The Arcana

by Matt Hiebert

VII.

  The next morning, Stokes calls me to his office. Borges is there, frantically chewing gum.

  “Last night, Justice went to your room,” the general says. “What did she want?”

  At first, a part of me wants to lie, or at least hide the truth from them. I decide not to. I want them to know at least some of it.

  “She wanted to talk. She said something big is about to come through. She said it’s coming for her.”

  Stokes looks at Borges as if something has been confirmed between them.

  “Did she say anything else?”

  For a second I almost tell them the rest. That she asked me to join the Hand even if I’m not summoned. But I don’t. I don’t want them to know that part. What if they try to stop me? What if they try to force me to go?

  “No. Just that she’s worried.”

  “Did she tell you what made her think that?” Borges asks. He knows that Justice has no means of divination. Each member of the Arcana has their own talents. Seeing the future is not one of hers.

  I shake my head. “She said she just knew. What’s going on?”

  Borges crosses his arms, weighing his words, deciding how much to tell me.

  “Something is shifting,” he says. “The Arcana is changing.”

  “Changing?”

  Borges takes the gum out of his mouth and throws it in Stokes’ trash can.

  “The Hierophant died last night. Heart attack.”

  I am stunned. Not just at the news that someone I knew has died, but how. A member of the Arcana hasn’t died of natural causes in a while. Never, actually.

  “Heart attack? Has he been replaced?” I suddenly feel bad about asking such a cold and practical question, but neither of the men react with judgment.

  “Yeah,” Stokes says. “But not in the regular way.”

  They both look at me as if expecting something.

  “What do you mean?” I ask.

  Borges sits in a metal chair in front of Stokes’ mosaic of computer monitors.

  “The Hermit has become the Hierophant,” he says. “One trump has become another.”

  I am more stunned by this news than that of the old man’s death. There is something….unnatural…. about the development.

  “How can that happen?”

  Borges shrugs.

  “Did Justice talk to you about anything else? Did she mention anything out of the ordinary?” Stokes asks again. Do they know? Are they testing me? Even if they have our rooms bugged they wouldn’t be able to understand us. They’re grasping at straws.

  I shake my head pretending to search my memory but coming up empty.

  “No. Nothing.”

  Borges rubs his eyes. I can tell he’s been up for a while.

  “We think the stakes are rising,” he says. “Justice and the Hermit have been shutting the demons down before they even manage to make it over. We think Justice is right. The other side is gearing up for something big. A few minutes before he died, the Hierophant dropped one more prophecy.”

  Borges pulls out a folded sheet of yellow notebook paper from his shirt pocket.

  “We only got the end of it.” He clears his throat and begins reciting the inscription in monotone, without the drama and passion usually delivered by the Hierophant. “….ignites the fires of our fears/And through the flames/ Moloch appears.”

  “Moloch?” I am not familiar with the name. It is not a caste of demon I’ve ever heard of.

  “Another name from the Old Testament,” Stokes says. “A real bastard according to Wikipedia. We think they’re sending the worst they’ve got.”

  There have been four Baals since the demons came. The first of them leveled a city, killed a quarter of million people and twelve members of the Arcana before it was stopped. I killed the second one, Justice killed the last two. The thought of something more horrific than those creatures coming into the world sends ice up my spine. My mouth goes dry and I try to subdue my imagination.

  “What could be worse than a Baal?” I ask myself out loud.

  “Don’t know,” Borges answers. “But I think we’re going to find out.”

  I push myself up from the chair not even trying to hide my dread. Fear churns in the hollow of my stomach. If Justice is right, I’m out of it. I don’t have to go back out and face those things again. Why should I? Whatever’s running this nightmare doesn’t want me anymore. Maybe there’s a good reason for it. Maybe I’ve done my time and I could just walk out the door if I wanted. Head to Idaho.

  As I walk down the hallway toward Justice’s room, the thought crosses my mind to try and leave. I should just turn around, head toward the wall and see if it opens. If it does I can just keep walking right out of the compound, past the airstrip, into the world.

  A world that is under siege by demons. A world being smashed, burned and devoured by monsters. A world where Justice needs my help.

  I want more information. I want to talk to Justice again. I approach the child’s room and the wall opens.

  She is sitting in the dark. The only light in the room is the glow from her sword.

  “Hi,” she says looking up at me.

  “Hey.”

  I enter and the wall closes.

  “Just talked to Stokes and Borges. They were asking questions about you.”

  “Oh, yeah?” She doesn’t care. At some point the military and science people become playful nuisances. Their scrambling and puzzling becomes a drama of futility that occurs around you, something to distract you from the boredom between the summonings, but nothing more.

  “They wanted to know what you said to me last night.”

  She stands, picks up her TV remote and turns on the huge, black, eighty-four inch screen at the other end of her room. A top-of-the-line Sony. Cartoons fill the rectangle with color and stupidity. She’s not being rude. I think she turned it on for me.

  “What’d you say?”

  I sit in the chair next to the bed with us both facing the television. Poorly animated turtles, rabbits, and, I think, possums chase each other within a brightly colored forest.

  “I told them you said something big was coming. I told them you said it was coming for you.”

  A bug-eyed eagle swoops down on the cartoon animals, scolding them about something.

  “Did they tell you the Hierophant died?” she asks.

  “Yes.”

  “Did they tell you the Hermit took his place?”

  “Yes.”

  “Weird.”

  “Yes, it is.”

  “Things are changing.”

  “Seems that way.”

  I look around the room. There are stuffed animals, sketch pads, empty soda cans and teen magazines scattered around the floor. Against the wall is a cluttered desk. I see a Rider-Waite tarot deck fanned out over its surface. Like all of us who’ve made it more than a few weeks, she seeks meaning within the cards, looking for some clue to her existence in their design.

  I also see something else, something that makes me stand up and cross the room.

  A pile of white envelopes is carefully stacked on the edge of the desk. There is no postage on any of them. I pick one up. They all say the same thing on the front. “To Stephanie Sappington.” There is no return address, but on the other side, a single sentence pleads in all capital letters: PLEASE WRITE ME BACK – MOM.

  None of the letters are open.

  “You should write your mother,” I say, but instantly feel bad about it. What do I know to give such advice?

  The kid just keeps watching the funny animals on television and acts as if nothing was said. I put the letter back on the four-inch-high stack where I found it.

  I look up at the cartoon. The animals are all holding hands and dancing as the credits roll up the screen. A happy ending for all.

  “I’m changing, too,” Justice says. The words give me some kind of jolt.

  “How?”

  She shrugs. “I’m becoming something else.
Another one of the cards.”

  “Which one?”

  She shrugs again, a big high-shouldered shrug like kids give when they don’t want to talk about something.

  “Okay. You can tell me when you’re ready.” My gaze falls to the fanned out cards on the desk. I notice one card is on the top of the pile. Its edges are bent from attention and examination. The image on the card shows a gold disk upon which a blue sphinx sits clutching a sword. Four golden creatures occupy each corner of the card. Anubis, the Egyptian god of the Dead, bears the disk upon his back.

  It is the Wheel of Fortune.

  I turn to Justice and see she is staring at me, knowing that I know.

  “I’m sure everything is going to be okay,” I say.

  She turns back to the television where a commercial for fruit-flavored candy explodes in high-definition color.

  Our conversation is over. My leader is dismissing me.

  Without saying good bye, I leave. As I walk down the curving hallway to my own room I seek meaning behind the coming change.

  There has never been a Wheel of Fortune. Now there’s going to be. What will her powers be? What does it mean to the Arcana? To the world?

  In my room, the wall closes behind me. I am left in darkness. I do not turn on the light. I do not turn on the TV. I just lie on the bed and hide in the dark. Sleep comes and goes throughout the night, but it is never restful.

  Morning comes and the Enclave fills with activity. I am sluggish, emotionally exhausted, worried. I slog over to the commissary to grab some food. There’s a lot of commotion for this time of day. Many of the Arcana are milling about talking to each other. Some seem distraught, their arms crossed, frowning.

  The Lovers is speaking loudly to Strength, almost shouting. She has a British accent. Or maybe Australian.

  “Because that’s what she wants, that’s why!” Her card has a plural name but she is only one person. Her power is the ability to duplicate the power of any other Arcana. All she has to do is hold their hand. I often wonder why we have never been in a Hand together. If there were two of us with my power, the probability of failure would be halved.

  Other members of the Arcana come out of their rooms and join the crowd. Soon all them are here.

  “What’s going on?” I ask Judgment, a short, big-boned woman from South America.

  “Justice wants us to go out. No one’s been summoned but she’s asked us all to go. All of us. Some people don’t think we should do it.”

  This is unprecedented. Without waiting to be summoned, the child wants to form the largest Hand ever assembled. A Hand with every member.

  This is it.

  “We should go,” I say loud enough so everyone can hear me, because now I know. I know what I will do. The moment has come and my choice is made without struggle or doubt. “If Justice says we should go, we should go.”

  The others stop and listen. I turn and address them all.

  “I don’t know how much you already know, but something big is coming. Whoever… whatever…is sending the demons is sending over the worst it’s got.”

  I see fear form on some faces. Disbelief on a few. Resolution on others.

  “Justice has led us to clear victory over the past few months,” I say. “The demons are upping the odds.”

  “What does that mean?” the Magician asks me. The golden infinity symbol magically inlayed into his forehead sparkles like real gold.

  What does it mean? “I don’t know, maybe…”

  “It means they are afraid,” the young voice comes from the great room and we are all riveted by its timbre. Justice walks forward with her thumbs hooked in her belt. Only she’s not Justice. Her flesh, hair and eyes have become solid, vivid blue. The color of a bright sky.

  The new Hierophant follows a few steps behind her. The old Thai farmer cuts a more impressive swath than his predecessor. He seems taller. The marks upon his face are in a different, more dramatic, configuration. He walks with his shoulders back, chin high. Here is a man who sees the future and is confident in his vision, not filled with dread.

  Everyone is silent, dealing with what they are seeing in different ways. We know what’s happened to her. Somewhere deep within our souls, we know.

  “They’re about to throw everything they have at us,” the child continues as she moves to the center of the crowd. Her sword still rests upon her hip but I notice it has changed. It is no longer of simple shape. Now it bears an elaborately serrated edge. Its once featureless cross guard is now ornate with flourish and detail. “They were trying to stop me before I changed. But they failed.”

  I can feel the members galvanizing. Even the ones who had been hesitant now hang upon her words.

  “Justice is no more. I am now the Wheel,” she says, the words slow and measured. “And I have the power to stop this.”

  Airmen, soldiers and scientists have gathered further back, listening, hoping to understand what she’s saying by our reactions.

  “In a few minutes, we will all leave this place and face the greatest threat the Arcana has ever known,” the Wheel says as she walks through the crowd. “We will face a foe beyond the horrors of our imagination -- an enemy beyond the limits of our minds.”

  It is not a child speaking to us now, but a symbol.

  “The monsters we have faced for the last five years are not creatures born into the universe. They are created. They were found in the dark side of our own nature. They are hatred, anger and fear. They are war, lust and greed. They are manifestations of all that is broken within humanity. They are the monsters we must conquer to free ourselves from ourselves.” The Wheel winds through the group making sure to make eye contact with all of them. “They are the demons we must defeat if we are to continue. They are us.”

  No shred of doubt remains among the Arcana now. Fear still shows on the faces of some, but resolve forms the dominant expression. What is the word for the feeling a human feels when they embrace their destiny? I guess there cannot be one. It is different for all of us.

  The Wheel stands and nods at the woman who is the Lovers. “Join with the Chariot to form a vehicle that can carry everyone.”

  Without hesitation, the Chariot and the Lovers walk into the great room. They join hands and a shimmer of light takes shape beneath their feet. But the shape is not a disk as it has always been before. Now it is two circles joined at their edges. The sign of infinity.

  With the vehicle formed, the Arcana gathers upon its glowing surface. There are eighteen of us. Across the room I see Stokes and Borges watching with concern.

  The vehicle rises and approaches the ceiling, but the Enclave does not open.

  The Wheel moves to the front edge of the sheet of light. She raises her hand and gently touches the shell ceiling with her fingertips.

  “Open,” she whispers.

  Seconds pass and nothing happens. Will we not be allowed to leave?

  “It is time,” the child whispers. Another few seconds pass in nervous silence and then there is movement within the ceiling. The Enclave obliges and a portal to the world parts like melting ice.

  Released, all who are the Arcana soar into the blazing morning sky and fly off to face our destiny.