by Erin Grey
@1UPNEWS
Regulator HQ denies system hack. Announces Regulator-sponsored initiative to encourage training and therapy for differently-abled. Read the full story on 1UpNews.knit
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@1UPNEWS
Senator Cadgwaladr condemns tag campaign accusations as hoax. “This is fake news, a desperate play by extremists to sow unrest and destabilize the economy for personal gain.” Read the full story on 1UpNews.knit
#LiveNews #FakeNews
“How can they get away with this?” I fumed. “The evidence is right there! They can’t deny the facts!”
“They’ve already deleted all our dummy accounts,” said Charis, shock causing her whiskey voice to wobble. “The original dooks have disappeared. How could they possibly react so quickly?”
“We know Senator Cadgwaladr is supporting them,” said Aidon grimly. “He must have more allies and resources than we realise.”
“Surely people don’t believe it’s a hoax.” I thumped the table with my fist, causing the communication device to jump across it with each thump. It ended up precariously close to the edge. “Those vids couldn’t have been faked!”
“Careful,” said Aidon, shifting the communication device back to the centre of the table. “It doesn’t matter if they deny it or claim it’s a lie. We put the truth out there. Thousands saw it, and you can bet that there are conversations happening. It’s up to each individual to choose whether to believe it or not.”
“At least we’ve created awareness,” said Charis. “They can’t stop people talking about it. This isn’t over.”
“It isn’t,” Aidon agreed. “We’ll go on fighting, go on searching for the truth and putting it out there. We might not have stopped them, but we’ve made it a lot harder for them to carry on without giving themselves away. And who knows what allies we’ve gained?”
“Well, it sucks,” I grumbled.
“What were you hoping for?” asked Aidon. “A call to arms against the Regulators?”
I grimaced. “Something like that.”
“Sometimes the bad guys win,” said Aidon. “We can’t save the world. But we can make a dent in it.”
“Oh, I wish we could save the world,” sighed Gwendolyn. “Else, what’s the point of heroes?”
“One does not need to save the world to be a hero,” said Jasper. “One only needs to help a single person.”
“And that person might be yourself,” finished Sandy.
Aidon laid a hand on my shoulder. “We should get some sleep. It’s a long walk to the portal tomorrow.”
I wiped away a tear. “Let me say goodbye, first.”
Goodbyes are hard, and these were no different.
Charis: my beautiful siren of the silver screen with a golden soul.
Brianus: my tag-along mental patient with enough power to destroy the world and far too much kindness for his own good.
Ric: so ready to share his incredible knowledge and forgive terrible sins, despite his own painful losses.
Quirinus: father and mother to everyone, eyes that saw into hearts and minds.
And Ju. Mixed up, deeply hurting Ju. I thought I heard her voice tremble when she said goodbye. Mine shook with sobs.
I even spared a thought for poor Idesta, so desperate for Zhian’s attention. So blind to his manipulation.
When I lay on the bed I’d been given, I cried. Tears of anger at the world for selfishly refusing to be fixed, tears of sadness for the friends I’d leave behind, tears of fear for what I might face on my return home.
I wanted to accept that I was going back, believe that this time I wouldn’t hide behind the mask of what I thought everyone wanted. I’d find another way to fix things, to get us out and someplace safe. I was going to live for them, the ones who loved me, but I was also going to live for me. I wanted to dig and search, listen to all the voices, discover who I really was beneath all the facades, and live for that person.
But first, I needed to remember what I had already lived.
So, I sat down and drew. I drew singing pirates and shiny multi-coloured people and scientific cats. I drew daring escapes and exploding yewnikruns and attack hogs. I drew guanis and growing things and spaceships. I even drew a little boat, sailing across a lilac sea to an indigo island.
Don’t get me wrong; it was the world’s worst comic strip. But I drew it, stick figures and all. Then I went outside and dug in the frozen earth and imbued it with nitrogen and nutrients and planted and made things grow.
Then I said:
“It’s time to go.”
56
The bit that hurts
It doesn’t really matter how we got to the portal. When I wasn’t lost in thought and remorse and self-deprecation, Aidon and I acted like we were out for a little stroll. We didn’t talk about saying goodbye.
At one point, while we were deep underground, Aidon veered from the path.
“Where are you going?” I asked.
“Just a minute,” he answered, marching down a side tunnel, then bending to scrabble in a dark cove. “Aha.” He straightened up and held out a clear gem.
A diamond.
“Here,” he said. “To replace the one the Regulators took.”
“How did you …?” I took it and examined it in awe.
“I’ve been looking since you told me there was another portal.” He watched his toe scratch a pattern in the dust. “Couldn’t let you go back empty-handed.”
I hugged him. “I will never, ever forget you,” I whispered through softly trickling tears.
“What did you say before about near-death experiences?” Aidon asked, rubbing my back. “They form an unbreakable bond. We’ve had our share of them, haven’t we?”
I sputtered a watery giggle.
“C’mon,” said Aidon. “Got to keep moving.”
“I can’t help feeling grateful to him,” I said as we plodded on.
“Who, Zhian?”
“Yes.”
“Because he saved your life?” grumbled Aidon.
“I like when he’s jealous,” said Sandy. “He gets all growly.”
“I get sad if he’s sad,” said Gwendolyn. “It makes me want to hug him.”
“It makes me want to ruffle his hair and call him tiger,” said Sandy.
“Zhian didn’t save my life,” I said to Aidon. “He only prolonged it.” I touched his shoulder, stopping him and making him turn to face me. “Until I met you. You saved my life. Because you made me want to be saved. Then you showed me how to save myself.”
He reached across his chest to place his hand over mine. “I wish we’d had more time.” His eyes fell to the ground. “But maybe that would have been worse.”
I sniffed. “Let’s keep walking.”
And then we were there. A run-down old building that used to house a Regulator outpost but had been decommissioned decades before. We crept through the deserted ruins overgrown with thick purple tendrils and thistles and weeds. Small rodents and ferret-like creatures scampered out of our path. It was the right atmosphere for a goodbye.
Down the crumbling staircase, we found the small room where the portal was located.
“Where is it?” I asked, searching the bare walls.
“You’re standing on it,” said Aidon.
I looked down. There was nothing but a metal grate beneath my feet.
“Here, let me.” Aidon gently pushed me aside. He lifted the grate as though it gave no resistance, but the metallic groan of the movement told a different story. Below was a hole.
“That’s it?” I asked in a voice flat with incredulity. “It’s just a hole?”
“What did you expect?” laughed Aidon.
“I don’t know. A door? A great swirling pyrotechnic force-field?” I flicked my hand at the silent, dark pit. “Not an ‘Alice-in-Wonderland’ rabbit hole.”
We stared at the void.
“I don’t want to say good bye,” Gwendolyn sobbed, clutching an equally dripping Emmy in
a tight embrace. Mitch murmured incoherently.
“It is time to go,” said Jasper.
I turned to Aidon and opened my mouth, then closed it and turned back to the pit. I felt paralyzed, not wanting to go forward or back.
I startled when Aidon’s hand slipped into mine. My head snapped up to look at him.
His nose was red. A tear slid down his cheek. “I’ll come with you.”
Fresh tears welled up. “You know that’s not possible. I have to go back and face what I left behind.”
“We’ll go together.”
“Then you’d be the one running away. And we’ve both done enough of that.” I took his hand in both of mine and cradled it against my face. “I love you.”
He looked away from me, lip curled, jaw clenched.
“Aidon. TRAG needs you. The differently-energied need you. I wish there was another way.” I kissed his hand and squeezed it. “I can never repay you for everything you’ve done for me, given me. You will always have my love. Remember that if it gives you any comfort. But then move on.”
He snorted. “Now you’re the one suggesting impossible things.”
“It’s better if you forget.” The words were Sandy’s. “I want you to be happy.”
“Never, never …” He leant his forehead against mine.
“Oh, don’t be so dramatic!” I pulled away. “Everyone moves on sooner or later. Nothing is forever, not even pain, though it feels like it is. But it passes and you forget and then the name Jane Smith means nothing to you.”
“I don’t want to forget.”
“But you should, for your own mental and emotional health.”
“I don’t see why …”
“Oh stop!” I cried out. “You’re making it too hard!”
“Don’t …”
I was sobbing now, the ugly kind that turns your face red and puffy and makes snot run into your mouth and spit drop out of it in clinging threads and the sounds you make are like dying pigs …
He held me close, and all I could think about was how much mucous was getting onto his shirt. I pushed him away.
“Enough. We’ve said goodbye. No more last words, no more attempts to be poetic or say something important. It doesn’t matter. It’s done.”
I turned around and marched towards the portal.
And I didn’t look back.
I jumped.
57
The bit where it all ends
When I finally traced my way from the portal’s end to the apartment, it looked just as it had the first time I’d entered it, except for a thin layer of dust that testified to the absence of trespassers.
“I shudder to think how your dead body would have looked if you hadn’t been abducted by aliens,” said Jasper.
“Our body,” said Gwendolyn. “We’re all together in this.”
Because they were all me and I was them. And that was okay.
My next thought was for the rings lying on the bed, next to my neatly arranged funeral plan and letters. I looked across at them, suddenly panicking that they would somehow have disappeared. But they hadn’t. There they were: two tiny bands for my ring finger—one plain white gold wedding ring and one engagement ring with a light sprinkling of diamond chips all the way round. I slid them back on, and it felt like coming home.
They covered the raised whorls that circled my finger, the only thing I had left of Aidon. I would never remove my rings again.
The apartment was stuffy. I threw the windows open and cool saltiness breezed in, washing away the stale trapped air.
I lay down on the bed and stared at the rings on my upraised hand. It was easier to focus on them than to think about what to do next. I couldn’t shake the feeling that it had all been a dream. Or maybe the other world was reality and this bed in this apartment was the dream. I rubbed at the grubby clothing I wore and found Quirinus’ knife.
“It was not a dream,” said Jasper.
“Will we live forever, though?” asked Gwendolyn.
“And what about that creative energy,” added Sandy. “Will it work here? Are there others like us?”
The space where the translator was installed itched.
“Wish we could still talk to them,” said Mitch.
I switched on the TV, and it told me the expropriation laws would be passed in 28 days. Minorities were leaving the country in droves. I stripped down and took a bath.
When the tub was emptied, I caught my reflection in the mirror. My body had hardened; it wasn’t thinner, but firm and muscular. The smattering of grey hairs that had begun appearing at my hairline were completely gone. I’d not had many wrinkles before my trip to Eorthe, but my skin had begun to take on that dull, saggy appearance of someone exposed to too much sun and polluted air and misery. Now it was smooth, full of blood, glowing.
Back in regular Earth clothes, I rolled the rough garments Kleisthenes had given me into a ball and aimed for the bin. But they ended up in my backpack. Another memento.
A few days later, I dropped a plastic bag of cash on the yellow comforter, more than enough for three aeroplane tickets to Canada and a new start. The diamond Aidon had given me was of particularly good quality.
I plugged in my cell phone and stared at the picture on the lock screen: my husband, Max. He’d stood by me through my worst breakdowns, and I still loved him to the point of pain. My strong man, my rock. But even he couldn’t withstand a hijacker’s bullet.
If only he could have lived to see me make it to this point, a place where I could see a tiny sliver of light at the end of the tunnel. Maybe I could have given him the happiness he deserved.
I rubbed at my rings, feeling them bump against the raised pattern underneath. I’d decided never to take them off, but I had to let go of the person who gave them to me. I’d never stop loving him. I’d never stop loving Aidon, either. I wouldn’t be living for them, though. I’d be living for me.
“It isn’t fair that we lost them both,” cried Gwendolyn through her sobs.
“Life’s a bitch,” said Sandy, sniffing.
“We’ll miss them,” said Mitch. “Forever.”
“Only if our energy functions the same way it did on Eorthe,” said Jasper. “But we’d do well to focus on the task at hand and worry about immortality later.”
The next trick was to leave the room and go back to the people I’d abandoned. I could never tell my parents the truth of why I’d left or where I’d gone, and I’d certainly never tell them of my adventures on Eorthe. I’d have to make up a story about how I got the money, then keep them distracted with our emigration.
Maybe I could try gardening when we got to Canada, now that I had my energy back. That’s if it lasted.
Maybe I’d find others like me, now that I knew what to look for.
Like Aidon had said: try for just one more day.
And then one more day after that.
* * *
Want more Jane Smith? Get the prequel ‘The Illustrated Diary of Jane Smith and the Voices in her Head’ FREE when you subscribe to my newsletter here: http://eepurl.com/gTaCA5
About the Author
Erin lives in South Africa with her pet husband and Evil Cat Overlord. Her personal experience with mental health issues similar to those Jane faces inspired this story. She laughs at things in the hopes they’ll go away, which is why she writes humorous novels, produces a comic strip—Survivor Bunny—centered around mental health and chronic illness, and manages a blog about survival through writing. The goal dearest to her heart is to eat chocolate cake without getting fat.
You can connect with me on:
https://survivorbunny.com
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https://amazon.com/author/eringrey
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