Vessel, Book I: The Advent

by Tominda Adkins

Corin stared at his Rolex in horror for the tenth straight minute, listening to the chortling over the long distance line. He was never going to get to the marathon in time. Never. Making it out of the ER without a passport or any form of ID had taken long enough. Now he was being subjected, for the hundredth time, to his father's story about losing a bet in Morocco and spending the next day wearing a beach towel. The humor was somehow lost on Corin, who was presently shoeless in the November chill, hopping from foot to foot in a Chinatown phone booth.

  Twenty minutes later, after hop-stepping speedily for ten blocks (it's impossible to get a cab without shoes and a wallet, no matter how outrageously wealthy you claim to be), Corin returned to his room at the Wellington, activated his backup Sabre phone, cancelled the stolen credit cards, requested a duplicate passport, devoured six packets of oatmeal, properly hydrated himself, threw on his running gear, and successfully hailed a cab. He used the time in traffic for followup emails, explanations and apologies for missed meetings. He had to keep his mind busy.

  He had to keep his mind busy or else he wouldn't be able to run. Out of the country, maybe. But not in the marathon.

  Corin had seen, in his head, what Jesse and Ghi had seen. You'd think that he wouldn't have been able to do much in a coherent, professional manner after that, and you'd be right. There were plenty of errors in those emails, and his running shorts were on backwards. But he made it to the marathon registration somehow, breathless, dizzy, and with fifteen minutes left to stretch before go-time.

  The day's air was cold and sharp, with a patchy overcast blanket admitting bold rays of sun. Several news helicopters waltzed around over the island, and sponsors were granting their well-wishes and advertisements over an obnoxiously loud speaker system. Everything was shining and splendid. Corin tried to focus on that and found it impossible. He slapped on his number and took his place in the eager throng of people behind the starting line.

  He was terrified.

  None of this was logical. It couldn’t possibly happen. Over the heads of the ten thousand or so people in front of him, Corin could see Liberty’s torch, and his mind rushed to the morning ahead.

  He just wanted to focus on running. That was all.

  The pistols flared and cracked the air. The marathon mass lurched forward towards the bridge, and Corin started pacing along just as he had for the past seven years, not expecting to place, just excited to be there.

  But this year was doomed to be difficult. No matter how hard he consciously tried, Corin couldn't appreciate the feeling of striding with all those strangers across the bridge, of watching the Manhattan skyline bob in front of him as he ran, or the chilly, stale New York air pushing into his lungs.

  He was thinking about what was supposed to happen. He was thinking of what he could do to convince himself that nothing was going to happen.

  By the time he had reached Times Square, somewhere in the first third of all the runners, he had structured a total solution for himself. He would finish this race and walk back to the Wellington for a relaxing evening. He would put off work until morning, then hunt down and confirm logical, medical excuses for his recent afflictions. He would go down to the hotel's lounge to watch marathon coverage, reward himself with several drinks before calling it a night, and get back down to business the next day.

  By the time the marathon route took him past the Wellington itself, Corin was so pleased with this idea that he was almost enjoying himself.

  Then he saw Ghi walking out of the hotel's front doors.

  Ghi saw him too.

  Ghi ran. Fast. Down the sidewalk. In the opposite direction.

  Shouting some unintelligible religious profanity, Corin darted sideways mid-stride. Some thing―some roaring, crashing, impulse of a thing―took over, and before he knew what he was doing, he'd cut in front of countless other runners, hurtled over the marker tape and through a glob of spectators, and started sprinting down the sidewalk.

  He kept shouting. Ghi kept running. People along the sidewalk showed only mild interest. There was a marathon going on, after all, and this was Manhattan.

  Ghi fled into a wide alley and pushed himself forward as hard as he could, looking back over his shoulder again and again at his pursuant. His veins exploded with adrenaline terror. He had seen that face. He had seen it in the dreams. He should never have come here. Call Dr. Avery. Call 9-1-1. Run inside somewhere.

  Just keep running. That was really the only feasible option. Ghi ran into every connecting alley he came to, hoping to put some more distance between himself and this berserk runner, maybe lose him at a turn. Eventually, he found himself at one end of a long, greasy stretch between two gigantic buildings. The loading driveways were gated off. There was no way to run but straight ahead.

  Ghi's head buzzed. His vision split and he felt a nose bleed coming on. He'd been told to take it easy, to avoid excitement so as not to wreck the results of any immediate testing. But he didn’t think about that, not with a marathon runner chasing him, yelling like a European dictator between sharp puffs of breath.

  He could feel himself slowing down despite the effort he was throwing into his strides, but he could hear Corin losing power, too. The pace dropped steeply. With the open street still over a hundred yards away, they were both loping along pathetically. Ghi moved just fast enough to stay ahead of Corin, and together they looked like a couple of senior citizen Olympians.

  Running out of breath, Corin decided to quit yelling and start negotiating.

  "Please!" he gasped, giving it all he had to sound sincere. "Just stop!"

  Ghi ignored him.

  "Come on!"

  Ghi tossed a look over his shoulder, kept going.

  "I just!―wanna talk!" Corin slurred between breaths.

  "Why!" Ghi squawked and galloped ahead, shouting one forced word at a time:"―should!―I trust!―you!?"

  "Because!―I don't!―want!―to run!―anymore!" Corin sputtered back. Feeling totally absurd, but seeing no other choice if he was to save them both from cardiac arrest, he simply shouted the word.

  "Vessel!"

  That tripped a gear in Ghi's pace, but it did not make him want to stop. In fact, it had quite the opposite effect. But Ghi was going to have to stop soon, and he knew it. His legs could not guarantee him that they would outlast Corin's.

  He looked over his shoulder again, still still hurling himself forward. "Let’s stop! Same time!"

  "Agreed!"

  "Promise!" Ghi warned.

  "Okay!" Corin screamed.

  "Now!" Ghi screamed back.

  Their footsteps drummed to a stop.

  With many yards still between them, they both doubled over and heaved in air for a solid minute. The sounds of the city hummed in and bounced off the buildings, filling their ears between breaths. Ghi maintained a distrustful watch out of the corner of his eye, ready to run again, but Corin kept his word. He didn't move an inch closer.

  The moment they stood upright to face one another, Ghi’s barrier of caution began to dissolve.

  Corin was exactly as Ghi remembered him from the steps of that star-shaped platform. The man standing before him now was lean and broad-shouldered, possessing both a swimmer's build and a commanding posture. His pale, noble face flushed red with pumping blood under a layer of freckles, and his rust-colored hair was darkened with sweat.

  Dually unnerved and relieved, Corin smiled in spite of himself. He, too, fully recognized Ghi. Here, without a solitary doubt, was a live fragment of that maddening, recurrent dream.

  In contrast to Corin, Ghi had little in the way of shape―from what Corin could glean anyway. The guy was packing at least two layers of sweaters under his outermost Red Socks hoodie. If one had to guess, Ghi was a slouching, noodly individual beneath all that, wearing only as much muscle as testosterone naturally allotted him. His complexion was one of coffee with a dash of cream and his features, to Corin at least, looked unplaceably Middle-Eastern: spiraling black hair, a permanent five o'clock
shadow, a prominent nose, and intense, golden eyes―one of which was disproportionately dilated and lazing to the upper left at the moment.

  Gusts of wind blew the pickled alley air between them, carrying the distant sounds of traffic and marathon cheering. Neither of them spoke for some immeasurable time, until Corin shrugged and stepped forward, diplomatically reaching his hand out.

  "Corin," he said. "Corin Livingston."

  Ghi hesitated for only a moment before taking his hand.

  "Ghiyath Ayman. Ghi's fine."

  They shook. And then they stood in complete silence again. What the hell would you say next?

  Hi! I'm made entirely out of light energy and I have dreams about you.

  Nope. No good at all.

  Ghi resumed his natural position: arms folded, shoulders up as if trying to guard his ears, feet shifting back and forth. Corin reached for his pockets, realizing only then that his running shorts were on backwards. He tapped his fingers casually on his sides instead, rocking back on his heels.

  "Are we on the same page here?" he asked finally. "Do you understand? What ... what we are?"

  Ghi's eyes darkened. The lazy one was beginning to come back into alignment again. He sighed. Definitely should've stayed in Boston.

  "Probably not any more than you do," he said.

  Corin watched his own breath puff out in front of him, and he nodded. He'd expected as much.

  "Yeah, then. Same page," he said. He looked down the length of the alley and then back to Ghi again. "I think you and I could use a drink."