Here's a list of links to all 27 chapters of No Romance. Some of the chapter titles have been changed since their original posting.
Act I. Swept
1. The Sequel
2. Don’t Get Swept Away!
3. The Only Choice He Really Has
4. Prisoner in One Way or Another
5. Escape from One Prison, Still in that Other
6. Out of Mercy, a Gift to Our Dear Jack
7. Golbez MacDowell
8. Protected by a God
9. It’s a thing, all right.
Act II. Embrace
10. A Trapmaster Gets Lost in His Own Museum, and Our Hero Gets Swept Away.
11. The One Who Was Chosen By The Gods
12. A God Among Beasts
13. The Chapter Where Jack Dies
14. Respawn
15. Johnson World
16. Ay, Bee, and Three
17. No Treasure Nearby, Search Elsewhere
18. The Rest of the Cast Turns Up
19. Talk About Cathartic
Act III. Snap
20. Choose Your Own Adventure!
21. Not Your Grandmother’s Retirement Plan
22. The Emergency Plan
23. The Law of the Western
24. Rebellion
25. The Fury of a Toothless Hellhound
26. 3:10 to Girafa Península
27. Diabolo Ex Machina or: God of Mercy
Sunday, August 26, 2012
Last chapter of No Romance
Chapter 27, “Diabolo Ex
Machina or: God of Mercy”
Not until night conquers day, and our decree falls below the earth.
Jack, though he alone could move, did not.
Not until night conquers day, and our decree falls below the earth.
Jack, though he alone could move, did not.
We are putting down our
tools of creation, and putting your story on what you might call autopilot.
“You mean this wasn’t on autopilot? The whole time, this
was supposed to be more? Different from all the other crap you’ve
put me through? Special?”
Yes, of course. There are several elements to this story that we haven’t used before. That is why our sentencing of you is so significant. That sentencing is thus: In forsaking the entire purpose of your life---your time and mission on this island---you have chosen your own destiny: a meaningless existence. Gun fights, barroom brawls, leaps of faith, chase sequences---temporary women, backstabbing friends, damsels in distress, femme fatales---that is your sentencing. This continually, this eternally, with no guidance, no goals, a plot without a purpose, just an endless splendid device, cause and effect into forever, no direction nor destination. We are walking away and withdrawing from you, leaving you alone.
Jack McDowell had no words. The anger inside him was no longer alone---sadness had entered his heart. A crushing pain. He let out a choked, gasping sob, a reaction he had never given before, to anything. He wanted to cry.
You chose this, Jack McDowell. Over all other roles, you chose this one.
“I didn’t choose not to choose!” he said, his voice cracking halfway through. “When and why would I have done that!?”
Images flashed in Jack’s mind. A computer hacker’s fingers dancing on the keyboard, ignoring the mouse on the side. A man walking with a woman on the beach at sunset. A great warrior wielding a mythic sword on a battlefield. A young magician learning the ways of wizardry. An eccentric, charismatic figure solving mysteries and mocking the lesser minds around him. Then finally a megalomaniacal villain, cackling and explaining his evil plan to a bound hero who was already planning a clever escape.
And Jack McDowell knew what he had to do. That which had been building up inside him for so long finally broke the surface. We say “broke” but in reality it burst out with an explosion, like a raging sea monster filled with fiery, red-eyed wrath.
Yes, of course. There are several elements to this story that we haven’t used before. That is why our sentencing of you is so significant. That sentencing is thus: In forsaking the entire purpose of your life---your time and mission on this island---you have chosen your own destiny: a meaningless existence. Gun fights, barroom brawls, leaps of faith, chase sequences---temporary women, backstabbing friends, damsels in distress, femme fatales---that is your sentencing. This continually, this eternally, with no guidance, no goals, a plot without a purpose, just an endless splendid device, cause and effect into forever, no direction nor destination. We are walking away and withdrawing from you, leaving you alone.
Jack McDowell had no words. The anger inside him was no longer alone---sadness had entered his heart. A crushing pain. He let out a choked, gasping sob, a reaction he had never given before, to anything. He wanted to cry.
You chose this, Jack McDowell. Over all other roles, you chose this one.
“I didn’t choose not to choose!” he said, his voice cracking halfway through. “When and why would I have done that!?”
Images flashed in Jack’s mind. A computer hacker’s fingers dancing on the keyboard, ignoring the mouse on the side. A man walking with a woman on the beach at sunset. A great warrior wielding a mythic sword on a battlefield. A young magician learning the ways of wizardry. An eccentric, charismatic figure solving mysteries and mocking the lesser minds around him. Then finally a megalomaniacal villain, cackling and explaining his evil plan to a bound hero who was already planning a clever escape.
And Jack McDowell knew what he had to do. That which had been building up inside him for so long finally broke the surface. We say “broke” but in reality it burst out with an explosion, like a raging sea monster filled with fiery, red-eyed wrath.
Jack snapped.
And time resumed again.
Ann had stopped shooting at the men around her because they had already stopped shooting at her. The men Jack had been brawling with were backing up, afraid of the unconquerable hero.
But Jack was no longer the hero.
With rage and gritted teeth he wrenched Wrench from Ann’s hands, strung his arm around her throat, and put the gun to her head.
“Come and get me if you dare!” he screamed, spinning slowly on the spot. “You attack again and the girl dies!”
“Jack, have you lost your mind?” Ann shrieked.
“I think I might have done just that, yes,” he seethed viciously. “And unless you all change your minds and join me as my lackeys, the girl dies!”
We the gods were so shocked at what he had done that all but one of us left. I stayed behind to witness the proceedings. I alone knew what was going to happen, how the final pieces of the story would fall into place.
The men around Jack were shocked too. No reaction seemed appropriate but to just stand and stare, mouths agape.
“You get to grovelling or the girl dies!” he yelled at all of them menacingly. “If I’m a slave, you will all be slaves too! I will use the advanced volcano technology in my possession to destroy every part and person of this island that is not under my control! And I will use the mystical protection of this jacket to shield myself against any foe! Bwahahahahahahaha!”
“Mr. McDowell!” came a raised but soft voice. “What’s going on?”
Dark Jack whirled around, gun still pressed to Ann’s temple. Blake had shown up at the top of the ravine. The seven or eight Cardaccian workers were with him.
Jack laughed insanely. “You think you can stop me? Nobody can stop me!”
He raised Wrench to fire on Blake and the innocent Cardaccians. But for the first time in Wrench’s remembered existence...it missed.
Jack fired again and again. After missing all the Cardaccians, he turned on and missed the surviving men of Amon Dem around him. He swore when Wrench was fully empty after only six shots. He made to check the chamber---
---and that was when Paula struck.
Ann had stopped shooting at the men around her because they had already stopped shooting at her. The men Jack had been brawling with were backing up, afraid of the unconquerable hero.
But Jack was no longer the hero.
With rage and gritted teeth he wrenched Wrench from Ann’s hands, strung his arm around her throat, and put the gun to her head.
“Come and get me if you dare!” he screamed, spinning slowly on the spot. “You attack again and the girl dies!”
“Jack, have you lost your mind?” Ann shrieked.
“I think I might have done just that, yes,” he seethed viciously. “And unless you all change your minds and join me as my lackeys, the girl dies!”
We the gods were so shocked at what he had done that all but one of us left. I stayed behind to witness the proceedings. I alone knew what was going to happen, how the final pieces of the story would fall into place.
The men around Jack were shocked too. No reaction seemed appropriate but to just stand and stare, mouths agape.
“You get to grovelling or the girl dies!” he yelled at all of them menacingly. “If I’m a slave, you will all be slaves too! I will use the advanced volcano technology in my possession to destroy every part and person of this island that is not under my control! And I will use the mystical protection of this jacket to shield myself against any foe! Bwahahahahahahaha!”
“Mr. McDowell!” came a raised but soft voice. “What’s going on?”
Dark Jack whirled around, gun still pressed to Ann’s temple. Blake had shown up at the top of the ravine. The seven or eight Cardaccian workers were with him.
Jack laughed insanely. “You think you can stop me? Nobody can stop me!”
He raised Wrench to fire on Blake and the innocent Cardaccians. But for the first time in Wrench’s remembered existence...it missed.
Jack fired again and again. After missing all the Cardaccians, he turned on and missed the surviving men of Amon Dem around him. He swore when Wrench was fully empty after only six shots. He made to check the chamber---
---and that was when Paula struck.
First with an impossibly
high kick that made her legs create a 180-degree angle (which isn’t an angle at
all), then an elbow into Jack’s gut. He dropped Wrench and doubled over. She
spun and kneed him in the face, knocking him backwards, dazed.
But the insanity hadn’t
left his eyes. And she, too, was now possessed---entirely taken over by Paula.
Jack recovered in a
matter of milliseconds, then charged at her, swinging his right fist at her
jaw. She dodged and tried a counter punch, but he grabbed her arm midway and
flipped her down on her back. She rolled to the side as he thrust his knee down
at her chest. She swung her leg around to the back of his knees, tripping him
up. He didn’t quite fall to the ground, but had to use his hands to keep
balanced as he righted himself. The two now faced each other in fighting
stances, his a boxing bounce, hers some sort of martial art. Both utterly
ignored the world around them. It had disappeared, and they had lost themselves
completely.
Nearly completely.
“So this is what it
comes down to,” he said. “The whole thing, leading to this.”
“It’s about time,” she
quipped back. “Afraid to kill a girl?”
She struck at him like a
cobra, coming at him with rapid steps in one smooth motion. He maintained his
brute force and barreled into the attack. She sidestepped him, but he managed
to grab her arm and jerked her around with his momentum. This threw her backwards
into the ravine slope. She found footing on the slope and launched back into
him. He absorbed the brunt of her attack, wrapping his bigger, more powerful
arms around her as she essentially tackled him to the ground. But Jack ended up
on top, and pinned her arms down.
He used that moment to
catch his breath. Both their breasts were heaving. Every ounce of his rage was,
in that moment, shooting through his eyes and boring into hers. And in that
moment---no one was ever sure if it was Annie showing through, or if Jack had
found a vulnerability in Paula---her eyes expressed fear. Real, desperate,
fear.
Jack’s grip on her arms faltered just a bit.
And that’s when something tackled him---something orange and black and magnificent, a beast with the mind and power of a god (though not a god’s speaking capability). Carl Sagan had toppled Jack, had pinned his arms down with his paws, was snarling at him, dagger-like teeth bared.
And now Jack looked afraid. But not just of the Super Tiger standing on his chest. It was a look of realization---the dawning horror of both his choice and his presumed fate.
Carl Sagan noticed this, and stopped snarling.
And that’s when something tackled him---something orange and black and magnificent, a beast with the mind and power of a god (though not a god’s speaking capability). Carl Sagan had toppled Jack, had pinned his arms down with his paws, was snarling at him, dagger-like teeth bared.
And now Jack looked afraid. But not just of the Super Tiger standing on his chest. It was a look of realization---the dawning horror of both his choice and his presumed fate.
Carl Sagan noticed this, and stopped snarling.
Then the wondrous beast
licked Jack’s face.
And Jack McDowell began
to weep. Genuine tears poured from his eyes amid wracking, heaving sobs. He was
crying out in agony, in regret, in pain, more than a wounded animal---a
wounded, judged, condemned soul. Carl Sagan got off Jack’s chest, and as the
ruined hero curled up into a fetal position, the Super Tiger licked the tears
as they fell from his clenched-close eyes.
Before anyone knew what was going on, Paula had melted
back into Annie and she was crying too. After lying on the ground a long time,
she crawled over to Jack and put her arms around him. Neither said a word, just
rocked in each other’s embrace. The darkness had released them from its
clutches.
At last, when the tear wells began to dry, Jack managed to sit up. He looked first to Carl Sagan.
At last, when the tear wells began to dry, Jack managed to sit up. He looked first to Carl Sagan.
“Thank you,” he said
quietly.
Carl Sagan looked at his
old friend sadly, as if to say, “You did the same for me! You saved me from the
darkest abyss! I was deep within the grip of hell, bent on violence and
destruction, and with one sock to the jaw you rescued me, and forced me to see
the light! I owed you, my friend, my only true friend. Thank you.” His words!
Annie threw her arms
around Carl Sagan’s neck and held onto him tight. She kissed his fur and then
she and Jack rose to their feet.
Jack was too ashamed to
meet the eyes of the men standing all around them, so he merely hung his head
as he said, “Sorry. I’m so sorry, everyone. I just need to leave. I need to get
out of here. We need to get out of here. That’s all I know now. I
promise you I didn’t kill Golbez and that I’m not faking as his son. I’m not
really your enemy, I’ve just been defending myself the whole time. Everything
else that happened was out of my control. I’m sorry it ended like that. I’m
sorry.”
He and Annie trudged up
the ravine, side by side, with Carl Sagan right behind them, past Blake and through
the line of quivering Cardaccians, and finally towards the train, walking with
an emotionally triggered limp. They left everyone standing still, wondering
what on earth it was they had just witnessed.
A few blinks later and
Jack was Jack again, and Annie, Annie.
“Jack, what was that?”
Annie asked quietly.
“I was trying to escape.
Trying to...” He sighed. “Make a choice. And it just took over. I don’t
understand it fully myself. I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Okay.”
“Hilti, we’re on our way
to board,” Jack spoke into his wristwatch. “And I think I know the last
password to get us out of here. I’ll deliver it in person. Wait for us.”
Annie had picked up
Wrench from the ground as they started leaving, and was now offering it back to
Jack.
“No, no,” he said, declining with his hand. “You keep it.
I don’t want to shoot another henchman again for the rest of my life. I’m not
going to do that ever again.”
“Are you sure?” she said tentatively.
But there was no time to answer. The whistle had just sounded on the train and the horn had been blown. Steam pulsed through the train’s system and brought the machine back to life.
Jack and Annie looked at each other in alarm. They could run, but they’d never make it. They’d have to stare helplessly as the train, for whatever reason, left the station, just barely out of their grasp.
Jack yelled into his wrist.
“Hilti! Hilti! Stop the train! How are you even going without the password?”
But no response came back.
Jack, taking on his old persona, looked back at Carl Sagan.
“Annie,” Jack said. “Take my hand.”
There was no reason for it other than theatricality, but she took his hand anyway, and the two mounted themselves on Carl Sagan’s back.
“Hyah!” shouted Jack unnecessarily. Carl Sagan had already begun running. Annie held onto Jack and Jack onto Carl Sagan’s ruff as the Super Tiger burump-burumped forth towards the runaway train.
Carl Sagan was more than a match for the locomotive. He got Jack and Annie close enough to the caboose’s porch that they could transfer over without worry. Jack went first, then helped Annie---though Paula, and maybe even Ann wouldn’t have needed the help.
They had finally made it. Onto the train as it was about to leave Rainswept Isle behind. Jack and Annie were about to share in their exultant triumph when they remembered the beast that had helped them get there. They turned back to see the gradually fading Super Tiger looking at them, his best friends, with a mournful, longing look. He bellowed after them, and Annie started to cry as they waved goodbye.
“Somehow that’s the saddest thing I’ve seen this entire journey,” she said, on the verge of further tears.
“I know what you mean. But let’s get up to the head car, where Hilti is. We have to find out what’s going on.”
They passed through the cars in the same way Jack had earlier that day. This time, the train was empty of passengers or stowaways. In one car, lit by cloud-burning sunlight pouring in through glassless windows, they found crates, and Jack, curious, pried open one of them.
He leapt backwards.
“What, what!” said Annie, the sudden fear spreading to her as if contagious and clutching onto Jack.
He just pointed. She crept over to the box and looked inside.
She turned back around, confused.
“Are you sure?” she said tentatively.
But there was no time to answer. The whistle had just sounded on the train and the horn had been blown. Steam pulsed through the train’s system and brought the machine back to life.
Jack and Annie looked at each other in alarm. They could run, but they’d never make it. They’d have to stare helplessly as the train, for whatever reason, left the station, just barely out of their grasp.
Jack yelled into his wrist.
“Hilti! Hilti! Stop the train! How are you even going without the password?”
But no response came back.
Jack, taking on his old persona, looked back at Carl Sagan.
“Annie,” Jack said. “Take my hand.”
There was no reason for it other than theatricality, but she took his hand anyway, and the two mounted themselves on Carl Sagan’s back.
“Hyah!” shouted Jack unnecessarily. Carl Sagan had already begun running. Annie held onto Jack and Jack onto Carl Sagan’s ruff as the Super Tiger burump-burumped forth towards the runaway train.
Carl Sagan was more than a match for the locomotive. He got Jack and Annie close enough to the caboose’s porch that they could transfer over without worry. Jack went first, then helped Annie---though Paula, and maybe even Ann wouldn’t have needed the help.
They had finally made it. Onto the train as it was about to leave Rainswept Isle behind. Jack and Annie were about to share in their exultant triumph when they remembered the beast that had helped them get there. They turned back to see the gradually fading Super Tiger looking at them, his best friends, with a mournful, longing look. He bellowed after them, and Annie started to cry as they waved goodbye.
“Somehow that’s the saddest thing I’ve seen this entire journey,” she said, on the verge of further tears.
“I know what you mean. But let’s get up to the head car, where Hilti is. We have to find out what’s going on.”
They passed through the cars in the same way Jack had earlier that day. This time, the train was empty of passengers or stowaways. In one car, lit by cloud-burning sunlight pouring in through glassless windows, they found crates, and Jack, curious, pried open one of them.
He leapt backwards.
“What, what!” said Annie, the sudden fear spreading to her as if contagious and clutching onto Jack.
He just pointed. She crept over to the box and looked inside.
She turned back around, confused.
“Stuffed animals?” she
said, her head tilted.
“Not just any animals,” Jack said, trembling. “Bunnies.”
He shuddered.
Annie laughed.
“This is what you’re afraid of?”
“Somehow I feel like they’re representatives of Death himself. Stupid children’s books that aren’t really for children. Gah. Let’s get out of here.”
And he marched out.
Annie laughed.
“This is what you’re afraid of?”
“Somehow I feel like they’re representatives of Death himself. Stupid children’s books that aren’t really for children. Gah. Let’s get out of here.”
And he marched out.
For a moment Annie
wondered if the stuffed bunny rabbits might have been used to transport drugs,
but did not pursue the issue. She just closed the crate and joined Jack outside
in his march to the head car.
But Jack had stopped
outside the door, and for good reason. The next four cars on the train weren’t
really cars because they weren’t really there. Just flat gray steel rectangular
platforms where cars once were. Something had done away with them.
And by now the rushing
train had taken them over the sea, off the isle proper. So without the cars,
there were no guards or boundaries to keep them from falling off and into the
water at 45 miles per hour.
“That wind feels
amazing,” Annie said, taking off her Paula wig and letting said wind blow
through her real hair. It was an odd image. Didn’t quite fit. She tossed the
wig into the sea. “Won’t need that anymore.”
“Won’t you?” Jack said as he leaped over to the steel platform.
“Won’t you?” Jack said as he leaped over to the steel platform.
She didn’t answer. Both
their minds were consumed of the age-old question: what happened next? For them
it wasn’t a matter of suspense but of true mystery. They had escaped the
entrapments of Rainswept Isle, surely, but where were they headed now? They did
not know. Not the train’s destination, nor the destination of their souls. Jack
was especially tortured, the judgment of the gods repeating endlessly in his
mind. He had forgotten the words I had whispered to him after his conversation
with the other gods in Golbez’s car.
They crossed the
car-less platforms without fear of falling and finally made it to the front
car. When they opened the door, Clara Higgins saw them just fine, but Hilti
jumped in surprise.
“Oh, it’s you guys,” he
said with relief as he turned back to the dashboard. “Scared me.”
Jack didn’t apologize.
Instead he stepped over to Hilti, spun him around, and made to punch him in the
face.
“Jack!” Annie said.
Jack halted in his
cocked position. “What?” he said.
“Violence isn’t the
answer!”
“Right, right. Is that
the lesson we learned? Anyway, Hilti, why the hell did you take off without us?
And how did you do it without the password?”
“You weren’t on board?”
“Some little fella with
a weird accent came in and told us to go ahead and start the train,” said
Clara. “Said he came in the name of the god of mercy, or some nonsense like
that. Told us you were on board. He even entered the password for us, though he
didn’t mention what it was.”
Jack caught Annie’s eye.
They knew who it was, of course. The one figure who they hadn’t seen at the top
of that ravine after the incident. The one person whose fate they had yet to
seal. The one character whose depths, limited though they may be, Jack had yet
to discover.
Amon Dem was on this
train.
Jack turned back to
Hilti.
“But why didn’t you tell
us on the radio, or respond to us when we talked to you?”
Hilti looked at Jack,
then at Clara, then at the wall where the radio transmitter was.
“Well would you look at
that. The damn radio was switched off. Huh!” He went over and flipped it on.
“Must have brushed against it with one of our backs.”
Jack let out a long
sigh.
“It’s funny,” Hilti was
saying as he retook his place at the train’s helm. “I feel like we should have
finished crossing the sea to the mainland by now, but it just keeps staying the
same distance away. Like we’re stuck in between two places. A liminal state.
Hm. I swear there’s a lesson in all this.”
“I think I need to go
think on what that lesson might be,” Jack said. “Alone.”
He exited the head car
and jumped onto one of the flat empty platforms. There he wandered, hands in
his pockets, head down, the sea below him rushing by.
Jack didn’t want to
think about his future. No doubt it would start as soon as he got to the
mainland. Probably some drug runners in the jungle would cause trouble and need
to be neutralized. And it would keep going from there. On and on, and on and
on.
He looked away, out over
the sea. He smelled the salty air. That scent might once have represented
freedom to Jack, just like this train. Now it was a symbol of his unbreakable
chains.
Wanting a distraction,
Jack turned his thoughts turned to the photo inside Golbez’s locked wooden box.
Then to the name on the back. Then to the elaborate emergency password system
Golbez had set up for the train.
“My son is named...”
Jackie. It had to be
Jackie. That was what Golbez called Jack all the time.
But...that was also the
name of the boy in the photo. Wasn’t it?
It started to rain. A perfectly normal, average kind of
rain. Not hard, not light, not drizzling, not pouring. Just rain.
“Is your name really
Jack McDowell, Hero?”
Jack stiffened. Slowly he turned around to see Amon Dem,
standing on the next car-less platform with a piece of paper in one hand, a gun
in the other. He seemed to be standing okay, though his left pant leg was
soaked in blood.
“That’s what I’ve been told for thirty years,” Jack said coolly.
“How would you like to know that you’ve been lied to that whole time?” Amon Dem said casually in his strange accent.
Jack’s eyes narrowed a little, but he said nothing.
“I have in my hand here a letter. A letter written from one Malandra McDowell, to her ex-husband Golbez MacDowell. In it she explains everything. Did you ever read it, Jack? No, you didn’t, did you? Just now, hiding on this train, I read the letter again and realized that you didn’t know any of it. You hadn’t opened it or read it or had any awareness of its contents. That explains why it was still sealed when I found it in your room after you poisoned Golbez.”
The letter he was meant to deliver to Golbez.
“Get to the point.”
“Few people know my real name. As I told you once, it’s pretty embarrassing. But you know it.” He grinned spitefully. “My real name...is Jack MacDowell. Or, if you’re my father, you could call me ‘Jackie.’”
Jack’s face paled, undercutting his rugged, unshaved look.
“What the hell are you playing at?”
“My father created that password system so he’d be reminded who his son was. His memory is notoriously erratic, as I’m sure you know. ‘My son is named...Amon Dem.’ That was the password.”
Jack’s paleness turned a sickly color.
Amon Dem went on, relentless. He spoke his next words with a bold finality.
“That’s what I’ve been told for thirty years,” Jack said coolly.
“How would you like to know that you’ve been lied to that whole time?” Amon Dem said casually in his strange accent.
Jack’s eyes narrowed a little, but he said nothing.
“I have in my hand here a letter. A letter written from one Malandra McDowell, to her ex-husband Golbez MacDowell. In it she explains everything. Did you ever read it, Jack? No, you didn’t, did you? Just now, hiding on this train, I read the letter again and realized that you didn’t know any of it. You hadn’t opened it or read it or had any awareness of its contents. That explains why it was still sealed when I found it in your room after you poisoned Golbez.”
The letter he was meant to deliver to Golbez.
“Get to the point.”
“Few people know my real name. As I told you once, it’s pretty embarrassing. But you know it.” He grinned spitefully. “My real name...is Jack MacDowell. Or, if you’re my father, you could call me ‘Jackie.’”
Jack’s face paled, undercutting his rugged, unshaved look.
“What the hell are you playing at?”
“My father created that password system so he’d be reminded who his son was. His memory is notoriously erratic, as I’m sure you know. ‘My son is named...Amon Dem.’ That was the password.”
Jack’s paleness turned a sickly color.
Amon Dem went on, relentless. He spoke his next words with a bold finality.
“Golbez is not your
father. You are not his son. You think you could have been born from such a
complex and eccentric tale as Golbez’s and Malandra’s? No---you could only have
been born from a ripe, overused cliche, that of the assassin who falls in love
with his mark. I, I was their son. Malandra is my mother. She’s both
our mothers. We are half-brothers, Jack McDowell! And only one of us ever truly
belonged on Rainswept Isle. My accent is proof that I was their son. It
might interest you to know that English is my first and only language. I have
always spoken this bizarre way, this combination of several different
languages. I wondered about it for a long time. I came to the conclusion that
it represents the United Kingdom, and all the nations it once conquered and
colonized. That is my heritage, after all.”
Jack was reeling.
“But the name...the name
Amon Dem...”
“Please, Hero. Do you
think I’d try to build my career in a military structure with the name
‘Jackie’? No---’Amon Dem’ is far more powerful. I made it up myself. I told you
once I was raised by my grandmother. My nani, Mother MacDowell. Golbez himself
never really had time for me. Once in a while, in the beginning, sure. He
offered to do those typical father-son things every few years. But he forgot
about me easily. Frequently. But I stayed with him. Loyal. Patient. He even
forgot all about me when you came along, but I still loved him. You never did,
even when you thought he was your father. And you killed him. You killed my
father. You probably don’t even know how to love, do you, Hero?”
“I...I loved my mother,”
Jack said, reeling. “You...never even knew her.”
“But did she ever love
you? I don’t think she was capable of love. This letter proves it.” He
waved the paper around. “The reason she sent you to Golbez was as I had always
suspected, but clearly something you were unaware of. So I apologize for
blaming you for that. She sent you here as the culmination of a plan that spanned
your entire life. Your parents knew exactly who and what you were. They were
using you the entire time. Preparing you to do this final mission. You, an
invincible hero who was born to fight corruption and villainy, were sent to be
a ticking time bomb to take Golbez and his industry down, as revenge for
what he had done to her around the time that you were born. She claims he
stole...me. That Golbez took me, her first son, away from her when I was
born, so after she escaped she had another son with Johnny Hit, a son to
replace me and act as a calculated, cold-blooded instrument of vengeance. They
planned it together. Both had come to hate Golbez. They knew you’d be the
perfect weapon against him and his organization. She even named you the same
name as her first son because she knew Golbez would get confused and believe
you to be me and accept you as his son, so he would be caught off guard. All
they had to do was put it together and press Play, and Golbez Industries would
fall apart. She wrote this letter to him to make him fear. She knew by the time
he read it, he wouldn’t be able to do anything about it. You were already
there, a virus that had already infected the organism. There’s even indication
she was working with that rat Vanasmas, but it doesn’t spell it out explicitly.
Either way, Jack McDowell---she was controlling and using you the entire time.”
Jack could hardly
process it all. So he said the first thing that came into his mind.
“I thought you came in
the name of the god of mercy? So why do you feel no mercy for her? for me? Why
are you so angry when such terrible things have transpired on both sides
of this battle?”
“I’m here now because of
your slaughter of my brothers. They all had names, Hero. And stories. They were
real people. They had love in their lives. They---we---were brothers. Not like
you and I, who only happen to share the same mother. No, my men and I were true
brothers. Family. And you destroyed that family. Including our father. My
father. And so this is your sentencing. This is your judgment. This is your
punishment. You have brought this upon yourself after so many merciless
killings. Jack McDowell---prepare to die. You have the length of time until I
can raise this gun and aim it at your heart.”
Jack didn’t move to get
away. He stood there, accepting his fate, without a care to contradict.
Amon Dem raised his gun,
and had almost aimed it at Jack’s heart when another voice sounded.
Paula’s.
“Amen, Amon.”
BANG. Only one shot
sounded, but two had been fired. They had gone off at precisely the same
instant.
Amon Dem crumpled to the
ground. He wasn’t moving.
Jack clutched at his
stomach, where crimson blood was soaking his white shirt underneath the black
leather jacket.
“Jack, Jack!”
Ann came rushing over from the doorway of the head car.
She caught him as he was about to fall over and helped him to lie down. “Jack!
Where are you hurt, where are you hurt? Jack!”
“Stomach!” Jack gasped as she lowered him. “Obviously! No, don’t touch it! Gah!”
Kneeling at his side, she drew back her hand from the blood and started panicking.
“I don’t know what to do,” she said frantically. “I don’t know what to do!”
“There’s nothing to do,” Jack said, breathing heavily. “I deserve what I got. But this...this is a mercy. One of the gods told me they’d do this. They’re letting me go. Releasing me from my bonds.”
Ann didn’t understand, but she didn’t know that because she wasn’t really listening.
Jack looked up, past Annie, at the heavens. “Thank you,” he said to me.
“Stomach!” Jack gasped as she lowered him. “Obviously! No, don’t touch it! Gah!”
Kneeling at his side, she drew back her hand from the blood and started panicking.
“I don’t know what to do,” she said frantically. “I don’t know what to do!”
“There’s nothing to do,” Jack said, breathing heavily. “I deserve what I got. But this...this is a mercy. One of the gods told me they’d do this. They’re letting me go. Releasing me from my bonds.”
Ann didn’t understand, but she didn’t know that because she wasn’t really listening.
Jack looked up, past Annie, at the heavens. “Thank you,” he said to me.
I am here because I care
for my creations, I told him. Though
I did not create you, I took pity. But there is little else I can do for you.
The human characters are so driven by reaction that the gods of pulp fiction
didn’t even have to write this story. All they had to do was have the martial
arts seminar and the villain symposium be booked at the same hotel on the same
day over thirty years ago. For the most part they simply observed as the rest
happened from there. A chain of cause and effect.
“My will!” Jack burst
out, through tremendous pain, “My will can break that chain.”
“You have a will?” Annie
said. “Jack, what are you talking about?”
“No...My choice. I
can...still choose something. Just like I have this entire time. Just one,
small thing. You know what it is. No...no romance...” He winced. “And in
choosing, I am a god, just like they are.”
“Oh, Jack!”
It was all too much for
Annie. Floods of tears pouring from her eyes, she leaned down to finally kiss
him.
“No!” Jack said as
loudly as he could. “Please, no. Stop...right there.”
She stopped a few inches
from his face. Though he was clearly experiencing the greater agony, Annie was
clearly enduring some of her own. The strain on her face in this act of
resistance really did made it look like she was in genuine physical pain at not
being able to just give in.
But she would do it and
she did it: she hovered there, giving him the choice.
And he made it.
“No, sweet strawberry
lips. I...won’t pucker up...for you. But please...help me get out of his
jacket. Eli Noyce was right. It is painful to die this way.”
“No, Jack, no! Please
no! If you die I’m going to marry someone else but I won’t care who and have a
baby with him, a son! And I will name that baby ‘Jackson’ because I love you so
much and I’ll never tell the man I married why. I’ll just say I like the name
and it will be your son, Jack, your son!”
“That’s...that’s
horrible,” Jack managed to say. “I don’t think that’s the right thing to do...I
don’t know if killing Amon Dem was the right thing to do either...”
“Oh, Jack, what can I do
then? What can I do?”
“You can take this
jacket off of me. Only then will the train reach the mainland.”
Annie, overcome by
grief, howled and wailed, but she did as Jack requested. That act was difficult
on both of them, though for very different reasons. The gratitude in Jack’s
face made her want to kiss him again.
Instead she steeled
herself and flung the jacket behind her, where the wind carried it into the
sea.
“Now I can die. Now I
can escape. Now I am free.”
He closed his eyes and
left her. And she, with the rains, wept.
Isle.
No Romance Chapter 26
Chapter 26, “3:10 to Girafa
Península”
The rivers of “lava” moved faster than Jack or Ann had been expecting.
“Paddle faster!” said Jack as the bubbly orange stuff entered the mouth of the river fifty feet behind them.
“There are no oars!” said Ann. “This isn’t even a rowboat!”
“Then why haven’t we turned on the motor yet?”
“That’s a more legitimate point!”
They had just untied the boat and let it float down the river. Jack immediately corrected the error of their ways by switching on the outboard motor. Then they realized the peril of that choice: increased speed in an underground tunnel that happened to be pitch black.
“Headlight! Headlight!” shouted Ann in darkness and desperation.
“It’s supposed to come on with the motor!”
“Okay, there it is.” The headlight had indeed come on. “Crisis averted?”
“No,” said Jack, keeping an eye on the direction of the boat. “Crisis CONQUERED.”
The radio came to life and Hilti’s New Zealander voice entered their ears.
“Yes, hello, Jack and Annabel. Clara and I would really appreciate it if you could get us that password. Sometime within the next four minutes, or so my dashboard tells me. That’d be really, really great.”
Jack turned on Ann in a swift swoop. One could almost hear the wind rushing around him, he moved so fast.
“Annie! How do I reach Paula?”
She looked affronted for some reason. “I have no idea.”
“Are you Paula right now?”
“How can I tell?”
“Maybe I should punch you and see what happens.”
“Jack!”
“This is the fate of the island and the fate of our lives, you girl! Seriously, why aren’t you wearing little pigtails and a dress---”
Paula interrupted Jack by punching him in the face.
Jack turned back to her slowly, rubbed his jaw, and grinned.
“That was easy.”
She glared at him, looked away, and folded her arms beneath her breasts.
Jack spoke into his wristwatch radio. “Hilti, we’ll have your password in just a minute.”
“You have three,” was the response, “before this island blows sky high.”
“I know that,” Jack said, irritated. “Why do you have to keep reminding me of the stakes? Never mind, never mind.” He turned to Paula. “Tell me what you know.”
“Why should I?”
“Really? That? Are you a child?”
“I’m a woman and a damn good one.”
“Then do the right thing like a damb good woman would.”
This triggered something. Paula’s eyes shifted, giving away her uncertainty. Then her hard gaze broke and her mouth wibble-wobbled.
“I can’t remember!” she said, wide-open eyes watering.
Jack was confused. Was this still Paula? Didn’t sound like her. Or look like her.
“Annie?”
Paula shook her head.
“Poppy?”
Paula shook her head.
“It’s somewhere in here,” she said, motioning to her head. “Somewhere...”
Jack’s eyes grew so thin that...well, never mind. It was still Paula. And Paula was attracted to power.
“What is it,” he said in a flat, direct voice. “What is the password.”
She grimaced and a tear fell through her mascara. “I told you---”
“WHAT IS IT?” Jack shouted, really shouted. “WHAT IS---”
“I TOLD YOU!” she shouted back, her eyes and nostrils flaring in indignation.
“You aren’t strong enough to save those people, are you?” Jack said mockingly. “You’re just impotent, like Annie. Can’t do a thing. Can’t remember a single word.”
“Wait wait. Shut up. Shut up. Wait. I think...I can’t remember it because it was something we say so often. It was something common. More than common. We don’t even remember it’s a word. No, shut UP Jack. Stop asking me what it is. What it is...what it is...it is what, it is what...”
“Jack, Annabel, I can see the wall...it’s yellow and black and has one of those nuclear symbols on it....” came Hilti’s voice. “It getting closer...I mean, it is getting closer...”
“THAT’S IT!” roared Ann Paula, coming to life. “Is is it! It is is! Is is! IS.”
“And that makes perfect sense!” said Jack triumphantly. “My son is...is what? That’s me the passwords are talking about, right?”
“Don’t know, and who even cares. Hilti, did you get that?” said Ann Paula, yelling at Jack’s wristwatch radio. “Is!”
Jack pressed the appropriate button on the radio and spoke into it. “Hilti, enter the word ‘is’. It should be the one.”
A few silent, suspenseful seconds (other than the intense music Jack could hear that Ann could not) went by before Hilti responded.
“The gates are opening! We are good to go! We’re over halfway to getting off this island!”
“Isle,” muttered Jack, but not into the radio.
“But I do need the next one within about twenty minutes!”
Jack sighed. “We have to find Blake as soon as we get to Boxcutter Bay,” he said.
“Do you have a plan for him?” Ann Paula asked.
“I’m working on it.”
The rivers of “lava” moved faster than Jack or Ann had been expecting.
“Paddle faster!” said Jack as the bubbly orange stuff entered the mouth of the river fifty feet behind them.
“There are no oars!” said Ann. “This isn’t even a rowboat!”
“Then why haven’t we turned on the motor yet?”
“That’s a more legitimate point!”
They had just untied the boat and let it float down the river. Jack immediately corrected the error of their ways by switching on the outboard motor. Then they realized the peril of that choice: increased speed in an underground tunnel that happened to be pitch black.
“Headlight! Headlight!” shouted Ann in darkness and desperation.
“It’s supposed to come on with the motor!”
“Okay, there it is.” The headlight had indeed come on. “Crisis averted?”
“No,” said Jack, keeping an eye on the direction of the boat. “Crisis CONQUERED.”
The radio came to life and Hilti’s New Zealander voice entered their ears.
“Yes, hello, Jack and Annabel. Clara and I would really appreciate it if you could get us that password. Sometime within the next four minutes, or so my dashboard tells me. That’d be really, really great.”
Jack turned on Ann in a swift swoop. One could almost hear the wind rushing around him, he moved so fast.
“Annie! How do I reach Paula?”
She looked affronted for some reason. “I have no idea.”
“Are you Paula right now?”
“How can I tell?”
“Maybe I should punch you and see what happens.”
“Jack!”
“This is the fate of the island and the fate of our lives, you girl! Seriously, why aren’t you wearing little pigtails and a dress---”
Paula interrupted Jack by punching him in the face.
Jack turned back to her slowly, rubbed his jaw, and grinned.
“That was easy.”
She glared at him, looked away, and folded her arms beneath her breasts.
Jack spoke into his wristwatch radio. “Hilti, we’ll have your password in just a minute.”
“You have three,” was the response, “before this island blows sky high.”
“I know that,” Jack said, irritated. “Why do you have to keep reminding me of the stakes? Never mind, never mind.” He turned to Paula. “Tell me what you know.”
“Why should I?”
“Really? That? Are you a child?”
“I’m a woman and a damn good one.”
“Then do the right thing like a damb good woman would.”
This triggered something. Paula’s eyes shifted, giving away her uncertainty. Then her hard gaze broke and her mouth wibble-wobbled.
“I can’t remember!” she said, wide-open eyes watering.
Jack was confused. Was this still Paula? Didn’t sound like her. Or look like her.
“Annie?”
Paula shook her head.
“Poppy?”
Paula shook her head.
“It’s somewhere in here,” she said, motioning to her head. “Somewhere...”
Jack’s eyes grew so thin that...well, never mind. It was still Paula. And Paula was attracted to power.
“What is it,” he said in a flat, direct voice. “What is the password.”
She grimaced and a tear fell through her mascara. “I told you---”
“WHAT IS IT?” Jack shouted, really shouted. “WHAT IS---”
“I TOLD YOU!” she shouted back, her eyes and nostrils flaring in indignation.
“You aren’t strong enough to save those people, are you?” Jack said mockingly. “You’re just impotent, like Annie. Can’t do a thing. Can’t remember a single word.”
“Wait wait. Shut up. Shut up. Wait. I think...I can’t remember it because it was something we say so often. It was something common. More than common. We don’t even remember it’s a word. No, shut UP Jack. Stop asking me what it is. What it is...what it is...it is what, it is what...”
“Jack, Annabel, I can see the wall...it’s yellow and black and has one of those nuclear symbols on it....” came Hilti’s voice. “It getting closer...I mean, it is getting closer...”
“THAT’S IT!” roared Ann Paula, coming to life. “Is is it! It is is! Is is! IS.”
“And that makes perfect sense!” said Jack triumphantly. “My son is...is what? That’s me the passwords are talking about, right?”
“Don’t know, and who even cares. Hilti, did you get that?” said Ann Paula, yelling at Jack’s wristwatch radio. “Is!”
Jack pressed the appropriate button on the radio and spoke into it. “Hilti, enter the word ‘is’. It should be the one.”
A few silent, suspenseful seconds (other than the intense music Jack could hear that Ann could not) went by before Hilti responded.
“The gates are opening! We are good to go! We’re over halfway to getting off this island!”
“Isle,” muttered Jack, but not into the radio.
“But I do need the next one within about twenty minutes!”
Jack sighed. “We have to find Blake as soon as we get to Boxcutter Bay,” he said.
“Do you have a plan for him?” Ann Paula asked.
“I’m working on it.”
I knew everyone had a
weakness. There was a way around every problem I was presented with, a solution
to every puzzle and an answer to every question. That was just how these things
worked, and how they always worked. I knew Blake would be no different. In
fact, the seeds of his weakness had been sown the very first day I met him,
given by Golbez himself in the open top jeep we rode in together.
“Don’t apologize,
Blake,” Golbez had said. “It just makes you look weak. What if you have to
battle him in real hand to hand combat later on? He’d know what you’re like
inside and destroy you with a well-chosen word!”
Of course, I didn’t
remember those exact words as they’re presumably printed there. The
gist---along with other elements of the conversation in that jeep---was
sufficient. I knew the exact combination of words that would tear down that
giant of a man and turn him against his old boss Golbez and join my side. Or at
least, help me out in getting off the isle.
The river, because of
the significant rainfall that entire day, was higher than it had been earlier,
so Annie and I (I can’t call her anything but Annie) had to stay low in the
boat. But more importantly, the speed of the river’s flow had been increased,
hastening our journey by several minutes, which I knew would be imperative to
getting to Blake in time.
But I didn’t care to thank the gods, or do anything that
might engage them in discussion or even bring them to my mind. I didn’t want to
think about them or my existential situation or what my judgment would be when
they finally finished conferring. The scene at the volcano and the epic Mexican
standoff had successfully distracted me, but sitting there in that boat for
just those few quiet minutes brought back that numb, anxious feeling in my gut.
I guess it was...fear. Of what they could do to me. Never had I rebelled so
openly. It felt good in the moment, but those things we regret always do.
That raised a question: did I regret it?
Not yet, I’d probably answer.
We got to Boxcutter Bay. After abandoning the Ex Nihilo we ran down the hill to the nearly empty compound.
“Do you know where Blake’s going to be?”
“By the train station. That’s where he was before.”
We passed by a few Cardaccians who obviously weren’t aware that they had been freed. I was perfectly content to let them stay that way, but Annie, trying to do the right thing, stopped to try to explain to them what was going on. I had to grab her arm and pull her away.
“Come on!” I said. “We can worry about them later!”
I felt like I had performed that exact action many times over the past few days. It was wearing on me. Just like every other stupid thing today.
The railway was in sight. We passed the restaurant at which Golbez and “Paula” and I had met earlier that morning. Then just down one more corridor, around some ugly chain link fence (I hoped I wasn’t alone in hating how chain link fence looked, trashy and industrial), and up to the platform.
“Three minutes!” came Hilti’s voice over the radio. “We’re getting nervous again, Jack.”
“Well you crashed our damb plane!” I replied into my wristwatch. “So this makes us even.” I took a deep breath and turned to the problem at hand. “All right, all right, we can do this, we can do this. Now just where the hell is Blake?”
“Hey!” came the sound of a soft voice trying to sound like a bark.
“That was mighty convenient,” I mumbled as Annie and I turned around.
There was Blake, coming out of the train station building. It was easy to forget how huge he was. Nearly seven feet tall, an even longer wingspan, shoulders like boulders (ooh, I like that one), and a chest the size of a tank. I had to play it completely straight. No fear of the giant.
“Blake! I’m so glad I found you!” I said, walking up to him with a bounce in my step.
“You were...you were looking for me?” he said, confused.
My ploy was working. I had him off the square.
“We have some bad news.” This part was genuine. But at the last second I decided to change it around. “No, skip that for now. I’ll tell you later. Right now I just wanted to talk to you, get to know you better.”
I could see I was successfully bewildering him. He didn’t even reply properly to that. Just knit his eyebrows, trying to figure out what was going on.
Then I said something that made him positively melt.
“Blake, can I read your poetry?”
Tears started flowing. It had worked better than I planned. He couldn’t speak.
Annie gaped, disbelieving. I thought about being impressed with myself, but it really wasn’t that hard a task. We got him on our side; we got the turn---now we just needed the prestige.
Time to walk through the door we had opened.
“Has no one ever asked you that before?” I inquired gently.
“No one. Never,” he said, shaking his cement block of a head. “I would...I would love to show you. I was working one one just now.” He withdrew a notepad and pen from his pocket. “I had to hide this right when I saw you. Golbez doesn’t want me to compose while I’m on duty.”
Then he burst into tears again and motioned us off the platform and onto the sand. Through his copious tears he drew a stick figure on the ground. “You made him cry! You made tears come out of his FACE.”
I reached up and patted him on the shoulder. “I’m sorry, buddy. But I’d really like to read the one you were writing just now. Well, actually, before that---we really need something. A favor. See, the train is moving, and it needs to get past the Bay of Potato Peelers. Can you radio in your password to the train man?”
“Oh, yeah, sure, of course,” he said, sniffing. His eyes were dry now, and he wiped away the remaining streaks on his cheeks. He then put his wrist to his mouth and said, “This is Blake. The password follows: named.”
Named. My son is named---
Jackie? What else could it be? That was Golbez speaking, right? He made up that password.
I’d try ‘Jackie’ at a later time, when Blake wasn’t here with us. For now we were stuck reading his poetry.
That raised a question: did I regret it?
Not yet, I’d probably answer.
We got to Boxcutter Bay. After abandoning the Ex Nihilo we ran down the hill to the nearly empty compound.
“Do you know where Blake’s going to be?”
“By the train station. That’s where he was before.”
We passed by a few Cardaccians who obviously weren’t aware that they had been freed. I was perfectly content to let them stay that way, but Annie, trying to do the right thing, stopped to try to explain to them what was going on. I had to grab her arm and pull her away.
“Come on!” I said. “We can worry about them later!”
I felt like I had performed that exact action many times over the past few days. It was wearing on me. Just like every other stupid thing today.
The railway was in sight. We passed the restaurant at which Golbez and “Paula” and I had met earlier that morning. Then just down one more corridor, around some ugly chain link fence (I hoped I wasn’t alone in hating how chain link fence looked, trashy and industrial), and up to the platform.
“Three minutes!” came Hilti’s voice over the radio. “We’re getting nervous again, Jack.”
“Well you crashed our damb plane!” I replied into my wristwatch. “So this makes us even.” I took a deep breath and turned to the problem at hand. “All right, all right, we can do this, we can do this. Now just where the hell is Blake?”
“Hey!” came the sound of a soft voice trying to sound like a bark.
“That was mighty convenient,” I mumbled as Annie and I turned around.
There was Blake, coming out of the train station building. It was easy to forget how huge he was. Nearly seven feet tall, an even longer wingspan, shoulders like boulders (ooh, I like that one), and a chest the size of a tank. I had to play it completely straight. No fear of the giant.
“Blake! I’m so glad I found you!” I said, walking up to him with a bounce in my step.
“You were...you were looking for me?” he said, confused.
My ploy was working. I had him off the square.
“We have some bad news.” This part was genuine. But at the last second I decided to change it around. “No, skip that for now. I’ll tell you later. Right now I just wanted to talk to you, get to know you better.”
I could see I was successfully bewildering him. He didn’t even reply properly to that. Just knit his eyebrows, trying to figure out what was going on.
Then I said something that made him positively melt.
“Blake, can I read your poetry?”
Tears started flowing. It had worked better than I planned. He couldn’t speak.
Annie gaped, disbelieving. I thought about being impressed with myself, but it really wasn’t that hard a task. We got him on our side; we got the turn---now we just needed the prestige.
Time to walk through the door we had opened.
“Has no one ever asked you that before?” I inquired gently.
“No one. Never,” he said, shaking his cement block of a head. “I would...I would love to show you. I was working one one just now.” He withdrew a notepad and pen from his pocket. “I had to hide this right when I saw you. Golbez doesn’t want me to compose while I’m on duty.”
Then he burst into tears again and motioned us off the platform and onto the sand. Through his copious tears he drew a stick figure on the ground. “You made him cry! You made tears come out of his FACE.”
I reached up and patted him on the shoulder. “I’m sorry, buddy. But I’d really like to read the one you were writing just now. Well, actually, before that---we really need something. A favor. See, the train is moving, and it needs to get past the Bay of Potato Peelers. Can you radio in your password to the train man?”
“Oh, yeah, sure, of course,” he said, sniffing. His eyes were dry now, and he wiped away the remaining streaks on his cheeks. He then put his wrist to his mouth and said, “This is Blake. The password follows: named.”
Named. My son is named---
Jackie? What else could it be? That was Golbez speaking, right? He made up that password.
I’d try ‘Jackie’ at a later time, when Blake wasn’t here with us. For now we were stuck reading his poetry.
“The book of poems I’m
writing is called, ‘To Keith.’ He was my best friend in the whole wide world
and he DIED. And that’s why I got into poetry. Here, this is the one I was
working on before you came. I started it a couple of hours ago.”
I took the notepad and
read:
The bats, they fly
WIth their wings, so high,
Time is flying by,
What’s your favorite kind of animal?
I looked up. “Blake, this is beautiful.”
I heard Annie behind me stifling a laugh that she turned into a cough.
Blake’s eyes started watering again. “Really?”
“I’d say my favorite animal is probably...the tiger. Or maybe the lamb. I’m not sure.”
“Both are very poetic creatures!” Blake said excitedly, bouncing up and down. “Oh, those are perfect choices! I wonder which one I’d be born as. Hmm...”
“Can I read some more of these later? We’re actually in kind of a hurry, so...”
“But oh, didn’t you say you had some bad news to tell me earlier?” said Blake in a quieter, more somber voice.
“Oh, right,” I said. “The bad news I had to say earlier was that...I don’t know how to say this, so I’ll just say it---” I hated myself for saying those words; I’d come all this way, and then to give in to a cliche like that? Horrifying---”Golbez is dead. And I think his whole army is too. You see, a miniature volcano just erupted in the middle of the isle, and---”
Blake bellowed like a
mourning tiger, and it actually made me, in complete and total honesty, step
back.
“He’s...dead? And you killed him? You, who I just gave
the most secret of all secret passwords to?”
“No, Blake, no! I---we didn’t kill him! Like I said, a volcano---it was just a random occurrence. I mean, no, he chose it, he chose to set that volcano off and go into it. It was his decision. We barely escaped in time.”
“But---but---” Blake’s tank-like chest was heaving, but he appeared to have calmed ever so slightly.
“No, Blake, no! I---we didn’t kill him! Like I said, a volcano---it was just a random occurrence. I mean, no, he chose it, he chose to set that volcano off and go into it. It was his decision. We barely escaped in time.”
“But---but---” Blake’s tank-like chest was heaving, but he appeared to have calmed ever so slightly.
“Now, Blake,” I said,
arms forward and hands open in a soothing movement, “Are you going to be the
Tyger? Or the Lamb? The choice is ours. I mean, yours.”
“I’m...I’m the Lamb,” he
said, breathing heavily. “I’m the Lamb with the broken leg that the Shepherd
Golbez picked up so long ago. Three decades of service to him and now it’s all
over...he did tell me about that Emergency Plan once, a long time ago. He said
that’s how he’d want to go. So...now I’ll never see him again. O Shepherd! Thou
has plucked me from my wounded place for the last, final, ultimate time. For
the final act of mercy...”
“But now you can be free to write all the poetry you
want!”
“Yeah. Yeah, that’s true. But Mr. McDowell! It’s your father who’s dead. How do you feel?”
That was a good question. How did I feel about my father’s death?
“Honestly, Blake, I don’t know if it’s really hit me yet. I had what you could call a complex relationship with him. He never really felt like my father, so I’m still figuring out how I feel.”
“Maybe you could put your feelings into poetry! That’s what I’m going to do. But argh! How am I going to make money? This job is all I’m good at! It comes naturally to me. Look at me. I’ve never worked out or done exercises; I was just born this way. But it’s not who I want to be! It’s not who I am! It’s just...the only way I got validation. Golbez was always so proud of me when I punched a guy really well.”
“I honestly feel like he may have been more your father than mine. And I’m sure you can get validation with your poetry! That’s what I just gave you, wasn’t it?”
“Yeah. Yeah, that’s true. But Mr. McDowell! It’s your father who’s dead. How do you feel?”
That was a good question. How did I feel about my father’s death?
“Honestly, Blake, I don’t know if it’s really hit me yet. I had what you could call a complex relationship with him. He never really felt like my father, so I’m still figuring out how I feel.”
“Maybe you could put your feelings into poetry! That’s what I’m going to do. But argh! How am I going to make money? This job is all I’m good at! It comes naturally to me. Look at me. I’ve never worked out or done exercises; I was just born this way. But it’s not who I want to be! It’s not who I am! It’s just...the only way I got validation. Golbez was always so proud of me when I punched a guy really well.”
“I honestly feel like he may have been more your father than mine. And I’m sure you can get validation with your poetry! That’s what I just gave you, wasn’t it?”
”You know, you might be
right. My pa, my real pa, always said, ‘Don’t quit your day job, son.’ I never
did. But now I can. Now I can.”
Eternally typecast. All his life. Just like me...just
like me. I took genuine pity on the guy, not least of all because his
poetry...well, let’s just say it wasn’t really beautiful.
“Blake, this is the splendor of your new beginning. Like a phoenix rising from the ashes.”
“Ooh! That’s my next poem! That’s my next poem! Oh, Mr. McDowell, you are a genius!”
And he started writing something down. I frowned, as what I had said was pretty derivative, and I felt like I may have even completely stolen it from somewhere. Hmm.
As Golbez would say, quidquid. I had another question for Mr. William Wgerald Blake.
“Blake, this is the splendor of your new beginning. Like a phoenix rising from the ashes.”
“Ooh! That’s my next poem! That’s my next poem! Oh, Mr. McDowell, you are a genius!”
And he started writing something down. I frowned, as what I had said was pretty derivative, and I felt like I may have even completely stolen it from somewhere. Hmm.
As Golbez would say, quidquid. I had another question for Mr. William Wgerald Blake.
“Blake, do you happen to
know the last word, the last password that can get us off this isle?”
Blake looked like he was
thinking real hard. Finally he shook his head and said, “No. No I don’t. But
Golbez did keep a strongbox that he kept inside a secret locked room. Maybe I
could take you there! You’re the rightful heir, aren’t you?”
I wasn’t sure if Golbez
had time to have written me out of the will yet, nor if he even had time to
write me into it to begin with. I also wasn’t sure he had a will. And in that
case, it seemed like a simple solution. I must be the sole inheritor of Golbez
Industries.
Well huh.
“Take me to that room,”
I said. Then I remembered Annie behind me, and could feel her annoyance at
being left out of the conversation. She’d probably complain that I was trying
to disenfranchise women or something, then punch me. I decided to guard myself
from that instead of convince her that things are just so much simpler when
it’s just me and the enemy. I stepped backwards to be at her side. “Us. Take us
to that secret room.”
Blake took us to the
restaurant, which I remembered as where Golbez went when he was hungry, even
when it was, like all of Boxcutter Bay, totally empty of both cooks and
customers. But Blake didn’t stop there; he went into the kitchen and swung a
certain pan that had been hanging on the wall from the right to the left. I heard
a little victorious chime as a secret passage opened where a sink used to be,
right before our eyes. It was a pretty cool effect. I wondered if I had seen
that somewhere else before.
Down the stairs we went,
into a simple basement with dark wood paneling and red shag carpeting. Another
door was in the middle of the wall opposite us. It had a silver handle with a
keypad directly beneath.
“Now, uh, I don’t know
the keycode for this, so, uh...”
So Blake took some initiative and punched in the keycode.
Now, I don’t mean he pressed in the numbers; I mean he literally punched in
the keycode. As in, with a fist. As with many of my other solutions in this
story, violence was the correct answer. The door obliged, and respectfully
opened itself for our entrance.
We walked in wordlessly. All else was still. No sound from either above ground or below. This room had a gray cement floor and red brick walls. On the far side was a single filing cabinet with locked drawers that needed a key to open. On top of the cabinet was a small wooden box. This, too, was secured, not by lock and key but by a little system that needed a password and had a qwerty keyboard with little tiny letters that looked hard to press. I noted that a dambed lot of passwords were needed on this isle and sighed.
Otherwise quietly, I took the box in hand. On a hunch I entered Moriarty. It popped open.
We walked in wordlessly. All else was still. No sound from either above ground or below. This room had a gray cement floor and red brick walls. On the far side was a single filing cabinet with locked drawers that needed a key to open. On top of the cabinet was a small wooden box. This, too, was secured, not by lock and key but by a little system that needed a password and had a qwerty keyboard with little tiny letters that looked hard to press. I noted that a dambed lot of passwords were needed on this isle and sighed.
Otherwise quietly, I took the box in hand. On a hunch I entered Moriarty. It popped open.
A photo lay inside. A
photo of a child. A tan-skinned boy about ten years old. His features were
soft, round, childish, such that I suspected he would have grown out of them
within a few years. On his left hand was a baseball glove, in his right, a
ball. Behind him was jungle. No other person or thing was in frame.
And that was all that
lay in the box.
By chance I turned the
picture over. On the back it said Jackie.
I put it down. It
probably meant something. Maybe even something significant. But I didn’t have a
clue as to what it could be, other than the photo itself.
Before I could even
raise the issue with Annie (not that I had any desire to), Hilti’s voice came
on the radio---but I was too far away, mentally, to register what he said.
Though I did hear the second thing.
“And they have GUNS!”
said Hilti’s voice.
“I’m sorry, what? Can
you repeat that first part?”
“A bunch of guys with
guns just hitched a ride on the train. Twenty or so.”
“What do they want?”
“How am I supposed to know?”
“By them saying so while they’re pointing the guns at you.”
“They aren’t with me. They’re just hanging out on some of the empty cars around the middle. I can see them in the rearview mirrors. But they look really close. Really, really close.”
“That’s how those mirrors work,” I said absently. Were they friendly? Probably not. Guys with guns rarely are. But you never know. Either way, I knew we couldn’t just get off the isle that easily. Damb it to hell. I sighed and said, “Okay, we’ll be ready for them.” Then, to Blake and Annie, “Come on, back up.”
Annie and I took the stairs pretty fast while Blake lumbered in our wake. He stayed behind as the two of us went back to the train station.
“Hilti, about how long until the train gets to Boxcutter Bay?” I said into the radio.
“About twenty minutes,” was the response.
I immediately looked to the tower clock near the tracks. It said ten to three.
“How am I supposed to know?”
“By them saying so while they’re pointing the guns at you.”
“They aren’t with me. They’re just hanging out on some of the empty cars around the middle. I can see them in the rearview mirrors. But they look really close. Really, really close.”
“That’s how those mirrors work,” I said absently. Were they friendly? Probably not. Guys with guns rarely are. But you never know. Either way, I knew we couldn’t just get off the isle that easily. Damb it to hell. I sighed and said, “Okay, we’ll be ready for them.” Then, to Blake and Annie, “Come on, back up.”
Annie and I took the stairs pretty fast while Blake lumbered in our wake. He stayed behind as the two of us went back to the train station.
“Hilti, about how long until the train gets to Boxcutter Bay?” I said into the radio.
“About twenty minutes,” was the response.
I immediately looked to the tower clock near the tracks. It said ten to three.
“We’ll have to wait,” I
said to Annie, and sat myself down on the railroad beam.
It was the first time on
this isle that I had nothing to do. As I sat down, anxiety started pouring into
my noticeably empty stomach, making me irritable and sour. More than usual, I
should add. My tiredness. It wasn’t mere physical weariness. And it wasn’t the
same as last night. Maybe the same as this morning---my weariness of the life I
led---but increased tenfold. Something was building up inside, soon to burst
out. It all depended on what the gods were going to do with me. I wasn’t afraid
anymore. They could do to me what they liked. I’d still keep fighting them at
every chance I got.
“I can’t just sit and
wait here,” Jack said, getting up. “I’m going to go meet that train.” He
started walking along the tracks, towards the jungle from whence they came.
“You can come if you want.”
He was already twenty yards ahead when Ann caught up to him.
“Do we have a plan?” she asked.
“Not if they’re not friendly.”
“Oh.”
He opened his mouth to ask if she was afraid, but found he just didn’t care anymore. Whether it was Annie or Paula or Poppy or all of them or none of them did not matter.
They walked, Ann trailing a few steps behind and to the right. The sandy shore Boxcutter Bay was built on turned gradually into forest. Up ahead the ground declined sharply into a bowl-like ravine filled with moss-covered logs and lots of green-leaved plants. Jack planned ahead and stayed on the train tracks. Ann stayed her course to the side.
“The weather seems to be lightening up,” Ann said conversationally. “What do you suppose that means?”
The sky to the south was bright and clear, the sun shining strong. But to the north, across the sea to the mainland, storm clouds retained their dominance.
“Do we have a plan?” she asked.
“Not if they’re not friendly.”
“Oh.”
He opened his mouth to ask if she was afraid, but found he just didn’t care anymore. Whether it was Annie or Paula or Poppy or all of them or none of them did not matter.
They walked, Ann trailing a few steps behind and to the right. The sandy shore Boxcutter Bay was built on turned gradually into forest. Up ahead the ground declined sharply into a bowl-like ravine filled with moss-covered logs and lots of green-leaved plants. Jack planned ahead and stayed on the train tracks. Ann stayed her course to the side.
“The weather seems to be lightening up,” Ann said conversationally. “What do you suppose that means?”
The sky to the south was bright and clear, the sun shining strong. But to the north, across the sea to the mainland, storm clouds retained their dominance.
“The gods are still
making up their minds,” Jack said quietly.
“About what?”
He just shook his head.
Then Ann, distracted by the conversation, slipped into the ravine, and only avoided a nasty, serious fall by catching herself on one of the logs. She gave a little shriek, but it died quickly. Jack watched unconcernedly as she struggled to pull herself up to safe ground.
“Jack! Help me!”
“Do you mean, save you?”
“I---I...”
He just shook his head.
Then Ann, distracted by the conversation, slipped into the ravine, and only avoided a nasty, serious fall by catching herself on one of the logs. She gave a little shriek, but it died quickly. Jack watched unconcernedly as she struggled to pull herself up to safe ground.
“Jack! Help me!”
“Do you mean, save you?”
“I---I...”
“Because I don’t want to
save you.”
“What? Why not?”
“Because I’m tired. Switch to Paula. Save yourself.”
He continued walking along the tracks. Ann stopped struggling and just looked on Jack, hurt clearly in her eyes. But he didn’t give her a second glance.
Just a few seconds later he stopped in the tracks and listened, shoulders tense. Then he whipped around to face Ann, his nostrils flared. He looked angry. But it was not at her.
He quickly moved down to the bank of the ravine and reached an arm out to help her.
“What’s going on?” she said in a panicky voice.
“I can feel the rails vibrating. The train’s coming.”
She took his hand and together they got up to stable ground. Then they heard a voice, distant, coming from back toward the compound.
“Hey! Will you be needing help, Mr. McDowell?”
It was Blake. He had seven or eight of the Cardaccian workers with him.
“If they’re not armed, they’re not going to be much help!” Jack shouted back. “Just act as if nothing is wrong. We’ll be watching in case they’re enemies.” Then, to Ann, “We need to hide. The train will stop automatically at the Boxcutter station. We’ll watch the guys on the train to see who they are.”
“Because I’m tired. Switch to Paula. Save yourself.”
He continued walking along the tracks. Ann stopped struggling and just looked on Jack, hurt clearly in her eyes. But he didn’t give her a second glance.
Just a few seconds later he stopped in the tracks and listened, shoulders tense. Then he whipped around to face Ann, his nostrils flared. He looked angry. But it was not at her.
He quickly moved down to the bank of the ravine and reached an arm out to help her.
“What’s going on?” she said in a panicky voice.
“I can feel the rails vibrating. The train’s coming.”
She took his hand and together they got up to stable ground. Then they heard a voice, distant, coming from back toward the compound.
“Hey! Will you be needing help, Mr. McDowell?”
It was Blake. He had seven or eight of the Cardaccian workers with him.
“If they’re not armed, they’re not going to be much help!” Jack shouted back. “Just act as if nothing is wrong. We’ll be watching in case they’re enemies.” Then, to Ann, “We need to hide. The train will stop automatically at the Boxcutter station. We’ll watch the guys on the train to see who they are.”
“Then there is a
plan,” Ann said.
“My guess is they’re
some last remnant of Golbez’s men, here to make sure I don’t get away. If they
are, we shoot on sight.”
“I don’t have a weapon.”
“I don’t have a weapon.”
“What? Paula always had
one.”
“I’m not Paula, though. I’m Ann.”
“One day I’ll figure out what that means, but today is not that day. Okay, fine. If you had a gun, would you have Paula’s aim?”
“That’s instinct, so yeah, probably.”
“Great. I’m giving you Wrench.”
“What!”
“You know, you say that a lot,” Jack growled.
“But Wrench is your gun. It’s always been your gun. What will you do without a weapon?”
“If the gods want to keep me alive, there won’t be any problem either way. There have been a deplorable lack of fistfights in this story, anyway.”
He withdrew Wrench from his waistband and shoved it into her hand.
“You lose this thing and you are dead.”
“One day I’ll figure out what that means, but today is not that day. Okay, fine. If you had a gun, would you have Paula’s aim?”
“That’s instinct, so yeah, probably.”
“Great. I’m giving you Wrench.”
“What!”
“You know, you say that a lot,” Jack growled.
“But Wrench is your gun. It’s always been your gun. What will you do without a weapon?”
“If the gods want to keep me alive, there won’t be any problem either way. There have been a deplorable lack of fistfights in this story, anyway.”
He withdrew Wrench from his waistband and shoved it into her hand.
“You lose this thing and you are dead.”
It looked like he even
meant it. When his back was turned she sneered at him and huffed.
“We need to draw them
away from the train.”
“You’re acting under the
assumption they’re bad guys.”
“If that whole scene at
the base of the volcano wasn’t enough to show you that I’ve got no friends on
this isle---”
“Okay, okay, they’re
probably bad guys. But if they’re Golbez’s men, they’ll know me, right? They
won’t hurt me. I’m Golbez’s girly.”
He glared at her. “Remember
Golbez’s final act with you? It wasn’t a kind one. Also, remember how no one
gave you a second thought before war broke out? And all those men whose guns
you stole and gave to the Cardaccians? That scene on the beach gave them plenty
of reasons to consider you an enemy.”
Ann sighed. “That’s
true. So I won’t try to use my feminine wiles on them.”
“Now isn’t the time. No,
just shut up. We need to get them over here, to this ravine, so we have terrain
on our side. The flat station platform would be a terrible place to fight. No
theater there at all. So we need to hide.”
Once more Jack grabbed
Ann by the hand, though this was no longer necessary; she had started moving
with him. Doubling back, they found a place to hide, behind a voluminous piece
of shrubbery a little ways from where the train would be stopping. They could
hear the train whistle now, and the trembling of the tracks. It reminded both
of them of the rumbling volcano. The signal of oncoming doom.
Jack shook his head,
clearing it of the thought.
What was he doing? Why
was he doing all of this? To get off the island? Why?
He shook his head again,
but these thoughts did not flee. Instead they attacked feverishly.
Then the train horn,
like a monster’s roar. Here it came, out from the trees into the lighter
jungle. Jack watched without blinking to see who the men in the cargo cars
were. A couple of the sliding doors were open, and there they were, some
standing around inside the car, others sitting on the edge, letting their feet
dangle. All had weapons in their hands.
“It looks like Amon
Dem’s men,” Ann said. “I recognize a few of them.”
Jack cursed, very
pointedly using the gods’ names in vain---William, Eagle Eyes, Montgomery.
Pshah. “Definitely enemies,” he said.
Why were they enemies?
What made them want to kill him? What made him want to kill them?
There were some valid
answers to these questions, but Jack didn’t feel them.
The train gave off a
high-pitched screech as it braked for the Boxcutter Bay station. Jack ran after
it. He called out to Ann over his shoulder, “Get on the other side of the
ravine there. That’s where we’re going to stake our claim.”
Gosh, Jack thought. I sound like a gold digger.
The train stopped before
Jack got there and he could see the swarm of men, as Hilti had said, about
twenty, jumping off onto the ground near the station platform.
He thought about sending a message to Hilti to not start
the train up again, but remembered that Hilti needed the final password, which
Jack had yet to give him. But he thought he knew what it might be.
Jackie.
But he wasn’t sure he knew what that meant anymore.
Jackie.
But he wasn’t sure he knew what that meant anymore.
He approached the men,
Amon Dem’s personal toon. He neglected to notice how convenient it was that
Amon Dem, of all people, had shown up in exactly the place they needed his
password to get through. The final word that would signify his freedom.
He wanted it. Wanted
that freedom. But right now, in this moment, this final moment, everything felt
dead, inside and out.
Jack acted anyway. Played the part. He went
forward, exposing himself completely.
“Hey, big shots! Too
busy to go to your father’s funeral party?”
Then he spun around and
started sprinting.
Shouts followed and
bullets whizzed past him as he ran the thirty yards to the ravine. He leaped
from the near bank and caught himself on a vine that appeared out of thin air,
swinging across in a perfect arc and landing perfectly on the far side, where
Ann waited.
I’ll die before I swing
on a vine again, he swore internally.
Then a bullet zipped
through the sleeve of his jacket, skimming the flesh of his arm. It stung like
a sharp finger flick. Then it burned.
The first new feeling
he’d felt in a long, long time.
“Hah!” he cried loudly,
pumping his fists in the air. “YES! SensATION! Pain! I love it! Keep ‘em
coming!”
The attackers certainly
did. They had been successfully drawn over to the edge of the ravine, where
they gathered across from Jack and Ann.
“You boys aren’t going
to face us two at the same time, are you?” Ann said, aiming Wrench stylishly
with both hands. “It won’t be much of a fair fight.”
The men stirred. Something was clearly unnerving them,
for they had lowered their guns with uncertain looks. Jack doubted it was because
of Ann’s words; he wasn’t sure if she had meant fair for him and her or fair
for them. But maybe ambiguity was the point. Ambiguity was literary, right?
Then came Amon Dem’s voice with that strange accent. “Wound him, but do not kill him! He has to face his proper justice.” The short, tan-skinned man himself emerged in front of his fellows. He and Jack looked each other in the eye without pretense for the very first time. “He must be taken to Golbez alive.”
“Oh, you didn’t hear about that?” Jack said. “Golbez is dead. As are the Johnsons, the Cardaccians, and all of your compatriots on this silly little island. Didn’t you notice the volcano going off? The volcano he himself caused---”
“What is this nonsense?” Amon Dem said.
“He’s dead!”
“And you murdered him?”
“Of course n---”
“Of course! The hero admits it! The man calling himself Jack McDowell murders the man he claims is his father! Golbez took you in, Hero. Was that all a part of your plan? Convince him you were his son so you could take him and this family down? You sicken me.”
Jack stayed silent. It was a clever narrative of Amon Dem’s, and he wasn’t going to bother correcting it. Let he and his men think they were fighting for a worthy cause. It would make no difference.
“Whatever,” Jack spat. “Quidquid, as Golbez would say. If you fight me, I’m going to kill you. If you let me get on that train, you can all keep your lives.”
“Does that sound like a hero, brothers? Of course not. I’ll be the one to take the first shot.”
Amon Dem raised a black semiautomatic pistol.
But Ann got him first. A bullet through his left calf.
Amon Dem screamed in pain and nearly fell headfirst into the ravine, but his men caught him in time.
“We’ll take him, Head Hermano! You stay in the back!”
Jack caught Ann’s eye and winked. “Nice shot.”
She smiled back. “Let’s do this.”
But that single wink sank Jack deeper into oblivion. The old Dilemma had come up again: her. He had to remain apart from her, aloof. He couldn’t be involved, not with her, not with anyone. He had to retain the only aspect of his self he had a choice in defining. He had to.
Else, what?
That’s when the ground fell out from under him, and he and Ann slid, voicing noises of alarm, down the newly carved out ravine slope.
This took Amon Dem’s men by surprise, too.
At the bottom Jack and Ann righted himself immediately.
“Get behind me,” he said quickly as they stood. “And aim over my shoulder.”
She did as he commanded. They faced upwards at the men.
“You won’t be able to hit me with your guns,” said Jack. “You know you won’t. You guys and all your friends have never been able to before. But we can shoot you from here. And that gun that she’s holding, it never misses. And it never runs out of bullets. So you can stay up there and miss and get shot and killed, or you can come down here and give me a good old fashioned fist fight. I’ve been missing those lately.”
He didn’t know why he said it. A desperate plea for excitement?
Well, it worked, but it didn’t work. For one, it was a lie. He felt nothing. And for another, the results were mixed. Some of the men tried firing down on Jack and Ann, but because of the jacket, they all missed. Ann fired back at those who tried, killing them. Their bodies tumbled down into the ravine. One of them was just shot in the arm, but it killed him anyway. Wrench had that capability.
Seeing that capability, the rest of the men gave their war cries, something about brothers and family and honor, and slid down the steep incline to take on Jack with their bare hands. And so Jack began to fight.
But like we said, it didn’t really work.
Then came Amon Dem’s voice with that strange accent. “Wound him, but do not kill him! He has to face his proper justice.” The short, tan-skinned man himself emerged in front of his fellows. He and Jack looked each other in the eye without pretense for the very first time. “He must be taken to Golbez alive.”
“Oh, you didn’t hear about that?” Jack said. “Golbez is dead. As are the Johnsons, the Cardaccians, and all of your compatriots on this silly little island. Didn’t you notice the volcano going off? The volcano he himself caused---”
“What is this nonsense?” Amon Dem said.
“He’s dead!”
“And you murdered him?”
“Of course n---”
“Of course! The hero admits it! The man calling himself Jack McDowell murders the man he claims is his father! Golbez took you in, Hero. Was that all a part of your plan? Convince him you were his son so you could take him and this family down? You sicken me.”
Jack stayed silent. It was a clever narrative of Amon Dem’s, and he wasn’t going to bother correcting it. Let he and his men think they were fighting for a worthy cause. It would make no difference.
“Whatever,” Jack spat. “Quidquid, as Golbez would say. If you fight me, I’m going to kill you. If you let me get on that train, you can all keep your lives.”
“Does that sound like a hero, brothers? Of course not. I’ll be the one to take the first shot.”
Amon Dem raised a black semiautomatic pistol.
But Ann got him first. A bullet through his left calf.
Amon Dem screamed in pain and nearly fell headfirst into the ravine, but his men caught him in time.
“We’ll take him, Head Hermano! You stay in the back!”
Jack caught Ann’s eye and winked. “Nice shot.”
She smiled back. “Let’s do this.”
But that single wink sank Jack deeper into oblivion. The old Dilemma had come up again: her. He had to remain apart from her, aloof. He couldn’t be involved, not with her, not with anyone. He had to retain the only aspect of his self he had a choice in defining. He had to.
Else, what?
That’s when the ground fell out from under him, and he and Ann slid, voicing noises of alarm, down the newly carved out ravine slope.
This took Amon Dem’s men by surprise, too.
At the bottom Jack and Ann righted himself immediately.
“Get behind me,” he said quickly as they stood. “And aim over my shoulder.”
She did as he commanded. They faced upwards at the men.
“You won’t be able to hit me with your guns,” said Jack. “You know you won’t. You guys and all your friends have never been able to before. But we can shoot you from here. And that gun that she’s holding, it never misses. And it never runs out of bullets. So you can stay up there and miss and get shot and killed, or you can come down here and give me a good old fashioned fist fight. I’ve been missing those lately.”
He didn’t know why he said it. A desperate plea for excitement?
Well, it worked, but it didn’t work. For one, it was a lie. He felt nothing. And for another, the results were mixed. Some of the men tried firing down on Jack and Ann, but because of the jacket, they all missed. Ann fired back at those who tried, killing them. Their bodies tumbled down into the ravine. One of them was just shot in the arm, but it killed him anyway. Wrench had that capability.
Seeing that capability, the rest of the men gave their war cries, something about brothers and family and honor, and slid down the steep incline to take on Jack with their bare hands. And so Jack began to fight.
But like we said, it didn’t really work.
I hate this, Jack thought as the initial punches were
thrown. I hate this and I swear on my life and on the gods that I’ll never
do it again.
Some of them tried to shoot from the top of the ravine,
some tried getting cover to shoot from behind, and some went into the ravine to
shoot Jack point blank, but none of those worked either. Ann kept shooting, her
inner Paula taking over.
Jack punched and ducked
and elbowed and kicked, all with an exceeding dullness in his heart. Cold
apathy masked his rising frustration---his inner self was becoming his outer
self. Both didn’t care what happened, how it happened, why it happened. He wasn’t
even looking his enemies in the eye anymore. So he didn’t notice how scared
they were getting---how they were trying to get out of the way, how their worst
fears about this legendary hero and his invincibility were coming true---how he
mowed down everyone who got in his path, for he had the gods on his side. They
may have even see how his fists and feet moved and maneuvered of their own
accord. How his every movement, every decision, was propelled by that jacket.
The jacket. The symbol of his
identity. The shield and protection of his body. The chains, the confines, the
prison of his soul.
“Will it ever end!?” he groaned, right after dodging an opponent’s blow.
No, said a voice.
And then everything seemed to freeze.
“Will it ever end!?” he groaned, right after dodging an opponent’s blow.
No, said a voice.
And then everything seemed to freeze.
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