"Yes…see all of me. I give it all to you."
Nina had never felt such emotion. Her eyes stayed shut; her entire body relaxed as if floating on her back in a pool below a brilliant sun. Her body tingled and she felt another there…entwined with her to the point of becoming one. She lifted her chin and her lips parted in the slightest. A gasp eased out and her entire person quivered.
"I…I…love…you…"
Then the voices came. She could not hear their words, but the meaning broadcast vividly. They needed. They looked to her. A thousand questions all at once demanding a thousand answers.
She felt pain. Not her own, but another’s. If only…if only she could take the glowing light in her hands and hold it. Comfort it. Chase away the pain.
"Me…I did it…I am responsible…I am responsible…"
She wanted to run away from the voices…and did. They faded and that tranquil quilt of comfort fell over her once more. She had found a quiet corner of her mind where she could hide but not be alone. No experience in her life could match that wonderful feeling.
And then it fell apart.
Not at once, but one piece at a time. One board. One plank. One nail. Pulled up and ripped away…a growing schism between where she went and where she wanted to be.
"No! No! No!"
Everything gone. The cold rushed in. The void drown away the light. Breathing became a labor. A salty sting built in the corners of her eyes. She lost control, bursting exhales like explosions of air. She became lost in the darkness again. The cold darkness.
"This is not fair! This is not fair!"
The good feelings-of warmth and comfort-faded so far as to be unreliable memories. The new cold felt more rigid than ever. It numbed her. Deadened the ends of her nerves…and slowly…morphed…into…
Nina growled. Her free hand clenched into a fist.
Anger. Bitter, horrid rage in its rawest form. Fury without focus. A whirlwind built in the darkness tossing unseen objects crashing and splintering and breaking.
"Shall I be a monster, then? Is that my fate? Then I will be the most terrifying monster!"
Legions on the march. Wave after wave; line after line; soldier after soldier. Tanks and planes; explosions and fires! It all boiled into one chaotic chorus played by Hell’s orchestra. The heat of the flames burned her inside and she relished every scar. "One after another you shall fall! My rage is my sword!" Flashing lights filled her mind; roaring destruction cut through the emotion and stomped it down…muffled it…disguised it…hid it……but not for long. All the machines of war, all the sounds of annihilation could not keep the feeling at bay. It rose to the surface. Emptiness. The sounds turned off. She saw only black; heard only her breath.
If only she had never known the joy, then the emptiness would not hurt so deep. Not a sharp pain; a dull one. Taken in doses, she could grow accustomed to it. She could live with it. But she could not forget it.
Who am I?
The question drifted to her but she could not be sure if it were her thought, or Trevor’s. The bridge had opened completely. She felt herself inside of him. She felt him, inside of her.
The waves came. The waves implanted in his mind during his imprisonment. Hard peeks and deep valleys. Instants of happiness followed by horrific drops into sorrow and fear. One after another without end. A torture of unbelievable malice.
Tears of joy warped into tears of sad. Relief into shock. Peace into turmoil.
Nina grabbed hold of her consciousness. This storm had to be broken.
She concentrated as best she could amidst the disturbing sea, searching her soul for the confidence and strength that had allowed her to stay true to herself even in the days when she felt so disconnected from the world.
This is who I am.
She found it. And gave it to him. Dropping it into him as if it were a boulder cast into a raging stream.
Take what you need from me. Hold on…follow me back to where you belong.
She felt the desperation as he grasped at what she gave. He struggled to gain hold of it. And Nina knew she had yet more to do. That giving would not be enough.
Nina released the dam. The sea surged into her.
The torment of his broken heart; of his loneliness. The guilt for all the blood on his hands, for the cold decisions that sacrificed many to save more; for what he nearly became in another world. He had lived it time and time again in the belly of The Order’s sinister machine. So much, that it played over and over even with the machine gone. Now she lived it with him. Now she took it from him. Now it became a part of her heart.
His torment…hers.
His guilt…hers.
Her body jolted. Her mind scrambled. Her mouth stretched open with a gasp that turned into a cry that changed into a forlorn wail. The cabin shook. Images played once more. Images of…Nina in his mind. Images of Ashley. Images of Trevor’s son. Images of the other Nina. Trevor, trembling on the sofa, opened his eyes wide. His lips quivered and he gasped for air. The weight of the deluge crushed Nina. Her heart broke a thousand times. She lost everything again and again. She felt herself drowning… — The Eagle transport appeared over the treetops, glinted in the dawn sun, and then descended into the clearing at the front of the cabin.
Nina Forest stood by the porch door with Odin lying nearby. She held the radio in her hand. She gave only passing thought to how the radio miraculously worked that morning after having failed during the night.
She stood there, a blank expression covering her face. An expression not unlike a shell-shocked disaster survivor.
The door on the transport slid open; a ramp descended. Ashley stepped out followed by the two medics who hurried inside the cabin.
Ashley approached Nina whose eyes remained fixed on some distant point but she did speak. "He’s inside. He’s awake, but very tired. I think…I think he will be okay." Ashley studied Nina’s face as if searching for clues but her blank stare offered no answers. "What about you? Are you okay?" Nina told her, "No. But I will survive." Ashley asked, "What happened?"
Nina did not answer. Instead, she pulled her eyes from the horizon and looked at the other woman. "I want to go home now. I need to see my daughter."
Ashley nodded.
The door to the cabin swung open with a creak and bang. The medics steadied Trevor as their Emperor walked with a wobble, the quilt still around his shoulders. He paused midway to the shuttle and focused on the two women standing several paces away.
His eyes sported deep bags, his hair ruffled, his clothes still tattered and bloody from rampaging through the forest. But it was Trevor; no longer a wild thing.
He did not speak. He had not the strength for speaking. But that strength would return now. Nina knew this to be so because some of that strength came from her.
Ashley looked to the ground in mild embarrassment as if she interrupted a private, silent conversation.
Nina saw herself in Trevor’s eyes. And felt him in hers.
29. Infection
Ashley sat across from Trevor at the otherwise empty conference table, but his lack of speech, movement, or even blinking made her wonder if she might actually be alone.
Whatever had happened between Trevor and Nina in the wilderness had chased the chaos from his mind. Yet shadows of the demons The Order placed in her husband's head remained.
Nonetheless, Trevor had issued orders to Jon and the others. The skeleton crew onboard the Excalibur hurried to repair hull plates, damaged weapons, and the over-stressed gravity generators as if they meant to push through the Philipan and fly to Washington D.C.
Ashley knew different.
All of Trevor's ships and soldiers could not save him from the nightmares The Order had constructed, just as the Excalibur could not now save The Empire from those who tore it apart. Salvation needed to come from Trevor himself.