Endless

by S. B. Niccum

  “Who?”

  “John!” I repeat, the whole thing making sense to me now. “He’s an Aeoninan. He can see and hear us, and he’s mortal…sort of. He’ll help!”

  “What’s an Aeonian, and how can he sort of be mortal?”

  “He’s like a human-angel hybrid. He’s a mortal that doesn’t age. He’s been here on Earth since—since, well…he’s John the Revelator,” I say, pleased to have explained things so well.

  “John the Revelator? He’s still alive? And—and you want to contact him?” Valerie’s mind is both stumped and racing at the same time. None of this makes any sense to her.

  “Listen, Val, John was there for me. My whole life! He promised my father that he’d keep an eye on me.”

  “John the Revelator knew your dad?”

  “Yes, they went to college together.”

  “John the Revelator went to college?”

  “Well I’m sure he went a whole bunch of times, but one of those times, he met my father and they became good friends.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know…they just did! Listen Val, I know this makes little sense to you, but I know he can help us. So I need to locate him.”

  “OK, OK. Let’s just say that this—this—John of yours, can help us. How on Earth are you going to find him?” Her sarcasm wasn’t lost on me. And she did raise a good point. How would I of all people find him? I never had to find John before, he always found me. He had to keep an eye on me, and that’s why he was always around. He knew I was dead, so he’d have no reason to find me now.

  “Wait a minute!” I exclaim, suddenly remembering something, as if it were out of a dream. “I’ve seen him! I—I even think I know where he lives!” I say, flying up into a little jump. “Think Tess, think.” I tap my forehead even harder, trying to rattle the memory loose. I saw John when Agatha pulled me out of Prison. I was in a daze then, confused, and trying to get back to the realm of the dead, but failing miserably. Vaguely I seem to remember certain things about the place. I mention this to Valerie and she starts thinking and asking for more details. Finally we narrow the place down to a few hundred possibilities.

  “It’s useless Val. I’m completely inept at directions. I can’t believe that this handicap of mine is going to cost Sam her life!”

  Valerie stares at me openmouthed, also in disbelief at the fact that being directionally challenged is costing us so much. She tries to say something comforting, but there’s nothing she can say—it’s not okay, it will not be fine, we won’t find another way.

  I look up at her with sheer pain in my eyes. Then I crumble to the floor of the attic next to the shivering Sam. I feel liquid, like I could turn into a puddle if I let myself. Instead of dissolving into fluid form, I groan an inner plea for help. “Don’t let her die because of me. Please, help me know how to help her!” I pray, and while I do so, I’m well aware of the fact that my plea is not just for Sam, but for Alex as well. My need to help Sam right now is not purely selfless—I need her to survive because I need to succeed at something right now.

  In the midst of my wallowing in self-pity, a sudden change comes over Valerie, and her old sassiness comes out full force. “For crying out loud Tess, you’re an Angel! Pull yourself together and start acting like one! In life you had all sorts of abilities that helped us! You found Alex in some hole in Mexico! You talked to him after he died and you could hear your dead grandmother your entire life! Can’t you use any of those gifts now to find this John character?” Valerie yells and Sam stirs, shivers, and mumbles something.

  “The Link…” I mutter, in the faintest of whispers. “I could talk with Alex because of the Link. Drymus! He spoke to me through the Link, too.”

  “Good, see? Use this Link thingy and talk to him!” Val orders.

  “Easier said than done,” I grumble, as I close my eyes and try to focus on John. Linking with Alex used to be easy; it was more a matter of wanting to talk with him and simply connecting. It was almost like the line to him was always active, only now, he refuses to answer. Pushing aside the pain that this thought brings me, I re focus my attention on John. I think of the first time I saw him, dressed like a police detective, investigating Agatha’s disappearance. Then I think of all the other times, culminating with the last time I saw him, in that nondescript apartment, coming and going as I lingered inert and lost in a foggy stupor.

  “Tess? Is that you?” A voice sounds clear as a bell in my head.

  “Yes!” I respond, opening my eyes with excitement. “John?”

  “Yes, who else? This is not like a phone line, where anyone in the house can pick up, you know.”

  I smile and chuckle. Valerie shoots me a quizzical look, and I wave her off. “Good I’m glad, because I wasn’t sure how to connect with you.” There was a long pause, where I could see a bit of impatience in his mind. He wasn’t annoyed that I had called, but I can see that he’s pressed for time, he has to be somewhere and he’s already running late. “Did I catch you at a bad time?”

  “No, no. I’m just trying to hurry. We are having our first Aeonian council today at my place, and I’ve already heard from two of them, saying that they are there already. When you first linked with me, I thought it was one of the other Aeonians wondering where I was.”

  “How many of you are there?” I ask, then remember that there are more pressing things. “Never mind. Listen John, I’m sorry this is not a good time, but I—we need your help.” I show him my memories of all the events, including Pete’s despondent state. “Now, I know they’re not your charges, and that you have bigger things to worry about, but is there a way at all that you could help us?”

  “Well, actually, it might just work for both of us. Hold on,” he says, and puts me on hold or something. It’s the weirdest feeling, like I’m still connected with him and hear his subconscious but in a paused state. I even think I can hear him humming, just as if I’d been put on hold with elevator music in the background. “Okay,” he says, putting me off hold. “I’ve just contacted the other Aeonians, and they are on their way to you. I’m going to get Pete. We’ll all meet back at my place. John out.” He hangs up on me and my brain goes perfectly blank for a second. Valerie’s aggravated face brings me back to reality.

  “So?” she asks impatiently. “Did you talk to him? Is he coming?”

  I nod. “With reinforcements,” I add. “We’re about to meet the Aeonian Council.”

  “You’re coming with me,” a uniformed soldier growls and bends down to lift Pete up by one arm. “Come on, don’t make me angry. Cooperate, or I’ll use force.” The soldier struggles with a listless Pete who keeps slipping from his grasp, only by sheer lack of willpower.

  “Come on Pete, wake up son! Fight! Don’t let them take you! I’m telling you, things are not as grim as you think.” Russell yells in Pete’s ear.

  A combination of Russell’s words and the soldier’s rough handling, wakes Pete up from his lethargy, and he starts to struggle. “Put me down, put me down! I’ve done nothing! Put me down, you filthy scum!”

  “Oh now, that’s no way of talking to an armed soldier, boy. If I had no cause to arrest you, I do now,” the soldier says good-humoredly, as if he was finally starting to enjoy his job.

  “Where are you taking him?” one of the soldiers standing guard over the shelter, asks with mild interest.

  “You know where.”

  “That bad, huh?” the guard responds, lifting Pete’s head by the roots of his hair, and staring into his horror stricken face. “What have you been up to?” he says sarcastically.

  “Is he at all involved with that incident at the Prefect’s house?” the other guard asks, conversationally.

  “Don’t know, don’t care,” the soldier who’s got Pete in cuffs says gruffly. “Come on, he’s a squirmy one, open the doors.”

  The guards do as they’re asked and as soon as they close the doors behind them, Pete arches his back forcefully and hits the soldier in the teeth, with the
back of his head. The soldier groans and relaxes his grip. Taking advantage of this, and inspired by Russell’s instructions, Pete swings his cuffed hands up and hits the soldier in the jaw. While the soldier is still reeling from the blow, Pete kicks him in the stomach and doubles him over, then takes to his heels and starts running.

  “Stop!” croaks the soldier through the pain. “If you ever want to see Sam again, you’ll be smart and stop right now!”

  This makes Pete stop and reconsider his actions. If they had Sam and they knew about the rebellion, perhaps he’d be able to convince them that she had nothing to do with that, and take him instead. “I know where she is,” the soldier groans, still recovering from the blows.

  “I want to see her,” Pete demands from a safe distance.

  “I’ll take you to her right now.” The soldier says as he takes in a few deep breaths, and lets them out slowly. Once Pete is within arm’s length, the soldier pulls him closer to him and secures his grip while he opens the back door of a limousine. Pete had only seen a limousine pull up when the Prefect himself came by to do inspections. He would parade around the shelters like a lord, and look down on the people who had been forced to live there, as if they were sewer rats. Wordlessly, the soldier takes his cuffs off, and pushes Pete into the car. Briskly he jumps in after him—something highly unusual—and shuts the door. “Let’s go,” the soldier orders, and the car peels out in a hurry.

  Pete’s eyes had to adjust to the darkness inside the vehicle, and once he did, he realized that there were other people in there with him. “Pete?” a soft, pain-filled voice says from the darkness.

  “Sam?”

  “Yes.” Sam nods and her head feels dizzy by that simple movement.

  Meanwhile the soldier sitting next to him starts to take off his uniform, tossing it in the seat across from him. “You have a mean left hook,” the soldier says amicably. Pete says nothing; he simply stares and looks alternatively from Sam to the soldier, who looks more like a normal person without the uniform.

  “What’s this all about?”

  “Your rescue,” the soldier says. “By the way, my name is John.” He extends his right hand and leaves it there for a long while, until Pete decides to go ahead and shake it.

  “Pete,” he says, with bewilderment.

  “Nice to meet you,” replies John as he shakes the boy’s hand vigorously.

  “Who are you, John, and where are you taking us?” demands Pete, still leery.

  “I’m a friend of a friend,” John explains elusively. “And that is Mathoniaha.” He points to the man driving the limo.

  “Matt for short, if you’d prefer,” Mathoniaha says, tipping his soldier’s cap forward just a bit.

  “You’ll have to leave us around back, Matt, there’s no camera there,” John instructs, as he leans forward. “I trust you’ll be okay dropping off this car by yourself.”

  “Don’t worry about me. I’ve done this before.” Matt grins and chuckles.

  “She’s bleeding!” Pete shouts, when he finally gets a good look at Sam. “What’s happened to her?”

  “I—I escaped the Prefect’s house through a window,” Sam says weakly.

  “Did you happen to break the glass first, or did you just jump?”

  “The window was broken, but I missed a shard.”

  “What were you doing at the Prefect’s house? And why are you dressed like that?”

  Through a dry mouth and shallow breaths, Sam tells him her whole story, culminating with her retreat into her old home, where she changed into Alex’s old military clothes that she found in the attic.

  “Wow! It’s a miracle you escaped at all. Why would that officer shoot his own father?” Pete mused.

  “I don’t know,” Sam says feebly and leans her head back in the seat.

  The limo pulls up to the back of a run-down apartment building that looks completely abandoned. John helps Pete move Sam out of the car and up the stairs. John’s apartment is a dump, and to make matters worse, it’s crammed with people.

  “Are all these people Aeonians?” I ask John quietly.

  “Yes ma’am,” John responds as he helps lay Sam on his dusty futon.

  Pete looks up, furrowing his eyebrows and looks around the crowded room. “Who were you just talking to?”

  “An angel, of course,” John says matter-of-factly, then winks genially at Pete, leaving him more bewildered than ever.

  Pete looks down at Sam with consternation and she shrugs in reply.

  “As soon as Mathoniaha gets back we can begin,” John states to the assorted group that is standing uncomfortably around his studio apartment. There’s a long pause in which no one speaks. Finally a tall and slender woman with shaved short hair, ebony skin, and a choker that takes up the length of her neck, steps out from the crowd and comes close to Sam.

  “I’m a healer. I can help,” she says with a thick South African accent. She then rattles off a list of items that she needs and John scoots his way toward his pantry to fill the order. Before too long, Sam’s wound is cleaned and bandaged, and she is peacefully sleeping.

  “Thank you,” I whisper, not sure if all Aeonians are like John and can see angels.

  “Karibu,” she says with a white, toothy, smile.

  Pete thought she had been talking to him, so he cleared his throat. “Um…what?”

  “I said, you’re welcome.”

  “Oh! Um. Thank you?” Pete responds, awkwardly.

  The woman smiles, then chuckles, and her laughter grows in crescendo for a minute, then dies down to a more subdued sigh. “She should sleep now for a while. She lost a lot of blood, so she’ll need nourishment when she wakes up. You have food in this…dwelling of yours, John?” She teases.

  “Yes, Eshe. At least enough to nourish the lot of you while you’re here.”

  A few of the other standing Aeonians utter some comments in low murmurs, then the front door swings wide open and Mathoniaha strides in confidently. “Okay, what did I miss?”

  “John here says he has food for all of us,” one of the Aeonians, who is standing toward the back says jovially. He’s big, like Russell, blond, with an equally blond bushy beard.

  “Enough to feed Tor and Atonga?” Mathoniaha quips.

  “Are you—?” Russell says with awe as he floats closer to the blond man.

  “Thor?” the large guy guesses. “Noooo…well…yesss. I suppose I am. I’m no God mind you, just a legend,” Tor says humbly in singsong, Scandinavian tones. “Hard to keep it under wraps when you can’t be killed.”

  “How about the rest of you?” Russell asks, excited now to see what other legends are gathered here.

  “I’m Atonga,” says the other big guy, in a booming bass, while bowing his head slightly. He looks Polynesian, and like he could give Tor a run for his money. “In my culture they think of me as half human, half spirit, and all because I made a canoe,” the big guy explains with a shrug.

  “Onamuji,” says a small Asian man, dressed in a white robe with long, wide sleeves and red pants. “Though I tried to discourage them, legends have been told about me among my original people of Japan.”

  Pete is staring at these odd people, as they speak to what appears to be thin air. His head turns from one to the other and to the empty space they are talking to, as if he were watching a tennis match. “Has everyone lost their mind, or have I?” Pete finally says with exasperation.

  “These are uncommon times, Pete,” John says casually, as he produces chairs and mugs filled with some hot liquid, for all the corporeal beings present. “Normally, a mortal boy such as yourself would never see or hear of us. You might pass us on the street and think we are just regular people, when in reality we’re not.”

  “No,” asserts Atonga, leaning forward on his chair. “There might be legends told of us, greatly exaggerated, but those only came about at the time of our transition.”

  “Transition?” Pete asks.

  “When we chose to remain on Earth until
the bitter end. You see, all our family members aged normally yet we did not. That’s when the legends and the rumors started. Many of us had to leave them behind, so as to not call attention to ourselves.” Mathoniaha explains. “Some of us have been hunted and thrown in pits full of wild beasts.”

  “Like Daniel,” I say.

  “Yes, like Daniel,” Mathoniaha responds, and Pete turns suddenly around to see who Matt was talking to. “We can see and hear angels, Pete,” Mathoniaha explains.

  “A—angels?” Pete stammers.

  “Yes, my son,” Onamuji says soothingly. “Angels. It’s one of the perks of this mission of ours.”

  “I—I don’t understand.”

  Eshe, who’s sitting on the futon next to the sleeping Samantha, leans toward Pete and pats his hand. “It is a lot to throw at you, and believe us, we would have never revealed ourselves to you,” she says, casting a sharp look toward John. “Except, well, this is a unique situation, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, it is unique,” John says defensively. “I made a solemn vow to Tess’ father that I would watch over her in life. How’s your tea, Pete?”

  “Good, thank you.” Pete frowns and takes another sip. “Who—who’s Tess?” he asks, annoyed now by the many pieces of information that he’s lacking.

  “Tess is Samantha’s guardian angel,” John says simply, like it’s an obvious fact.

  “Is she—” Pete swallows, but his throat seems extremely dry. “Is she the one that drew all those dresses?”

  “Yes!” I say eagerly, and John nods toward Pete.

  “Sam carries a picture of her everywhere she goes. She thought that—that there was a presence with us.”

  “She was right about that,” Tor nods and his eyes drift toward the three of us spirits, who are floating behind Pete.

  “How many—um—of them are there?”

  John looks up at us as well, as if he had to count again. “Three. One of them is yours.”

  “M—mine?”

  “Hey, don’t act so surprised! I’ve been with you for a long time now.” Russell protests. “You have no idea how hard I’ve worked at keeping you alive!”