“Heck, that would explain the actions of most of the human world these days,” I said. “Ironic, isn’t it, that these two are trained psychologists, and yet they are unaware of their own cognitive dissonance, one of the most extensively studied theories in social psychology?”
“Ironic, but typical,” Volk said. “They may well detect it in others, but rarely in themselves. In fact, because of the social bubble they live in; academicians, intellectuals, and the so-called educated classes—they are particularly susceptible to the self-delusion this yetzer perpetuates. This one is relatively small. I’ve seen Clueless Yetzers over thirty feet long in places like Harvard, Yale, and Berkeley. Spend a day at the UN or in most media newsrooms, and you’d think you had stumbled into hell’s own viper pit. The Clueless Yetzer’s power for self-deception makes it one of the most dangerous of all the yetzers.”
“How is it that the Academy could overlook such a powerful yetzer? It’s as if they are possessed by Clueless Yetzers themselves. But that’s impossible, right Captain?”
“If you mean can yetzers possess a cupid, the answer is no, they can’t. Despite our fallen nature, a yetzer can’t survive in such holy altitudes. It would be incinerated, like a meteor or asteroid that passes too close to the sun.
“No,” he continued, “the problem over at the Academy isn’t cognitive dissonance: it’s historical amnesia, which in the Academy’s case looks a lot like arrogance. Captain Cyrus and I once tried to educate the professors and top brass there about both Clueless Yetzers and ketoret, but they weren’t interested. It’s all a numbers game with them, and hunting down Clueless Yetzers takes time and effort. When we mentioned where ketoret came from, they laughed us out of the room.”
“I’m confused, Captain. Yetzers work to prevent matches. But it’s almost as if you’re saying they want this one to go through.”
“Yes, and no,” Volk said. “Remember, the Clueless Yetzer hides beneath the others. The other yetzers usually don’t even know he’s there. See the way they are looking at him?”
Volk pointed around the room, and indeed all the other yetzers seemed to have one weary eye on the Clueless Yetzer, and the other on us.
“They’d tear him to shreds if they weren’t so baffled by him,” he continued. “They want to stop the match. That’s what they do. But Clueless isn’t so clueless. He wants the match to go through. He knows this relationship is doomed, and that a failed match can do far more harm than a match that never took place. Now he can’t do his thing because he’s outnumbered by yetzers who won’t let him get in the way of them doing theirs. Yellow Eyes was hoping that a cupid would take out the competition for him. See the way he’s swaying side to side, hissing at us with that ugly forked tongue of his? We blew his cover, so now he’s one pissed-off yetzer.”
I said, “Why wouldn’t the Clueless Yetzer just inform the others of what is going on? You know, let them in on what he knows?”
“Yetzers don’t reason, and they have no free will. A tiger is a tiger, a shark is a shark, and a yetzer is a yetzer. It exists to oppose. What’s unique about a Clueless Yetzer is that its powers of self-deception are such that it can lead a person to a match as long as it is a bad one. But, in the final analysis, who knows what really goes on in a yetzer’s head? It’s such a dark, malignant place, we’re probably better off not knowing.”
“Okay, but what was Captain Cyrus’s excuse?” I asked, still unable to make sense of the situation. “How come he didn’t test the couple for Clueless Yetzers? Why didn’t he light some ketoret under them?”
“Eventually he did. He flushed them out. But because he was convinced that Ellen Veetal was the Swerver of the generation, he left them alone. If she was indeed the Swerver, she would have to defeat her yetzers on her own. His meddling would have ended any chance of the Swerver fulfilling her destiny. And because of how quickly the world is falling apart, the captain believed no generation afterwards would merit another Swerver.”
“The last Swerver,” I said.
“Possibly, yes.”
At this point, the Clueless Yetzer, which was eerily watching us the whole while, let out a demonic hiss.
“That’s right, pal,” I shouted at the yetzer. “We’re on to you!”
The yetzer responded with another hiss, and then darted right for me. It stopped just in front of the lazurite circle and rose up on its tail and hissed some more. It’s malevolent yellow eyes latched onto my own. Volk quickly clamped his hand over my face, blocking my vision.
“I forgot to mention that its bite isn’t the only weapon it possesses,” Volk said. “If it gets close enough to you, it can hypnotize you with those mustard-colored peepers of his. Another few seconds and you would have stepped out of this circle convinced that he was just a harmless little pet. A few seconds after that, you’d have become a raving lunatic, and a few seconds after that, I’d have had to put you down like a rabid dog.”
“Gotcha,” I said, the heebie-jeebies running up and down my arms and legs. “Sooo, what do we do?”
“Put on your sunglasses.”
“That’s it? That’s enough?”
“It is if you brought the right pair.”
“I only have one pair—the pair Captain Cyrus awarded me after having memorized the entire Tanach [Bible]. The mirrored… Oh, I get it. The mirrored sunglasses. Yetzer here would see his own reflection and…and, what?”
“Put them on and find out.”
I did. The yetzer screeched and somersaulted backwards through the air. It landed with a thud, and then slithered back around Ellen Veetal’s feet.
“Holy mackerel, Captain. If you weren’t here, I’d be dead!”
“Moral of the story?”
“Never doubt you?”
Volk patted my head. “Good boy.”
“So now what do we do?”
“We take them all out,” he replied coolly.
“Huh? But what about the Swerver? If we battle them, we disqualify the woman. We will have interfered with a Swerver.”
“We have no choice. It’s lose-lose for us. Unlike Captain Cyrus, we aren’t gonna get a second chance to follow orders. Besides, if we don’t finish this, either someone else will or Clueless here will. One way or another, this match is getting made.”
“But, Captain, we’ll be known forever as the slayers of mankind’s last Swerver!”
“If there is any history left to be recorded, yes, I suppose we will. Are you ready?”
I unsheathed my ruby-edged wakizashi short sword. “I’d better be,” I said, noting the way the yetzers were crowding around us.
“Follow my cue,” Volk said. He bent over and scooped up a handful of lazurite from the circle. He threw it into the throng of yetzers, momentarily blinding them. Then, an obsidian tomahawk in each hand, he let out a mighty war cry and leaped somersaulting into the pack of frenzied and deadly yetzers. I followed with my own war cry and joined him. “Wattaaah…!”
Carl yelped, and tail between his legs, leaped onto Ellen Veetal’s lap.
“Carl!” Ellen said. “What is wrong with you?”
“I think he knows,” Chauncey said.
“Knows what?”
“What I’m about to say.”
Ellen chuckled and cupped Carl’s furry head in her hands. Carl’s panicky eyes were darting left and right, up and down.
“You hear that, Carl?” she said. “Professor Matterson thinks you’re psychic.”
Carl whimpered and hid his head under Ellen’s armpit.
“So, Professor, what does Carl know that I don’t?”
“That…that…”
“Yes…?”
Matterson hooked a finger into his collar and loosened his tie. “Is it a little hot in here, or is it just me?”
“It is a little hot, yes. As you were saying…?”
“Marry me, Ellen.”
Ellen lifted up the dog’s head. “Don’t worry, Carl. You’ll always be my favorite.” She kissed him on the snou
t.
“Is that a yes?”
Ellen smiled. “Yes, Professor Matterson, that is a yes.”
“Kohai, are you okay?”
I yanked my short sword from the belly of a woolly, pike-toothed Fault-finding Yetzer. A thick, yellow glob of pus dripped onto the floor. “I think so.”
“What happened to your leg?”
I looked down and saw my bloody, tattered pant leg. I pointed to the dismembered parts of a Commitment Yetzer. “That Commitment Yetzer over there … there … there … and there, got in a lucky swipe with one of its claws. It’s just a scratch. No big deal.”
“Any wound from a yetzer is a big deal. Put this on it—now.” He tossed me a coin-sized jar.
I unscrewed the top and stuck my finger into the clear green gel. “Where’s Clueless?” I asked as I rubbed the ointment into the wound. It tingled.
Volk nodded towards the door. The mock poster of X-Files’ FBI Agents Maulder and Scully pointing at each other’s heads with the words ‘The Truth is in Here’ underneath, now had a six-foot long Clueless Yetzer hanging from the center of it, a crystal dagger in its open mouth. It’s freaky, yellow eyes continued to glare at us as its body made final protests of indignation. It almost seemed to be saying, ‘Too late, suckers!’
I whipped a sapphire-tipped, six-pointed tungsten shuriken at the beast and nailed it just below its ugly head. Its severed body hit the floor with a thud. The yetzer’s creepy eyes mushroomed in shock, and then closed forever.
“Been practicing I see,” Captain Volk said, impressed. “Okay, we’re through here. Let’s whirl on home.”
“What about them?” I asked, speaking of Ellen Veetal and Chauncey Matterson.
“I suppose we’ll be seeing them at their wedding,” Volk said.
“No potion-tipped arrows or anything?”
“No need. He has already proposed.”
“So, it’s done,” I said. “Over.”
“The woman’s swerving days, anyway.”
“What’s left for us, Captain Volk?”
“What do you think?”
“To continue my training,” I said resolutely.
He nodded. “More and harder than ever, Kohai. You’re gonna need it.”
34
Memory Lane
A plaid throw-blanket over him, Cyrus sat bolt upright on a leather sofa. He looked around the room for a clue to where he was. The stuffed leather chairs and sofa, oak coffee table, and brick fireplace said he was in someone’s den. Three exits led from the room. He gathered that the home was old but recently renovated.
Cyrus stood and felt momentarily dizzy and not his usual spry and limber self, which made him wonder if he hadn’t been passed out on that sofa for a while. A glance towards the bay windows and their white, diaphanous curtains told him it was early afternoon. He recalled having been in jail in the morning, and although he had no recollection how he had got to the house, he figured that he couldn’t have been there more than six hours. He was ravenously hungry, and had to pee something fierce.
First things first.
He found his boots on the floor at the foot of the sofa, put them on, and headed towards the back of the house. Passing through the hallway, he noted the pictures on the wall. Now Cyrus knew where he was.
At the end of the hall was a bathroom. He took care of business, washed his hands and face, and stepped back into the hall, where he uttered a short blessing.
“There you are,” said a petite brunette at the other end of the hall. “Breakfast?”
“Isn’t it one-forty-three in the afternoon?” Cyrus replied.
The woman checked her watch and arched a surprised eyebrow. “Exactly,” she said. “But you missed a few meals, so I thought we’d start from the beginning.”
“A few?” He made his way toward the woman.
“Seven, actually.”
“No kidding? People eat a lot around here, I guess.”
The woman chuckled. “You’ve been passed out for two days, Mr. Cyrus.”
“Two days? Really?”
The woman nodded. “How are you feeling?”
“Okay…I think.” Cyrus put out his hand. “Thank you, Sara.”
She scrunched her pretty doe eyes in bewilderment. “How do you know my name?”
“I, ah, saw it on the wedding cake on that picture there.” He turned and pointed to a collage of framed wedding photos that hung on the hallway wall.
“Oh…well, aren’t you a clever one, Mr. Cyrus. Come, you must be starving.”
Sara led him into the kitchen and told him to take a seat at the table. He picked a chair with a view of the backyard and it’s green grass and large elm tree.
Cyrus observed the tree with interest… Ulmus americana. Division: Magnoliophyta. Class: Magnoliopsida. Order: Urticales. Family: Ulmaceae. Genus: Ulmus. The tree is hermaphroditic, capable of self-pollination. The flowers are small, purple-brown, and apetalous. The fruit is a flat samara with a circular wing surrounding the single, 4–5 mm seed…
Whoa!
Cyrus cleared his throat and said, “You have a beautiful home.”
“Thank you. We bought it about five years ago, a year after Sam and I were married. It was a fixer-upper, and we’re still up fixing it every weekend.” She smiled. “Bacon and eggs okay?”
“Scrambled, thank you. But please hold the bacon.”
“Wheat or rye toast?”
“Rye, please.”
“Hash browns?”
“Sure, if it’s no trouble. You were a waitress once, weren’t you?”
Sara cracked the first of three eggs into a bowl. “You can tell, huh?”
“Is that how you met your husband?” he asked, already knowing the answer.
“Yes, a matter of fact. What made you guess that?”
“Just a hunch. Police officers are often creatures of habit. I figure that he was a regular, and over time, you two hit it off.”
“Well, let’s just say that it wasn’t long before I realized that it couldn’t have been the lousy food he was coming in for.”
“No, I’m sure it wasn’t. It was your smile, and how you always saved his favorite booth and had the morning paper and a cup of coffee waiting for him.”
“Mr. Cyrus,” Sara Jeffreys said, turning to him as she whipped the eggs. “That picture was not hanging in the hallway. I see that you and my husband talked about quite a bit in your short friendship. Sam said you were amnesic, but clearly you are now cured of that. So, would you like to tell me what happened in that jail cell?”
“I was hoping that you’d tell me. How did I get here, and why on earth would your husband, a police officer, leave you alone with a known criminal?”
“You’re not a criminal, Mr. Cyrus. And he didn’t leave me alone. Colt is here.”
“I thought your dog is named Millie?”
“Our dog is named Millie, though she is outside and you haven’t met her yet, so I don’t know why you know that. And besides, the best she could do is to sniff you to death. This is Colt.” Sara flipped up her blue blouse at the hip, just enough to reveal her holstered gun. “Colt M1911. A gal’s best friend.”
“Nice,” Cyrus said. “The Colt M1911 was designed by John Moses Browning who was born in Ogden, Utah in 1855. It was the standard-issue sidearm for the U.S. armed forces from 1911 to 1985. It’s a single-action, semi-automatic, recoil-operated handgun chambered for the .45 ACP cartridge. Interestingly, it was the Browning-designed FN Model 1910 handgun—serial number 19074—that was used by twenty-three-year-old Gavrilo Princip to assassinate Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his pregnant wife, Sophie, sparking World War I. The pistol was rediscovered in 2004. Mr. Browning died of heart failure on November 26, 1926 in Liège, Belgium.”
Sara stared at Cyrus for a long second, and blinked. “That’s a little more information than I need to know.”
Right, Cyrus thought, making a note to keep a lid on his newly-activated Midrashic database.
“I just call the little fella Colt, and I take him twice a month to the shooting range to let him run around a bit, if you know what I mean. In the back of my closet are some friends of his. Oh, and I also spent five years in the Army. Sharpshooter.”
“Okay, so you can take care of yourself and you’re not afraid of me, but why do you think I’m not a dangerous criminal? After all, I was arrested twice in twenty-four hours.”
“I have an unswerving trust in my husband,” she said. “Moreover, we both have a feeling that we’ve met you before. Have we?”
I remember the match well, Cyrus thought. It was a very satisfying operation. A blister-covered, spindle-shanked Commitment Yetzer possessed your husband, and you were the slave of a Grass-is-greener Yetzer.
Sam Jeffreys had never met anyone like you before. He admired you as much as he loved you, but he didn’t feel worthy. His humble background weighed upon him. Why commit to something doomed to fail?
You had grown up privileged, but had decided to bypass the easy road and all the connections and entitlements of your upbringing. You hung up your bluestockings and grabbed for a pair of Army greens instead. Already an independent thinker, your real-life experience alienated you from the snob-driven, sanctimonious lives of your family and high school friends.
You first met Sam at a charity drive for the bereaved families of firefighters and police. You liked him immediately, but the Grass-is-Greener Yetzer you grew up with would have none of it. Surely, there was someone even better just around the next corner. Nonetheless, he learned where you worked and became a regular, looking forward each morning to the few minutes of small talk that he could get with you.
I had read your souls, and knew that if I didn’t succeed, only misery and regret would you ever know. I planned well and my prayers on your behalf were deemed worthy. When the time was right, I struck. Both of your yetzers put up a hell of a fight, but I slew them with meteor hammer and broadsword.
Shooting Eros - The Emuna Chronicles: Book 1: Hell-bent (Shooting Eros Series) Page 21
