Dreamer Cycle

[Kaelir]

(This isn't set in Aden - so if you want me to delete it I will. Anyways, this is a story I was working on earlier because I had total, complete writers block.


Imagine there's no heaven,
It's easy if you try,
No hell below us,
Above us only sky,
Imagine all the people
living for today...

Imagine there's no countries,
It isn't hard to do,
Nothing to kill or die for,
No religion too,
Imagine all the people
living life in peace...


You may say Im a dreamer,
but Im not the only one,
I hope some day you'll join us,
and the world will be as one.


Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...

You may say Im a dreamer,
but Im not the only one,
I hope some day you'll join us,
And the world will live as one.

Imagine no possesions,
I wonder if you can,
No need for greed or hunger,
A brotherhood of man,
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...

You may say Im a dreamer,
but Im not the only one,
I hope some day you'll join us,
And the world will live as one.

- A perfect Circle
To imagine the unimaginable is the highest use of the imagination. – Cynthia Ozick


Trapped.

“The spider sometimes forgets and gets trapped on his own web.

I am that spider. I am the fly trapped in amber and the mosquito that has fallen in a swimming pool and can no longer fly. I am the turtle stuck on its back in the middle of the road. I am the mouse stuck in a maze.”

The girl did not look up as she spoke. The cameras were trained on her, and the eyes were trained on her. She looked down into her lap, past her bare, chafed arms. There was dirt underneath her fingernails and dirt inside her brain. Nothing was linking up. The harsh white room stung and made her want to cry, but her tears were dry and they burned.

[Pyrokinesis, literally means "fire movement". It is purported to be the postulated psi ability to manipulate a flame, or control it. In a definition which overlaps that of thermokinesis, it could also be the purported ability to excite the atoms within an object, possibly creating enough energy to ignite the object, and is the theorized cause of spontaneous human combustion[citation needed]. Pyrokinesis would be a minor form of psychokinesis, similar to poltergeist activity. Pyrokinesis is created by bouts of rage[citation needed] or intense concentration, gathering energy into a singular point and then exciting the atoms enough to cause fire[citation needed].]


The room spun sickeningly. The girl clutched the arms of the chair. Her hands were so cold. Her hair hung down in front of her face, past her eyes and chin. She looked down. There was blood on her shirt, stained down her neck.

What have I done?
What have I done?
What
(Have I done?)
Happened?

Someone strapped down her arm and squeezed a cold injection through her skin. She could taste it in her mouth. It made the room blurry and her face even colder. She drooped forward in the chair. They spoke to her, but the voices were slow and hard. She wanted to forget.
Had she spoken? She couldn’t remember speaking. There was a recorder on the desk. Taking in her thoughts, and taking in her words and turning them back. The lights flickered, but it was only her eyes – blinking slowly. A burned eyelash fell on the top of her hand. It was white. She twisted in the chair and it floated away, onto the tile. Several pairs of eyes were trained on her.

She jerked away, but her hands and her legs were strapped down. She felt unbearably trapped – and she was trying to float away, but she couldn’t. She was tied down and they wouldn’t let her disappear into the clouds above her head or fall down and sink into the rain below her feet.

[Telepathy (from the Greek ôçëå, tele, "distant"; and ðÜèåéá, patheia, "feeling") is the claimed ability of humans and other creatures to communicate information from one mind to another, without the use of extra tools such as speech or body language. Considered a form of extra-sensory perception or anomalous cognition, telepathy is often connected to various paranormal phenomena such as precognition, clairvoyance and empathy.
While there have been numerous scientific experiments into telepathy over the years, no positive result has ever resisted scrutiny. Positive results have always been demonstrated to be the result of flawed methodology, statistically erroneous conclusions, or could simply not be replicated by independent researchers.
The majority of the scientific community believes that claims of phenomena associated with telepathy constitute pseudoscience.]
Someone was tapping into her brain. She could feel them – hard and strong and they didn’t have a right to be there. She pushed away. She was falling. Trapped and falling. She jerked, and the chair fell over. She hit her head on the ground. People rushed to pick her up, but she was falling away – little pieces of her floating down into the cracks between the floors as she struggled to take every breath.

A spider caught in its web.


Check.

Seven guns were laid out on the perfectly made bed – all of his favorites. They had been with him forever and he had cared for them like children. But in the end, he chose the assault rifle. He fixed the scope carefully. It wouldn’t make a noise. There would be just a little pressure, and very little blood until they hit the ground.

He pushed a teddy bear off the windowsill and sat down on the pink cushion. He had prepared everything perfectly. He had printed out all the layouts and the plans on the home computer downstairs. He spread them out on the

Sometimes he always managed to get distracted. Right before a big kill. The anticipation unnerved him. He looked around the room. His wife had sponge-painted little white flowers on the pink walls. He thought it looked good. There were portraits of their daughter on a bookshelf – little trophies in gymnastics. She was a real great kid.

Right – the kill. He opened the window and popped out the screen and placed it on the floor. The target would be coming by in a herst in approximately twenty minutes. He aimed the rifle through the blinds, brushing his hair out of his face. He was sweating.

He glanced back at the papers again. The subject was a seventeen year old girl named Winter Blake. They were just getting younger and younger – and she was being transported under top security by the F.S.I – in a coffin. At least two armed guards – a possible four. He didn’t get the information until his superiors got the information.

He wiped his forehead again. His hands were sticky with sweat. He only had one opportunity. But it might be enough of an opportunity to land him a retainer in the firm and enough money to purchase a ship. A small ship.

The microphone tapped into his ear started to hum. “Target within site.” There were men down the block. He could see them, barely – positioned throughout the neighborhood. The recon team.

“Affirmative,” he replied.

“Don’t screw this one up, Tracie.” The line went dead.

He saw the herst from a few blocks away. He took aim through the blinds. For a moment he thought the herst would stop or back up – it was moving so slowly. His hands felt like they didn’t belong to him when he caught the target. The glass was darkly tinted, but it didn’t matter. He took aim and squeezed. Again – and again.

The herst squealed and pivoted to a stop. There were tiny holes blown through the window of the driver’s seat, the glass shattered. Tracie was shaking when the men nearby in hiding ran out, drawing their guns. They were wearing dark suits and helmets – even though it was the middle of the day. The doors flew open. Tracie watched through the scope as the men in the herst fell over dead.

His men, the team – dragged out the coffin from the back. They hoisted it up on their shoulders, helmets and dark gloves glistening in that midday sunlight – so beautiful and warm. Blood was on the pavement, running through the cracks.

He reloaded the magazine on his gun, even though he knew it wasn’t necesccary. He continued to watch through the scope until they had loaded the coffin up in a covered flatbed and then driven off. Neighbors were watching from their houses. He could see blinds peeled back, doors half ajar. There were cracks and eyes could see through them. He didn’t expect them to be surprised at what had happened. Later someone would come up to clean the blood. Not surprised at all.

No one ever was.

He set down the gun on the bed. The mic in his ear was buzzing with effusive praise for all members of the team. He wiped sticky sweat away from his eyes – which now stung. Before his daughter got home he would put all the guns safely into hidden storage, delete the conversation and maps on the computer, and take a nice long shower.

Someone was behind him.

[mehrunes]

That was...wow. You know what's funny? That story had the most natural "heart" I have ever read. Seriously.

[Kaelir]

Stress.

[Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, or PTSD, is a psychiatric disorder that can occur following the experience or witnessing of life-threatening events such as military combat, natural disasters, terrorist incidents, serious accidents, or violent personal assaults like rape. Most survivors of trauma return to normal given a little time. However, some people will have stress reactions that do not go away on their own, or may even get worse over time. These individuals may develope PTSD. People who suffer from PTSD often relive the experience through nightmares and flashbacks, have difficulty sleeping, and feel detached or estranged, and these symptoms can be severe enough and last long enough to significantly impair the person's daily life. – United States Department of Veteran Affairs]

She could feel the bullets piercing her brain. Inside the coffin she awoke from the cold sedative, screaming. The herst wheeled to a stop. Her hands were burning. As she felt the people around her die and the blood spattering in her ears, the fire shot out from her hands and beneath her fingernails. Her skin was cracked and bleeding. The nails in the coffin melted. She kicked upwards. She heard her toe crack but the coffin lid burst open. She set the lid back down with her shaking hands and crawled away, into the front seat. Beneath the bleeding people and the screaming and the bullets whistling over her head. She hunkered down beneath the wheel and waited for everything to stop. Waited for everything to go quiet.

Then she ran down the street. As fast as she could. Her bare feet hit the pavement and she could almost feel them burning from the hot midday sun. her skirts flew up and she ran as fast as she could. Her feet were burning. Her head was burning. Everything was burning and it was warm underneath her skin but cold in her blood.

She needed to find shelter. The herst was getting farther and farther away but she couldn’t stay or rest and hope that they wouldn’t find her.

She panicked. She really couldn’t help herself. Her feet hit the cool grass and she climbed a fence. Splinters buried into her skin, and she rolled into a backyard of one of those suburbian homes. A door was opening. A young girl, a blonde girl with a ponytail and a pink backpack was opening the back door and going inside. Soon she would be inside, and lock the door, and herself would be outside – and vulnerable.

It took only a few strides, a few pumps of her arms and bending of her knees and she had caught the girl from behind. One hand over her mouth, another on her head, petting her – trying to reassure her as she dragged the girl inside and closed the door with her foot.

The girl struggled and kicked. The pink backpack pressed into her chest. There was hair in her mouth. She grabbed her tighter. Her hands were burning. Dark streaks appeared in her veins. She couldn’t let go of the girl with the pink backpack. The girl with the pinkback was her shield and her safety, her gateway to get out of this mess and away from the blood screaming in her ears.

She dragged the girl upstairs. The girl continued to scream into her hand and kick. But she pressed down harder on her mouth and the girl stopped.

There was a man in the pink room. There were guns on the bed. Six guns on the bed and one in his hand. He was peering out the window. His eyes and his scope were trained on the herst.

She didn’t say a word. The girl kicked harder when she saw the man. Her father. Her shield was getting better, stronger. She hoped the girl would stop struggling. Her hands were burning up, wanting to touch and destroy. She had to control them – even when she could feel herself shaking and losing all control.

The man turned around and slowly set the gun down on the carpet.

“Put her down,” he whispered. His eyes were full of fear, brimming with a sadness that couldn’t be controlled. He was shaking too. Their eyes met.

Tear.

When Tracie turned around he knew instantly what had happened. Winter Blake wasn’t in the coffin. She was in front of him, with his daughter as a hostage. And her hands were blackened with rage.

“Put her down,” he whispered again. He didn’t take her eyes off the terrified, confused girl as he set his gun down. The girl’s hand went to his daughter’s throat. Her fingers left sooty, black smears across her throat. His daughter swallowed. Her terrified, vulnerable, exposed throat.

The white sponge painted flowers floated in front of his eyes. Not like this. It couldn’t end like this with blood and fire and everything breaking around in front of him. Tracie wouldn’t let it end like this. He wouldn’t allow it.

Winter dragged the girl from the doorway, closer to the bed. Little black flakes of skin peeled off of Winter’s face and floated down. She whispered something, looking at Tracie.

“The spider. The spider,” she said. Such vulnerability. Such tenderness composed of such power. It would be like a flower burning up from the inside. Once, not so long ago – she had been a normal seventeen year old girl. She was wearing the latest fashion, that had been popular at the schools. A white laced shirt with long sleeves and a V-cut. She probably bought it at the mall. Now it was spattered in blood and ash. A long skirt with a looped, braided belt. It was a soft blue colored, and layered. Now it was burned up at the edges, crumbled and soft.

Just a normal girl. A normal girl who had run at the edge of the line and found out there was something dangerous and unseen in her. Something uncontrollable that couldn’t be found until the right exact moment when the pieces interlocked and the threads were interwoven and everything was destroyed in that utterly cruel, perfect moment.

“Set her down,” he whispered. “No one’s going to hurt you.”

She was shivering. Like she was cold and scared; afraid. Someone who had lost her way.

Someone very dangerous, with living weapons in her fingers pointed at his daughter, who had lost her way.

“Explain,” she whispered. She hugged Tracie’s daughter closer to her, swaying back and forth. The pink backpack with all the books crushed against her. The ponytail crushed against her. “Explain who I am.”

“Someone very important,” he whispered. He put his hands out in front of him. “Set her down.” He could see the blood racing to the tips of her fingers, like fire.

“I don’t want to be important,” she said. She gripped his daughter tighter. She squealed underneath Winter’s hand. “Make it stop!” Her hand grew hotter, the blood was racing. The tips of her fingers ignited in flame, underneath her dirty fingernails ignited in flame.

“STOP!” He rushed at her.

The room burst in fire.

Hush.

Two empty canisters of fire extenguisher laid on the floor. There was smoke on the walls, streaked black in the pink paint. The guns were on the floor, as well as the clips and ammunition. A warm afternoon breeze blew through the open window, rustling the blinds.

The pink bed with the teddy bears and the stuffed animals was also burned. The sheets were coming off in layers of black, peeling away onto the floor. The pillows were streaked and smelled of smoke. The bedskirt was torn and dark, peeling away.

Tracie sat on the bed. His daughter, Jen, was laying down, head on his lap. She was holding a white teddy bear, also smelling of smoke – tightly in her hands. Winter was standing up right, leaning on his shoulder, staring into space with her milky, cloudy eyes. Tracie had both of his arms around the two girls.

“We’re going to have to explain this,” Winter said – staring at the pink wall with the white flowers. Her eyes fell across the trophies, and the pictures of Jen with her cute blonde ponytail and her cute clothes and cute friends. What a small little girl, what a fragile little girl. She looked down at her skirt. It was peeling off. She could see traces of her white underwear beneath the scarred belt.

“Yeah,” Tracie whispered. His hair was singed. There was black soot all across his face. So much for the shower – and putting up the guns. Tracie’s watch had stopped working. Jen had come home earlier than he thought she would.

Jen wiggled slightly, positioning herself to get more comfortable.

It wouldn’t be long before the company paged Tracie over the mic and they started a search for the missing Winter Blake. It also wouldn’t be too long until his wife came home, saw the burned furniture and walls, and Winter. Tracie wasn’t too good at explaining things. Never had been. It was much simpler to do dangerous, death-defying missions.

“hey, Tracie?” Winter said. She had calmed down. There was no more fire in her skin or in her eyes.

“Yeah?”

“Can I go home?”

He petted Winter’s hair, her black thick hair slightly damp with sweat and smelling of smoke. He would really hate to give this kid up to the company when they asked for her. But instead of explaining things, he petted her assuringly. Just a kid.
“Not yet, Winter,” he said. “Just a little while longer, okay?”

“Okay,” she said, seeming to be satisfied with the answer, and then closed her eyes and went to sleep on Tracie’s shoulder.

[Makora]

I really like the story so far.

[Kaelir]

Fresh.


If you always put limit on everything you do, physical or anything else. It will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them. – Bruce Lee.


Don't fret precious I'm here, step away from the window
Go back to sleep
Safe from pain and truth and choice and other poison devils,
See, they don't give a f**k about you, like I do.

Count the bodies like sheep
Count the bodies like sheep

Counting bodies like sheep
To the rhythm of the war drums [x2]

I’ll be the one to protect you from your enemies and all your demons
I'll be the one to protect you from a will to survive and a voice of reason
I'll be the one to protect you from your enemies and your choices son
They're one in the same, I must isolate you…
Isolate and save you from yourself … - A perfect circle


The body is a house of many windows: there we all sit, showing ourselves and crying on the passers-by to come and love us. ~Robert Louis Stevenson


Tracie heard Charlotte’s car come into the garage. He had cleaned up as best as he could. Jen had gotten a shower, and so had Winter. Now he just had to wait.

“Hey, I’m home!” Charlotte called. He heard the clink of her purse being set down in the kitchen. “I ordered take out!”

“That’s great, Charles!” Tracie called. “Why don’t you come up here for a minute, dear?”

“Oh, what for? Hey, Jen! Is Jen here or with friends? I’m home!” She called, and ran up the stairs. Her heels made dull noise on the thick carpet.

She just kind of stopped at the landing, and looked at the burn marks that streaked out into the hallway. She peered into the girl’s bedroom.

Tracie was sitting on the bed. The two girls were playing with teddy bears and plastic tea cups. Winter looked kind of awkward hunched over the small table at the age of seventeen playing with an eight year old girl – but they almost seemed to kind of fit. Kind of like a strange, dysfunctional family.

“Jen been smoking again?” Charlotte said wryly, looking at the burned walls – the smoke stains, and the bed nearly falling apart . She looked at Winter. “Who’s she?”

“Family friend,” Tracie said. He got up, but suddenly there was a buzzing in his mic. “Look, I need to go to the bathroom. You stay safe,” he kissed her on the cheek as he ran past her down the hallway.

When he got into the bathroom he locked the door behind him and sat on the edge of the tub.

“Yeah,” he whispered. “This is Tracie,”

“There’s an alert going out for Winter Blake within a 25 mile radius of the contact. We’re checking the scanners and video records of nearby security stations.”

“There’s no need,” Tracie sighed. “I found her.”

There was a silence. Tracie could hear the hiss pop of static. He also swore he could hear someone mildly cursing in the background.

“You… you sure?”
“Yeah,” he said. “I’m sure. She’s at my house.”
Another lengthy, awkward pause. And then an incredulous voice. “At.. your house?”

“Yeah,” he repeated.

“We’ll be there in an hour,” he said. The mic connection went dead.

Tracie flushed the toilet, unlocked the door, and opened it.

He jumped, nearly falling on the slick tile. Winter was standing there in the doorway, on her tiptoes. Tracie could feel his heart drop into his stomach. Had she been listening? He checked her hands. They weren’t red or burning up. Normal, smoke and ash covered dirty hands. Well, that was good. It looked like there wouldn’t be an inferno anytime soon.

“Coming,” she whispered. She looked into his eyes. “I want to go home. Don’t make them come for me.”

The doorbell rang. “Food’s here!” Charlotte called. The door swung open and soon the smell of chinese food was floating up the stares. But Winter and Tracie hadn’t stopped locking eyes.

“I’m sorry, Winter,” he said. “There’s nothing I can do.” He moved to go past her, bumping into her shoulder as he walked down the stairs.

Halfway down, he turned to look at her. She looked so lonely. She hadn’t moved away from the bathroom door, but she continued to stare down at her feet like she would discover something there. She was haunting. Winter Blake – property of C.S.I and the Company and whoever else would want to fight for the right to study her and use her and make her into a kind of creature to be pitied and feared but never human. But to give up his job for her would be absolutely ridiculous. Absolutely insane.

She was seventeen years old. A girl. A child. She imagined that it would be Jen when Jen grew up. She kind of looked like her. They had nearly the same eyes – except the older you got the older the eyes. They were tired, milky like cream. She had parents, but they were either dead or had been taken into custody by the C.S.I.

He imagined everything before him. A nice fat paycheck. A ship – a better home. He could buy Jen a pony. Yeah – a pony that flew. He rolled his eyes.

“Come down for dinner, guys,” Charlotte said. It never really ceased to amaze Tracie how much she could adapt. How things never really quite got under her skin or made her anxious and afraid. She worked at a bodyguard firm. A bodyguard who knew three different styles of martial arts and could kill Tracie with a look. And she still managed to look so good.

“They’ll come for you too,” Winter said quietly – but her voice carried to where Tracie was standing on the stairs.

He couldn’t just walk away from this, let them carry her away. Because he knew – they would take his family too. They would question them and sterilize them and pierce them with needles that went deep into the brain just to see how much they would tell before they screamed.

Tracie wasn’t surprised to hear his voice shaking. “Change of plans,” he called down the stairs. “Pack what you can’t spare to lose and take the food. We’ll eat in the van.”

Charlotte looked up at him. Her eyes were shaking and quivering with liquid fear. Jen came out of her room. “What?” she said. She was holding a teddy bear.

“Pack Bobo and I don’t have time for questions – let’s MOVE!”

Screech.

· [By its own definition, science is incapable of examining or testing for the existence of thing which are untestable. Science concerns itself with what can be measured and seen through observation, logic, and reason. Proponents of supernatural phenomenon hold that scientific methods would not detect them; therefore the lack of evidence does not matter. Scientists counter that if this is so, then proponents of supernaturalism themselves would be incapable of witnessing any supernatural phenomenon, as human senses themselves operate within the laws of physics and can only sense events occurring in the natural, physical world. – Wikepedia]

For everything there is a season,
And a time for every matter under heaven:
A time to be born, and a time to die;
A time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
A time to kill, and a time to heal;
A time to break down, and a time to build up;
A time to weep, and a time to laugh;
A time to mourn, and a time to dance;
A time to throw away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
A time to embrace, And a time to refrain from embracing;
A time to seek, and a time to lose;
A time to keep, and a time to throw away;
A time to tear, and a time to sew;
A time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
A time to love, and a time to hate,
A time for war, and a time for peace.
Ecclesiastes 3:1-8


They were on the highway. Tracie explained everything to Charlotte as he drove. Jen and Winter sat in the back of the van.

“I figure we’ll get a hotel off the scanner and lay low for a while. Switch the plates on the van later. Honey… honey,” Tracie looked in the rearview mirror. Jen and Winter were eating the chinese take out – moo goo gai pan and orange chicken with fried rice. “Try not to get it everywhere. Use your napkins please. You could even make a little plate on your lap – anyways. Charles, you understand now?”

“Charles is a man’s name,” Winter said. She stared out of the window. Off the highway there were some pastures full of cattle. Her finger traced across the glass, smearing it as she followed the patterns in the distance.

Jen grinned from ear to ear, splitting her face nearly in half with a beam as she took another bite of food.

“Yes, yes it is. She is pretty manly,” Tracie grinned.

“Road,” Charlotte said absentmindedly. Tracie swerved back into his lane.

“How about some music?” He said, reaching for the radio button. A rather annoying country western song blared into the car. He instantly switched the radio off again. He listened to the hum of the car moving along the road for a few minutes before Charlotte spoke again.

“I’m getting some sleep,” she said. “Wake me up if we stop,” she stretched like a cat and then went to sleep against the door.

Tracie never loved her more than he did right now. Most women would be like, “We’re never going to see home again, are we? Or, where are we going? Or possibly, ‘I want to get a divorce’”. Not Charles, Charlie, Charlotte. Wonderful bodyguard don’t ask questions jump in front of a bullet Charlotte. She smelled like sunflowers. Her blonde, reddish hair was so beautifully soaked in sunlight streaming through the tinted window.

Tracie swerved back into his lane. He checked all three mirrors until he was certain that he wasn’t being followed by C.S.I or Company or any of a thousand rent a cops self employed mercenaries patrolling this part of the company.

Some rest would be good. A nice shower to wash the sweat off. And he smelled. He turned the air conditioner up full blast and cracked his window. Some circulation would be good. He didn’t really want to think right now. Thinking would mean that he’d realize he didn’t have a damn plan, or a damn clue.

Winter whispered to herself. Her black hair was falling in front of her eyes. They had both finished eating and the empty cartons were piled on the middle seat. Jen had closed her eyes and had also gone to sleep. Beautiful kid. It was a shame things had to start like this for her – on the run, possibly forever.

Things were about to get beautiful crazy.

[Sharae]

Good stuff, keep it up

And yay! Another A Perfect Circle fan! Pet is an awesome song, probably that The Noose and A Stranger are my favourite songs on Thirteenth Step.

Tried any Tool?

[Kaelir]

Dark.

They stopped at around midnight. The engine shutting off and the car going into brake made Charlotte wake up. Winter and Jen were both asleep in the back. Winter woke up, her eyelids fluttering. They seemed to glow in the pink neon of the motel “Open” sign. Jen was holding her teddy-bear Bobo tightly.

Tracie opened the door and went to the back and pulled out the two suitcases they had stuffed full of clothes, medicine, and different personal items. He groaned a bit as he lifted them up.

“I’ll carry those,” Charlotte said. She picked them up without even dropping her weight and started for the front door of the motel.

“Thanks, babe,” Tracie said. He rubbed his eyes. They felt swollen and big and heavy – like they were made of cement mixers. He went to Jen’s window and tapped on the glass. She awoke with a start. Tracie motioned toward the motel.

Winter was standing behind him. She didn’t say a word, just tilted her head when he screamed and jumped.

“Got you,” she said, and then skip hopped to the door of the motel. Tracie let out a panicked breath, then opened the door for Jen to climb out.

Charlotte came back out with Winter, holding a key card in her mouth. She motioned for them to follow.

[“Remember in elementary school you were told that in case of fire you have to line up quietly in a single file from smallest to tallest? What is the logic in that? What, do tall people burn slower? – Warren Hutcherson ]

Charlotte threw the suitcases in a corner. “Let’s get some sleep. Winter and Jen, you can share the bed on the left. We’ll take the bed on the right.”

“I want the bed on the right,” Jen said, grinning.

“Then you’ll have to fight me for it, rooaarr!” Charlotte grabbed Jen by the waist and spun her around several times until they were both laughing. Winter stood in the doorway quietly, watching.

“I’m going to take a shower,” Tracie said, moving past Charlotte and into the bathroom.

There was hair all over the floor – and some kind of gummy substance. Tracie locked the door, pulled the mic out of his ear, and then crushed it beneath his foot. He picked up the tiny microchip pieces, threw them in the toilet, and flushed them. He then took off his clothes, kicked them out of the way, and turned on the shower.

When he got out, Jen and Charlotte were both asleep. Jen in the right bed, Charlotte in the left. Tracie smirked to himself. Guess Jen had won the fight after all.

He looked over at the window. It was open. The curtains were fluttering in the room and there was a draft. And oh yeah, Winter was gone. Damn. He pulled the towel tighter around him and ran bare foot across the sticky motel carpet, and looked out the window. Damn. Damn. Damn it to hell. He braced himself, prepared to climb up the fire escape toward the roof.>

The door opened. Winter walked in with a bag of peanuts she had gotten from the vending machine. She stopped in the doorway when she saw Tracie half in and half out of the window. Tracie looked over his shoulder, breathed a sigh, and stepped down.

“oh, well – glad to see you back. Did you open the window?” He breathed deeply again, trying to relax his pulsing heart.

Winter rolled her eyes and ate another peanut.

“Well, get some sleep,” He said.

It was only when he was laying awake in bed next to Charlotte when he realized why he had panicked when he discovered Winter was missing. He was beginning to care about her – like he thought of her as a daughter.

How strange. He fell asleep dreaming about such things and trying not to think too hard about them.


Favorites.

When Tracie awoke, Charlotte was at the window. She was dressed in tight jeans and a black t-shirt. Her hair spilled out above her eyes. She had Tracie’s assault rifle in her hands. He looked over. Jen and Winter were gone. The bed was unmade.

“Charles, where are the kids?” She was looking out the scope, and at first didn’t respond. Finally she spoke. “getting breakfast.”

“I don’t remember packing the..
“I packed it,” Charlotte said, finishing his thought. “We’ve got four men out here. Near our van. They’ve found us.”

“So, what do we do?”

“Get Jen and Winter and get out of here,” She clicked the safety off. The motel room overlooked the courtyard, and beyond that – the parking lot. “Get dressed.”

Tracie quickly slipped off his pajamas and put on his t-shirt and jeans. “They aren’t going to stop coming, are they?”

“I don’t know…” Charlotte said. Her voice was low. “You’de be surprised how persuasive a bullet to the head can be.” The window was open. The curtains fluttered around her, around her wiry, surprisingly thin frame – dancing and tickling. Tracie’s stomach grumbled.

“C.S.I or Company?” he asked.
“Company. No one else has suits quite that fine.” She looked up. “Go get the kids. Their eating breakfast in the main room. Continental. If you hurry you can sneak back and then I can pop a few heads, huh doll?” She looked back into the scope.

Tracie grabbed the key card, opened the door – and headed toward the front.

His eyes were trained and his thoughts were trained. He saw everything in that hot morning with the cars racing by and the people walking on the sidewalk nearby. He tried to look normal, but he was scared. Everything in his vision was pumping and reeling. He reached the door.

He opened it. The smell of cereal and coffee hit him.

He saw Jen and Winter on the far table at the other end of the room.

There was a man standing in front of their temple. He had a black suit on. Winter and Jen were looking up at him – cereal and coffee and grapefruits forgotten. Even from that far away, Tracie could see Winter’s hands shaking, burning. She moved to get up. The man blocked her.

Tracie winced. And then it got really hot.

[Kaelir]

My November Guest

My Sorrow, when she's here with me,
Thinks these dark days of autumn rain
Are beautiful as days can be;
She loves the bare, the withered tree;
She walks the sodden pasture lane.

Her pleasure will not let me stay.
She talks and I am fain to list:
She's glad the birds are gone away,
She's glad her simple worsted grady
Is silver now with clinging mist.

The desolate, deserted trees,
The faded earth, the heavy sky,
The beauties she so ryly sees,
She thinks I have no eye for these,
And vexes me for reason why.

Not yesterday I learned to know
The love of bare November days
Before the coming of the snow,
But it were vain to tell he so,
And they are better for her praise.


- Robert Frost



Burn.

It was as if there was suddenly a draft. Winter stood up and the world around her got very, very still and very, very cold. Tracie stood in complete transfixtion at the door, unable to move.

Fire seemed to come from within her, and it exploded across the man in suit’s face. It was strange – like she had always been on fire somehow, but it had only been invisible. She cried out, a scream wrenching from her throat. Tracie could see the blue pulsing of her veins, growing ever thicker and stronger. Her face burned up, her feet burned up. She was dancing and singing and crying and moving fast, fast, fast to the rhythm of that strange lilting song. But it wasn’t her – it was the fire around her leaving smears on her skin. The table burst into flames. The carpet burts into flames. The man burst into flames.

Jen ran into Tracie’s arms. He grabbed her, shielding her from the blast. Rubble and shards of table flew at them. He put a hand over her head, ducking his own, letting his back face to the destruction.

It wasn’t fair, really – that a girl of seventeen could have such power without prior warning. He knew how this stuff worked. It was absolutely uncontrollable.

Winter cried out, terrified – Her hands shaking and trembling as they went to her burning face. Her clothes ignited into flame.

The motel owner was at the desk and screaming. People rushed past Tracie and Jen, squeezing through the door and running out into the parking lot. So much for breakfast.

Winter was on the floor, writhing and screaming. Stop, Drop, and Roll – kids – and she was rolling but the fire wasn’t going out, because the fire was inside her and throughout her and burning, burning hot.

“Go get your mother,” Tracie said – and he ran into that inferno.

He went to the continental breakfast table, shoving cereals and fruit out of the way. He grabbed one of those big pitchers of orange juice. Man, no one ever told you how painful it was to be close to heat like this. He ran to Winter and dumped the orange juice all over her face.

Her eyes popped open. They were cracked red and startling white in the black sooty, burned face and the lines and the cracks that ran through her forehead. But she was alive – because the fire was in her.

The motel was still burning when he took her warm hand. Her clothes fell apart into ash and he dragged her into the parking lot.

They were waiting. The men in suits – with finely crafted guns pointed at him in the hot morning sun, and their black shoes seeming to smoke on the pavement.

“The girl,” one of the men said. They were close. There was a gun pointing at Tracie’s nose. He squeezed Winter’s hand tightly, as she tried to break her grip and run. She panted heavily, her breath coming out short then fast in little stops.

Five of them. In the hot morning sun.

Then one of their head’s exploded.

A bullet pierced the man’s head from the side – and his head seemed to nearly fold and collapsed. Blood squirted out the other end, a fountain, a blanket – for him to fall upon. Winter screamed. Then another fell, hit in the chest. Blood spattered on Tracie’s lips and face. A bullet whistled past his ear and the guns slowly turned.
Charlotte was standing outside of their motel room. Jen was in her arms – and the sniper rifle was on Jen’s shoulder. She fired again, and again. Jen put her hands to her ears. Charlotte put a protective hand around Jen’s waist. Even from that distance, Tracie could see Jen’s tears glistening, trailing like beautiful sad creatures down her face.

Wow. Wasn’t he a great father.

Winter’s hands were warm and burned. She pulled away and ran for the van.

Someone shot her in the back. Panicked and shot what they were meant to be retrieved in the back. The rest of the Company officers went down by Charlotte’s gun.

It was a dry moment. A moment where you are unsure that everything happening around you is real or imagined – fake or fiction or a dream of some sort that you have yet to wake up from and hope to god that you wake up soon. People were screaming. There were sirens in the distance – and fast approaching. Cars were pulling out of the parking lot and peeling out. Parents were dragging their screaming, crying children.

He saw Winter get hit in the back, the ricochet cause her to rock forward – the force of it making her contort visibly. She fell to the ground.

“WINTER!” He screamed. His voice was so hoarse and desperate. He ran to her, past the bodies of the men. There was blood on his shoes. Bloody shoepirnts. Going to have to clean that up later.

He dropped to his knees and set her over. She opened her eyes in her burned face.

“No, don’t die,” he whispered. “Don’t die.” He petted her black hair. He picked her up in his arms and by the weight of her and the blood pouring out between his fingers he knew that this was real and painful. It wasn’t a dream anymore.

Charlotte, still holding Jen, walked toward their van. She held the rifle menancingly out at people who were daring to approach. Most backed off. The sirens were getting closer.

“Get her in the car!” Charlotte called out. Tracie shifted his weight and ran with Winter in his arms. Charlotte found her keys, opened the back door and let Jen crawl in, then she got in the driver’s seat and turned on the ignition.

Charlotte opened the passenger door and Tracie crawled in fast. She didn’t wait for him to close the door. She put it in reverse and squealed out of the parking lot.

“We need to get her to a hospital,” he said. His pants were soaked in blood. She must have lost a tremendous amount, but she didn’t close her eyes or pass out. He tried to wipe the black smears away from her face.

“They’ll find us.”
“To hell,” was all Tracie said – part frustration and part defiance. A part of him realized how easy it would to give up. Winter would live – his family would live at least for the sake of further questioning, or maybe to play actors for one of those crime biographies. “To hell.”

NO!
(don’t let them take you.)
Not happening!

“Get to the hospital,” he said. “come on Winter, just keep your eyes open.”

She smiled a bit. “I don’t see any stars outside tonight,” Tracie patted her cheek. Sweat ran down his face. Jen was crying into her hands in the back. They had left all their luggage at the hotel – Bobo, their clothes – everything.

Charlotte took a swift turn at an exit ramp toward the hospital. The scream of sirens was disturbingly near.

The multiple letter named chapter of which I can think of nothing to name it as.

Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away. - Philip K. Dick


"We are living in a time when flowers are trying to live on flowers, instead of growing on good rain and black loam. Even fireworks, for all their prettiness, come from the chemistry of the earth. Yet somehow we think we can grow, feeding on flowers and fireworks, without completing the cycle back to reality. Do you know the legend of Hercules and Antaeus, the giant wrestler, whose strength was incredible so long as he stood firmly on the earth? But when he was held, rootless, in midair, by Hercules, he perished easily." - Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451

Nothing like a nighttime stroll to give you ideas. ~J.K. Rowling, Eye," Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire,

Tracie never thought his heart could feel so painful as it was beating in his chest. He ran to the main doors – not looking behind him. He burst in, holding Winter – holding her like something precious and fragile.

“She’s hurt! I need to get her taken care of – now!” His hands were soaked with her blood now. She looked up at the ceiling. Her hair trailed down – her beautiful black hair smelling of smoke. She smiled again – but it was distant and faint.

It was excruciating moments before they took Winter away and wheeled her into the emergency room. It would be far too few minutes before the Company or C.S.I or one of a million would realize that Winter Blake was being held here.

“Her name is Cynthia Fields,” he said. He filled out the paperwork. There were too many blankspots. He wrote down her false information and gave them his creditcard and identification from the wallet in his jeans to verify. Good thing he wore the right jeans.

Charlotte and Jen came into the waiting room. Charlotte was squeezing Jen’s hand tightly.


“Will she be all right?” Jen asked. Cute kid. Damn cute kid.

“Yeah,” Tracie said. “Why don’t you go read one of those magazines or something? I think we all will.”

The three of them sat down in the waiting room. Tracie jumped everytime someone came in through the double doors – he had a reason to jump. They all had year old magazines, wrinkled and torn out with cut up pages and the crosswords and word games already completed in faded pencil – in their laps, but no one was really reading. They rubbed elbows on the waiting chairs – eyelids fluttering heavily. The worry in the room was sick. This room was made for people to worry and make people sick for their worrying. And he hated it.

And even from here, he could hear Winter’s screams echoing in his head. He saw her go down, her back arching in pain. He could feel her warmth and that pain coursing through him, screaming through him – when he was in the hospital bathroom – washing off the dried blood from his hands and sleeves, trying to blot it out as best as he could on his jeans. Lastly, he wiped the smudges of black off his face with damp paper towels.

But she was just a girl. She could be Jen. She could have been the kid from the broken condom. She could have been the one taken to picnics and the park and the movie theatre and the zoo – her eyes trembling with sites. But here was a seventeen year old girl, a stranger – and he felt himself aching so badly that she would live. He had never felt this way – never known such pain seeing someone going down.

And it shook him. Shook him so terribly.

Faint.

People who cease to believe in God or goodness altogether still believe in the devil. I don't know why. No, I do indeed know why. Evil is always possible. And goodness is eternally difficult.” – Anne Rice



[Shepherd Book prepares a meal as he absentmindedly addresses River.]
Book: What are we up to, sweetheart?
River: Fixing your Bible.
Book: I, um… What?
[Pan over to River, who works on a book with pens, brushes, and loose pages.]
River: Bible's broken. Contradictions, false logistics… doesn't make sense.
Book: No, no. You - you can't...
River: So we'll integrate non-progressional evolution theory with God's creation of Eden. Eleven inherent metaphoric parallels already there. Eleven. Important number. Prime number. One goes into the house of eleven eleven times, but always comes out one. Noah's ark is a problem.
Book: Really?
River: We'll have to call it "early quantum state phenomenon". Only way to fit 5,000 species of mammals on the same boat.
. . .
Book: River, you don't… fix the Bible.
River: It's broken. It doesn't make sense.
Book: It's not about… making sense. It's about believing in something. And letting that belief be real enough to change your life. It's about faith. You don't fix faith, River. It fixes you.


- Firefly

[Kaelir]

Winter could not describe the pain that coursed through her. She could not describe the animal panic that made her run through that fire squad of agents. The bullet ripped through her, past tissue and shattering bone. She wanted to die and fall unconscious but she stayed awake the entire time, her eyelids fluttering – her breath shakey. Her body contorted and writhed on the ground. The ground was hot. She tried to get it off her skin but it burned and sizzled and she screamed, screamed far gone.

She was on her belly in the emergency room. She gripped the railing of the bed. They tried to put an IV in her arm. She tore it out, gritting her teeth. Screaming inside because the fire inside wasn’t going out. They extracted the bullet, gave her cold injections and warm injections that made her veins want to explode. Doctors rushed around her. Winter’s breath was fading in and out, fading in and out fast fast forceful like she couldn’t quite get enough air.

They extracted the bullet – and still she didn’t pass out. Her knuckles were pure white as they gripped the railing, struggling to keep still. She screamed again, and again – gasping taking in that fading piece of breath inside.

It hadn’t been long. Only a few months ago when she still remembered her parent’s names. Before the needles and the tape recorders and the tap, tap, tapping inside of her brain. Before the scans and the white cell and the white bed with the itchy sheets and the lumps that made it impossible to sleep. Before the fire.

She remembered it vaguely now. Her parents had been fighting, and she hid like she always did. Somewhere dark and safe – in her closet. She loved them so much. It hurt so bad and hurt so long that somewhere deep inside of her the pieces aligned. The closet got hotter, and whiter, and brighter – and smaller.

The house burned down. She was sure of that. And she was on fire when the C.S.I came for her, and she had been on fire ever since. She didn’t know if her parents were alive. She didn’t know if her brother was alive, or her dog. A labrador retreiver. Winter called him Napolean. Strange, that she could remember her dog’s name – but she couldn’t even remember their faces or what normal food tasted like or what the stars looked like. She was down deep, and no one was coming for her. She thought vaguely of Tracie.

They gave her a strong sedative in the arm. The needle passes cold through her skin, and she fell a long, long ways onto the bed. She felt them patching up her skin, treating the burns, sewing up the bullet wound – but it was far away, and she no longer hurt.


Bend.

“Your daughter is going to be all right, Mr. Fields. Oh, and you’re under arrest.”

Tracie jerked out of his sleep. The side of his cheek was wet and his entire body ached from sleeping in the waiting room chair. He had been dreaming.

“What?”

The nurse smiled. She had pretty, faint freckles. “I said your daughter is going to be all right.”

“My daughter?” Tracie said, confused. He looked over at Jen and suddenly remembered. “Oh yes. Win – Cynthia. She’s fine?”

“She’s fine,” the nurse said reassuringly. We can release her in a week.

Charlotte was awake, still reading a magazine. She looked up at Tracie. When the nurse left, she folded it in her lap. “We don’t have a week,”

“Yeah, yeah,” he said. “I know.”

She whispered. “We’re marked fugitives. I rolled the car into a ditch about five miles in the woods behind the hospital and we walked here. That should keep them off of us for a while. That is – if no one here recognizes us.”

Jen stirred. “Mom, are we going home?”

Charlotte looked at Jen, and tried to smile reassuringly – but her lips twitched with worry. “Honey, we’re going to go for a walk for a while – and we may not go back home soon.”

“Why?” She asked. Her eyes were quivering with anxiety and fatigue. Tracie could feel butterflies doing aerial formations in his stomach. Cute kid. Damn cute kid. Trophies, pictures, friends, blonde hair. Sweet. Curious. Innocent. A regular kid. Just a regular kid.

Charlotte was no longer smiling, she had stopped trying. A bead of sweat rolled down her forehead to her nose. She reached over Tracie and patted Jen on the leg. “Sometimes, people just have to go for a walk and clear their heads, clear their minds.” Jen did not look reassured. Tracie patted her on the head.

As Charlotte moved back to her seat she whispered in Tracie’s ear. “We’re leaving tonight,” then picked up a magazine and continued to read.

Tracie sighed. “I’m going to get something from the snack machine,” he said, and stood up. As he walked down the hallway, it didn’t even feel as if his feet were touching the ground.

Scenic.


Do you know what the definition of a hero is? Someone who gets other people killed. You can look it up later. – Serenity


He was the sort of person who stood on mountaintops during thunderstorms in wet copper armour shouting "All the Gods are bastards." – Terry Pratchett


Yeah, Charlotte carried a concealed handgun.

They took Winter out of the hospital with relatively little incident later that night. The entire time Charlotte’s hand went to the gun, prepared for anything – for cops, for company, for anything that might happen at just the exact wrong moment as often as it did. They came out surprisingly lucky. But the secretaries didn’t ask questions and the doctor’s didn’t ask questions – because it was late and everyone was tired and they had the glint of strange people. That might have been because of their subconscious confidence. Or maybe it was because they were all burned and their clothes were half falling off.

They wheeled Winter out of the hospital in a wheelchair. She was still heavily sedated. Sometimes her hand went to the neck of her hospital gown, pulling on it – her chest moving up and down fast, as if she couldn’t get enough breath. Tracie rolled her out to the parking lot, then picked her up.

“Sure you don’t want me to carry her?” Charlotte asked. She rubbed Jen’s head absentmindedly. Jen grabbed Charlotte’s fingers tightly and walked fast alongside her.

“I got it, Charles,” Tracie said. In truth, he was out of shape. He never really was a good killer. He was panting halfway to the bus stop, Winter grabbed his hand tightly as he tried to set her down on the bench.

“Where are we going?” Jen asked. Jen and Charlotte sat down on the bench next to Winter. Tracie let Winter hold his hand – even though he was sure she was cutting off the circulation from his arm.

“Well,” Tracie said, panting and trying to catch his breath, “We’ll catch the next bus getting out of here… which is –“ he checked the schedule. “We’ll go to Sacramento – which is about three hours away. The city is big enough that we won’t stand out. There we can get some new clothes, maybe rent a car – then we’ll drive somewhere to the south. Maybe Texas, or Mexico.”

“Actually, I was asking Mom.”

Tracie blinked. “Oh.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Charlotte said. She sprawled back on the bench and sighed, closing her eyes. “But you know – they’ll find us.”

“Yeah,” Tracie said. “You really can be cynical sometimes.”
“It’s called being realistic.”

Winter jerked her head up, tightening her grip on Tracie’s hand. “I didn’t ask to be taken down into this place. Bring me back up – I can’t see!” her eyes rolled upwards and back again, and her head fell forward.

“It’s okay now, it’s okay,” Tracie said. “We’re bringing you back up. And it’s going to be a sunny day, bright and beautiful.” Winter did not move. Her grip did not relinquish in its intensity. She held his hand until the bus came, and they boarded.

There was only one other person on the bus, an old man asleep in the front. Tracie, Winter, Jen, and Charlotte made their way to the back in the dim light. Tracie paid. The doors closed. The bus wheels squealed and started.

Jen crawled into Charlotte’s lap, curled up and fell asleep. Tracie laid Winter down carefully, trying to keep pressure off the spot in her back where the bullet pierced her and soon, in Tracie’s arms, she fell asleep too.

Charlotte stared out the window for a long time – watching the landscape go by – like frozen glass in the darkness. Lights floated by from skyscrapers in the nightscape and they shone bright in her eyes.

“Can’t sleep?” Tracie whispered, careful not to wake up the kids.

It was if Charlotte had to be revived from some deep place of thought – because she did not respond for several moments.

“No,” She whispered. She looked at him. The lines in her forehead were deep.

“What will your firm think?”

“I killed five men,” she said. “Five men to protect a girl we don’t know.”

“No,” he said. His voice was a hiss. “To protect ourselves. To protect our family,” he nodded toward Jen.

How much the dim light made the pools beneath her eyes dark and her face look like a ghosts, sunken in that flat place of time.

“We have to keep running – or they will turn us into people like Winter. Shells. Places where the thoughts run out from beneath us and we can’t quite escape from the dark place. Shadows, Charles. And when we go to that place, deep in the Company or the C.S.I or the jail – there will be NO escape. There will be no hope for us because in that place we are lost and no one will think to search for us there because down in that place we no longer exist.”

“I’m not giving up,” Charlotte said.

“I know,” Tracie whispered. “And I won’t either.”

“We wouldn’t be slowed down so much if we got rid of the girl.”

Tracie felt an awkward shiver run down his spine.

“I can’t,” Tracie said. “I couldn’t.”

“But you know…”

“We’re not discussing this!” Tracie hissed. He was surprised at the anger in his voice. “She comes with us. She’s a part of our family now and there will be NO argument.”

Charlotte looked at him for several moments. She didn’t blink. Her eyes were soft and torn. “I love you,” she whispered, “And I would die for you. But that doesn’t mean I have to agree with you.”

“She stays.”

She looked at him hard. “Until she becomes too much of a problem and you realize that you have put this family in danger that you can’t escape. Then you will have wished you left her on the ground in front of the motel with that bullet still in her back. The Company would have gotten what they would of want and we would be put on low-priority. But not now. Now we’ve probably got the whole government after us. And for what? A seventeen year old girl that likes to burn things. Good job, Tracie Fields.”

“Don’t talk to me like that, Charles. I can’t handle this right now. I don’t want to fight with you.”

“Then don’t bring it up.” She stopped talking to him and looked out the window. The landscape was frozen as ever.

Tracie didn’t fall asleep. He couldn’t.


Fence.

It was early in the morning when they got off the bus, carrying the kids. They stopped at a department store and bought new clothes, changed in a gas station bathroom one at a time – Winter needed some help buttoning her shirt – and then went to eat nearby at Denny’s – the only place that was open at that time.

Tracie helped Winter into the booth. She gasped in pain as she was lowered onto the seat. Tracie’s hand lightly touched the wound as he set her down and she cried out.

“Shh,” Tracie tried to calm her, “Shhh – the pain will pass.” When he turned around Jen and Charles were on the opposite side of the booth. Charlotte just stared at him.

Tracie checked his wallet – he had a few credit cards, a bank card, and some cash – about eighty dollars in all.

They hadn’t eaten a good meal in about two days. Early in the morning, they ordered pancakes, egg, sausage, orange juice, and milk. They ate ravenously, as if they had been starving for a long, long time. However, Winter held her fork and she stirred around her eggs but she only took a few bites. Every swallow seemed incredibly painful to her. Her hair fell in front of her face and into her plate and down in strings toward her lap.

Then Tracie noticed something strange.

There was a man two booths in front of them. He was alone, an older man – maybe in his fifties. He had black hair that curled down to the nape of his neck. He was a little overweight. He ordered bacon and eggs and two glasses of milk and a glass of water. But Tracie had the feeling that he only ordered it so that he could stay, and watch, and observe. He barely touched his food. He picked at the bacon, swallowing little bits with his fingers.

He kept glancing over at them. He kept glancing at Winter who barely seemed to notice anything but her lap and the strings of hair falling down in front of her eyes, even if that. Her fork slid across the white plate, down across the table. Tracie reached over and took the fork and set it back down on the table on the napkin. Winter did not respond, or protest, or try to grab it again. She just sat there.

When the man had looked over for the fourth time Tracie tensed up. Charlotte looked up from her food and noticed it instantly. Tracie mouthed. “Don’t look,” she nodded, then suddenly turned to Jen.

“Hey, sweety – can you let me up, I need to go to the bathroom.” Jen got up from her seat and let Charlotte up.

She walked past the man, toward the bathroom. Several minutes she came back out again to the seat. Jen got out of her seat and let Charlotte back in.

“Company?” Tracie mouthed. Charlotte shook her head. “C.S.I?” Again, she shook her head.

They finished the meal. Charlotte joked with Jen but everytime Charlotte looked at Winter it was as if something had frozen inside of her, as if something had sucked out all the breath inside of her and she stopped, her face growing pale until she could somehow force herself to look away and then the skin would return to normal and her face would lose the lines that deepened them.

Winter did not respond. Nothing existed beyond that landscape of her mind now sitting in the seat beyond the dark window where the cars were frozen and they barreled across the highway and the lights were frozen and they blurred onto her eyes and burned onto her forehead. It was as if nothing was real. Everything was a dream beyond that which could not be seen and that which she did not want to see but was burned into that place behind the eyes in the skull and the soft brain working ceaselessly. It was all – just a dream that she had constructed and partly watched by to be constructed but could now not escape because she had built the walls too high and there were no doors of which she could exit from.

All just a dream. And everyone just passengers and passerby’s.

They finished eating. Tracie paid for the bill and then they walked out. From the dark windows he saw the man get up and follow them. So much for being subtle.

They walked down the street, and turned a corner. The man was still following him.

“Ready?” Charlotte asked. Without waiting for an answer she took the concealed gun out of her shirt, turned around, and pointed it at the man. He froze.

“Back to the wall,” she said. The man was smiling as she backed him into the back wall of the building. He looked over at Winter.

“Hello child,” he said, and smiled.

[Kaelir]

Drench.

Anyanka: You trusting fool. How do you know the other world is any better than this?
Giles: Because it has to be.
- Buffy the Vampire Slayer


If something in your writing gives support to people in their lives, that's more than just entertainment-which is what we writers all struggle to do, to touch people. – Dean Koontz


I'm so tired of being here
Suppressed by all my childish fears
And if you have to leave
I wish that you would just leave
'Cause your presence still lingers here
And it won't leave me alone
- Evanescence

Charlotte cocked the gun.

Tracie walked closer to the man. “Who are you, why are you following us?”

“The coat pocket. Check it,” he said. Tracie moved forward.

“No!” Charlotte held up a hand to stop him. “You take it out yourself and throw it on the ground, in front of me.”

Jen began to cry. She backed up against the opposite walls. Her tears streaked her face and she was shaking, sobbing. Winter backed up against the wall with her. Winter’s hand folded over Jen’s, tightly. They held each other like that, both afraid – both unable to comprehend. Their knuckles and their hands were white and bloodless.

The man’s hand went into his coat pocket. Charlotte tensed, prepared to fire, but he quickly dropped a brown leather wallet onto the ground. Tracie grabbed it, opened it. He took out the I.D

“Ed Harrich,” he read outloud. “Five feet eight, brown eyes. Great. I’m happy for you.”

“The other one,” he said. He rolled his eyes slightly. Tracie found the other I.D behind the billfold.

“Ed Harrich,” he read again, “Department of Neurology.” He scanned the card again. He was used to reading the details in everything. “Yeah right, Buddy – this I.D is 28 years old. You’re out of date.” He looked at the wallet again, took out forty dollars, and threw it back on the pavement.

“Charles, tell him to run or cap him. And I’ll keep the forty bucks if you don’t mind. Kids, let’s get out of here.”

“I can offer you sanctuary,” he said.

“Sorry, but this isn’t the Middle Ages. And I don’t see any churches around here, buddy. So get out of here.”

“They’re coming. They’ve already got your location.”

“Bastard,” Charlotte growled.

“It’ll be about five minutes and they’ll be swarming this place like flies. So you either trust me, or kill me.”

“I’m liking the second plan better,” Charlotte said.

Tracie held up a hand “Wait a minute, Charles.” He looked at Ed. “What’s the catch?”

“You give me some alone time with that extremely valuable subject you’ve got with you.”

Tracie looked back at Winter. She was looking at the ground, breathing heavily. Her hands were pure white and bloodless. She looked at the ground, her hair falling down over her eyes – black and damp and the bloodless spots on her face were white like bleached bone down inside of her. It was like her skull was on the outside and on the inside was a beautiful face that had long ago been buried away with all the thoughts of outside and flowers and toys and things like friends. Beautiful things.

“Are you sick?” Tracie said.

“I don’t mean that. I mean I want a brain scan. All the equipment is at my apartment. And I can give you safety. I work with a special task force called Charybdis and Scylla – we’ll make sure Winter and your family is taken care of.”

Somewhere in the distant sirens sounded. It was like the unharmonious discord of wolves rising and falling, rising and falling.

”Let’s go,” Tracie said. “Charles, you can cap him if he turns out to be a liar.”

“If he is a liar probably won’t get that chance,” she said. She bit the inside of her check, and then pocketed the handgun.

“Come on, girls,” Tracie said gently. He took Jen’s hand. At first she stiffened, but then she followed him, keeping in stride. Winter let go of Jen’s hand and grabbed Tracie’s. Her grip was covered in sweat. Her long, dirty fingernails dug into his palm but Tracie did not complain. She too, kept in stride, as if she was afraid that if she stopped something bad would happen, or something would catch her. She kept looking behind her shoulder. Ed led the way. Charlotte walked in front of Tracie. She shot him a look that nearly stopped him dead. The sirens continued to wail. They hurried down along the building, turning into an apartment alleyway.

There was a man in a black trench coat leaning against the alley wall, against the wet bricks behind a dumpster. He seemed to jump out of the shadows at them. Charlotte stiffened. Tracie stopped, the girls clinging to him.

“Hey Rick, make sure no one follows us,” Ed said to the man in the trench coat. The man was smoking a cigarette – exhaling long puffs into the warm air.

“Sure thing, Dad,” he said – taking another long puff.

“Don’t let your mother catch you smoking,” was all he said – and then he began to climb the fire escape. “We’ll go inside this way – there are security cameras on the sidewalks on the other side.” He climbed the long ladder, to the fire escape, and then through a window to the hall.

“Come on, kids, up you go.” Tracie grabbed Jen around the waist and held her up to the ladder.

”Dad…”

“I’m right behind you, Sweetie. If you fall I’ll catch you.” Jen hesitantly grabbed onto the ladder and began to climb. Tracie followed closely behind her. The iron ladder rungs were cold on Tracie’s palms. He looked upward. Jen’s haphazard ponytail bounced against her back. She was shaking when she climbed onto the fire escape. She fell backwards when she regained her footing, but Tracie grabbed her and spun her around, hugging her close until she stopped shaking. Then he gave her a boost up into the window. She jumped down into the hallway.

Tracie looked back. “Okay, send Winter up.” Without any help, Winter grabbed a rail with both of her hands, then pulled herself up. She began to climb.

“Watch her!” Tracie called down. Charlotte nodded and began to climb up behind Winter.

Winter looked down and began to scream. She slid down a rail, nearly catching Charlotte in the mouth with her sneakers.

“Winter, we’re not that far up – only a few feet. You’ll make it.” Charlotte sighed. Tracie could hear the visible frustration in her voice. Winter was shaking, hugging the ladder tightly, her eyes widening as she looked down at the ground.

“Don’t want to go up – they don’t catch you when you fall and they push you and make you fall but they never catch you!”

Charlotte nervously patted Winter on the back. “It’s okay – we’ll catch you. I promise.” After several minutes of coaxing Winter began to climb again. She took a sharp breath after grabbing every rail. Every time her foot left a rail she held her breath and shook until her foot could find a place to rest again. She climbed over to the fire escape, and grabbed the window. Tracie helped her over. Her hand passed over his. It was so cold. She jumped down into the hallway.

Tracie helped Charlotte over, even though she didn’t really need it. He looked down. Ricky in the black trench coat waved up at him. He waved back and then jumped down into the hallway.

Ed was waiting for them. “Come on, my apartment is over here.” He fished out his keys from his coat pocket and opened the door.

“Honey, I’m home – and I brought visitors.” He walked in, and Tracie ushered his family through the door.

“Dear lord, Ed, it’s 4 A.M in the morning,” a woman called from the bedroom.

“We’ve got a spare bedroom – and two couches,” Ed said. “Don’t worry about anything. Ricky will keep watch, and so will I. You sleep as long as you need to.”

“You know we don’t have anything to pay you for. Except for the forty bucks I just stole from you.”

“Nah, it’ll be fine,” Ed said, waving them away with his hand. “Make yourselves at home. I’m in this for the research.”

“So is everyone else, it seems,” Charlotte said. She and Tracie were both looking around the apartment, studying it. It was a habit hard to break.

The apartment was cramped. There were a lot of antiques everywhere – those glass painted eggs on all the tables and stands. Figurines of children, bears, and dogs. There was an 18 inch television and two pale green couches. One was foldout. The kitchen was adjacent to the living room – stuffed with pots, pans, and all that kitchen stuff but organized in such a way that there was no organization whatsoever.
Ed noticed their uneasiness. “Really, it’s fine. You’re safe at the Charybrdis and Scylla organization.”

Tracie sighed. “Really, Charlotte – let’s just get some sleep. If he’s really lying we can wake up and then be dead, all right?”

Charlotte sighed. “Fine,” she said.

They made sure the kids were comfortable on the couches. Charlotte and Tracie kissed Jen goodnight. Ed brought them blankets and sheets and Winter slept on the foldout.

“Lights on or off?”

“On,” Jen said. Her hands squeezed the lumpy pillow and she stared at the ceiling.

“On,” Winter whispered. She was staring at the ceiling too. Her breathing came out slow and her chest barely moved.

When Charlotte left the room, Tracie bent down and kissed Winter’s forehead. She didn’t even blink.

Charlotte and Tracie went to sleep in the back bedroom – which was pretty much decorated like the rest of the apartment. There was a bathroom adjacent. Tracie brushed his teeth and scrubbed his gums until they bled – he felt suddenly like he was very dirty.

They crawled into bed with their clothes and jeans still on, without saying a word – and slept in the dark. Sometime midmorning Tracie awoke, and imagined he saw stars floating by past the windows, but it was just a dream – and soon he closed his eyes again to revisit those dreams beneath his brain.

BrainFeed.

What is reality?
I am a plaster doll; I pose
with eyes that cut open without landfall or nightfall
upon some shellacked and grinning person,
eyes that open, blue, steel, and close.
Am I approximately an I. Magnin transplant?
- Anne Sexton


Welcome to my nightmare. I think you're going to like it. There'll be some more when you come down.” – Alice Cooper

When Tracie woke up – it was nighttime. He checked the red clock and the blinking light said that it was 7:40. He heard laughter. He checked the spot beside him and found that Charlotte was gone. He stood up at the edge of the bed, rubbed the back of his neck, and walked down the hallway to the living room.

The fold out couch was folded back in its original place. The smell of home cooked dinner was in the air. He was instantly hungry. He swallowed, trying to smooth out the creases in his wadded up T-shirt.

He stumbled into the kitchen, stood in the doorway. They didn’t notice him at first. The kitchen was dimly lit. Six people sitting around a crowded table, eating and passing around plates and digging into food with their forks. Fried potatoes, brisket, corn, peas, potato salad, macaroni and cheese – all the bad stuff that gave you heartburn but memories of childhood or at least the distant memories of what childhood was supposed to be.

“Are you –serious-?” Ed’s wife said. She was in her fifties at well, but the lines in her face made her look pretty and sweet. She had a pile of white, silvery hair and her eyes were brown and sharp. “Girl, you must be pretty tough to be a bodyguard. Ever had to take someone out?” her eyes twinkled as she said this, and she smiled widely.

“Well, it’s mostly a boring job,” Charlotte said. “Mostly scouting out locations and a lot of sitting around. Our cases are usually domestic – woman scared of her ex-boyfriend, things like that.” Charlotte said this like she was bored, but Tracie could see that she enjoyed the attention. “But I did get in a shoot-out once…”

“Hey Dad!” Jen said. “Come eat with us!”

“Oh, look – the husband decided to show his face,” Charlotte smiled from the corner of her mouth. “Sleep well?”

“Like a rock,” Tracie said. He sidled past Winter into the empty chair. “This sure looks good.”

“We hardly eat like this,” Ed’s wife said. “I’m Sarah.”

“And I’m Ricky,” Ricky said. He smiled, showing his braces. The kid was about eighteen, and no longer wearing his trench coat – but a sports shirt and jeans.

Tracie piled his plate full of food and ate. Winter was eating as well, which surprised him. She divided her food into sections, whispering under her breath. Everything was kept separate. Each bite was calculated. Tracie reached over and pulled her hair out of her eyes and tucked it behind her ear, but it fell back down again, creating a curtain over her face, darkening the lines underneath her eyes.

“So, Winter – you think you’re ready?” Ed said, looking at her divide her food across her plate.

She looked up at him. “Are you?” she said. Ed looked over at Tracie. “I’ll just take her into my room – I’ve set up all the equipment last night.”

“While I was trying to sleep,” Sarah added. She took a bite of potatoes. Ed looked over and grinned at her, then looked back at Tracie.

“There really isn’t much to it – little pain. And I’ll restore everything and back it up on my hard-drive. Then we’ll talk about getting you to a safe location.”

Tracie nodded. He no longer really felt hungry, more sick. “So tell me – how did you know it was her?”

“I’ve been looking for Winter ever since I picked up the files after an accidental data scan on the Company network. I tracked you guys through various security cameras across California.”

“But… how?”

”Dad’s kind of a genius when it comes to that sort of thing,” Ricky said. “I told him he should be a super villain. Buy his own island with sharks and stuff.”

“So,” Tracie interrupted. “Where is the Scylla and Charybrds headquartered?” He looked from Ed, to Ricky, and back to Ed.

“Well,” Ed said, clearing his throat and setting his fork down, “This is it, mostly.”

Tracie sat down his fork as well, but it more fell out of his hands.

“Scylla,” Ricky said.

“And Charybrds,” Ed finished.

“They started the organization as a special project,” Sarah said.

Everyone stopped eating, except Winter, who continued to methodically section out her food and eat in tiny swallows.

“You’ve never really done anything like this, have you?” Tracie asked. He raised an eyebrow. His face twitched involuntarily. Charlotte looked at Ed. Her eyes were like steel blazons.

“Well, we mostly track down lost pets and missing children through the router security videos installed throughout the apartment complex. The local people hire us. Sometimes a family will catch news of us from one of the neighborhoods close by.”

Tracie got up from the table, knocking his chair back into the wall, creating a small hole in the plaster. He looked across at his family. “Let’s go,” he said.

Ed jumped up as well, holding his hands up. “Now – now wait a minute! We may have a lack of experience but we’re well trained. Me and Ricky – we go out to the shooting range every week and Ricky’s gone through basic in one of the mercenary programs. I’m a neurosurgeon – well, retired neurosurgeon and I know everything there is to know about the human brain. I also have a minor in psychology from a national college.” Ed took another bite of potato, looking very pleased with himself.

“Yeah!” Tracie said “Like the people who changed Winter – who made her into this.”

Winter did not look up. A single tear slid down her face, past the contours of her cheek and fell shimmering to the ground, but no one noticed.

“Girl isn’t right,” Charlotte said. Tracie shot her a dangerous look. Charlotte shot it back at him.

Winter picked up her plate suddenly, stood up, and threw it against the opposite wall. Everyone ducked. Ricky cried out and jumped out of his chair. The plate hit the opposite wall, smashed and fell to the ground, leaving a dark stain of juice across the plaster.

“Winter!” Tracie said. She turned to face him. Her face was a flush red.

“Not a thing! Not a thing to be bargained over or talked over!” She said. “Not a thing to be taken out of the needles and put into the dark rooms and the cold rooms!” She stepped backward, placing her foot behind the chair. It fell to the ground. She squeezed out from behind the chairs, past Jen, and ran to the back bedroom – her skirts being kicked up around her ankle-high socks. Her hand was pressed against the spot on her back where the bullet had pierced her, her face squeezed into a moment of aching pain.

“You see what I mean?” Charlotte said. She pushed her blonde hair behind her ears. Her eyes were dangerous and cold and like fire entrapped in a cellar. “She’s going to get us into trouble, Tracie. Just like I told you.” She stood up. “Come on. Let’s get out of here.”

When Ed spoke his voice was low and dark, quite unlike how he had up until now spoken. There was a twinge in the corner of his lips. “Leave now, and you’re going to die.”

Charlotte crossed her arms, tilting her head slightly to the side. “Is that a threat, doctor?”
“No,” Ed said. “A promise. Ricky, go get the files.” Ricky stood up from the table. Sarah began to take the plates away and the bowls full of food. No one really felt like eating anymore.

“I should have shot you the moment I realized you were watching us,” Charlotte said. She growled slightly as she spoke. Tracie moved back to her side.

“Without our help you’re going to be in trouble. We’ve got everything you need – bus tickets, maps, station tokens, routers, casts, information sheets, protection. Ricky and I know how to work the system we’ve been forced to live in. You folks seem decent enough-“

“Bodyguard.”
“Hired killer.”

“Seem decent enough that you don’t know exactly how to get through this mess you’ve created for yourself. We’ve got four more eyes to lend to your cause. And all I ask is for a bit of your time. Of Winter’s time.” Ed finished. He looked at the couple.

Tracie looked at Charlotte. “He does have a point, you know.” Charlotte rolled her eyes, and turned to Ed.

“Okay, we’re going to let you help us. But seems like the girl doesn’t much want to be given up much time.” Charlotte said. “She seemed ready to throw a fork into someone’s neck, to be honest.”

“She isn’t a killer, Charles,” Tracie said. He sighed. “I’ll take care of this.”

Safety.

We humans do, when the cause is sufficient, spend our lives. We throw ourselves onto the grenade to save our buddies in the foxhole. We rise out of the trenches and charge the entrenched enemy and die like maggots under a blowtorch. We strap bombs on our bodies and blow ourselves up in the midst of our enemies. We are, when the cause is sufficient, insane.” – Orson Scott Card

It's funny. All you have to do is say something nobody understands and they'll do practically anything you want them to. ~J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye,

Winter was sitting on the bed. She looked like a pale, broken doll. She wiped away at her eyes, and black smudge rubbed into her fingers.

“Hey, Winter,” Tracie said. Time slowed down before Winter looked up, her eyes full and brimming.

“How are you?” He asked. He sat down some distance away from her on the bed. It was unbearable to not touch her, to hug and comfort her. But some part of him told him to hold back. The girl was made of fire – it circled her in rings and the heat and the warmth in her skin was nearly unbearable to touch. Touching her might drive her over the edge.

Winter looked at Tracie and frowned. “Not good,” she said. “Not very good at all.”

“Why is that, Winter?”

Her lip quivered slightly, so slightly Tracie wondered if he had imagined that faint quirk or if it was a blur or error in his vision. She gripped the edge of her skirts tightly, her long fingers curling slowly around the material until they were bunched in her fists. Her bare feet swung across the carpets.

“I don’t want him to touch my brain,” she said. “I want to go home but I know it’s gone and nothing is waiting for me. I want to go home.”

“He won’t hurt you, Winter,” Tracie said. Even her gaze was burning, but it was fleeting. Her eyes fled across the walls. “If he does I swear I will kill him.”

“Not a killer,” she said, and smiled. “You never were.” She frowned again, and looked around – as if she had forgotten anything.

Tracie could feel the color draining out of his face. “What?”

She looked at him. “It’s your job, but you’ve never liked it. It makes you feel cold inside.”

“How… how do you know this?” Tracie swallowed.

“I see it on your face. Charlotte is a killer. You’re not.” A shiver passed through his spine as she said his wife’s name.

“Charlotte has a job to do.”

“She enjoys it,” Winter said. “You don’t.”

Tracie sighed. There were red spots inside of his eyelids. He held out his hand to Winter. She looked at his hand.

“Winter, if you let Mr. Ed take a scan of your brain, he’ll be able to help us. And we can go to a place where there are no more bad people, no more bad things will happen to you.”

“No needles?” Winter said.

“No needles,” Tracie assured her. Winter looked at his hand for a second more before taking it in her own. Tracie winced. It was like touching a stove warming up. Her face was so pale.

“I’ll be there the entire time,” he said. “I won’t let go of your hand.”

“Don’t let go,” she said quietly, and she got up and let him back to the living room.