301. Outtake #2: Ministrations

The boat (bed) gently rocked to and fro in waters (sheets) clear (clean) and calm (fresh). Trev felt the warmth of a breeze kiss his neck and, like fingers subtle, brush the hair from his forehead. The movement soothed, lifted, lightened and dissolved burdens as salt in water. Somewhere off in the distance, faintly, a bird called, echoes as pebbles dropped into the limpid water, each a siren call to sink deeper into the arms of nature. The sun shone bright radiating a penetrating heat as rays, upon skin taut, nestled home, giving forth life from distance measured by minds in ivory towers.

If his eyes could have rolled any further into the back of his head, they would have. Silence pervaded except for a single sound, a steady lapping of water against the hull, rhythmic like drums on a dry plain (or rain on the roof), heat rising in the distance, sounds (memories) of times past just out of reach. Louder banged the drums, just out of sight. Steady the beat on skin pulled tight, a beat that bespoke of education, of intent, of plan. Trev pushed his head into the pillow. His hips rotated with a mind of their own. He watched with sensation, seduced by forces beyond his understanding, forces of nature before and after, without beginning or end, forces that would ebb and flow.

From within a warmness grew, radiating from center outward. Legs tensed. Arms followed. Mind focused, spun, rose and sunk and still the lapping of educated friction, a sound seductive, marched on, relentless in firm purpose. Breathing increased. Lips opened and spread, softening to the tune of digits divine. Tongue flicked and smile melted into the intoxication of surrender taken. Time gave way to timelessness. Gravity took recess. And, as if by magic, the wonder of neither this nor that rose from darkness to light.

A presence hovered, not seen. Intuited. Not questioned. As cream flows, richly, inevitably, up and forward as soldiers at the whistle. Hope springs and fear pushes. United. Birth greets death as dawn emerges from night.

300. Cold

Kyra Journal Entry:

In a few hours we will be docking and I've been told our arrival is anticipated, or at least John's is. Seems another lifetime when we set out on this mission. High hopes. Another Hynerian vessel. Full of righteousness I was, but even that is, perhaps, another illusion. Emotion flowed. How could it not. I saw it, felt it. I'm not an idiot. I just chose to ignore it, justify it, rationalize it. Not really a hard thing to do. And in the exchange, we lost Bravo, almost lost our lives, twice, put Rog and John in difficulty, all but abandoned Yul--and never saw the other vessel. I would do it all over again if given half the chance. That is as honest as I can be. Why it disturbs me so, I cannot tell.

I sit in the captain's chair. Everyone else is asleep, the ship on auto as we slip silently through the blackness toward two points of light, toward John's home, not ours. If I listen very intently, I can hear a slight hum with only starlight illuminating the bridge, giving my skin a soft bluish cast, which is about how I feel; cold. Cold of heart, not of limb. Cold of mind. Still, I long for quiet and I long for peace and I know these things come from within, not without. I am weary of searching. Weary of the burden. Weary of no place to call home. Weary of judgments not asked and of answers not given. I miss Kieran. I wonder if he misses me. I miss the beaches of Valla. I miss Bravo. I miss being more certain of who and what I am.

So nice to be self-indulgent. I wonder what The Unknowns would think of that. I would like to say I've been thinking about Yul and all she has had to suffer. I have not. I will see her soon. We've been told she is doing well. I will say all the right things. And she will know; and I will ask for her forgiveness--or is it understanding--as I tell her I would make the same choices, that I would again leave for the bird and abandon the bush; and I wonder what part of my heart is capable of such coldness. Not exactly the behavior of the chosen one, but I never asked for that appellation. I'm sorry Papa. I wish I could be more than I am. I wish I could be all you dreamed I would be. I wish I could stand in the room of mirrors and see what they would say now.

Abandoned. Why do we do it. We profess love and we do otherwise. John abandoned Cait, not to mention Ariel. Perhaps harsh, but he has no dog in our fight, no reason to do what he did and risk what he risked. I should be grateful. I'm not. We abandoned Yul. We left knowing we might not ever see her again, that the chances were good that was the case. Still, we did it. We left her to die, virtually alone. We did that. And my heart tells me I would do it again. The thought makes me heavy as if a lump of lead sits in my chest. There is fog at the end of the plank. I cannot see.

Actually, I do see. I see that place in my heart that will not heal, that I have kept locked away with the chains of repression and denial. That place that asks why. That place that wants to lash out. That place the cries out for a father and a mother. That place that wonders why they made the choices they did. That place that Papa could never reach. He tried. He tried with all his might. He knew it was there. But even Papa had his limits. So I sit here and I feel an energy within me. A dark, heavy, burdensome energy. I feel tired without being tired. My soul aches at the dirty untidiness of expectation. To be touched with unLove. It leaves a mark, a stain. And it colors everything I do.

299. Jackassery

Rog: So you have a dream chip?

John: Von, would you tell our friend it might be best if he kept his frailing mouth shut.

Rog: Why?

John: Why! Are you shiotting me?

Rog: What?

John: Von, you want to take this one?

Von: No John, I think you’re doing just fine.

Rog: You’re not still mad are you?

John: Mad? You think I’m mad? Von?

Von: Rog, if I may, I think the fact that there is a small chance we will not regain our sight, and the fact that cause and effect points to your, how do I say it, Jackassery, well, I think that might have something to do with John’s attitude.

John: Jackassery. Thank you Von. You know what Jackassery is Rog?

Rog: (quiet)

John: I’ll tell you what Jackassery is! It’s you pulling out that las pistol. What the frail were you thinking?

Rog: You know what I was thinking . . . .

John: Well?

Rog: (raises voice) I was thinking someone was going to get off his arse and do something! You heard the same cries I did.

John: Yeah, well, did you not think maybe, just maybe, Von knew what he was talking about? Maybe, just a little? (holds out hand and uses fingers to illustrate before realizing no one could see him)

Rog: Look. I did what I did and it is what it is. I’m not going to apologize for making something happen. In fact—

John: Don’t frailing say it.

Rog: Frail you. In fact—

Kyra: Rog. John. Let it go. Intent, by both parties, was pure and I find no fault in either the action or inaction, as the case may be. Von, you were right. Rog, I love you for being yourself. I wouldn’t want to go into harm’s way without you. And John, get use to it. This won’t be the last time you see some Jackassery out of Rog. (slight pause and then she starts laughing, followed by Von, John and Em)

Rog: Kyra?

Kyra: Yes Rog?

Rog: I love you too.

Kyra: You’re welcome Rog. Now I suggest you guys get some rest. We’ll be docking in about twelve hours.

John: Kyra?

Kyra: Yes John?

John: Care to tell us what happened?

Kyra: No, not really.

John: Okay. Just thought I’d ask. You know, since, well . . . .

Kyra: Don’t push it John. Remember, I still have your chip.

Rog: Yeah John, she still has your chip.

John: Frail you.

Rog: You got that half right.

John: What?

Rog: I’m just saying.

Kyra: Hey. Enough. Lights out. See you in eight. (turns out the lights and leaves)

Rog: Nice job Disco.

John: You're welcome, Jackassary.

298. The Dream Chip

Kyra held a small golden disc in her hands, not much bigger than the pad of her pinky finger.

"I bet you're wondering what that is," said John, rubbing the back of his head and realizing Kyra had inadvertently found and released the chip as she tightened his blindfold.

"Well, I wasn't going to ask."

"It's what is called a dream chip. Kulmyk fighter pilots, for training purposes had a small chip installed in the back of their head. It recorded brain activity and allowed specialized neuronic training, a way to accelerate the learning process, or so they said."

"I see," said Kyra, taking the measure of John's face. His blindfold secure. "So why do they call it a "dream chip?"

John smiled. "The chip also records dreams. Our scientists thought this was important in the evaluation process of new fighter pilots. They wanted a window into a Kulmyk's hopes and fears, into his psyche, his dreams if you will."

"So this chip has your dreams on it?"

"Yep."

"And this chip allows you to view your dreams, to watch them like a movie?"

"Yes."

"So I could, if I wanted, see your dreams?"

"Yes, you could, if you wanted."

"And right now, in your condition, you couldn't stop me, if I wanted?"

"I suppose that's true."

__________________

From Nashville for my Dear Beautiful Soul:

297. Be Yourself

Kyra: (looking up into the light) What do you want from me?

Unknown #1: Be yourself.

Kyra: (looks confused)

Unknown #2: Drop everything you think you know. Knowledge will only confuse you.

Kyra: So what do I do?

Unknown #1: Be yourself.

Kyra: What does that mean?

Unknown #2: Just. No more. No less.

Kyra: I don't understand.

Unknown #1: Understanding is an facade. Let it go.

Kyra: How?

Unknown #2: Don't pick it up.

Kyra: (hangs head)

Unknown #1: (whispers to Unknown #2)

Unknown #2: Resistance Kyra is the source of your pain. Hold on, and you will suffer.

Kyra: (balls her fists and cries out) I am my resistance!

Unknown #1: No more than a butterfly is her cocoon.

296. Von's Journal #4

No one was really sure when Von made this entry since in a very unlike Von fashion, he forgot to log a date. Time estimated based on other entries: shortly after the Kyra Incident.

There is a stillness, like the moment before dawn, in which understanding is reached; and, like the breaking of dawn, surrender to the inevitability of all hell breaking loose.

Eyes do their best work when closed.

Things are never as they seem. How can they be since "to seem" is to separate, to create beyond, to work in interpretation--the playground of the non-Janus.

295. First Time

Ed note: Title is a triple play. In a literal sense, this is the first time Mairi kisses Trev. From a story point of view, this is the first chapter literally written in the comment section of the preceding chapter. And, this is the first time I have used an image previously used in the story, albeit with a slightly different hue adjustment. Enjoy.

Trev’s breathing stabilized, a good sign thought Mairi. Spreading her fingers like a web on the underside of his head, she lifted with the care of a mother lifting her baby while with a gentle skill that belied her training, secured a blindfold with her right hand. As egg to crate, she lowered his head on the soft pillow, a sight, she thought, more delicious and tempting than it ought to be.

Chatelaine training taught that smell, of all the senses, caroused with memory and the moments to come, she knew, would be moments of healing that would need to be cultivated far beyond the moment of capitulation. Placing small warming tablets on either side of the bed, the sensual aroma of willowbrush gently rose as if awakened from sacred slumber. Breathing deep, she closed her eyes, and a thousand images flashed before her mind like cards shuffled. With each out breath, the images slowed until the one she needed, the one she wanted, appeared in clear focus, floating in subservience.

Slipping back into bed, her legs, smooth and neither too long nor too short, ran the length of his, her toes taking the measure of his sigh inducing muscle of youth; her hands traced lightly his wounds of days past, her eyes marveled at his chiseled jaw and angular cheek, looking more like marble than flesh. Her lips found his, the warmth, the softness, the slippery wetness, the firmness, the intensity, the passionate energy as her eyes closed and the soft warm light reflected off her eye lids reminiscent of a dual moonrise on the beaches of Valla. Her hair fell into his face, her thumbs to his temples; and her lips moved beyond skill, sucking, biting, gliding, teasing, suckling, wrapping, brushing, pushing, molding, of breath shared as moans escaped.

With lips locked in a living dance as angels or devils might in a moment of reprise, Mairi breathed her mind into his, a mind tender in abuse, aching for embrace, fearful of hurt. As a warm blanket covers a cold and frightened child, she gently began to massage his centers of pain and memory, milking them of power, kneading stress from neurons inflamed. As her tongue traced the row between his lips so did her mind dance and dart to soothe concern and hold fear at bay long enough to wrap her intent around his desire as tongue around a lollipop.

Trev’s mind begin to response and Mairi went deeper. Later Trev would write this in his journal:

Then I think about her slipping into my mind and what a good mind-frail would be like and I imagine the most delicious and intense wet dream, the utter stickiness, the musky-sweet aroma of release, taken with a caress of neurons in ways the hands can only admire. I imagine her chest heaving with life, rising with curves divine, creating their own eclipse; and in the shadow of my surrender, a tenseness rendered with the crack of a whip, the slap of a glute, the exhilaration of being rode, hard.

The kiss has an energy that sends a shock from lip to eye and stirs emotion in the gut as only first love can. Lights swirl as flesh paints with passion upon flesh and hands talk in touches like feathers on silk. Her tongue narrows and darts with a playful precision and I follows her lead to places shared by few and desired by many. The bed seems to sink, to envelope us as if the sheets rose as waterfalls port and aft. Golden hide graces porcelain digits as spoon to warm honey and endearments announce as gates open and trumpets play for an audience of two.

I lean my head back and press hard into my pillow, as if to brace myself that all before me could be but a dream. She lifts her chin and looks down from the bottom of her eyes, her regal nose triumphant, her lips slightly parted, glistening with lust raw and pure; and with a feline arching of back, tosses her short auburn locks and closes her eyes as curtains between acts. Her tongue glides over her pert upper lip as her hips settle into position, moving and rotating as if greased, as if control was quartered not granted.

294. Listen

“Papa, the children of the shells, they—“

Papa continued to walk, gifting Kyra space and silence.

“They seem lonely.”

Still Papa walked along the beach, a steady pace neither rushed nor purposeful, just walking to walk as he would say. He offered no opinion.

“Well?”

“Well what?”

“What do you think?”

“I think you think too much.”

Kyra kicked a shell into the surf. Papa bowed his head, placed his hands behind his back and continue to walk, his white tunic flapping in the ocean breeze. No footprints.

“I’m serious Papa.”

“I’m not.”

“What does that mean?”

“Listen to the ocean. Is it lonely? Is it serious?”



“Papa? Papa!”

Kyra gasped for breath. Her abs contracting, painfully, involuntarily as another volume of viscous blue liquid expelled itself from her bowels. Sucking for air, her throat burned. Her eyes watered such to make everything seem blurry, faded, out of focus. Pain, fear, the unknown, however, have there own way of rendering sight blind, of thought single minded. Grabbing the sides of her bed, her nails as claws, her chest heaved upward, her heart jumping as if it could escape. Her plaintive wail, both of child and adult, brought glass to tears of flickering shards as so much confetti.

“Papa!”

Papa was more distant now. His head still bowed and he walked without turning, without acknowledgment.

Kyra’s lithe body hardened, her muscles straining, against what she did not know. Her teeth ached with pains sharp and dull. Each joint, from elbow to ankle screamed as if on fire. Papa slipped from sight as if consumed by the shimmering waves of despair. Her hands slackened. The room fell quiet.

Rog looked at John, who looked at Von. “I can’t take this anymore. Back away from the door.” Before anyone could stop Rog, six rounds from his las pistol burned into the door and from six holes came light so brilliant, so blinding . . .

293. The Unknowns

The concern over Kyra notwithstanding, the crew had much to celebrate. After all, prayers had been answered, how had not been discussed, but six days became seven and seven eight and everyone was just a little too overjoyed to tempt fate with questions.

John poured four glasses of amsec and handed one to Rog, one to Von and the last to Em. Lifting his crystal flute to the center, the others followed suit, the four golden glasses shinning like a chandelier as eyes looked upward for words to be spoken. A toast, he said as his voice trailed off.

What started as a slight vibration, a disturbing ripple across nectar held high, held firm, grew, exponentially; and in an instant, amsec rained down with shards of crystal and their small vessel rocked as if the hand of a giant had slapped the hull. As the four struggled to get to their feet, a second concussive wave knocked them down again as a young boy might shake a box of toy soldiers. Lights blinked and klaxons wailed and as quickly as the vessel was hit, stillness returned.

Rog yelled, although he didn’t need to, “I thought you said we had shields?”

John yelled back. “We do!” Picking himself up, his sea-legs betrayed him and only his strong arms kept his head from banging the control panel. “Our systems must be down?”

“What?” asked Rog.

“I said our systems must be down. Not a threat within a parsec, the screen is blank.”

“Blank?” said Von.

“Nada.”

Rog took the pilot’s seat. Then a low vibration, almost a moan wafted over the comms followed by a sickly gurgling sound. “What the—“

The hair on the back of Von’s neck stood up. Before anyone could react, a blood curtling scream, unmistakable in tone, permeated the room.

“My Janus,” cried Von. “Its Kyra.”

Unknown #1: We put her at great risk.

Unknown #2: We have no choice.

Unknown #1: Are you prepared to lose her?

Unknown #2: (with hesitation) Yes.

“Open the frailing door!” screamed Rog, his nerves frayed by the unworldly cries from within Kyra’s room, his hands bloodied from effort.

“It won’t budge,” screamed John back.

“Move!”

“Won’t do any good,” interjected Von.

“What?”

“The door will open when it is ready to open. You’d just as soon change the fabric of reality as to pry it apart.”

“Are you suggesting we just sit here?”

“I’m not suggesting anything. I’m telling you the matters at hand are beyond our ability to influence. Take that as you will.”

“So what do we do?”

“Bow our heads and pray we see our girl again.”

292. In the Ways

As Mairi had carried Trev, so John carried Kyra. Her breathing was steady, her face tranquil. John laid her in her private quarters and took a moment to trace her curves with his eyes before quietly taking his exit.

Five days later:

John: How long is she going to sleep?

Rog: We’ve seen this before, after Kieran died. Took her almost two weeks to recover.

John: (looked lost in thought) I wouldn’t think the body would need such a long time to heal. Is this a Hynerian quirk?

Von: (laughing) Hynerian? Janus no. This is a Kyra thing. You see, what is healing is not the body, although I’m sure the body is recovering from the exertion. (Von paused)

Rog: (looked from Von to John)

John: (looked from Von to Rog)

Rog: Don’t look at me.

John: Okay, you got me. What is healing?

Von: Well, we’re not sure.

John: What?

Rog: We think we know, but we don’t really know. Her grandfather was, perhaps, the most famous Hynerian of our generation, a Zing Tao master of the ninth order, protégé to the Brandonian, Ji.

John: And this means?

Von: Her grandfather, Zeke, or Papa as she calls him, had a gift. He could swim in the current of the universal in ways the rest of us only dream about.

John: The universal?

Rog: Love.

John: (laughing) Love. Okay.

Von: Laugh if you like. But ask yourself this. Could you have done what you have seen Kyra do twice now?

John: (didn’t answer)

Von: Zeke believed that Kyra’s gift, her potential, put him to shame. He dedicated his later life to developing her abilities. Unfortunately, our little planet went south before he could finish the task. Kyra swims in waters me and you will never taste.

John: (leaned forward on his knees and looked at Rog)

Rog: (nods head)

John: Okay, so I ask you again, what is healing?

Von: As Kyra might say, if you would stop interrupting me, I’ll tell you what I know. (Von winked)

John: Sorry. I’m usually the one telling fairy tales, but please, continue.

Von: (sighs)

John: I’m sorry, I didn’t mean---

Von: Forget it. Most on Hynerian would have reacted the same. But then again, most have only heard tales of Ji and Zeke and the Zing Tao, and Kyra was not much more than a rumor. Anyway, what I believe is healing, according to Zeke, is neither body nor mind, but the education of the soul in the ways of the flow, the water, the universal, Love, whatever you want to call it.

John: (has a “you’re shiotting me” look on his face)

Rog: Dude, we shiott you not. And we aint’t shiooting you either (laughs)

Von: (laughs a little less than Rog and looks back at John) And we ain’t seen nothing yet.

291. With Considerable Effort

With considerable effort, Mairi carried Trev into her quarters, his neck hanging limp in the valley of her left elbow, and gently placed him on her bed. He looked younger than he was, or was it innocent and childlike; she couldn’t quite decide. His hair was matted and his eyes looked crusted with sleep, at least that is what she tried to tell herself. The idea that a grown man had cried the tears she knew he had cried, in shame or pain or, as she knew, both, knocked at a door of her heart she would rather not unlock.

His tunic, once white, looked more like a painter’s canvas of dark gray’s and textured browns and the buttons were mismatched as if manipulated by fingers rushed and too large for the task. Flashes of fists and kicks struck like lightning and faded just as quick leaving ghostly imprints in her mind. With care, or haste, she could not recall, she slowly released each button, pealing back his shirt. His nipples looked bruised and slightly swollen with ruddy concentric rings that implied stimulation gone wrong. A strange whey paste-like substance flaked to the touch and visions of forehead straining against leather, of veins bulging as eyes narrowed in the smiling windows of another’s wickedness sent a shiver up her arm and into her chest.

Lifting first the left arm and then the right, she eased Trevor’s shirt from his dirty shoulders and tossed it to the floor. Reaching for the warm wet cloth from the wooden bowl on the side of the bed, Mairi cocked her head as if the mere position could somehow soften the touch of rag to skin and communicate care and love. Her eyes watered as each pass of cloth removed a layer of yesterday from Trev and overwhelmed her own mind with screams and terror mixed with pleasure and slaps as piece after piece of his ordeal danced with horrid grins before her still burned out mind.

Black water filled the bowl as rag released pain into the cleansing basin. Moving with tenderness, she unbuttoned his trousers. Pulling from his ankles, she removed the soiled garment and tossed it to the side of his discarded tunic. The back of his legs showed reddish purple welts, each a testament to a cruel darkness. Sliding her pristine copper nails under the waistband of his shorts, she pulled them gently over the firm tautness of his young flesh. She had never seen Trev nude before nor had she ever seen such a magnificent body abused and beaten so mercilessly. Falling to bended knee, Mairi placed her hands upon his cold and trembling chest and whispered supplications of forgiveness.

Wiping salty petition from her eyes, Mairi examined the focus of wickedness past. What was flesh and what was blood, was not easy to surmise. With strokes tender and grasp light, Mairi washed and caressed his divine manifestation with the punctilious care of the discalceate before alter. Her hands lingered, letting her warmth become his and as blood begin to flow, her mind throbbed with his agony in step with the rising tumidity in her hand. She sighed, of relief or surprise, she would not say. He was magnificent in repose, his battered body bent but not broken, bruised but not forgotten. Why she had never noticed him before, in this way, she could not explain.

With a fresh bowl, she went to work again with her cloth and from head to toe, cleansed his body as if the healing waters would absolve her guilt, each pass of cloth a prayer. When she was done, she stood, and releasing the bow that held her dress in place allowed it to fall to the floor as a parachute to ground. Nestling Trev’s head to her warm bosom she placed her right leg over his tender and abused agent of masculine surrender as her fingers combed his hair and pulled him tight. Tremble responded to tremble as cold melted into warmth and the story of Mairi and Trev intertwined as strands of rope, giving strength and comfort in union.

Commentary: With Considerable Effort



Soundtrack for this chapter: Un Giorno Per Noi (Josh Groban)

290. The Kyra Star

Papa and Kyra are walking down the beach on their way for ice cream when a man and his son approach them. The man speaks of need and solicits money from Papa.

K: Papa, why did you give that man all our money?

P: I did it for the son.

K: But we can’t get any ice cream now.

P: Ice cream might make the belly smile, but to give love makes the heart smile, or, as I’ve heard it put, makes your soul shine.

K: Soul shine? Really?

P: (kneeling down) Look closely at my eyes.

K: Oh.

P: Soul Shine.

K: Can you make my eyes do that?

P: No.

K: (frowns)

P: Only you can do that.

K: Show me how.

P: (smiles) I just did.

K: (looks confused)

P: Every day we are blessed with opportunity, the opportunity to give, to smile, to paint the world around us with yellow, to touch the canvas of another with the paintbrush of our heart. Do that, and your soul will shine. Do it enough and . . .

K: And what?

P: (looking more serious) And you become a light unto the world.

K: (looks with wonder)

P: Yes, but can I tell you a secret?

K: (Kyra leans in) Only if you promise to tell and not show.

P: (Papa smiles) Look into the heavens my precocious one, just above the horizon. What do you see?

K: I see my star, the Kyra star. (Papa had named the brightest star in the Hynerian sky after Kyra)

P: And?

K: It is the brightest most brilliant star in the whole sky.

P: Yes it is. And do you know why I named it the Kyra star?

K: Because you like teasing me with lessons.

P: (Papa laughed—sometimes he forgot he was conversing with a child) Because, my child, you have a gift, an ability, a potential, if you will.

K: (looks somewhat puzzled)

P: (Papa puts his hands on Kyra’s shoulders, his eyes looking into the endless cisterns of her young sapphire eyes) You are that star Kyra.


Kieran: I must go now.

K: I know.

Kieran: You know, Papa was right.

K: (looks searchingly) About what?

Kieran: You are the—

John: Hey, I appreciate the family reunion, but we best get moving before reinforcements arrive. And they will.

Commentary and Reading: The Kyra Star




Categories: Story, Papa, Kyra, Kieran, John Discovery

289. coup d'oeil

Ed note: The following bits and pieces surfaced on the flight yesterday. They may or may not have happened in the story. The image is what I call "Place Your Bets," an allusion to which bits below you think really happened.


Internal Affairs visited Cait. They wanted to know where John was. Said something about a chip.

Mairi finds Trev. He's a mess. Camera pans away with Mairi holding Trev in her arms like a frightened child, her hair blowing in the wind. She is wearing a long pleated skirt with a mustard colored blouse offsetting her auburn locks.

Dr. X discovers that Châtelaine's undergo three months of training to communicate with their eyes.

The signal Rog recognizes comes from Kyra's Zing Tao ring.

Taren is forced to destroy the ring, and under duress has to do it in front of Kyra.

This unleashes a side of Kyra never seen and she destroys the entire compound.

When no one is left alive, she collapses in a heap as a light is seen around her--Kieran.

When Mairi finds Trev he has blood caked on his upper lip, his eyes stare unblinking, lifeless; he can't form coherent words or thoughts. His body feels strangely cold and he trembles uncontrollably.

Mairi puts hands on his head, closes her eyes and has flashes of his mind. She cries, something a hardened Châtelaine would never do.

Kyra spares Taren, barely. The number of dead in the compound count into the hundreds as she moved of body and mind.

Von said it was the most terrifying and beautiful birth he had ever seen.

Emy couldn't talk about what she saw for months.

Mairi feels guilt at encouraging Trev to sow his oats.

BC is pissed Lil' let Trev go and not kill him.

Kieran holds Kyra as Mairi holds Trev--tells her he has someone that wants to say hello, someone that did not take the last ship out of dodge.

John writes in his journal that "After the Kyra Incident" he is losing his moral compass with Cait.

Mairi looks to the heavens and cries out, "My Janus, what have they done to you." Tears streak down her cheeks and she looks back down at Trev's blank stare and through her tears she utters, "My dear child." She wipes his hair away and shaking her head says, "How will you ever forgive me?" She is rocking back and forth as a mother might rock a frightened child to sleep.

"Papa?"

Kieran says she can't directly connect with him but that he can act as a conduit.

Message from Papa: "We can still get there from here."

Von: (Looks at Rog) I hope you brought some snoot?
Rog: I did.
Von: Good Hynerian.
Rog: I drank it--all.
Von: (deadpans)
Rog: But I have a plan.
Von: Yeah?
Rog: Looks at John.
John: What?
Von and Rog: (Start laughing)

I Love You, I'll Kill You by Enigma is the Soundtrack for "The Kyra Incident."

Interview from Earth:

T: Can you explain what happened?

K: Taren's hammer was like a pickaxe. The down stroke to Papa's ring broke, and I shiott you not, to my mind's eye, I saw it as clear as day, but broke layer upon layer of inhibition and doubt while harnessing a synergistic melding of practice, theory and application that took years of pieces and in an instant painted, how would you say it, a Mona Lisa.

T: Wow.

K: Don't ever say that word again in response.

T: Okay.

K: (starts laughing) I'm just shiotting you. Bring more whiskey--nine glasses.

T: (just smiles)

288. Ratchet Me This

The badious leather table supported Trev’s torso, his feet and hands secure in their respective stirrups, his eyes fixed at a forty-five degree angle to the floor. Between torso and stirrups were smaller accoutrements to support the legs without hinder. Designed to allow access to those parts deemed necessary while fully supporting the client at hand, the table was the instrument most requested within the house. Trev was not given that option.

Sal slowly turned a smallish luteous wheel under the table and Trev heard a series of audible clicks, what sounded like the screech and clap of a metal ratchet. Each sharp click matched the throbbing in his chest as he realized his legs were slowly being spread. Exposed and hanging, fearful and wanting, mind racing, heart pounding. “Keep breathing my delicious,” said Sal as her hands took the measure of tightness firm. “First time, I see.” If Trev could have turned his head he would have seen her creamy smile, rich as lust, brimming with purposeful anticipation.

Trev tried to speak, his lips moved but no words came forth. She had placed a small round silver device, no larger than a dime and somewhat cool to the touch, on the back of his neck that held the vocal cords at bay. As her fingers begin to probe, his fear of the unknown, a fear tinged with lustful expectation, gave way to a flood of emotion too complex, too muddled, to convoluted for this drugged mind to sort. Yes and no, right and wrong, shame and lust wrestled such that where one was the other soon took its place.

“Relax my pretty. I don’t want to hurt you, but I can, and I will.” Trev tried to speak again—nothing moved but the bulging veins on the side of his neck. Sal moved to the head of the table, allowing her nails to lightly trace a path from tumid tautness, over the roundness of hill and the curve of valley to the device. Circling the metal with her finger she said, “You’ll speak when I’m ready to hear you call my name and beg for more or is that curse my birth, defame my mother and pray for mercy. Besides, the room is sound proof, Lil’ has turned off your comm and no one knows you're here. And, correct me if I’m wrong, but I have a very strong feeling that you didn’t tell anyone you were coming here.” Sal’s nails bit into the back of his neck drawing forth a small crimson worm that fell with gravity to the cold cobbled floor below. “Now shut the frail up and do what I say.”

Trev closed his eyes as if shutting out the world would make it go away.

“I don’t often get this privileged. Give yourself to me, and, well, we may have a mutual experience. Resist,” Sal hesitated, “well, let’s just say I’d rather see you walk out of here. But make no mistake; don’t much matter to me either way.”

Categories: Story, Trev, Sal

287. Breathe

Sal held her grip, neither firm nor slack but just held it as one would hold a beating heart, listening to life throb, luxuriating in dominion as queen to slave . Leaning forward, naked curve on naked curve she bit Trev’s lobe, her long black hair falling as curtains on either side of his auditory orifices.

“Breathe. Just breathe.”

Trev sunk deeper into intoxicated clarity, a sensual landscape beyond the vial, beyond letters and art, beyond words or even images; bound not of leather and steel but of essences of body and mind unspeakable.

“Better,” whispered Sal, an aroma of lust on her long tongue as permissive hands and fingers began again to move with intent of pure unadulterated presentness.

Categories: Story, Trev, Sal

286. With Bitter Verve

“Morning Yul, how are you?” asked Mairi.

Yul moved her eyes without moving her head giving Mairi a look as cold as a witch's tit.

“I did what I had to do.”

Yul pulled her hand away.

Mairi sighed.

“I want you to leave.”

Mairi looked without expression.

“Now.”

Mairi started to speak, stopped and then said, with effort, “As you wish.” She walked to the door and before leaving looked back. “Yul?”

Yul did not response.

“Frail you you ungrateful betoch,” said Mairi, with calculated bitter verve. She didn’t wait for a response she knew wasn’t coming.

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: Bonnie Somerville's Winding Road

Alternative soundtrack: Yungchen Lhamo's Fade Away

Categories: Story, Yul, Mairi

285. From Within

“Zeke, I have a vessel waiting. Join me,” said Ji.

From dry to wet, eyes silently twinkled like so many stars in the heavens, illumination, not reflection. “I can’t.”

“Which is why you must.”

Recommended soundtrack for this chapter: Enigma's Sadeness (Pt.1), or at least the first ninety seconds. ;-)

Categories: Story, Zeke, Ji

284. The Turret

Papa walked into the turret room, as Kyra called it, an eight sided addition he had built with calloused hands and sweaty brow on the rear left side of the villa, facing the more rugged coastline. The room had eight sides, eight windows and between the windows, eight mirrors. To casual visitors, the room was a shrine to the eight precepts, and in so much as it was told, it was true. But what is truth, Papa would often say, but a word, a raft we put into the river of all that is. Rafts come and go, and we live not for the raft, for the river is truth and life and love and the river flows and moves and lives and dabbles not in labels and opinions and concepts.

For a small child, the turret room was a magical place with its mirrors and windows—Kyra’s favorite place on the whole estate. As she grew, so did the magic and if she were not on the beach she could be found reading in the turret, or, as Papa discovered many times, standing in the center of the room in wakeful meditation.

“Kyra,” whispered Papa, sticking his head through the door, “may I come in?”

Seemingly without effort, Kyra pirouetted with arms outstretched, her coal black mane catching the Hynerian sun is shades of gray and blue with the luster of youth, her porcelain white skin, almost too white, shinning with eyes limpid, bright and calmly reflective. “My dear Papa, state your intention and be quick. Hesitation is the mark of shadows dark, of purpose complicated.”

Papa laughed. “My purpose, my child, is to marvel at the gift of you and to wonder what vistas you will see beyond my ability to imagine. Yet, we must be careful of conceit. Look around the room.”

Kyra did. Eight mirrors, eight views, each slightly different and even the same mirror never gave back what it offered before. She had heard it before and knew she was about to hear it again. Papa was nothing if not consistent in his belief that repetition was the mother of all teaching, so she cut him off. “And we never look into the same mirror twice.”

“Exactly!” exclaimed Papa.


+Tell me more about these mirrors.+

Commentary: The Turret




Categories: Story, Papa, Kyra