True Heroes (66 page)

              “What’s that have to do with anything?”

              ‘What does that have to do with this?’

              “Good people shouldn’t have to be brainwashed to be taught.”

              “But bad people should?”

              “No. Good and bad have nothing to do with it.”

              “Then what does it matter if we’re good?”

              “It matters because you guys will use the right knowledge the right way.”

              “We might not be able to learn the right knowledge…”

              ‘Because I can, and that would mean showing them how to live the right way.’

              “I believe I can, and then I can help you guys learn it too.”

              ‘You don’t want them to live as you have. You’re afraid of failing them, which increases your resolve to superhuman levels, and suddenly, you have the strength to become a savior. All because of your fear.’

              “What if you can’t learn it?”

              ‘I’m not afraid of failing.’

              ‘You’re lying.’

              ‘If I was afraid, would I be able to sit and ponder these questions? Fear is overwhelming if you don’t have water for the fire. I sit and think for hours on end.’

              ‘And nearly every thought process ends with you in a self-loathing mass on our mental plane. You’re not ready to lead yourself anywhere, let alone a group of selective mutes.’

              ‘I hate myself. That doesn’t mean I’m afraid of people becoming me.’

              ‘But it doesn’t limit what you can see as the truth.’

              Caleb stared at the designs in the clear floor. “Then he’s right.”

              “Those are the only two options.”

              “No. There’s always a third option. I’m just not smart enough to know what it is yet.”

              Benny jumped off the back of the bench and landed in front of Caleb. “The sockdolager of this, our esteemed colleague, will send even the most established of foundations rolling into a shallow grave. For now, we must retreat anon as I feel the very spirits of winter hast split the skin of my palm to quell their warming touch.”

              Alice removed her other glove and smiled as she thrust them at Benny. “Here. You’ll need your hands if you’re going to keep writing amazing things for us to hear.”

              He hesitated before taking them. “My righteous lady, I cannot bear your adorn as the reason from which you spring with kind gestures is reason enough for me to reject it.”

              “What do you mean, Benny? You can’t write with no hands.”

              “Nor can I scribe without the very fuel from my soul. The wisps of inner sublimity have not struck me true in some time.”

              Alice looked over at Caleb, as did everyone else. “He means he has writer’s block.”

              “Aye! What an awfully terrible cripple to have, but no worse than all the ones I’ve had before.”

              Caleb looked towards him. “To say that your disabled self is such is to say mine own self is a cripple within a crumple.”

              Benny laughed loud enough to draw stares. “To say that after so verily projecting your hopes to waver the fabric of righteous thought and maliced cross provides candid inflation to your misappropriation. To your defective credit, you are quite enamored, nah entrusted, with tumultuous talent that breaks the nature of our deformation. If you would ever wish a change of clothes to fit the sight of your imposed degradation, give to me your genes and take from me my brace.”

              ‘Here, here. Enjoy me. Don’t be blue.’

              Caleb couldn’t help but smile. “All these words cannot dance without a partner. How is it your soul is vacant and your mouth still buoyant?”

              “Tarried and verklempt are my thoughts; muddied and entrapped within my grey cage without a path to the soul’s promising soil.”

              Caleb turned his head for a second and smiled as everybody was looking at Benny as he moved. ‘He’s acting for them. Performing his pain.’

              ‘Yippie for him.’

              “You’ll work it out. All it takes is one flick of a switch, and you won’t be able to hold the lid of your thoughts tight enough.”

              David and Mr. Dyllo appeared from the clustered crowd with smiles on their respective faces. The leader of the pack stepped forward while the philosopher stayed in a properly observational position. “Are we enjoying the outside air today?”

              ‘Alice will respond now.’ “It beats the crusty gym air any day.”

              ‘Now complaints from the gallery.’ “It’s too cold.”

              ‘Angela will follow her man.’ “We should wait until the spring time.”

              “That’s when everyone will be out,” Caleb railed. “This is unexpected. It fits you guys perfectly.”

              ‘You’re becoming a better liar than me.’

              ‘You predicted one situation there Nostradamus.’

              ‘I can continue to predict, all on the basic meaning of Mr. Dyllo’s words.’

              ‘Be my guest.’

              “I’m inclined to agree with the group wrapped in coats and blankets rather than with a man that looks as though he’s ready to go surfing.” ‘He won’t look our direction.’ “Let’s all walk back to the gym, then call it a day.”

              Everyone besides Caleb stood. “Andrew, what was the count?”

              “Only twenty-seven.”

              “You mean we actually used words other than ‘I?’” Caleb looked wryly between Dyllo and David. “How about that….”

              He stood before Alice clutched to his side and laughed while mumbling into his ribs. ‘She will say how amazing you are and how she’s confused.’ Both conscious entities listened carefully. “That was funny, but was it mean? No, they don’t even know what we’re talking about. How could they? And besides, he’s trying to help us. He’s probably built up half our confidence just by making that quip. He’s not afraid of them. He’s not afraid of anything.” ‘Here it comes.’ “He’s…going to help us.” She looked up at him as they turned onto the empty sidewalk. “You’re still mine right?”

              “As far as I know.”

              She smiled widely and stood up straight, flowing her hand into his again before raising it and kissing its back. ‘Huh. How about that.’

              ‘The action spoke to the same effect.’

              Their walk didn’t last long as the gym came into sight a few blocks down. Alice and Caleb continued to walk as everyone else splintered. “Alice.”

              She whirled around. “Yeah, David?”

              “Do you mind if we talk?”

              She looked back at Caleb. ‘She’s going to mumble for your permission, decide you’re far too pretty to say no, but she’ll ask anyways.’ “Is it okay?”

              Caleb smiled. ‘I’m glad she cares enough to ask.’ “Absolutely, but I’m going to start back.”

              ‘She’ll look sad.’ “Why? You don’t want to walk with me?”

              ‘You’ll step up and comfort her.’ “No, I do, but David probably wants to talk about something personal. I’ll be there when you get back I promise. I’m sure he can look after you for a little.”

              ‘She’ll mumble quickly because her heart is beating faster.’

              ‘You’re feeling her heart beat?’ Caleb smiled a little as he kissed her on the cheek and turned. ‘How much longer are you planning to pretend that you don’t care about her?’ Power didn’t respond but, in fact, stepped out of his ocular portal and deeper into the confines of his mind. ‘Are you going to predict what foot I’m going to use next to walk?’

              ‘I’ve been right on everything.’

              ‘You’ve been in the neighborhood with every predictable response. That in no way proves yours, or Dyllo’s, hypothesis. And you were completely off with Alice.’

              Caleb hopped over a patch of ice and into an alley. Three garbage cans suddenly tipped over while four medium framed men stepped out. They approached quickly and without warning, but stopped before any violent act. Caleb quickly scanned them, and was abnormally relaxed. “Oh, you guys again? Stealing from any other apartments lately?”

              The one directly in front of Caleb instantly swung, but Power suddenly engulfed Caleb’s body and seemed to slow the quick action to a crawl. ‘Fine. Here’s your proof: you’re going to fight them using me, and we’re going to win so decisively this time that they will never be recognizable or contemptuous enough to arrive in this violent state of mind again, therefore purging them of delusions while vaulting you into an apparent state of universal plenipotentiary dominance. How will that not serve your interests? How will you rationalize that as something that had to be done? You’ll be pushing your ideas onto them with a violent veracity that would put slave owners to shame. Curb the dogs, Caleb.’

              Power was forced back inside by Caleb’s will and his body suddenly felt the effect of quickened time with an uppercut smashing against his diaphragm. Caleb doubled over before feeling something much harder than bone smash against his temple. He recoiled with the smell of wet rubber filling his buzzing head as, from a knee, a large boot crashed tread against his face. All of his consciousness was retained in the effort to constrain his power’s forceful attempts at freedom. ‘We’re getting beat. Stop this!’ Caleb kept his eyes open and felt his own muscles aching for a block or reversal, but his arms and legs lay as limp as he could manage despite the constant wail. The non-human instrument struck low multiple times, surging more pain than the repeated blows to his boney face, but his imagination, between whooshing swings, could almost taste the metal striking the length of his legs.

              All three whams ceased at once and the pattering of shoes could be heard echoing away. Caleb kept Power back as he willed himself through anger to stand, quickly seeing Benny standing at the opposite opening of the alley the men had just run through. Caleb felt the slight streaming of warm war paint across his face and blew some from his open mouth. Benny stayed where he was. “Alice said you were a good fighter.”

              “I didn’t fight.”

              Benny took his hands from his pockets. “Why not? They hurt you.”

              “It doesn’t matter.”

              “Why?”

              “Just…because.”

              ‘Why the hell indeed!’

              ‘I wasn’t ready to lead them, you’re right. I had to experience the other side of things for a change.’

              ‘You sanctimonious moron. They could have killed you, all so you could learn what it was like to get your ass kicked?’

              “Because they just taught me how to lose. Maybe even that I’m not as strong as I thought. They’ve proved to me that I wasn’t right before when I fought them.”

              “You fought them once?”

              “They were stealing from Alice, and I was a bit rough when I kicked them out.”

              “And now they were rough with you, so it’s even?”

              “No, it’s not about even. They didn’t want to be even they wanted to be up, so I let them have what they wanted. No resistance, and yet, I survived.”

              “What does that have to do with it?”

              “I handled it. It means that every time I think there’s a truth in my fists, I’ll think back to here and remember that I survived. I think I’m almost ready to see every side. To help you guys.”

              Caleb smiled a haggard mess before turning and waving back to Benny as he walked away.

---

              “What are you and him, officially?”

              Alice jammed her hands in her pockets. “You know what we are, David. That’s why you’re always so rotten to him, and he’s always tolerating it because he doesn’t want to hurt me.”

              “He’s another warm body, then?”

              She jammed her shoulder into him hard enough to cause him to stumble. “No one was ever a warm body. You needed a friend so I was one.”

              “I always thought we’d be more.”

              “We were more, but now me and Caleb are more than that. I never knew there was something above friendship before he showed it to me. It’s not like I chose for this to happen. I’m not going to run away from it, though. This is just you and I were meant to end up.”

              She looked up at his face as they walked. “No, it isn’t. If it was, we’d be together still because you know it makes me happy when we are.”

              “Yeah, I know.”

              “You just said—”

              “Real happiness isn’t about putting on a pretend face and laughing at every joke.”

              They stopped and looked into each other’s eyes. “That sounds like something he would say.”