The First Book of the Pure

by Don Dewey

  “Forgive me for asking, An’Kahar, but I suspect you weren’t looking for your father. You seemed quite stunned to find out who I really am. Why were you here looking into me?”

  “I read about your racing accident, and wanted to know if there were others of us. Ruby’s curious, but I really wanted to know. I’ve investigated many, and found them all to be Normals, lucky ones to be sure, but just Normals.”

  “And now what? You’ll continue looking? What do you expect from me? I mean, I’m truly glad you’ve survived and inherited my longevity, but still…what is it you want?”

  “I don’t expect us to be a family after so long. I have a life, Ruby has a life, and you obviously do. But perhaps I can keep you informed of my searches, and visit from time to time. Family means a lot to me now.”

  “My last family.” Gheret choked back unexpected tears as he paused. “I had a wonderful wife and sons, as I did with you. Can you believe I was a lumberjack? Emma, my wife, finally died, and my boys married and had children of their own. When my sons passed away, I kept seeing their children as a grandfather might. However, it was finally strange and a bit unsettling that I was still around at all. Now I track some of my offspring, but I make no contact. Frankly, knowing I’ll likely outlive them makes it painful to want another family. It would take just the right woman to spark that fire again and make me start another family.” Gheret stared at his son for a long moment and finally said, with a warm smile, “It’s a miracle that you’re here. I’ll settle for that right now.”

  An’Kahar sat quietly, looking at his father. “Sometimes I think it would be enough to be able to talk about things that concern Pures with another Pure. Ruby is wonderful, of course, but still…another man, my own father. That would be a plus.” He grinned a boyish grin at Gheret, as he pushed his own straying lock of hair off his face.

  “Perfect,” said Gheret. “I may be able to point you to some very interesting people to investigate, as you say you’ve been doing. They’re unusual to say the least, and may be Pure as well. You understand though, that being a Pure doesn’t mean someone will be good or moral. You may find Pure idiots, or Pure demons. I’ve never looked for them, although I have known some through the centuries.

  “I’ve had dealings with people who seem … different. Perhaps they’re Pures, and you should investigate them. One is a woman named Rose, who is quite interesting. More different she couldn’t be.” He laughed. “But I like her. Another is a ruthless businessman named Karl Schmidt. He’s acquired far too much for one so young. He seemed to come out of nowhere. My company had to deal with him on a couple of occasions and he was a serious pain. Be very careful with him. I know from long ago that he actually is a Pure, and as ruthless a person as I’ve ever known. He’s done some horrific things in his long life.

  “I must ask; do you know much about us? About our, condition, as it were?”

  “You mean, do I know why we’re like we are?”

  “Yes,” Gheret answered with that warm smile again. “That.”

  “Well, Ruby’s quite a scientist, and ahead of most science today. She’s found that we’re stronger than Normals due to higher levels of type 1 muscle fibers. We have roughly four times the amount than an athlete would have. And as far as our healing abilities, she talks about our platelets having a serious flash mob effect, and wounds contracting or some such thing. They ‘granulate’ more quickly than in a Normal. Then there was something about epithelialization, whatever that is. I have to admit, I don’t pay much attention to scientific jargon. I’m afraid I’m a bit more of a doer than a thinker.”

  “Hmm, I’ve done my share of research, but all I had to go on was me and my body, my experiences. She has the two of you, so I’m thinking she may know more about it. I’ve looked into it and found that our bone density is greater than that of a Normal, and our rate of protein absorption is much higher too. I’ve checked my own sleep patterns, and I seem to get many times the delta sleep of anyone else. I’ll look forward to meeting your Ruby, son, and perhaps collaborating on our studies.”

  “Thank you father. I’ll look into the people you’ve mentioned, and I’ll let you know what we find out. I have no doubt that all of us are pretty good about concealing our identities and longevity, or we would be targets. I did it, you did it, and Ruby did it. Others must too.”

  With renewed warmth and a much more sincere embrace, they parted, An’Kahar heading back to meet with Ruby, and his father, Gheret, to do whatever it was he did in the normal course of his incredible life.

  Chapter 36

  Session 12

  Kenneth’s host met him promptly the next morning. “I have many business affairs to keep up with, so I’ve had to carve out this time for you each day. My enterprises go on, you understand.”

  He walked about, nibbling a fried croissant stuffed with a delectable cream cheese. “Today you have to really try to put time in perspective. Goyahkla was living in Chicago. Do you know Chicago at all, Kenneth?”

  “Not well, I guess, but I’ve made several trips there. It’s a big place, and I haven’t seen nearly all of it, let alone know the place. Do you know Chicago well?”

  “I’ve probably known any place you can mention better than you, by the very virtue of my long life and ability to do what I wish. I’ve traveled extensively, and have lived lives where you just took a vacation.

  “Yes, I know Chicago, and I knew it back when it was becoming what it is today. Well, it hasn’t always been the vast city it is today. But it has always been interesting. This was in the days of the crime families, and after a lifetime in the west, and then in the south, Goyahkla made it his home.”

  Chapter 37

  History Repeats Itself

  Keep in mind that this happened in the mid-1940s, and people were feeling pretty desperate, especially in cities like Chicago. Crime was a real threat, and nobody was truly insulated from it. Powerful crime families each claimed portions of the city, and turf wars were common.

  Later that same night in which Goyahkla’s family had argued and laughed together, with all of them in bed, Goyahkla got up and went about his nightly routine. He wandered about the house, checking doors and such. As he walked through the living room, gunshots rang out very close, splintering wood explosively, throwing shards of wood through the living room. An explosion upstairs shook the house, and Goyahkla rushed back up the narrow stairs to their bedroom. The smoke and scent of cooked flesh was overpowering to one such as he had been. He knew the smell all too well, and knew what he would find as he ran into the room. His beloved wife had still been in bed when the homemade bomb had been thrown through the window. The blast had killed her instantly, and had charred her and much of the room. He rushed back down to his son’s room, a small add-on at the back of the living room. As he rushed in, Elihas was bleeding and unconscious. Shock had already set in. Goyahkla immediately set about staunching the flow of blood and checking his son for other wounds. One bullet went in and then back out, leaving a sizable hole in his back. His heart had been missed, but the wound would likely kill him, unless…

  Goyahkla carried his grown son to the basement, and laid his body on a weight bench he cleaned off and put in a closet. He checked the wound. It had stopped bleeding already, which was a good sign that perhaps his son had inherited his abilities. He’d never felt a need to find out before now. He realized too late what an oversight that had been! This wound would not have put Geronimo down, but it certainly would have been painful and taken time to heal well. He arranged his son carefully, and slid the door into place to conceal the bench with Elihas on it, still losing blood. He sat for a moment and pulled long, bloodied wood fragments out of his own side, imbedded there with the first gunshots through the living room. Then he made a stop in his bedroom to bid farewell to his wife. He held her scorched body in his arms and cried freely, horrified that this had happened to her. He rocked her for awhile, and then laid her body down in the bed gently, with great care, as if she were
just injured.

  He stood and went to the basement once again. He checked on his son, whose breathing was very shallow, and then opened a box and took out two eight inch blades. With these he had taken many lives. With these knives he would avenge his family. With these Goyahkla stepped into the shadows, and Geronimo returned.

  He went to the street and talked with some of the people gathered there because of the shooting and explosion. His neighbors were relieved to see him, and saddened when he told them Ohma had been killed. His desire was to know who was behind this, and who had actually done the deed. Facts were thin, and what he could find out was that it was most likely a hit by the Pelegrinis, the crime family claiming this portion of the city. That was enough. If he was wrong it would still be just, to put an end to those people. They may have hit his house by mistake, or perhaps he’d spoken out once too often about the crime and the “fees” he was often told to pay to stay in business. Perhaps this was his fault, for not paying off the Pelegrini family. No matter, someone had chosen to do this, and he would now choose his own course: one they would regret. As he walked, he tied his hair back under a headband, knotting it at the back.

  ***

  He was a shadow, this tracker and hunter from long ago. His world had been prairies, and his prey in good times was deer and buffalo. In bad times, his prey was enemy soldiers. Tonight his prey was once again men, and he would deal with them as Geronimo, War Leader of the Apache. He watched the house the crime family held: an estate with walls and gates, guards at each entrance. He heard the men laughing and talking about the size of the explosion and the point it must have made. He heard one laugh and say, “Stupid Indians should have stayed on the reservation.” That was enough evidence for him. He wanted nothing more from them except their lives.

  He crept silently toward the gate, stopping just a few steps from it, listening to the man there. He was smoking and not paying very close attention to anything, feeling secure in his station. That secure feeling was ill-fated. Geronimo slipped in behind him and clamped his left hand over the man’s mouth, jerking him backwards and off balance, driving his knife between the man’s right ribs, striking directly into the heart protected there. The guard collapsed like a marionette with its strings cut, straight down, no sound at all. As his body pumped out blood, Geronimo touched an index finger to it, and made a red stripe on each of his cheeks.

  Through the gate Geronimo boldly walked, no longer a shadow, but an avenging angel, or more accurately a demon, both knives held close. Three men were near the house, loitering near a car, very likely the same ones who had just returned from killing his family. With an Apache war cry that chilled the blood, he leapt at them, his knives remembering their patterns from days long past. First one throat was opened, and then another knife sank in and out of a chest so fast the third man didn’t know what was happening. Geronimo finally spoke to the man lifting a gun toward him. “Did you shoot into the house on Barnett Street tonight? Did you throw the bomb?”

  “You betcha, buddy, and now you’re gonna join them schmucks!” The man’s voice held great bravado. Looking at the hair band, the red “paint” on his face, he seemed somehow shaken. “You dumb Indian; you don’t bring a knife to a gunfight.” He shot at Geronimo several times, hitting him once, which knocked the Apache backwards. The man stepped closer and Geronimo sprang to his feet and stepped inside the man’s reach, the gun no longer of help to him, and essentially useless. Bleeding profusely from the bullet wound, he opened the man’s arm and watched him drop his gun as he screamed in pain. Then he slashed the other arm, and blood fountained from the wounds. “You can’t kill me, fool,” he spat at the gunman. “Every life in this place is forfeit because of your actions this night. I’m a full blooded Apache. Some advice for you, never bring a gun to a knife fight.” With that and a vicious grin he back-slashed the throat in front of him, and had moved past the body before it began to collapse.

  Inside the shots had been heard, and while it wasn’t that unusual in this compound to hear a gunshot, it still caught everyone’s attention. Out they came, like bees flying out of a nest that had been kicked. Toward him they ran, not knowing what was going on, but all armed and full of themselves. Geronimo waded in, knives flashing, a dark wraith among sheep, slitting and gutting men as fast as they could come. Again he was shot. The man who hit him knew it, and looked confounded. With a twenty-foot throw he sank one blade deep in the surprised gangster’s chest, driving his other up into the ribs of the last man outside. Bleeding but feeling no pain, either from shock or the old habit of not allowing the pain to stop him, Geronimo retrieved his second knife as he burst through the doorway into the house. He threw his knife again almost at once, embedding it deeply in the thick neck of an overly large man in a dark suit. The man dropped onto the beautiful, expensive Persian rug, surprise on his face. As his life gurgled away, spreading a red stain on the once beautiful rug, Geronimo ran through the house, hacking and hewing when anyone appeared in his path. When he was done and it was quiet he had no idea how many he’d killed. But it was done. His family was avenged, again. He was sorry for the two women in the house, arrogant as they seemed, and was truly grateful there had been no children there.

  His sorrow was deep, and his pain was now acute as the adrenaline rush subsided. Twice he’d been shot, and struck by various things as the thugs had fought back. But he was no ordinary foe; he was Geronimo, and his knives had once again found the enemies of his people, and of his family. He realized that he had much more to do. Without a backward glance at the carnage he’d wrought, he walked purposefully away from the gruesome scene, back to his home. He was an Apache on the warpath, bloodied and bruised, but victorious. He wiped at the rid stripes on his cheeks as he walked, making them ore like he was flushed than bloodied.

  When he neared his home he saw some neighbors still lingering about. Some policemen were there as well, and when they saw him they brought up their weapons and ordered him to surrender. He looked at them and said, “They killed my family, they took me, and I fought free. They’re at the great, walled house on Murdock Avenue, the Pelegrini family. Please hurry; they have my son.” The police huddled, then entered their cars and left, going in the general direction he had indicated. Whether they would actually try to confront the family was anybody’s guess. His neighbors gathered around him and asked so many questions it was just noise to him.

  “Friends. Let me care for my family. I’ve dealt with the ones who did this.”

  “What do you mean…how did you…who was it...are you okay?” All these questions were hurled at him together and felt like a physical blow. He shrugged them off and entered his smoking house. As the crowd remained at the front of the house, he slipped out the back with his son bundled up. The lie he told the police should give him enough time for what he had to do. He carried his son as if his weight was nothing. He carried him on and on for what seemed miles to the wounded Apache, to a great cemetery with large markers and some old family mausoleums. Into one of these he took his son, and placed him carefully on a stone ledge built to hold a casket. Several of his very old gold coins had been sold to pay for this mausoleum, and his family knew nothing of it. He had a huge internal slide bolt installed so it could be locked from the inside. He shoved it now into the locked position. He thought about a casket, but decided against it. If his son revived he must not wake up in such a thing; it would be terrifying.

  He waited with him for two days while Elihas continued to breathe shallowly, then more deeply. The bullet did much damage as it exited. Risky to move him soon. Just then Elihas stirred, and his father stepped close. “My son, hear me.” Elihas nodded, almost imperceptibly, unable to move more. “Breathe with me, my son, and rest deeply. Breathe in, and out, and in, and out, let the tension go, let your mind rest and step outside of your body. Rest my son, rest. I will be here, and nothing can happen to you.” He continued along those lines until it seemed that the tall Indian lying on the stone ledge had stopped breath
ing altogether. Taking a lock from his pocket, he closed and locked the door from the outside, going out to finish some very personal business and put some other things in place. Then he, too, would rest.

  He moved through the deep night quietly and smoothly, the wounds he’d suffered no longer significantly bothering him. He walked through the finest of shopping areas and plotted his course through two stores. Both had gemstones and jewelry, neither of which had ever meant much to him. But now he had need for his son’s future. In the first shop he managed to finagle the lock and enter quickly, taking just the gems from the cabinets into the worn leather pouch on his belt. He never gave up carrying such, even after his many years in the white man’s world, as he still thought of it. The second store’s lock was more stubborn, and he gave up and smashed the door in, grabbing what he could from the shelves there. His pouch was full to bursting and out he ran, right into the police. Two officers were checking on the noise they’d heard on their beat, and he ran smack into them, nearly knocking them down. “Hey now, what’re you doing?” one yelled out as they collided. Geronimo broke that one’s jaw with his fist, and lifted the other and threw him into the side of the building he’d just exited so rapidly. Both men lay on the ground moaning. He had no quarrel with them, so he decided to let them live, and made his escape.

  He went to his home, which was now vacant, with the door open and windows broken out. He searched, but his wife’s body was no longer there. He used his bathroom to clean up; he showered, making sure the blood on his face and covering his arms was washed away, changed clothes, and made his way back to the mausoleum. He left the gemstones there and went in search of the local morgue. He found it easily enough by asking a cop, who pointed him in the right direction. He arrived, identified himself, and was shown into a small, white room. On the table in the center of the room was a body covered with a sheet-like piece of cloth. Under it, the two men working that late night shift told him, was the body of his wife. They had a lot of questions for him about where he had been, and the episode at the Pelegrinis’ house that left a pile of bodies that were still coming into the morgue. They never got to ask their questions. He silenced the men who worked the night shift at the morgue quickly with an economy of motion, then lifted the light burden of his wife’s still form, and walked away.