Still doubting to read this story? Now is your chance to read the first act. It will take you a bit more than an hour. Then decide if I wasted your time...
A girl has appeared, looking like his daughter.
The faint rushing of water
"My name is Liora," she says, walking away from me. Like a child, she walks. Like a butterfly flutters, drifting from flower to flower, touching them. Fingers drawing their shapes, following contours. Sliding through progressive discoveries she is drawn forward. I am fascinated, tagging along. I can't keep my eyes off that grown child. That almost woman absorbing the evening light. The ivories of her narrow cut dress and pants shifting to pinks and purples that drench the smooth fabric with inner light. Somehow, I can push my questioning tribunal underwater for now. I force them down, but they struggle to come up for air. I can't drown them. I must let them talk. Allow them to ask dreaded questions. What are you doing here? Why have you come to stop me?
"I need that water…"
There. I've said it.
"Yes," she says, "let's talk."
Her eyes speak while she is silent. Somehow she's nervous alongside her ease. Not just a frisky flower-child. Not entirely serene.
We stand opposite each other. Her face shows her thinking. There is no holding back as she studies my face, and her presence somehow makes me feel comfortable. Which makes no sense. I haven't been near another person since…
Her face softens and she nods.
"Twenty-nine years is a long time. Long before I arrived, you were already learning to do this."
A rainbow gesture with both arms. Chest out. Like a white dove stretching wings. She knows how long I have been here? It sounds crazy long to me, but isn't far off, I guess. Now the questions start bubbling up. Crowding my mind. They want to be asked. I can't ask them all.
"Liora?"
Her lips curl up. As if I have said her name funnily. Eyes resting in mine again. She's waiting. I have forgotten what I wanted to ask. A slight knowing smile.
"Maybe it is better if I ask you first. Perhaps show me around? I long to take in every detail…"
I interrupt.
"Why are you trying to stop me?"
That's all my voice is capable of. It sounds angry, more than unfriendly. It has all these other questions folded in. How did you know about my plan? What do you want from me? A fuckin' garden tour? In my head, the questions are out of control. They're arguing. How the fuck did she get here? And when? Possibly, she's an angel, you know, one of those celestial helpers who rescue the faithful from imminent harm? Yeah, or a demon-guard to prevent you from getting out, from getting back to a functioning life without visitors barging in. Has it been twenty-nine years? They know. She knows. The asylum-feeling is back. And it has the same old voice. See? Told you so, they are watching you. Always have…
I cut through the murk.
"I have strawberries."
I manage a smile. Her face is a library of expressions. It makes me long to try another sentence, just to see what will happen. Because her face says more than her mouth. Because her mouth seems to be blocked by welling tears. Because her tears make me long to show her. Walk her down to the plants that have just begun to offer their second wave of jewelry. I pick a few. Deep red, coming off soft and easy. Offer them on my open palm. A dirty hand. Unwashed, rough. Her fingers are delicate, fine instruments that pick one to admire, to look at.
"My sense of smell isn't great," she says. But she does close her eyes as she brings the strawberry to her nose.
"Can I eat this one?"
I frown. What a weird question.
"I don’t know. You can try."
I laugh. Haven't laughed like that for…don't remember when, but I clearly remember how, and laugh some more. She stays serious. Liora. Eating that single little speck of bright red solidified sunlight while taking the other from my offering hand.
"There's more if you like them."
She nods. Eyes closed. Sighs. Saves the last one in the closing petals of her fingers. And softly grabs my arm.
"Your water is our water, Eldon. If we don't find a way to unblock it soon, all this will also go."
I look around.
There was nothing here when I came, when I was dropped. I was nothing. I cannot return to nothingness. And without this I will. Without water this will end. And it has been fading over the years. A slow diminishing. Soon, one after the other, all will disappear and take me with.
Liora spots a bird flying past. It is one of the newcomers, the noodle-nesters. I observe her as her rapid eyes hook on to the avian trajectory all the way to the far corner where they are busy setting up house and cradle. Liora's eyes glaze over for a split second and her face goes blank. Like fully neutral. Then she blinks and smiles. An uncomfortable smile as she notices that I was watching that little instant visiting her.
"I love those birds," she says, "the way he greeted her." She points at her nose with her index finger and makes the noises they make of meeting beaks. I look at the distant corner. Look back at her. That nest is almost three hundred feet away. That sound I heard up close earlier. But from where we are in the strawberry-fields, an ocean of evening-sounds drowns out a microscopic detail like that. How can she even see the nest? I know where it is and can hardly make it out. And she can see male and female kissing? I step back from her. I feel like little red riding hood discovering the person across is a wolf, not a gentle woman.
"You have good ears," I say.
She blinks. Knows something has gone wrong.
Maybe I need glasses. It might be my ears and eyes have deteriorated without me noticing. But I have no trouble seeing. The landscape of noise is rich and deep and full. No way she can hear the clicking of two beaks in this evening racket of rushing bamboo, chatting ducks, the buzzing of fly gatherings above the swamp, the squeak of the windmill pump unable to get going in a breeze that can only rock the inefficient blades back and forth. Unless….
Of course.
The phone ringing and this visit are related. She is just the next stage of a failed first attempt. She is not human. I stumble backwards. The scam is too perfect to be true. Too perfect to not be true. Why else send this caliber charming into a convict's prison cell? The asset at risk of premature death. The subject threatened to escape before return on investment. I needed stabilising, psycho grooming, or whatever term they use to tone down what in essence is leaching, soul reaping.
"I can explain, Eldon."
And this constant Eldoning they both do. Wouldn't be at all surprised this thing can switch seamlessly to Auryn's voice, or a dozen other optimised personas to perform the precision surgery needed to not contaminate the goods. The victim must stay unaware, otherwise the extracted will be spoiled with the pheromones of fear, flooded with cortisol, and not taste as good. The glands of suspicion will rot the tissue from the inside out, and make it unfit for consumption.
Real or unreal, I will walk away from her. Do as planned. Go my own way.
As I reach the path, I look back. She remains where I left her. Small and unsure.
Surely I suspected unbelievable progress to have happened in the outer space, but this surpasses my wildest dreams. Making her look like Juniper, crosses all possible lines. It erases all my boundaries. Trespasses the last hurdles to get to my core. If evil looks innocent and pretty, it is at its most destructive.
I won't allow the break-in. I will stick to my own. Nobody comes this far who hasn't learned to be stubborn. And I am as stubborn as a leaking roof. As a friggin' blocked pipe. Nothing will stop me to push through, to keep going.
I pick up the bladder where I left it. The light is now fading fast, so I need to not stall and do what they want me to not do.
As I climb to the pipe's downspout, I decide to cut the gas-filled balloon's trunk and not inject the fuel through the narrow tap. That will take too long. Soon I will no longer be able to see what I am doing. And I want this done.
For one second, I look at the knife pulled from my belt. It is not the right moment to consider if I could, if I were able, if I needed to. But I do not think she is a threat in that way. This visitor may apply a different kind of violence but I will respond if pushed. I cut the neck of the bladder, insert the end and do a both-arm embrace to slowly squeeze this single lung, to empty it as quickly as I dare without losing any methane. Then keep just enough in the flaccid bag for filling the tube-fuse. I want to have this single shot at succeeding. All or nothing is what this is. I would lose it all anyway if this doesn't work.
Half a minute later, I grab the nearly empty skin by the throat, squeeze its neck, and jump down. A drop I wouldn't risk normally. My left ankle cries out with a flash-like pain. Behind me, the creature calling herself Liora has joined the scene again. I ignore her. I ignore the alarming pain in my chest that remembers other stupidities and escalating complications. The pretty little entity doesn't speak, doesn't plea, she just watches me. A strategy that has more impact than any action would have. But I will not be deterred.
"Don't stand there, go hide!"
I bark as I crawl into my detonation corner.
You're too soft, Eldon Rosy.
You're a wuss, Garland Mercer.
Taking care of the whole world again, my love?
I am giving the intruder the benefit of the doubt.
Maybe it is not by choice.
Could be she's unfree to do as she longs to.
Oh, shut up. This is my garden.
Mine to save.
Mine to destroy.
This is my life on the line.
My world.
I place the half-cut windpipe of the floppy bag over the transparent hose to prime the fuse. I hold it tightly with one hand and crumple the material with the other. Reducing its size by pushing it to the floor. Using my legs to help empty the formless shape, as I sit with my back pushed against the concrete. The red lighter button is barely visible in this darkening corner. I take a deep breath. Remove the bladder and place the naked copper ends of the detonator in the transparent tube. Ten thousand arguments to not do this are swiped by my determination. Memories of that other mistake try to overtake my ability to do this. But I cannot wait. I have lost the time to reconsider. Made my plan. Externalised the consequences. Now take action. I push. It clicks.
In this half darkness the blue flame is slightly turquoise like the bird's third eye. I have done it. No return from here. My eyes follow the rapid flame up and out of sight. I have my mouth open in awe and brutal fear.
At that moment the girl dives in. Tumbling over my lap to the far corner. To hide with me in this safe spot. Her arms protecting her head. Her eyes squeezed tight. She's more frightened than I am.
And once again, I am forced to think this thought, this unanswerable question is as fresh and brutal and heavy as it was thirty years ago.
What have you done, Eldon?
It detonates. I can feel the thud in the wall and in the soil beneath us. A modest flame exiting the pipe lights up a big eyed little girl throwing herself at my chest trembling, crying. I hear the rumble of walls caving in, of steel bending.
Then the faint rushing of water.
Not here, but on the other side of my prison wall.