The Felix Chronicles: Five Days in January

by R. T. Lowe

  “So I’d have to lie to them?” It always came back to lying, Felix thought. At the chapel, he’d refused to tell them he was the Belus, and now he would have to lie and tell them he was. How the hell did this happen? Would he ever be able to escape the lies?

  “It’s not so much lying as giving them hope,” Allison said with a sympathetic smile. “The Order still believes in The Warning, they’ve just become soft and cynical. Proving you’re the Belus shouldn’t be too hard though because ultimately, isn’t the Belus just the most powerful Sourceror in the room? Isn’t that what Lofton is? If anyone ever challenged Lofton’s legitimacy, he’d just squash them like a bug, right? Nothing cures doubt like a demonstration of mind bending power, and you’ve definitely got that.”

  Felix stared at her for a moment, shaking his head in awe. “So you just figured all this out last night?”

  “I wish I was that brilliant.” She smiled down at the table as if embarrassed. “I’ve been thinking about it for a long time. When you first told me the prophecy was called The Warning, I think it set something off in my head. The name seemed weird to me so I burned up my hard drive researching prophecies. There are hundreds of them out there, and after a while they all start to read like the same story. It’s always the pure incarnation of evil battling the Chosen One for the fate of the world, or humankind, or souls, or whatever it is that’s important to you. I think The Warning has survived for so long because it explains why Sourcerors have supernatural powers and that’s always been used as proof of the existence of the Source and the truth of The Warning. It’s a circular argument, but physical proof is pretty compelling. After all that research, you know what I finally realized at four in the morning while I was trying to understand why Lofton didn’t kill you?” She shook her head as though disappointed it had taken her so long to unravel. “The Warning is actually supposed to be taken literally. Can you believe that shit? It’s a warning, an actual warning, as in stop and think before you take another step and fall off the platform into an oncoming train. I think the Druid responsible for it was probably a very wise old man and he looked out at the world and recognized there might come a day when we’re presented with two paths. The first leads to safety and security, but we have to give up our individual freedoms, and the second puts the emphasis on the individual over the collective and results in a society where no one cares for anyone outside of their family and circle of friends.”

  “So where’s the warning in all that?” Felix asked, amazed at Allison’s analytical abilities.

  “I think the Druid was trying to tell us we have to avoid the day where those are our only two choices, because if that happens, it’s too late. The Druid was warning us that both choices are bad. They both suck.”

  “So you’re saying it’s too late?” Felix said.

  “It’s just a prophecy, Felix.” Allison shrugged. “I’m sure that Druid guy would be disappointed, but disappointing a weird mystic dude who lived in a mud hut is the least of our concerns.”

  “So saving the Source, that’s just…what?” Felix worked through the implications in his mind, unwinding everything he’d read in the Journal piece by piece. “A fiction? The Source isn’t dying?”

  “There is no Source.” Allison gave him a sorrowful smile and Felix realized she felt bad for him. “I think it’s just a metaphor for the sun, the giver of life and all that. Remember we’re talking about Druids, people who worshipped the sun, the moon and the stars. If something terrible happens on earth, do you really think the sun gives a shit?”

  “But I can feel myself tapping into it,” Felix said, feeling somehow obligated to defend a belief system that had become his bedrock, his reason for living. “When I want to use it, I reach out and I can feel it inside of me.” He put a hand to his stomach. “I feel it here, and my fingers get all tingly and then I feel all charged up like a superconductor or something.”

  “The ‘inside of me’ part is the key factor, I think. You’re reaching inside yourself. You have incredible powers, but the Source isn’t giving them to you. It’s in you. It’s always been in you. That’s how it must be for all of us.”

  “In me?” He thought about his black out at the rock quarry and what he’d done to Kane and Lilly. He’d tried to avoid accepting responsibility for striking out with such violence and savagery, blaming the Belus (as if it was someone other than himself) and the Source, but it was him, he realized, the same person responsible for melting the skin and flesh off Parni’s bones at the Cliff Walk and methodically crushing the shooter until his organs exploded. Allison had called him a ‘Restrainer’, but there was a dark streak residing within him that operated without boundaries or conscience, a part of him that reveled in destroying and torturing those who got in his way. It had always been him. What if it was more than just a ‘streak’ of darkness? he wondered. What if it was more than that? If he acted without restraint, was that the result? Torture, brutality and mass destruction? He turned his mind from the uncomfortable questions and a new thought rushed over him like rising flood waters. He sputtered it out, sounding slightly desperate, “What about the immaculate conception? That couldn’t have happened without the Source. Doesn’t that prove…something?”

  Allison had a quick response and Felix knew she’d already considered it. “When we were here talking to Harper and Lucas, you didn’t tell them about your parents—which I know was deliberate and something they never have to know—but there was one other big piece of the story you didn’t tell them, right?”

  “The immaculate conception,” Felix said softly, lowering his eyes. “You’re right. I guess I just forgot.”

  “Did you?” She gave him a doubtful look.

  Felix thought for a moment. “Maybe it’s because it’s just weird and hard to explain and…if I start talking about the Cycle it seems so…um…”

  “Unbelievable?” Allison suggested. “Felix, I think there’s a very good chance you have a father. In fact, because the Source doesn’t really exist, I can just about guarantee it. The Journal made the immaculate conception seem so real for you, but that’s only because you felt that curse thing your aunt did to it and you couldn’t have known the prophecy wasn’t true. You assumed since the Journal was magical it all had to be true. I don’t want to be insensitive or anything, especially about something I know really upsets you, but your mom died in a mental hospital. I think she may have had, well, issues. She could have convinced Bill of whatever she wanted because she was a Sourceror, and you told me she could persuade people, right?”

  Felix fell silent, saddened by the thought of his mom—his crazy mom—dying in a mental institution. “Yeah, Bill said she was a persuader. Just like Lofton’s mom.” I could have a dad? The thought startled him like an intruder in the night, dangerous and unwelcome. He’d already lost his parents and his biological mom. He didn’t need a dad. Not another person in his life who was probably already dead. He didn’t have the emotional capacity to waste on another dead stranger.

  She watched Felix. “What are you thinking?”

  “I don’t know,” Felix said with a shake of his head, noticing for the first time the fatigue in her eyes. He wasn’t feeling the truth in Allison’s words, but he had no choice but to believe her. Relying on his own instincts and judgment had gotten him nowhere. He’d felt the truth before—in the Journal, in the power of the Source, that the Source had worked through him to kill Kane and Lilly—and he’d been wrong about all those things. He couldn’t trust his own feelings anymore, or his judgment. He had to put his faith in Allison. She knew the truth. She knew it so purely and so deeply she actually experienced it. If Allison believed the prophecy was a lie, then he had to accept her judgment. “I’m not sure what to think.”

  “Well then let me offer you some suggestions,” Allison said, smiling.

  Felix smiled back wanly and gestured for her to continue.

  “You should be ecstatic!” She held out her hands like she wanted to make him understand hi
s sudden good fortune by taking him by the shoulders and giving him a stiff shake. “You just said you felt like everyone was lying to you, well whether they knew it or not, they were. Now that you know the prophecy isn’t real, you can stop feeling like it’s robbing you of your free will. You can stop worrying about the Source dying if Lofton doesn’t win. That means we can make our own fate. We can think for ourselves. We can say fuck the prophecy and do whatever we want.”

  “Whatever we want,” Felix echoed. No limitations? No restrictions? Was it possible? “So, what, uh, what do we want?”

  Allison frowned at him then cracked a grin. “Why are you looking at me like I know all the answers? What do you think we should do?”

  “What do I think?” Felix snorted. “I can’t even decide if I like butter on my popcorn. One time I go to the theater and I’m licking it off the bag—literally. The next time, I think it tastes like floor wax and I wanna puke.”

  Allison laughed. “That stuff is so gross but I love it so much.”

  “So what are our choices?” Felix mused, letting out a long breath, glancing around the room. “Lofton controls the government, which includes the most powerful military on the planet, and everything else, right? The public loves him because of that girl he saved at the Rose Bowl. He has an army of Drestianites and all of his Numbered Ones and whatever else he’s hiding in his forest.” Felix shook his head at Allison as a cold reality squeezed him in its irresistible grip. “Lofton’s won. It’s over.” He gave her an exasperated look. “Is this supposed to be ironic? Now that I have a choice, there’s really no choice at all, is there? This is bullshit. If we don’t choose Lofton’s side, it’ll be me, you and those fuckups in the Order. If we go against Lofton, we’d be going up against the government, which means we’d be criminals. We’d be the bad guys.”

  “Probably end up in jail,” Allison said with a heavy sigh. “It does make it that much harder that Lofton’s so goddamn legitimate. You might be looking at it the wrong way though. Here’s the real question. How do you feel if Lofton follows through with everything he’s planning to do? Do you think that’s a good thing?”

  “If I said ‘maybe’ would you hit me? Lofton is dead set on making the world a safer place, and I think he’ll do it. You should have heard him going on about destroying terrorists and the enemies of society. He said he knows where they are and he’s going to wipe them out. He’s not messing around either. Is that such a terrible thing if a bunch of awful people die so the rest of us can live in peace? But”—Felix frowned, grinding his knuckles over his forehead—“Lofton the zookeeper had no trouble admitting to killing thousands of innocent people. His monsters just tore through the Rose Bowl wiping out his own followers just so he could make the government look like murderers. He can justify just about anything by claiming he’s doing it for the good of society, and that’s a little scary. So I…I don’t know.” He finished with a sad little shrug.

  “He’s not going to let you stay on the sidelines forever,” Allison began, “but I wonder if he’d let you take a wait-and-see approach? If he does great things and brings prosperity to everyone and rids the world of terrorists we’d be stupid not to join him. I’m just not so sure he’s going to stop at terrorists. You know what they say about power and absolute power and all that?”

  “I can’t see him pulling on the brakes once he gets started,” Felix agreed.

  “So where does that leave us?” Allison asked.

  “Confused and clueless. As always.”

  Allison laughed until her laughter turned to a sigh and she sat with her head lowered, suddenly very interested in a picture in Felix’s Western Civ text. She snapped the book shut and stood, stepping over to an end table, brushing her fingers over the dusty surface. “Do you think it means anything?” she asked in a soft voice, her back turned to him.

  “What?” Felix wasn’t sure if they were still discussing Lofton.

  “What Kane said about my parents?” She faced him, crossing her arms, delicately, her bandaged arm on top. “Why would the Protectors kill them and let me live? I was six when they died. They could’ve killed me whenever, right? Easiest thing in the world to kill a kid and those assholes specialize in murdering children, right? Why didn’t they? I mean, it’s weird, isn’t it? I understand why Kane was so suspicious. He shouldn’t have tried to kill you, but…”

  Felix didn’t have an answer but Allison looked troubled so he hazarded a guess. “Maybe they lost you in the shuffle? They shipped you around a lot before Coos Bridge, right? All those foster homes. Maybe they…lost track of you.”

  Allison’s expression didn’t lighten. “They’re letting Caitlin out at five,” she told him, apparently done with the topic. “We should be there.”

  Felix nodded down at his computer. “I just wanna finish this up. I guess we can’t stop living just because Lofton’s taking over the world.”

  “Yeah, that would be really bad form.” Allison smiled and rubbed her eyes. “I haven’t been for a run in a while.” She checked her watch and pulled her foot behind her, stretching her thigh muscle. “What is it, like six miles?”

  “About.”

  She fished Felix’s keys from her jacket pocket and slid them across the table. “Can you bring coffees for everyone? Lucas was saying the hospital’s is weak on caffeine and it’s giving him migraines.”

  “Sure,” Felix said, smiling. “Give me an hour or so.”

  Chapter 31

  Extermination

  Clouds of steam billowed out from the vents behind the laundromat, swirling and gusting away in the afternoon wind. Lynch waited alone in the lot, gesturing for the woman to exit the late model Cadillac, the sagging tailpipe chuffing out exhaust like a smokestack.

  Leaving the car running, she stepped out and closed the door, using the window to check her hair (long in back and shaved above the ear on one side), though her eyes were fixed on Lynch’s reflection. She turned and addressed him confidently, “Hello Lynch. You’re looking as cheerful as ever.”

  Lynch grunted. He hated anarchists. They stood for nothing and caused chaos not out of principle, but simply because they enjoyed reveling in the aftermath of their actions. At heart they were voyeurs, no more sophisticated than a child who drops toys from the roof to watch them break when they strike the ground.

  “Not even a hello,” she quipped, smiling to herself.

  “Make it quick, Xena,” Lynch said stiffly. “I don’t want to be seen with you.”

  She laughed caustically and waved a hand at a row of overflowing dumpsters beneath the vents, the stench of garbage drifting over the lot. “Unless rats are taking pictures with their smart phones I think you’re safe.” She gave him an amused shake of her head and snorted through her nose which was pierced through the bridge, a silver end cap on either side. “You worry too much. It’s not like you’re associating with a wanted fugitive.” She burst out in a squall of laughter, tracing black nails along the death’s head tattoo curling around her throat. “Wait a minute! Actually you are.” She turned to the dumpsters and shouted, “No photos! You hear me? No photos, you goddamn filthy rats!”

  Lynch considered killing her.

  Xena, and those like her, operated networks of loosely affiliated murderers-for-hire, anti-government crusaders, arsonists and gun runners that had originated in the country’s prison systems. Lofton referred to them as “ungovernables” and Lynch thought the description apt. Lynch had hired her, and the ‘leaders’ of the other networks, to destabilize the government. For the most part, they’d done a commendable job, but if it was Lynch’s decision to make, he’d permanently sever their relationship before sunset. Lofton was in charge though, and he placed an inordinate value on caution, preparation and timing. In Lynch’s view, the strategy was an obvious mistake, and despite what the other Drestianites believed, Lofton the Chosen One wasn’t infallible. His weakness for beautiful women, for example, particularly beautiful young women, influenced his decision making and impa
cted his judgment. Lofton’s other failings and flaws, however, and all his mistakes of the past, were trifles compared to the dangerous game he was playing with the student at Portland College.

  At its core, Lynch believed the concept of governance was quite simple. The strong ruled the weak. That was the natural order of things. The Drestianites forced to live in the shadows of Wisp rule for so long was shameful and insulting, a historical aberration without precedent. But finally, the era of the weak governing the strong—Lynch thought of it as the ‘perversion of the past’—was about to end. Unless, that is, Lofton decided now was a good time to ignore the prophecy. There was a certain amusing irony to Lynch’s present quandary. He had always thought Lofton was far too absorbed in the mysteries of the unknowable, wasting his energies on matters like The Warning. Lynch had never questioned Lofton’s status as the Drestian, nor had he ever challenged his authority, but as a practical man, an empiricist, the prophecy had never ruled his mind or his actions. The Warning was simply words. And the Source? It couldn’t be proved or disproved. He didn’t know where his powers or Lofton’s or the other Drestianites’ derived, and he didn’t care. Why did it matter?

  Yet if Lofton, the Drestian, believed Felix was the Belus—and from his reaction at watching the video of Felix’s test, it seemed he did—allowing him to live another second was the pinnacle of stupidity. It was irresponsible, an egregious error in judgment bordering on sheer insanity. If there was even a sliver of truth to The Warning, and if Felix was indeed the Belus, Lofton was not only endangering himself, he was jeopardizing everything they had worked for to end the corrupt and incompetent reign of the Wisps. The Drestianites had already initiated the first steps to correct the perversion of the past, so why would Lofton risk it all by permitting the only person in the world who could kill him to live? If Lofton fell, the Drestianites, the ERA, AshCorp, and the influence Lofton had seeded in every corner of the globe would crumble and scatter in the four winds. All would be lost. The old establishment would return to power and Lynch and his kind would scurry back to the shadows. Lynch preferred death to that world. The future was at hand, but a threat—perhaps the ultimate threat—stood on the path to a permanent victory, and it had to be expunged immediately. If Lofton didn’t recognize the irrefutable logic of that truth, then Lynch had no choice but to take matters into his own hands. He felt no sense of satisfaction at disobeying Lofton, but he was saving Lofton from himself—and saving the future—and in matters of death, Lynch had never before erred. Lofton, he thought, would forgive him, eventually, and Lynch would gladly accept whatever punishment Lofton deemed necessary if it meant the destruction of the old world and the preservation of the new.