A Lunatic Fear

by B. A. Chepaitis

  “Deer scat?” Jaguar asked quietly.

  Fiore dropped the spoor, grunted in the affirmative, and stood. She began running, low to the ground, her movements silent and sure. Jaguar followed, and in a sheltered spot beneath a grouping of trees, they saw the small herd of deer, nested down for the night. As they moved closer, a buck lifted his head and gave warning to the others. They clamored into wakefulness, scattering through the trees, and Fiore pinpointed the slowest.

  She pulled her arm back and let the knife fly, her aim as sure as her steps had been. It pierced the neck of the deer, who stumbled, stood, took a step forward, stumbled again, and finally fell as blood poured out of its artery.

  The women waited as the deer’s legs jerked spasmodically, kicking at the ground. When all movement ceased Fiore walked over and pulled the knife out, brought it to her lips and licked at the blood which covered it.

  Jaguar pushed Fiore’s face into the deer’s. “Breathe,” she said. “Breathe, and say thank you.”

  She heard Fiore’s breath moving with the last breaths of the deer, and then she said, “Now take the heart. It’s yours.”

  There was only a moment of hesitation before Fiore cut through to that organ, pulled it from the chest cavity and held it up, steaming and still pulsing weakly, moonlight and blood pouring down her wrists and arm.

  “Go ahead,” Jaguar whispered. “You’re hungry for it, aren’t you?”

  Fiore brought the heart to her lips, and held it there, suspended. Then she bit into it, teeth working hard against muscle, the red splashing her face and running over her breasts.

  Jaguar rocked back on her haunches and sang a wordless melody. She heard Fiore’s feast, gruntings and slurpings and small laughter in the darkness. Then, it all stopped. Silence, and an absence of motion surrounded them.

  Jaguar stopped singing. Fiore was staring at her hands, catching the rich scent of blood and shit. Now she saw herself. Now she saw what she wanted.

  Jaguar scrambled to her side and wrapped her hands over Fiore’s face, finding her way in.

  See who you are. Be what you see, she intoned.

  She started with surface material. Recent memories of daily events. When she was pregnant, shopping in maternity stores. Jaguar could feel the pleasure of life moving inside her. The pleasure Fiore felt at that - a pleasure long delayed.

  Jaguar pushed further in from here, going back in time to when Fiore was not pregnant, trying to get pregnant, the time of frustrated desire. She saw Fiore’s face, hot with rage and grief and the tears that expressed them. But it wasn’t all because she wanted a baby. Something about her husband in there, another woman.

  Then, Fiore, enraged, slamming a hand down on the doctor’s desk, screeching at him to do something for her, do something dammit.

  Fiore, walking, head bent low, toward a lab that had the logo for La Femme on the door. The research labs. Fiore being told the vitamin they gave her wasn’t a fertility drug. Just a way of increasing her health so she might get pregnant. And Karena at the lab with her, taking different vitamins for different reasons.

  Fiore, not telling her husband or anyone about this, but taking her vitamins like holy communion. Then, her dual discovery – that she was pregnant, and that she could look into the mind of the researcher who gave her the vitamins. She’d seen what was in them, where they came from, and she’d tracked her way to the plant where they were made. She stood outside the building, clutching her rounding belly under a rounding moon.

  Realization dawned on Jaguar. Fiore knew what she was taking, and she continued to take it. More importantly, she knew where the plant was. She might also know who ran it.

  Where? Take me there.

  A clear response came back.

  I wanted what they gave me. My husband wanted – a baby.

  Jaguar wasn’t surprised. She already knew this, but Fiore needed to make her confession.

  And Karena? Did she want a baby?

  She wanted money. We were paid well, test subjects. Only Terez didn’t know. Her husband gave it to her to make her want sex more. He worked at the plant.

  Stupid, Jaguar thought. They bought the lie. Thought they could make themselves over in the right image, if only they had the right chemicals. She spoke harshly into Fiore, telling her the truth.

  You’re an empath. A hunter, pyrokinetic. You’ll never be anything else without twisting yourself into little bits. Artemis won’t make you a normal woman with a baby and a husband and a house.

  Jaguar placed an image in Fiore’s mind of the moon sailing weightless over curtains of clouds.

  Look at her. The only power she’ll give is what you already own. That’s what terrifies you most, isn’t it? She told you the truth about yourself.

  Fiore scuttled back on her haunches, trying to escape these words, but Jaguar wouldn’t let her. She lunged, pressed Fiore hard into the ground, feeling the fire that lingered behind her eyes.

  Fiore struggled, then ceased struggling, a hiss of air escaping her lips as her eyes became heated stones in an earthen pit, her hair nothing more than the screaming grass of a forest where animals foraged and slept and fucked and were born and died so that the bones would dissolve and feed the trees and grasses that were her hair.

  Her voice whispered into Jaguar.

  It will kill me.

  Jaguar laughed. She thought of Kali dancing while thousands died, then dancing again so thousands would be born. Fiore was ancient. Her wisdom was the raw knowledge of life and death. She contained fire, which contained both, and she’d have to learn how to own that. Direct it. Stop fearing who she was. Slowly she let the knowledge take hold, let it seep like moonlight into the deepest places. Then she dropped her hand.

  She waited until Fiore opened her eyes and sat up. Her breathing was ragged and the corner of her mouth twitched. She dug in the earth with her hand, brought earth to her mouth and ate.

  “Hecate,” Jaguar said sharply, and prepared to slap her on the back, but Fiore grasped her wrist and stopped her. Jaguar looked at the hand that held her, felt the heat of it, and the intense strength. She relaxed, and Fiore released her hold.

  “Okay,” she said. “It’s all yours.”

  Fiore stood, pointed her body east, and ran. Jaguar pulled in breath and ran behind her, working to keep up. The moon poured light down, and they ran through it, under it, until woods gave way to road. And Fiore kept running.

  Jaguar tried not to think about how much ground they were covering, for fear the thought would stop her from continuing to cover it. She just ran, let her feet pound earth, let her heart and lungs do their job, kept Fiore in her sights.

  The road turned toward a gravel path, and Fiore took her down that, and then began to slow.

  Jaguar caught up with her as she came to a complete stop, raised her face and made a sound like growling. Jaguar followed her gaze toward a long low building a few hundred yards away.

  There were lights on behind the windows, vehicles in the lot. Fiore walked forward.

  “Wait,” Jaguar said, catching up to her, grabbing her arm. “Wait. Is this the plant?”

  Fiore nodded.

  “I’ll call it in,” Jaguar said. “This is all we need. Proof. Evidence.”

  Fiore stared at her. The spirits of the night blazed at the back of her eyes.

  “Fiore,” Jaguar said sharply. “No.”

  Fiore held up a fiery hand, and Jaguar clutched it at the wrist.

  No. Not this. Not here. Not now.

  But heat surrounded them, and fire bit at her face, her hair. Fiore shoved her down onto the ground and ran toward the building.

  No time to think. Jaguar rose and ran after her, with no idea what she could do to stop her prisoner. She only knew she had to keep this building here, intact, until someone else saw it with her.

  Fiore stood at the plant door, hand raised. Jaguar could see the outline of fire in her thoughts. Her only idea was a flying tackle, but before she could take it a man appeared fr
om the side of the building and moved to Fiore.

  “Hell,” Jaguar said. “Hell, no.”

  She dove for his knees. He lost his balance and went down over Fiore who, undeterred, scrambled out from under him, ran back to the door and pressed her fiery hand against it.

  Jaguar turned and rolled into the bushes as the sound of fire roared up in the night, and fire in a great rolling sphere engulfed the building, and something like thunder boomed out across the sky.

  She rose from the bushes to see the man dragging Fiore by the left arm across the parking lot, illuminated by the wall of fire the building had become. She didn’t wait for him to get to her, but strode out to meet him, landing a punch hard on his jaw as soon as she was close enough.

  His head snapped back, and he rubbed at his chin while he regarded her. “What the hell was that for?”

  “What’d you do to my prisoner.”

  “I was trying to stop her.”

  “Who the hell told you to do that?” Jaguar demanded.

  He held a hand out, palm up. “Could we discuss this somewhere else? We’re not gonna be alone very long.”

  Jaguar knelt down to Fiore. “She’s not dead, is she?”

  “Don’t think so. Burned bad, though. It’s a shame. She’s good.”

  Jaguar looked up at him. “How do you know?”

  “I was watching the two of you. In the woods. She could be trained for tracking.”

  Jaguar pushed herself to standing. “She doesn’t need training,” she said. “I have to get her out of her.”

  “She’s going nowhere.”

  “She’s coming with me.”

  “No.”

  Jaguar looked up at him, about to ask him who the hell he was, and then she saw.

  A boulder on top of a mountain, and a great head of golden hair. A small black and gold ring on his pinkie finger.

  “Shit,” she said. “Golden Retriever.”

  “You can call me Pasquale,” he said. “I understand you want my services in a big way. Which means you do what I tell you.”

  Jaguar fought with herself. She needed him. She hated needing people. It cut down badly on her options.

  “Anyway, you’re not thinking straight,” Pasquale continued. “She’ll get to a doctor quicker if we leave her here.”

  The sound of sirens approaching told Jaguar he was right. Dammit, she thought. She’d found the place only to have it destroyed, all evidence slipping out of her hands. And Fiore wouldn’t survive rough travel. She had to leave her.

  “Let’s get out of here,” she said.

  * * * *

  Jaguar made herself as relaxed as possible for one of her least favorite activities – being a passenger in someone else’s wings. They kept low and not too fast so Pasquale could scan the road for an open bar. Jaguar wanted a drink, and she wanted to talk to this man while not in motion. She needed to concentrate with him, she thought.

  They found what looked like a dive, landed and went inside. Jaguar peered through the dim light and noted the only other customers had very few teeth and wore flannel. That felt safe. When Pasquale returned to the table with her two shots of tequila and a pack of cigarettes, she felt even safer.

  He plunked them both in front of her, with lime and a shaker of salt, and sat down across from her to watch the proceedings. Jaguar stared at the sticky tabletop, picked up the salt and cupped the lime between thumb and index finger.

  The first shot felt good.

  The second one felt better.

  “You out to do some damage?” Pasquale asked.

  She shook her head hard as the burning coursed its way down her throat, and rasped back at him, “I already did some damage. I’m out to stop feeling it.”

  She wiped the back of her hand against her mouth, opened the pack of cigarettes, and lit one. This wasn’t the kind of place where anyone would call the cops for illegal smoking.

  Pasquale lifted his glass of beer and took a sip. He lounged back in his chair, leisurely, relaxed. “That’s bad for you. Smoking.”

  “My life is bad for me,” she said.

  “I believe you. You hurt?”

  Jaguar took a deep pull on the cigarette, felt the nicotine course through her, making her dizzy. She didn’t smoke often enough, she decided. “My left leg is killing me,” she said, “and there’s something going on in my ribs I’d rather not think about. How do I look?”

  Pasquale chuckled. “You know how you look. Like a really good meal.”

  “Then I hope you’re not hungry,” she said.

  “Not me,” he said. “My grandmother taught me better than that.”

  “What’s that mean?”

  He turned his glass around and around, lifted a hand philosophically and let it drop again. “My grandmother made homemade pasta,” he said. “From the time I was a little boy, I ate good homemade pasta. It was great, except now I can’t eat the crap that comes in boxes.”

  “Does that mean something?”

  “It means I won’t try food that’ll spoil me for what’s available on a regular basis. I hear that’s you.”

  She shrugged. If it was an insult, she didn’t mind owning it. But she wanted the terms of their relationship stated clearly. “This is business,” she said. “That’s all. Punto. Finito. Just business.”

  “From what I here, that only encourages you.”

  She startled, flicked ash onto the floor. “What do you know about it?”

  Pasquale shrugged his mountain shoulders. “When I take on a job, I find out everything. So I know everything about you.”

  “Then,” she said, “you know what the job is, don’t you?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “I know. You’re looking for Alex Dzarny. And I owe a friend of yours, so if it all checks out, I’ll find him for you.”

  “What’s to check out?”

  “How come you’re doing this for this guy?”

  “If you know everything else, then you should know that,” she said.

  “I know he’s gone with a prisoner. I know about the moon mining and that you want to stop it. I know about that plant your friend blew up tonight. Now I wanna see if you know how to tell the truth. So tell me, why’re you doing this for him?” he asked, punctuating the words with his finger in the air.

  “Good supervisors are hard to find,” she said.

  “Bullshit.”

  Jaguar lifted her shotglass, saw that it was empty, and licked the bottom of it. She put it down on the table hard. She didn’t take offense at what he said. He was right to call her on it.

  “Because,” she said, “he’d do it for me.”

  “You think?”

  “I know.”

  Pasquale considered her, and nodded as if concluding a conversation with himself. “There’s more, but you ain’t ready to say it to yourself, much less me, so technically you’re not a liar.”

  “Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome. How do you know he’s still alive?”

  “If he was dead, I’d know it.”

  “How?”

  “How do you know things?”

  Pasquale chuckled lightly and considered her some more, turning his glass around and around. He lifted his head and sniffed the air around her. “You smell like mint,” he said.

  “I know,” she said, “But I’m not the one you’re supposed to sniff. Can you find him?”

  “Does he want to be found?”

  “I don’t think so,” she said honestly. “In fact, I think he’s hiding.”

  “From what?”

  “Me.”

  “Why?”

  “So he won’t kill me.”

  Pasquale looked at her keenly. “He’s good at hiding?”

  Jaguar nodded. “Among the best.”

  “Then I’ll need something from him.”

  “What?”

  “Something important to him. Something that stays in his mind, regardless.”

  Jaguar dropped her cigarette on the floor, ground it out
with her foot. “I don’t have anything like that here.”

  “That’s okay. He ain’t here anyway.”

  “You know that?”

  “I checked it out.”

  Jaguar leaned back in her chair. “How much?” she asked.

  “What?”

  “How much do you want from me? What’ll you try to soak me for before you tell me he just can’t be found?”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “I’m talking about whatever game you think you’re playing, you arrogant son of a bitch. Just like that, you checked out the whole goddamn world and you know he’s not here, but you need something to find him? You sell snake oil on the side?”

  Pasquale smoothed his lower lip with his tongue, lifted his glass and drained the contents. He carefully placed it away from him on the table and, swiftly, easily for a man his size, moved to press the blade of a knife against her throat.

  She hadn’t seen it coming. She sat very still, staring at his hand, with the small, unlikely ring on his pinkie. It was intricately carved, she noted, with a circle of leaves around the face of an animal who had black diamond eyes.

  “I don’t like insults,” he said, smiling. Anyone watching would think he was caressing her, from the way his hand moved, the knife cupped hidden within it. She knew this move. She’d done it herself more than once.

  “I don’t like assaults,” she returned, flicking her knife out from her wrist, letting her hand stay still on the table and holding him in a steady stare.

  “Don’t try that on me,” he said, still smiling. “I know about empaths, and how to deal with them.”

  She felt the blade against her flesh and figured her odds. She’d beaten worse, she thought. “Maybe,” she said. “Or maybe not.”

  He ran the edge of the blade against her skin, and with his other hand smoothed her hair back from her face. His smile widened. “Now who’s being arrogant?” he asked. Then he retreated into his seat, the knife disappearing from view. “If I was looking for money, I wouldn’t be trying to get it from a Planetoid Teacher. I know what they pay you. Ever think of that?”

  She shrugged, stayed silent.