by Jason Letts
A subtle haze, like a fire of fog, drifted from his chest and faded into the clear air. Mira fell to his side as she tried to lean down, but it didn’t matter for the agony she felt. The sight of his stricken face and the impact of his sacrifice brought a sorrow sharp enough to pierce her confusion.
“Yannick!” she howled.
She touched his bristly, warm face and felt the life slipping out of it as the smoke gradually vanished above him. His breaths became almost non-existent, and a cold shiver paralyzed him.
“Was it too much to ask for a happy life?” he whispered through frozen lips.
“Yannick,” Mira screamed, leaning over and shaking him. Jeana and Kevin, themselves fighting back tears, pulled her away.
“He’s gone, sweetheart!” Jeana managed, choking up. The electron magnet had stopped running, and the stillness and the silence felt overwhelming.
“We never would have found you if he hadn’t shown us the way. We never would have gotten through the door without him. And it’s because of him that we still have you,” Kevin said, clutching his daughter and his wife in a forlorn embrace.
It hurt to look, but they couldn’t stop staring. Yannick lay on the tarnished and damaged tile with Flip Widget’s body just a few feet away. Having seen his power, they could finally start to make sense of him.
“He wanted my soul,” Mira murmured.
“A life’s work to understand himself all in vain. How we become slaves to our gifts,” Jeana shook her head.
“And now those powers return to the web of the universe to be reborn,” Kevin added.
Mira lost her balance and started to fall, but Kevin quickly caught her and supported her. The parents took stock of their daughter’s deplorable condition. Torment and torture still eroded her face. She felt ready to pass out or vomit at any moment.
“Mira, you need help. Tell me what to do?” Kevin demanded, holding her still and looking directly into her heavy eyes.
“Daddy, I’m not a real person. I’m sorry,” she said.
“Mira! What do you need to get better? Tell me!”
“Vitamin C.”
“Can we get it here?” Kevin asked, shaking her shoulders a little. His face wrinkled in agony. Her dire, disturbing condition made her parents fidget frantically.
“He locked the kitchen,” she mumbled, but it was enough for him to act on. Jeana took her as Kevin found the kitchen across the main hall. They heard heavy banging and Kevin rushed back.
“I found a bunch of bottles, but none of them are vitamins. They’re all acids and herbs. You have to help me here. I need you to tell me what to do,” he begged.
Mira scrunched her face and started to cry. So many factors overwhelmed her emotions, the pain she felt, the bodies, or the strain of thinking. In her present condition, she wouldn’t make it to the Darmen healer.
“I don’t remember. I’m so stupid,” she sobbed.
Kevin got up and made another trip to the kitchen. He brought back a handful of bottles and jars. They rolled around on the floor near where Mira leaned against her mother. Jeana suggested giving her a bit of all of them, but first Kevin started showing Mira the labels. She reached out and grabbed one of the jars on the floor. “Ascorbic acid. It’s this one.”
Kevin instantly had it open and emptied half the bottle into her mouth. The stinging powder hit her tongue and made her wince when she swallowed, but it would relieve her vitamin deficiency. Kevin lifted her to her feet.
“Is that it, Mira? Can we go?” he asked, ducking down to look into her teary eyes. He pulled her close and prepared to lift her onto his shoulder and carry her away from the scene of this horrid crime.
“No, daddy. We need his things,” she growled through her teeth, stopping him. Before he could ask her what she meant or dissuade her, Mira dropped to the floor and began floundering toward the bodies. Jeana and Kevin watched her crawl through the broken glass, numbed to the cuts they left on her arms and legs. She made it to Widget and slipped her hand in the chest pocket. Feeling around inside, she pulled out her mother’s bottle of tears and the blood stone. Her message had gotten through after all.
“You’re right,” she mumbled to his still, pale face. “It’s a matter of life and death.”
Slipping the stone back in her ear and the bottle in her pocket, she continued to wander about the room. Her movements seemed random and thoughtless, but she always managed to find something. Discovering a drawer of lighters and aerosol cans, she took one of each. On a wall, she found a pair of rubber gloves and a rope. She took them. Finally, a few Leyden Jars sat unused on a counter. She took one of them too. Her parents helped her gather the materials, making a pile near the doorway.
Though she said nothing, her move to the door signaled she had finished. The sun began to set, and her parents anxiously helped her leave. Mira staggered to the door, turning back once she had reached the center of the room. An afterthought came to her, and she looked at the massive machine aimed at the metal tablet. She studied it closely.
“It doesn’t do anything,” she observed.
Though Mira trudged to the doorway, Kevin looked down at Yannick’s body and gritted his teeth. “We have to bury him. Our family owes him that,” Kevin noted, and Jeana agreed. Kevin dragged his body through the open doors to the bare ground outside. He found a shovel among Widget’s tools. The light dimmed and each moment would delay crucial help for Mira, so he quickly dug into the ground, sprinkling Yannick until the dirt covered him from head to toe. He called for his family to join him, and the women emerged from the building. Jeana carried Mira’s bag full of the things she had acquired.
They looked at the small burial mound, which contained a friend they had only begun to know. The sun had all but set, and in that semi-darkness they offered their wishes for his peaceful rest. They didn’t need to say they would long remember him; they just knew they would.
Loath to lose any more time, and a long journey to Darmen still ahead, Kevin created a cloud to carry them off into the night. Rising into the air, Mira looked over the side at the rapidly shrinking laboratory. For so long her death had appeared certain, but her life had been traded for a friend’s instead. She had lost a part of herself down there, and now the only thing her mind could grab onto was the thought of recovering her sister. Her heart beat in her chest like a war drum, enflamed and unceasing.
Chapter 12: Reunion
Jeana made tiny whirlpools in the warm water with her hand. Her husband next to her and her daughter across from them, they sat together in the healer’s pool. Though it was early in the morning, they had already spent several hours in the water and their fingers had wrinkled into prunes. Only a few others occupied the pool, including the massive healer who meditated peacefully in the center. Hardly anyone stood around the edges, but that would change once the market opened.
Kevin and Jeana tried to talk lightheartedly as they played in the water, but hardly a minute went by when they didn’t glance at Mira to evaluate her recovery. The scratches and cuts had closed. The bruises softened and disappeared. The bags under her eyes and the dirt on her skin had vanished, almost as if the whole ordeal had never happened.
But no matter how healthy her skin looked or how long she spent in the water, Jeana and Kevin could tell scars from the experience would not wash off completely. It was in her eyes, which never opened as wide as they remembered. A weight pulled down her eyelids, and every glance now had the quality of untrusting scrutiny. She seemed distant. Mira wouldn’t respond to any of their old jokes. They could hardly get her to speak.
“You are looking so much better,” Jeana said, offering an encouraging smile.
“Darmen’s got to have the best healer in the entire world.” Kevin noted to fill the silence.
“Do you remember when you wanted to come here after breaking your ankle?” Jeana asked her daughter, who sat passively across from them.
“Sure beats eating hair,” Kevin added.
All those thing
s they thought they’d be talking about when they met again seemed off limits. Asking what she had learned, what she’d done, and where she’d traveled would only lead to the pain that still haunted her. While Jeana and Kevin tried to think of a new topic of conversation, they sat in silence. They too mourned their recent loss, not just of Yannick but also of the hopeful, naïve daughter they waved goodbye to at the gate of Corey Outpost. After a time, even talking about what had happened felt preferable to the silence.
“Corey came to us immediately when he heard of Widget’s treachery. He told us Widget had turned on you and taken you captive. We could’ve searched the northern mountains forever trying to find you, but all Yannick needed was something of yours to guide us to you. Fortunately there was still plenty of your hair lying about your room.”
“He finds like things,” Mira said.
“Yes, yes he does. Or did,” Jeana continued, flinching. “It turns out he’d been there before. You had sent him. From what he remembered of the place, and what had just happened to you, we knew we had been the victims of Widget’s twisted endeavors. It hurts to think he had deceived us for so long, abused our need for help. But for all of his bad, something good did come out of it. We have you.”
It hurt to speak so plainly about their deepest misfortune, but they could see that Mira listened, and they craved her attention more than anything else.
“I’m not real,” Mira said, and Kevin instantly spoke up to respond.
“Mira, we may never understand exactly what he did or how he did it, but you belong to us, and you look like us, and you come from us. We love you, and that’s real. There is more room for what can be real than we can ever imagine, and there is certainly enough of it to include you.”
Mira shut out his words, turning her head away and down toward the water. Kevin sighed, wishing for a more befitting way to comfort his child, but she looked so estranged to everything they offered that he feared the painful discomfort it would cause her. They sat in silence, each of them appearing more than a little disappointed.
The market opened, and traffic through the area increased. Mira slipped deeper into the water, attempting to hide. The pool started to fill up, and her parents found it annoying to have people swimming around them.
“Should we go? I can ask the healer if she’s ready,” Kevin suggested.
“OK, that sounds like a good idea,” Jeana replied, and Kevin swam away.
Familiar voices joined the chatter along the poolside, growing louder and louder and closer and closer.
“Mira!” someone shouted.
Both Mira and her mother turned to look along the edge, where a small group approached. Vern walked at the front, leading Aoi, Will, and Roselyn, all of whom conveyed their excitement at seeing Mira again with big smiles and bouncy steps.
“We heard you were here early! Are you OK?” Vern asked, kneeling at the edge of the water.
“I’m fine. Nothing happened.” Mira moved away from the wall, turning so she could face them. Jeana said nothing, letting her daughter answer as she wished.
“You’ll never guess what happened!” Will chattered. “It was crazy. We uncovered the spy we were talking about. He grew into this giant water-sand monster, but we fought him with the townsfolk and forced him into the pit! You wouldn’t have believed it. It was unreal!”
“Hi, Mira!” Roselyn interjected, waving her hand and flashing a delighted smile.
“Hi,” Mira replied, her expression about as animated as a brick.
“Mira, look at this,” Aoi motioned. She pulled a toothpick out of her pocket and put her forefingers and thumbs to it. Taking a deep breath and assuming a relaxed appearance, she pressed against the tiny wooden toothpick. It bent but did not break.
“Are you trying to tell me you can’t snap it? How is that going to help us?” Mira chided. Her harsh tone differed so clearly from her friends’ enthusiasm that it caught them off guard. Before anyone could say anything else, Kevin returned.
“He said she’s ready to go.” Recognizing the group that had formed on the pool’s edge, Kevin smiled broadly “Wow. Hey, everybody!”
“You’re going? Where are you going?” Will asked.
“We’re taking her back to Corey Outpost,” Kevin said, and Jeana nodded in agreement. This announcement came as a shock to the shadows, who stared at each other in mutual confusion.
“But the Rite at Shadow Mountain is in just a few days. You can’t seriously be thinking about taking her home,” Vern protested.
“The Rite, huh? I don’t think that’s going to happen anymore. She needs some peace and quiet,” Kevin said, but Mira turned to him, defiance radiating from her face.
“I’m not going with you. Just because I had a hard time doesn’t mean I can give up. I have to finish what I started. I have to win for the one who’s counting on me or else his sacrifice will be for nothing.”
“A hard time? What does that mean? Why does she need quiet?” Roselyn wondered.
“Nothing happened!” Mira spat over her shoulder.
Everyone stared at her, but no one ventured a single word. The good feelings her friends had brought disappeared. All they had left were questions about what had happened to make her this way. Kevin and Jeana felt a growing remorse that proved impossible to ease. When they looked into her eyes, she regarded them with all the familiarity of a complete stranger.
They watched Mira climb out of the pool and walk into the changing room. Her parents had no choice but to follow her.
Suddenly left to themselves, Vern, Will, Aoi, and Roselyn scratched their heads.
“What’s going on?” Roselyn asked.
“Look everybody,” Vern said. “Something has happened to her, something a healer can’t fix. But above all she is still our leader. If she is bent on going to the Rite, then we need to do our best to make sure nothing happens to her. Her safety is the most important thing.”
“You think we can stop things from happening to her at the Rite? That’s like asking a river not to flow downhill. And what about our own chances of winning?” Will asked, casting a subtle glance to Aoi. Her expression relaxed, signaling no criticism of any kind.
Having mastered his wall-walking skill, Vern began to picture himself as a serious contender for winning. It was difficult to imagine anyone having an easier time climbing steep cliffs. But he meant what he said. They needed Mira more than the honor of victory. He closed his eyes to say goodbye to his own hopes for victory.
“If we win the Rite but lose Mira, all of our respect will soon go to waste when we flounder on the battlefield. If one of us wins, it has to be Mira, and I’ll do everything I can to help her,” he promised.
“Maybe if she wins it will help her feel better,” Aoi added.
The reasons in favor started to add up, and they agreed their primary goal would be to keep Mira out of trouble. If they could help her win, they would do so. They hoped with enough time she would return to her old self.
“But we have to keep it a secret,” Roselyn whispered as Mira started back from the dressing room. “She needs a sense of control as much as time.”
The others nodded quickly and soon Mira grabbed her pack nearby and looked at them impatiently.
“When are we leaving?” she asked.
“It’ll take about two days to get there. The first is along the river and the second is over the ridge and past the flatlands. If we left now we would just be waiting there. What do you want to do?” Vern asked.
“I want to go to Shadow Mountain,” Mira said.
“I still need to say goodbye to Cybil,” Will quibbled.
“Yes, we need to say goodbye and grab our things,” Vern agreed.
“I’m not going to follow you around for that. I’ll get supplies from the market. We’ll meet by the river,” Mira said, starting to walk off.
“Do you have money?” Will asked, reaching into his pocket.
“I don’t need money,” Mira said.
Kevin an
d Jeana returned, looking for Mira and approaching her friends after they couldn’t find her. “Where did Mira go?” Kevin asked.
“She went to the market. She wants to leave as soon as possible, but it’ll take at least an hour or two before we all start off along the river,” Vern reported, unable to look them in the eye. He felt embarrassed on Mira’s behalf. She just wasn’t acting right.
“Oh.” Concern washed over Jeana’s face.
“We’re going to keep an eye on her,” Roselyn promised.
“Thank you. She did have a hard time. I hope she remembers to appreciate your friendship. It’s often when things are hardest we lose sight of what’s most important.” Jeana wiped a tear from her eye and hid her face under the pretense of fixing her hair.
Wearing heavy thoughts and concerned faces, the two groups parted. Vern and his friends watched Mira’s parents depart without knowing where they were going or what they would do. It wasn’t long before the foursome went their separate ways to visit their mentors for the last time.
Roselyn, who had left Corey when she came to Darmen, joined Will on his journey to Cybil’s wave shop. They found her playing with her young son, tossing a disc back and forth. They didn’t have to say anything for Cybil to know why they had come. She gave Will a long hug, sniffling with emotion.
“We had some great moments, didn’t we?” she asked.
“It was great, but I’m not ready for this,” he whispered so that Roselyn couldn’t hear.
“I have a feeling as long as she’s around you’ll give it your best,” Cybil smiled. “And more often than not, a brain can be the greatest gift you can get. Didn’t your friend Mira teach you that?”
Will’s heart sank at the mention of Mira. He didn’t have the heart to tell Cybil what they had just seen in her. He mustered a smile as he looked her in the eyes.
“Thank you. This experience turned out differently than I imagined, but you made it unforgettable. I’ll do my best to make you proud. One day when you’re old you’ll think back at how I became your greatest shadow. It’ll all be because of you.”
