Second That Emotion
by
Latikia
Copyright © 2006
Chapter 22
The darkness was sweet and cloying; seeping in thru my nose and mouth with every breath I took. I coughed as it filled my lungs, leaking out again thru the hole my broken rib had made. I had been fighting this darkness for what seemed to be forever and this time I was losing.
‘Why do you
struggle? You cannot defeat me.’
“You keep saying that, and I keep beating you.”
‘Really? What
have you won?’
“My life! The lives of my sister and my friends!”
‘You count those as
victories? You sad, pathetic little
boy...’
“Then what is it you do want?”
‘Death
and destruction. They are your nature, your reason for
existing. Death and destruction… Foolish child, when will you accept yourself
for what you are? You cannot save…you’re
meant to kill, it’s your gift!’
“Fuck you! I’ll decide what I’m meant to do, not some disembodied voice in the dark.”
‘You want a face to go
with the voice? Very well…’
The darkness flexed and contorted, pulling in and pressing out then plunged full inside me, filling every cell of my body. My mind screamed from the intense pressure. I struggled for air, battled to keep my heart beating just one more time and then once more after that.
I lay in nothingness. The darkness was inside me now and there was nothing all around. Everywhere I looked was nowhere. No sounds, no smells, nothing to touch, nothing to see.
I coughed wetly. The pain in my chest was terrible, but reassuring. There was something in this place, if only my own pain. I doubled up as the pain increased, hacking and coughing. The pressure from within tripled and I became nauseous. The muscles in my belly contracted and I began vomiting. I puked up darkness in endless streams, from my mouth and nose, feeling as if I were being turned inside out.
The inky lake at my feet rippled and swelled upwards, growing like a putrid stalagmite. It bulged out, forming vestigial arms that waved aimlessly. A head began to emerge at the top of the towering mass, facial features started to form as the rest of it took on human form.
After an eon of agony, I stopped vomiting and the pain eased in my body. I fought to my feet and stood facing the writhing mass of darkness as it finished its transformation.
Its eyes opened and bored into my own. The trunk had shaped itself into a human chest and the mass below split into legs that spread apart and matched my own stance.
It was like looking into a photographic negative. It was me, but it wasn’t…was it?
‘Now do you see? Now
do you understand? You can never defeat me!
And you can never save them
from me!’
I reached for the rage that layed buried within me, linking with the dark twin across from me. It wasn’t there. The fury, the fire, the blazing power was gone.
The dark apparition across from me grinned like a maniac. I saw hellfire licking at his lips and streaming like tears from his eyes.
‘I am a god! There is nothing I cannot do and nothing to stop me doing it!’
“You’re no god. I’ve beaten you before, I can do it again.”
‘With what? I am all the power you ever had.’
“Not all.”
The negative figure smirked and blasted me with the immolating power of my own rage. I felt myself burning, my hair curled up and fell away from the heat, my pale skin turned red then black as it crisped and cracked while blood and other bodily fluids leaked from the fissures.
The pain was very specific, very intense and unbelievably horrible. But it was only pain. I accepted it and pulled it deep within me, bathed in it, drank it deeply and relished its life affirming astringency.
I had no rage to fight with, no flame of my own that could humble the darkness. Darkness…what does darkness fear? One thing and one thing only. I opened my heart and let out my love.
That relentlessly burning little flame blazed up and filled me with light and warmth, soothing my burns, healing my wounds and cooling my spirit. It grew brighter and larger, filling all the spaces within me left empty by the darkness. I burned brighter than the fires of rage and lit up the nothingness. The light flowed down the link and burrowed into the dark figure. He bellowed and blasted back with more and more pain. I drew it in and put it aside.
‘You cannot save them from ME! You cannot save them from US!’ my darkness screamed at me as the light burned it to pale gray ash.
“You fuckin’ watch me.”
I woke up with a blinding light in my eyes and blinding pain in my body.
You have no idea how much I’d begun to despise waking up. I wondered if it were at all possible to never go to sleep again.
I twisted my head away from the bright light and my eyes adjusted slowly. I was in a bed. Okay, fine. Where was the bed? I tried to focus my eyes, but my vision was blurry and I couldn’t make out much beyond my feet.
What happened?
‘The man in the car.’
Right, the man in the car. He’d tried to hit the girls. Or had he? Maybe he was after all of us? Or maybe he was only after me?
‘Wouldn’t hurt to know who he worked for.’
Yeah, but a little late for that. I’d fried him, hadn’t I?
‘He wasn’t working alone, was he?’
The woman! The skinny, stringy haired blond! I had to get to her before she got away. I had to find the girls…were they alright? Were they in danger?
‘Shit, they’re near you…how safe can they be?’
“Don’t start with me, asshole.” I growled.
I sat up and swung my legs out over the side, putting my feet on the floor. I was hooked up to bags of fluid, wired up to machines that went ‘beep’ and ‘boop’ with an annoying regularity. I pulled the hoses and needles out, yanked the wires off then pushed up with my arms and settled my weight onto my legs. My ribs burned with pain every breath I took and my legs and hips ached from the strain of standing. I ignored it all and looked around for an exit.
I blinked rapidly, getting the grit out and moisture back in. My vision improved greatly and I saw a pair of sliding glass doors in front of me. I walked slowly but steadily towards them. They were automatic and opened as my foot hit the floor pad. I stalked thru and into the hall.
The hall dead ended on my right, so I went left, down past the nurse’s station, broadcasting determination and menace. The few people I came across scrambled to get out of my way. I grabbed hold of one white garbed young man before he managed to get away.
“Where are the elevators?” I croaked.
He pointed in the direction I was going, so I let loose and he ran. I kept going forward. The hall emptied into a wide waiting area, empty except for three men in dark suits. I recognized Mr. Jones, the other’s I didn’t know.
They stood up and faced me.
“You are supposed to be in the ICU.” Mr. Jones said.
“I have something to do that can’t wait.”
“You’ll kill yourself.”
“Doesn’t matter. There were two of them. She might still be up on the ward. I have to know who ordered this.”
Jones nodded. “Alright, I’ll go with you. What does she look like?”
“Five foot five,
Jones dispatched his two men out to the front and rear entrances and told them to call for additional support. I plodded towards the elevators, with Mr. Jones in tow.
“Are my sister and the other two girls okay?” I asked him.
“They’re fine. We had a hell of time getting them to leave you though. It was like fighting a pack of wolves just to get you into the ambulance. I had them moved to a safe house for the time being. As soon as you came out of ICU we were going to move you there as well.”
“They weren’t hurt?”
“A couple of scraped elbows and some bruises, nothing worse.”
I nodded. “Thanks for looking after them.”
“Not a problem.”
The elevator stopped and the doors opened. I strode out, walking faster than I should have, but I wanted to get my hands on the bitch so badly I was more than willing to endure the agony my body was going thru.
Jones stayed at the hallway entrance while I went from room to room, pushing open doors and broadcasting a feeling of impending doom.
“Where are you, bitch?” I hissed.
I went from one side of the hall to the other, slamming open doors and scaring the hell out of the occupants. I stormed past the nurse’s station and glared at the personnel behind the counter.
“Stay where you are and keep out of this.”
I saw the blond woman step out of the dayroom. She saw me and stopped moving.
I watched her watching me and I grinned.
“He missed.” I said softly.
The girl shifted her stance and turned so that her left side was towards me, her fists cocked, one near her waist and the other at shoulder level.
My grin got bigger. I walked slowly towards her, my weight on the balls of my feet.
Her expression never changed; calm and relaxed, patient and planning. Definitely more dangerous than the man. I linked and hit her with all the pain in my body.
She flinched, but that was all. Tough too. Good, very good…she’d be lots of fun to interview.
I slid in closer and presented her with my right side, the one with the least amount of damage.
She was very fast and moved like lightning. She kicked at my right shin with her left leg, shifted around and planted her right heel in my stomach.
I reached out with my right hand, clamped my fingers around her neck while she hammered away at my ribs and belly with her fists.
Her eyes bugged out slightly as I squeezed my fingers into her carotid arteries, cutting off the flow of oxygen to her brain.
She punched and hammered at my arm like a lumberjack chopping trees, but I continued to squeeze. She kicked at my balls. I managed to shift my hips in time to take the blow on my thigh, but it hurt like hell. I lifted her off her feet and into the air, hoping to rob her kicks of leverage. Her arms and legs slowed their flailing and hung limply. She eventually passed out. I dropped her to the floor and staggered sideways, leaning heavily against the wall.
“Mr. Jones?” I called out weakly. Jones came running down the hall.
“Would you put the young lady someplace safely out of way until I feel up to talking with her? And you might want to have your men gather up all of her and her partner’s personal effects and files.”
“Consider it done, sir. Might I suggest we call a doctor as well? You appear to be bleeding all over this nice clean floor.”
“Capital idea, Mr. Jones. I can see now why you get the big bucks.”
Jones cracked a smile briefly, then bent down and slung the woman over his shoulders in a fireman’s carry and hauled her off down the hall. I heard him command someone at the nurse’s station to get someone from ICU up to me ASAP.
I sagged down the wall and sat on the floor with my legs splayed wide. I looked down at myself and started laughing.
I really should have put something on first before leaving the ICU.
The doctor and a few techs got me up off the floor and onto a gurney then rushed me back down to the ICU. Before long I was hooked up once again to all the machines and drip bags. I tried to relax, but all the attention, poking and prodding was setting my teeth on edge.
Then everyone filed out in a hurry. Doctors, nurses, techs…it was like watching a mass lemming migration.
Across the room was Dr. Wills. He did not look terribly happy. He slowly walked towards the bed I was laying in, pulled a chair over and sat down next to me.
“You have to stop doing this kind of thing, young man. It is not conducive to a long and productive life.”
I glared at him from the corner of my eye. I turned my head and glared at him with both eyes.
“I don’t recall asking anyone to hit me with a car.”
He shook his head. “I don’t mean that. I’m talking about you climbing out of your deathbed and then getting into a fist fight with a trained assassin. That was foolish and unnecessary. We have specialists who do that sort of thing.”
I raised one eyebrow. “Sorry about that. I had no idea I was threatening someone else’s job security.”
Dr. Wills smiled. “Don’t worry about it too much. If I’d been aware there were agents planted in here with you I’d have had them rounded up sooner.”
“This morning was the first time I saw them, so I wasn’t sure if they were yours or not. I’d planned on asking you about it on Monday.”
He frowned and took a deep breath.
“I’m afraid I may have been responsible, in part, for this attack.”
“Oh?”
He looked up at me. “Ike, my position may not be an appointed one, and I may have a lot more latitude in what I can do than most, there are still…constraints. I have to answer to two oversight committees, one in the Senate and one in the House. I’ve reason to believe that a major intelligence leak is occurring and that the source is in one or both of those committees. The attack on you confirms that belief. I had meetings with both these committees while you were on leave and I informed them of my selection of you as my eventual replacement.”
I nodded. “When can I meet the people on these committees?”
Dr. Wills smiled. “Somehow I just knew you were going to say that.”
He stood up and pushed back the chair. “We’ll be moving you to the safe house tonight. Your lady friends will be relieved when they can see for themselves that you are alive and well. When you feel up to it, get what information you can from the female assassin and then I’ll schedule meetings with each of the committees.”
“Doctor…shouldn’t this sort of thing belong to the FBI? I was under the impression that the CIA
wasn’t allowed to operate within the borders of the
“The CIA is not. We, on the other hand, can do pretty much anything we have to. It’s a hell of a lot of power and at times it’s also one hell of a temptation. You see why it’s so important to choose the right individual to hold this position?”
“Yes. I understand very well.”
“I thought you would. Which is one of the reasons why I chose you.” He turned to leave.
“Doc…just out of curiosity, how much does this new job of mine pay?”
He turned back and grinned at me. “I was wondering when you’d ask about that.”
“Normally I wouldn’t care, but recent events have forced me to think about the welfare of other people besides myself. I need to buy a house and furniture…things like that weren’t important to me before.”
He cocked one eye and smiled slightly. “Yes…yes I can see that. Well, we’ll have to look into helping you out in that respect, at least until your appointment becomes official.”
He started walking towards the automatic doors. “The job pays $130,000.00 a year.” he said over his shoulder as he stepped thru the doors and out into the hall. The doors slid closed behind him.
I leaned back and closed my eyes.
$130,000.00 a year…well, that should make it much easier to get a house.
I was taken out of the ICU that evening, drip bags and all
and put into the back of a nasty looking Chevy van and hustled off base and out
of the D.C. area into the
Where ever we were going, the driver must have taken the
scenic route, because it took more than two hours to get there. Fortunately for me I was on a morphine drip,
so we could have been driving to
The van slowed down and came to a stop. The back doors opened and two large men hauled out the gurney I was strapped to and hauled me inside the house we were parked along side of. It was dark and I couldn’t see all that well, but the house looked to me to be fairly old, like a farm house.
Once inside the men released the straps and helped me stand up and they aimed me in the direction of a large bedroom on the first floor.
A very serious looking middle aged woman came in and took over from the two men. She bustled around, arranging the bags on rolling stands next to the bed so the tubes were out of the way. Then she attached a couple of wired pads over my chest and hooked them up to a small machine that looked like an oscilloscope and made annoying ‘boop’ noises in time with my heartbeat. When that was done she started taking my temperature and blood pressure.
She was in the process of pumping the cuff bulb when the door to room burst open and my girls came charging in and climbed onto the big bed with me.
The annoying heart monitor went absolutely nuts as my pulse
increased and I broadcast so much love into the room it felt like
Peggy crawled up next to me and laid her head on my chest. Lilly sat on the same side as the middle aged woman and caressed my thigh, tears running down her cheeks, a bright smile on her pretty face.
Izzy…my sweet beautiful loving Izzy crawled in next to Peggy and threw her arm around the both of us.
“Are you girls alright? Nobody got hurt?” I asked.
“Lilly and Izzy got scraped hands and elbows and I got a bruise on my leg.” Peggy mumbled into my side.
“Glad that’s all.” I said.
“The only one who got hurt was you, you big dumb goof!” Lilly said.
“We thought you were dead.” Izzy cried.
“I’m sorry baby…but I had to be sure he didn’t hurt anyone else, or get away.”
She balled up her fist and punched me in the ribs. Luckily it was on the side without broken ribs. Damn that girl can punch!
“Don’t you ever fuckin’ scare me like that again!”
“Izzy,” I said when I got my wind back “…what day is it?”
She got a concerned look on her face. “It’s Monday night.”
I smiled at her. Two days. I linked and added two tiny embers of my love to her ring.
Izzy’s eyes widened and rolled back in her head, her mouth opened and she gasped loudly.
“Ohhhhmyyygodddd!” she moaned and fell back onto the bed.
The older woman beside me dropped the pressure cuff and rushed around to the opposite side of the bed to check on my sister.
“It’s alright. She’s just a little overexcited.” I said as the woman checked Izzy’s pulse.
“Yes, I can see that.” The woman said with a slight smile as my sister panted and shuddered, her hands clamped between her thighs.
I stroked Peggy’s back and motioned for Lilly to move closer. She layed down beside me and put her head on my stomach, her arm around my waist. With my free hand I brushed her hair.
The woman came back around and removed the pads from my chest and the little machine went silent.
“I think we can do without that.” she said with a smile.
“Thank you.”
“You really should get some rest.”
“I will.”
“The girls can come back and see you in the morning.”
Peggy whimpered softly and Lilly’s arm tightened around my waist.
“No…they stay with me.”
The woman backed up quickly. “Alright. Dr. Wills said this might happen. I’ll have cots moved in for them.”
“That’s fine. Thank you. I’m sorry if I frightened you, but at the moment I’m feeling very protective.”
“I understand. I’ll see you later, sir.”
The woman hurried out closing the door behind her.
Peggy giggled. “She called you ‘sir’.”
“Funny, huh? I’ve been getting a lot of that lately and it’s really starting to bug me.”
“Don’t worry; I won’t call you ‘sir’.”
“You’d better not, squirt or I’ll paddle your butt.”
Peggy squirmed around and giggled again. “Promises, promises.”
“Lilly? Why don’t you move up here, honey? Just be careful of my ribs.”
She crawled up and laid her head gently on my shoulder. I kissed her forehead and she hummed to herself.
“Why don’t you climb up on top squirt and make room for Izzy?”
Peggy climbed onto my chest and stretched out over me, getting comfortable. I reached out and rolled Izzy up against my side. She burrowed up under my arm and I gave her a tight squeeze.
I lay there, sandwiched and covered with girls and feeling pretty damn good…if you didn’t count the broken ribs, the torn muscles and bruises.
I exploded with love, contentment and happiness; and I let everyone in the house know it, as the four of us fell asleep together.