by Jamie Ott
Chapter 12
Jacko moved through the air at a speed so fast that, for all he knew, he’d circled the Earth a few times. He was numb and angry without any ideas about where he was going. All he could do was call for Lucem, but he got no response.
At one point, he contemplated flying to Venus to see if Lucem really was the morning star, like the old Romans used to call it and like Gaia had explained to him. Jacko aimed further upward to the edge of the Earth’s atmosphere, but when he tried to move beyond the last phase of atmosphere, something held him back, like an invisible bowl that kept inside.
After failing many attempted angles to exit the Earth, Jacko began to feel dizzy and tired, so he sought out a high, snowy, deserted peak to settle on.
He needed to think about how he was going to bring back Sissy; that was all he cared about.
But how do you bring back someone from the Fountain of Youth without being sucked in yourself? You can’t, he told himself.
What about with the power of a God? If he had the power of a God, would he be able to bring her back then? And should he? Or was it immoral? Would he face punishment from the gods? If he did manage to pull her back out of the fountain, would she remember him?
He didn’t know enough about life and death to know how to go about it.
Instinctively, he did know that what was dead should stay dead.
Also, he knew that he didn’t want any blessings! How dare the gods put such burdens on him, a teenager! What ruthless, cruel, uncaring, war mongering gods!
Hate seethed through Jacko, making him incapable of further logical thought. And he would do everything, and anything, to have nothing to do with them – even kill them- if they came near him ever again.
There was a huge explosion. He jerked his head up toward the sky and saw red and blue streams of light that flew off toward a nearby star. Then, the whole peak, on which he sat, quaked violently, as the star was obliterated by the red beams. Waves of heat and fiery matter flew out for miles in all directions across the sky, and at a pace that could cut a whale clean in half.
Jacko knew it was the gods, warring in space. Oh, well! Let them. It was not his problem, anymore. They screwed themselves when they let his sister get killed, so they could take their prophecies and shove them.
The snow fell down fast and hard around him, but he didn’t feel it. He remained still in a zombie-fied state for hours.