Bright Star

by Grayson Reyes-Cole

  Jackson was silent. He had been there. He would always be there. But she didn’t care. Rush hadn’t come.

  “I need to go to bed,” she stated abruptly. She stood and walked away, veritably melting through the walls to her room.

  “He won’t save you again,” Jackson couldn’t help but mutter as she left. And though he said it softly, he knew that she heard.

  *

  They were going to wreck the train.

  The day was bright and blustery. The sun had not shown in three days. But that morning, it caused the streets to glitter with the precipitation of the night before. Puddles of melting ice showed signs of the burgeoning warmth from that lone star in the sky. And yet, the wind whipped through the people with a frigid whistle. It cut to the quick, forcing muscles to tense, hands to clench in pockets, bodies to strain toward solid in a brace against it. And yet it was still so very bright out.

  Birds circled and cawed above them in a near white sky. Cars and pedestrians went by, barely noticing the heightened Energy pulsing to life around them.

  They looked like a tour group.

  They—all fifty-five Followers—stood together but clumped into smaller groups. They laughed and talked about their day’s events. Few talked about their night’s plans. That was an insult. Some held steaming coffee cups. Some carried nondescript, small leather journals. Destroy and Harm took turns punching each other as hard as they could in the arm. The stronger, the louder each blow landed, the louder they laughed. Monk stood chatting with someone while holding Point, an arm loose around her shoulders. He stood in the way of the wind for her and let his hands tangle in her thick, free-flowing hair. All of the Followers were dressed in comfortable clothes and carried minimal baggage. Few of them were tense. Few of them were nervous. Most waited as patiently as anybody would at a stop for a train.

  They were waiting for the next train. They’d already passed up one that was already filled with passengers. They preferred to ride in a single car together. The next one would be arriving in three minutes.

  Darting in and out of the group in uneven but hurried strides was a copper haired woman bundled in a white jacket with a gold and white scarf. She wore very dark sunglasses. She checked with each of them. She made sure they had their tickets. She asked if they needed anything. She gave an encouraging squeeze to trembling hands though those were few and far between. When the train arrived, she called them together, appearing only as a guide for them. She spoke softly for a moment and then the entire group went silent and still.

  Passersby who had paid minimal attention to the assembly, stopped to watch. Some of them even lowered their heads as well, as if in prayer. The long moment, only a minute in truth, ended and the group filed into the train. Though it took time to get them all in, the doors did not begin to close. Instead, they waited until all were inside the car. Then the car lurched gently forward.

  After they had been in motion for nearly fifteen minutes, Bright Star reached out and touched Point’s shoulder. “It’s a little late for me to ask…”

  “What is it?” Point questioned. She briefly covered Bright Star’s hand with her own. It was rare that she had to lend strength to the woman who had become her leader, but she felt honored that Bright Star allowed it.

  “I know your…” The red-haired woman paused. “your issue…”

  “With pain?” Point questioned with a tilt of her head.

  “Yes,” Bright Star told her. “With pain.”

  “The second time I was born, I was born with no fear of pain.” It was the first time she had shared this with Bright Star.

  Bright Star nodded slowly then her blue eyes ignited and she smiled. She placed both of her hands on the taller woman’s arms.

  In turn, Point grabbed Monk’s hand. He looked down at their entwined fingers briefly, then leaned against Ban, whose elbow bumped Destroy, who stepped on Harm’s foot, who tangled his fingers in Mix’s braid. And so on, and on, and on, until they were all connected and one’s Energy could not be distinguished from another.

  It was then that Monk said the words. He hadn’t planned for them, but couldn’t stop them from spilling forth from his lips. The softly spoken words reminded them all of where they had come from and why they were there. These words entreated the universe to recognize their plight and to help Rush either deliver them or destroy them. It was at once a prayer and a curse. An ode and a eulogy. And on the final stanza, the High Energy in the car seemed to swell, intensifying as it grew at an exponential pace.

  The metal room began to hum. The sound of snapping and whipping wires joined it. The whir of broken wheels enhanced the noise and then the train peeled off its path and crashed over the elevated track. The first indicator of the car folding in on itself was a metal spike that plunged down from the roof of the train. It sheared through Bright Star’s collarbone, shattering it, tearing through her lungs and liver, breaking her hipbone, impaling her, affixing her to the floor. And then there was only the roar. A loud, ear-splitting roar that sounded like Rush.

  Souvenir

  “How did you get that scar?” Jackson asked, raising a fingertip to her face. Against his own better judgment, he traced the angry, jagged pink scar that marked her from her widow’s peak down between her copper brows and under her gently rounded cheek. The injury’s puckered ridge, both raw and dark, punctuated the softness, delicacy of her pale skin. His fingertips tingled at the touch. The feel of her was pure High Energy. Addictive. He put his hand in his pocket.

  “Rush left it for me,” Bright Star answered with a flippant shrug of her shoulders. Her red hair rustled and settled with the movement. Her eyes were heating up, casting blue light everywhere they touched. No blue light warmed Jackson: she would not look at him. He knew she was hiding a bashful and enchanted smile.

  Jackson touched her face again in an attempt to erase the mark. He failed. In fact as he touched it this time, he could feel Rush’s pattern in his fingertips. Rush would not allow him to repair her this time. And, obviously, she did not want to be repaired.

  Jackson tried to stop his hackles from rising. That was before he saw her get up and walk to the sink, dragging the blanket she’d been cocooned in with her. She was dragging her right leg as well. The same leg he had been sure she injured before the train wreck. “What happened, Bright Star?” he demanded, coming to stand in front of her.

  She only gave him a sunny smile then averted her eyes. She washed her hands slowly. Jackson stood there crowding her space. Silly of him to think he could intimidate her into answering his question. Even realizing that she would not succumb, he didn’t budge. She smelled like tropical flowers. For the first time in months, Jackson was reminded of that isolated island, the beliefs of its people, and the promise that Bright Star had made them.

  Finally, she turned toward him, her face tilted up and waiting. Jackson reached a trembling hand into the warmth underneath her blanket and laid his hand on her hip. With a mental flex, he read that her leg was broken from hip to ankle in three places. He could sense the mending injury to her lung. Her hip had sustained the worst of the injury. He swallowed and his heart began to beat rapidly, his chest started to constrict, but before Perma-Shift could take place, he realized his efforts were for nothing. He wasn’t repairing her.

  Her small hand came down and lay over his briefly before she grasped his hand and pushed it away from her.

  Jackson felt a spark of anger. Violent and visceral, that spark flared but he quickly tamped it down with long-practiced discipline. His anger was tempered by well-honed logic. He would reason through this… this state of affairs that didn’t seem to make sense. Bright Star didn’t want to be fixed. This, she had, in effect, done to herself. She had caused the train wreck, the wreck that had the Followers give themselves to Rush as sacrifices as well. She had stood in the valley intending to cheat death that day. She intended to cheat death every day. The train crashing had merely been the most recent and most cataclysmic of her attempts. Jackson
had heard her explain many times, “I’m not suicidal.” No, she wasn’t suicidal. She thought she was saving the world.

  And somehow, she managed to draw Rush out each time. He saved her each time. This last, he had shown his anger, his emotion, by leaving her the scar on her face and the apparently serious injury to her leg. But Bright Star did not appear to mind. In fact, she seemed proud of the mark. Rush left it for me. It was as if she were a child finding a gift beneath her pillow. She had said it with reverence, with love. Jackson’s anger thundered again like the aftershock of an earthquake.

  The urge to grab her was powerful. It consumed him. He shook with it. The only thing that stopped him was the fact he didn’t know what he would do if he did. Hit her? Kiss her? Equally damning.

  She turned to him, shifting her weight onto her good leg. One sleeve of the white tank top she wore slipped over her shoulder. He realized that the oversized garment only stopped when it caught precariously over her breast. She wasn’t wearing anything underneath it. He could see the soft slope to the dark peach halo, but even when he strained, he couldn’t see the tip. Unconsciously, his hand moved toward his sharp, quick, and painful erection. Before it was too late, he moved his hand to a dish instead. He closed his hand over the cool hard glass and threw it at the wall. It shattered into countless pieces. Bright Star jumped and the shirt slipped beneath one heavy, cream globe. She hurriedly pulled the sleeve back up on her shoulder and rewrapped the blanket around her.

  Jackson walked away from her. He couldn’t do this. Damn, he couldn’t do this.

  In the doorway he paused, but did not face her. “Bright Star, how could you have led those people to die?”

  “None of them died,” she contradicted. Her expression was one without remorse. She had already slipped down to the floor to clean up the mess he had made.

  “You made them sacrifices,” Jackson accused her.

  “They made themselves sacrifices, Jackson.” She slid a waste bin close to her and began to dump pieces of the plate into it. “And I’ll tell you again—None of them died.”

  “God,” Jackson gritted. “Do you have to do that right now? We are talking.” His voice broke. “Do you have to do this now?”

  “Yes, Jackson,” She looked up at him briefly, “Yes, I do. “

  “They could have died.”

  “No, they couldn’t have,” she debated. She wrung her hands and sat back on her heels. Jackson could tell she had reached the point of exasperation. “Rush wouldn’t let all of them die. You don’t understand, Jackson. He couldn’t.”

  “What makes you think so?” Jackson finally faced her as she said that. He thanked God that she had pulled her blanket up to even cover her shoulders. “He’s been gone for six days, Bright Star. We don’t know everything he can do. What if he wasn’t able to save all of them?”

  “He was.”

  “What if he hadn’t come?”

  “He hasn’t gone anywhere, Jackson,” she said, shaking her head. “I’m surprised you didn’t know that.”

  “What?”

  “He never left the house.” Bright Star explained. “The others understandably believed he was gone. And if he wanted them to believe it, I wouldn’t tell. I was hurt that he sought to hide from even me, but that is his prerogative.”

  Jackson could barely focus.

  “He never left,” she repeated. “He just cloaked himself. Like I do.”

  In truth, she didn’t have to repeat the words. Jackson knew them to be true just as he knew himself to be a fool. He’d grieved just like those other poor souls when he should have known that his brother was right there in the house with him.

  He squeezed his hand and pounded himself on the forehead. “Stupid, stupid.” He castigated himself. Never in life had he felt as inadequate as he had in these past months.

  “Stop it,” Rush appeared, grabbing Jackson’s hand. “You haven’t done that since you were a kid.”

  “How can you stomach me?”

  Rush was perplexed, and his face showed it. “You’re my brother. And you shouldn’t beat yourself up for not knowing I was here. No one should have known. I don’t know how she knew. I swear to you I don’t. I just couldn’t go without keeping an eye on things here. I felt something was going to happen even if I didn’t see exactly what it was.”

  “You see,” Bright Star said, alerting them that she was still there. “You see, Jackson. He’s starting to give in. He’s starting to accept what he has to do.”

  “Bright Star,” Rush warned. “Don’t start this. And please do not interrupt this conversation I’m having with my brother.”

  Bright Star said nothing else, but Jackson, for the first time, could feel a growing animosity inside of her all directed at him. Bright Star was starting to hate him.

  “Please,” he entreated, holding his palms out to her. He didn’t know what he was asking for, but he knew he had to try.

  “This wouldn’t have happened if you had made her leave.”

  “She’s not safe out there alone.”

  “She’s even less safe in here. Or rather, everyone else is less safe with her in here. Because remember, she’s not alone. She has her own personal little army of fanatics. Isn’t that right, Bright Star?” Rush turned an accusing eye to her. “Your own growing army of fanatics.”

  “Who have no meaning without you,” Bright Star offered. Though her words were submissive enough, and her demeanor no less, there was a challenge.

  “Bright Star,” Jackson reached out to her.

  She didn’t answer, merely raised her hot gaze.

  “What will it take for you to stop this?” How many times had he asked this question?

  “Stop what?”

  “Stop… this.”

  “There is no ‘this’ to stop, Jackson. This is our way of life until Rush delivers us.”

  “But what does that mean?” Jackson’s frustration was palpable.

  She shook her head. She puffed out her bottom lip. She shifted where she stood on her bad leg.

  “What does he have to do?” Jackson demanded again. Still she said nothing. “Why isn’t the fact that he saved you—that he continues to save you—enough?”

  “You don’t understand,” she said finally.

  “That I won’t argue. Today, you led a group of people onto a packed train. You and that same group of people crashed the train and called out just in time according to some estimate or equation I don’t want to even know about for Rush to save you. And, he did. He saved you. Every last one of you and all of the other people you endangered when you did this. What else do you want?”

  Again, she said nothing, and her bottom lip began to quiver. Jackson wanted to stop asking her questions. He wanted to go back the way he’d come and avoid bringing her to tears. But he didn’t have a choice. If he were going to help her, he needed to know exactly what he was up against. “What else could you possibly want from him?”

  “You already have it,” she answered cryptically, angrily. “So even if I told you, you would never understand what we want or why we want it.”

  Gang

  They entered in slow motion. Bright Star stepped aggressively even with her pronounced limp. One brilliant blue eye was covered by a lock of melting fire. Flanked by Point and Monk, she wore her standard white fare. A fuzzy white pullover. White pants. White, shiny heels. A white, plastic ring around her middle finger. Her luscious lips were even a translucent white. She had one yellow satin ribbon tied around her delicate wrist. Her broad face was bracketed by impossibly large white hoops in her ears. She didn’t even look at him. None of them did.

  They kept coming and started up the stairs to the front door. When, finally, they reached the door, Bright Star turned. Monk and Point stopped short. Then, upon a non-verbal, non-observable cue, they both nodded their heads and continued inside. Bright Star tossed her hair back and bathed Jackson in the full unadulterated light of her mystic blue eyes. Just her neck. Nothing else. She turned to him.r />
  Scheherazade, Bathsheba, Jezebel, Helen, Ceres, none of them could have produced that fascinating yet slightly condescending look that curved her lips. “Remember,” she told him in a deep and sultry voice. “I belong to him.”

  “I—”

  She cut him off before he could begin the lie. “Rush doesn’t want me. We both know that, Jackson. But I won’t betray him.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Jackson countered. Too late. The hungry gaze had already traveled up and down the length of her.

  “You know,” she threw back, then squatted before him.

  “What happens now is bigger than the both of us,” she told him as she grasped his face between her hands and stared at him gravely. His face was bathed in warm blue.

  “I wish you would let me help you,” he said helplessly.

  Bright Star scoffed and stood. The moment they shared was now over. “Help, help, help. It’s all you ever talk about. You can’t help me. Jackson, I think you know that. Furthermore, I don’t need any help.” She was quiet for a moment. The blaze from her magnificent blue eyes, cut in half by the persistent scar, stroked his body. “What I need from you is your faith.”

  “Faith in what?”

  “Faith in him, of course.”

  “He’s my brother, Bright Star. Of course I have faith in him.”

  “He’s not your brother,” she argued, reaching a warm and slender hand out to him again. “Okay, well, he is. Yes. He is your brother. But he is so much more. So much more. He belongs to the Earth, not just to you.”

  “Or you,” Jackson dared. He watched that hand in anticipation. Would she touch him?

  “Or me,” Bright Star agreed, ruefully pulling her hand back. She never hid her wants and desires when they came to Jacob Rush. She stood and started back into the compound.

  “You never leave the house unless it’s to the SHQ. Where have you been?” Jackson asked, wanting to end that perilous thread of conversation.