The Great Altruist

by Z. D. Robinson

  “I don’t understand,” the girl said, finally pushing her long, red hair out of her face.

  “I know,” he said, extending a small finger between the bars of her cage for consolation. “They want you to create chaos and war, but I won’t allow that. They don’t know this, but you will soon be incapable of revenge. Whatever time and place you escape to will be far grander than this miserable place. Moreover, you will never need to return. You will only remember enough to remove the fear you feel now.”

  “Who are you?” she finally asked.

  He only smiled. “You might say I’m your father. And yet, I cannot give you a name as the Fuhrer has already chosen one for someone of your...uniqueness. Your name will be Genesis.”

  “But won’t I forget that too?”

  He chuckled. “Very clever girl.” He removed a tiny syringe from his pocket. “Do you see this?”

  She nodded.

  “When I inject you with this, a powerful drug will permanently imprint on your mind only what you need to know about yourself. Whatever treasures lurk beneath, you will need to discover on your own.”

  She approached the door to the cage and remained still as the man gently injected the syringe into her arm, but nothing happened.

  “You’ll feel its effects soon enough.” He looked behind him as a loud noise came from outside the laboratory.

  “Come,” he gestured toward her, “you need to leave now.”

  He removed a key from his belt and opened the door. The man gently lifted her up, placed her in his shirt pocket, and held his coat together.

  “Please be quiet, my dear,” he said.

  The man carried her to the door of the laboratory and into the hallway. It was silent. A moment later, alarms sounded.

  “Oh, no,” he muttered. He looked down at Genesis. “They’re tracking us, or more to the point: you. No matter – where you’re going, they cannot follow. I may have given them my people’s technology to the wrong people, but that’s my problem. Besides, I’ve kept the best parts for you.”

  “I’m scared,” she said.

  “That’s good,” he replied dryly. “Don’t hold back your emotions. Or else you’ll never make it out of here.”

  Down the hall, a stream of German guards stormed toward the scientist. They stopped as they neared him and drew their weapons.

  “On the ground, Doctor,” one of them barked.

  “Heil Hitler!” the scientist said plainly, but insincerely.

  “Hand over the woman!” they shouted.

  “I’m afraid I can’t do that,” he said.

  “All we want is the girl,” another guard demanded.

  “You won’t get her back now. It’s too late.”

  One of the soldiers approached the scientist cautiously, when emerging from his pocket was the small girl surrounded by an intense blue light.

  The soldier stopped, but it was indeed too late. The small ball of light encompassing Genesis exploded in all directions and all of the soldiers fell to the ground. She hovered in mid-air and appeared confused, but the scientist egged her on, whispering: “Don’t hold back!”

  She nodded and let all of her anger surface. The scientist smiled with delight. Bright azure light emanated from within (and around) her once more.

  The soldiers looked up and saw the ball of light grow bigger and getting closer. Most of them covered their heads. While the once mighty group of soldiers now lay defeated on the ground, one fearless soul among them looked up and reached for his gun. The blue light blinded him as it continued to grow more brilliant. He raised his sidearm and tried to focus on the source of light above them. Shaking, he pulled the trigger. The blast struck the scientist in the back.

  “No!” the scientist cried.

  The last thing Genesis saw was the kind expression on the dying man’s face, a look that assured her everything would be all right.

  In an instant, she was alone in a deserted and quiet oasis with not a sound to be heard other than her own breathing. A moment later, the abundant sounds of nature surrounded her, but true to the man’s word, she remembered nothing of her past, just enough of the present to calm her pulse, and an overwhelming hope for the future. As promised, she feared no more.

  The home of the Grant family appeared serene from the outside and nothing seemed able to disrupt its stillness. Tangled strands of ivy clung comfortably to the window shutters like too many cobwebs in a deserted attic. The sun shone down on the bed of daisies in the neighbor's yard, but shone on nothing in the Grant yard.

  Finally, the sound of a rumbling diesel engine shattered the silence. Glass on the windows began to rattle. A truck slowed down in front of the Grant home and made an abrupt stop as though something behind it were nudging it. The truck's engine was still running as a scruffy-looking man exited the driver's side of the vehicle and walked to the back of the flatbed. He tinkered with a couple levers and the bed lowered a small, crippled Honda hatchback to the ground. From around the back of the truck, a young man approached the driver.

  “Anywhere but here, please?” he asked as he held out a twenty dollar bill.

  The man smirked and shook his head. “I'm afraid I can't help, kid.”

  “But my father will kill me if he sees I wrecked the car!”

  The driver shrugged his shoulders and within a few seconds, the Honda was on the ground and the man worked quickly to untie the car from the hitch. The man hurried back in the truck and drove off. The stillness returned eventually, but the young man felt no calm as he stared at the totaled vehicle stranded in front of his parent's home.

  What am I going to do now? he thought. He covered his face with his hands and rubbed his eyes, as though foolishly thinking it was all a dream. His bright, blue eyes focused on the damaged fender, the flat tire, and the smashed headlights. Frantically, he ran his fingers through his brown hair and nervously scratched his scalp. I'm so dead.

  He hurried inside the house and ran upstairs to his room to change his clothes. Minutes later, he heard another car stop in front of the house. He ran to the bathroom window and saw his father get out of the car. His father shook his head as he looked at the ruined Honda and climbed the stairs to the house as fast as he could.

  “James!” his father yelled as he walked through the front door and slammed the door behind him.

  The young man sprinted downstairs to meet his father. “I know what you're going to ask, but there's nothing I can say to make this better,” he said.

  “I just want to know what happened this time.”

  “The same thing as ever, Dad. The same thing that got me fired, the same reason you and Mom hate me.”

  “Your mother and I don’t hate you and don’t change the subject again. And if you're telling the truth about the car, then this problem of yours has gotten out of control.”

  “It's not a problem, Dad. You and Mom just won't accept it!”

  “Accept what, James? That a girl who broke your heart three years ago has ruined your life? You're right about one thing: The girl isn't the problem. She never has been. The problem is you!”

  James shrugged off his father's words and began to walk away.

  “James!” his father shouted, standing taller on his toes in a weak bid to project authority. “Don't walk away when I'm talking to you.”

  James ignored him and ran up the stairs. “I don't have a problem, Dad. I just want her back.”

  His father slammed the front door cursing as he stormed out of the house and drove off a moment later, leaving James alone in the house.

  The girl his father referred to was Katherine. James met her on the Internet and fell for her immediately. They agreed to meet face to face and the meeting went beautifully as James recalled. She broke his heart when she went home and never made contact with James again. She never answered his phone calls, his letters, and e-mails. He actually wondered if she had died, which would have explained her sudden disappearance. Unknown to him, Katherine was alive and well and movi
ng on with her life.

  James had not. Three long years went by, but James refused to give up hope for their relationship. The photographs, drawings, and paintings of her that decorated his room were a testament to that.

  His life spiraled out of control not long after she left. He lost several jobs, two different cars (due to accidents brought on by daydreaming), and the respect of his family. His parents suggested he receive professional help since his obsession with Katherine had crossed over into what they perceived was "dangerous territory." They feared his depression would lead to more paranoid, even psychotic, behavior. James disregarded all their concerns as rubbish. He felt no hatred for Katherine. He only wanted an explanation from her why she left. A reason was all he needed. “Why couldn't she have given me that at least?” he often asked them. The therapy his parents encouraged, which James reluctantly agreed to, did little to curb the daydreaming. He felt no need to move on; he firmly rejected any assertion that she had dominated his life.

  Above the bed in his room was an enlarged picture of Katherine attached to the ceiling. The picture was taken in a forest with a blanket of autumn-colored trees surrounding the petite girl of twenty years. She leaned against the only evergreen in the photograph and faced the camera with her beaming smile while her long, auburn hair flowed past her shoulders. Her arms were folded loosely beneath her breasts. My God, she is beautiful, he thought. Although the image taken during their day together should have brought a smile to James's face as it usually did, Katherine was not the only source of James's depression these days. On the contrary, her smile was his only source of comfort.

  James's parents were fighting again. He never noticed it much in the past: Katherine distracted him adequately enough. The arguments were now too frequent and combative to ignore. His sister was growing up; his parents had grown apart. They all spent less time at home. Their jobs and friendships kept them safely away from each other. Whether the arguments erupted between his sister and his parents, it seemed as though everyone in his family felt it necessary to leave home when problems overwhelmed them. To James, home was his only refuge. His room served as the only shelter in a storm and it served its purpose well since childhood. Times were much happier then and laughter was more common. The silence outside his room was normal now. James hated it.

  Katherine's smile from above his bed was the only constant in his life, despite what went on outside these four walls. While it provided him some relief as he dozed off to sleep, he also knew the time was rapidly approaching when Katherine would not be enough.

  Genesis sat up and climbed out of the tree that for the three months after her arrival served as her home. The field below was lush with all sorts of animal life, but there was no one like her in all her travels. She discovered her ability to fly a few hours after she left her maker's laboratory. Yet, even though it took her just days to circumnavigate the planet, all she found were endless varieties of plants and animals; she found no towns or cities.

  Although she didn't know why, she never felt scared about being alone. She felt fear of other things – for example, the creatures that were bigger than she was and made frequently attacks. On dark nights, when clouds covered the stars, she never slept; she spent all her time fending off mosquitoes and spiders.

  Why am I here? was her most persistent thought. True to her maker's words, she remembered nothing of her past except her name. She felt an overwhelming urge to help people like her, but no one else appeared to exist.

  As time passed, the woman began to sleep more easily. Her insomnia was cured permanently upon a remarkable discovery late one night. In a fight with several wasps, she was briefly overwhelmed and stung. Nothing happened. There was no mark on her skin; the stinger never punctured her. More than that, she felt no pain. The wasp, on the other hand, fell to its death within seconds and shriveled. After another wasp made a similar attempt – and with the same results – the swarm eventually moved away from her tree. Curious of the incident, the she provoked an attack on a menacing horde of spiders. This group of arachnids always sought the woman out at night and she usually ended up leaving for another tree. Here, she broke a twig from a branch and furnished it into a weapon. The spiders attacked fearlessly. After holding her ground for a few minutes, she allowed them to bite her. Again, as the fangs of the spider clamped down, her skin was never damaged. The spider, however, reeled in agony as the bite drove its fangs back into its head. The rest of the group ignored their fallen comrade and attacked Genesis from all sides. Overwhelmed and on her back as dozens of the spiders attempted to break through her skin, she suddenly lost her breath. Panicked and frightened, the girl tried to free herself. Less than a second later, she was free – and every spider was dead. She looked down at her hands and realized their deaths had not come from her super strength (an ability she discovered shortly after her first flight). Her hands glowed with a deep and pulsing red, as did her feet. She looked back at the spiders and saw nothing but a dozen tiny puddles of burning spider remains.

  “What have I done?” she whispered aloud.

  She stood still and tried to duplicate this new power, but nothing happened. “What's different?” she asked herself.

  Another group of spiders approached but when they saw the remains of the first bunch, they quickly retreated.

  “Come on!” she taunted. “Fight me!”

  The spiders scurried out of the tree as quickly as their eight legs would carry them. Within minutes, no other insects remained in the tree – all of them had run for their lives.

  That night, Genesis lied on her back in peace and came to realize the downside to her nudity. The seasons were changing and the night air caused an uncomfortable shiver. As she grabbed several leaves and fashioned a blanket, she pondered the events of the day. Why can't I get hurt? How did I kill those spiders? None of her other powers seem to require any effort to occur. But now, when she discovered what might be her most useful power, a means to generate warmth, she could not repeat it. As she drifted off to sleep, she imagined what it would be like to find someone else like her.

  Come morning, a new creature – one that she never saw before – awakened her. This one was much larger than the insects she'd seen previously, but it was much smaller than any of the beasts she saw on the ground. The animal, covered in hair and shouting in short, halting screams, poked Genesis until she stirred. Immediately, she jumped up and pressed her back against the trunk. The creature inched closer to her and flashed its teeth. Suddenly, the young girl, yesterday so proud of herself for driving her enemies from her home, now felt frightened of this new predator. It stomped its foot on the branch and charged, when suddenly it happened. Genesis closed her eyes and heard a terrifying explosion. She peeked at her hands and saw them glowing again. Nothing could have prepared her for the sight before her. The creature, so intimidating and aggressive a moment ago, no longer existed in discernible form. She watched as the shock wave of whatever she produced wash over the animal, tearing its skin and flesh from its bones. When the tree settled to normal moments later, not a drop of blood remained on the bones of the creature. Its skeleton was dry and brittle to touch. Genesis stood in amazement as she witnessed what she was capable of doing. Joy returned to the young girl when she realized just what gave her this new power. Fear.

  Chapter 2

  James arose from bed about an hour later and went to the store to buy the family groceries. His father would be back eventually and, whether he and James’s mother stayed home or not, dinner would need to be prepared – if only for himself. He figured he should help out around the house since he was unemployed. At the very least, it would keep his father at bay; he hated that his son couldn't keep a job.

  Grocery shopping was more about doing the work everyone else neglected than being charitable. His mother, Becky, was seldom home. Chores always took a back seat to James's father who believed that laundry and dirty dishes were 'woman's work'. His sister, Melissa, was too busy with her boyfriend to be reliable
.

  As he arrived home from the store and approached the front door of the house, his hands full carrying the shopping bags, he heard a man from inside the house scream. He knew it was his father, although he never heard such a sound come out of the man. He left the groceries piled on the porch as he ran inside to see what was wrong. His mother was at the kitchen table crying, but it was James's father unleashing a torrent of profanity from upstairs. Between the sobs of his mother and his father's screams that echoed down the stairwell, James heard only gibberish, except for the foul names for womankind his father articulated clearly for his wife to hear. One word in particular propelled his mother's sobbing into full-blown wailing.

  "What happened?" James asked his mother as calmly as he could.

  She waved him away without a word as she blew her nose in a tissue and wiped her eyes with her hands. "Nothing," she said.