Over the next two weeks, she will spend roughly five days with each of us. At the end of it, she will make her choice. When she does, Natty will honor the agreement. Sweet Natty, I know he will. Bart may be another situation entirely.
May 15, 2156
It finally happened today. After two weeks of Natty, Bart, and I spending time with Adaiah, she asked to come to dinner tonight to speak with us. I knew she would announce her decision. As I’d expected, she told my brothers she’d grown fondest of me.
Oh, it went well enough at first. She simply stood, looked each of us in the eye, and said it. Natty and Bart seemed to take it well. Nat appeared somewhat crestfallen, yet he stepped forward, said he felt happy for us both, and kissed Adaiah on the cheek. Good-hearted Natty. I’m certain he was sincere, which breaks my heart a little.
Bart, of course, remained still and formal. He said nothing untoward to Adaiah, simply wishing her—not me, I noted—well. Afterward, I escorted Adaiah home. We talked about how relieved we both are to have the whole business behind us. Now we can focus on each other. I told her that despite the stress of it, I still believed it the right thing to do.
Since returning home, I’ve become less sure.
I came straight up to my room when I arrived, planning to read before turning in. I heard a commotion in the garden, below my window. I peered out to see my brothers arguing. Though I couldn’t make out the words, they shouted and motioned with animation. Normally, I might shrug off such an argument, but between Adaiah’s announcement just hours ago and…
No, it was more than that. I felt a deep foreboding about whatever was happening down in the yard. My brothers’ emotions drew me to them with a compulsion I could hardly control.
Bart had a large, stuffed bag slung over his shoulder. When I asked what was going on, Natty told me Bart intended to join the ranks of the Core Union. He intended to live at their base.
We’ve known Bart is a Union sympathizer for some time, but to go live among them? I’ve always believed that, so long as the three of us live in relative proximity to one another, Natty and I can influence Bart. Keep him from straying too far from the freedom he takes for granted.
Panic gripped me. I implored him to stay, which is what Natty had done before I arrived, going so far as to block Bart’s way. (Which is what started the shouting.)
We argued back and forth about Bart going. It wasn’t so different than other arguments we’ve had across the dinner table. I told him how destructive the Unions were. How he’d be giving up his beliefs.
He told me he didn’t intend to join his mind to the Union. He simply wished to live among them. To which I replied that the idea was, of course, ridiculous. It would be like living among robots. I have no doubt he’ll be persuaded to join before long. Here with Natty and I, that wouldn’t be an option.
Then Bart said something I’ll never forget. We were shouting by this time, and he yelled, “What you’re too close-minded to realize, Johann, is the Unions can be used in other ways besides joining with them. I will not be a mindless drone!”
I have no idea what he meant. No idea what he plans to “use” the Union for. Something about it chilled me.
When I asked what he meant, he immediately clammed up. Said something about how I needed to respect his beliefs and he needed some time among them to think. He said it would be too hard to live side by side with me, now. To see Adaiah every day. With me.
I suppose I should have seen it coming. I’m no longer convinced Bart is truly in love with Adaiah, though. He wanted her, but the two of them were never close enough for love. She never shared with him the things she’s shared with me, so how can he possibly love her or know her like I do? He’s simply angry she chose me, and I said so.
I regretted it the moment it left my lips, especially when Natty put a hand on my arm and gave me a chastising look. I refused to take it back, however. It’s how I felt and Bart deserved it, selfish as he’s always been.
I fully expected him to shout back at me. He didn’t. Instead, he went deathly still. When he spoke, he had the audacity to blame the entire thing on me.
“Only once, Johann,” he said, “I wish you’d choose me.”
I had no idea what that meant, so I asked him.
He launched into a story about when we were kids playing in the woods together. I remember the incident he spoke of, though not in much detail. I couldn’t have been more than six, and Bart four. Natty, only a toddler at the time, played a short distance from us on a blanket where my mother kept an eye on him. Anyway, there had been a storm the night before. Apparently lightning struck an aspen tree we were playing near. The tree didn’t fall, but the trunk was being held upright by only a thin breadth of wood. When the wind picked up, the tree fell.
I do remember the tree. Not large, the trunk couldn’t have been more than a few inches around. I heard a loud crack and turned to see it falling. My two brothers stood fifteen feet apart in separate places, both in the path of the falling tree. Naturally, I dove for baby Natty.
I should have saved Bart. Natty was littler, it’s true, but he toddled right next to the trunk of the falling tree. Even when it hit the ground, he sat perfectly situated in the right angle created by the fallen trunk. Not in danger of it hitting him. He cried because the resounding crash startled him.
Thankfully, though the tree did hit Bart, it wasn’t anything too bad. The aspen tree didn’t actually hit the ground. It fell against another, stronger trunk and halted roughly six feet from the ground. The crash of it hitting the other trunk still shook the earth, and some of the trees branches reached long enough to hit Bart in the head, knocking him onto his backside. Thin scratches marred his cheeks, but no more. I remember thinking Bart seemed as shaken as baby Natty.
A scary incident, to be sure, yet no one was seriously injured. I couldn’t understand why now, in the garden, under the full moon, my brother was using it as a reason to desert us and join the Core Union. He knew they were enemies to all individual freedoms.
“What are you talking about?” I burst out.
He remained stoic. All the fight seemed to have left him. He merely shrugged. “Even back then, you didn’t choose me.”
Even Natty looked confused.
I couldn’t understand what Bart meant. “You mean because I didn’t save you? You’re holding that against me now? Bart, it happened fifteen years ago. We were children.”
“And you didn’t choose me.”
“Natty was only a baby,” I pled with him.
“I’m your younger brother, too,” he said.
“I knew you could take care of yourself.” I’d thought nothing of the sort, but was grasping for arguments.
Bart pointed out that he’d only been four years old, but I refused to concede.
“Yes,” I told him. “You could run or dive out of the way of the falling tree. Natty didn’t. He was toddling around in a diaper.” He didn’t answer, so I pushed what I perceived as my advantage. “No one got hurt, Bart. I don’t understand what it has to do with you leaving.”
“It has nothing to do with anyone being hurt,” he snapped, his passion returning. “You’ve never chosen me. You wonder why I have no affection for you, Johann. It’s because you have no loyalty to me. You’d choose to be beside every other individual on the planet before you chose to stay beside me.”
“That’s not true,” I insisted. “You can’t hold a split-second decision, made in a moment of panic, against a six-year-old boy. I couldn’t have comprehended that the tree would hit you and not Natty.”
I took a deep breath, recognizing my brother needed me in a way I’d never understood before. He’d always been so independent. So distant and cold. Like he didn’t need anyone at all.
“I choose you now, Bart. Please stay. We all know there’s a war brewing between the Core Union and the B.C.O. I want my brothers around me when the battle lines are drawn. We must have each other’s backs.”
The moon shone from behi
nd Bart, and his eyes were hooded. I couldn’t see them. He smiled at me. It chilled me more than his earlier comment about the Core Union. Something bad was coming. “Like you had my back with Adaiah?” His voice sounded like iron grating against iron. “I met her. Brought her here. You stole her away from me.”
Something in me snapped. The sound of it echoed deep in my eardrums. I’d tried to be patient, understanding. I would not let him make me feel guilty about Adaiah. Not after all we’d done to try and spare his and Natty’s feelings.
“You will hold that against us too?” I tried to keep my voice calm, but it rose anyway. “We cannot help how we feel, Bart.”
“Oh yes,” he practically snarled. “The heart wants what it wants. Once again, you don’t choose me. An honorable man would not seduce his brother’s love with flattery and deception so he can feel like the bigger man.”
I lunged at Bart and hit him in the jaw with my fist. I’ve never fought another man in my life. Never felt the inclination. But I wasn’t sorry. My feelings for Adaiah are not a lie. They are real. No one will tell me otherwise.
Nat grabbed me and pulled me off Bart. If he hadn’t, I might have broken Bart’s nose. Natty’s always exceeded me in physical strength. He refused to let go until I calmed down. Which I did. Physically, anyway. I breathed as though I’d run a mile and consciously told myself not to give in to my adrenaline. After a few moments, I reigned myself in.
Bart, his lip bleeding, struggled to his feet.
“You do not choose me, Johann. You never have. You choose only yourself. Over and over again.” He turned to Nat. “And you. Why you are so loyal to him, I’ll never know. I suppose you’ll come to me sooner or later. When he breaks your heart too.”
Natty’s reply still echoes in my ears, in the stillness of my bedroom hours later.
“My heart is broken, Bart. I love her too. But I choose to stay with Johann. A broken heart is no excuse to defect to the enemy.”
Natty’s words shocked me so much, I didn’t focus on what Bart said next, so I’m unsure of the exact wording. I know he laughed bitterly, and said something about how Nat must be confused about who the real enemy was. (Me, apparently.)
I recovered myself enough for the next words Bart spoke. Even now, after thinking about them for hours, I still don’t understand what he meant by them.
“Can’t you see what truly happened that day, Natty? I, for one, refuse to ever again be blinded by the so-called morals of an individual.”
Even as I sit here, I’m puzzled. “What truly happened…” What does he mean? I’ve gone over that memory in my head, as well as his words. It happened as I described above. So, what does he imagine happened? I saved Natty when Bart stood in more danger. I was too young to realize it at the time. A mistake on my part, to be sure, but I was six years old. I refuse to apologize for such a thing, fifteen years after it happened.
With those final words, Bart turned and disappeared into the darkness. A heaviness settled over me I still have not been able to shake. Natty, looking sad, turned and walked into the house, without saying a word to me. He stopped, looked over his shoulder, and threw one final look my way. It was…I don’t know. Sad? Lonely? Disappointed perhaps. I couldn’t fully read it. Natty and I have always been close. There has never been a time we weren’t. I find his silence nearly as heavy as Bart’s absence.
I’ve sat awake all night thinking about the exchange. As I write this, the eastern sky is beginning to lighten. When the sun rises fully, I will go see Adaiah and tell her what happened. I’m sure her presence will sooth me. Then I will have to return and stare my heart-broken baby brother in the face.
And somewhere out there, Bart is joining himself to a group of people who will take away his freedom, his emotion, and everything that makes him human. I simply don’t think it’s because he doesn’t believe I love him. It’s an excuse to do as he pleases. I also refuse to believe he loved Adaiah so much, he’d want to throw away his emotions rather than feel the heartache of it. No. More than anything, I think this is way of getting back at me. I won Adaiah, so he’s trying to make me feel guilty now. Now he’s the one being manipulative. That has to be it, doesn’t it? Sooner or later, he’ll tire of it and return home. Of that, I’m confident.
So why do I have so many doubts?
Why can’t everything be as black and white as scientific data? I’ve never felt such a polarity of emotions, and you never encounter such things in hard science. I don’t regret my decision to be with Adaiah. She’s my love and my future. I’m certain of it. And yet…as I write this by candlelight, I can’t help but wonder if my brother will ever forgive me.
August 15, 2156
Adaiah and I spent a wonderful honeymoon up at my family’s cabin in the mountains. I always thought I’d be content with my books and my science. I know now how naïve I was. I’ve never felt such evanescent happiness as when I’m in Adaiah’s arms.
Feeling such happiness, I find myself reflecting on the night Bart went away. Finding such joy with Adaiah, I can only conclude he never felt any such thing, which must be why he left. I must concede to being a part of that, though it was not done intentionally.
We invited Bart to the wedding, of course. I didn’t expect him to come, yet we’ve heard nothing from him for months. If he’s simply ignoring me, I suppose it’s understandable, but I can’t shake the worry that he’s nothing more, now, than a collective drone. Bart and I have never been one another’s biggest fans, but the idea of my brother giving his freedom to the Union saddens me more than I can say.
Unfortunately, Adaiah and I have returned from our blissful honeymoon to less-than-happy news. The leadership of the B.C.O. has agreed to conduct a meeting with the leaders of the Core Union in a few days. I gather the meeting has been in the works for some time. I can’t think it will be a good thing.
It’s to be open to the public, and the two sides will present their arguments for and against the issues. Meetings like this have happened several times. They simply present the two different ways of living: individually or collectively. The Unions are manipulative, and often paint things in a deceptive light. With each meeting they bring more people to their side. Why can’t people see how detrimental it is to give up their freedoms? To let others live their lives for them? Will the world become a silent place? Peopled only by mindless drones instead of human beings with voices and passions and light?
This meeting is sure to be worse than others in the past. The Core Union is threatened by all the neurochemical powers on the rise. In the B.C.O., they teach us to embrace them. It doesn’t take a scientist to know these abilities will be instrumental in resisting unwanted neurological advances. If we ever devolve to the point of the Unions trying to forcibly join individuals to their ranks, these neurochemical abilities are all that will save us.
The Unions try harder with each passing day to control them, which tells me they know that, and want power. They are threatened by those who might resist them. Of course, they don’t say that. If they simply banned neurochemical abilities, the public would rail against them, crying tyranny. The Unions are crafty. They instead claim they want to regulate the super-brain powers, insisting they only wish to protect against those who would use such powers for ill.
It sounds logical, so people listen to their arguments, and hand over their only protections for the sake of seeming reasonable. I shake my head at it.
I imagine it will be a stressful meeting. Adaiah must attend, being President Zealey’s right hand. She will most likely sit beside him on the panel, keeping minutes and handing him what he needs when he speaks. Natty and I will, of course, watch from the audience.
I’m not looking forward to it, but do harbor some small hope that perhaps I will see Bart there. I want to apologize to him for what happened before, and ask him to come home. I do not delude myself that he will, however. I miss him more than I could have imagined.
Chapter 12: Green Balloons
Jonah had never
felt the urge to punch an old man in the face before today. He truly liked and respected Doc, but if the man murmured, "Hmm. Strange," one more time….
“Hmm. Strange,” Doc murmured.
Jonah ground his teeth.
Lila stood beside Doc’s chair. He’d been staring down at his computer for an hour. The corners of Lila’s mouth turned up as she tried unsuccessfully to suppress a smile. For some reason, she found Jonah's frustration funny.
Maggie stood beside Jonah’s chair. She’d been with Doc when Lila went to get him, so she’d come along, and now hovered over Jonah, looking worried.
Finally, Doc spoke. “There’s definitely a jam in the part of your brain dealing with memories.”
Lila had already explained that a “jam” was something that kept neurological abilities from surfacing. Like a jam in a wifi signal or something.
“As with Maggie’s flashes,” Doc continued, “it may be a matter of simply bringing the memory to the surface. Once we do, the jam should disappear.”
"So what do we do Doc?" Lila asked. “What did your scan show?”
Jonah raised an eyebrow, wondering what kind of scan Doc had done on his head.
Doc saw Jonah’s reaction. “I’ve been looking for anomalies in your brain, Jonah. I haven’t found anything except the jam. It feels fairly standard to me. About what you’d expect with any jam. I’ve seen them dozens of times. Lila was correct in assuming the pain you felt is just your mind trying to work through the jam. Perhaps this is a more difficult jam than most, but nothing more than that.”
“So how do I…un-jam?” Jonah asked.
"I'd like to try and bring this memory to light. That is, if you don't mind me working on Jonah first," he flashed Maggie a smile.
Maggie waved her hand dismissively, as if to say it was of no consequence. “Let’s figure this thing out. Mine can wait.”
Doc nodded. "Very well. Jonah, lean back in the chair and close your eyes. The computer is going to probe the area of your brain where the jam is. It will allow you to visualize the memory involved in the jam. Once you can see and explore it, we’ll work through it. The computer will tell me what's going on in your brain, but you'll have to verbalize what you're seeing."
Dark Matter (Interchron Book 3) Page 17