by David Beers
He would truly do anything, anything at all, to get his daughter back.
“I don’t think so,” Carriage said. “I can try, but that’s all.”
“Will you?”
Carriage nodded, and Yule saw the odd bond between the two of them. The man had once tried to kill his daughter, him too … but now they were working in tandem, and the Pope was on the outside of it all.
“Yule,” Trinant called from the other side of the large office. “You’ll want to hear this.”
Yule looked over at the small group, then said to Daniel, “I have to go.”
Daniel reached up and grabbed Yule’s hand, startling him. “Don’t tell them. Don’t tell them she’s alive.” Yule looked down, seeing Carriage’s shock in his periphery at someone touching the Pope in such a manner.
“I won’t, Daniel.”
Daniel stared for another few seconds, his red, teary eyes pleading with the Pope. Whatever words had passed about men and gods, they mattered not here. The man in front of Yule trusted no one with his daughter—probably not even Yule.
“I won’t,” he said again.
Daniel finally released him and the Pope went to hear the One Path’s best plans for survival.
Tidus looked at the prison for the upper echelon of society. There were no pits here, but rather a room that stretched forever. Naked men and women floated inside it, unmoving. They went back as far as the eye could see—Tidus knew that these prisoners could see him, just as he had been able to see those in the pits.
Tidus stood inside the detainment center, looking at these naked people, and not knowing why.
A large group was behind him, both inside the room and outside of it.
Why are we here? he wondered. Why are we all staring at this?
The question was a logical one, if a bit foreign to Tidus’s mind. They had been moving upward, with one goal in mind—what the Prophet told him. They were here to kill the Ministers, and the Ministers were at the highest point in this forsaken place.
Yet, he was here, staring at these people.
What are you doing? he asked himself again, and giggled immediately after.
He was losing focus again, and though the Ministers were important, so were these people. Because it was people like them that had thrown him into the pits.
There’s time, Tidus thought, for whatever the Prophet wanted.
It was growing harder to remember that, though—what the Prophet had told him to do.
With a wicked smile, Tidus tossed the strands from his right hand onto the black liquid in front of him. They stuck on the outside edge as if they possessed suction cups.
A moment passed … and when the black liquid started melting, Tidus giggled harder.
There was a fat, bald man not five feet in front of him.
Tidus wanted to have some fun with the fat man.
Fifteen
Rachel Veritros looked on without understanding. The world was unfolding before her, and though she could intervene again, she didn’t.
She had watched Nicki Sesam speak with a woman that should not exist, who had died years and years before—the entire time Veritros thinking all was lost. And then, the woman who should be dead simply stood up on her stoop and went inside as if Nicki had never been there.
And then what did Nicki do? She laid down and went to sleep; Veritros had kept watching, not daring to venture away. There were others she could go to—the Prophet’s sister … the Prophet himself if she truly wanted (though that was at a much greater risk, and something she’d never attempted).
Veritros waited, hoping something might happen, but as time passed, she slowly began to believe it might actually be over. The Prophet was alive and preparing for the Union; Veritros knew that much. The sister had failed and the last chance—the last one that Veritros could see anyway—now lay in a world she couldn’t enter, a place she wasn’t sure was even real.
And then Nicki woke, and Rachel had access to her again. Miraculously, as if she had never left at all, back in the same building where the High Priest had previously imprisoned her.
How? Rachel wondered. How is any of this possible?
Her first instinct—as it always would be—was to rush forward. To crowd the girl and tell her what must be done. Veritros held back, though, because for the first time in long years she didn’t understand …
Long ago, she hadn’t understood as well—when the Ministers asked her a question that was utterly foreign. Again and again, she had attacked that question until finally an answer was revealed.
Now, as Veritros watched Nicki speaking with the Prophet’s sister and some woman she didn’t recognize, a new question came to her.
What aren’t you seeing? What are you missing now? What question aren’t you asking?
Something was happening and she was finally seeing it. Something wildly out of her control; was it the Unformed?
What aren’t you seeing? she asked again.
Nicki Sesam, the key to all of this, sat down in front of the two women, and Veritros stared from her position inside the Unformed. She stared and was silent,
“You’re his sister?” Nicki asked. “The dark man’s? The weapon’s?”
The woman in front of Nicki nodded. She’d said her name was Rebecca, and the one to her right Raylyn.
“Yes. I am.”
“And you?” Nicki said, looking to Raylyn.
“I’m ….” The woman paused, smiled, and looked down at her feet. “I’m lost,” she finally said, looking up. Her smile was gone and her face solemn. “Completely and totally, for the first time in my life, I’m lost.”
Nicki didn’t know a thing about Rebecca Hollowborne—but this woman was telling her the truth. Nicki saw herself in those eyes, a wandering loneliness.
“Why did you come for me?” Nicki said. “How did you know I’d be here?”
“We didn’t,” Rebecca answered. “It’s a long, long story, and we’ll tell you at some point, but we knew you’d been here, so we came. Neither of us thought you’d actually still be here.”
The three of them had left the room with the skeletal box, walking down long hallways before finding a few benches. Nicki sat on one, the other two women across from her.
“What do you want with me? You didn’t come here to talk.” Her eyes flashed to Hollowborne. “You certainly didn’t.”
“You don’t know me any more than I know you,” Rebecca responded, her voice easily as harsh as Nicki’s. “I didn’t have anything to do with what happened to you. I’m not my brother, any more than you are.”
The last words echoed in the hallway, and then everything fell silent.
Any more than you are.
Nicki felt hot, unwanted tears in her eyes.
“What do you mean?” she said. “What do you mean by that?”
“I mean that I’m different than him. Just because we share blood, that doesn’t make me him. Just because you have power like his, that doesn’t make you him either.”
“I don’t understand,” she said. “I don’t understand any of this.” And the tears came then, unstoppable, wracking her whole body. She bent over, wrapping her arms around her stomach, and sobbed. “I don’t know what’s happening. I don’t want this. I don’t want any of this. I don’t understand it.”
She could see nothing, her vision blurry; Nicki only felt her stomach cramping and the tears rolling endlessly down her face.
“I’m not him. I’m not him. I’m not him.” The words streamed from her mouth, nearly unintelligible with the body wrenching sobs pulling on her.
Nicki didn’t see or hear Rebecca moving, but only felt arms draping over her back. Sitting down beside her, Rebecca held Nicki.
“It’s okay,” she said. “It’s all okay. You aren’t him. I know you aren’t. You never were.”
Nicki fell into the embrace, perhaps having never needed to be touched so badly in her life. The sobs kept coming, her body rocking back and forth, but Rebecca didn�
�t release her. Hanging on, even as the girl leaned into her.
Minutes passed, and finally the sobs slowed, coming out in hitched cries.
“I don’t know what to do,” she said through clenched teeth, anger in her voice. “I don’t know what to do.”
No one said anything and Nicki straightened up, pulling away from the woman she barely knew. She kept her arms wrapped around her stomach, as if somehow holding herself could both protect and give her support.
“What do you want with me?” Nicki finally asked, sitting up further, but staring listlessly at the floor. Her voice sounded dead, the pain that had just erupted falling away and leaving a husk. “Why did you show up here?”
“It’s not over.”
And then Nicki heard what the voice had said before, when Nicki first hung inside that box: It’s not over. Maybe it never will be, but this is not the end.
“Why? Why can’t it just be over? I don’t have anything else to give. I’ve already given it all. Everything. My fucking father!” The last word erupted, screeching across the hall like tires on pavement. It echoed for a few seconds, and then the hallway was silent.
“It’s not over because my brother is still alive, Nicki. It’s not over because he’s going to kill everyone alive, and whether or not it’s fair, you’re the only one that can stop him. I can’t. None of the Ministries can. It’s just you.”
Nicki shook her head. “I don’t want to. I don’t care if he ends everything. There’s nothing here for me, anymore. Let him.”
Daniel scooted to the side and made room for the psychopath. He realized now that he had saved the man’s life, but he still couldn’t think of him any other way.
“She’s far away,” the psychopath said as he sat down next to Daniel. “Way out there where we were.”
“Where did she go?” Daniel asked. He shuddered remembering the pain of that gray light rushing by him, somehow being sucked back into Nicki. He hadn’t thought he’d survive it, the gray light like endless sandpaper rubbing across his flesh.
“I don’t know. She did go somewhere, though. I feel sure of that, because she wasn’t here, but now she is.”
Daniel looked over to the group of four huddling around the One Path Minister’s desk. They were discussing how to survive this onslaught, none of them solely putting faith in their respective gods to prevail. It would be men that saved them, though no one would admit it. Even the Pope would use some Biblical quote to justify himself. Perhaps, ‘God helps those who help themselves’.
“Have you ever done anything like this before?” Daniel asked, still staring at the general and three Ministers. The room was too large for Daniel’s words to reach them.
“No, but I haven’t tried either,” the psychopath said. “The only reason I could do the transference that I showed you in the transport was because of my mentor. We used to play pranks on each other with it. Trying to scare the other. I couldn’t really use this with anyone else, for obvious reasons.”
“So it’s possible?” Daniel asked.
“With your daughter, I think anything is possible. She’s stronger than anyone I’ve ever felt. It’s … It’s frightening.”
Daniel didn’t know what to say, only that Nicki’s sight didn’t frighten him. Not being able to speak with her frightened him. Not being able to see her again frightened him. Death—his own—didn’t mean anything. Nor would the death of anyone in this room bother him. Or the entire world for that matter.
He only cared for his daughter; if some god wanted to damn him for that, so be it.
“I just want you to tell her that I’m alive, okay? Don’t tell her where I’m at. I don’t want her coming anywhere near this place. Just let her know that I’m alright.”
The psychopath nodded. “I’ll try.”
He stood and walked away from Daniel, heading to another corner of the room. Daniel had been amazed when first walking in here; he’d never seen a room so big. The ceiling stretched 100 feet high, the room at least twice that in width and length. Someone could walk across it and practically be in another part of the building altogether.
Daniel watched the psychopath walk across the room, feeling an odd kinship with the man. Two weeks ago, he wouldn’t have thought such a thing possible. Yet, despite the original reason the psychopath had appeared at their house, there was …
What?
An ability to care in the man?
Yes, that’s what Daniel thought he saw. If the psychopath ever got his hands on Nicki, he would hang on to her forever and ever, until his God returned, rapturing the faithful. Yet, outside of her, the man was capable of loving. Daniel had seen the respect the psychopath showed Yule, a reverence that Daniel would never feel again.
And now, while the rest plotted how they might all survive, this one man—partly insane, without a doubt—was trying to help Daniel. To give him a moment’s peace.
Daniel looked at the floor, shaking his head.
Please let him reach her, he prayed, though without any idea who he might be asking.
Jackson Carriage walked away from Daniel Sesam with his own head down, looking at the floor. He hadn’t said anything to Daniel, but he was nervous about reaching out to his daughter. Jackson hadn’t lied when he said she was more powerful than anything he’d ever seen—yet, even that hadn’t been the whole truth.
Jackson could always feel those with the sight, especially when put on their trail. He had always been something like a hound dog in that sense, yet he no longer needed to search for Nicki. He couldn’t even open his eyes and focus on the world around him without feeling her. It was nearly physical at this point.
He felt like someone had placed a hot coal inside his mind, something the size of a walnut. While it wasn’t painful, nothing he could do could take his attention from it. Even when talking with Daniel seconds ago, his thoughts had been constantly drawn to Nicki’s presence.
And it wasn’t just his obsession causing him to do it, either. Jackson recognized his affliction, but this was different. She was pulling him, instead of his mind pushing him.
If he had lied to Daniel, it was when he said he didn’t know if he could reach her. Daniel felt pretty certain he could reach her. He thought if anyone else in the world existed with the sight, they could talk to her, too. If Daniel himself hadn’t lost it, he could have simply spoken with his daughter—perhaps from even across galaxies.
She was just too large. A thought in her direction, and she would pick it up.
Which was Jackson’s concern, his hesitation. Because if he could simply think toward her and she hear his thoughts, what could she do in return? She knew him. She’d seen his affliction up close, and while Daniel might be a bit more understanding at this point, she probably wouldn’t be. She’d only seen one side of him, the part he couldn’t help—the part that grew obsessed when around those with the sight. Nicki Sesam would most likely be scared when Jackson reached out …
And he held no doubt that with a flick of her finger, she could completely destroy him.
Still, he walked across the room and sat against one of the massive windows displaying endless death. He put his back on it, sitting and staring across the room. He saw Daniel to his left, the other group to his right, but he paid none of them any mind.
You might die, he thought. In the next few moments, there might be nothing left of you.
He thought briefly about going to the Pope and having his last rites read, but quickly pushed the idea away. If those over there started asking questions, it might disrupt everything. Jackson didn’t want to get caught up in anything like that. Daniel wanted his daughter back, his own obsession just as consuming as Jackson’s.
Instead of last rites, Jackson said a prayer. A simple thing.
Lord, I’ve tried to love you the best I can. I am a poor ambassador of your will, but I hope you can find it in your grace to take me home to you if I pass from this Earth. In your son’s name, amen.
And then, Jackson Carriage perf
ormed a selfless act.
Rebecca stopped talking and looked from Nicki to Brinson.
She’d been talking for a half hour, and now she realized how far lost she was—or rather, how far lost Nicki was.
Brinson looked back at Rebecca, but only shook her head.
I don’t know.
“Nicki?” Rebecca asked.
The girl didn’t move, but simply stared out into the hallway, almost as if in a coma. She had grown more and more solemn the longer Rebecca spoke, but Rebecca hadn’t known what else to do. Out of everyone in this hallway, she was the only one who understood the terror just beyond the horizon.
And right now, David had to be on his way to begin it all, heading to the Nile River.
“Nicki?” Rebecca asked again.
The girl said nothing.
Brinson stood and walked across the short hallway, then knelt down in front of Nicki. Brinson snapped her fingers in front of her face, but there was no reaction.
“What the hell happened?” Rebecca said, moving from the bench down next to Brinson, looking at the girl.
“I—I don’t know,” Brinson said as if she should have somehow been responsible. “She seemed alright, seriously, like moments ago. I mean, she hasn’t been talking much--you have been--but she wasn’t brain dead.”
“Don’t say that,” Rebecca whispered just before snapping her own fingers. No reaction.
“She’s been through too much,” Brinson said. “She might have broke.”
A sick panic was spreading from Rebecca’s core to her extremities, feeling like minor electrical jolts moving through her body.
This couldn’t be happening. If this woman wasn’t their savior, then who? Who would stop David? Because Veritros was no more, only a ghost that no longer even came and went.
“NICKI!” Rebecca shouted.
Her voice echoed down the hallway, and the silence that followed was a horrifying reminder that the woman in front of them had left.