by Nathan Wall
“Look at you, Daniel.” Hershiser looked up at Jackson and sighed. “Are you going to be his new whipping boy? You’re becoming undone and for what? What have we really accomplished here?”
“We’ve helped bring security and freedom to our country and those around the world,” Jackson replied.
“Have we?” Hershiser stood, slapping Jackson’s hand away. He walked quickly toward the door with his head down. “All it seems we’ve done is replace one threat with another. How secure should we really feel now?”
* * *
The warm water washed over Lian’s back. She sat with her arms spread while a few maidens scrubbed her. The delicate curves of the sponges ran across her skin, tickling her as if millions of little fingers slowly massaged her. She closed her eyes and took in the scent of candied apples which lingered in the air.
Slowly, fingers sifted through her dark hair, lathering it up with a mass of foam and bubbles. She held her breath and slipped under the water. When she returned to the surface she looked up to see Maya standing at the base of the large in-ground bathtub, smiling at her.
“Leave us,” Maya commanded the young women tending to Lian to leave, lifting her right hand. She took off her robe and stood completely naked in front of Lian. She dipped a toe into the bath and made her way over to the side of the tub to pump in more steamy water. She sat, stretching her legs, and placed in the tip of one toe. “There. It needed to be a little warmer.”
“I should go,” Lian said, looking down as she started pulling herself out. She quickly slipped her robe on.
“Please, do not leave on my account.” Maya submerged herself and made her way over to Lian, placing her hands around the girl’s bare hips and pulling her back in. Maya’s upper body emerged from the water. Her dark red hair sat draped over her breasts. “It has been such a long time since I have enjoyed the company of friends while I bathe.”
Maya pulled Lian along and sat down on the steps of the large bath with her back against a wall. She dug her fingers into the meat of Lian’s shoulders and swirled her thumbs firmly on her shoulder blades. Lian sighed with content as her body melted like butter to Maya’s touch.
“When I was an infant, I was taken in by an old lady-in-waiting. This woman, who was much like a mother to me, said that nothing soothed the soul and relieved stress quite like a warm bath and a firm massage.” Maya’s voice took on a smooth and sultry form as she spoke. “The many nights I spent afraid as a young child on the run were always set at ease by my would-be-mother’s words of wisdom.”
Maya slipped Lian’s wet gown off her body slid her hands onto Lian’s stomach, rubbing in a circular motion. Her other hand slid up Lian’s neck, her fingers cruising through Lian’s hair. She sank back between Maya’s thighs, sitting on a lower step while she leaned further into Maya’s grasp.
“But I never allowed myself to take my mind off what I was destined to do.” Maya’s eyes started to glow with a faint orange shimmer. “Even though her firm fingers eased me temporarily, everything changed when we were no longer able to run. I watched as the woman who raised me since infancy was ravaged like a cheap harlot against her will, and then removed from this world so that the moans of her suffering would cease to irritate her rapist’s conscience.”
Maya spun Lian around and pressed their foreheads together. Lian’s breathing became heavy and forceful as her eyes glanced at Maya’s full lips and then up her soft cheeks to her radiating eyes.
“I knew then as a young girl, watching my father’s men rape and murder the only one who had ever loved me, that this world was meant for a woman to rule it.” Maya’s lips hovered closely to Lian’s. “My father pretended to love my birthmother for over a year before suddenly leaving her in ruin, making her feel worthless. My mother, Dido, killed herself and left me an orphan because she thought the love of a man was far more important than ruling her people… or being my mother. But no man’s purpose, not even one parading around as a fake god, should be allowed to interfere with the natural order of motherhood.”
“I’m sorry,” Lian whispered, trying to pull back. Maya stopped her by wrapping both legs around her. “It all sounds so horrible.”
“It is not your fault, my dear.” Maya hugged her, embracing her tightly and spoke delicately into Lian’s ear. “We should never be left to feel inadequate by the conquests of men. My sweet child, you have much to learn in this world. I was once content at laying waste to everything my father’s conquest had built for his people, but now I see there can be more. With your gift to see into men’s minds and my ability to control their desires, we can expand my kingdom—our kingdom, together.”
“You have the wrong girl.” Lian shook her head. She freed herself from Maya’s grasp and started plowing up the steps. “What you want isn’t a kingdom… It’s manipulation.”
“What is the difference when we are still left to rule?” Maya followed, grabbing Lian by the wrist. She twisted Lian around and kissed her. Their arms embraced tightly around one another as they slowly lowered to the floor, entangling around each other. “You cannot tell me that you have never felt trapped in the world man has created. Look at what I have accomplished all on my own. Grown from an eight-year-old girl lost in a scary world into the Princess of a people who do not want for anything. No one suffers under my rule as they do in man’s world. Now, the men who controlled you for so long look to extend their hands into my realm. Help me stop them and together we will be able to accomplish what we have only dreamed of individually.”
Lian rested her head on the tile floor and closed her eyes as Maya kissed her neck. She wanted to fight it, but for some reason, she couldn’t. She just felt her body relaxing and giving in.
“What do you need me to do?” Lian asked, smiling as she opened her eyes and looked at Maya with a glazed-over expression.
* * *
Jarrod next to a table in a blank white room. The lights overhead scintillated brightly as he looked over at the two-way mirror and examined the gash on his chin. His hands were bound by handcuffs to the metal table in front of him, but he knew he could easily break out if he wanted.
His mind couldn’t shake the thoughts of this “Ben” character he encountered. His head kept phasing back and forth from the present reality to the sounds of Ben crying for help. Jarrod looked at his arms and they were shaking in unison with echoes stirring around in his mind. Blue light emanated from his veins. An intense craving for smoked cod sat on his lips, and he hated fish. It was Ben’s craving.
“Let me out.” A shrill skated across his back like fingernails on a chalk board.
Jarrod opened his eyes, looking over to the clock on the wall. Several hours had passed. He looked back down and across the table where Ben sat looking perfectly normal.
“How did you get in here?” Jarrod tilted his head to the side, trying to see up into Ben’s eyes. “Am I imagining this?”
Ben’s gaze shifted up, but his face kept looking down. He shook his head and slowly leaned back, but the chair didn’t bend or creak.
“I watched you nearly die.” Jarrod leaned over the table.
“They’re...” Ben shimmered in and out of focus as he tried to speak. The more Jarrod tried to concentrate and listen, the more the lights in the room flared up. “They say I’m not responsive.”
“Who is ‘they’?”
“Can’t you hear them?”
The door opened and one of the lights burst as Jarrod turned around. He looked at Jackson dressed in a more official military uniform—not his typical purple laden armor—and nodded.
“Leave us.” Jackson looked back at one of the military police that followed close behind and shut the door. He walked around the table and sat in the same chair Ben was sitting in. As he sat, Ben vanished in a plume of transparent vapor and reappeared at the end of the table, standing. “Quite a mess you’ve gotten yourself into. Drugs?”
“What?” Jarrod squinted and shook his head, staring at Ben out of the corner of
his eyes. “This is all a misunderstanding.”
“You beat the hell out of seven men and put another in a comatose state, which by the way, how did you beat a man so hard to leave him brain dead and on a respirator? You know they’re going to pull the plug, right?” Jackson took his cap off and ran his blotchy hand through his hair. Strands of his hair were straight and blonde, others curly and a dusty auburn color. His eyes were different colors; one stark blue and the other brown. The veins in his skin were easily visible. “All that hardly sounds like a misunderstanding to me.”
“You look like shit,” Jarrod said.
“Thanks. Tell me something I don’t know.” Jackson pointed at his own arms and face. “This is your future, buddy. Respect your elders.”
“The guy who is comatose,” Jarrod whispered, scratching his nose as he scooted closer to the table. “What happened to him? You said they’re going to pull the plug?”
“You’ve got everybody freaked...”
“They can all get in line behind me…” Jarrod frowned, looking at Ben.
“We’ve got healers in there now trying to fix him, but he’s not responding...”
“You didn’t come alone?” Jarrod asked.
“No.” Jackson cleared his throat and sat back. “We brought psychics to try and mask what happened out there as a random insurgent outburst. We can’t have our secrets making their way out and into the world.”
“Can I see him...? Ben, that is, before they pull his plug?”
“I don’t know why you’d want to do that.” Jackson shook his head. “Do you want to see your handiwork?”
“I didn’t do that on purpose,” Jarrod snapped back. “I want to see if I can help him somehow. Save him.”
“Why? So you can get off easier?” Jackson scoffed. “Not likely. They’re having a big conversation back at HQ about what to do with you. A lot of weird things have happened since you’ve arrived. Some spectacular, others head scratching. We lost a lot of people...”
“You lost a lot of people,” Jarrod spoke through his teeth as his jaw tightened. “I was busy saving Hershiser, Travis, and Christian while you were off gallivanting around with your butt-buddy...”
“I told you and Lian to fall back to the forest, not to run into the unknown with guns blazing. She’s not a fighter and you’re not combat tested.”
“I’m pretty combat tested now.” Jarrod shot up and flung his chair back against the wall. “In case you haven’t noticed, enemy movement along the eastern Pakistani border has suddenly dropped off quite a bit.”
“Yeah, we noticed that too.” Jackson nodded, smirking as he crossed his arms. “I’ve pulled up your file. You’ve got a real problem with learning when to fold your hand.”
“Like you did with Lian back on the other side of that rift?” Jarrod pulled his chains off the table, breaking his cuffs apart. He walked over to the chair, spun it around, and sat on it with the back facing Jackson. “Nothing is wrong with swinging for the fences. Especially when you still have strikes left.”
“If you want to mix metaphors, then fine. Sometimes you have to realize when a single is good enough.” Jackson pressed an index finger on the table. “You were the one who got separated from Lian, not me. We didn’t know if she was alive or dead. And by all accounts, the rest of Hershiser’s sector was dead as well. We were able to get in there, get our living teammates out, and get home.”
“I was willing to go back in for her.”
“You may very well have been, and I applaud that, but that would have been a foolish endeavor. You can’t save everyone, Jarrod.” The room went silent for a few minutes before Jackson eventually continued. “When you try to save everyone, you end up letting someone else down. It’s just the law of the universe.”
“I don’t see how trying to save Lian would have let other people down…” Jarrod shook his head.
“You could have died...”
“Yeah, so what?”
“Look at me.” Jackson sighed, shrugging his shoulders. “I’m a mess. I am falling apart at the seams. The program is being trashed and our numbers are dwindling. We’ve experienced more loss in the past month than we’ve experienced since before I came aboard. And our greatest weapon—you—doesn’t give a shit about anything other than just trying swing for the damn fences every time he is at the plate. Hershiser told me what he saw. You destroyed hordes of men on your way to save him and you didn’t bat an eyelash.”
“It’s my choice.”
“You don’t get to make your own choices anymore.” Jackson stood and paced back and forth. “You were the only one ever given a choice, you know that? Why you would choose to become like me is incomprehensible. I mean, look at me. You have people at home waiting for you and you don’t care if you run into a fortress and die for someone who might already be dead. Or what if we, in the process of waiting for you, would have died or had to leave you behind? Like I said, when you try to save everyone, you always end up disappointing someone.”
“Is that how you justify it? Leaving her behind?” Jarrod faked a smirk as his nostrils flared, shaking his head. “It was all for the greater good?”
“No, it’s not.” Jackson leaned against the wall and pressed his hand onto his face. “I’m never able to justify it. I feel it every time I’m out there and every time I come back. But that’s ok, because the burden is mine and mine alone. I don’t have other people who share it with me like you do. I am able to make hard decisions like that and I don’t justify what I do. I just learn to cope. There is never a gold star or a prize for me. There is just going back out there the next time and hoping the losses aren’t as big as they were the time before so that I can wake up in the morning and actually get some food into my mouth.”
“So because you’ve got no one at home and poor little old you is all alone in this world with no one to share the burden of your cross, you get to be brash and bust into Oreios’ chamber and drag him all alone into another... whatever the hell that was... and play hero because you can take it?” Jarrod said in a mocking voice as he gave a fake salute to Jackson. “You’re some Boy Scout.”
“I didn’t say it’s ok.” Jackson slowly moved back to his chair and sat. “It wasn’t. And that’s part of the loss when you try to save everyone. I made my choices and Lian was lost because of it. Like I said, when you win a battle for one person, someone else always loses.”
Jarrod nodded and rested his arms on the back of the chair. After another few silent moments, he began to chuckle.
“What’s so funny?” Jackson asked.
“You said I’m your best weapon.” Jarrod smiled, winking at him.
“Oh, get off of it.” Jackson stood. “I guess it’s been long enough. We could probably leave.”
“I’d like to see him.” Jarrod stood, putting his hand on Jackson’s shoulder. “The one who is comatose. Please, it won’t help me justify anything. It’ll help me cope.”
Jackson nodded and led Jarrod through the military base and into the infirmary. Jarrod slowly walked to Ben’s bedside and Jackson waited behind. The steady beeping of the heart monitor and the frequent compresses of the respirator were the only sounds in the entire room.
Jarrod closed the curtain around Ben’s bed and turned on the lamp next to his pillow. He looked Ben over, noticing his sickly-looking wrinkly skin littered with liver spots. The hair on his head was incredibly thin and scraggily. The transparent form of Ben hovered on the other side of the bed, staring at his body.
“I’m sorry,” Jarrod said, having to catch his breath as he watched Ben’s hand pass through his comatose counterpart’s face. “I wish I could fix this and return you. But I don’t know how.”
“Yes, you do,” Ben replied, looking up. “Well, sort of.”
“What do you mean?” Jarrod asked.
“Through the many voices, there was one very strong. Dominant, but resting,” Ben replied. “His form… he looks and sounds like you, but he’s not you. He knows how to retur
n me. He told me how.”
Ben reached out his hand and Jarrod did the same. Jarrod’s hand phased through the transparent image and the light next to the bed became incredibly bright. Jarrod lowered his hand to Ben’s wrinkly face and the machines which monitored him and kept him alive began to work in overdrive until finally sparks burst out of them and the lamp exploded.
The room went dark and Jackson rushed to Jarrod’s side. When the lights came back on, they both looked down to see Ben opening his eyes, gagging on the tube in his mouth. Jackson removed the breathing apparatus. His eyes widened and jaw nearly touched his toes.
“Thank you,” Ben said, his hand shaking as he reached for Jarrod. The color of Ben’s skin was already returning to normal. The two connected hands and they embraced one another in a hug. Jarrod looked at Jackson—who was going pale from the shock—and then back at Ben, accepting the firm hug.
* * *
Lian followed Maya through the dark torch-lit halls of the fortress. The damp rock gave off a pungent odor and the drizzle of little streams stood in small puddles along the crevasses of the walls and stone floor. Charon followed them close behind.
Maya snapped her fingers, catching Lian’s attention, and two men opened the large wooden door to a cell. Lian peered her head around the corner to find Austin lying in the shadows, curled up into a ball, bloodied and broken. His arms covered his face as he peeked between the creases of his fingers.
“What’d you do to him?” Lian looked at Maya, the expression on her face hanging low.
“A lot less than what we could have.” Maya stepped back and Lian rushed into the cell, pulling Austin onto her lap. “You will need to be a little more callous when we return to your realm. It does get easier, I promise.”
“There’s a fine line between killing and torturing them.” Lian looked down into Austin’s swollen face and closed her eyes. She ran her fingertips around his temple in a clockwise motion, prodding her way into his mind and removing the sensations of pain. “There… rest easy.”