*****
“You’re okay, Cadet!” Gill was yelling into my face, making himself heard above the helicopter’s rotary blades, “You did your best! Understand me? You did your best!”
“What happened?” I said. My own voice sounded like it was coming from the end of a tunnel.
Then I was in the back of an ambulance. Medical personnel were talking to me, but their words were not registering as English.
“…doesn’t look like you will lose any fingers, Enforcer. You’re very lucky…”
“…what’s all this on his face? Is there a head injury? Enforcer, was your head injured…?”
I looked down and was astonished to see a wrap of bloody bandages where my hand had been. One would assume a bullet wound was instant agonising pain. But I felt only a dull throbbing, as if having slammed the hand in a car door.
There was a pressure on my arm as a needle penetrated skin.
When I awoke I was on a bed being wheeled down a corridor. A nurse was looking down at me.
“You’re awake,” she said, “Relax. All is well.”
The bed entered a ward and was shifted into position against a wall.
“Where am I?” I asked.
“Why the hospital, of course” she replied gently, “you’re a bit of a celebrity right now, you know that?”
“No. What happened?”
“Hush now. Try to get some rest.”
I fell into a deep dreamless sleep from which very little could have woken me. Which was fortunate, since when I did wake I realised the medical ward I occupied was home to a persistently loud person, as well as a handful of other snoring patients. A stark contrast from the facilities found at the medical wing of the Academy.
The loud person, muttering from behind a nearby curtain, spouted gibberish punctuated by curses and groans. The racket did little to aid a headache that pounded feverishly in my skull. Nor ease a lingering pain that pulsed up my arm, throbbing in synchronicity with my heartbeat.
I attempted to ignore the gibberish, closing my eyes. But try as I might the headache only deepened and hand continued to ache. Soon I was biting the insides of my cheeks.
In desperation I grabbed a remote from beside my bed and aimed it at the wall mounted television. But not surprisingly, the image that met my eyes was helicopter footage of Judy stumbling up the street. I gazed at it, recalling the events as if they must have happened to someone else. Even when I saw myself enter the frame, a blue uniformed figure approaching the girl, I could not relate myself to the scene.
A skeletal face hovered before me, strings of hair clinging to a flaking scalp, cracked lips stretched over rows of yellow teeth. Hardly human, barely alive. The ghoul’s head snapped to the side and red mist spurted like an aerosol can.
“Good girl,” I heard myself saying, “Good girl, Judy Carlson. Good girl.”
On the television the frame panned right to show a black horse. Then I saw myself raise a hand to cover the girl’s eyes. The news program had had the decency to blur out the explosive head wound.
I gripped my aching head. Nearby, the jabbering continued.
The helicopter footage was replaced by a crowd of civilians hovering restlessly behind a blockade. From the homemade signs to fists punching the air, they could only have been protestors. Following this was the face of Dempsey. He was addressing the crowd, body ferociously animated and face conveying outrage. His audience was quickly whipped up into an indignant frenzy.
The babbling continued. I sighed and squeezed my eyes shut, certain my skull would fracture and leak out my brains.
“Excuse me,” I barked, “Excuse me!”
The muttering stopped.
“You talking to me?” a breathless voice replied.
“Yes. Please stop that. It’s driving me crazy.”
“What?”
“The muttering! Shut up!” The words were louder than intended and a groan sounded from nearby.
There was pause.
“You know what’s happening out there?” the voice asked.
“No. And I don’t care. Please just be quiet.”
“It just needed a spark. All the elements were there; fuel, air. It just needed a spark. And that girl was it.”
“Please, my head…”
“They been oppressed for too long, treated unfair. It was inevitable, just needed an excuse. Just needed the girl to get shot…”
All at once I realised the room was alive, the air singing a constant tuneless note. It was there in the hospital, so soft and subtle it could have gone unnoticed. But my mind, once catching a glimpse, tuned in of its own accord. The stealthy Spell was brought into the foreground of thought. I flinched, eyes watering at this new assault on my senses.
“What the hell…” I groaned.
“Just needed the girl to be shot,” the voice repeated, “cut down in the street like a damn dog. See the way she looked? Walking skeleton. Walking skeleton in a robe.”
I threw off the bedcovers and marched across the ward. The curtain was ripped aside, revealing a wrinkled old creature hunched beneath white linen.
“Hey, what are you doing?” the creature gasped.
“What is that spell?!” I barked, “How are you doing it?!”
“Spell…?”
“I can feel it! Don’t lie to me!”
The creature squinted at me, eyes confused. “Just relax, pal. Okay? You’re not thinking straight. Given you lots of drugs. Cause of your hand. You’re not all there in the head.”
Without thinking I lunged out and penetrated its head, bowling over flimsy defences and shooting out probing tentacles. Old rusted doors creaked open, shoddy walls collapsed, barriers groaned and twisted. Images streaked by in an infinite slideshow.
… house with blossoming rose garden... Young girl off to college… terrier named Scratch… guilty late night television shows…
But there was nothing. Not a thought about any kind of passive magic.
“Hey? What the hell are doing?!”
I blinked. The presence was gone. Before me on a hospital bed was an old, frail man, gaping with terrified eyes. One liver spotted hand was held up in a pointless attempt to shield his head from intrusion.
“I’m sorry,” I stammered.
“Haven’t got anything in there worth anything to you,” he rambled, “Ain’t got any money. Ain’t a rich man…”
“I know. I’m sorry. I wasn’t trying to steal anything.”
“Who the hell are you?”
“I’m an Enforcer. I thought you were using illegal magic. I’m sorry. Get some sleep.”
I closed the curtain and returned to my bed. There were rustles of cloth as a few bodies moved. Then silence. The television continued to flicker its artificial light.
A deep breath rattled my lungs as I regained composure. I spotted a call button and pressed it. A nurse arrived moments later.
“You’re up,” the young woman said.
“Yes. I need some coffee, please.”
“Of course. How’s your hand? Is the pain bothering you?”
“I avoid taking painkillers. They dull me.” But even as I said it my hand flashed with pain, twisting my mouth into a grimace.
“Can’t be as sharp as a razor all the time.”
“Maybe later.”
She nodded, “Very well,” and turned to leave, but paused. Her eyes flicked to the television. It again showed Judy tottering up the street. “I should mention two Enforcers were stationed here earlier waiting to speak with you. They said they send their regards and you should return to the D.O.M for debriefing as soon as you are able.”
‘Okay. What’s happening out there? I saw protestors on the TV.”
“I’m afraid the incident with this girl has caused a number of political groups to get restless.”
“Just needed a spark,” the old man spoke up from behind his curtain.
“You hush your mouth,” the nurse snapped at him, “or I will have to sed
ate you again, Mister Brown.”
He went quiet and her attention turned back to me. “He was brought in earlier from one of those protests,” she whispered, “I’m afraid he’s a little…” She tapped her head.
“I see.”
“I’ll bring your coffee and some painkillers,” she concluded, exiting.
I looked back at the television and changed to a cartoon. But my mind had begun grasping eagerly at a new thought. One that crept in and, in the process, eased out a skeletal ghoul named Judy Carlson. I accepted it, grateful for the relief, and allowed it to put down roots. There was a school named Little Dreamers Day Care somewhere out there, and I was going to find it.
Balance - Book 2 Page 31