by Micah Thomas
"Should we cut the resources free?" Thomas asked in a helpful voice.
"Not yet. There may be a use later," Cynthia mused, "Anything else?"
Thomas knew there was more, and let the younger PM, Rachel tell the story.
"There were two fires this week," Rachel said.
"Here is comes," Cynthia said, rolling her eyes.
"There was an encounter we believe was instigated by government interference. Entirely their side. I swear we weren't keeping it from you, but it's on the news. Masked as a semi-truck explosion carrying petrol by the IC, but clearly it's one of ours," Rachel said.
"Summary?" Thomas asked.
"Nevada. Middle of nowhere. Telltale whispers in community that they tried to engage Henry. I don't know how they located him, but it's not good," Rachel said.
"Losses?" Cynthia asked.
"Civilian and agent life."
"Maybe they assumed they could have our leftovers?" Cynthia said, "Don't answer that. I take it, it was unsuccessful?"
"Complete failure," Rachel replied.
"You said there were two fires?" Thomas asked with a raised eyebrow.
"The drop out lodge. It burned down yesterday," Rachel said, "It's so fresh, it hadn't made it to the report."
"Dear god," Cynthia said.
"Erik was not located. Evidence of accelerants, natural fire in a sense, normal temp ranges. We suspect this an intentional act, likely Erik," Rachel said.
"Who died?"
"Project Permsia, Janet; Project Permsia, Charles; Project Thractia, Donald; the property manager, Sandy missing."
"Christ," Cynthia said.
"Do you want us to find Erik?" Thomas asked.
"Steer. Steer the cops. Meeting adjourned." Cynthia said, leaving the question unanswered.
***
Henry, wore his deceased grandfather's suit, and a fresh shave, and actually looked like he belonged here. How long had it been since he could say that? They'd missed half the ceremony, arriving at his cousin's farm outside of town late. It was like time had never passed, watching his mother rush to get ready and then flustered haranguing about some minutia in the house that delayed exit. They rode together in his mother's car. She drove single-mindedly, fast, as if she too wanted to escape the enclosed space with its minefield of potential conversation. Down a winding dirt road, cars lined up on the grassy shoulder. His mother walked unapologetically into the seating area, taking a seat while the vows were being exchanged. Henry stood back behind the attendees, smoking a cigarette from a pack he borrowed from his mother. The vows might have been sweet but he was too far to hear them.
He looked at the wedding party, scanning for familiar faces. The only one he knew for sure was the bride, his cousin close in age. He'd always envied her. While he'd lived in the succession of increasing chaotic and temporary homes, starting with his alcoholic and manic mother, he'd known that his aunt and uncle were stable. Long married, Christian, working class, normal. He'd visit when he was a child and never want to leave. Now, he was merely happy that someone had found someone and was doing the normal things. Sure, he thought, no one gets out with some scars from their past, but she would be alright. For his part, this was little more than watching a movie. The distance from what he'd done, what he'd seen was so vast, and weird, and awful.
The ceremony ended with the usual rituals and rites and promises. The bridal party were ushered away for photos and Henry kicked around the water cooler. The drinking started for the rest and Henry knew that he wanted none of it. If he was going to maintain any semblance of control, and there was no reason to think otherwise, he had to be sober. Not as if sobriety itself had stifled the nuclear reaction in his heart when things turned sideways, but what evil acts could interrupt this happy day?
The parents of the bride were talking with his mother. They gestured to him to come over. He felt like a skulking sulking teen as he shuffled over.
"Henry!" his uncle exclaimed, "How the hell are ya?"
"I'm good," Henry said exchanging a hearty handshake.
"Oh my, you've certainly grown into a handsome young man," his aunt gushed.
"That's dad's suit," his mother said, possibly trying to take him down a peg.
"Well, it fits," his uncle said.
Henry's mother rolled her eyes and walked back inside the farmhouse venue, leaving Henry with his aunt and uncle.
"She's really doing so much better," his aunt said, "God has given her a second chance."
"That's cool," Henry said, "We really haven't been in touch."
They did that awkward nice person thing, a pat on his shoulder, a glance of compassion. Henry bore it well, knowing that once upon a time he'd thought of it as condescending.
"It's so funny that you are here. I was just thinking about you," his aunt said, "It was that movie. What was it called Jim?"
"Here we go," his uncle said.
"We were watching that movie, you know the one, there's a little kid and he says, 'I see dead people,'" she said miming the little kid voice.
Henry knew the movie, but didn't recall seeing ghosts as a kid.
"You know, with all your sleep walking and taking in your sleep. You scared mom half to death sometimes. You'd go out to the porch and have full conversations with nobody."
"I totally do not remember that," Henry said.
"Well, you were little. We figured you'd grow out of it, the walking and the wetting your bed," his uncle added, "Did you?"
Henry laughed, "I guess that cleared itself up."
The summons came for everyone to enter the hall and sit for speeches, a meal, and eventually dancing. Henry kept quiet, nodding along, answering his connection to the family, was he married, what did he do, in a few brief sentences. He didn't remember or had never met most of the guests. He was busy inside his mind, scouring for memory fragments. He knew he'd always had vivid dreams, and nightmares, but what was this about sleep walking? A lot of people do that, right? But not everyone was able to do what he could do now. He felt like it was connected. Like, what if not everything was because of Black Star? He realized that it must have been something about him, something that was always there. Some sleeping ability to make a journey. He didn't know how to use this information, but it meant something to him to know, to know what? That he was special, or that this was fate in a way.
He was lost in these thoughts, when he felt a tap at his shoulder. It was time to dance and the bride, his lovely cousin, wanted to dance with him.
She half dragged to the dance floor, his protests useless, so he did what one does and shook what he had. Music from their youth, the pop punk and emo songs might not have resonated with the older folks, but it was fun and Henry let his worries go as they jumped up and down with the music.
After a couple songs, he extricated himself and walked outside, standing off from the other smokers and drinkers. His cousin came out, ignoring the dirt swirling on the trim of her white dress. They leaned on the railing, overlooking a pastoral farm scene. Chickens pecking in the dirt, cows and horses moving slowly in the distance.
"Congrats, Emily. I hope you two have a wonderful life," Henry said.
She looked at him cockeyed and then shrugged.
"Hey man, you used to be funny. A smart ass, in a good way. What happened to you?" she asked.
"We thought maybe you were dead or in jail. I'd tried to find you online through the Myspace years, then on Facebook, but you were never there," she continued.
"I've been... I guess I've been doing my own thing. I didn't realize that anyone even thought of me," he said.
"Well, we were. Thinking of you, that is. If you needed help, mom and dad would have been there."
"Everything happened so fast. Everything after grandma died. I felt like I was a grown up. That I could get by on my own," Henry explained.
"You were just a kid, Henry. Anyway, that's all in the past. You seem like you're doing ok now."
Henry laughed, hard and loud.
&n
bsp; "Sure," he said.
"Anyway," she said changing topics, "I don't know if you follow politics at all, but are you excited about Wiseman?"
Henry's eyes went wide.
"What are you talking about?" he asked.
"Where have you been? Under a rock? The president is going to debate Wiseman on live TV in a couple days. They hype is unbelievable. Everyone online is fighting about what is going to happen," she said.
"Oh god," Henry said.
"Yeah. The whole thing is going down in Vegas. At first, I wanted to go but, man, it's going to be a cluster fuck. People on the news are warning about violence and riots," she said.
She produced a smart phone from some hidden depths of her dress.
"Look," she said handing the phone to Henry, when a gaggle of bridesmaids fluttered out of the hall like a series of brightly-colored flower petals caught in the wind. Emily was rushed off, leaving Henry with her phone.
It had been a while since he had held a piece of high-priced electronics, but figured out the navigation, so damned intuitive. He opened a browser window and searched for Wiseman. What the hell, he thought. The man he was searching for had been on TV, radio, and YouTube, performing minor miracles and saying cryptic shit. Why? What was the point of all this? He searched Black Star and didn't see anything connecting the two.
Henry found his aunt and uncle and returned Emily's phone. His mother was with them. She looked high strung and he wondered if she'd been drinking or if it's just the sight of drinking that was making her crazy.
"Good. You're here. I need to go home. You know I don't like driving at night. You can find another ride if you want," she said.
"No. I'm ready to go," he said.
Emily came running up to him.
"You were just going to leave?" she asked.
Henry smiled and shrugged as they hugged. She took his hand and pressed a wad of cash into it.
"This was a wedding gift, but there's plenty more and I think you need it more than I do," she said.
He hugged her again, knowing he'd never see her again and soaked in the fleeting moment of true affection.
His mother shook her keys impatiently, so they left, headed back to her house.
In the car, Henry said, "I'll be leaving tonight."
"That's ok. That's fine."
"I'm glad you are doing good, Mom. It was good to see you."
She didn't answer, likely caught up in her own personal hell, a battle of conflicting desires and Henry didn't figure into it. Maybe he never had. That was fine with Henry. He knew where he had to go.
***
"Oh shut up. What's wrong? I asked if you were hungry?"
Sandy smelled bad. Erik had not allowed her to take even a supervised bathroom break and she'd been sitting in twenty-four hours' worth of shit and piss. She couldn't understand how he could stand the smell of being in the car with her. He'd left the car several times when they stopped for gas and food. Each time she wanted to drive away, or run screaming, but the dread would return, a paralyzing fear, like the devil was just out of her sight, sitting next to her. The more motivated she was to flee, the more intensely she could feel it, almost even see it. Some demonic grinning face playing her emotions like a puppet. The intensity would only diminish when she surrendered.
She hadn't slept. He'd given her truck stop ephedrine with nothing to wash it down, and had laughed as she choked trying to chew and swallow the bitter white pills. Erik would slip into strange periods of mumbling as she drove. He'd come to and give her direction, pull off the highway, go here, go there. She had no idea when this would end, but how could it continue much longer? She was losing her mind. She knew that. As the terrors would ebb and flow, she had brief moments of lucidity where she tried to make a plan.
It was early morning, the sun rising in the southwest haze. They were on another off-highway detour, guided by impulse and seemingly random rights and lefts, when Erik suddenly leaned forward on the dashboard and pointed to house.
"That one. We'll stop at that one."
The neighborhood was nice, nothing fancy, but nice. Streets named for presidents and well-maintained lawns. They were either in Oregon or Idaho. Sandy wasn't sure anymore, except she knew they were making their way south. She parked the car in the driveway.
"Erik, why are we here?" she asked.
"They're sleeping. We can feel them in their dreams. Sweet and kind. Ripe," he said.
Erik hopped out of the car, stepping around the child's toys on the porch before easily opening the door.
Sandy felt the corners of her mind for the bad feeling and it was gone. She flinched as she undid her seatbelt, expecting some new horror to hit her brain, but it didn't come. Erik was busy. What did that mean for the poor inhabitants of the home? If Erik was busy with them, dear god. The decision tree raced through her mind. Was this like the airline warning, that in case of emergency you should save yourself first or should she interfere with Erik's plans? She knew she couldn't stand up to him alone, but with him distracted? What's the point of saving yourself if your guilt haunts you for the rest of your life? She couldn't save her wards at the Institute, maybe she could do something now.
Sandy got out of the car and ran to the neighboring house, and frantically beat on the door. No one answered. She ran to the next, repeating the panicked knocking and calling out to anyone that might help. Again, no one came.
She ran in the street, screaming at the top of her lungs, not even caring that she might look like a crazy person.
"Help me," she screamed, "help! Someone help!"
The horror slammed into her brain hard enough to take her off her feet. She crawled in the grass of a well-manicured lawn. Her eyes could not see as she writhed in agony. He was showing her his work inside the house. Blood. He'd stabbed the father in his bed. A sheet covered the man's face, but blood seeped through. He'd dragged the mother, a young woman, screaming into the kitchen. Oh god, make it stop Sandy moaned, clawing at her own eyes, but nothing helped. The images were pumped directly into her head.
Erik was preparing a fire. He blew out the pilot light of the fancy gas oven, and turned it up on high. Sandy could feel his tittering laugh in her body. The woman screamed but just stood there, hands at her side, clutching into fists. Sandy could see blood there. There'd been baby toys in the yard, a plastic play set. Where was the child? Sandy felt Erik turn his focus on the woman, filling her mind with dark torments. He was enjoying this. A righteous anger filled Sandy and she found mental resources she didn't know she possessed.
She got up, despite the waves of nausea, and ran back to the house. She entered quietly, wiping blood from her stinging eyes. She heard the cries of pain from the kitchen and smelled the gas. She had to be fast. Sandy ran upstairs, glancing into the bedroom, the murder scene sickening her, but she pushed on until she found the nursery. She grabbed the baby, who had started to cry, waking up with an ugly, unfamiliar woman. Sandy ran out of the house carrying the baby. Half blind from her own scratching and still seeing the images of the house as Erik doused the screaming woman with alcohol from her own liquor shelf.
Sandy made it to yet another house on the block, and beat on the door, kicking it, as she held the baby. When no one came, she went around the back and placed the crying baby in the empty dog house she found there.
"I'm sorry, baby. I'm so sorry," she said, tears and blood streaming down her face.
She ran back around to the front of the house as the explosion boomed through the neighborhood. Her car was gone, and she felt around for the mental connection. Was it over? Had he gone?
She sat on the curb, hoping to hear a fire trucks alarms, unsure of what she would tell responders. She anxiously glanced back to the house where she'd stashed the baby. Even if the fire spread, it was a few houses down. They'd be ok, right?
Neighbors were now peaking from their curtains, men and woman in night robes came out of their houses, cell phones in hand. And it came, the merciful sound of a siren
. A neighbor approached Sandy with towel, and was that a first aid kit?
She saw his lips moving but didn't hear his words. The pain struck her like a bullet and she was mentally locked to the burning woman, feeling the sensation of skin searing and fat popping, rendering in the heat. Sandy fell over from her sitting position, the pain too much finally. Her last thoughts, excruciating agony and fear, before some physical apparatus of the brain popped under the strain.
CHAPTER NINE
IT WAS A seven-hour drive from Reno to Vegas. Henry had the little bit of cash his cousin gave him for gas, and made sure to mind the speed limit, and fully stop at each stop sign. Each time a cop passed him, he thought he'd be pulled over and then what? Chance another homicidal fire or go to jail for life for what he'd done? How could he explain that it wasn't really him, but something inside him? He knew that one way or another, he'd be paying for the lives he'd taken. There was no escaping the guilt he felt. The subtle shifts in his relationship with the fire inside was making memories more accessible, and the clarity was horrifying. There'd been deaths when he escaped Black Star. He knew now that he'd sought retreat in his little community, his little camp of lost souls, and that they'd burned up. He knew that he'd incinerated Denzel, but that was at least self-defense. If he could take it back, would he have rather died? If he had known that there'd be more death and destruction to come, maybe he would have, but it's not like it was his choice. The thing inside him had its own wants and its own set of levers to control what they did. He wondered why he hadn't checked to see if Del and Bobbie had survived the roadside encounter. He wanted to believe they were ok and back home with the sheep and their little quiet lives. But he wasn't sure. They hadn't been with the group of survivors in the underpass.
Something was still changing inside him, but he couldn't tell what he was changing into, not really. The reasoning capacity of the fire was so limited, but it was influencing him in strange ways. A certain reliant confidence and detachment from his emotions that he couldn't figure out. The loss of the fear and anxiety about what happens next was ok. He could live with that. But, not for the first time, he wondered if he should be feeling more than he was. Even his guilt was an intellectual understanding that he had taken something from people, something of value, something that could not be undone and he didn't like it, but it wasn't a sobbing sorrow for having killed people. As he drove, Henry thought about a concept Del had tried to introduce him to, the internal family system. Del described a method of psychoanalysis that imagined us all as having different characters inside, parts he had called them. The managers that protect a person as they interact with the world. Exiles, parts in pain, carrying the person's childhood traumas. Firefighters that surface up to distract a person from emerging exiles, the self-medicating impulse behind a person's drug use. Beneath these parts was the self, the honest and curious part of awareness.
