by T. S. Mann
He remembered back when he was twelve, watching his mother carefully paint the black letters onto the orange background. Halloween, Christmas, Easter, hell, she even had a wreath for Labor Day. She loved holidays and loved sharing them with her two boys.
Matt walked halfway to the stairs and then put his back to the wall and slowly slid down to the floor, finally and completely overcome at last. For a good three minutes, he wept.
CHAPTER 4:
THE DOCTOR IS IN
After Matt had composed himself, he walked down the stairs wondering what to do next. Where to go. Who to turn to. The last question was answered when he walked out the door – about thirty yards down the street, there was a Yamaha Silverbird parked against a tree. Electra Dellamorte was leaned against it, talking on a cell phone. As Matt walked towards her, she closed it and put it away.
“How’d you find me?”
She looked at him as if he were a slow child. “I dunno. Magic, maybe? I put a spell on you earlier to get you off the bike. It let me track you here.”
“Oh yeah, I do seem to remember getting hurled up into the sky and left to fall to my death. Thanks for that.”
“Well don’t blame me!” she snapped. “You must have tried to interfere with the spell in some way. If you’d just left it alone, you’d have fallen to about twenty feet off the ground and then floated gently down the rest of the way like I planned. It’s your own fault if you insist on trying to work magic when you have no clue what you’re doing.”
He glared at her, suddenly very tired of her attitude.
“By the way, my mom doesn’t seem to remember giving birth to me. Is that Lindsay’s fault? Or yours?”
She regarded him dispassionately. “If you must know, it was entirely because of something you did.”
Matt held her gaze for as long as he could and then turned away. As much as he wanted to blame her, to blame anybody else for the nightmare of the last few hours, something deep inside him said that she was right. Somehow, through some inexplicable misstep, this was all his fault. He rubbed his eyes, which were still red.
Behind him, she spoke, still firmly but less harshly than before.
“Matt, you want answers, and I’m not the one to give them to you. I can find and rescue your brother – I hope – but I can’t even start trying until I deal with you. If you’ll just trust me, I can take you someplace where you can be safe for tonight and introduce you to someone who can explain to you what’s going on. Can you do that – trust me – at least for a little while?”
He nodded and then followed as she got back onto the bike. They rode in silence, and the journey was uneventful. He wasn’t sure where they were going but thought it was somewhere near MIT. Electra pulled the bike off the main thoroughfare into an upperclass subdivision – not rich, really, but clearly more upper class than Matt’s neighborhood. She pulled onto a cobblestone driveway leading up to an older, two-story home. It was hardly a mansion, but for this neighborhood, it was big enough to show the owner had money.
They walked up to the front door, an over-sized thing made of oak timbers and wrought-iron accents that looked like it had been stolen from a medieval castle. The door opened even before they reached the porch, and a thin black man stepped out to greet them. He looked to be in his mid-sixties and was wearing a plaid bathrobe over pale blue pajamas. His hair was close-cropped and grey at the temples, and he wore a pair of black-rimmed “Buddy Holly” glasses. The man smiled warmly and welcomed the boy inside.
“Good evening! Or good morning, I suppose. You must be Matthew. Come in, come in.”
Matt stepped into the living room. It would have been tastefully decorated if it weren’t overcome with clutter. The room was covered with stacks of books and magazines, computer components, and, strangely, a number of musical instruments. In the corner, an upright string bass leaned precariously against a baby grand piano. The host led Matt gingerly past the debris into the cleaner and more brightly lit kitchen beyond, introducing himself along the way.
“Parker Ellington, at your service. Most of my friends call me Doc.”
He gestured towards the kitchen table, so Matt slipped off Luke’s trench coat and laid it over the back of one chair before sitting in another. The kitchen was plain and somewhat retro, with a pale-blue linoleum floor and matching countertops popping slightly against off-white walls and cabinetry. The table was a small vintage piece that might have been rescued from a 50's diner, and the chairs were chrome with white padded seats.
Hanging on the wall and looking down over the table was an incongruously silly clock in the image of a young Elvis Presley clad in a bright yellow jacket and pants, his swinging hips and legs forming the pendulum. It was nearly 3 a.m. Big band jazz played softly on a radio sitting on the counter. “April in Paris by Count Basie,” Matt thought idly. Doc had apparently put a kettle on before they’d arrived, and he handed Matt a cup of what smelled like hot chocolate.
“Now, Matthew, I need to talk to Electra for just a second, and then I’ll be right back. I know you’ve been through a lot tonight, but you’re safe now, so just try to relax.”
He smiled reassuringly and then followed Electra back into the living room. As the Elvis clock ticked slowly in the background, Matt sipped at his chocolate, strangely feeling like a little kid again. His dad used to make hot chocolate to cheer him up when he was upset over some minor childhood drama, and it had always made him feel safe.
His mother never knew how much those little bits of male bonding over hot chocolate had meant to him, and he never asked her to make it after his father died, perhaps because he didn’t want anyone else to try and take his father’s place.
Matt reminisced for a few moments but then came to and remembered where he was. He put the cup down quickly and stared at it, wondering if magic told Parker Ellington what to serve that would put him at ease. He couldn’t see any weird colors like before, but that meant nothing. Eventually, he gave a deep sigh and picked the cup back up – whether it was magic or not, Matt was both physically and emotionally exhausted, and he needed whatever sort of pick-me-up he could get.
A few minutes later, Doc returned to the kitchen, opened the oven, and removed a sheet of cookies. Humming softly, he started transferring them onto a platter with a spatula. After a few seconds, Matt finally spoke up.
“Thanks for the chocolate, um, Doc. But did Electra say anything about my brother? I’m really worried about,” he faltered for a second, “well, about a lot of things, but mainly him.”
“It’s okay. We’ve got time to talk.”
“Excuse me, sir, but it’s not okay.” Matt’s voice rose a bit. “My brother is out there somewhere in the clutches of some crazy ... whatever the hell that bitch is! I really don’t want to sit around eating cookies if there’s something we can do to save him, so please don’t tell me ‘we’ve got time!’”
“Nephilim,” said Doc randomly, as he turned and set the platter on the kitchen table. Matt stared at the plate of M&M cookies, then up at Doc, and then back again at the cookies in utter confusion.
“... what?”
“Nephilim. Lindsay Forrester is what we call a nephilim. It’s a neologism derived from an ancient Hebrew word meaning fallen one. We use it to describe Strangers who have gone mad and turned to the service of some facet of the Great Beyond. Other terms include chaos-magician, agent of the Thirteenth Axiom, and ‘crazy, magical nutjob you should run away from as fast as you can.’”
With that, he turned back to the stove to pour another cup of hot chocolate for himself, talking over his shoulder as he went.
“Of course, that answer probably didn’t help you at all, so perhaps we should start with more basic questions. I’ve already read your mind, so I’m up to speed on what you’ve been through. And I’ve also taken the liberty of stopping relativistic time, so we can talk about things calmly and reasonably without you having to worry about your brother.”
Matt was just about to ask what that
last bit meant when he suddenly noticed that the ticking of the clock had ceased. He looked over at it and did a double-take. Sure enough, the Elvis clock had stopped ticking, with the King’s legs stuck at the apogee of their leftward arc, frozen in mid-swing as if he were kicking at some invisible music critic. Matt checked his wristwatch. It said 2:54, just like the clock. And just like the clock, the second hand was frozen. He looked up in wonder as Doc sat down in the opposite chair.
“You ... you can just ... stop time like that?” he stammered out. Doc smiled.
“It occurred to me that your concern over your brother, along with the other traumas of the evening, might cloud your perceptions of what’s important in the long term. You’ve been through an incredible change, and how you respond to that change over the next few days could affect the rest of your life. You deserve a chance to learn what you need to know unencumbered by time pressures and emotional concerns.”
Doc paused to take a sip of the hot chocolate and then lick his lips.
“Accordingly, I took the liberty of trapping my kitchen within a temporal embolism. It’s a rather difficult effect to maintain for very long, but happily, I’m very skilled at what I do. Within this room, we are standing between tick and tock. The world outside this room sits perfectly still, and we have all the time in the world to answer whatever questions you have, assuming they are questions I can answer. We do not, however, have all the cookies or hot chocolate in the world, so we’d better get started.”
Matt stared at this man who claimed to have stopped time itself. Then, he shook his head. Too much weirdness had already happened for him to reject anything as impossible now. He reached over and took a cookie for himself. Then, after considering for a moment while he chewed, he decided to just rattle off the most pressing questions all at once and see where that took him.
“What happened to me and Luke? Why doesn’t my mother remember me? How can I work ... magic, if that’s really what I can do now?
Ellington seemed pleased that Matt had cut right to the chase. He claimed one of the cookies as well and began speaking between bites.
“You suffered a traumatic event of a supernatural nature. The stress of that event broke through the illusions of normalcy that had blinded you to the true nature of reality, illusions which most people cling to with a death grip like a drowning man with a life preserver. Such traumas are not uncommon. My order, the Invisible College, theorizes that most people at some point during their lives experience a brush with the supernatural that is disturbing enough to potentially awaken magical abilities.
“However, most people who have such encounters, well over ninety-nine percent of them in fact, reject the truth completely and promptly forget about it, choosing the comfortable lie of mundane reality over accepting the existence of unremitting strangeness that constantly lurks just out of sight. There are many names for what happened to you – waking up, gaining insight, having an epiphany – but the most popular term in the Western world for the last century or so has been going strange.”
Matt thought back on the events at the church. “Lindsay said I’d gone strange.”
Doc brushed cookie crumbs from his mustache and continued. His face briefly assumed a look of distaste when Matt mentioned Lindsay’s name.
“Anyway, having chosen to accept the truth about the supernatural world, you instantly became a supernatural being yourself. And because of that choice, the mundane world rejected you, erasing all evidence of your pre-Insight existence, including even the memories of your friends and loved ones. With the possible exception of your brother, who was part of the same supernatural occurrence, no non-magical person who ever knew you before tonight remembers you at all. Hence the term: Stranger.”
Matt’s eyes flashed as he put the cup down forcefully, a few drops of the hot chocolate spilling onto the table.
“Now, wait a minute! I never chose anything. Some crazy ... nephilim or whatever was trying to feed me to a giant blob of killer candle wax! Then, I saw this bright light, and next thing I know, I was shooting fireballs and my mom doesn’t know who I am! I never asked for any of that!”
Doc’s eyes were kind but also sad.
“I never said it was an informed choice, Matthew, or a fair one. Honestly though, if you think back to what was going through your head when you saw that light, don’t you remember a feeling, deep in the back of your mind, that you didn’t have to reach out to it? That you could have said ‘no.’ And that by saying ‘yes,’ that it would change your life forever?”
Matt stared at him defiantly, but what Doc said was true. He did remember that feeling, that second of hesitation before he accepted what the light was offering. After a few seconds, he looked down at the hot chocolate.
“It’s not fair,” he said softly.
“No, it isn’t. When I came home a Stranger, my family didn’t recognize me, either. I had a wife and three children. They all were convinced that I had died years earlier and refused to accept me as their husband or father. I even had a chance to visit my own tombstone and hear friends who no longer recognized me describe how I died and what my funeral was like.”
He hesitated for a second.
“A friend of mine actually did attend his own funeral. I … don't recommend that. It ended ... unpleasantly. Electra had similar experiences during her Insight. We all have. Strangeness is the price you pay for the power you now possess. In your case, like mine, it is also the path you take when you come to the fork in the road and the only alternative leads to an early grave.”
“Is there anything I can do for my mom to ... to help her remember us?”
Ellington paused before answering cautiously. “It would be very difficult. And also extremely hazardous. For her, I mean. There is a good chance that such an effort could ... damage your mother severely.”
Matt swallowed, as Doc continued.
“Understand that, to your mother, the idea that she gave birth to two sons, raised them to near adulthood, and then simply forgot them would be nearly as unacceptable as what you experienced with Lindsay back at that church. If you tried to make her accept your existence, she would most likely reject it, and if you forced it on her, she would be much more likely to retreat into psychosis than acknowledge the truth. Even the best-case scenario would likely cause her to remember you but go strange herself in the process. Ask yourself: Do you really want to put her in the same position you’re in now?”
Matt closed his eyes for a moment, and then he took a deep, cleansing breath.
“No. No, I don’t.”
“Again, I am truly, truly sorry, Matthew, but you must accept that the life you had before tonight is over. If you try to go back to it, it will only cause pain to you and your loved ones. If you want to make it now in this world, you have to keep moving forward.”
Matt nodded silently and stared down at the hot chocolate. It no longer made him feel safe, not one bit. Then, he shook himself. The man was right; he had to keep moving forward, for Luke’s sake if nothing else. He had no time for self-pity.
“Okay, then. Let’s get back to the magic stuff. Exactly what can I do? What does being a Stranger mean other than my whole life is shot to hell?”
“Well, you could spend several mundane lifetimes learning everything that is now possible for you, but tonight, we’ll stick with the basics. Now, I’ve looked through your memories, and you’ve already achieved a few things. The fireball, which is technically referred to as empyreal fire … or holy fire if you’re religiously inclined, I suppose. A somewhat clumsy attempt at inertia manipulation. A surprisingly sophisticated memory alteration spell ....”
“Yeah, I lived through that bit, okay?” Matt’s face flushed at the memory of what happened at the apartment, which embarrassed him now for reasons he could not explain. “You know, I’m not sure I like you poking around in my head, Doc.”
“And I’m sorry for doing so, but as you noted, your brother is still in danger. I judged that you would forgive the
intrusion if a clear and unvarnished depiction of what happenned helped us to get him back safely. If it’s any consolation, you do seem to have an affinity for mind magic. Later on, I can show you how to create mind shields to protect yourself from hostile telepathy in the future.”
Matt rubbed his eyes with his fingers and thought to himself: “Mind shields. To protect me from hostile telepathy. This is my life now. Un-fucking-believable.”
He looked up at Doc, wondering if the older man had heard that in his thoughts. If he did, he gave no sign of it.
“Thank you,” Matt said aloud. “That would be ... helpful, I guess. But in the meantime, how does all this work? So far, I’ve seen some colors and done some stuff by manipulating them in my head, but I don’t know what any of it means.”
“Well, those colors are the result of what mundane scientists call synesthesia. Your mind has not yet adjusted to the new perceptions available to it, so it is choosing to perceive the different aspects of magic as colors. Most Strangers do, although a few of us, for whatever reason, make use of other senses. In my case, I heard musical tones instead and could work magic initially by using a musical instrument to generate melodies that resonated with various magical principles.
“As my awareness grew, I moved beyond the need for such crutches. There’s a very nice lady in Brussels I know who was a pastry chef before she went strange, and she told me that she could smell magic, with different spells reminding her of different flavor combinations. She's able to achieve remarkably powerful magical effects by working them into cakes and pies. Anyway, we’ll discuss this more fully tomorrow after you’ve rested, but for right now, we’ll just go with the Strangeness for Dummies explanation.”
Matt listened in silence, attempting to process. He thought he’d heard of synesthesia, although he couldn’t remember from where. Idly, he noticed there was a bit of an M&M stuck between his teeth. He suppressed the urge to ask whether Doc had any toothpicks or whether he should simply “magic” the annoyance away.
