“Whoa!” Aazuria said, struggling to stand. She stumbled forward and shoved her body in front of Taranis to protect him. “Someone stop Vachlan from killing him!”
Callder and Naclana immediately moved to restrain Vachlan, who had great fury in his eyes.
Taranis placed his hands on Aazuria’s shoulders, helping her to stand. “That’s the Destroyer?” he asked her softly.
“Yes,” she told him.
“I don’t trust this man!” Vachlan roared. “Isn’t this a little suspicious? Where the hell were all these ships a few hours ago? How did they get here so conveniently? Explain yourself! Explain yourself!” Vachlan demanded.
“Uhhh.” Taranis cleared his throat. “To be perfectly honest, I had no idea they were going to be needed so soon. I had them built and stored nearby as a present for Queen Aazuria.”
“A present?” she said in surprise, looking up at him. She felt butterflies of excitement in her stomach, and had started to smile when she remembered to be suspicious and serious.
“Yes,” Taranis said, lifting a hand from Aazuria’s shoulder to rub his nose in embarrassment. “It was going to be your divorce present.”
“Divorce present?” Trevain asked in surprise, gesturing for Dylan to pause working on his wound. He frowned as he observed the way that the Prince of Atlantis was holding Aazuria.
“Sure! I never got you two a wedding present, so it’s the least I can do.”
Everyone was silent as they stared at Taranis suspiciously.
“Why on earth would you do something like that?” Vachlan demanded.
Taranis lowered his face and blushed. “I was trying to be romantic. They say that a thousand ships were launched for Helen of Troy. I figured that it would be more suitable to a legendary woman like Queen Aazuria if I launched two thousand ships in her name.”
There was another silence.
“That was really kind of you,” Aazuria said. Feeling rather warm and flushed, and a bit unnerved from standing so close to Taranis, she reached up to remove his hands from her shoulders. She tried her best to limp over to Vachlan, to use him for support instead. He immediately understood her discomfort, and put an arm around her to help her stand.
“You’re a difficult lady to impress,” Taranis said. “Sending flowers obviously didn’t work.”
“Okay,” Vachlan said, with a nod. “I believe his story, and I’m not going to kill him. Today. But I’m going to keep a close eye on you, Taranis Evenor.” Vachlan pointed a finger at the man ominously. “I don’t trust you with my wife, with my queen, or with my country. Tread lightly.”
Taranis nodded. “Trust me, Vachlan. I do not want to make an enemy out of you.” He looked back to Aazuria. “Speaking of your divorce, Queen Aazuria, have you signed those papers yet? I’d like to ask you out on a date. We could go right now, if there are any restaurants still standing around here…” He stroked his chin as he looked around the island nonchalantly, searching for an establishment.
Trevain cleared his throat. “No, she hasn’t signed the papers. And I’m her husband.”
“Her part-time husband, right?” asked Taranis.
“Uhhh…” Trevain looked at Elandria awkwardly. Elandria covered her mouth to hide a laugh at his evident discomfort. Trevain scowled and turned to Dylan. “Maybe I need some painkillers or anesthesia for this after all.”
Dylan shook his head. “Nonsense, sir. I know how tough you are, and I’ll have this bullet out in no time!”
Taranis strolled forward and dropped to one knee, extending his hand to shake Trevain’s hand. “Sorry to bother you while you’re having surgery. It’s a pleasure to meet you, King Trevain. I’ve heard good things. Mostly.”
“I’ve heard bad things, mostly, Prince Taranis,” Trevain said as he returned the handshake, “but I do appreciate what you’ve done here for our country, and I am happy to have a new ally.”
“Great!” Taranis said. “So, about your wife…”
Aazuria turned to Vachlan, her cheeks red-hot with embarrassment. “This is so awkward,” she whispered.
“But rather amusing,” Vachlan responded quietly.
Taranis was explaining his idea to Trevain. “I figure that until you two sign the divorce papers, we should work out some sort of system.”
“System?” Trevain asked, wincing in pain from Dylan’s handiwork.
“Since you’re busy with your other wife part of the time, maybe Aazuria could spend part of her time with someone else, too. I mean, I don’t want to step on your toes here. I mean no disrespect. But as I understand, she’s usually in my part of the world most of the time, anyway.”
“Wait—I’m not sure I’m understanding this correctly,” Trevain said in bafflement. “Are you asking for permission to date my wife?”
“I’m sorry,” Taranis said. “Am I out of line here? I figured that since you married someone else… that Aazuria should also be free to have a little something on the side…”
“Dear Sedna!” Aazuria said loudly. “Prince Taranis, would you like to go for coffee sometime?”
“Why, I would love that!” he said graciously.
Trevain gritted his teeth and made a loud groan of pain.
“I got the bullet out!” Dylan said happily, removing it from Trevain’s chest. “Perfect. It’s all in one piece. That was easy.”
After taking several deep breaths, Trevain wiped the sweat from his brow. “You might as well just put the bullet back in there! That’s what it feels like Aazuria just did.” Trevain groaned and tried to sit up. “God, Zuri! Are you trying to kill me?” He pressed a hand against his chest, near the wound that Dylan was still mending.
Aazuria looked at him with sympathy. “For heaven’s sake, Trevain. If not for Taranis, we might all be dead,” she said softly.
Dylan cleared his throat as he applied pressure to his friend’s chest. “Honestly, Trevain, if you want my professional opinion—you should really be more understanding about this. You gave the girl divorce papers. So, let her have her freedom.”
“I think there’s an unwritten rule,” Aazuria explained. “When the Prince of Atlantis gives you four aircraft carriers and saves your city, you’re obliged to have coffee with him.”
“There are actually a dozen aircraft carriers,” Taranis told her. “You just can’t see them all from the islands, because some are spread out closer to Alaska and Russia. I figured that you could deploy them all over the world as you see fit.”
“A dozen aircraft carriers?” Aazuria said with a little sigh. “That really is romantic. Alright, let’s go to dinner. Right now. I’m buying.”
“I’m hungry too, Auntie Zuri!” said Ivory as she and her brother joined the conversation.
Aazuria smiled. “Alright, then. Everyone’s invited. Let’s go eat!”
Everyone began to chatter as they all moved toward the city together. When Dylan finished bandaging Trevain’s wound, he helped the man stand and guided his friend along the destroyed sidewalk.
Naclana moved to help Aazuria walk, and leaned into whisper something naughty into her ear. “I’ll have ‘coffee’ with the prince if you don’t want to,” Naclana volunteered. “I’ll have coffee with him all night long.”
Aazuria laughed at this. She laughed a little bit too loudly.
Chapter 16: They Try to Move On
One month later…
“So, tell me about this movie you’re making,” said Dylan Rosenberg, leaning back in his chair and adjusting his glasses. They were at the Ramaris house in Diomede City, where Dylan had taken up residence.
“Well, I guess you could say that it’s a family project,” Vachlan explained. “I got the kids helping me to direct—just giving them small tasks and asking for their help with minor decisions, here and there. I’m hoping that it stimulates their creativity.”
“That sounds like an excellent bonding experience,” Dylan said.
Vachlan shrugged. “After I abandoned Ivory and Ronan for so long,
I really wanted to make it up to them. I know you told me about how crucial these early years are, with the rapid brain development and all—I didn’t want to waste any more time.”
“I’m really glad to hear all this,” Dylan said, making notes in his notebook. “You’re really doing a lot better than you were when we first started having these sessions. Do you think you’re ready to talk about the subject matter of your movie today?”
“Yes,” Vachlan said. He reached into his briefcase and pulled out a weathered old script. “You see, the movie is based on a play I wrote when I was very young. When I first met Visola in 1797, she asked to see some of my writing. This… this is the first thing I ever shared with her. I don’t know why I gave it to her. Back then, I was very sensitive about my work. Too sensitive. But she loved it. She understood it.”
“What did she understand about your work?” Dylan asked.
“It’s hard to say exactly,” Vachlan said, flipping through the yellowed pages. “This story was loosely based on my life. It’s about a man who achieves world domination, but the entire time that he’s fighting to conquer the world—he feels empty. He feels ill-at-ease with his own power, and he doesn’t really want it. I guess, he keeps looking for something to bring him down. He’s seeking his own end. Then, when he finally gets conquered by a force greater than himself… he finds peace.”
“So, it’s a story about loneliness?” Dylan asked. “A lack of love?”
“Yes,” Vachlan responded. He smiled. “As I said, I was very young when I wrote it, and I’d only seen really negative things happen around me in the world. I had never really had a true connection with someone until I met Visola. Frankly, I think the story is horrible. That’s why I recently re-wrote it.”
“What did you change?” Dylan asked.
“Four main things. First, I made the main character a female,” Vachlan said with a smile. “I used to see myself in the lonely warrior, but now I see Visola. Second, I made it relevant to recent events. Instead of having the fighting take place mostly in Europe and Africa like in the original story, I had the main character destroy the United States of America. Third, I gave the main character a family. I gave her a husband who loves her unconditionally, even when she’s killing tens of millions of people. I also gave her two adorable children. Fourth… I gave the story a happy ending.”
“Those all sound like excellent changes,” Dylan said, making plenty of notes.
“Yes. I have considered using Ivory and Ronan to play the parts of the children,” Vachlan mused, “but I worry that it might seem like cheap theatrics.”
“Cheap theatrics?” Dylan asked.
“Yes. The movie is for Visola. It’s my trump card.”
“It’s for her?” Dylan asked. “In what way?”
“She’s going to see it,” Vachlan explained. “I’m going to pour a shitload of money into advertising. There will be posters and billboards everywhere. She’ll see the title, and she’ll read the synopsis, and she’ll recognize and remember. It’s important to us. I still remember sitting cross-legged on a small bed across from her in a ship’s cabin, and listening to her talk about my story with such excitement. It meant as much to her as it did to me. I know that.”
“What did it mean?” Dylan asked.
“It meant that we both needed something to live for, so we decided to live for each other. It meant that we both felt vastly superior to our peers, both physically and mentally, and this bored us. So we decided to challenge each other so we could continue to grow. It meant that we discovered, through our feelings on this story, in that moment, that we were two parts of the same person. We were each other’s missing half. Soulmates...” Vachlan trailed off in memory. “It sounds cheesy, but that is literally the way it is. There was never any going back from that. I tried to put centuries, and half the planet between us, but once I found her, there was no letting go. She was always there. Every time I looked in the mirror, and she wasn’t beside me, I only saw half a man. Do you know what I mean? Dylan?”
The doctor had taken off his glasses and was holding his face in both of his hands. His shoulders were moving a little erratically.
“Dylan?” Vachlan said with concern. He got up and moved around the desk, to take the man by the shoulders. “Dylan! Dylan, look at me. Are you okay?”
“No,” the doctor whispered. “How can I ever be okay again?”
“I’m sorry,” Vachlan said. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”
“I do know what you mean—about soulmates.” Dylan could not seem to stop crying. “I didn’t even have one year with her.”
Vachlan moved away to sit on Dylan’s desk. He sighed and strummed his fingers on the wooden surface. He happened to glance down, and was startled to see the doctor’s notebook open near his hand. The notes were surprisingly simple and repetitive. Written over and over again in the doctor’s neat handwriting, was a single word:
Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna. Sionna.
“Dylan?” Vachlan said with concern. He picked up the notebook and rifled through it. He found hundreds of pages covered in the same way. “Good god, man! How long have you been doing this?”
The doctor gestured up to a shelf that contained several dozen notebooks.
Vachlan moved over to the shelf, and began to rifle through them. He found at least ten notebooks that had only Sionna’s name written in them from cover to cover. Finally, he managed to find a book that had actual coherent sentences. The final real entry was dated on the day of Sionna’s death. They were notes on her lecture from the conference in Cairo. Vachlan turned back to the blonde man, and fixed him with a pensive look. “This can’t be healthy,” Vachlan informed him.
“It’s not,” Dylan replied with a smile. “You probably should have let me shoot myself in the head, that day.”
“No,” Vachlan said. “You’ll get better. I promise, you will.”
“Am I supposed to be counseling you, or are you supposed to be counseling me?” Dylan asked sadly. He sighed. “Vachlan, I can’t do this. I’m too close to the situation. When you talk about your wife that way, I think about her sister. I feel jealous of you, because you had things—you have things I will never have. I can’t be impartial. I think you need a new therapist.”
“No,” Vachlan said. “I don’t just want an impartial, logical counseling session, man. I’m not just here because Elandria said she would take my children away unless I got therapy. I’m not just here because I’m seriously messed up in the head. I’m here because you’re my friend. We went through something together that really messed us both up. I’m not going to ever be comfortable speaking to another human being about what happened in that car, in Cairo. But you were there. You cared as much as I did—maybe more. No one else can understand what that day was like.”
Dylan nodded, tearfully.
“This?” Vachlan said, holding up the notebook covered in Sionna’s name. “This is what my therapist should be writing. This is the whole point. This is the heart of the matter. This is the reason for everything that’s happening. The whole world should know and understand, but they don’t.”
“I want to help you do everything you need to do,” Dylan told Vachlan. “I want to help you be the best father you can be. I want to help you find your wife and reach her, and pull her back from her madness. But how? How can I do that, when I’m dealing with my own madness?”
Vachlan reached out and placed his hand on his friend’s shoulder again. “We’re all a little psychotic. All of us. You and I are going to talk this out, as much as we need to. We’re going to get through this together. We’re going to counsel each other. Okay?”
Dylan nodded again. “Vachlan… I think there’s something I need to show you.”
He cleared his throat, and replaced his glasses on his nose. “But if you’re going to counsel me, you need to keep this confidential. It’s very important to me, and could get me in a lot of trouble.”
“Sure,” Vachlan said in confusion. “Not a problem, mate.”
Dr. Rosenberg rose to his feet and moved out of the office, gesturing for Vachlan to follow. He walked up the stairs of the house. “I stay here because it’s where she stayed, you know. I do everything I can to be close to her.”
“I know,” Vachlan said.
“Please, try to understand what I’m about to show you,” Dylan implored. He opened the door to his bedroom, and gestured for Vachlan to enter.
With a curious expression, Vachlan entered the room. His jaw dropped. “Holy shit, man! You—you did not… you…”
“I’m sorry,” Dylan said, moving forward to place his palms against the cryonic glass casket. “I just couldn’t let them cremate her. What are we, barbarians?”
Vachlan exhaled in amazement. “Whose body did they burn?”
“Just some dead woman I stole from the morgue,” Dylan said with a shrug.
Vachlan nodded in approval. He moved forward and examined the body, feeling a little shiver at her perfect state of serenity. While frozen, Sionna looked like she was merely sleeping. Dylan had even arranged flowers around her body; her favorite oleander. “Why are you showing this to me?” Vachlan asked.
“I figured that you would understand. Since you told me the story about taking that strand of Visola’s hair from the motel room…” Dylan cleared his throat. “I know this is much more than a single strand of hair, but it’s the same concept. I couldn’t lose her altogether.”
“Why is this in your bedroom?” Vachlan asked.
“So I can see her every day when I wake up, and before I go to bed,” the doctor answered.
“Dylan…” Vachlan said. “The moment you start keeping a dead woman frozen in your bedroom is the moment you should seriously consider doing something other than counseling others on their mental health for a living.”
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