The figure emerging from the twisted light took shape. Sami said, “Sophie? Is that you? How did you know where to find me?”
“It wasn’t that hard,” she said. “The valley only goes one way – west, and smoke only goes one way – up.”
Sami was hiding in a cabin at the top of the Valley, near Kalash, fifty kilometres from Lucerne. The sudden attention since Guru Baba’s death had been hard for him to handle, and he had decided to hide.
The Valley’s residents had protected him from numerous officials, reporters and stalkers chasing him. It was amazing what some well-placed Firing Range and Blast Area signs could do. There was no longer a need for Sami to dress up in his gorilla suit and chase people through the bush, which also worked. Good job it wasn’t hunting season.
“Would you like some tea? Hang on, I’ll just put the kettle on.” He went into the strange metal cabin; she heard water pouring.
Sophie admired the dark, glinting solar panels affixed to the roof. Sami emerged and joined Sophie on a fallen log, and she asked, “What are you doing out here on your own? People are worried about you.”
“Guru Baba had a lifetime to get used to fame; it was gradual. When he kissed me that day and said, “It is you,” and died, my life changed immediately. I wasn’t ready for it. It seemed that I had no choice, but then I realized I did.”
“Is this your choice then, to stay here, far away from people?”
He reached out and held her hand. “Not all people. Sophie, I’m not sure what my choice is. I can either remain apart from the world, with all its temptations and evil ways, or I can engage with it, and do what little good I can.”
Cottonwoods around them rustled in a burst of wind. Their leaves caused light to dance.
“Who wouldn’t want to stay here?” said Sophie. “It’s so peaceful and beautiful. There’s no pollution, no noise, no crowds, no stress, no expense. Whenever I step out of the door in the village I’ve spent twenty bucks. In the city it’s fifty. Here you are self-sufficient in everything – energy, water, food, and peace is everywhere, not just when you put on your headphones or lock your room.”
They sat in silence, listening to the river gushing, and watched a white mule deer wander on the far shore.
Sami said, “Guru Baba’s last kiss held messages for me, but I may need years to understand them.”
He looked so perturbed; she held his other hand too.
Sami continued, “He told me many things while I was working as his assistant. I didn’t understand them all, but somehow his final kiss brought them together. He said that to build a good society you need good people and dynamic interaction. He said the heart is the body’s strongest generator of electro-magnetism, constantly changing the fields around us. He said that like attracts like, and if we build our ideal selves, we attract, reflect and refract universal matter in powerful ways. He said that psychic self-control is the highest art; to keep your head when all around you others are losing theirs; and he said the psychic realm is both a cosmic ocean and a personal drop.”
Sami’s attention returned to the twisted light running through the valley from Mt Alba, a white sentinel above the village, to Mt Negra, dark guard at its other end. He became quiet.
After a while Sophie said, “Well, there are two drops here. Shall we rejoin the sea together, and be good people building the good society he spoke of?”
Sami continued looking into the twisted light, and said, “Maybe you’re right. You usually are. Guru Baba said that karma is not driven by thoughts but by actions. Give me another week here alone, and then I’ll join you.”
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