Hadrian's Wall

by Felicia Jensen

  No, no and no! That was a hallucination...and this is too.

  “Have you forgotten that she’d be dead if I had not interfered?” Adrian said with more emphasis. “By my side, she will be safer than any other human being, anywhere on the planet!”

  “In my opinion, you are losing your focus like you did back in those dark times. It’s bad enough that she ignores the problem, but she must be protected from the humans that watch us. It’s not because she belongs to the same species that the yellow mantles will be complacent with her. They can be much more cruel to their own than we were...in the old times... even more than the first, at the height of the carnage.”

  “Please, Adam! No one was more cruel than the first,” Adrian jokingly countered. “I thought you sympathize with humans. After all, you chose to work at servicing their psyche...”

  “That doesn’t mean I’m blind,” Adam laughed. “I wish you would reconsider the situation and put things in perspective. Accept my help...”

  “What? Do you want me in therapy too?” He playfully hid a hint of annoyance.

  “You know, that’s not a bad idea!” Adam’s reply was sarcastic. “Adrian, promise that you will come to me if the situation starts to get out of control.”

  “You’ve always been the same peacemaker. Just this once, don’t try to convince me to confess my nature just to escape from the Inquisition...or the Sacred College of Cardinals!”

  Their laughter dissipated the tension, as if by magic. I honestly don’t understand the little secret joke.

  “Bad habits never die ...and if I remember correctly, you did not confess anything. Your roar almost killed the poor priest!” His laughter ended with a sigh. “Seriously, Adrian...again I say that if you want to keep her here and you do not want her to become a target of the Council, you should initiate her in the rules.”

  “She has a lot of suffering to overcome...her own traumas. I don’t think she’s ready to face it. Although you don’t like and don’t want to know the details of the scheme I’ve improvised, I assure you it was absolutely necessary to protect her from the main rule. Believe me, I had no choice after what happened in South Portland...”

  “Do you think you neutralized judges and hunters?”

  “Yes. If my plan continues as anticipated, then we’ll see about the next step; otherwise, I’ll have to face them openly and provide her safe passage. I heard the sound of a loud sigh. “Oh, Adam! If only you could see how she’s blossomed here.”

  “I have seen it, Adrian,” Adam replied impatiently. “I know it. I just don’t know what weighs more...

  Suddenly, the air conditioning shut off and a heavy silence settled over the gallery. Without the constant noise, when they were both silent, I could only hear my own breathing.

  “Oh, no...” one of them whispered.

  A strong current of air slammed the door behind me. Instinctively, I turned in that direction and saw a woman in a white lab coat standing there, looking straight at me. Asia “No Surname.” My heart was pounding.

  She smiled, but it was not a friendly smile. Well, nothing from her could be friendly! The girl stared at me intently, her eyes narrow and shining from behind the photochromic lenses. She looked like a statue until suddenly the statue came alive when she put her index finger to her lips. Shh!

  I heard another door slam. I jumped and then turned to stare at her again, but she was no longer there. In her place was Stephen Cahill and his expression was stern.

  “You should not be down here,” he said.

  “I’m lost,” I managed to stammer.

  “If you’re looking for the elevator, it’s over there.” He pointed to his left and waited for me to follow him.

  Damn it!

  Just as I did in the Polish Man Springs Resort, I turned my back on him and I burst into the room where I thought I’d heard the voices. I wasn’t surprised to see that it was empty with a window that locked from the inside. They couldn’t have passed me without my seeing them. So...it was just another hallucination. Just a hallucination... Just?

  I went back to the hallway and Stephen Cahill remained standing in exactly the same place, except he was smiling, as if he knew what I was thinking. Bastard!

  “Just so happens I don’t want to take the elevator. I’m looking for Dr. Barringer,” I said, unable to avoid the petulant tone.

  Stephen casually turned away from the wall and pointed to his right side. He seemed unaffected by my anger...not even a little.

  “It’s over there,” he responded with indifference.

  I walked head on in the direction he was indicating. From the corner of my eye, I could see that he’d accompanied me, his face revealing consternation and humor at the same time. Hmmm... As I did with Charity, I felt latent animosity coming at me in waves. Will all of Adrian’s relatives antagonize me for no reason?

  Finally, I reached the door of the psychiatrist’s office. I looked back and my smile died on my lips because Stephen was gone. He’s left without even saying goodbye.

  Furious, I entered the office and I approached the desk of Dr. Barringer’s secretary. She looked at me strangely.

  “You don’t have an appointment today, Melissa. Did something happen?”

  I looked at her for a split second, feeling like a fool, until I was forced to answer. “I just wanted to say goodbye to Dr. Barringer, Dana. Today is my last day in the hospital. Would it be possible to speak to him briefly before his first appointment? Is he here yet?” I held my breath. If he wasn’t in his office it was because...

  “Yes, he’s here...since very early this morning.” Dana smiled and looked at the computer monitor.

  Frustrated, I let the air seep slowly from my lungs like a punctured flat tire deflating.

  “You’re in luck, she said, putting something in the drawer. “His first patient hasn’t arrived yet. I’ll ask him...”

  Dana moved away from the computer and entered his office through the adjacent door. Soon she returned, still smiling.

  “Come in, please.”

  I quickened my step, wondering whether his patient would arrive at any time. Dana stepped aside so that I could enter and then left, closing the door behind me.

  As soon as I heard the click of the doorknob, I looked across the room and spotted Dr. Barringer sitting behind his desk as usual. He rose slowly with a strange smile on his lips. I watched him carefully. He seemed a bit agitated, maybe nervous. He hesitated for a split second before he came around the desk to greet me. As always, he was very gentle and led me to the couch.

  As we sat down, he stared at me, peering in my face as if searching for something. After a long silence, he said, “Then you will leave us today.”

  “Yes...Yesterday, I was discharged from hospital.” Carefully rehearsed, the speech I had memorized evaporated. I rubbed my chin as if I could automatically massage my brain.

  “You know... I’ve thought about everything you said to me. I’ve researched a lot of information on the Internet and I came to a decision.”

  He nodded slightly, waiting patiently for me to proceed.

  “I decided I’m not crazy. Although I’m sure about that and I have no more fear about losing my sanity, I still cannot believe that the things that are happening to me are real. Well, no sane person would believe that, anyway. So I think I’m at an impasse.” I stopped for a moment in order to collect my thoughts. “This may sound very confusing, but I don’t see all this as a bad thing. I don’t know if you understand me... Perhaps that’s a possibility of facing life in a different way. Don’t people say that crises are positive because they make us grow?”

  A silence ensued as if he was waiting for further explanation, compelling me to say the first thing that came to mind. Damn! I had tried so hard to seem mature and sophisticated. My fateful impulsiveness strikes again!

  “Have you seen the movie, A Beautiful Mind?”

  He raised his eyebrows in surprise. I’m sure for the first time, Dr. Barringer had no idea wh
at I wanted to say. I liked it and I smiled.

  He also smiled and replied, “Okay, Melissa...He overcame his delirious episodes.” My smile faded a little. He knew exactly what I was saying.

  “Well, then...I won’t sit here, worrying myself about what happens with me...if it’s true or not. After all, what is the truth? How many scholars, thinkers, philosophers, scientists, playwrights, whatever have been asking this question throughout the centuries—and they never reach a satisfactory answer. Each one believes in a different truth and makes this search from within the bubble in which they live...the center of their own personal universe. I discovered that I’m claustrophobic. I hate being trapped in bubbles!

  “If mankind’s greatest thinkers have not found their perfect bubble without any kind of cracking... why me, a nobody, a loser...I mean, why could I determine what humanity has attempted to define for centuries? Besides, why am I wasting my time trying to find something that can cause me more harm than good? For this reason, I’ve decided to forget about finding the ‘Supreme Truth’ and take care of my future... which brings me to my second decision.”

  “Second?”

  “The first is that I’m not crazy. Remember?”

  “Oh, yes. Sure!”

  “Second, I’ll going to accept Adrian Senior’s offer to help him make his project a reality. This, in turn, brings me to my third decision.” Of course, I didn’t intend to reveal my fourth decision to the psychiatrist since it involved Adrian Cahill, the son.

  “Third?” he urged me to continue.

  “Third, I will attend the College of Arts. I’ve always wanted this, but I never admitted it to myself. Deep down, I was so afraid of failing that I preferred not to try.”

  He nodded.

  “I’m glad you’ve come to conclusions satisfactory to you, Melissa. The total truth is incomprehensible. We must content ourselves with pieces of it...interpretations about it.”

  He looked at me inquisitively. “A certain amount of truth resides in this: Believing in something that will transport you to a higher level, that makes you more secure about yourself, regardless of what others think.”

  “This does not preclude us from continuing with our little game, does it, Doctor? I intend not to miss our meetings. It makes me feel so good!”

  Now it was my turn to face him inquisitively. “Can I ask you something? What was that avalanche of vampires? I’ve read so much about them that I could almost do a dissertation on the subject.”

  He didn’t pretend he didn’t know what I was talking about.

  “You wanted to know the origins of your so-called owl. It was necessary to demystify it, to show you that many others have talked about strange sightings of winged beings similar to yours. You demonstrated so much fear...and fear is usually born from ignorance.”

  Hmmm...it makes sense.

  “Melissa, you need to prepare to face the mystery that surrounds you because this will make all difference in curing your hallucinations, understand?” he said, looking me in a very strange way. His face was serious and veiled at same time.

  Suddenly, he broke eye contact and sat back on the couch. The time to ask “what do you mean by that?” had passed.

  “However, there were not only vampires.” He cleared his throat before returning to the subject. “The links can be used to locate other legends, such as elves, banshees, fairies, trolls, the Lizard Man of South Carolina... The main issue was not the legend itself, but the manifestation of archetypes and how they influenced people’s daily lives. It’s you who decided remain on the subject of vampires. Why is that?”

  He got me!

  “Hmm...maybe because of my obsession for movies?” I ventured a guess. “Perhaps because of “Pal” Dracula and his clones have more films produced than goblins and leprechauns?”

  He nodded absently, then spoke a touch of melancholy in his voice. “Or maybe blood has always impressed more humans than any other symbol...and they had a reason for that—much human blood has been shed.

  “You know, Doctor, most of the texts were quite contradictory. One author said something about a particular myth. Another explained the same myth completely different. The authors that I found didn’t come to a consensus and seemed to possess a limited knowledge on the subject.”

  He stared at me in a manner penetrating. “Their knowledge is limited. The myths themselves are also quite contradictory.” He drummed his fingers on the arm of the couch, perhaps deciding what he would say next. “Humans tell their experiences like exploits according to their personal interests and the anatomy of their perception, which is very limited and selective, by the way.” He joined his hands by lacing his fingers together on his chest. “In another words, perception is limited on one hand because it depends on gross senses and selective on the other hand because only processes the information according to what it already has of prior understanding of the context that surrounds it, even if such understanding is precarious.

  “For humans, the motivation involved in the act of interpreting an event is basically based on previous learning experiences. The reasoning does not have sharpness necessary to fully understand things beyond one’s own circle of experiences. Allied to this, is the fact that humans want fast answers and often they cannot resist the temptation to invent outcomes for events that hinder or challenge their inquiries.

  “They never respond well to unexpected circumstances, despite their reputation for being able to adapt to different situations, considering the survival instinct in hostile environments, etc., etc., etc. If you look closely, you realize that nothing in the human culture is completely new: the facts, the rituals, mythologies, then... There is a pattern that repeats itself over the centuries and thousands of years. The context of the events change and are enhanced by new technologies and knowledge, but in essence, the events remain the same, perhaps because of the predictability of human motives or human reasoning.

  “Like history that is constructed based on human interpretations, there is no way to prove one hundred percent that the facts were recorded exactly as they happened. Often, the distortions were conducted by different interests: satiety of desires, control... Many things may be played as motivation for humans to glorify certain events or relegate many others to ostracism. Man has always known to be irrationally logical...or logical within his irrationality, if you like.” He sighed.

  “What I’m trying to say is nobody knows who actually were the supernatural creatures. Humans have interpreted the events that they didn’t understand and have distorted their records, according to the convenience of moment and the level of communication they dominate. The gossip of everyday life, combined with the oral tradition, both more powerful than many laws of coexistence, contributed to the construction of the legends that today’s authors don’t understand and cannot explain. To understand them accurately, they would have to investigate the history behind the history...and this, my dear, can only be done with a time machine.”

  “Or a crystal ball,” I added, laughing.

  “That’s right!” He gave me a modest smile. “Of course, even without a crystal ball, many incontestable truths have collapsed, thanks to the questioning of people who were not content with conclusions presented as immutable. Today, most scientists are obliged to recognize that the life of ancients was not devoid of technologies and rational values. The technologies and values of ancient people had the same impact for them that our values and our technologies have on our daily lives. It was a great mistake to believe for so long that the ancients were devoid of science and sophistication.

  “The difference between their way of thinking and ours lies in the relation between the mental stimulation and the everyday tools which drive or motivate people to act. Technological changes also have contributed to change the functioning of mind in many ways.”

  “So what is considered supernatural today might have been natural at that time. One of these days someone will discover that where it was once believed to be only a myth, t
here actually was a real spark that boosted it and that turned into something with proportions that now is completely different from the common interests that gave it birth.”

  Here he goes again, speaking Greek.

  “Some authors describe the gods as immaterial beings, coming from a spiritual world or from another dimension. Others decided that they were an evolution of the human race... or its origin. What do you think, Doctor?”

  “Remnants of the lost Atlantis, perhaps?” He shrugged. “A race of inter-dimensional creatures? Fallen Angels? Aliens? Exotic endangered animals? Mutants generated in scientific experiments? Immortal warriors?” He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “The movies, the TV shows, and the books have exhausted their explanations sources. Taking into account that these sources come from ancient oral traditions that have been reformatted and will remain for centuries...how do we know what was true? Unfortunately, the real events are irretrievably lost to posterity.”

  “You’re telling me that such creatures really existed?” I questioned with skepticism.

  “No.” He stared at me in a cautious manner. “I’m just trying to tell you that nobody will ever know what really existed in that time because the records do not correspond accurately to the facts, just as the myths today to not correspond to the facts that gave rise to them in the past. But if the records were published, they should have some consistency, even if the myths are just fanciful reports.”

  “That’s the big mistake that people often make and a researcher should never commit it. It is not enough to use a clue and a handful of deductions to say something that serves to contribute to learning, not to the sensationalism. It is necessary to reconstruct an accurate picture of the information trajectory. Even though its origin remains unclear, it is important to ask why, where, and how certain information or concepts took hold. In the specific case of legends, we need to remain wary in deference to the belief of the ancients on certain phenomena. We cannot simply assume as true a range of texts that make incursions into the subject, categorizing them as excellent references for our hypotheses. If you write on the subject, for example, it would be a grave mistake to hide from the reader the level of reliability of sources used. There are authors who make interpretations and their own psychological inferences about the behavior of ancient people, basing it only in the way modern man deals with the world. Of course, there are human patterns that can be checked at any time, but there are elements from a malice developed, learned, and re-transmitted that cannot be attributed to the mode of being of another era. Although ancients enjoyed sophistication and relationships on a level as symbolic as the current relationships, they did not see the world and the events in the same way their descendants.”