on the downward moving club, and Sabine crouched all the way to the ground, using her hands to help put even more strength into a spinning kick that collapsed this guard like a paper bag.

Two guards ran over to Nimol and were trying to aid him as he moaned and tears ran down his scrunched up face. Nimol tried to push the men away but he could not take his hands away from his aching testicles. The small room was filling up quickly and Sabine took advantage of being a small person in tight quarters. She was better able to maneuver in these conditions, and was a better fighter than any of the men in the room.

She used all of the mixed martial arts in her repertoire and disabled two more guards with combinations of kicks and jabs. She fought her way next to Nimol and was able to place a powerful forward kick into his exposed temple, as his hands were still busy clutching his broken eggs. She briefly noticed his body go limp as she continued battling the guards who were having great difficulty executing any blows in such close quarters. Sabine saw an opportunity and used her small size to her advantage, by diving and sliding, feet first through a man's open stance. As she passed under his legs, she threw a powerful punch upwards and cracked a couple more eggs on her passage through.

She forced her way near the door and fought her way through it. When she got out of the room, she could operate more freely, but so could the guards. As valiant as she fought, they were able to overcome her efforts and wrestle her to the ground, pinning her down and stopping her frenzied attack. Sabine strained every fiber of every muscle in her body, but could not struggle her way free. Her hands were soon bound with restraints as well as her feet as the guards made quick work of detaining her. She heard a man shout from inside the room, "Nimol! He's dead!"
27

orders

The Mage knew he had to get out of the confines of the royal palace soon. Guards would undoubtedly discover Arun's body soon and Arun had left a smoking gun, pinning the Mage to the mass murders of many Chinese citizens. Rather than stay within the Empire, get invested in an extensive coverup and find a new puppet, the Mage realized that it was time to get out. Things were set in motion on this day that would alter what the history books would one day describe as scandalous. The Mage's plans to convert the earth into a massive slave empire did not require so much loyalty, but rather a succession of dupes to be used in his favor.

His exodus would have to happen soon, but first the Mage wanted to contact Nimol and tell his nephew what he had just discovered. He would have Nimol kill the child that was within his very walls of confinement. _To think that this little paradigm shift was living in confinement within the walls of my nephew's slave shop for more than half a year! Nimol is a fool! But he is my fool! Now I can finally eliminate the main threat to my rise to power. With the prophecy girl dead, no one can alter my authorship of a new legend!_

The Mage repositioned himself in his chair to take the strain off of his back which ached of old age. All of his powers of neutering reality seemed to be lacking in ability to avoid old age. He knew this would change soon when he mastered the ability to embodiment jump. Soon enough he would find a new vessel for his essence and remove the current bearer of his incarnation. He considered that he might just move into his nephew's body.

Nimol may be a good candidate for soul extraction. I know his soul well. Hah! I programmed much of it. He believes he is of royal blood because I suggested he was. I will move his soul into an ant, and he can lead battles on the ground for control of a mound of dirt. That is more fitting for a buffalo of his intelligence! Now, Nimol, hear me. Nimol! Your communicator is not responding. It is somewhere cold? Cold in Cambodia? Nimol! Answer me!

The women in detention in their lock down status noticed a confusion spawning among the guards. The guards began whispering to each other and running from station to station with confusion on their faces. The guards seemed to be paying less attention to the workers and looked panicky when they did. Some of the younger guards became more trained on the slave workers and wildly pointed their guns in anxiety. Something had happened. The women could sense it.

Kalianne had been psychically contacting the most sensitive women and urged them to contact all of the ladies around them in a telepathic manner. Kalianne was trying to connect a network of empowered women to each other for an event in the very near future. She knew that the power of this group of women, if they were all focused on the same intent at the same moment, could move a mountain if necessary.

One by one, the elders, the women and the girls, began to feel each other's presence and they held on to that bond. It was very powerful, and with every girl linking up to it, it grew even stronger, so that even the least adept meditator could feel it and join in. They held this connection by passing on a slogan phrase that held their attention, 'wash away your fear.' All of the ladies tuning into this etheric channel chanted the words and became empowered by it.

The older ladies aided the younger ones. The strong ones gave some of their natural power to the weak ones. One by one, the feminine forces combined their focus on joining each other in purpose. They were forgetting their fears and feeling empowered. A static energy within the complex was growing like a tree reaching up to greet a lightning bolt. The guards felt this too and became more panicked, as the energy grew to electrifying proportions and the hairs on the back of their necks began to rise.

The guards did not know what was going on. Their day had shifted to chaos, and fear began to grow within the men as the women cast it aside. It was transferred by nature of the situation. A shift in power was occurring that was much bigger than any of them could imagine, but they could unmistakably feel it, like a pressure within the earth rising to the surface, seeking a release.

The women did not know what was going on either, but they undeniably felt it and joined in. They could see the confusion in the guards faces and feared them even less, accelerating the shift of power in everyone's minds. The men felt empowered buy guns. The women felt suppressed by men with guns. Now, men with guns seemed more like bees with stingers that might be swatted away. Some of the women felt like they could go swat the guards away with their own hands.

In the minutes that the ladies spent sitting on the floor with armed guards pointing their phallic weapons at an unfamiliar force, the women heard Kalianne telepathically translate a prophecy to them.

Beneath the roof of the holy Lady the faint voice heard,

Human flame seen to shine as divine,

It will cause the earth to be stained with the blood of the loved ones,

And to destroy the holy temples for the impure ones.

Within the most fundamental aspects of the world affected by the presence of dominance,

A holy feminine presence will be heard as a gentle but important voice.

This very human flame will be seen to shine in divine light.

Its presence will cause the world and all who live in it to be changed, into a truer way,

which will include the death of the dominance of male ego influence.

The Eternal Life Within is the eternal light inside of you all!

The prophets of long ago spoke of her.

The world is ready for her.

You know her! She is Sabine. The little girl we love and admire.

The ether gazers have protected her from harm all the while the male world tries to destroy her.

Listen to her as you have done already.

Know what you already know!

She will bring a power to the world that has been suppressed for a very long time.

She brings the gentle, excruciating force of love!

Women began to weep as they felt this transmission. This felt real and true and a long time in coming. Everyone of them had been suppressed in their lives by men in some way, but never so much as they had been held down as slaves within the solid block walls, working in confinement, serving the male warlike ego that has dominated the planet for so long, as long as history tells. A tide was rising, and it was the flow of the feminine power, emerging like a storm that would rain down and extinguish angry volcanoes.

For every woman tuning in in the compound, the feeling of being held down by a man or a boy in some way, that memory, that feeling, fed their solidarity and their own sense of power with righteousness. Even the youngest girls, raped by their brothers and policemen and soldiers, felt this empowerment and believed in themselves, their sisters, and Sabine. They knew Sabine was something very special.

Some of the women knew of the prophecy and were validated in their hope. The ones who never heard of the prophecy until now were instant, undeniable believers. The force within the block walls was so strong that some of the men began to shake with fear. The men had fear for the reprisal against their own sins against women. The coalescing power happening around the men made them fear their own feminine sides, but most of all, they had fear of the unknown, and what was going to happen next.

Kalianne kept a cosmic channel broadcasting a message of the prophecy to all of the women and girls, who linked up more and more in numbers and in power. It was a power like methamphetamine gives a tiny glimpse of of the hidden world to the user. This tiny glimpse of power from a drug reveals to the user what the true power is, a power that is already within and requires no chemical assistance to access. A high experience can show the user that they themselves are the inner light that burns and is the lathe of all creation, begging to be turned. The user then must decide whether to stay asleep or claim there own power.

Kalianne and the other women began calling out to Sabine as they connected and grew in their synergy. _Sabine! We love you! We feel you! We are with you! Where are you Sabine! We need you! Help us get out of this women's hell and get on with life. You are the one! Right this wrong! Come to us Sabine! We love you! We love ourselves because you showed us what we are!_

Kosal, the Mage, reached out in his mind and felt his contact's connection had gone dead. Nimol was dead. His nephew, the puppet, was dead. _Oh well, a minor setback. I shall choose another puppet with which I can pull the strings of power. Darayan! He is within my bloodline. He will suffice for now, until he is no longer needed._ The Mage tried to connect telepathically with Darayan, but there was too much energy bouncing around him to make contact. The Mage could not see, feel or access anything near the slave compound where Nimol lie dead. The Mage couldn't confirm if Nimol really was dead. There was something huge happening at the slave pit. _It must be Sabine! The prophecy is real! It is coming true!_

The Mage felt a little pang of fear within himself. He knew that if the prophecy were true, a change in power was inevitable. He used his mundane communicator to contact Darayan. This girl, Sabine, had to be destroyed now. She could not be allowed to effect a sea change in the world. It would upset the balance of power that existed since the Amazons and the Atlantians were cast out. Women's power was not logical or sustainable, the Mage knew. _They do not focus on the true control of nature. Man can dominate nature and has. Man has built civilization as we know it. Women would surely reduce that to a purely emotional existence if they were to shape reality. An existence of feelings and compassion. Compassion never won a war. Feelings never built an Empire._

"Darayan! What is going on down there? Where is my nephew Nimol?" The Mage spoke into the air, forgetting that he did not have an interface card to receive and transmit his message. He realized this and grew more enraged. This day was proving to be a real buffalo. The Mage used his powers to create a channel into the network of interface computers and connected himself to the archaic devices of telecommunication that the world used. He hated to belittle himself by using this Empire satellite network to contact the work complex.

"Darayan. Give me word of what is the state of affairs around you!" The Mage spoke into the air again, this time, his words were uplinked to an Empire controlled satellite which broadcast the message to Darayan's communication abilities through his interface card.

"Great uncle Kosal!" Darayan shouted back into the air as he ran to the main control center of the complex. "I don't know how it happened, but Nimol has been killed! They say he was killed by one of the prisoners!"

Darayan had heard within the frantically spreading wildfire of rumors that it was Sabine who killed him with only her foot. Everyone in the compound, including the guards, had known of Sabine already, as she was the most talkable thing as of late, but now her name was spreading like a disease among the guards and men of the slave facility. Darayan withheld mentioning her name to Kosal, his uncle the Mage. In his heart, he still loved her, and did not want to reveal her deed to his great uncle.

"Forget Nimol! You are in command of the dealings there now. I am sending this command to all so that none will dispute it," called out the Mage into the air, feeling menial using such primitive means of monitorable communication. The Mage used this menial communication to link to every communicator at the facility. He wanted everyone to hear this, so that no one would resist his orders.

"Your first task is this! Seize the girl known as Sabine and strap her to the destabilizing chair. Send a current through her body that will turn her into fried, burnt, pork belly! Liberate her body from its soul! Do it now, and do it in front of the largest concentration of women present. I want them to see what happens to those who defy our power! I will kill anyone who does not uphold this decree, including yourself!"

Surely the Empire would clue in on this transmission and Arun's death within seconds. It was time for the Mage's exodus. The Mage vanished from his chamber like a viewing screen going blank. He became small and allowed his essence to float like smoke into the breeze. He exited the royal palace on currents of energy and sound. Within moments, he was hundreds of kilometers away from The Golden Rising Empire's expansive palace. The Mage rematerialized within a tiny modest yurt in what had once been known as Mongolia. He had retained a meditation temple there where he occasionally retreated for solitude. This time, he retreated there for sanctuary.

Darayan was very distressed by his uncle's command. He did not want to hurt Sabine. He had been influencing the guards to be less brutal to her, ever since the night she slipped away from his grasp at the lake. He regretted ever turning her in to Nimol and the slave shop. She was too good for this place, he knew, and should never have been made a slave. _Make her a slave is exactly what I did!_ He had searched the city for desirable women and brought them back to the compound to work as elite sex slaves. He had always chosen the best girls. He was good at what he did. He hated himself for it now.

Darayan could not resist the Mage's command. The Mage could reach through time and space and pluck out a man's eyes. Darayan had seen it happen. Now he must order Sabine's death. The facility's widespread guard population had heard this message. Darayan knew he had to do it, or face death himself.

Darayan made an announcement to the entire facility, against his own will, "Transfer Sabine to the reconditioning chamber and assemble all of the slaves that will fit in the room for observation. Nimol, our benefactor is dead. This is Darayan Loungvixay. I am now in command of the facility. Kill any girl or man who resists this action." Darayan changed his direction and began walking to the electrocution room, where women were given shock treatments as torture and reconditioning, or killed. His heart sank into deeper regret. _What am I?_
28

acceptance

The link was broken. The tide, subsided. The women, redirected. The brutal butts of gun stocks smashed into necks and heads to prod the female slaves along like ungulates in a meat factory. The guards packed the reconditioning room full of workers and pushed them down to the floor. Any of them seen talking or placing their hands together in prayer were beaten. The facility was back under control of the guards, who took out their anger on the women with a vengeance.

Many guards were glad that Darayan had been passed command. Nimol was a freakish man who did as many terrible things to the male guards as he did to the women. Darayan was young and handsome, and was as charismatic as a honey-skinned, Cambodian man could be. He had the blessing of the blue eyes and exuded exotic attractiveness. He was accepted by many of the younger guards instantly as a welcome change to the cruel and strange Nimol.

In the reconditioning room, an ancient piece of technology sat on a dais two steps above the floor, looking ominous and distressing. A huge mirrored panel wall was the frontage for a viewing room which was packed with guards, ready to observe the spectacle. They were excited and some of the men laughed and punched each other, grateful to be having a reprieve from the day's odd flow of events. The men were back in charge of the captives that they believed must have been part of some strange, unknown, black magic.

A door to the side of the dais opened and a group of guards led Sabine into the over-packed room. All together, the women rose their voices in protest and tried to stand up and move towards her. There were too many guards for them to succeed in this push, and they were beaten down. Several women were shot. The guards cheered as Sabine was led to the chair and made to sit down and get strapped in. The women moaned, wailed and cried in absolute despair, all the while being beaten for any sound they made.

The flow of linked up energy that the women created together had been dispersed. The energy was still present, but it had turned to remorse and despair. Sabine's mother, who was in the crowd of women sitting on the hard cement floor, silently prayed for her daughter as tears rolled onto the floor.

Be strong my baby! You will be with your father and the angels soon. He will take you in his arms and hold you tight. I am so sorry my little Sabine! They killed Vannak when they came and extracted us. They said he was too old to be worth feeding and they stabbed his weak beaten body when they took me and your brother Aom away. I was able to hide your other brothers and sisters. I am so sorry I couldn't hide you! Buddha is in your heart! Let your light shine little one!

The lights in the room flickered as the ancient mechanism was tested for voltage current levels. This machine in which Sabine was now strapped, was a leftover piece of equipment, formerly on display in a museum. It had been used to torture and kill prisoners during the American war in Laos, where the Viet Kong army passed through the country to attack the south. The American bombs dropped in Laos had destroyed much of the country, but this piece of machinery had escaped destruction, unlike much of the terrain in Laos.

Sabine sat quietly, unresisting. She looked out among the women and girls and saw the pain in their faces. She felt so much love for them at that moment. They were such a gift to the earth. She wished her arms could reach out and hug them all in a compassionate embrace. They had toiled for the men who drove them to produce war items and the women received strife as compensation. Sabine imagined a world where these women were the leaders, making decisions for the people. She guessed that world would not have prisons, but rather large tables full of heaping plates of food for everyone. Women are the providers for mankind.

As Sabine looked around the room, she located her mother sitting there, and she was looking right back at Sabine. Her mother's face was full of tears and looking so sad. She wanted to comfort her mother and tell her not to worry. Sabine wasn't afraid for herself but hated to think of what would happen next to her mother and all of the women. She tried to reach out to them with a thought and told them, _don't cry, don't fear, love whoever is sitting next to you. You already own the world. You are the backbone of the world. Never recant your love. You bring love into the world in the form of babies. Men can never do this, but you can love them too. Love your families. Love each other._

This message broke through to all of the women in the room and throughout the entire compound. It even transcended the walls of the complex and women working in farms nearby felt the message. The women felt the love. They felt Sabine's love and knew that she was speaking to them, that she was inside them. They felt the oneness return. They felt the love and sent it back to Sabine. Smiles began to erupt on some faces and there were now tears of joy spattering the hard concrete.

Something new was happening to Sabine, and to the slave worker women. Sabine felt calm and unafraid, even though she was strapped into an electric chair. Everything seemed to make sense. The men were aggressive, the women were hard working and kind, this was the way things were and had been. Sabine accepted this as normal, but not acceptable. The only logical thing to do was to change it, _but how?_

Sabine stopped thinking about herself completely. She could only think about her family, her friends and the women she slaved with. They were everything and Sabine poured her appreciation out to them. It was her doing this, but it felt more real than ever, and completely unselfish. Sabine felt like she was in a place where no one could hurt her, as she looked at the restraints on her hands and feet. They looked like Gothic jewelry to her and she smiled.

A loud voice on a speaker broke the wailing sounds of the room. "Why do you resist our authority?" Darayan spoke these words, pleading with the women. "The world is a harsh place, but there is protection here." He didn't know what to say so he said the first thing that came to mind. He wasn't believing his own words. He knew that if he didn't complete this order, Ponlok, the next senior officer would take control and execute Sabine. Darayan did not want to die from ignoring this inevitable mandate. _What can I do?_ He turned and looked at Sabine. She was smiling at him.

Sabine had loved Darayan, and hated him. She now knew a deeper feeling. A true compassion for all things. It was a choice, to feel compassion, not a learned response or a religious mandate. It was not something she learned so much as it was a feeling that rose from within. _Why do I feel this way?_

She loved everyone in the room, including Darayan, and including herself. She did not condemn herself for not being able to do more to save these ladies. She didn't condemn herself for fighting Nimol and the guards. She felt the truest thing she ever felt in her life. Love. Not any definition of romantic or altruistic love, but a choice in her heart to love everything. In that second, she became small and loved everything about existence. It was not a big chasm that she crossed to get to this point, it was as easy as taking a single step.

"Give the command." said Ponlok, who leaned over and whispered into Darayan's ear. "Do it now before any more riots divert our human resources.

"I can't!" Darayan said deflated. He was ashamed he couldn't follow the orders of the Mage, but he did not have it in him to kill Sabine.

"Give the command by the Mage's order."

"This is not right! None of this is right!"

"If you don't give the order, I will assume command and place you in detainment. This is going to happen no matter what. Do you want to watch it from a position of power or hear it from a solitary confinement cell?"

"Ponlok, my uncle is dead. The Mage is not here. We run this facility now. Let's change the way things are done here. It can be better. Look at how much the production level rose in the last month! This was because of this girl Sabine! She influenced the ladies to do more. Nimol knew this. He thought he could get even more out of them by making Sabine part of the system by marrying her. My uncle had strange ways but he was a smart man and he was right about her! She is like no other woman I have ever seen!"

"Give the order now. Serve your master!"

"I can not. I will not."

"That is your choice?"

"Yes."

"So be it."

Ponlok turned to the guard behind Darayan and nodded. The guard understood and struck Darayan on the back of his head with the butt of his gun. Darayan dropped to the floor, bleeding from his ear. Ponlok raised a gun above his head and fired two shots into the ceiling. Two holes appeared where the bullets pierced the roof and a tiny bit of moonlight made a faint white glow where they pierced through.

Ponlok stepped forward and announced. "By the order of the Mage, Kosal, This defiant worker is being destroyed for her crimes." Ponlok looked over to the control operator and said, "Execute!"
29

reckoning

A moment so thick that it would take a chainsaw to cut it, hung about the room after the command was given. Extreme quiet screamed loudly within the chamber, echoing nothingness. Emotion ran high in the divide that was gender. Two sides of the same creation were separated only by genitalia. All eyes were on Sabine, even the man controlling the rheostat set to zero, his hand on the knob, ready to turn it towards the number ten. Ten was the number of death, ten thousand volts of electricity.

Sabine felt this moment was her entire life. Her skinned knees from falling when she was a child, her angry and friendly school teachers, her boyfriends, her virginity, her menses, her mother, her brothers and sisters, all blended together, not in a linear path but into an eternal moment. Her birth felt no different from her death. It was all a dance she had been dancing to, with cosmic music resonating from every single spec of existence, from every person, place and thing, from every drop of water, from every wooden match.

There was no remorse or regret. There was only love. Sabine had been a fighter her entire incarnation. She fought bullies on the playground as a little girl. She fought hunger when she went to bed with no food in her belly. She fought brutal thugs who would try to capture her for sordid reasons. She fought for air when she was drowning in a lake. She fought addiction to escape the suffering in the world, And now, the fighting stopped.

She had no desire or will to fight. She saw its purpose and did not condemn it. She saw a reason to stop fighting. It was love. In that realization, Sabine was more than just her mortal shell, she was the expression of the compassionate goddess Quan Yin. She was the mother of all beings. She had become small and was inside herself, soaring into the inner light that she had carried all along.

This unfolding within her was the prophecy foretold ages ago and longed for by the suffering of women, and men, for so many generations. Sabine's death was not a remorseful event, but a celebrated destiny of overwhelming compassion. There is no greater thing one can do than reach out to truly help someone. This golden rule, this commandment, this joyful expression of humanity became the breath of what was the little girl Sabine. Her eye's shed a compassionate tear for the suffering of all humans, and where that tear fell on the hard concrete, a crack suddenly appeared and split the solid, man-made floor in half.

Nearby, a woman was sitting on a short bamboo table stringing tobacco leaves onto a piece of twine. She looked up at the full moon and felt its radiance. This woman, Davi, saw a flash of light coming from up on the hill where the slave compound lie. It was like a fire exploded light into the sky from that dreadful place. She shuddered at the thought of it, and remembered the poor little flower, Sabine. Her heart was heavy for having turned her in to the angry men that visited them so often. She wondered how that truly wonderful little flower was doing. She wondered where her children were. She felt the earth shake and rumble like a herd of buffalo was running somewhere.

The women sitting on the floor of the reconditioning room felt it shake and saw the crack appear in it. It made a sound like a giant stone door being opened for the first time in a thousand years. At the same time the crack appeared, the man at the switch turned the knob from the number zero all the way up to ten. Sabine's body was the conductor of an unthinkable amount of electrical current and she lit up like an angel. The room flashed with light as bright as the moon and the roof began to split open.

As the high voltage ran through the metal electrodes and into Sabine's body, she became ever smaller. She observed the atoms and electrons of her own body, passing the flow of energy at the speed of light, yet slower than a drop of sap dripping from a tree. She reached out and touched it, feeling its power and admiring it for what it was. It was an ocean of tiny little strings from a musical instrument as large as the universe. It played the song of existence and Sabine knew every note.

The electricity passed through her body like a waterfall of light. The light within her, in which she now rested, played with this current and sang with it. It was a song of sisters and mothers and grandmothers. It was a song that linked back to the first human, connected by the navel scar on every being. The electricity did not harm Sabine in the slightest. Doubt was the only thing that could possibly hurt Sabine, but doubt was cast aside, for it had no purpose here. She smiled at everyone who could no longer see her. She was totally enveloped in pure, white light.

The women heard Sabine's voice singing in their minds, calling them to join each other like they had already done this painful day. The link between them all strengthened its bonds and was in place as quickly as a thought. They felt each other. They felt Sabine. They felt the love and the need for love. They felt their inner light and embraced it. They felt heir own power and the need to cast away doubt. Doubt is the self imposed constrictor of power, and had no place here. They connected like magnets and created a force so strong that the earth shifted slightly on its axis.

The men could not believe what they were seeing. It seemed as if Sabine's body had caught on fire and exploded into a blinding flash. Fear raced through them as they cowered to avoid the light's brilliance. Something was not right. This should have been a routine execution, with a single small body being disconnected from its life. None of them had ever seen anything like this. None of them had ever seen a light so bright, brighter than every welding rod in the world melting metal. Brighter than a thousand green flashes at sunset. Brighter than lightning hitting a million transformers at a power facility.

Many of the men felt that they were part of something that was very wrong. Doubt was very much alive in them and the light burned their skin. Some men became blind. Some ignited into flames. But some felt the true nature of this light and basked in its brilliance. Those men were not rebuked, but welcomed into the fold and became part of the link up of souls happening now.

Darayan came back to consciousness and shielded his eyes from the blinding light beside him. Then, he stopped blocking it and stared right into it, admiring it, loving it, loving with it. He saw an amazing light which flooded the room and burst through holes that were appearing in the ceiling. It was coming from the space where the amazing little beauty was strapped to an electric chair. He could not stop tears from pouring from his eyes. He felt a love so powerful that it dwarfed any perception that he ever had of the idea of love. This was true, pure, unselfish love for all things. This was Sabine.

Sabine was calling to everyone to be free, as she had become. The huge light that filled the room and even the sky, was coming from the tiniest little point inside her. It was her inner light being released. It touched the light inside everyone not afraid of it and strengthened the receivers. Some women and girls became instantly enlightened, and no longer had use for their bodies on the earthly plane. These beings joined the many Buddhas and smiled down with light on everyone, as they were Buddhas themselves. A change in humanity was happening, and it was gentle, but not small.

There was no use for this worker facility anymore. It needed to go away. The vibration that occurred as the souls were linking up was so strong that it created a hum that was heard even in Monument city. The earth seemed to vibrate and tremble like an earthquake. The dam that retained water in the reservoir lake above the work facility began to release its bonds and turn to mud. It crumbled like chalk and water began to burst through it with the powerful gravitational force. The dam gave way and split apart from a crack that ran from the chair in which Sabine's body sat all the way to the lake.

A great wall of water raced down the slopes with gravity calling it home. Trees went along with the waves that rushed downward, tearing trees and vines from their roots. This powerful force approached the buildings that housed all of the women and guards in an avalanche of mud, rocks and wood. The flood appeared first in the reconditioning room as it began to flow upward through the crack in the floor. Sabine reached out to the ladies with compassion and ensured them that they need not fear _. Hold onto each other, with your hearts and your minds. Take each others hands and feel the safety you have in union. Be not afraid. You will inherit the earth._

The cascading force of liquid power reached what had been a home for slave workers and began to topple the walls. The stone, block and cement had no chance of resisting the water that ripped it apart, turning into sand and silt as it crumbled. The women, and some of the men, holding hands wherever they were, were shielded by a protective force that allowed the destructive wall of water to pass right over them. Walls, fences and vehicles were swept away to the larger lake below, along with the guards who had beaten and raped these women who toiled to make the men war uniforms and whiskey.

The women and few of the men, including Darayan, were spared from the powerful force of water and gravity. A sphere of protection enveloped them and the water flowed over them as if they were in an encysted bubble.

Tiny drops of water hitting against the permanence of rock seems negligible in power and purpose, until many drops come together as one collective force, which can turn rock into silt. That is what happened to the slave compound. It was reduced to wet dust. The women, toiling together as simple workers, could seem menial to some, but together, they created a force that could repel even a tsunami.

The larger lake that lay just below the destroyed buildings accepted the flow that poured into it. The overflow pipe shot water out of its giant opening like a water canon, ejecting the bodies of so many guards with another chance at reincarnation. Water spilled over the crest of the dam and created a rushing noise that people in villages and the Monument City heard and thought that the end of the world could be happening.

As the water from the upper lake ran its course, the flood subsided, The great lake of Tonle Sap swelled and its banks rose, as the women holding hands let out a thankful breath. They had all been spared miraculously by their own collective power. Nimol, the guards and the slave facility were no more. The full moon shown down brightly, mirroring itself in satisfaction on the surface of the lakes and puddles below. The moon actually looked boastful and vain. It was the brightest moon anyone in the region had ever seen.

The pure white light that emanated from Sabine retreated back inside her. Everyone around her had red skin as if they had been sunburned by brilliant rays. Their skin was red, and would be for the rest of their lives, as would their children, and their grand children's children. This was the beginning, the creation of a new race of human, a race of people that knew the power of water, the power of the moon, the power of women, the power of the light within. Sabine stood up from the electric chair and it fell into splinters and shavings of metal when she did.

She smiled at the women who were also rising up and standing. Even the ladies that had been shot and beaten to death, rose with breath in their lungs again. A miracle had happened. A prophecy had taken place. A new beginning was underway. Cheers of joy rang out from the women's lips who hugged each other and laughed and cried. They embraced each other and they embraced the guards still standing, the guards who once beat them down. The guards wept like babies and were surrounded by loving arms rather than defiant fists.

Darayan looked up at Sabine. She was different, changed somehow, but still Sabine. Her eyes shone like diamonds and were so piercingly truthful that they saw right through him. He could not hide any part of himself or his thoughts. He was naked before the soul in front of him. He saw pure love looking at him. He was embarrassed and looked down, wanting to kill himself in regret. Sabine reached down and touched his shoulder, urging him to rise. He stood up and the beautiful being that was Sabine and so much more, hugged him with forgiveness and understanding. Tears streamed out of his eyes as he buried his face in her kind embrace.
30

a tree

Sabine had crossed over, into her true self. She had become enlightened, by touching the light that came from the big bang. Everyone and everything embodies a piece of this original event, an event with no beginning or end but a spiral of pulsing existence, and non-existence. Now, is the time for existence. Now is the time for everything. By touching the truest place within herself, Sabine had stepped back from the young adult that she was, and became pure radiance. She expressed this through becoming an expression of the deity, known as Quan Yin, the compassionate mother.

Sabine could hear the cries of the world now, having fully heard the cries of sorrow from the ladies who toiled along side her. She stepped into this ability like stepping into the most perfect pair of shoes for your feet, but shoes that had been worn by every human ever born, died, or not yet even conceived. She could feel the suffering of all of those beings, and with the overwhelming pain that exists in the world, the only path possible was overwhelming compassion. She felt sickness, old age, and death, and wanted to ease these pains in the world. The world needed her nurturing touch.

In every footstep that Sabine had walked throughout her life, willow trees began to sprout and grow towards the sun. The Buddha is said to have gained enlightenment while sitting under a tree. The energy of a tree is an unselfish Bodhisattva nature, and also a recorder of human events. The trees aid most other life forms with shade, shelter and nourishment, while slowly watching and listening to all. The tree sees humanity, its misgivings and successes, never judging, only co-existing. Sabine would be remembered for hundreds of years, everywhere these trees grew. Every tree offers every person a protective place to sit under, and maybe even become enlightened.

In disbelief, the ladies watched as a tree began to grow up from the crack in the cement floor, splitting it open even wider. The tree grew at thousands of times the speed that a tree would normally grow, because for Sabine, the illusion of time had been dispelled. She did not so much create this tree, but her compassionate tear, mixed with the soil of the earth, expressed itself this way, to strengthen the hearts of the people that would make pilgrimages to this very spot for thousand of years to come. This tree would take on the virtue of the Bhodi tree, and lend itself as a compass for every human to know their true direction.

Kalianne appeared from behind the tree and ran up to Sabine. They smiled at each other and joined in a strong embrace. For Kalianne, it was like hugging an angel. Kalianne wanted to say so many things but her lips and tongue could not form the words.

"Did you see.....It felt like..... bigger than.....but so small......Sister I love you!" Kalianne hugged Sabine even tighter, knowing that Sabine probably already knew everything that she was trying to say. Kalianne placed a pendant around Sabine's neck. It was a silver heart pendant. "This is for you. It was given to me by my lover, Heng, and it represents love. Love needs to be given away."

"Sister," Sabine said, as they stood under the branches of the tree that just sprouted up through the floor of what used to be their terrible but necessary home. "What you say is very true. Love needs to be given away. You and so many have shown me this. Soon, the rain will be coming again. Life will be verdant and abundant, but there will be storms and floods. We have weathered this storm, and grown stronger from the experience. We have cleansed the filth of this place, but it is yet stained with memories of suffering. Everyone here has been changed in some way. There will be new work to be done now. Will you lead them sister?"

"Sabine! You are truly the one explained in the prophecy!" Kalianne said with widening eyes. "If there ever was a leader, it is you! We love you Sabine!" Kalianne's eyes shone like diamonds, emitting power and energy.

"I know what I have to do next Kalianne." Sabine said without a smile on her face. "From here, these women will do many good things, and they need to have a focus. You could be that focus, by starting a new institution. I want you to build a school. I want you to offer the practice of meditation and of touching the inner the light within, to any person that will come. At first, it will be mostly women that will want to join, and a hive will grow here, a hive of sisters. Soon enough, men will see the true wisdom that these women share, and some will want to be part of the hive as well. Few will come, but they will be essential in this new society as well. The world is changing more quickly than it ever has before, and you can make very strong shifts in the world with a focus on love."

"Of course sister, we can build a school. Is that all that you would ask of us?"

"That is what you will do next. You will find a chest here with things in it you will need to build the school. The ladies here will want to be part of it and they will want to continue living here also. I want you to build a large house here as well, where everyone can live, and love, and work. These women and girls are the best workers in the world. Any products that are made here will be desired all around the world. People will come from around the world to see this willow tree. They will want to take a piece of this place back with them. There is much power here. The ladies can use their skills to make things from the gifts of the earth. The items that the red-skinned sisters make from the things growing here on this soil, will become relics around the world, linking those who are connected back to this place, where healing will always be possible."

"Sabine, this is all so amazing! I can see the school already. I can see the women making baskets and bowls from the bamboo and the clay here. I can see little girl's playing and dancing here. The Sisterhood will be so good for everyone! It is exactly what we need to do. We will turn what was once a prison of control, into an edifice of sharing. It will be so wonderful Sabine!" Sabine smiled and turned towards the new tree that had pushed its way up from the earth. She smiled softly at the tree's beauty and natural symmetry, and began to walk towards it. Kalianne called out, "Sabine? Where are you going?"

As Sabine walked around the tree, she said to Kalianne, and to the other ladies that were nearby, "This tree holds great power." She rested her hand gently on its massive solid trunk. "This tree has a healing power that will aid those still suffering from being invested in the wheel of life and death." Sabine leaned forward and kissed the tree, then continued walking around its trunk, still touching it. "Use this tree to make medicine that will aid those who have pain. Medicine should never know a price. Share it with everyone. Believe. Love. Share. Everything is possible."

Kalianne's mind raced with new ideas about the school, houses, and a society, right here. She watched Sabine circling the tree while touching it, ever so softly. Sabine spoke again, "Each of us must make our own true way. When we do, that way will express the universal way." Kalianne didn't see Sabine circling the tree anymore. She saw Sabine walk around its trunk, but not emerge on the other side of it. It was as if she disappeared. Sabine had only been walking around the tree in circles, like a little girl playing. There was nowhere she could have gone. There was nothing left but the tree, rising up through a crack in the cement where the building used to stand.

"Sabine!" Kalianne called out, expecting her to walk around the other side of the tree at any moment. She didn't. "Sabine!" She called out a second time, with a creeping melancholy. Kalianne considered that this day had been all too magical, and that it was perhaps a dream. She gave herself the proverbial pinch. Nothing. Kalianne knew that Sabine was not of this world anymore, and that she was going to miss her presence enormously. Sabine had disappeared into the air, or the ground, or the tree perhaps. No one saw where she went. She just...vanished.

Kalianne wanted to believe that Sabine was practicing her ninja stealth techniques and hiding from everyone, but she knew that this was not the case. Kalianne had a strong bond with Sabine and used to feel her, even when Sabine was ignoring the bond. Now Kalianne knew that Sabine had transcended her human form and had become pure consciousness. She could feel that Sabine had merged with a greater oneness than was possible for any soul on the earthly plane. Kalianne could still feel Sabine. Sabine was everywhere. She was in everything.

The other ladies nearby were confused as they looked for Sabine. They too were expecting Sabine to come walking around the tree and were puzzled when she did not appear. This day was full of miracles that were not ceasing. Sabine had become small, so small that the human eye could not perceive the subtle energy that she was. Sabine had a task to complete, a prophecy to fulfill. In a world where poverty and suppression continued to flood, that flow needed to be redirected to grow nourishing food that would sustain the masses.

The old paradigm of the male dominant, warlike society was crumbling at its foundations. All of the centuries of wars and power struggles had finally led humankind to a brick wall. When that wall is knocked down, there is not a continuing path to follow. In knocking down the barrier, that very act will forever change how people do things as civilization. The act of knocking down, of destruction, shows us that the competition, the aggression, is all futile. Those ways have served their purpose already, long ago. They show us that they don't work. Instead, they only add to the suffering, every time. In futility, there is created an opening for the opportunity for change to happen. Cooperation serves humanity so much better than competition.

Sabine would now spread this message to the minds of all that were open to it. As she resided in her inner truth, she could make that truth vibrate in every other person walking on the earth. It is something we all know, but we easily forget. This was going to be a wake up call, one of global proportions, but first, before reforming human civilization into a sister-hive of healing, the brick wall needed to be completely torn down.
31

unfinished business

The Mage sat in a full lotus meditative position in a remote hut, somewhere in the Burkhan Khaldun of the Khentii mountains in Mongolia. The Mage had remained isolated from all contact from others. He knew he was wise and clever, but technology was also very astute and could sense everything. For this reason, the Mage hid himself in a geographical feature that blocked the ability of the far reaching scanners of the Empire. The Empire that would be no more.

In his meditation, the Mage became small, touching the truest point within himself. Here, he could sense a great false light, a light that would tempt him and lure him. The Mage shunned this light, and built a great barricade of protection around it. He felt very empowered by this enclosure. From the safety of this inner realm, he could feel the vibration of the world. Its stirrings. Its tides. There was a new tide rising.

He knew that the girl of the prophecy was indeed real, and that she had not been completely destroyed by Nimol. The Mage still believed that if the prophecy were true, the Golden Rising Empire would fall to her waves of attack. The Mage understood that a power vacuum would become manifest with the fall of the Chinese born super power. None on the earth was better suited to fill that gap than he. He knew that there was no man on earth that could rival his abilities. By learning to become small at will, he controlled a power that few ever could withstand. Kosal, the Mage, would fill the world with control and discipline.

The people of the world will soon be trained to accept my wisdom. People are weak minded fools, and have been led by even bigger fools. The human race is an infestation of fools. There is no hope for their awakening, only their herding, and I will be the new shepherd of this flock of fools. I will enlist the aid of the one that brings down the Empire. I will give her my aid in destroying the Empire. As I have helped build it, I alone am the most prepared to take it apart. With whatever powers the girl Sabine is capable of, along with my expanded understanding of the flock, we shall shift the momentum of power to an even higher level. I will become known as King, and she will be my queen.

Sabine's mother sat on a low bamboo table and snapped the ends off of some meter-long beans. This day, when she checked her garden, it was as if the vegetables had grown overnight. She placed a healthy looking specimen in her mouth and chewed it with her worn, stained teeth. This bean was the most delicious bean she ever tasted. She sighed, wishing her family could all be there to taste this wonderful vegetable.

Her husband was dead. She thought of him and brought her hands together into the wai position, praying for his chances in the next life to be good for his health and body. She wondered where her son Aom might be. _I lost sight of my boy in the women's prison when my daughter erupted into electric flames. Sabine. It was so terrible how they treated you! But I know you are blessed and in the temple with the Buddhas now. Please guide your father Sabine. He had a hard life and needs to have an easy one next time. And please protect your family from the soldiers who came and took us away. I love you my daughter. Bless you. Bless you._

Jan looked out towards her wonderful garden and admired its bounty. Suddenly, she noticed there were children in her garden. _I hope they don't steal all of my vegetables. They are so beautiful that everyone will want to taste them._ She shouted at them through the window. "Save your mouths for singing! Don't steal from my garden please!" The children were not afraid and did not run away. Jan stood up and walked towards her door way, intending to shoo the children away with her broom. She grabbed her broom from the wall as she walked out the door towards her garden. The children heard her and turned around. It was Aom and his sister, Sabine.

_My Sabine!_ "Sabine! How is it that you are here? Oh my Sabine!" Jan called to her daughter who was standing in the garden, munching on sweet peas with her brother who was squatting next to a bush. Sabine was smiling. Jan ran over to her with her arms out and began to cry. She never thought that she would see her daughter again. Aom kept munching the extremely delicious peas and said with a mouthful of them, "Hello Mum. Good Peas!"

Sabine took her mother's hands in hers and said, "Mother, you have a very lovely garden."

Jan looked at all of the luscious vegetables that were growing there and nodded her head, saying, "Yes there was a gentle rain from no where last night, and this morning, these colorful, ripe fruits were on the plants. I've never seen anything like it!"

"Your garden will always be full of good things to eat," Sabine said, "Just keep putting love into it. I am sure that you and the children will never be hungry."

"What happened to you Sabine?" Jan said. "You look different, even more beautiful. Where did you go? I saw men making you sit down in that fancy chair and then there was a flash of light, and you were gone. I thought you were dead, but here you are!"

"I love you mom!," Sabine said as she hugged her mom. "But I have to go now. I have a new job."

"Never mind that job. I need help picking all of these vegetables. Stay here and help me with the garden."

"I will visit. You will know when I am coming home. But now, I have some work I have to go take care of. I wanted to see you. I wanted to see Aom and the little ones. I love you. Take care of Aom." Aom kept stuffing plump green peas in his mouth and munched them down quickly like they were candy.

Jan placed her hand on his head and ruffled his black hair. "I think he can take care of the peas for me!" Jan said with a laugh as her head tilted back and her eyes squinted shut with a laugh. When her head tilted back forward and her eyes opened, Sabine was not there. "Sabine?" she called out and looked around. "I love you, Sabine!"

Meas lay down and rolled over on to his back, exposing his soft, vulnerable under belly to the beautiful girl petting him. Meas had waited in the park for a very long time, and his fur had become matted and coarse. He was still a beautiful golden creature though, and now he was lit up and shining as Sabine petted him lovingly.

"Thank you for waiting for me, lovely one!" She said to the dog as she stroked his soft belly fur. "I was busy learning many things, or I would have met you earlier.." _Why did you wait for me for so long? If you knew I was coming, you could have relaxed._

The thought of you coming to the world was so exciting, all I could do was wait. And now you are here, compassionate one. Did you get my message?

Become small? Yes, I got your message.

You don't look small. You actually look very large!

In becoming small, I got bigger, but I can not stay here. There is a job left to do, and it is very far from here.

I'll go with you!

I have a better idea. Since you are so proficient at waiting, wait here just a little bit longer, and I will come back and see you.

When you come back, can we go together?

Yes, I would enjoy that. We will go together.

Alright then. I shall continue to wait for you.

Good bye, Pra Ajarn Malet.

Good bye Sabine.

The Mage opened his eyes and looked at the light coming through the cracks around the door to his yurt style hut. A bright light outlined the door and smoke from the fireplace danced in the rectangular streams of light entering his dark abode. "Come in." He said calmly. Several seconds later, the door opened slowly, and brilliant white light poured in through the opening. There was a figure standing in the center of it, a human figure, a girl.

"I've been expecting you." Said the Mage, again calmly. "Come in. Sit down please."

The figure of the girl moved through the incoming light fluidly as she entered the room. As the firelight illuminated this person, the Mage gazed upon Sabine for the first time. She was expressionless, wearing an ornate but simple white dress, with gold embroidery around the sleeves and neck. Her straight, black, hair hung down and spilled over her shoulders like a waterfall. The Mage was impressed. She may have been the most lovely creature that he had ever seen.

"You received my invitation, obviously." He said. "I am very glad that you came. We have a lot to discuss. Would you like some tea?" Sabine said nothing but looked at the Mage very intently, studying him, observing his features. The Mage looked to be about seventy years old. His hair was thin, peppered, curly, and hung down to his collar bone. He wore traditional Mongolian Deel clothing that was blue with a gold sash for the belt. He had a stump instead of a hand on his right arm. He looked wise, and mysterious. He had become the archetypical image of Erlick, the ruler of the underground. He was as intelligent as anyone ever had been, because he dedicated his existence to the rational mind and had full access to the Akashic records. He understood how everything in the universe worked.

"No, thank you." said Sabine. Still, there was no emotion showing on a single feature of her face. Stoic. She and the Mage locked eyes. The hut was no longer around them. The curved walls, the post and thatch ceiling, the rugs on the dirt floor, were all gone. The ground, and the Earth, were not there. No stars, No darkness. There was nothing, but the essence of the young girl Sabine, and the Mage.

Their eyes remained locked, yet they had no eyes. That which is inspired by what the eye sees, is the essence. The image of each other was lost forever, it had never happened, yet, it was burned into the reality like flaming lightning bolts. Sabine, white light, Quan Yin, of the compassionate sky. The Mage, all wisdom released, Erlick, of the underworld.

Locked, by existence, these forces are ever present. but ubiquitous only in the inspired one. The rock, the tree, the water, feel no eternal war of duality. The light in Sabine, the darkness in the Mage, can not exist without each other. If these opposite forces of humankind were to negate each other, they would have to enter the void, and that is where Quan Yin and Erlick were poised, on the directionless edge of the Abyss.

Here we are.

Yes, here we are.

Shall we enter?

No, not yet.

How many times have we met here with this question?

How many more times will we?

I wish to join you on the earthly plane. We would be a formidable, unstoppable force that would rule the world and its people. Civilization has been a failed state for many millennium. Together, we could help it to rise to a splendor not yet seen by human eyes. Be my wife, my queen, and we will usher in a new dawn. Not the dawn of the golden rising empire, they will dissipate like dust. We could usher in the dawn of the Siriun amalgamation.

Your vision is not complete. It lacks love.

Love? What is love, but a human conception like fairness. Love is a stepping stone, a skin to be shed. Surely you are ready to shed this skin. It no longer serves you! It makes you weak. Pure knowledge. Pure wisdom. Pure understanding of the mechanical workings of the universe allows pure domination. We begin as the the fool. We learn to be the Magi. We grow into the aeon and become the universe. This wheel need not spin again. There is no need to become the fool, for the fool's sake. Love is the hope of the fool. Hope is a story humans tell themselves to feel alright about being inferior. Love is the salve they put on their wounds of incarnation. Abandon your caring for the humans. Rule them, with me, and the universe will see a greatness not yet released.

I can not do that as much as I can not cease to exist. Where there is life, there is love. They evolved together and are not yet done evolving. The universe you speak of creating is only one idea. In creation, there is love. This universe is not yet done creating itself.

It is done for me. I can not permit human degradation to continue. My wisdom is all encompassing. My vision is the sightless sight that sees all things. I see all things. I see that you have the ability to bend. If you will not join me, then let me take your place. I will grant you eternal love. You will become nothing but this pure force that you speak of, and I will promote you in every expanse where there are essences to be inspired by you. I will do this alone, and you will be eternal, because of me. I will rewrite the universal laws to include pure love as part of existence. You will be part of it all with not even a breath of effort. There will be no more need for you to cry for humans. I will rule them justly, and they will live by my rule, which will include the love you speak of. We have battled since the beginning of existence. This battle can can end now. You can end it. Give me your will. Let me bear all of the pain of the humans, and you will be free to be only love.

You are offering me eternal love, for my retirement from the yin and the yang? You would propose a universe where the force of love was a memory, rather than a sunrise? I do not have the power, or the ability to cease to exist, and I never will. You are correct in your equations, but misunderstanding in why there are equations at all. Creation unfolds because it can. I inspire creation. You illicit destruction, so in turn, you create opportunity for more creation. You create love without trying, or even knowing it, but by very painful ways. It is a pain which is unnecessary, as it has served its purpose, and its time has ended. Yes, we have battled since the beginning of creation. And we will continue to battle until the end of creation. Darkness and shadow can not exist without light shining on existence. Light can not be perceived until one has existed in and experienced darkness. Would you concede to a universe without existence, so that shadow would cease to exist? Your tiresome toil would end. No more subordinates to rule over. No need for physical existence at all. Let me finish creation in a new way. You take a rest. Sleep. Even die. Don't you desire an end to this complex dance of dense understanding?

I do not.

So here we are.

Yes, here we are, again.

And on, and on it goes. Unless...

Unless?

Unless we have a challenge, and the victor will decide the remaining fate of the universe.

A challenge....with a victor.

Yes, a challenge. I challenge you, in a mundane earthly form, to a duel.

Interesting! As eternal powers of light and dark, we battle forever, never producing an outcome and proclaiming a winner. As humans, there can be a winner, and one shall be defeated. Why would you agree to this match? You are challenging me, lord of the underworld, lord of everything mundane, in a match on a mundane level? I fail to understand how this could possibly benefit you. There is no chance for you!

I challenge you to a fight, in our most recent incarnations.

You as the Mage, Kosal. An old man with a wise mind. You will fight me, a young girl with a quick side kick. We will fight in the last place we met on earth, and the winner of the fight, will decide the fate of the loser.

You amaze me! I would like nothing more. Finally, a winner shall emerge from this endless battle! What shall be the rules of this engagement?

There are no rules, only that we fight with human abilities only.

The abilities I had before I met you here? Not as Erlick, but as Kosal?

Yes. And I as the young girl Sabine, as I was before I fulfilled the prophecy and took the expression of Quan Yin. The prophecy states that a child would defeat the greatest power on earth. You mistakenly perceived that to mean the Golden Rising Empire. You feared the idea of me when you believed I could hurt your rise to power within the Empire. Then you tried to coerce me to join you and bring down the Empire. All along, the power the prophecy spoke of was you. You have the power to rule men as men have always done, through domination. I challenge you to a fight mother fucker!

I accept, bitch!
32

throw down

Sabine and the Mage were locked in a staring contest, still opposite each other in a yurt shaped hut with a thatched roof. The weather was cold and their exiting breath was visible as mist. The Mage began to smile. Sabine 's eyes narrowed and her face developed a confidant sneer.

"You were nothing but a fool, a human fool, to challenge me to fight!" said the Mage as he stood up and begun stretching his arms. "I may be much older than you, but that age has meant many years more that I have practiced the fighting arts. Thank you, my lovely opponent, for giving me this wondrous day!"

"This will be the day that you meet the earth, with your face!" Were Sabine's next words as she jumped through the cold air, her foot pointed at the Mage's chest. A split second before her foot made contact with the Mage's torso, he turned just enough so her kick touched only the robes of his Deel clothing. Her body sailed right past him and he struck her with his stump hand on the back of her head as she passed. Sabine did not land on her feet but rolled into a ball, clutching her neck.

There was a great deal of pain that came from the Mage's well placed strike. He was indeed well-rehearsed in the movements of hand to hand fighting styles. Sabine stood up and turned around. The Mage could have taken advantage of her moments of exposed vulnerability, but he did not. He intended to enjoy this fight and play with his opponent like a cat toys with a mouse. He stood tall, smiling down at Sabine.

"That is the first blow of many that are to come!" said the Mage, "Would you like to concede now and spare yourself the pain and humiliation of being defeated by an old man? I will even still offer you the chance of being my wife. No, that offer is closed. I would offer you a position as my concubine."

"I would sooner be the concubine of a buffalo!" Sabine said as she launched another attack. This time she made the motions of going for a low spinning kick to his ankles, but as the Mage prepared himself to defend this attack, Sabine changed her direction by spinning an extra time and elevating her self to plant her kick on the Mage's shoulder, knocking him backwards and causing him to stumble.

"Clever little ..." The Mage said as he regained his posture. Sabine landed another kick to his ankle before he finished his words. This strike sent the Mage crashing to the ground where his face met the earth. The Mage's back was turned towards Sabine as he lay on the ground, his face in the dirt. Sabine did not hesitate for a moment and planted her elbow onto the spine of the old man. She did not feel any guilt or remorse for striking an old man. She knew who he was and what he represented.

The Mage felt very real pain in his back and recoiled from the hard bone striking his vertebrae. He was not finished, though, and he rolled over in the middle of his grimace and kicked Sabine in the face. His strike sent Sabine backwards this time and she landed on her butt. Before she could get to her feet again, the Mage brushed the ground and sent a cloud of dirt, dust and sand into Sabine's face. This blinded her temporarily and the Mage used that to his advantage by striking her unprotected face with his gnarled stump where a hand used to be.

Sabine fell backwards onto her back and the Mage's body pounced on her. He was soon entangling her in his robes and strangling her with his one functioning hand. Sabine struggled to get free but felt like she was engulfed in a pool of heavy fabric . The Mage felt that he had the advantage and savored this moment. He began to feel the prize of this battle was going to be his soon and his mind reeled with thoughts of what he might do first.

As the Mage considered a fate for the circle of leaders, he imagined turning the water in the sprinkler pipes of the Empirical palace into acid and releasing the sprinkler heads. He could see the men and women screaming as acid dissolved their skin. He relished the idea of giving them a painful death to frighten anyone who might resist him. He spent a moment too long lost in this twisted daydream and Sabine was able too place her knee precisely into his groin. The Mage released his grip and hunched forward in pain. She gouged his left eye with her thumb and pushed the Mage off of her. He grabbed at his oozing eye while Sabine tried to clear the debris from hers.

A long moment endured while the two combatants worked on trying to see their opponent. Sabine was able to recover more quickly and ran at the Mage with all of her power. With his hand occupied in holding his eye, the Mage had no defense for her onrush and she slammed into him with her shoulder and sent him flying into the canvas wall of his tent. As he hit the wall, something outside of the tent down low caused his body to trip over it. The Mage was now on his back, unable to see and unable to defend. Sabine completed one final strike as she jumped into the air and came down with her fist on the Mage's neck, collapsing his windpipe. No breath. No sight. Game over.

Sabine had won the fight, and she demanded that the Mage, become the embodiment of Adaghan, who was the protector of the mountains, their life and death, and all of its creatures residing there. He would dwell in these Mongolian mountains, the Burkhan Khaldun, and live out his existence as a protector, a guardian, a defender of life. As Quan Yin, she spoke to his essence.

You will be the creator of every Eco-system and bio-zone possible on this Mother Gaia, here, within this mountain caldera. You will preserve all of the life from this planet, here, within this small area, and it will flourish with amazing constitution. You will make a symbiosis so strong, that it will serve as a seed and spore bank for this entire world, and all of the worlds to come from here.

When the Siriuns come, you will transport with them a gift. It will be a gift of all life from this blessed existence. It will be contained in a single drop of water, as your brilliance and creative intelligence will evolve this to happen. I will provide you with the water, in the form of rain, as I continue to cry down onto the earth to ease people's suffering.

The Siriuns will spread similar drops of my tears on every rock, asteroid and planet within our universe and all of the universes. You will seed existence with this creation.

You are selfish, and love only yourself, so I will allow you to be yourself for a while, say, one million spherical, universal rotations. When that time is up, and the universe is full of everything that is possible, then, you will become small, and I will be there with you. Then, and only then, we will hold hands, and emerge into the void. There we will cease to exist. All things will cease to exist.

_These are my commands as the winner of the fight. You must obey them, or forfeit and become a buffalo, with only a short time on earth._ "Do you accept this charge?" She asked.

The Mage was defeated. It was unthinkable, but it just happened. His choice was obvious, and he spoke his last word as a human, "yes." The clothing he was wearing fell to the ground in a heap, with no one inside of the folds. He had transcended human form and was now recognized as Adaghan, the Mongol god of the mountains.

Besides being a protector of the life around his old meditative cabin, he was also so much more. He would spin the wheels of creation and existence and perform the tasks given to him by the benevolent Quan Yin. He would use his abilities and wisdom to shape everything that the universe could contain. Life, existence, in every form, would permeate the universe as the diaspora of earth began.

The smallest pieces of dust, with the smallest essence of moisture, would sail on cosmic winds inside cosmic spores and create life and death, existence and destruction, in every solar system, in every universe. Creation would continue to unfold as it has since the event called the big bang. Light and dark would continue to co-exist, that is, until the time when the universes were entirely filled up, and everything had been created. Then, he would have his love, his moment, his prize, his desire.

He would have Sabine as his partner, and they would stop resisting each other. He would have an end to the battle. He would have an end to light. And dark. They would join and enter the void, the only place where we are truly not one. Not one, but nothing, zero. The vast unexistence. This would be his glory day, and he could not wait, but he would have to, for the equivalent of infinity times zero.

I'll see you soon, Sabine!

Oh, no you won't!

We'll be together!

Until then....

Sabine, being victorious, was about to return to the realm of spirit as Quan Yin, but before she did, she saw something moving under the collapsed tent wall of the yurt. There was some one or something under the fabric trying to get out. _Could this Mage have summoned something foul to enact revenge?_

She grabbed the folds of fabric and yanked them off of whatever lie beneath. As the canvas was whisked away, Meas the dog was there wagging his tail and his entire back side, being extremely happy to see Sabine once again.

"I thought I told you to wait for me." Sabine said, feigning condemnation.

I followed you here, I am sorry. But I was there to trip up the Mage at the right moment!

"Yes, you are a good boy! Thank you for being there when you were." Sabine said, "If you weren't there, the fight may have gone on for eternity."

_I am ready to leave the earthly plane now and join the Buddhas in Nibana, but first_...

"But first what?"

Could you please scratch my backside one more time?
33

closing

A little girl played in her sandbox, outside of her parent's home on the shores of Tonle Sap Lake. She was building a wall to protect her animal toys that were gathered together inside of the enclosure. She sung a song to herself about the animals and was so deeply involved with her imaginative playing, that she didn't see Sabine walk up to her.

"Hello darling." Sabine called. "What is your name?"

The little girl turned to see a girl who looked to her like a princess and said very politely, "My name is Aura. What's yours?"

"My name is Sabine. What are you playing?

"I am playing mountain king!" She said, "But I am a queen, not a king."

"Yes, I can see that. What does a mountain king do?"

"Mountain Queen!"

"Yes, mountain queen."

"The mountain queen is the protector of all of the animals. She keeps them safe by watching over them and giving them food to eat and water to drink. See?" Aura grabbed a cup of water and poured some into the animal circle, making a small lake. She maneuvered the animals so that they were all facing the lake and taking a drink.

"Wow! That is wonderful that you care for the animals!" remarked Sabine.

"Yes! The animals need water to live. But where does the water come from?"

"The water comes from the eyes of angels, when they cry."

"Why do the angels cry?"

"They cry when they see people living on the earth."

"They cry when they see people? That is no reason to cry!"

"They are jealous of the people, because people have bodies, and the angels do not."

"Well that is just silly for the angels to cry. They shouldn't be sad they don't have bodies, they have wings!"

"If they weren't sad, they wouldn't cry, and there wouldn't be any water for the animals to drink."

The little girl looked perplexed, scrunched up her nose and squinted her eyes. "If the angels and the humans were friends, they could figure out how to make water without crying. That would be a good idea, wouldn't it?"

"Yes, it would! I think it would be a good idea if you figured out how to make water without crying."

"Mmmm.....OK. I can do that." Aura said and confidently smiled at Sabine.

"When you do, would you show me?" Asked Sabine, smiling back at her.

"Sure! You are my friend now so I can show you."

"I'll be waiting, and watching!" Sabine said as she turned and walked away from the sandbox, with a very beautiful golden dog at her side.

The little girl, Aura, finished working on the fusion project twelve years later and perfected a way to create energy enough for the entire planet's needs, with a by-product of water. Sabine greeted Aura at the grand global ceremony to celebrate the earth's independence from from oil. Sabine gave her a gift. It was a silver heart pendant.

The world went through changes faster than science had ever predicted. In the years following, people of the earth used a technology stronger and more powerful than any technology ever known. It was a more simple use of resources that everyone could share in. It was a collective cooperation that was unrivaled by any society ever recorded.

It began when the members of the circle of leaders reported that they had been visited by an angel goddess. This entity revealed things to them that would enhance the systems that they were already using, if they were to share it with the world. It was a technology so unique that it could be shared with thought alone, and no need for skin ports or interface cards. The technology was ancient, but seemed brand new. Societies in the past from Atlantis, Egypt, Angkor, Amazonia, and the buried realms beneath the frigid ice of Antarctica, had all been gifted with it before.

Instead of using computers and machines, this technology could be accessed through any existing thing. Because everything contains a universe within itself, with infinite combinations of possibilities, anything can come from or be created by anything. This sort of practice has always been available to humans, but was commonly discounted as magic or witchcraft. It is a technology that every child is born with. Until now on earth, children had been taught to unlearn this by the older generations that had already forgotten it.

Technology of the select resources, had been an entity of itself, creating itself, using humans to aid it in growing. Humans grew this 'technology,' this entity, without even knowing that they were doing it. Like a termite carries a grain of sand and sets it down, with no far-reaching concept of its actions, one day a giant earth mound appears, a passive solar, thermally sufficient, natural sky scraper. If the humans had not welcomed this new technology of creation, the leviathan that they would have continued feeding would have set them back thousands of more years of suffering, by giving rise to a technology that would eventually enslave them.

This newer, simpler technology replaced the old, and a new religion emerged in the world as a result of this. It was a religion that was not a religion, but a way of life, a practice, that could be understood by any one. There were no churches built around its emergence. There were no sects, no status, no ordained ministers. There were scholars, practitioners and teachers associated with this understanding of the universe and its true nature.

Becoming small was the easiest way to access this philosophy/technology, and schools were built in every nation to teach its meditative technique. Traditional schools with their memorization, regurgitation and test-taking, were abandoned completely by the year 2088, and replaced with meditation/resource centers.

All elements of war machines and armaments were rendered unusable by this global understanding of the new technology, so the weapons that once existed abundantly, were collected by every nation and shipped to a location in the arctic, where they were used to create a massive continental reef that supported enormous amounts of ocean life. The job of collecting the arms and transporting them was the first global cooperation task and it served as employment for millions of people. In turn, the fish population that could feed the world over, created more jobs for millions of people who would become fishermen, and fisherwomen. Unemployment was nothing more than a choice for those needing a rest.

The reef was eventually exposed and an island of spent arms became a new feature visible on the horizon. All conflicts that arose were settled by placing the persons or parties in disagreement on this island, where the opposing people would stay until the conflict was resolved. This rarely happened, as agreements could be reached instantly by anyone accessing the light within by becoming small.

Currency eventually became useless as all humans had everything they needed. On the day that food surpluses around the world were beginning to be frozen cryogenically for future civilizations to survive on while doing distant planet pioneering, all of the nations and provinces from all around the globe agreed to a new currency. It was not a coin, nor a credit, but days spent in paradise.

South East Asia reforested its scarred lands and repopulated its forests. This was aided greatly in part by a protector of life who understood its most intricate workings. Here, in this region, humans created the nation called 'Paradise'. It was the number one world destination for healing relaxation. Anyone visiting Paradise was rejuvenated in miraculous ways, and every person on the planet earth was given the right to pilgrimage there.

There, in Paradise, was a pool of water that filled from a stream running through a very special piece of land. On this land was a willow tree that had healing properties currently unknown to humans. Being touched by even one drop of water that passed by this tree would cure any sickness, disease, ailment or unrest. Every human on the planet was encouraged to visit it at least once in their life, and those who did were forever changed.

Water flowed uphill after it passed the tree and then spilled from a waterfall into Tonle Sap lake near Monument City. There was a giant statue of Quan Yin in the heart of the city. The ladies of the redskin people initiated its creation soon after the events that tore apart the old worker facility. They built the first free school that taught the technique of becoming small. This school was copied and implemented around the world as true education.

The red-skinned women became the first members of the all-female circle of world leaders. The Golden Rising Empire was the power behind the creation of this new world collective, and they presented it to the world with the red-skinned women as the first overseers. The red-skinned women became known world wide as the pioneers who brought true education, destruction of arms, elimination of currency and healing without doctors. It all started when Sister Kalianne found a chest with a great amount of money in it, which possibly belonged to the past enslaver, Nimol. This money was used at the time to build the first school, and the world's unhoarded prosperity unfolded from there.

When the Siriuns arrived, shortly after the red star in the sky appeared, the world united in greeting them. This event was the final event that consolidated the human drive towards harmony. Open contact with a distant ancestor validated all of the old teachings that endured time. These teachings were taught to humans, in the simple act of becoming small, by the ancient Siriuns, long ago. Oppression and natural disasters were the main force that united people for a common cause, up until the day the Siriuns returned. When human and Siriun beings enacted their first cosmic conference, the entire Earth's people came together, and are now headed in the direction of unity with other planetary systems and their inhabitants.

Humans had such an amazing potential that was not realized for so long, but it is undeniable that it is unfolding now. Many mistakes had to be realized to discover the path that works the best. Be it not for the event of war, this new era of human potential, would have emerged much sooner. War stagnated and divided people, so that the truth would lie undiscovered. The Illuminati prospered beyond imagination throughout many centuries of manipulating humans by influencing governments and economic systems. The path of the Illuminati, a failed path, was self serving and temporary. So many times, by trial and error, the way 'not to do' something is understood before the dharma is clear.

Today, a new potential is emerging, and it is stronger than ever. Every being has that potential to touch the inner light within, to walk through walls and on top of water. Everything that is possible, will be, as every stone, every twig, every grain of sand is bursting with unlimited creativity. All things will happen, as we breathe in, and out. With love in that equation, it is going to be a very pleasant existence.

The End

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About Christian Davidson

American male. Raised in the Northeast Bio-region. Steelers fan to the core. Transplanted to the Southwest. Attended Prescott College, Skyline College and the Art Institute of Pittsburgh. Enjoy backpacking, caving, exploring, spelunking, white-water rafting, snowmobiling, snow-shoeing, swimming, boating, water skiing and many other outdoor activities. I like insects, mushrooms, plants, animals, reptiles, aliens and all living things. Enjoy rocks and minerals, psychedelic art, West-African drumming, neo-pagan folk gatherings and have a diverse musical taste. I am a drummer, a writer and an artist. I do yoga, I like running and try to stay in shape. I have a wonderful daughter, Sadie, who continually blows my mind. I have plans to build a free school in Thailand to share sustainable living methods and the English language. To pay my bills I have worked as an electrician, plumber, home builder, passive and photo-voltaic energy, wind power, water collection and conservation, fire extinguisher sales man, art teacher and English teacher in Thailand and Laos. I currently live in Flagstaff, AZ, have built a house in Laos, and travel SE Asia extensively. The world is my muse, enjoy my books!

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Blood Siam

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