“Sam! Please, come back!” came Del’s muffled voice from beyond the door.
Her cries gave him new vigor. He wasn’t exactly prepared. He didn’t have a plan. But that’s how life occasionally worked. Sometimes you have to just do it and see what happens.
So he stepped back, got a running start, then threw his body into the door, shoulder first.
And, somehow, it whined open.
Melting snow dripping from his brow, Sam stepped into the cavernous great hall. Vaulted ceilings a hundred feet high were adorned with torches, orange light from the flames flickering upon the stony walls, which were accented by red, stained glass windows. A crimson carpet stretched to a platform, upon which sat a throne of gold. And sitting at the throne, as casually as if he were expecting a visitor, was a bearded man in a black robe, most of his face obscured by shadow.
The door closed with a sickening slam. The gentle crackle of fire echoed gloomily through the rafters.
“I didn’t think you’d make it this far,” said the hooded man in a throaty, gritty voice that sounded distantly familiar. “I am a little surprised.”
“Who are you?”
“Let’s not waste time on clichéd introductions of the obvious.” The man stood and stepped down off the platform. “You know who I am.”
Sam agreed with a nod. “Where is she?” he demanded. “I don’t have any trouble with you, just give her back and I’ll be on my way.”
Diakrino sighed. “Well, that’s disappointing. And here I thought you’d learned something.” A panel in the ceiling opened up. A brass cage descended. Inside, Delaney banged against the bars. “Is this what you’re looking for?”
“Delaney!” Sam shouted up at her from underneath the suspended coop.
“Sam Pierce! You came back!” She reached her hands through the gaps in the floor, extending her fingers in the air.
“I’m here! I’m going to get you out of there!”
“Not without this,” Diakrino said as he pulled a key from his pocket and dangled it on a string.
“Give me that key,” said Sam. “Give me that key and I’ll be out of here. No harm, no foul.”
“Sam,” Diakrino smiled malevolently, “did you think this would be easy?”
“Easy? Easy? Nothing about what I’ve been through the past two days has been easy. I’ve come all this way, now give me that freaking key!”
Diakrino chuckled. “You think that because you’ve worked hard, you’ve earned a reward? And here I was, thinking you’d learned about the harsh realities of life from your world. Tell me, Sam. Why do you want to go back so badly?”
He paused. Thought about his answer.
“Your hesitance proves that I’m alive and well, Sam.” Diakrino sat back on his throne and playfully tossed the key up and down in his palm. “What are you going back to, hmm? A cold, dark world that constantly rejects you? A father who pushed you aside? A woman who chose someone else after you gave her everything you had to offer?” His voice became vile, bitter, angrier. “You want to go back to a world that kicked you out?”
“I…”
“Don’t listen to him, Sam!” Delaney pleaded from her cage. “Overcome him!”
“I’m not trying to sway you in either direction, Sam,” Diakrino hissed as politely as he could. “I am simply providing you with facts. You always liked facts, right? Pity you always thought with your heart. The heart is cruel, naïve. Its constant pursuit of impossible happiness always leads to suffering. I ask you this, Sam…here before you, you have this world, this city, these deserts, all of your own creation. This is your world. A world you can control. A world that doesn’t spit on you when you’re already down. Why would you leave this world for the one that does?”
Despite Delaney’s whimpers, Sam didn’t have an answer…
Beep…beep…beep…
“The heart’s slowing again,” the doctor said. He looked to a nurse. “Start charging.”
“Sam!” Delaney hit his chest. “Sam, listen to me! Sam!”
Beep…beep…
Logan finally broke free from his mother with little protest and rushed to his uncle’s side. He grabbed his hand. “Uncle Sam, wake up!”
“Is this world not better?” Diakrino stepped toward him with his hands behind his back. “Is this not a more viable option?”
“But the other option,” Sam whispered glumly, “is death…”
“Is it? You’re in a coma, Sam. Sometimes they last years, sometimes until death. Life is a road. A road that has not been kind to you. Wouldn’t you like to stay on this new path until life’s road ends? Stay…with us…don’t go back to that world. I’ve been to that world.”
“It’s the real world, Sam!” Delaney yelled. “I’m waiting for you up there!”
“Reality is whatever you wish to make of it,” argued Diakrino. “You can derive greater pleasure here than you ever could in that other horrible realm. Imagination is the reality of many, the only reality, because the one with which they were presented was not kind. Do you think I was always like this? This…monster? No. I wasn’t. I was molded into this creature seen before you by the bane of my own existence. Stay in this reality, Sam. Avoid my fate. Stay with us. Where life is not a mere game of chance.”
“I…I…”
“Don’t, Sam!” came Del again. “Come back to me!”
“I…I think I want to—”
The door cracked as Eleos—the little boy from Atlas—cautiously pushed his way in. There was a swift gust of wind that blew off Diakrino’s hood. He angrily covered his face with one hand while shooting a bolt of lightning at the child with the other, which made his miniscule form evaporate within a quick puff of electric dust.
“How dare anyone enter my lair!” snarled Diakrino as the door slammed back shut.
And that’s when Sam saw it.
Brown eyes. Black hair. Olive skin. A grain of sand on a beach. Diakrino’s voice was familiar because Diakrino’s voice was his own.
Something sparked. Like seeing a future potentiality he wanted to avoid. Like, for once, he wanted to act as his own fate. Sam quickly tackled Diakrino, throwing all his power into his side, knocking him to the ground. He grabbed the key and ran to a column, where he started climbing.
On the ground, Diakrino convulsed. His body twisted and turned, bones snapped, and then…he started growing…and growing…until the robe tore under the pressure of massive, reptilian scales and the great dragon let out an angry roar that shook the stronghold.
Near the top of the pillar, Sam leapt into space and stretched out his arms, barely grabbing the bottom of the cage. He started climbing his way toward the lock on the door, coming ever to closer to—
Swoop!
Diakrino ripped Sam from the cage and threw him across the chamber, where he smacked a wall and hit the carpeted floor with a hard thud. The dragon gnashed its teeth. “This is your decision? To try and make it back to that world where you are nothing but an insect to an ungrateful population? Pathetic. I expected better of you, Sam!”
Sam’s head throbbed with pain. His legs wobbled when he stood.
“You are giving up a life you can control for one you cannot.”
“Destiny isn’t about control,” Sam coughed. “It isn’t about fate. You can fight fate. And that starts with overcoming doubt. Overcoming you.”
A silence. Diakrino smiled. Each tooth grew a foot right before Sam’s eyes. “As you wish.” And he lunged. Sam rolled out of the way as the dragon’s nose smacked the wall, but he easily brushed it off. “There will be no shards of glass nor broken teeth this time, Sam. You are out of luck and out of blades.”
“I don’t need luck! So I guess I’ll have to find something else!”
Another pounce and another miss.
The dragon was getting frustrated. “Stop prolonging the inevitable! You’re only hurting yourself! Hope is but a poison that slowly kills the heart.”
“Sometimes it’s all we have!”
/> The dragon roared and lunged again, this time slamming into a pillar, bricks spilling to the floor. Sam saw his chance. He reached for one of the stones and—
He was immediately swept up by Diakrino’s tail, which coiled around his legs. The dragon dangled him in front of his face. “Ah, ah, ah, not this time, Sam.”
Sam squirmed, but it was hopeless.
“Saaammmm!” Delaney howled from the cage. “Fight it Sam!”
Diakrino squeezed. Tighter and tighter. But he looked as if he took no personal pleasure in it. Sam couldn’t breathe. His face turned blue. The dragon’s eyes watched him with focused pleading. “Every journey has an end, Sam. There is nothing for you to go back to. Accept it. Be at peace. Please.”
Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeepppppppppp.
Flat line. An electric hum as the electrodes discharged their energy. Sam’s unconscious body slumped back into the bed. Motionless. Still.
“Saaammm! Sam, please!” Delaney tightened her grip on his hands. “Please!”
Nothing. Rain.
The doctors did nothing. Could do nothing.
Logan started crying.
And Del started singing. Voice cracking through tears. “Twinkle, twinkle, little star…How I, wonder, what you, are…”
“Up above the world so high…Like a diamond in the sky…” Sam looked up to see Delaney watching. She was singing, voice trembling. Her face glowed. Her eyes were wide. Hair dangled through the grating. Beautiful. Simply beautiful. “Twinkle, twinkle, little, star…How I, wonder, what you, are…”
And she was apparently done. She closed her eyes. Parted her lips. The chamber was quiet but for the pulse of Sam’s heart struggling in his chest.
“Hmph, that was pointless,” said Diakrino. “Now, where were we?”
Sam was silent.
“Then the traveler in the dark…Thanks you for your tiny spark…” Del suddenly continued.
“Alright, this is getting annoying. Keep it down up there!”
She ignored the dragon. “She could not see which way to go…Until you went and twinkled so…”
She finished. Officially.
“Well, I hope that’s over and—”
“I’m going back,” Sam said vacantly.
“Excuse me? I think I’m in charge here.”
“No. You’re not. Not anymore.” A power surged through his veins. One he’d never felt before. It was intoxicating. Strengthening. Solidifying. Making him whole.
Diakrino was getting a little worried. He could feel his grip on his victim loosening. “What? For her? For the woman?”
“Not just for her,” Sam said. “For me.” And with one burst of energy, he broke free from the dragon’s death grip and landed on the floor.
“You little—”
“I’m not afraid of you anymore!” Sam’s eyes glowed with a fire.
“Then I guess I’ll have to make you!”
It was quick. Almost anti-climactic. Diakrino opened his mouth, exposing his dripping fangs, and dove. Sam gave him one strong uppercut to the bottom jaw. There was a loud crack and the dragon’s neck snapped backward and he crumpled to the ground…
Where he lay in a stupor, engulfed by the looming shadow of a forthcoming death.
His last breaths were short and raspy. “You think this is over, Sam? It is not. You need me…you don’t know how to live without me…and one day…I…will…return…”
“Then I’ll just have to fight you again. And again. Until you don’t come back.”
“With…pleasure…” The lights in the dragon’s eyes went out. The breathing stopped. It was done. Defeated. Sam felt his pulse quicken.
“Sam…” Delaney spoke weakly from the cage. Sam climbed over the dragon’s corpse, unlocked the door and helped her out, where she laid in his arms, dying. “You came back for me, Sam…” she coughed.
“I did. And we’re going to go home now, okay?”
“Paradiso?”
“No. My world. We’re going to my world. And we’re going to give this a shot and—”
“Sam…I ain’t goin’ nowhere.” Her voice was barely a whisper.
“Yes you are! You’re coming with me!”
“I want you to know somethin’ Sam…you saved me…”
“I know, that’s why I’m here!”
“You showed me that there’s good people in this world after all…”
“And even the times when I was at my darkest,” Delaney said over Sam’s body, “I always knew someone like you and your family had to be out there somewhere, to show me that life don’t have to be so bad…that everyone’s got a choice…”
Beep. Beep. Beep.
“Please, come back, Sam.”
“I am back,” he said. “I’m back for you.”
She said nothing. He stared into her eyes. Leaned in to kiss her.
And she evaporated, slowly, just before their lips touched, until he was holding nothing but air.
He sat alone. The fire sputtered. The light faded. He felt cold. Could hear wind.
Then…in an instant…there was an intense pain…the worst he’d ever felt…that frayed his chest and knocked him unconscious.
In the hospital room, Delaney leaned forward. Her lips barely brushed Sam’s when a dreadful, piercing screech filled the room and she recoiled in terror.
“That’s it,” the doctor sighed, turning to the nurse. “It’s done. Check the time.”
34
The Curtain Always Has to Close
Nothingness. That’s all he felt, if it’s as possible to feel nothing as it is to see nothing. When he woke up, he saw but blackness. He stood. Where was he? Some void. Infinite emptiness in all directions. Except, of course, for one thing: a portal. A swirling, blue and orange portal, beyond which was white light.
“What is that?” Sam asked himself.
“It can be whatever you want it to be,” answered the Mysterious Figure.
“Am I dead?”
“Kind of.”
“That sucks…”
He shrugged. “Glass half full, the IRS won’t be bothering you anymore.”
“So this is it then? Show’s over?”
“Perhaps.”
“Where’s the portal lead?”
“That depends,” the Figure sighed. “That’s up to you.”
Sam stepped toward it. He couldn’t see anything besides the bright light within. “Where does it lead?”
“Again, that’s up to you. You’re in limbo right now, between life and death. You can choose to just stay here, brain dead, most likely, or you can go through the portal.”
“And what happens when I go through it?”
“One of two things. You live, or you die. It’s that simple.”
“Limited options?”
“Well, the third is doing nothing. Hasn’t this journey taught you anything about risks?”
Sam contemplated it. “I’m not sure…”
“Well, I’ll tell you this. If you walk through that portal, and there’s any hint of doubt about where it goes, then you’ll die. So…it’s up to you.”
“I…I…”
“Haven’t you learned anything from all of this, Sam?”
“I’ve learned not to ever be a pilot…”
“Besides that?”
Everything was in slow motion. The doctor reading something off a chart. The nurse checking the clock. Beverly Pierce wailing in the corner, sobbing into her arms. Logan’s face buried in his mother’s jacket as it grew damp with tears. John Pierce covering his mouth, failing to hide his emotions.
But Delaney felt a calm. A peace. She gently grazed Sam’s neck with her fingertips. She whispered, “Come back, Sam. Come back to me.”
“So what’s it going to be? Limbo or the risk?”
Sam stared at the portal. Twirling with light. He heard something beyond. A voice. Delaney’s voice.
The Figure put his hand on his shoulder. “Sam, I just want you to know that no matter what you de
cide, I am very proud of you. This was never about Delaney Cooper. This was about you. And even if you walk through that portal and it leads to death, I take a lot of solace in the fact that at least you’ll die a better man. Every curtain closes eventually…”
“You’re not going to have to worry about that,” Sam said with the utmost conviction. “Because I’m not dying today.”
And with that, he took an assured, confident step toward the celestial gateway…
Samuel James Pierce was dead. The heart monitor’s drone let the world know.
Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeepppppppppppppppppppppppp.
“Please, Sam…come back…come back to me…”
Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeppppppppppppppppppppp.
Del leaned forward, eyes closed.
Beep.
Beep.
Beep.
For every moment that science can explain, there are dozens that it cannot. From coincidence, to fate, to premonition, to instinct; there are mysteries that will never be fully understood, because understanding is simply an ever-evolving theory. And no one could explain what happened that evening in the hospital in Manhattan.
All anyone knew was that the dead man’s eyes, which were to never see the light of day again, inexplicably opened as wide as they ever had.
But before anyone could speak, before Delaney knew what was happening, Samuel Pierce kissed her for the first time, ignoring the looks of shock surrounding him. It went on forever. And that was fine. The tears of pain became tears of joy. The feelings of doubt and despair were all washed away in an instant by a rolling tidal wave of happiness, of life from death, of the first true miracle to bless Sam Pierce’s young life—one that he brought on himself, with the help of someone very special, someone fate provided as a reward for his struggles.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
When it was over, and they stared into each other’s open eyes, he could think of only one thing to say: “I have a great idea for a book.”
Farewell from Paradise Page 24