Darkness (standard:fantasy, 35761 words)
Author: Saxon Violence	Added: Dec 27 2012	Views/Reads: 6668/17105	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
Jimmy says his blind brother framed him for murder—but then he's in an Insane Asylum. When he escapes, things start to get Weird.

Click here to read the first 75 lines of the story

slightly higher frequencies but they're not especially sensitive to 
those frequencies, so it's a minor side issue.) 

Dogs are four-by-four. We're about three-by-three; can hear the entire
canine spectrum and in the range well above canine; we have a couple of 
narrow ranges with very high gain. 

They say that a regular dog smells about two hundred times as well as a
human, a Bloodhound about three hundred and a domestic cat twenty. 
Bucky and me rate twenty-four—and five times the ordinary human sense 
of taste. 

Our sense of feel balance and speed of nerve impulse are all notably
better than the best ordinary human's. I can also sense magnetic North 
weakly. Bucky's sense of magnetic fields was sharp enough to qualify as 
a sense in its own right, though by his accounts; it was more than a 
bit vague. 

My eyesight is noticeably better than twenty-twenty and at night, my
eyes have a bit over two-and-a-half times the light gathering power of 
a human's. To put that into perspective, a cat has eleven times a man's 
light gathering ability and a dog, about four. My brother has no eyes. 

Brain, brains, both our brains are a bit larger than normal. The one
anomaly that I share with Bucky; is our corpus callosum has grown until 
it amounts to a small third brain lobe. It runs along the medial brain 
fissure, somewhat thicker than a hotdog. 

We both have total recall; or I did until multiple sessions with
electroshock. We tested off the scale on any known intelligence tests. 
Experts coached us both, how to largely conceal our true abilities when 
taking tests. 

My brother has no eyes. Do you know what lies behind that exceptionally
thick frontal plate of his? He has two smaller auxiliary brains where 
his eyes should be. 

They're about the size of a tennis ball in. Each is connected to the
main brain by a nerve as thick as the spinal chord of a pig, where an 
optic nerve should be. The two nerves connect in a plexus bigger than a 
rat's brain before continuing on to the main brain, crossing over in 
the process. 

There's a whole network of spaghetti-sized nerves running through
channels of bone and connecting the two eyeball brains. 	They 
also	provide extra pathways to the main brain. 

I can't begin imagine how Bucky perceives the world, anymore than you
could truly understand my mental processes with my extra brain lobe. I 
can't fully comprehend a normal human's worldview either, since I've 
never been a normal human. 

Of course, I couldn't prove any of this. It does kinda sound like
demented raving, doesn't it? 

No records exist to document my claims. I can't even tell you the name
of the company; or organization—or whatever—that put us through all 
those elaborate tests, X-Rays, MRIs, CAT-Scans, Ultrasound; etc., etc. 

Or if records still existed, which I'm reasonably sure that they
did—remained hidden away somewhere—where they did me no good at all. 

For a very brief time, it looked like my attorney might get a court
order to scan Bucky's skull, but the judge finally ruled against us. 

I ended up in the Looney Bin. The first few months were hard. They
pumped me full of antipsychotics to try to “cure” me of my “delusions”. 
They tried hard to get me to speak to the counselors and I sat mute. 
There were courses of electroshock, insulin shock, hydrotherapy and 
measured doses of medicinal psychedelics. 

After awhile they gave up and warehoused me. Then the only time that I
got any therapy, was a de facto form of punishment, generally for 
fighting. 

I didn't speak to the other clients much. If pressed, I'd tell them that
my brother had no eyes and walk away. That discouraged all but the most 
determined. 

The fact that I had trained in a half dozen martial arts since childhood
and had been kicked about by life ‘till I was downright mean made me a 
good man to leave alone. Still, there's always someone who wants to put 
it to the test. 

I did twelve years like that. I did the Thorazine shuffle and let myself
go. I got relatively soft—though still strong and agile enough to put 
out an eye, or crush a testicle when the situation arose. 

I Learned how to handle sitting or standing, doing nothing for hours on
end and letting time wash over me; like I was a smooth pebble at the 
bottom of a crystal-clear, cool mountain stream and being constantly, 
though slowly polished ever smoother. 

Then on my thirtieth birthday, I asked myself if I wanted to spend the
rest of my life that way. It was a hard decision. I'd been there since 
seventeen. I could easily have spaced the rest of my life away. 

But then no one would avenge my parents. No one would make Bucky suffer
for what he had done. No one would be able to stand against the evil 
machinations of my brother. I had realized, thinking long and hard 
about it over the years, that Bucky's agenda had to be bigger than 
committing a single double murder and framing his twin brother. No, 
Bucky's unquantifiable genius and his sociopathic tendencies brooded 
ill for mankind. 

It took me three more years to work my body back into shape; trying to
heal burnt neural pathways—inasmuch as possible—and studying the 
set-up; creating a plan and waiting for the right moment to spring it. 

Chapter Two 

He insisted on being called Mister Jenkins. I avoided any contest of
wills by simply failing to address him at all. He was a big brawling 
brute of a man. He thought that because he was bigger and stronger than 
most men and had trouble controlling his temper, that he was tough. 

He carried an old-fashioned style kosh in his right hip pocket—a
seven-inch-long black leather sack, filled with the finest grade of 
powdered lead. The way that it would hang flaccidly out of his hand 
when he was getting ready to use it on some poor neurotic, made me want 
to suggest that he get some Viagra for it. I restrained myself. I could 
tell that he didn't have much sense of humor. 

Of course the kosh was against regulations but who cared? The clients
might have objected, but who would believe them? Obviously they were 
fantasizing—some of them could fantasize hard enough to give themselves 
multiple concussions. 

Administration didn't care. It was hard to find staff and they were more
into running a tight ship than they were into arbitrary rules and 
restrictions on the methods. They cared nothing for justice either. 

I waited until almost bedtime. I got close enough to Mister Jenkins to
throw a Styrofoam cupful of my urine on him. Typical neurotic 
behavior—except as a general rule, even most of the really bent ones 
knew to leave sadists like Mister Jenkins well enough alone. They 
usually remembered past brutalities—at least in a general type way—that 
had been inflicted on them, or upon others within their ken. 

He wasn't particularly angry. It was just that now he had a mildly
tedious but also mildly enjoyable task to perform—beating me half to 
death or to death for all anyone cared. 

It had been a long time since I'd had a proper dance. Jenkins wouldn't
be too skilled a partner, but I could still turn this into a 
workmanlike performance with care. Today Jenkins would be the client. 

I concentrated on trying to look very spaced and just a wee bit
apprehensive as he barked orders to the other guards. They cleared out 
all the other clients. He wanted them all out of the dayroom; and the 
clients all snug in their beds, before he got started. 

I could see him licking his lips in anticipation. I could hear the first
strains of the song “Walking on Broken Glass” running through my mind. 
I believe that's a harpsichord they play at the beginning. 

I loved that music video; because when they pull Annie Lennox away from
the fight and throw her on the floor; she's trying to crawl and claw 
her way back to her rival to continue the fight. That, for me, is the 
spirit of the warrior summed up perfectly in one brief image. 

He came swinging his kosh at me, like my head was a pumpkin on a tee and
he wanted a home run. I stepped back; grabbed his right arm and as his 
momentum pulled him off balance; I threw him to the floor. 

I'd broken his right arm at the elbow before he'd fully realized that
he'd been thrown. I could see a dark stain spreading across the crotch 
of his white uniform as he wet himself. I had a similar arm bar on his 
left arm in about two racing heartbeats. 

I immediately broke his little finger—partly to get his attention—partly
as insurance. Assuming that he somehow managed to escape my lock, which 
was highly unlikely—to say the least—he'd have a broken right arm and 
his left-hand grip somewhat hampered by a mangled pinky. 

My room was on the third floor and I'd watched and  studied him coming
and going. I knew which truck was his. I knew he came in wearing street 
clothes; so I knew that he changed into the White Orderly's Uniform 
somewhere. 

I needed the codes for the doors, the location of the changing room, his
locker number and the combination—and anything else about the place 
that I could sweat out of him. 

I dislocated his ring finger at the knuckle joint the first time he
hesitated. I dislocated it at the second joint the second time he 
balked. I didn't think that I could get enough leverage to dislocate 
the third joint one-handed; so I was prepared to move on to the next 
finger if it proved necessary. It wasn't. 

I had told him that if he lied, I'd be back to punish him. In all
probability a good lie would result in me getting caught, but I'd 
thrown the fear of God into him and he told me the truth. 

His screams wouldn't cause any complications. Everyone would think I was
screaming. I broke his left arm and I let him try to do the backstroke 
across the waxed floor for three long heartbeats, in honor of all the 
helpless clients he'd serviced over the years. Then I grabbed his head 
and broke his neck. What could they do, even if they caught me? I was 
legally insane after all. 

I'd picked Jenkins, partly because I knew that his clothes would fit me,
though somewhat loosely. I changed into his threads as quickly as 
possible. There was a big Buck knife on the belt and a tiny little Case 
skinner in the right-hand pocket. There was a huge wad of bills in the 
trucker style billfold, but I didn't take the time to count them. 

I walked through the gate without being challenged and climbed into
Jenkins' truck—a jacked-up four-wheel drive. Lo and behold, there was a 
Road-Warrior style sawed-off twenty gauge; along with a half-dozen 
rounds of magnum number three buck; all in an oversized pistol rug. I 
guess Jenkins thought he was relatively immune to ATF trouble, since he 
was a Law. Maybe it was official issue; or maybe he had paper on it. I 
didn't know—or care. 

All I knew was that my brother has no eyes. 

Since I'd already committed a murder that night, it hardly made any
sense to get too bent out of shape over an NFA violation. I was legally 
insane after all... 

Five miles down the road, I noticed an Army Surplus store. A few minutes
later, I'd swapped some of Jenkins dough for a backpack, poncho, liner, 
wool blanket, Kabar and a few other minimal camping supplies—along with 
plenty twenty gauge shells. 

I was tempted to climb back into Jenkins' truck, but they might have
discovered my escape by now. The big four-wheeler was just too easy to 
spot. 

I waited ‘till there was no traffic and headed into the thicket behind
the surplus store. I wasn't out of town yet; but I kept in the shadows 
and faded into the ground when I heard traffic and worked my way 
outside the city limits. 

I hadn't laid eyes on Bucky since my trial. I had little interest in
having any casual interactions with him. Nonetheless, he'd pulled some 
sort of strings to get me transferred to a facility in Central 
Michigan. He claimed to be concerned about my welfare. I think it was 
because the facility made much more liberal use of electroshock and 
hallucinogens than was de rigueur nowadays. 

He may also have figured that if I ever escaped; I'd have to travel that
much farther to get to Kentucky, where I knew the terrain; had kinfolk 
and could access some of the extensive system of caches Father had 
left. The old man was a hard-core, die-hard Survivalist. 

Chapter Three 

I had no idea how long it would take them to find Jenkins' body and
conclude that I'd done the dirty deed. It could be hours, but to be 
cautious I allowed myself a half hour—then say another hour to find 
Jenkins' truck. 

I assumed they'd interview everyone in the small shopping center,
because that's what I would do. If they weren't bright enough to canvas 
the area, then Protein for me. 

They would though. They'd find out that I'd purchased some camping gear
and a few groceries and it wouldn't take Sherlock Holmes to figure out 
that I had taken to the woods. 

The big question was whether they'd bring in Bloodhounds or not, and how
long it would take them put the Hounds on my trail—figure three to four 
hours. Of course I might hope that they wouldn't devote many resources 
to pursuing me, but I wasn't counting on it. 

I took three Caffeine capsules—Vivarins, four Aspirins and ate a Large
Snickers bar—and washed it all down with a Twenty-Ounce Coke. I wished 
I had some Benzedrine, but the Caffeine would have to do. 

I changed into the camouflage BDUs—long johns, black pants, woodland
green shirt, desert brown field jacket, and cold weather cap. In the 
woods; brown is actually a better camo than green; particularly in 
winter. Think of all the dead leaves, tree trunks, branches and dirt. 

I added a pair of wool socks and donned a pair of Corcoran Jump Boots
with Dr Shoal's pads and plenty Gold Bond. It would have been better to 
have boots already broken in, but I had to make do. The Sugar and the 
Caffeine were coursing through my veins and speeding my heart rate and 
neural impulses, before I'd traveled two miles. 

My underwear and socks and Jenkins' outwear—that I'd worn briefly—were
wadded into a big ball and bound tight with paracord. When I got to the 
Railroad, I contrived to drag the ball of clothing somewhat to one side 
of me. 

Forget television. They weren't going to turn a Bloodhound loose on my
trail—this wasn't coon hunt. They'd keep the hounds leashed. 

If you can move faster than the handler, you can loose the Hound. One
method to contribute to that worthy aspiration is to force the Dog and 
handler to take the long way around—through the briars and sticker 
bushes. 

Nonetheless, I couldn't afford to devote a lot of time to being hard to
track. I discarded the bundle within a mile. I walked another mile, 
walking on the rail to leave no ground trail. 

It was one hundred and thirty-nine pound rail (per yard). That meant the
ball of the rail was something close to four inches wide. I could walk 
on it fairly easily, without it slowing me down too much. I wanted to 
go left. I made three false starts to the left over the next mile—only 
going twenty or thirty yards into the bush each time. 

Then I laid a bit longer trail to the right and dumped a sock filled
with black pepper and spread beaucoup pepper all around. I'd read that 
black pepper wouldn't slow a good Hound down very much. Still, it might 
slow him down some. Every delay was Protein for me. 

Finally, after another half mile, I went left and meant it. Dried Blood
mixed with Cocaine is said to be a potent and temporary spoiler of 
Bloodhound's abilities. I couldn't say—and I never had occasion to find 
out. 

It was possible to make better time when I wasn't balancing on the rail.
After about another hour, it started to steadily drizzle freezing rain 
that eventually became sleet. It was miserable weather, but good for 
throwing Hounds off my trail. I sent up a silent prayer of 
Thanksgiving. I put on my poncho and liner and continued to move 
through the darkness. 

I kept hearing that old song about a fox on the run. I never could catch
all the lyrics to that song. It made me picture a warrior fox; fleeing 
from a score—or more foxhounds—lost in that strange psychedelic ecstasy 
that only comes to a Warrior; and then only when he treads the razor's 
edge between life and death. 

When I'd enjoyed the song before, I'd only imagined that state of
consciousness. Now I was living it. 

When the sky started to lighten, I cast about for a good place to camp
for the day. I put up a low, but waterproof tarpaulin lean-to and 
camouflaged it with plenty of brush. I opened a couple of my coffee 
cans and poured the coffee out onto the ground. It was wasteful but I 
needed the cans and I hadn't the time to go dumpster diving. 

Working with my Kabar and a small pair of snips and a pair of needle
nose pliers; I quickly turned the larger coffee can into a hobo stove. 
I threaded a thin length of piano wire through the other can, so I 
could use it for a kettle. 

A mere handful of twigs would have cooked my dinner; but I'd thought
ahead and picked up a several newspapers and circulars at the grocery, 
so I wouldn't have to search for firewood my first night. 

I started a small fire and cooked a large batch of spaghetti noodles for
my supper. 

I'd bought some cheap stainless forks and tablespoons. They'd come three
to a pack. I didn't need three. 

I buried two spoons and two forks while my noodles cooked. I threw in
some salt, pepper and a couple pieces of jerky-jerky. I opened a can of 
salmon and ate it out of the can, bones and all. A can of Salmon has 
eight hundred calories—lots of protein and fat—but it's a bit heavy to 
carry. 

I'd only bought four cans of salmon, but they'd be good while they
lasted. I placed the salmon can in the hole with the spoons and coffee 
grounds. I didn't know who might be on my trail and I saw no future in 
leaving them “gimmes”. I ate my noodles, doused my fire and fell 
asleep. 

I knew that although I could use an Army poncho and liner for a sleeping
bag, that it was only rated down to about forty degrees. Yes well, on a 
cold sub-freezing night, a man will still be warmer with a forty-degree 
bag than he would be with no bag at all. 

The military issue poncho liner is a simple blanket, but I'd bought one
of the after market ones, with a hole and a hood; so I could wear it 
through the day, if I needed to. I also had a single full-sized wool 
blanket. I'd piled pine boughs on the ground—both for padding and for 
insulation. 

I had a thin ground sheet, my poncho and liner sleeping bag and my wool
blanket. Keeping a fire going probably wasn't the wisest thing. The 
people who were pursuing me might very well have infrared capabilities. 


While I lay in the cold waiting for my bag to warm up, I pondered my
situation. I had part of Michigan and all of The Sovereign Nation of 
Indiana to traverse, to get to The Free Commonwealth of Kentucky. Even 
then, my father's caches and my kinfolk were in the eastern part of 
Kentucky. 

I had to take my time and be as cautious and elusive as possible. Run
silent; run deep. It wouldn't do to get caught. They'd transfer me to a 
much tighter facility, with no guarantee that I could ever escape 
again. Even granting that I could, why go through all that again? Time 
was a wastin'! 

Thoughts of Jenkins came into my mind. I'd never liked him. He was cruel
and I half suspected that he was a coward. Still, he'd died a warrior's 
death, something every man couldn't guarantee. 

I'd worn his clothes. I'd walked in his shoes. I'd driven his truck. I
still had his blades and his Gun. I'd bought my gear with his cash. I 
felt obligated to call him “friend”. His opposition, had been good 
training—and in death, he'd been generous with me. 

My brother has no eyes and he'd never done half so much for me as
Jenkins had. 

I'd never really seen much point in praying for the dead. It's way too
late to alter their final destination. I couldn't say with certainty 
that Jenkins was in hell; but if he'd been a Christian, I'd never seen 
the slightest indication of it. 

Still, there are serious theologians that believe that there are
different levels of torment in hell (of course, other theologians deny 
this vigorously). So on the slight chance that it just might do him 
some good, I prayed for the welfare of my good friend Jenkins. 

My brother has no eyes. I couldn't wait to say a prayer for the benefit
of his soul, though it would be infinitely harder to be sincere about 
it. 

Chapter Four 

It had taken me over a month to make it to the Northern border of
Indiana. Some days I'd been able to cover fifteen or sixteen miles, 
especially as I'd acclimatized to the pace. Other days, I'd only be 
able to cover two or three miles. 

I didn't mean to be seen. If that meant crouching hidden beside a busy
highway for several hours, waiting for the opportunity to cross 
unobserved—so be it. I traveled only at night. I'd picked up a compass 
at the Army Surplus store and a few roadmaps at the grocery. They were 
distressingly vague for my purposes; but they did show roads, Railroad 
tracks, towns, rivers and creeks. 

I preferred to travel along Railroad tracks. I could make good time, and
the ballast wouldn't leave tracks on its surface. I could always see 
the train's light in more than enough time to hide. When it wasn't 
possible to travel along the tracks, I tried to travel parallel to a 
road, with enough distance to drop out of sight at the first hint of 
headlights in the distance. When I couldn't do either, I'd take off 
cross-country. 

I'd gotten a pretty big grubstake at the grocery. As I've said, my go-to
mass carbohydrate was long spaghetti noodles. I like the noodles and 
they're quick to fix. It didn't take any longer to cook a pot of rice, 
or grits; but I don't think either is noticeably better for you than 
noodles. 

Beans and rice, or beans and grits supplies complete protein; but beans
are much slower to cook. I saved my beans for days that I retired with 
plenty of night left and had a particularly sheltered place to build my 
fire. 

Perhaps it would seem that it'd be easier to hide a fire in daylight. It
isn't. You can cover your light with the proverbial bushel. You can cut 
the smoke down to almost nothing. What you can't do is hide the visual 
column of hot air, rising through cold winter air. The sign can be 
visible for miles. I endeavored to have my fire put out well before 
daybreak. 

I'd bought several packages of jerky-jerky. It's expensive, but pound
for pound, it's pretty nutritious. I was notably well funded, so I 
loaded up—Peanut M&Ms, Jumbo Snickers Bars, Sugar, Coffee, and Cocoa. 

I bought several cans of Salmon, Spam, and Corned Beef. They were heavy;
but I resolved to eat them first. I'd started out with a relatively 
heavy load, but it would be dropping a couple of pounds every day as 
long as I was eating the canned goods. 

I got some Tuna too. Now Water-Packed Tuna has forty grams of protein,
and about two hundred calories. Oil-Packed Tuna has all the protein, 
but well over twice the calories. Guess which one is the wiser choice 
for a Bug-Out Bag? 

Thing is, Oil-Packed Tuna would gag a maggot. You need to mix it with
some kind of Starch, to absorb the Grease- Potato Flakes, Rice, Beans, 
Noodles, etc. I had some Powdered Milk and plenty of Vitamins, Vivarins 
and Aspirin. 

That wasn't all that I'd bought at the store, but I'm getting to that.
It's difficult to efficiently utilize traps when you're moving daily. 
My sawn-off twenty gauge was a bit loud to be shooting at game—though 
I'd laid in a box of high base number sixes; just in case the situation 
should arise. 

A silenced .22 pistol; or a wrist rocket would have been nice; but I had
neither. I did make me two Apache throwing stars. Each one consisted of 
a couple of eight-inch sticks; sharpened at both ends and tied together 
at right angles in the middle by some paracord. I managed to kill a few 
rabbits, several songbirds, and one squirrel. It was all good, but I 
wasn't exactly living off the land. 

I'd decided that when I ran out of grub; I'd simply contrive to slip
nonchalantly into a small grocery, in a reasonably small town, and buy 
more. It would be a calculated risk, but what isn't? But the slow pace 
and the constant tension were wearing me down. 

I stopped right outside Merrillville, Indiana and had a long
reevaluation. I still intended to use part of my original plan but 
toward a different end. 

My hair is naturally straight and black. They'd forced me to keep it cut
fairly short in the asylum; but it had been about as long as they ever 
let it get when I escaped, and it had grown out a bit more in the last 
few weeks. 

I carefully shaved myself, leaving a goatee. I loathe hair on my lips or
chin; but I could put up with it for a few days. I got out the Lady 
Clairol Platinum and contrived to bleach my head, beard, and eyebrows. 
That's not the easiest task to accomplish while sitting at a campfire. 

Then I teased my hair straight up—kinda like a longish flat top. I had
one set of non-camo clothes; and a very lightly tinted pair of wire 
rimmed shades, that could pass for photo-gray. 

I'd originally planned to use the disguise to help me buy groceries. Now
I had a different objective. I wanted to examine the classifieds and 
try to buy a used motorcycle. I'd be screwed if I got pulled over; but 
on the other hand, I could traverse the length of Indiana in a single 
night on a bike. 

My father had taught me to ride a motorcycle. He'd said that you never
knew when a skill like that would come in handy. He hadn't taught 
Bucky, of course. My brother has no eyes, but I did and I'd learned. 

Chapter Five 

I had thought to buy a motorcycle from an ordinary individual. It was
coming up Spring and almost warm enough to be good biking weather. 
Hopefully no one would think it too noteworthy that someone was in the 
market for a motorcycle. 

I ended up at the house of a jovial biker dude, named Brian—all dressed
in black leathers, his hands covered with gaolhouse tattoos. 

He had his Harley—several in fact; but he did a lively trade in his
spare time, fixing up all sorts of bikes for resale. Unlike many biker 
dudes, he didn't look down his nose at the “other bikes”. In fact, in 
his opinion, he confided to me, the Harley was probably not the best 
first bike for most folks. 

When Brian first laid eyes on me, with my peroxide hair, he'd declared
that I looked just like Spike—the white-haired vampire character on 
“Buffy”. I suppose that was flattering. 

I liked the Spike character, but in my opinion, I was a lot bigger, and
sloppier looking. Though with my scarred face, and glaring eyes, I 
suppose that I looked sinister enough. Brian continued to call me 
“Spike” all through the transaction. 

I didn't have enough money to buy even the cheapest Harley in Brian's
garage. Eventually we ended up dickering over an old Honda Seven-Fifty 
that was almost as old as I am. 

Brian had restored it to like-new shape and given it a wonderful
metallic indigo paint job. It pained me to think that I wasn't going to 
posses it all that long. I had Jewed the price down to where I could 
afford the bike and still have plenty cash in reserve. 

I continued to haggle after I'd gotten the price acceptably low, mainly
because I found Brian congenial and his garage comfortable, after 
spending so much time in silence and solitude. 

Eventually, Brian raised his index finger, gesturing for me to wait a
moment. He came out packing a long black leather duster, split up the 
backside to allow one to straddle a bike. 

“Tell you what Spike, take the bike at my final offer and I'll throw
this in for boot. It suits you. How will people recognize you, without 
your disguise?” Brian said gleefully. 

After I'd paid Brian and donned the long black coat—much to his delight,
He gestured me over to a workbench. He took a revolver out of the 
drawer; unloaded it; and handed it to me—cylinder opened. 

It was an old two-and-a-half inch Smith and Wesson Model Sixty-Six .357
Magnum. It was Mag-Na-Ported, had Stag grips, and a silver colored 
Tyler-“T” adapter. It came with an old style Bianchi shoulder rig that 
carried it butt-down, and had two dump pouches on the weak side. 

“There are eighteen rounds of one hundred twenty-five grain hollow
points in the cylinder, and pouches. I'll throw in a box of hundred 
fifty-eight grain semi-wadcutters.” He paused, and squinted into space 
momentarily. “Tell you what Spike, I'll let you have the whole set-up 
for what I got in it—for three hundred bucks.” 

“Why? It's worth more than that.” 

“Sometimes a man on the lamb needs a good Gun. Whatever it is you're
trying to hide under that coat—it ain't really making it, concealment 
wise.” 

He seemed sincere. 

My brother has no eyes. Given the same situation, he'd have killed Brian
to ensure his silence, and incidentally, to save money. I peeled off 
another three hundred dollars and let him help me adjust the rig. We 
gave each other a hearty handshake and I left. 

Two days later, I was at the site of one of father's caches. My father
had a long string of caches. All of them had GPS coordinates. Most of 
them were also locatable by key landmarks. I had a list of locations 
for some of the caches. Bucky had others. I think my father had caches 
that he'd never told either of us about. 

He didn't want any one person to be able to ruin it for everyone. My
brother has no eyes, so I have no idea how father expected Bucky to 
find or utilize his caches. Since I was only concerned with “my” 
caches, that was pretty much academic. 

My Father was never entirely comfortable with the idea of burying
valuable stuff underground—particularly firearms. He had a respect for 
firearms that bordered on reverence. He often told me that any weapon, 
especially knives and handguns, have feelings and a soul—although he 
was not at all sure that polymer-framed firearms have a soul. He said 
that they might very well have managed to invent a soulless weapon, 
when they designed the Glock. 

At any rate, he was always afraid someone would build a shopping center
smack-dab on top of one of his caches. Or maybe put in a dam, and 
flooding his cache under thirty feet of water. On the other hand, he 
obsessed too much, to be willing to try to protect all of his baskets 
with one egg. So he cached—he cached fairly extensively and if you get 
right down to it, a bit obsessively. 

He had buried most of his caches reasonably deep; but he always cached a
good entrenching tool nearby and not nearly as deep. I, on the other 
hand, knew that I was coming to dig and so I brought a pick and a 
spade. 

One good thing about Daddy's caches—they all had a few Guns; but they
all held beaucoup food, ammo, gold, silver, and cash—along with some 
other goodies. As I've said, the company had kept him well supplied 
with cash for thirteen years. I particularly wanted some of the 
miscellaneous goodies in this particular cache. 

This cache hadn't been paved over, or turned into a lake. However, it
had been way out in the boonies when my father and I had buried it. As 
I feverishly tried to unearth it in the clammy cold sweat that comes 
from hard work when it's both humid and cool; I could plainly see what 
I was doing by the glow of the not-too-distant streetlights. 

Finally I reclaimed the contents of the stash and loaded it onto the
bike. Time to start phase two of my undercover work. 

Most of what people see on TV about disguise is bogus. Actually, most of
what anyone sees on TV about anything is largely bogus—particularly The 
News. 

You're pretty much stuck with the height you're born with—although lifts
can make you a few inches taller, at the cost of making you awkward and 
putting your back in a strain. 

Even if you're the right height, you can't, as a general rule, make
yourself into a spitting image of someone else, unless your facial 
features are already fairly similar. In fact, so I've read, even 
extensive plastic surgery won't generally turn you into a dead ringer 
for anyone in particular, unless you have the right stuff to work with. 


What a good disguise can do is make you unrecognizable. I read of a
study done with photos and college students. Changing hair color will 
disguise you from almost no one. Drastically changing the hairstyle, 
particularly if it changes the outline of your head, is far more 
effective. Changing both color and style works best of all—as you might 
expect. 

The wire-rim glasses helped a little; the goatee helped more. The bad
part of it was, with no ID, a Law would know right away that I was a 
person of interest, particularly if he caught me driving without a 
license, or spotted one of my Guns, whether he knew that I was James 
Connolly, escaped mental patient-slash-murderer, or not. 

A nose, chin, brow line, etc., can be built up reasonably convincingly
with the right tools. The only real way to make anything noticeably 
smaller would be surgery. Even then there are limits. 

Consequently, most disguises make you look somewhat Trollish.
Nonetheless, there are Trollish looking people in the world. They're 
not even that uncommon. So having big Neanderthal features isn't a dead 
giveaway. Nonetheless, someone with fine chiseled features is almost 
certainly not in disguise. 

There were several sets of fake ID papers that would give me a flying
head start on creating several alternate identities. But my go-to 
disguise was going to involve a fat-suit that I'd built as a teen; 
along with a few other items I'd had Father bury in this particular 
cache. 

Ever notice how no one except grand old timers like Jeff Cooper, and
people who speak Spanish, ever uses the term “Macho” except to 
denigrate the very qualities it is supposed to signify? It's a bit 
dated, but I always picture Rob Reiner on the old “Archie Bunker” 
sitcom, spitting the word out, as though it left a nasty taste in his 
mouth. 

Well, my next disguise was about as un-macho as one could get, but it
wasn't occasioned by any desire to spurn masculinity. It was simply the 
best long-term disguise that I could imagine. 

Many years earlier, when I was just learning about disguise
techniques—my father had dutifully turned me on to lots of fields of 
endeavor not generally thought to be indispensable parts of a young 
boy's curriculum—we'd happened to drive through the poor part of town. 
I spotted an old black woman struggling to hobble across the street 
before the light changed. 

She was big—close to three hundred; and she had extraordinarily enlarged
legs and ankles. Father said that she had Elephantiasis. It's supposed 
to be a tropical disease, but I've seen several other old timers who 
seemed to have it, when I was a boy. 

Don't see it much anymore. Presumably we have better medicine nowadays.
At any rate, the poor old black woman had been the inspiration for my 
most extreme disguise. 

It was easy to add apparent bulk with the fat suit. While I was at it,
it was easy to add two gargantuan sized bazooms. 

You see more old fat women, than you do men and they're not nearly so
hard to clothe—think, “sack dress”. Also, an old woman is generally 
perceived to be even less of a threat than an old man—even if neither 
can walk without a walker. 

Suppose, just for the sake of argument, that I could have disguised
myself convincingly as a young woman—and I couldn't have, not by any 
stretch of the imagination. People, men in particular, sometimes want 
to hit on a young woman. Someone might also decide to rape her. It 
would take a sick bastard to want to hit on, or rape my Babe character. 


Her clothes said that she was impoverished and highly unlikely to have
enough money to make a mugging worthwhile. Just in case, I made sure 
that she had a generous von of body odor, and yeast. 

I could have made her white, but then she might be hassled by militant
blacks. As a black, she was just an uninviting mobile eyesore wherever 
she went. The only drawbacks were having to remember to walk slowly and 
painfully at all times; and the fact that the suit could get ungodly 
hot if it was even remotely warm; but the copious sweat added to my 
camouflage. I also needed to remember to always talk in a rough 
strained whisper. 

Pretty soon I had Babe moved into a small, low rent house, with an
attached garage. I chose Louisville, because it's easier to hide in a 
big city and Louisville would have more of the resources that I needed 
for the next portion of my plan. I established her as enough of a 
hermit that I didn't have to sit around inside the house, in costume. 

Also, though she as slow, she walked all over town. One night a
gentleman called. Perhaps it was someone from the church. He came to 
visit and he parked his nice violet motorcycle in the garage. No one 
would have seen him leave but he must have. They just missed it. Surely 
he wasn't still there after all this while... 

My brother has no eyes. He did have two auxiliary brains- three if you
count the big plexus where his “optic nerves” crossed. To get parity 
with Bucky, I'd need to build me a fairly large electronic brain. Oh 
well, Electrical Engineering is something we mad scientist types excel 
at. 

Chapter Six 

Renting a place to use as a base of operations had been of paramount
importance. Babe looked like one of the poverty-stricken elderly; 
condemned to scrape by on a small Social Security check and what State 
Welfare and private charity she could raise. 

But “she” let it “slip”, talking to the landlord, that she had a small
pension—not enough to make her nouveau rich, even by ghetto standards, 
but enough to let her rent a small two bedroom house, with a good–sized 
attached garage—as opposed to a Section Eight somewhere. It's best to 
answer such questions before they are brought up. 

The Laws wouldn't find me, except by accident. My brother has no eyes
and I had no idea how he fitted into the equation. He could be totally 
unconcerned. He could be mildly concerned. He might have dropped 
everything else he was doing, to devote his full attention to finding 
me. 

He'd look for me electronically—Largely with Bayesian Filters. He would
write all sorts of ingenious algorithms to look for interesting 
discrepancies. I took it for granted that he was working somewhere that 
he had access to heap-big-juju computing power, but it scarcely 
mattered. He could easily craft the hacks to steal as many CPU cycles 
online, as he felt he needed. 

A bunch of sophisticated electronic gear mailed to a seventy-year-old
black woman, who lived in the inner city was one of those type 
anomalies. Now I suppose there's nothing in principle that would keep 
an old woman like Babe from being an electronics whiz, but it would 
certainly be remarkable. I'd gone to great lengths to make Babe as 
unremarkable, uninteresting, and unappealing as possible. 

Remarkable equals interesting. Interest would end up damning me. It
would hardly draw any less attention to waddle into stores as Babe, 
plunk hard cash on the counter, and breezily saunter out with my 
purchases. 

I thought briefly about giving Babe a grandson. I wasn't good enough
with the make-up; or the acting, to play a young black man though. 

Babe did let the word out, that a nice young white man from her church
sometimes helped her with shopping and maintenance around the house. 
Sure enough, a young white man who met the description had been seen 
more than once, toting bags into Babe's house—though generally, he 
parked in her garage. 

What he did when the door was closed and he was out of sight would have
been pure speculation on the neighbor's parts—although, just like folks 
everywhere, they made assumptions. 

Eventually I had color surveillance cameras covering everything for two
or thee blocks around the house. Color is easy on the eyes. Besides, I 
might catch something that I'd otherwise miss watching monochrome. 

I had a couple dedicated listening posts- good-sized sound gatherers
aimed at particular spots, and amplified electronically. I had an 
aim-able shotgun mike; though there was a limited number places I could 
effectively point it. Then I put a fairly elaborate system of 
microphones around the neighborhood. 

All of them used line-of-sight Infra Red carrier waves. Didn't want
anyone picking up any stray radio waves. Finally, I cobbled together a 
pair of mini blimps with radio controlled engines and FM TV cameras. I 
scrambled the signal, so even if anyone intercepted it, it wouldn't 
reveal the location—even in a general way. 

Painted the right way, my little dirigibles were invisible when sixty
yards high. They would give me plenty of warning, if someone were 
mounting a raid. 

With my physical security largely taken care of, I switched my attention
to building a brain to try to second-guess Bucky. My brother has no 
eyes; but he is fiendishly clever. How to spell relief? I spelled it 
“BEOWULF”. 

I converted over half the garage and one of the bedrooms into computer
rooms. For some applications it's better to tie a relatively small 
number of relatively sophisticated processors together. For finer 
grained applications, a large number of cheap processors work better. 

I crafted my network to have two lobes to its electronic brain. The
“left brain” had over sixty cutting edge processors connected via 
Ethernet into a single entity. The “right brain” had over three hundred 
obsolescent processors tied together. 

I wrote some self-programming protocols; gave it some complex routing
problems and left it largely alone for several weeks. It evolved its 
own strategies for how to use its two lobes together most efficiently. 

The joke was kind of on Bucky. I'd never been particularly interested in
computers, or artificial intelligence, but Bucky had bored me to the 
point of tears, with his endless expositions on the subject. I must 
have picked up some of it. 

Somehow the years in the mental hospital, the drugs, perhaps the shocks,
even the never-ending tedium, had quickened my mind somehow. My 
intelligence may have been high before but I'd never had any particular 
talent for advanced mathematics. 

One of the first things that I did, once I had the house, was to order
every science and mathematics book that Dover Press offered. I found 
that I could read a book full of obtuse theoretical mathematics as 
easily, and with the same retention, that I'd been able to read a 
“Spiderman” comic before. 

I'd quickly gotten to the place that I had a mathematical and
theoretical base that most AI researchers could only envy. I had some 
very good—and innovative equipment and I'd developed self-teaching 
programs that were decades ahead of state-of-the-art. It was a pity. 

If I hadn't been hiding out from the Laws and my eyeless brother, I
could have sold my programs and designs, for a fortune. They kind of 
made the “Mac” Vs “PC” arguments very much beside the point. 

Electronics is okay, but I'm not real keen on it. While the computer
network that I'd cobbled together dutifully, and meditatively crunched 
numbers, then I found other things to hold my interest. 

One thing that I'd been getting into lately was small robots—about half
the size of a loaf of bread. Some were ground-effect vehicles. Others 
had treads like a bulldozer or tank. They had a miniature one-cylinder 
internal combustion engine or engines. 

I'd gotten some of them up to thirty miles an hour. They had a range of
three or four miles. Just like the miniature tanks they resembled, each 
one had a Gun—a five-inch 10mm with a five round magazine capacity and 
some of the most sophisticated targeting and guidance systems ever 
shoe-horned into such a small package. They weren't ready to be 
anything but a toy—yet, but I was working out the details. 

I was working on one, when I decided that I needed some more
microcontrollers, some pieziosensors and some more .40 caliber barrel 
stock. I shrugged into the fat suit and the babe costume as quickly as 
possible. I'd have to waddle halfway across town—remembering to make 
each step look like it was painful and took great effort. 

Once I got to my rented room across town, I could change into a male
persona. I'd picked a room that I could enter without being seen 
clearly. Then I could go shopping for my gear. I could spend the night 
at the room and not have to do the Babe waddle twice in one day. I was 
looking on it as kind of a break. 

Only thing was destiny had other plans for me that night. I'd traveled
about three blocks. As I started across the alley, I saw four or five 
would-be toughs scuffling with a young woman named “Pretty”. 

I'd never done more than nod to Pretty. We weren't friends. I didn't
know anything about her. I didn't want to know. My psychotherapy had 
left me with little or no interest in sex. Even if I'd thought Pretty 
was the finest young thing ever to walk down a sidewalk, I could hardly 
have hit on her in my Babe persona. 

I wasn't a hero. I didn't suffer from the slightest case of hero
syndrome. I couldn't afford to be heroic if I wanted to beat my 
brother. My brother has no eyes. If I was to stand a chance of 
defeating him, I needed to be heartless, ruthless and nasty. 

Killing Jenkins had seemed a good start on becoming the sort of
hard-bitten and cynical nihilist it would take to defeat Bucky. But I 
saw the look in Pretty's eyes as they were shucking her pants down 
around her ankles. I saw her beaded locks flying all around and I knew 
that I was going to play the fool. 

At least I stayed in the Babe persona momentarily, as I waddled quickly
and clumsily up the alley. They'd learn that there was something 
different about Babe momentarily but there was no reason to spoil the 
surprise. No reason to spoil the fun. 

Chapter Seven 

I huffed at them furiously, in my old woman voice, to cease and desist.
There were definitely five of them. Two of them advanced to meet me. 
They didn't seem particularly apprehensive, nor was there any reason 
for them to be, based on external appearances. 

The fat suit limited my mobility to a degree. Nonetheless, even in the
suit, I was capable of maneuvers that would be downright astonishing if 
they'd actually been performed by a seventy-year-old, three hundred and 
thirty pound old woman. 

These guys were looking for trouble. Trouble is, looking for trouble
often gets you way more than you'd bargained for. 

I had one of the Cold Steel sword canes- one of the heavy-duty ones that
you can actually use as an orthopedic device. I snatched the sheath off 
with my right hand, and executed a full lunge through the foremost 
client's right eye. I followed through until I felt the point solidly 
contact the back of the skull. The sheath made a fair club. I snapped 
it across the second client's eye socket, with a move reminiscent of a 
movie Samurai's dagger-hold sword attack. 

The blow was hard enough that by the time he'd quit seeing stars, his
eye would be swollen closed. I barely had time to thrust the sword 
through a third client's chest, when the fourth client tackled me. I 
released both the sword and sheath to grapple with him. 

He had a fair sized fixed-blade knife and he was sticking into my big
fat gut, over and over, with rare enthusiasm. I had to give him credit 
for initiative and enthusiasm. Thing was, his knife blade wasn't quite 
long enough to penetrate the layers of foam padding that I had around 
my waist. 

Breaking the neck is generally a matter of forcing the cervical
vertebrae to bend at two different ninety-degree angles at one time. I 
grabbed the client's head with both hands and turned his head 
ninety-degrees, ‘till he was looking parallel to his left clavicle, 
shifted my grip ever so slightly and I forced his head toward his back. 
Maybe I heard it snap. Maybe the snap was psychological. At any rate, I 
could feel it give. 

I dropped him to the street and drew the silenced .32 Auto that Babe
concealed in her bosom. It was a Holmes pattern Gun that my father had 
made. I cast about momentarily for client number five. 

I caught sight of him just as Pretty cut his throat with the biggest
Britva I'd ever seen. It looked like a Britva that Sweeny Todd would 
have been proud to own. 

I gave him two quick taps to the head with the subsonic lead
round-noses, just for the sake of completeness. I wheeled around to 
find client number two still holding his eye and looking out of 
everything. I double tapped his head for him. 

“Don't be greedy!” I said in mock outrage, “One bullet each!” 

All the while I was making sure that each of the five clients had two
bullets to the brainpan and one into the general vicinity of the heart. 
Dead clients need to be made deader. That way you're far less likely to 
have unsatisfied clients filing complaints, somewhere down the line. 

“Do you want to do the 911 thing and plead self defense? ‘Cause if you
do, I need to split. I kind of executed a couple there. Just lay it all 
on me and you should be okay.” 

“Screw the Laws,” Pretty Said. 

“Well, you can do that, but they don't arouse me. I'd recommend that you
come by my house—make sure you don't have any blood on your clothes—and 
so forth—and so on. By the way, where did you get that enormous 
Britva?” 

“What?” 

“The Britva—the Straight Razor,” I said. 

“Friend of mine makes them. You can shave with them but they're meant
for cuttin' folks.” 

Well no sense doing things by halfway measures. If I was going to trust
Pretty not to snitch, I might as well show her the inside of my house. 
It was also in my best interest to make sure that she didn't have any 
trace evidence on her. Maybe I could impress her enough to ensure her 
silence. 

The other alternative was simply to walk away. That was probably the
wisest course, but I hated to start building another hideout and 
BEOWULF brain from scratch- though I'd picked up many time saving 
shortcuts over the last three years. Anyway, sometimes I just felt 
lonesome. 

“You're not a woman,” Pretty stated confidently. 

“When did you figure that out?” 

“The first time I saw you. I can always tell.” 

“Do you think anyone else knows?” 

“Maybe a couple. If anyone else does, they probably figure that you're
just an old, full-time transvestite. That's what I figured.” 

“How flattering.” 

Later, inside my home—or Babe's home... 

“I know that you're a man. I know that you got a sword cane and a
silenced pistol. I know that you aren't really fat. I see all kinds of 
computer gear. Are you going to kill me?' 

“No, but if you can't keep a secret, let me know now. Won't be any hard
feelings but I need to beat feet. All I ask is that you give me a 
running start.” 

“I can keep all sorts of secrets. I keep all sorts of secrets. If we're
going to be friends though, I want to see what you really look like. “ 

“Give me a minute.” 

I went into the bathroom. I came out a few moments later, as myself.
Pretty was flabbergasted. 

“You're white! I never dreamed that you were a white man.” 

I looked at my hands incredulously. “You're right. Damn! I wonder how
that happened?” 

It wasn't that funny but she laughed uproariously. It wasn't that
funny—probably a post stress reaction. 

I showed her around. I told her that my brother has no eyes. I told her
about the years in the mental hospital, about my escape. I told her 
about my father and mother. I let her examine the pistol that my father 
had made. 

“Are you gonna ditch it?” 

“No, if they ever get me into custody, I'm screwed anyway. Besides, I'm
legally insane. What more can they do to me?” 

“Jimmy, you're like a hacker dude—aren't you?” 

“Well there are a number of other terms that I'd use to describe myself.
I'm a hunter, a warrior and an artist. I'm a genius. I'm a mutant. I'm 
a convicted felon. I'm an escaped mental patient. But yes, I'd have to 
say that yes, I'm a hacker dude.” 

“Could you teach me?” 

“If that's what you want to learn.” 

That's how Pretty and I became a team. She started referring to “Our”
campaign against Bucky, after the first couple of computer tutoring 
sessions. She never questioned that as my friend, she was just as 
committed to bringing Bucky down as I was. 

As she picked up skills, she came up with all sorts of new and different
strategies. She was deucedly clever. Pretty was the only real friend 
I'd ever had, with the exception of my brother. 

Beside my mother, she was the only woman that I'd ever gotten to know at
all well. It was indeed fortuitous that I'd happened to enlist her as a 
friend and ally. And yes, “Pretty” was the name her mama gave her—at 
least so she told me... 

Chapter Eight 

Pretty gave my mammoth bifurcated electronic brain a long searching
stare. 

“You realize, of course, that as impressive as your network is, it
doesn't come anywhere near to replicating the complexities of a normal 
human brain; much less the hydra-headed brain of your brother's. Hell, 
you don't even have a decent cat brain here,” She opined. 

All this from a twenty year old woman who'd never heard of a BEOWULF
network, six months earlier; who'd never finished high school for that 
matter and if she could be believed—and I was inclined to believe her. 
was still a virgin. Even though she'd grown up in a crack-head infested 
neighborhood. 

I couldn't recall just which shelf I'd picked her off at the people
store; nor could I remember precisely what had inspired me to add her 
to my shopping cart. Sometimes I came close to regretting it though. 

I was diligently trying to upgrade my graphics; because for me, that was
a major part of the system. I'd thought of going to a laser projection 
system but though red and green lasers were no problem, finding the 
right quality blue lasers would be a pain. Instead I was wiring my very 
own very large home made solid-state screen system, using red, blue, 
and green LEDs. Once again, the blue ones were the most problematic to 
find and the most expensive. 

Since I wasn't limiting myself to standard color palettes, I found a few
places where white, yellow, or UV LEDs could add something useful to 
the mix. 

Also my screen wasn't anywhere near flat. It was more an irregular—but
bilaterally symmetrical—hemisphere surrounding the high-priced 
vibrating recliner chair. Like the human retina, my screen was designed 
to be very high definition to the front central, tapering off in 
definition and brightness towards the edges—just like the sensitivity 
of the human retina. 

It took both a good understanding of Impressionist Art techniques,
animation, and some skull-crackingly involved projective geometry 
algorithms to milk any sort of usable images out of my stored visual 
programs. 

Of course to Pretty, they were little more than overly complicated
Psychedelic light shows. 

“My brother has no eyes!” I swore. 

“My Aunt has no balls!” Pretty countered. 

“Has she tried hormone enhancement therapy?” 

“For what?!?” 

“How in the seven burning Hells would I know? You brought it up.” 

After a moment I relented. She did want to understand. 

“I'm not trying to reproduce Bucky's brain. Obviously, I don't have the
wherewithal to attempt that. I am a Mutant Super Genius in my own right 
though and I'm trying to create a prosthesis for myself. that will 
allow me to duplicate one of Bucky's amazing capabilities.” 

“Bucky couldn't groove on the light show?” She sounded a wee bit
uncertain. 

“I thought I'd mentioned it. My brother has no eyes. Bucky can think,
—‘Visualize', if you will—in multiple dimensions. It helps him see 
around corners. I've never mastered that ability.” 

“Don't we live in a 3-D; or 4-D World? What does thinking in multiple
dimensions get him?” 

It wasn't a simple concept to get across to her. All kinds of
Engineering and other predictive problems can be solved by the simple 
expedient of two variable equations—X and Y. Quite a few of these two 
dimensional equations can be visualized much better; by examining the 
graph they make on a set of X-Y Cartesian coordinates. 

That isn't the limit. You can plot three variable equations on an X, Y,
Z system of coordinates—though you generally have to use Isometric 
projection to represent it. If there was any real advantage to be 
gained by doing so however, three-dimensional models could—and 
sometimes are—assembled. 

Four dimensions can be deucedly tricky but with the right computer
software; showing three D graphs evolving over time; looped and 
repeated enough times; can generally get the thrust of an idea across. 
But your fourth variable doesn't have to be the passage of time. 

Suppose we're trying to factor in the velocity, frontal area, spin,
weight, nose shape, viscosity and structural integrity of multiple 
handgun bullets—that's way more than just four variables anyway and 
none of them are time lapse—though some are time-related. To choose to 
present any of the variables as changes over time, would be rather 
artificial and arbitrary. 

Human brains are good at visual pattern recognition. Some pictures can
be worth a thousand—or ten thousand words. Once things get too 
complicated to visualize; they become much more difficult to handle. 

Consider Imaginary Numbers. It takes two dimensions just to map the
entire set of one-dimensional Complex Numbers. It takes four dimensions 
to map a simple two variable equation. 

Riemann's Conjecture encompasses such a set of 2-D/4-D charts.
Mathematicians have to work with such equations for a very long time to 
build up an intuitive “feel” for them. If it was a common human 
ability, to think visually in four dimensions, I have little doubt that 
Riemann's Conjecture would be much more thoroughly explored by now. 

But why can't humans learn to visualize in four or more spatial
dimensions? We take the flat 2-D Images from our retinas and by virtue 
of much experience muddling around in a 3-D World, we learn to think in 
3-D. It is not an inborn ability. Watch a small infant endlessly 
experimenting with visual cues, to learn navigation in a 3-D World. 

There's a question of whether humans have enough data processing
capability to truly think in 4-D. No one ever accomplishes anything 
until they try. Visualizing a hypercube would also be relatively 
simple, compared to visualizing some complicated four variable 
equations. 

My conditional verdict for humans was: maybe yes, maybe no. But I wasn't
human, in any case. 

I neglected to mention earlier, that you can help visualize multi
variable equations to some degree, by multi-colored graphs, hybrid 
graphs and some other ingenious conventions—none nowhere as good as 
actually being able to actually think in N-Dimensions, but a 
semi-useful stopgap measure. 

I'd plot a seven variable equation on my big screen—Dimensions A, B, C,
D, E, F, and G. None of the letters representing a temporal dimension. 
I'd make a 4-D graph—A=X; B=Y'; C=Z and D=T. Some times I'd vary the 
parameters.”1” could represent a second; a minute; or an hour on my T 
axis—whatever seemed to clarify the concept the most. 

Then plot it B=X; C=Y; D=Z; and E=T. I would spend hours looking at the
equation, matching the three spatial coordinates and one temporal 
coordinate to every conceivable permutation of variable assignments. 
Then I'd fiddle with color schemes and tesseracts—not to mention 
memorizing large blocks of coordinates. 

I figured that if my Mutant brain was capable of resolving the deluge of
data into a 7-D portrait of my equation; that it would do so largely 
subliminally, subconsciously and instantaneously (at some point) 
without much deliberate guidance from my conscious mind. 

How else? My brother had no eyes. I had no other visible course of
action to pursue—at least so far as learning to think multi-D. 

As always, Pretty came up with all sorts of ingenious variations on the
theme, once she had the initial concept down pat. She was an invaluable 
assistant, when she wasn't talking nonsense. 

“Do you think we might be lovers someday?” 

“My brother has no eyes. I, fortunately, have no libido.” 

“I don't either. Maybe we were meant for each other.” 

“Hell's pecker woman! I'm old enough to be your father.” 

“But you're a virgin too, just like me. Maybe that's fate. Does it
bother you that I'm black?” 

“Your physical appearance is quite soothing. Please change the topic.
You make me most uncomfortable. I'm a Christian and I don't hold with 
extra-marital sex.” 

“Is that why you kill people at the drop of a hat? Are you proposing to
me?” 

“Drop the topic, Please! My word! My brother has no eyes! And yes, I do
need to quit killing would-be rapists; just for forcibly stripping off 
your britches. ” 

“Change of topic. Can we get a dog?” 

“Cool, Get two,” I allowed. 

Chapter Nine 

“These neural networks and the programs you developed for your Testudos
were brilliant—though you kinda quit and left them hanging. Mind if I 
borrow some of your ideas and try to develop them further?” Pretty 
asked breathlessly. 

“Use anything of mine you want,” I said. Then taking into account her
literal nature, I quickly modified my statement. “Use anything within 
reason and good taste—and always excepting my toothbrush, and other 
tools of personal hygiene.” 

I think I neglected to mention that she'd promptly moved herself into my
house, more or less immediately after the first time I invited her in. 
I didn't necessarily want her there. I hadn't asked her to move in. I 
hadn't even granted permission. She just kinda presumed her way in. She 
had a good straight presumption, with a lot of power down the 
left-field line. 

Two years after I'd given her permission to get two dogs, we had four
dogs, and a cat. She got a Bullmastiff and a Bloodhound—she named them 
“Charles” and “Chester”- because she'd always wanted big dogs. 

Apparently she shopped around for size, because both of the dogs were
well above standard. Chester the Bloodhound, weighed almost two hundred 
pounds, wasn't obese and insisted on sharing my bed. 

While the big dogs were still wee puppies, she bought a Boston Terrier
named “Martha”. She said two big phlegmatic type dogs like Charles and 
Chester needed a Boston to stir their spirits up. 

Well, to hear Pretty tell it, if you buy a Boston, a Beagle Dog is
almost mandatory, to complete the set. Never heard that one myself. 
Pretty thought she knew all about dogs, though she admitted that she'd 
never had one. Whence she drew her mysterious, and seemingly arbitrary 
knowledge, I do not know. 

Hell, it was easier to give in than to argue with her. We ended up with
a Beagle Dog named “Heidi”; and a big tomcat named “Luke”- ‘cause the 
dogs needed a pet too; don't you know... 

Every since I'd explained to her how my Multi-Dimensional Visualizer
worked, she'd been working on her own smaller version. She'd set up her 
own solid-state LED monitor, built around her own easy chair. 

She used my electronic brain for much of her number crunching but she'd
also set up several nodes, consisting of sixteen dual processors each, 
to supplement her system. She'd also hooked two or three-dozen 
state-of-the-art visual cards together, in what looked to me to be a 
tangled, confused mess—at first glance—though I'm sure there was some 
underlying theory in there somewhere. 

She was trying to do things in a fundamentally different way than I was.
I wanted to be able to expose my mind to large amounts of raw data, 
including a few inevitable errors, or distortions—all in real time. I 
was relying on my subconscious mind and my mutant intelligence to 
assemble it all together somehow, in a way that made sense. 

Pretty was trying to spend a lot of time creating a very highly polished
final product. It had all the errors, redundancies, and distortions 
carefully edited out. Even though she'd taken a large part of the 
creative process herself, watching the final presentation was a useful 
learning process for her, and she could watch each presentation several 
times, picking up new insights each time through. 

Essentially she was creating first class tutorials for herself. On the
other hand, although her presentations were much more eloquent than 
mine, they lacked much of the obfuscating real world details that made 
mine so much more real—but harder to grasp in their entirety. 

Pretty also had another obsession: self-programming, evolving software
and hardware. She'd simulate some extraordinary neural networks—using 
some primitive first designs that I'd developed, and some mathematical 
tools that I'd created and she set them to evolving through hundreds of 
billions of clock cycles. 

Then she'd evolve the software the same way. Then she'd figure ingenious
ways to hybridize her brilliant analog computers, with the most digital 
number-crunching power that she could cram into a small package. 

I really wasn't sure at that point, what her ultimate goal was. I was
generally happy when she left me in peace. I did know that she wanted 
to be able to create small autonomous robots, with a very high degree 
of autonomy. 

She also talked a lot about creating small robots- from the size of
praying mantises, up to the size, perhaps, of a large coon—capable of 
scuttling around in the dark, out of sight; rustling through garbage 
heaps, dumpsters and junk piles and gathering enough material 
surreptitiously to fabricate armies of new robots. I have to admit, 
that last sounded rather fanciful to me. As I said, her games kept her 
out of my hair. 

Artificially simulated evolution was already creating some weird stuff.
Computers with their vaguely defined methodologies and their billions 
of calculations per second, sometimes came up with magnificent 
kludges—things that worked by the use algorithms no human brain could 
fully comprehend; by methods no human could ever have conceived, woven 
amongst brute force computational paths that could never be thoroughly 
explored, or even understood by men. 

My artificial evolution projects, such as they were, were for me, no
more than only moderately interesting means to occasional ends—and they 
were already decades ahead of state of the art. 

Pretty, who was a genius in her own right, had managed to harness both
her own prodigious intellect, and some of my multi-dimensional 
calculating programs, to create stuff that was generations ahead of our 
time. 

You'd never guess that Pretty was a genius, judging from some of the
crack-brained activities she took part in. She really got into the 
cyber-punk scene. They were into some new novel nonsense they called 
“Costuming”. 

It was part amateur Magna and Animae, part role-playing and to some
small degree, reality. The way I understood it, you created a comic 
book hero but you were also supposed to have a real live costumed dude 
to bring to conventions—or whatever. 

He was supposed to really take his role seriously and be a bit of a
hacker in his own right. Just the type reality-blurring activity that's 
bound to help anyone batten his or her reality hatches 
down—particularly people that are reality challenged anyway. 

Now Pretty had a character who wore a long baby blue velour duster. He
had long blond hair, and carried a replica artillery model 08 Lugar 
except that it was chambered for. 357 SIG. 

Can you guess the dude's name? That's it: “Luftwaffe Air Marshal Herman
Goering”. 

I didn't see the desirability of the Nazi connection, but she insisted
that all sorts of costumers borrowed historical names, that it was one 
of the tenants of costuming, that a historical villain's name was just 
as good a handle as a historical hero's—actually, all else being equal, 
a past villain's handle was to be preferred. But mainly, the dude was 
master of the skies. He really couldn't be master of he skies with any 
less imposing title than “Luftwaffe Air Marshal”. 

Well you guessed it. She managed to persuade me to go to the convention
and be Air Marshal Goering for her to show of to her crack-brained 
friends. What could possibly induce me to do such a humiliating thing? 
Well, I spent large amounts of my time impersonating a seventy year 
old, three hundred and thirty pound black woman. 

My brother has no eyes. 

I'm not easy to embarrass. Besides, I stuck to the time-honored tactic
of negotiators everywhere--I insisted on concessions. I'd wear the baby 
blue duster, and impersonate Air Marshal Goring for ten days but in 
return, I wanted all of us—me, Pretty, the four dogs, and the cat, to 
go on a six week camping trip in Northern Michigan. 

I hadn't been in the woods since I'd moved to Louisville. I thought it
would be a happy-making thing. Yeah well... 

Chapter Ten 

“Why do they call them ‘catfish'?” Pretty asked me, as she concentrated
on taking what looked like a five or six pound cat off her hook. 

“It's my understanding that the name comes from the whiskers. Someone,
apparently, found them catlike. On the other hand, I've heard them make 
some surprisingly catlike verbalizations as they're unhooked—not real 
loud, but catlike.” 

“They're slimy, and nasty,” she griped. 

“Yes they are. Ever butcher a chicken? No, of course you haven't—big
inner-city girl like you. Paradox—chickens are nasty, dirty, filthy 
creatures. A lot of what they eat is garbage. 

“Yet when you butcher them correctly, you come up with some of the
purest, most wholesome meat around- not that you can't get Salmonella, 
Trichinosis Tapeworm—God alone knows what else—if you don't handle the 
meat correctly. Catfish are kinda like that.” 

“Well then, maybe they should call them ‘Chicken-fish', “ She argued. 

I shrugged. Even out in the unspoiled wilderness of the Upper Peninsula
of Michigan, she couldn't seem to can the non-stop speed-rap. I tried 
to tune her out—sometimes with more success than others. 

“They can't fly,” I said. 

Nonetheless, I was enjoying myself. It brought back happy memories of
camping in the area, with my mother and father, and Bucky too, when I 
was a boy. 

My brother has no eyes—yet he'd learned to do a surprising number of
outdoor type things—partly because of his superior senses and superior 
intellect, partly because my father never pitied or pampered him. 

I hadn't always hated Bucky. I grew up with him. He was my brother. When
he'd killed my mother and father, he'd also robbed me of a brother. 
That was one more reason that I had to hate him. But my faith taught 
forgiveness. 

The day that Bucky came to me, said he was sorry, and asked to be
forgiven—I'd give it serious consideration. Until then, screw him. Even 
if I forgave him, I could still feel obliged to kill him—I supposed—In 
the abstract. It was pretty much academic. Bucky wasn't going to 
repent. 

“My brother has no eyes” Pretty said with some heat, as a catfish finned
her. 

“That's something I'm supposed to say. You don't have a brother. In
fact, since I've never heard you so much as mention a father or mother, 
you may very well have formed asexually, under a cabbage leaf 
somewhere.” 

“Are you my friend?” 

“Yes, of course. Why else would I put up with you?” 

“I have really big jiimel-jobbies.” 

“Yes you do, but lets not get into personalities. I told you that I have
no interest in sex. I've also told you that I don't groove on vulgar 
jesting.” 

“That wasn't really vulgar.” She held up her hand to forestall further
conversation on that topic, ‘cause she was hot on the trail of another 
item of dispute. 

“Bucky is your worst enemy, right?” 

“Bucky is my worst—and only—enemy.” 

“Well, that makes him my enemy too—my worst enemy. Isn't an enemy the
same thing as a brother?” 

“How so?” 

I could see that she was going to treat me to another dose of her outré
logic. I saved time, and started shaking my head in wonderment, before 
she'd gotten started good. 

“Cain killed Abel,” She argued. 

“And Jesus Wept.” 

“Not right then, of course,” Pretty countered. 

Once again her hand came up to silence me. 

“ I know. You didn't imply that. Jacob cheated Esau out of his
birthright. Joseph's brothers sold him into slavery,” She plowed on 
relentlessly. 

“Yeah, I see what you mean. Moe Howard used to slap his brothers and
call them ‘Chuckleheads'—obviously proving your point. If you want to 
claim Bucky as a brother, feel free. Don't be too surprised, if you 
ever have the misfortune to meet him, to find him under whelmed at the 
idea of having a black sister.” 

“Is he a racist, or something?” 

“Well, everyone can't be tolerant enough to have Herman Goering for a
hero. But y'know, I'd never given it much thought—but you're right, 
Bucky never seemed to care for black folk very much. Don't know where 
he picked that up. Course'n he didn't much care for anyone.” 

“Not the real Herman Goering...My costuming character. Anyway, I based
him on you!” 

“Yes, well um...when did you ever see me carry an Artillery Model
Lugar—or any Lugar, for that matter, speak with a Germanic accent, or 
wear a Baby-Blue Duster? Where do you come up with some of this 
silly-ass bullshit?” 

Leaving aside the constant chatter, and the crack-brained arguments, we
had a good time. At least I had a good time. The dogs enjoyed getting 
to roam a bit, though I kept them in sight. The cat stayed in a box, or 
on a leash, since cats aren't smart enough not to wonder off 
permanently. 

Nonetheless, I think that he enjoyed the fresh air and change of
scenery. I think Pretty enjoyed herself. She said that she did and I 
really had no reason to think that she didn't. However there was always 
enough of an element of opacity to her thoughts and emotions for me to 
ever be absolutely sure about anything, where her inner world was 
concerned. 

I taught Pretty how to build a good campfire. Then once she mastered
that, we moved on to starting a fire with a fire drill, flint and steel 
and with a magnifying glass. I showed her how to cook over a bed of hot 
coals, how to make camp bread, biscuits and panna cakes. 

We fished and set snares for small birds, squirrels; rabbits, possums
and such. We went for long hikes in the woods. I showed her how to pick 
blackberries and possum grapes, how to harvest cattail roots and how to 
make sassafras tea. 

We grooved on a half-dozen edible insects that weren't too likely to
incite reflex gagging—at least not in me. We made a bow and several 
flint tipped arrows. 

We looked at the stars at night—and I'd devoted most of the load
carrying capabilities of the two big dogs, to lugging in a fairly big 
telescope. It didn't have much to do with primitive survival but I 
liked stargazing. 

We were in the fifth week, of a projected six-week trip—not that there
was any compelling reason not to stay another six weeks, or even six 
months, if it came to that. 

It was night. We'd let the fire die down. I was sitting close to
Pretty—by my standards. I find it extremely claustrophobic to have 
someone anyone much closer to me than a long arms length, plus a few 
inches. Nonetheless, I could have touched her, if I'd leaned way far 
over to my left. 

“You know I'm really not bullshitting with you, when I tell you that I
have no libido—or if I do, it's such a still small voice, that it's 
very easily drowned out by legitimate concerns”, I began. 

“Well, I'm not quite that bad, but I don't joke when I say that it's
something that I don't feel very often and not very strongly, even 
then,” Pretty said. 

“I like spending time with you though. I'd gladly make the commitment to
always hang with you, like this.  Anyway, my parents wouldn't have 
approved of us living under the same roof like we do; without benefit 
of clergy...” 

“Are you proposing?” 

“No, not yet anyway—let me finish my disclaimer. Did you ever hear the
joke about the ninety seven year old man, who went to the Doctor, to 
find out if he was ‘Sexually Fit'?” 

“No, what happens?” 

“Doctor asks to see his sex organs, so the old bastard sticks out his
tongue and gives him the finger.” 

“Why? He asked the Doctor to evaluate him.” 

“The old man was completely impotent. Those were his ‘Sex Organs'.” 

“I gotta admit, that's pretty funny, but I thought you hated vulgar
talk.” 

“I'm trying to make a point. If you should marry me, I might, at some
future time, come to find some lead in my pencil. There's no guarantee 
though. 

“I might never be able to offer you more than the old pervert in the
joke. It's little enough to offer anyone—let alone a pretty young woman 
like yourself. Nonetheless, if you're serious, when you make all those 
remarks about getting married, I'd truly like to. 

“Just don't ever forget, that my brother has no eyes. If I ever had
children, God knows what kind of Godless mutants that I might sire. I'm 
evil,” I confessed. 

“How do you figure that you're evil?” 

“I was convicted of murdering my parents. I didn't kill them but just
being accused of it, makes me somewhat guilty.” 

At that precise instant, she leapt to her feet and started to draw her
.357 Magnum Revolver--a four inch Smith and Wesson Model 19, round 
butted, nickel plated, Mag-Na-Ported, hammer bobbed with custom Stag 
grips. As she started her draw, she shouted, 

“What the F...” 

She never got to finish her draw, or her exclamation. All at once the
peaceful night erupted into gunfire. 

Whatever they hit Pretty with didn't sound like a firearm. It wasn't
that loud, but it was ungodly bright. It crackled venomously, and 
promptly robbed me of all my night vision. Yes well...I don't need eyes 
to see. 

My brother has no eyes. Like him, I have three-by-three hearing. I have
three times the sound gathering ability and three times the tone 
discrimination of a human. 

I also have not one; but two narrow zones in the ultrasonic, where my
gain is very high indeed. And I'd watched them teaching Bucky how to 
echolocate as far back as I can remember. 

I'd practiced echolocation in dark rooms, from an early age myself. Not
only was it interesting, but also I flashed on how handy it might come 
in, coon hunting on a dark night, or something. 

I used my echolocation sense to shoot the first two. I kept my eyes
tightly closed, so as to spare them any more immediate exposure to 
bright light. I can recover my night vision in a fraction of the time 
it would take a human. 

I'd have thought the sound of gunfire would have hurt my ears. Instead,
each time that I squeezed the trigger of the .45 Caliber 1911A1, I got 
a super-detailed vision of the world around me. 

Echolocation, as opposed to vision, is not strongly directional. I could
perceive things behind me, almost as clearly as I could things right in 
front of me. Although some aspects of them would be progressively 
becoming more dated, they gave me a clear map of the permanent features 
of the terrain. 

I consciously chose to hold each gunshot enhanced snapshot in my
mind—although constantly making minor revisions—until the next loud 
snapshot became available. Something had kicked my echolocation skills 
into a whole new area of expertise—instantly. 

I got my night vision back in time to see one of the clients getting
ready to stick me with what appeared to be a pitchfork-sized shock 
prod. Chester the Bloodhound leapt between us. 

The client stabbed Chester in the chest with the prod and activated it.
Sparks flew six inches from the triple tines. It wasn't meant to be 
lethal. It probably would not have been—except Chester kept forcing 
himself forward toward the client, driving the blunt tines deeper into 
his chest all the while. Finally he dragged himself close enough to the 
client, to rip his throat out. 

Truth be told, these were some passing strange clients. They were clad
in black BDUs, from shoulders to toes. They all had some quaint helmets 
on, that completely covered their faces with odd, insectoid compound 
lenses hiding their eyes. Bunch of Sociopathic freaks—of anyone should 
ask me. 

One of them managed to grab me from behind, just as I was moving to try
to come to Chester's aid. Another of the fly-eyed ninjas ran up to 
Chester and gave him both barrels of a short shotgun, at contact range. 
Then he had to draw his pistol, and empty it into Chester's head, as 
Chester ripped his leg to shreds. 

Heidi the Beagle Dog leapt out of nowhere, to seize the gunman's gun
hand. I didn't get to see her demise, though I have no doubt that she 
died like a warrior. 

About then someone hit me hard across the back of the head. It didn't
put me down, but it addled me. Then I was hit by one of the jumbo shock 
prods. Someone hosed my face with a combination CN/CS 	and Capsin 
spray—never seen tear gas and pepper gas combined. 

Someone else shot me with some sort of trank dart. I had two or three
clients hanging on each hand. Overburdened as I was, my customer 
satisfaction slipped considerably. 

Sometime—several eternities later—I came to consciousness in an
alternate universe that was virtually identical to the one that I'd 
left behind so many eons before. 

They had me in a straight jacket and leg irons and they even had a
muzzle on me. I noted that they'd piled the bodies of all four of the 
dogs beside the fire. While I watched, one of the clients grabbed the 
cat's cage, the cat still in it, and hurled him into the creek to 
drown. I howled in rage and tried to sit up. But I couldn't stand 
because of he way that I was bound. 

I looked at Chester's body. He'd focused on me, for some reason, to be
his best friend, his brother, his God; and the source of all that was 
good and bright in his little world and I'd let him down. 

If someone had asked me how I felt about Chester before that day, I'd
have said that he was a bloody nuisance and he was. 

But I realized then, that I'd loved him, even before he'd given his life
trying to protect me. No normal human—or a near human mutant like 
myself—could have failed to return such a powerful emotion. 

He'd loved me and I'd repaid him by getting him killed. The rage started
to pour over me in bright warm burgundy waves—thick as corn syrup, 
bitter like unsweetened cocoa, but sweet as honey, all at the same 
time. I'd never been quite so angry. 

The client who'd killed Chester sat across from me, his helmet removed
and his leg and forearm bandaged. I smiled at him. 

“You killed my dog. I give you fair warning. You should kill me while
you can. You are already dead, but that isn't your main problem. 

“I am a mutant and a genius. 

“My brother has no eyes. 

“When I come for you, I will have invented whole new categories of
suffering for you to experience. You will beg me to kill you for 
months. 

“ Nor will it stop here. Do you have parents? A gray-haired old father?
A dear old mother? They'll die in screaming agony too. Do you have any 
brothers or sisters? I hold them all equally guilty. They'll share your 
fate. Have any children? Cousins, friends? —how about pets? 

“I'll make myself a necklace of their finger bones and their screams
will be a hymn thanking God, that I can't torment them forever, and 
when they finally die, Hell will be a relief for them.” 

“I hold no one or no thing dear-except The Eyeless One. He is Alpha and
Omega—The One True Light!” The Ninja dude told me. 

“My eyeless brother? I'll try to keep you alive to see me make him eat
his own balls—and make him chew them thoroughly before he swallows them 
too. Then I'll make him a nice lei from his own bowels. It'll be a 
happy-making thing. You are invited!” 

“Jimmy! I see you're still alive, and still the diplomat.” 

“Pretty! You're still alive!” 

“You won't get out of marrying me that easily.” 

I couldn't see Pretty but just then my eyeless brother walked into my
field of vision. He'd grown tremendously. He was a head taller than me, 
his shoulders nearly a foot wider. He was muscled like a troll. There 
was something extremely dark, evil, and brooding about him. He walked 
in a sort of rolling, muscular, humpbacked stroll. 

“My brother has but one brain. Then as if that wasn't enough of a
disgrace to his family; he goes and gets himself engaged to a Nigger 
bitch!” 

“My brother has no eyes.” 

“Maybe I should gouge your eyes out; and make you like me then.” 

“Sorry Bucky, but it'll take a little more cutting than that. You'll
also have to cut off my balls; and my tinkler—and you'd also have to 
remove my backbone, and about half my brain—O, and my conscious... 

“But you know Bucky, I still wouldn't be like you,  ‘cause I could still
look back and remember what it was like to have those things.” 

“I'm going to make you suffer.” 

“Good luck on that project. I can't see it happening. You ain't bright
enough to get to me.” 

“How about I kill your girlfriend?” 

“Well, as long as God still has a place for her in this world, you
cannot kill her. If God is ready to take her to heaven, why should I 
mourn? However, even the slightest discomfort you put her through, will 
multiply the payment that I'm eventually going to exact from you a 
thousand fold—you eyeless eunuch.” 

Chapter Eleven 

Being back in captivity again was rather tedious. Bucky hadn't
condescended to stoop to the cruder forms of physical torture—at least 
he hadn't so far. I hadn't even had to put up with seeing Bucky. 

I got tranked, and woke up in a sensory deprivation tank. It had some
custom modifications, of course and it did its job extremely well. They 
had a tube down my throat to feed me—though I could only barely feel 
it—and then, only when I concentrated. They also had at least one 
heparin lock in a good vein 24/7, so they could dose me at will. 

I carefully kept track of the time, the first few days—counting
heartbeats, breaths, sleepy cycles, etc. Eventually, of course, I lost 
all track of time. I do know that they let me stew in the tank Au 
Natural the first five or six days. 

Then they started IVing fairly large quantities of LSD-25 into my
system—not in batch doses, but in a continual drip. 

I knew that they tranked me every so often too, because I could
tell—though very vaguely—when they'd put in a new heparin lock. 

Did Bucky think the LSD-25 would leave me less able to escape? Or did he
think it would intensify my discomfort? Was he trying to soften me up 
for something? Could he have been experimenting on me? 

Maybe he just had a huge surplus of Acid and thought that a good steward
would find use for it somewhere? Or maybe there was no motive. Who 
could tell with Bucky? 

My brother has no eyes. 

Before the long stint in the Looney Bin, I'd had total recall- as near
total as it's truly possible for a mortal to have. It's not so much 
things get forgotten—there's a lot of fairly convincing evidence that 
once something makes it to long-term memory—anything that can be 
remembered a minute, or so, after it happened- will always be 
remembered. 

What gets misplaced- even there, not truly forgotten—over time—are the
“Call-Up Codes”. 

There are very few ways to get a “Stack Pass” to riffle at random
through one's memories. 

I had obsessed for years about memories that the Electroshock and
Insulin Shock and massive doses of Psychedelics, combined with 
long-term use of Thorazine and strong Anti-Psychotics and 
Anti-Depressants, might have cost me. 

I'd also obsessed that someday I might be locked up again, with no way
to verify any figures, or formulas, or facts that might be even 
remotely useful in trying to escape. 

In consequence, I'd thoroughly mastered the most advanced of the
mnemonic systems, and I'd memorized all sorts of things—almost 
compulsively—formulas, charts, graphs, physical and mathematical 
constants, trig charts to five places, logarithm tables, anatomy 
charts, chemical formulas, molecular diagrams, maps, Bible verses, 
foreign language vocabularies, ballistics charts and loading manuals. 

Guess what Bucky! With nothing else to occupy my mind, all kinds of
facts are spontaneously arranging themselves into some very elegant 
Multi-Dimensional organizational and flowcharts. 

Something else Bucky: all that LSD-25 has written me one hell of a stack
pass, to wander all the dead-storage archives in my brain. My brother 
has no eyes, my ass! I was coming to wonder if he had a brain! 

I'd worked with 7-dimensional equations extensively, for no real reason,
except that seven seemed a nice round number. I found when I came to 
truly visualize things in multiple dimensions, that except for a few 
very limiting and specialized cases, there was no good way to expand 
from 7 dimensions to 8, 9, or 10 dimensions. To further the 
understanding much, it was necessary to make the quantum leap to the 
next prime number of dimensions. 

I had all kinds of partial intuitions as to why that was so, but nothing
that I could have conveyed, even in the vaguest terms, to any other 
Mathematician on Earth. 

17 dimensions—with many limiting conditions, and restrictions of
scope... I could now follow some useful arguments visually in 17 
dimensions. 

Now here's the thing—there is no room in the real world for more than 3
spatial dimensions. One would think that a 17 dimensional space—even an 
abstract one—would feel like it was packed full of everything that it 
could properly contain—sort of claustrophobic, as it were. 

Nope, I constantly felt that I was standing in all kinds of odd nooks
and crannies, looking at my 17 dimensional abstract sculpture from 
somewhere outside of time and 17-fold space—Weird. 

Weirder yet, I could feel my heparin locks being removed, the tube
carefully being withdrawn from my throat. Then the bandages were 
removed from my eyes. For a very brief moment, I thought I saw Bucky. 
Then I realized that this fellow was lacking an eye and socket, only on 
the right hand side of his head. 

On the left side, he had a perfectly good eye, though set very deeply
under a very thick supra-orbital ridge and over a very robust 
cheekbone. He looked like a workingman. 

Bucky had—only too obviously—never had done any real manual labor—though
I had every confidence that Bucky would prove a strong and cruel 
fighter. 

“I'm your cousin Lemuel. I came to get you out of here.” 

Suddenly I seemed to make sense of it all. 

“You're a Centaur!” I said, while laughing uproariously. 

“What a time for you to be high!” He said disgustedly. 

I was sorry if it inconvenienced him. I struggled to find the right
formulas to convey that precise flavor of my mannerly regret, but 
nothing seemed unambiguous enough. Every possible word combination 
seemed fraught with frivolous vagueness. 

“You mean a Cyclops but don't ever tell a man who's actually met a few
Cyclops, that he looks like one—that is, unless you want to start a 
fight.” 

There were a couple other armed men with him. I couldn't walk right
good—or even stand with any sense of conviction, so they propped me up, 
and half dragged me along. 

Lemuel handed me Pretty's .357. They'd stuck it into a holster, on an
over-the-shoulder leather bandoleer. The bandoleer had seven or eight 
speed loaders in leather pouches and over twice that many spill 
pouches. Someone was most anxious that Pretty not run out of ammo. 

“Is this yours?” Lemuel asked. 

“Actually, that's Pretty's.” 

“You do know how to use it?” 

I frowned at the inanity of the question. 

“Of course. Weapon Master am. Pistolero am. Verbal skills screwed up by
acid--yes? Not a Cycloptic Centaur. My brother has no eyes.” 

“Try to concentrate real hard. There's something I need the answer to.
It's very important. Are you allied with The Hellspawn?” 

“Do you mean Pretty?” 

“Is that her name? Is she your ally?” 

“She is my beloved. She is betrothed.” 

He did a double take as that unexpected aspect of reality blindsided
him. 

“Well then, we mustn't spare any effort to rescue her. We'd hate to
leave anyone in your brother's clutches, but then again, sometimes we 
need to triage. 

Kindred betrothed to Hellspawn.” He laughed uproariously, and added, “
It will be funny as hell, to see some of the Elder's faces, when we 
load that onto their plates.” 

Understand that we weren't standing around shooting the breeze. They
were dragging me at a nice clip, the whole time. As we stepped around 
the corner, we ran into a squad of Bucky's Insect-Eyed Buckaroos. 

There was Lemuel, the two men dragging me and two more of the Kindred.
There was over a dozen of Bucky's henchmen. 

In less time than it takes to tell, there was Lemuel, my two bearers, my
two honor-guards, and me. All Bucky's Boys were dead or dying. 

My bearers never bothered to attempt to draw their weapons. They knew it
would be over before they could hope to join in—all except for one 
Ninja. 

I grabbed Lemuel's rifle, and pushed the muzzle up just in time. 

“No!” I wailed frantically. “You can't kill him!” 

“Why not?” 

“Because I want to!” 

I shot the fellow right in his kneecap. He rolled on the floor, and
howled like a lost soul. 

“Does that hurt? I hope so.” 

I paused for a moment, to let him savor the moment thoroughly. Then I
shot his other kneecap. 

“Balls” I said, and then shot him there. 

Finally, I gave him two to the face. I spilled all six shells on the
ground, making no effort to save the live one. I contrived to reload 
the revolver from a spill-pouch, thus keeping one more speed loader in 
reserve. Lemuel looked furious. 

“What was that little psycho mini-drama about?” 

“That dude killed my Bloodhound. I told him that I'd make him suffer,
when I killed him. Pity that circumstances didn't allow me to make it 
more prolonged and painful.” 

Lemuel patted me on the shoulder. 

“Did you catch that?” One of my Bodyguards enthused. 

” Gave the man a double kneecapping for killing his dog- He's Kindred,
all right!” 

“And engaged to The Hellspawn!” Another cheered. 

I was becoming a bit concerned about the way they all referred to Pretty
as “The Hellspawn”. Not only did it sound kinda disrespectful, but also 
they were starting to make me wonder... 

Chapter Twelve 

“My father said that we had kinfolk in Kentucky. He said that's why we
were moving back here—to have allies. I never found out what he and the 
company were quarreling about. I did wonder why no kinfolk showed 
up—briefly. At the time it didn't seem important.” 

“He probably figured that he was being watched fairly closely and
figured he was subject to a preemptive strike at any time. He didn't 
want to precipitate a one-sided struggle,” Lemuel explained. 

We'd all escaped in good order. Bucky had moved Pretty and me to a
compound he had in the Western part of Virginia, while we were both 
unconscious. We'd quickly scurried back to our home turf, in Eastern 
Kentucky. So a few hours later, we sat across a table, forming a War 
Council. 

“Just who exactly are you people?” I asked. 

“They're The Kindred” Pretty said, as though that should have made
everything crystal clear. 

“Honest to God, it never occurred to me that you were Kindred. You don't
have the exaggerated facial ridges. You're strong, but you don't pack 
on wholesale-sized slabs of muscle, like most Kindred. You're too smart 
to be Kindred. You don't even have the characteristic smell...” 

“Kindred are stupid?” I asked, honestly perplexed. 

Lemuel didn't take offence. He started explaining in his own words. 

“ Kindred are far smarter than humans—however...” He began. 

“Kindred are fairly long-lived. Often many of our intellectual gifts
don't start to develop ‘till our 60s and 70s. Even then, many of 
us—although ingenious in many mechanical and mathematical ways—have 
inferior verbal skills. 

“We also tend to get stuck in rigid, unyielding customs and traditions.
Also—paradoxical as it may sound—we are much more driven by instinct, 
in some sections of our lives than the less intellectually gifted 
humans. 

“You have enough human in your genome though, that with any luck at all,
you should avoid most of our inflexibility, and bullheadedness.” 

“But just what in hell are y'all?” I persisted. 

“What do you know of your ethnic heritage?” 

“Not much—we're mainly Scots-Irish.” 

“Where were the Scots-Irish before they came to Ireland?” 

“Scotland.” 

“Before that.” 

“Celtic Europe? I'm not a historian,” I said 

“Farther North?” 

“ The Norsemen? Norse gods? Laplanders? Santa's Elves? Frost Giants?” I
guessed wildly. 

“Close with that last guess. We're what the Norse referred to as
‘Trolls'- though most of their tales about Trolls were nonsense. 
Kindred are Trolls. Not to say that all, or even any significant 
fraction of Scots-Irish are Kindred.” 

“And why do y'all refer to Pretty as ‘The Hellspawn'?” 

“I'm sure that Pretty would like to explain her own unique heritage to
you, in her own time and way. We need to tell you—and her—some more 
about your own unique ancestry. Have you ever heard of the ‘Tuatha De 
Danann'?” 

Pretty gasped aloud in shock. The others already knew, but it was clear
that the subject made them uneasy. 

“That's an old Gaelic term for Leprechauns—the ‘Wee Folk' isn't it?” 

“No that's a whole other story. The Tuatha De Danann were an ancient
people of extraordinary knowledge, wisdom, power and longevity...” 

“They were gods”, Pretty cut him off. “They were gods. They haven't
walked the Earth in centuries though. They had their time and now 
they're gone—departed...” 

“That's where you're wrong. We know where a small enclave—seven or eight
of them—though highly reclusive—still survives. We hadn't exchanged a 
thousand words with them, in over five hundred years—until Jimmy's 
great-great grandparent's time. 

In a word, he is a little more than three-eighths Kindred, a little less
than one-fourth human; and a bit less than three-eighths ‘Tuatha De 
Danann'—He and his trouble-making sibling. Certain other Kindred among 
us share lesser amounts of Tuatha De Danann blood.” 

Lemuel gestured at his own freak visage. 

“My brother has no eyes” Pretty ejaculated. 

“Mine either—there's a lot of that going around, apparently”, I agreed
with her. 

The rest of The Kindred—my kinfolk—looked at us strangely. 

“What kind of idiot necromancy are you up to, trying to reweave The
Ancient One's genes? Does your arrogance have no limit?” Pretty 
demanded. 

“What kind of dangerous gene weaving will you and ‘Light Breaker' be up
to, once you get to the point of consummating your nuptials?” Lemuel 
countered. 

“Lemuel, if your crack-brained revelations cause Pretty to reconsider
our betrothal, I'll use your misshapen skull as a hood ornament!” 

“And if you were convinced it was necessary for ‘The Greater Good'?” 

“Then I'd cut you far less slack than if you acted from cruelty or
ignorance.” 

“I have no objections to you marrying The Hellspawn. That will be good
fun actually.” 

“Thank you, Lemuel. You don't know how relieved I am—to hear you say
that” Pretty purred menacingly. 

“When did I become ‘Light Breaker'?” 

“Well since some of your brother's Minions started referring to him as
‘The One True Light'. Good Psy-Op, don't y'know?” 

“And I suppose” I said wearily, “That there's all sorts of Prophecies
about Light Breaker?” 

Lemuel took a hefty swallow of Scotch from the Tin cup that he was
drinking from. 

“Nary a one” He said, while wiping his mouth with his sleeve. “But if
you'd like to have some prophesies spoken about yourself...” 

“No, no—my brother has no eyes. No need to warn him what's going down
ahead of time—unless you can come up with some suitable Delphic and 
inscrutable, ambiguous; and ultimately self-fulfilling prophecies... 

“Anyway dude, were you raised in a barn? You could offer to share some
of the liquid libation...” 

“In all seriousness, yes, I was raised in a barn-but as Kindred, and
friend of The Kindred, you're both welcome to partake of ‘The Water of 
Life', “ Lemuel Said. 

We didn't get much scheming and strategizing done the rest of that
afternoon—or that night either, so far as that goes. I did find out 
that Lemuel was both a clever Chess player and a tough arm wrestling 
opponent. Pretty proved that she could hurl daggers farther, and more 
accurately than any of the Kindred—although by all appearances- 
throwing darts, daggers, and tomahawken was a common Kindred pastime—as 
was good-natured, bare-knuckled fights and all sorts of eating and 
drinking contests—and curiously enough—long ballads, stories and poetry 
recitations also figured highly in the nights entertainments. 

It's good to have kin. 

I found out a few things of interest, and value, over the next few days.
The Louisville home had been compromised. I'd fixed it up so that 
anyone breaking in, would initiate a meltdown sequence of my gear. 
There wouldn't have been two untoasted transistors still connected 
together, nor two unaltered bits of data still in sequence in any of 
the memories. 

{Yes, yes I admit it- I used transistors in some of my gadgets—a few...
At least I have a firm enough grounding in the theory of Vacuum Tubes, 
that I always see any solid-state device as a pinch-hitter for a 
tube(s)- and never as a primary. 

I know that as long as theorists and inventors continue to take the
easy, short-term approach of designing their projects around 
transistors, that tubes never will be restored to their rightful place 
as the go-to technology. 

On the other hand, I often have to build on the work of
transistor-minded chuckleheads—and my time is always in short supply... 


Anyway, anyone who feels holier than me, should be researching their own
tube-friendly designs...} 

Though I'd made scant effort to back up any of my projects—and I really
had scant reason to do so; Pretty had backed all her stuff up in 
multiple ways—Almost to the point of mania. Using her online but hidden 
and brilliantly encrypted design notes, we soon had several working 
copies of my electronic brain, Pretty's modified brain, her AI 
Network/Programs—And what seemed very trivial to me at the time—her 
“Herman Goering” Stuff. 

It was only when she got some of her toys ready to try, that I realized
how advanced some of the systems were. Keep in mind, Pretty was a 
super-genius. She'd taken the goals of her Cyber-Punk role-playing 
friends quite literally. She'd been developing systems that would 
actually allow a bizarrely dressed man to walk the streets and to 
posses all sorts of Animae/Comic Comic book powers and abilities. I 
should have taken her work more seriously. 

Just as things were kinda gettin' back to normal; just when Pretty and I
had set a date for our wedding, just as I come to know the family I'd 
never met before; just as Pretty had started training a couple more 
Bloodhounds—Bucky decided to strike. 

We all had some desire to stay off the government's radar. Both sides
had tried to keep a low profile. In any sort of stand-off situation, 
where there is indeed a good reason(s) to stand off—The initiative 
always lies with the biggest gambler and/or the least rational. 

That's an excellent reason to avoid stand-offs whenever possible. Ain't
always an option though... 

My brother has no eyes. 

His Blitzkrieg resulted in several of my kinfolk killed—folks that I'd
come to love. They'd killed both my new Bloodhound puppies—and though I 
hadn't truly bonded with them yet, I was not indifferent. 

Worst of all, the knob-gobbling pervert had kidnapped Pretty once more,
along with a handful of other Kindred. 

I went to Pretty's lab and started riffling through her real-life
Super-Hero gear—time for Herman Goering to save the world. I was sure 
glad that using the gear wouldn't entail calling myself “Ted Kennedy” 
or impersonating hillary clinton- I mean, some things are too much, 
even for love. 

Chapter Thirteen 

In the old days, a desire to keep in close touch, had kept the Kindred
in one general area. They'd begun in the area where Kentucky, Tennessee 
and Virginia come together. Over time they'd spread the length of 
Kentucky and into Missouri and Southern Indiana a bit. 

Secondary concentrations formed in the Ozarks and parts of Alaska. The
Kindred had always been free to live where they chose, even in ancient 
times. In the modern world, there were individuals, or small family 
groups in every state of the Union. 

The call had gone out for a Council of War. The Kindred had foreseen
that the day would come when they'd need to have a large meeting. When 
that day came, they wanted to be able to hold the meeting in secret and 
secure from attack, in case it turned out not to be as secret as they'd 
hoped. 

They managed to build a huge underground meeting bunker—as large as many
medium-sized high school's basketball auditorium. 

Now that did not mean that every Kindred in North America were coming to
confer in the bunker. Mostly it would be leaders of one sort or the 
other. Of course, if someone had a very strong feeling that he ought to 
be at the meeting; it wasn't like the Kindred to deny him access. 

They were just getting ready to start, when Cletus gave me the
count—three-hundred and thirty-seven Kindred—give or take. I'd been 
curious, and asked him and his cousin to stand at the entrance with a 
counter. 

Folks came and went. There were ushers, and other service people, making
a fully accurate tally very next to impossible, but the count gave me a 
fair idea. 

Cletus was Lemuel's nephew. He and Lemuel's son Earl had been appointed
my general guides, aides, and liaisons during the coming campaign. They 
were fourteen and thirteen respectively. They'd both lost a brother and 
an aunt to Bucky's attack. They were both grimly focused on whatever 
task I put them to. 

I thought time was a wasting while they gathered but that was nothing
compared to when the meeting started. Honest to God, they would call 
adjournments while two—or three—or more—of the participants went 
“outside”—not actually above ground mind you—to reason out the finer 
points of some argument by the use of fisticuffs. 

They had a couple styles of boxing they practiced and three or four
styles of grappling. They spent large blocks of time arguing what style 
to use—though they usually resort to no-holds-barred type contests. 
Surprisingly, or perhaps not, there were very few injuries—beside 
broken noses, smashed lips an occasional broken arm, or strained knee 
or elbow. 

Lemuel walked up to me during a recess. 

“If it ever occurs to you to wonder: That's why the Kindred, with their
greater strength, intelligence and longevity never conspired to take 
over the Earth—particularly back in olden times—now you know. We lack 
the ability to reach consensus or to govern ourselves beyond the 
medium-sized clan level. 

“Partly it's our greater sense of smell. You and me don't have anything
like a full dose of it. They can't sort out all the pheromones in a 
gathering that large. That's one main reason for the fights. You'll 
notice that after a fight, they're much more likely to agree? They've 
been close enough, for long enough, to get a good whiff of each other,” 
Lemuel said. 

“They're like a bunch of inbred Hillbilly Klingons, wasting time as if
there were no reason to make haste!” I spat. 

“My brother has no eyes!” 

Here has Pretty, as well as several others—if any of them are still
alive. God alone knows what Bucky might do to them. He was insane, and 
worse yet, he had no honour. No telling what sick things he might think 
to do to her... 

I clenched my fists and ground my teeth in pure frustration. All the
while, there was a small part of me that knew that extreme anger was as 
close to enlightenment as mortal man may come. That small part of me 
ran around gleefully picking up the pieces of my shattered thoughts 
like manna from heaven and carefully storing them away, to serve me in 
the future. 

The future was where I might meet Bucky. In the future, I might need
every bit of rage I could muster to defeat him. In the future, my rage 
might be put to good use. In the present circumstances, it could only 
serve as an expensive sort of entertainment. 

I slowly calmed myself. It always seemed wrong—almost blasphemous—to
deliberately dim the light that way. But what alternative did I have? 
I'd lose the light eventually, regardless. Keeping the rage going 
longer would simply mean that I would burn up more physical and mental 
resources. When times are hard, it makes no sense to keep a fire going 
in the fireplace all Summer. Hoard the fuel for Winter. 

“They're not really wasting time. We'll have to locate Pretty and the
others before we can strike. It would be nice to pin down Bucky too—but 
he may not be with the captives. Indeed, the captives may not all be in 
one place.” Lemuel said. 

“People are searching as we speak. When we find them, we'll strike. We
don't need the council's okay for that. The council is more...what? Pep 
rally maybe? Formality? Hard to explain... 

“Come on I'll introduce you to some people who are trying to find Bucky
even now,” Lemuel said. 

We went to his truck, my two ever present aides and me; and he drove us
to a farm about forty minutes away. It took longer than that of course, 
with all his tail-spoiling maneuvers. 

“What if Bucky's already hacked into the Domestic Surveillance
Satellites?” I asked. 

“Well, he might be able to get past Homeland Security's Firewall, but I
doubt that he could gain control of the Satellites, without tipping off 
some of the security trips we put in when we hacked into them—largely 
to warn if anyone else gained access,” Lemuel said. 

“And of course, no one has,” I added wryly. 

“Actually, there's almost a dozen groups have access. Best that we can
tell, a couple of the other hacker groups are even human.” 

“Just how many humanoid, non-human species are there running around
loose in the world?” I wondered aloud. 

“Well, if you want to limit it to humanoids capable of interbreeding
successfully with humans—at least once in a great while—that does 
narrow it down a bit.” 

He paused to think. 

“Several, none anywhere near as numerous as the Kindred, of
course—but...more than we have the time to discuss right now. We've 
arrived,” He said. 

After we'd negotiated security, we ended up in another underground
bunker—this one filled with computers, bright flashing lights and all 
sorts of highly modified copies of my easy chair and solid-state 
screen. 

I really didn't need my multi-dimensional Visualizer, since the time in
the isolation tank but Lemuel took me up to one anyway and hooked me 
up. 

For someone who understood the process—Pretty's process, not mine—it was
a remarkably fast way to transmit complex ideas. Now we'd only been 
with the Kindred a few months before the attack and it had only been 
about three weeks since Bucky attacked us. 

There was already over a dozen people in the room who'd mastered the
process thoroughly and each and every one had made some sort of 
improvement. 

Compared to the multidimensional displays of data I could now visualize,
Pretty's elegant little Seven Dimensional shows seemed like Haiku. 
Never mind. The Kindred had managed to expand them elegantly up to Nine 
Dimensions—despite the fact that I'd never been able to get a useful 
expansion without going up to the next Prime. 

“I thought you said that Kindred don't get real smart ‘till they're
retirement age. These all look like youngsters to me,” I observed. 

“Lot of them don't. These are some of the exceptions,” Lemuel shrugged. 

“Boys,” Lemuel said. “ Find a chair. You need to watch this too. You
can't really get anything out of it, unless you're perfectly centered 
in front of the screen. There are only so many screens to go around, 
but we have plenty Virtual Reality Goggles. 

You won't understand a lot of it at first. Never mind. It's mnemonic.
Once you see it, you'll never forget it. Your subconscious mind will 
work on it day and night, ‘till it cracks the code. “ 

As he got them set up, he told them, 

“Your cousin Jimmy here invented this. That nice young lady—Pretty—Who
was stolen from us, she made lots of improvements to your cousin's 
design and so have we. That's what we do—Improve things. 

Stay awake, and try to watch them through twice, just to be on the safe
side. If you get through them twice, we have some extra tutorials that 
will help you decode them sooner.” 

“And yourself, Lemuel?” I asked. 

“Doesn't work without binocular vision. That's okay. They're working on
condensing it down for one-eyed folk. I have a pretty good auxiliary 
brain where my right eye would be. I'll be able to wrap my mind around 
it.” 

I sat and watched the presentations they'd prepared for me. I'd spent
years obsessing about Bucky but for the first time I began to see the 
limitations as well as the advantages of his intelligence. 

He'd want wealth and power—great wealth, great power. He could have run
for political office. He could probably have figured out just what 
positions—both political and postural, what words, what gestures to 
both make people forget that he was blind, while simultaneously playing 
the pity and guilt trip to the hilt. But politics involves many random 
factors, and beside, being the visible head of anything would make him 
a target. He'd much prefer to be the puppeteer behind the throne. 

He'd need money. The stock market—In the short term-Is a Drunkard's
Walk—meaning totally random. I'd seen convincing mathematical proof of 
that. Say, for the sake of argument, that the proofs were wrong 
though—I'd also seen convincing mathematical proof that if anyone ever 
did figure out how to accurately predict the market, that it would be 
impossible to hide the fact, regardless of how small-scale and discrete 
he tried to be, and there was a limit to how small scale such schemes 
could go and still be even hypothetically possible—even with beaucoup 
cheating and lawbreaking thrown in. It just wouldn't work below a 
certain scale. 

My brother has no eyes. I could see him getting off on being the leader
of some crack-brained cult, but if he were too successful, he'd draw 
the attention of IRS agents, ATF agents, both government and free-lance 
assassins and God alone knew what else. 

They'd be more than happy to shuffle him off to the big house, even if
he were playing it straight—which didn't sound at all like my brother. 

Big money, influence, the opportunity to stick his fingers in many
pies—nonchalantly fishing around ‘till he had enough under his control 
to chance a stab at the rest—that's what he needed, and he needed to be 
somewhere his mental abilities to crunch beaucoup numbers, and see 
patterns developing ahead of normal humans could be put to good use. 

I knew now where to look for my brother. He'd be behind many false
fronts, shell companies, and every other obfuscating artifice he could 
conceive, But that's where I'd find him—when I got to the bottom—he'd 
controlling the advertising and entertainment industry, maybe not 
totally—not just yet but he'd already be a key player and not too far 
from his bid for complete control. 

Chapter Fourteen 

“My sister has no eyes.” 

Hell of a statement to spring on me like that. I looked up from the
schematic I was studying. Sure enough, there was Lemuel standing with 
what would otherwise been a reasonably attractive girl except that she 
was as eyeless as Bucky ever dared to be—even on his worst days. 

She was about six foot—Pretty's height, but any resemblance ended there.
She had Lemuel's long red hair, hanging just as straight as it possibly 
could, almost to her knees. 

She had what my father had called a “buttermilk” complexion. His
memory—and mine—went back to when buttermilk actually had flakes of 
butter in it. Her skin was milk white but profusely sprinkled with 
cornflake-sized freckles. 

I took in all this in an instant, as my hand went to the grip of my
1911A1. I didn't quite draw though. There were many reasons why I 
shouldn't have shot her. The only one that caused me to hesitate right 
then and there, was because unlike Bucky. She didn't seem to have an 
aura of evil engulfing her. 

“Jimmy, every blind person isn't evil. Every completely eyeless mutant
isn't evil either. You trust me, don't you?” Lemuel said from a vast 
distance. 

I'd decided not to fire. Nonetheless it took me a few seconds to get my
locked fingers off of my pistol. 

“This is my twin sister Laura”, Lemuel said by way of introduction. 

I shook her hand. 

“I'd like to examine that pistol sometime.” 

“My .45? I assembled it from parts. It has an ambidextrous safety, high
profile sights and a two-pound trigger, pinned grip safety, and stag 
grips. Since it has been a pistol, it has known no other hand but my 
own. If I have my way, it never will.” 

“No, not the .45. The Artillery Model Luger replica that you have in the
shoulder holster—the .357”, She said. 

I looked at Lemuel in astonishment. I could have seen her picking up a
hint of the .45 on my right hip, since I'd exposed it during my aborted 
draw—and as I've said, I'm fairly good at echolocation myself. Her 
picking up that much data through a leather jacket was impressive. 

“I might be persuaded to let you examine that one sometime. I built it
from scratch. The original fired .357 SIG; but I wasn't satisfied. This 
one fires a wildcat based on .45 Magnum cases necked down to .357. It's 
more powerful than the old .357 Automag Wildcats—and that's saying 
something.” 

“You know how sharks can sense the electrochemical signals in potential
prey? Laura can do that too. More than likely, your brother can too. He 
likes to hide his abilities,” Lemuel said. 

“But the Gun? Too much detail...” 

“It's metallic, of course. It bends the lines of force all around it and
I can sense them,” Laura said. 

I had a sinking feeling. If Bucky could sense my muscles tensing, he'd
be able to feel me preparing to launch an attack before I'd even moved. 
He would always be a tenth of a second ahead of the game. It would be a 
limited but very useful form of precognition. In fact, it might be an 
advantage that I couldn't overcome. 

“I can feel you preparing to launch an attack. The answer you're seeking
is: Yes. I can almost read your mind; so you don't have to put it to 
the test,” Laura Said. 

Over the next few weeks, we buckled down trying to find Bucky. To the
best of our knowledge, he didn't know about the Kindred. Like me, he'd 
almost certainly thought that “Kinfolk” meant simply that. There was no 
reason for him to suspect the existence of the Kindred, until the raid 
had made him unambiguously aware of their existence. Bucky taking us, 
right to the heart of the Kindred Territory was probably only a 
coincidence. 

Our family farm had been near Cawood, in Kentucky- just next to the
border. When Bucky had liquidated the assets, he'd bought some land 
across the State line—presumably to get the best real estate deal. 

He'd set up a small software consulting firm, made plenty money and then
moved to parts unknown. For whatever reason, he'd chosen to take Pretty 
and me back to his first piece of ground, perhaps because the facility 
was expendable. 

I'd designed the helium filled mini-blimps to reconnoiter from the air.
I'd also fiddled around with some armed Testudoes—Wee-Little Tanks, a 
bit smaller that a half loaf of bread. I'd never trusted their 
Artificial Intelligence capabilities and I'd put them to one side. 

Pretty had done some major upgrades on every one of their systems. The
Kindred in turn, took Pretty's work one-step farther. And once again, I 
had my hand in the mix. We soon had a fleet of small; AI piloted 
aircraft doing all sorts of low profile spying for us. 

“At some point, Bucky has to get into the drug market” Laura was saying.


“Can't see that. My brother has no eyes. Drug dealing is a rough trade.
Eventually someone would perceive his eyelessness as a weakness and try 
to take over his action. It's too high profile. Bucky doesn't like 
risks.” 

“Okay, your brother sets up a software company. Being able to think in
multiple dimensions, he can improve almost any program. Get through 
almost any security system too,” Laura said. 

“That's what we call: ‘Phase One',” Cletus contributed helpfully. 

We'd been over all this dozens of times. Even my aides knew it by rote. 

“No, no let him speak”, I said as someone stared to shush him. ”How else
will he learn strategy? Earl, tell us about Phase Two.” 

Earl hesitated for a moment, to make sure of what he was going to say. 

“In the second phase, he's still making most of his money legit but he's
starting to run a few cyber-scams remotely and very discretely, of 
course. He starts to look around for some loyal lieutenants,“ Earl 
began. 

“Okay, once he has a few loyal followers, he branches out. He can't tell
you the future of every product on the market. He's not completely 
prescient. However in certain isolated cases, he can tell with great 
accuracy that a certain product will really take off—or flop. It's 
harder to make money off knowing something will flop, but occasionally 
an opportunity comes along,” Cletus finished for him. 

“You forgot to say, that he could also predict the best way to advertise
those new products. He opens an advertising agency—or several. He only 
really pursues the accounts that will be a big success; then he tries 
to take most of the credit for their success and he would certainly 
have been a major factor in their success, then he goes back to being 
mostly legal,” Earl continued. 

“He makes more and more money. He makes many useful contacts. He starts
financing all sorts of projects through intermediaries—particularly 
Movies. He knows what the public wants and he knows the best way to 
sell it to them. 

“Eventually, not only is he the silent partner in more multi-million
dollar businesses than you can count; but he also has a large input 
into what the mass media is conditioning folks for...” 

“I just don't see the necessity to deal in drugs,” I concluded lamely. 

“Look at this equation, one more time,” Lemuel said. 

“I know it's some kind of Gambler's Ruin argument but I can't quite
visualize it. Why is my brother inevitably going to run up against 
Gambler's Ruin?” I argued. 

“Think of this as a way to conceptualize money flow as a fluid system.
This is a seventeen dimensional expansion of laminar flow—just before 
it starts to get turbulent. Remember Bernoulli's Equation. Look at some 
of the constrictions,” Laura said. 

“I get it! Bucky is not a reckless gambler—anything but; however the
only way that he can make sure that his cash flow doesn't become 
turbulent, chaotic and completely unpredictable is to have fairly large 
amounts of cash to pour in from outside the system, that can be poured 
into his money flow at a moment's notice, to kill—or at least 
considerably dampen—Harmonic Oscillations,” I said. 

It's always happy-making when you finally understand something. 

“So how does this help us find Bucky?” I asked wearily. 

“Bucky's entrance into the drug market, with his considerable wealth and
his unique way of organizing, assessing risks, and just generally doing 
business, will leave identifiable signatures. Things will always be 
just a bit skewed from where they should be. And if we can hack into 
enough Law Enforcement Databases and we can crunch the right numbers, 
they will lead us right to him.” 

I was napping in my chair a couple hours later, when a Kindred named
“Frank” woke me up. He was prudent enough to do it long-range, with a 
long mop handle. 

“We've located Bucky's drug operation,” he told me. 

Chapter Fifteen 

I parked my van a few blocks away from where the street corner dealers
were hustling their wares. I could see how so many of them get busted. 
What amazes me is how some of them can do business for months or even 
years, without getting busted. 

I walked up to a dealer that I'd been cultivating, a man called “Modok”.
At first I thought that he'd taken the name of the big-brained comic 
book villain; but it turned out that he'd once beaten a fellow half to 
death with one of those nylon Tonfas most of the Laws carry nowadays. 
They're sometimes referred to as “Monadocks”. Yes well, can't always 
get the terminology straight—I suppose. 

Modok was no brain but he sold Bucky's brand of Crack. I had no doubt
that Bucky had found some economical way to chemically synthesize 
Cocaine. That would be his style. He abhorred risk and he'd want to cut 
out middlemen as much as possible. That would raise profits and reduce 
exposure. 

Now Bucky had figured out some way to get his rocks to come out in
perfect little dodecahedrons—each one just the right size for one big 
hit off the pipe. They were almost one hundred percent pure crack. The 
only impurity being the green food coloring he put into them, as one 
more brand identifier. 

They were cheaper than most, purer than any other and very hard to fake.
They were called—brazenly enough—“Bucky Balls”. Our sources told us 
that he'd started marketing them before he'd become aware of the 
Kindred. That might be—but I got the feeling that Bucky wasn't hiding 
from us very hard. 

“Give me three hundred worth of Bucky Balls,” I said to Modok. 

“Can't do it man. I can let you have two hundred worth of Bucky Balls,
and one hundred worth of pure Whip-Crack Cocaine.” 

“Thing is man, sometimes your whip just ain't whip. Keep the three
bills—just give me the rest of your Balls.” 

Now Modok should have been around long enough to know that there just
ain't nothin' free in the drug world—but hope springs eternal. 

Modok would have liked to think that I'd just made him a gift of one
hundred dollars. He should have been waiting for the other shoe to 
drop. I'd been patiently waiting for him to be sold out of the Bucky 
Balls one more time. 

“See man. There's a problem. That's three times now, that you done been
out of the good stuff. I got people that are wanting to do volume—but 
they need a reliable supply- and lots more than you usually handle.” 

I held my hand up to forestall his protest. “You think that I just want
to cut you out. Okay, I can dig that. Take this...“ 

I handed him a thick envelope. “Now don't open that up out here on the
street. Take it somewhere private. That's a gift for you inside, just 
for considering introducing me to your supplier. If you decide to go 
through with it, I'll have five times that much for you. Man, I'm 
planning on doing big things and I like you. I'll make sure to take you 
along.” 

Inside the envelope, was a thousand dollars for Modok, and one thousand
dollars for his supplier—a one thousand dollar tip just for the intro. 
It was enough money to assure both of them that I had plenty cash to 
back me up. It also pretty much ruled out me being a Law. The Laws 
couldn't be anywhere near as cavalier with their buy-money as I was 
being. 

As he took the envelope, I retained my grip momentarily. 

“Just think about it,” I urged. 

“I don't even know your name,” he said. 

I'd have never been a good actor because it took me a moment to overcome
a feeling of being silly. Modok thought I was hesitating to give him 
even a handle so I managed to play it off. 

“On the streets, I'm known as ‘Herman Goering'.” 

He knew that that wasn't my real name, of course. What he didn't know
was that virtually everything else about me was faked too. I wasn't 
alone, for instance. I had at least two score Kindred backing me up at 
all times. 

Some listened intently to police frequencies, making sure there were no
Laws in the area. Others watched at a distance, to achieve the same 
worthy goal. At least four or five Kindred followed my every move 
through the scopes of high-powered sniper rifles. 

The van I drove was a marvel of Kindred engineering. From the outside it
looked just like a rusty old 1978 Ford E-350, powder blue. There was 
very little of the old Ford left however; and the rust was faked. The 
Kindred designed engine would drive the van far faster than I'd ever 
dare to drive it. There were special effects working through the 
exhaust pipe to simulate a rough, out-of-tune engine, even blow a bit 
of blue smoke occasionally. 

Chitin panels had replaced the exterior sheet metal panels. They would
stop anything short of .50 Caliber Machinegun Bullet. They'd stop the 
big .50 Caliber slugs about half the time. They didn't rust. They 
didn't reflect laser or radar—not that the van would ever be invisible 
to radar, with its metal engine, of course. 

The panels could change colors very easily. At the touch of a button, my
blue van could become red, or black, or egg cream with a detailed 
airbrush painting. I had a couple of dozen paint schemes on tap. The 
license plate could also change to a half-dozen different numbers—all 
legitimate van numbers. 

The van's highest tech features though, was its windows. Although they
weren't half as bullet resistant as the skin, they were even more 
amazing. Each window was in actuality, a very high definition 
holographic screen. 

You could put your nose right up against it, and not notice anything
amiss. One of the on board computers kept the view consistent from all 
windows, at all angles. The back right glass was a tour de force. It 
looked cracked, and was in fact several irregularly shaped holographic 
screens, not quite flush with each other. 

From the outside, the van looked moderately cluttered and mostly empty.
In actual point of fact, it was jam-crammed full of sophisticated 
electronics. It had weapons too- not the least of which was two kindred 
following my progress at all times- via a video link. The both had main 
battle rifles, and were ready to come to my aid at a moment's notice. 

A few days later, Modok got in touch with me via the cell phone that had
been in the big envelope I'd given him. 

“Meet me tonight,” he said. “You're going to meet my boss and we're
going to meet my boss's boss.” 

We met later that night. Modok climbed into my van for the first time.
We'd put a wall behind the seats, to keep him from seeing into the 
Back. I had a receiver in one ear—as always—hidden by the length of my 
hair. We had a real time Voice Stress Analyzer trained on Modock. 
They'd let me know if Modok seemed to be equivocating. 

Modok pulled out a map and showed me the spot where we were supposed to
go. 

“Man, I don't know about this”, Modok said. “I've been through this
place a couple times. There's a park covering a square block. There are 
big ole apartment buildings on all sides. If, I say ‘if', you could 
chain just four entrances shut, and if you could block the four 
corners—wouldn't be no way out.” 

I read the streets aloud for the benefit of my team. 

“He's right, the buildings form a cull de sac. He's also sincere in his
warning,” the voice in my right ear said crisply. 

“Look here Modok, it would take a half dozen men with rifles to block
each corner. If they chain the doors too soon, someone might call the 
super or the Laws, or they might just take a big pair of bolt cutters 
to the chain; so that means they'd need at least four more men, to 
stand ready to chain the doors at the last minute. 

Then they need someone—several someones—to come after us. You're talking
about thirty men, or so. Do you think your boss's boss can field that 
many soldiers?” 

He admitted that it was unlikely but he continued to mutter negative
comments the whole way. 

“Where'd you get the street name ‘Herman Goering'?” Modok asked me, just
before we got out of the van. 

“My girlfriend gave it to me,” I told him truthfully. 

“She a Nazi, or somethin'?” 

“No, I wouldn't think so- though I admit that it never occurred to me to
ask her. She's black, and there are not too many black Nazis around. Do 
you know any?” 

“She's black?” 

“Couple of shades darker than you.” 

He looked at me rather strangely, I thought. 

“Still, why Goering?” Modok asked. 

“Because he was the Air Marshal of the Luftwaffe.” 

“What does that mean?” 

“Maybe you'll see sometime”, I told him. ”Be quiet now. Use your eyes
and ears. We may be going into a trap. We can talk more later—if we're 
both still around.” 

In retrospect, I was prepared for just about any type of treachery from
Modok. What threw me completely off my game for several long seconds 
was when he jumped in on my side. I'd simply never considered that 
possibility. 

Big boss man walked up with three lieutenants. They didn't shilly-shally
around. When they got to long voice contact range, one of them asked, 

“Are you Herman Goering?” 

No sooner than I said, “Yes”, they were reaching under their coats for
heavy-duty firepower. 

Modok leapt in front of me, pulling a long barreled Smith and Wesson
.357, and shouting, “Ambush!” at the top of his lungs. I drew the 
Artillery Model Luger; but I only managed to shoot two of my attackers 
with Modock blocking my field of fire that way. 

It hardly mattered. There were Kindred snipers in a dozen of the
apartment building windows. Kindred very rarely miss. They eliminated 
the first wave almost instantly. But there was a second, and a third 
wave of attackers. 

Modok took a shotgun blast from a Cruiser, to his center torso and
several shots from a Beretta 9mm. That wasn't his big problem; because 
he was wearing a vest, although I daresay that it knocked the wind 
right out of his sails; but his problem was the AK round he'd taken to 
his upper thigh. It was gushing blood all over the place. I decided 
that I was through jacking around. 

I was pushing hard on Modok's thigh, trying to stop the bleeding. 

“We have a friendly down” I said into my microphone. “Probable femoral
puncture- I require immediate emergency EVAC.” 

Then I changed my timbre slightly. “This is Air Marshal Goering, I'm
calling in an ALL-OUT-AIR-STRIKE.” 

Pretty had conceived, and the Kindred had helped her perfect, a whole
Air Force of tiny planes. They flew just high enough to be invisible 
from the ground. They followed me, or more precisely, the Goering 
Duster, everywhere we went. There were hundreds of the little planes, 
in over a dozen models. 

There were the tiny Stingers. A Stinger's wingspan wasn't much wider
than the length of a man's hand. It carried five rounds of .25ACP. They 
flew up close, aimed for the brainpan and very rarely missed. 

There were several sizes of Kamikazes packed with explosives or
incendiaries. There were the .40 S&W Caliber Thumpers and the planes 
with seven-foot wing spans; armed with miniature .22Short Caliber 
Miniguns and Beaucoup ammo. There were recon planes. 

Even with their advanced AI targeting programs, at this range, this
close to the enemy, my heretofore black colored duster turned powder 
Blue and the long Black wig that I was wearing turned blonde—Just to 
make me it a little easier for my Lilliputian Air Force to avoid 
shooting me. 

The duster was actually composed of a bunch of tiny hexagonal
solid-state TV screens. The duster could approach invisibility, with 
its stealth program. Within seconds the combatants were eliminated with 
vicious efficiency. I gave the command for the duster to go into 
stealth mode. 

A couple of Kindred ran up. 

“Get Modok some treatment. Save him if you can,” I ordered. 

“Why?” 

“Because he took bullets intended for me. I'm through losing friends to
Bucky. Modok may be a poor excuse for a friend—but he is a friend now. 
That's what counts. You just save him. We'll worry about what to do 
with him later.” 

Chapter Sixteen 

“What's up with Modok,” I asked. 

He was standing—If that's the word for it—In the Kindred Drafting room,
looking over the shoulder of one of the Kindred Draftsmen. The Kindred 
firmly believe that if a man truly cares about what he's designing, 
he'll draw it on paper. CAD, in their opinion, is for uninspired hacks. 


Be that as it may. At the moment, I was more concerned with Modok's
strange antics, than I was with the Kindred's philosophy of 
craftsmanship. 

I couldn't think of any real reason for him to be in the Design room,
yet there he was. He was so excited about something, that he was 
jumping up and down, and squealing with delight—Like a prepubescent 
girl at a teenybopper concert. 

“Well, I've been meaning to talk to you about Modok,” Lemuel began. 

Complications! That's what I love! My brother has no eyes! 

He murders my parents, gets me committed to an insane asylum, kills my
dogs, kills several of my cousins and kidnaps my fiancée. I'm trying 
frantically to find the eyeless bastard, so I can repay him, in some 
small way, for all the light and joy he's brought into my world. Now I 
can hear in Lemuel's voice, that there are complications with Modok. 

“When you had them bring him in, you told the medics to fix him up. You
weren't very specific. They fixed him up GOOD. For instance: Modok was 
blind in his right eye. We fixed it.” 

“I could tell that he had a bad eye. I didn't know that he couldn't see
out of it at all. So...” 

“It was congenital. We couldn't just put the eye in. We had to do some
rather sophisticated brain stimulation to get it to work. Also, he was 
a drug addict; forty-two years old, and with some major health 
issues...” 

“Get to the bottom line Lemuel.” 

“Modok currently has much better than human eyesight- maybe twice the
light sensitivity, at night. He's got 2x2 hearing and his sense of 
smell has been drastically stimulated. His reflexes and healing powers 
are all jacked up. He has the life expectancy of one of the Kindred. 

His brain is over-stimulated at the moment. That will pass—eventually,
but he'll still have a permanent IQ of close to two hundred He has 
total recall, at least for everything that's happened since the 
stimulation. And did I mention, he's fanatically devoted to you?” 

“Say what?” 

“Yeah, he really grooves on binocular vision—though I think it's
over-rated myself—and he thanks you for it,” Lemuel said. 

“So, he ain't Kindred and he's not really human anymore either. Back to
my original question, why is he jumping up and down in the Design 
room?” 

“When you stimulate the brain that way—well, you gotta give the mills
something to grind. We let him read some engineering books, because 
they were handy. Then we gave him some schematic printouts. He's really 
into The Luftwaffe. Actually made some notable improvements.” 

I shook my head, and turned to go. Lemuel laid his hand on my shoulder,
and detained me briefly. 

“Being Kindred is more than a matter of genetics. He fought beside you.
You named him your friend. That was an act worthy of Kindred. We 
respect your naming. He is Kindred now. He has a place among us as long 
as he wants one. None begrudge him that.” 

I'd turned my back to Modok. He came walking up behind me; but he was
prudent enough to stop just outside arm's reach. 

“Hey Herman, I want to show you something,” Modok said. 

I don't know precisely what I was expecting, but Modok dressed in a
Confederate Cavalry uniform was not foremost amongst them. He had the 
Ostrich-plumed Cavalry hat, the knee-high Cavalier's boots, and a Gray 
Confederate Greatcoat that reached a palm's width below his knees. 

“Watch”, he said. 

The Greatcoat turned a half dozen colors; including absolute black, then
it went into stealth mode. I could still see Modok, of course, but I 
could see stuff behind him, though greatly distorted—as though through 
a really thick piece of glass. When he moved, it also lagged a fraction 
of a second behind. At a slight distance though, particularly at night, 
he'd be all but invisible—particularly when standing still. 

“Now watch the hat,” Modok said enthusiastically. 

The hat morphed into a half-dozen Stetson variations. 	Then it became a
Top Hat, a Bowler, a really bulky black Sock Hat, a red, gold, and 
green Rasta Hat, a hood seemingly attached to the Greatcoat and finally 
a Cat-in-the-Hat style Hat—with multiple color schemes, of course. 

“And the Greatcoat, boots, and hat are all bullet proof just like
yours,” Modok said. 

“And just what is the point of all this tomfoolery?” I asked. 

“I am JEB Stewart, Commander of The Confederate States Luftwaffe.” 

“Lemuel...” 

“He thought the idea up all by himself,” Lemuel hastily started to
explain. 

“He has his own Luftwaffe?” 

“Yes.” 

“Why?” 

“He came up with some really good Design ideas. He helped us invent the
first truly practical micro helicopter, for one thing...” Lemuel was 
saying. 

“Too inefficient- fuel wise” I said. 

“True, but Modok figured out a way to use a fairly big mini zeppelin as
a sort of aerial aircraft carrier. It works really well. Some of the 
smaller planes can use them to refuel and re-arm as well.” 

“Outstanding,” I muttered to myself. “Modok, what makes you think I'd
want you out in the field with me?” 

“You need someone to cover your six. I am the rational one to do it.
You'd be dead now, if it wasn't for me,” he said—which wasn't precisely 
true, he'd been more in the way than anything. 

His words came out all staccato, like popcorn popping. He looked like he
was going to start riding his imaginary pogo stick again. 

“Oh all right, once you get the hyper activity under control. Can't have
you out on the streets acting like that—you'll get yourself put into 
the loony bin. But tell me, why JEB Stewart?” 

“I saw his portrait in one of the books the kinfolk let me read. He had
a long duster like yours—besides, I read an article one time about the 
Confederate Air Force.” 

“They didn't have aircraft back during The War Between The States”, I
told him. “And that's ‘Kindred' not ‘kinfolk'.” 

“No, no, I'm talking about a society of old military aircraft collectors
and restorers. They call themselves ‘The Confederate Air Force'.” 

“Why, pray tell, do they do that?” 

“Because The South shall rise again”, He stated with utmost conviction. 

“Lemuel!” I saw Laura enter the room and I gestured for one of the
Kindred to bring her over. “ Glad you're here Laura. We're going to do 
a reality check—you, Lemuel, and me.” 

“My brother has no eyes. I'm a mutant—descended from a race of beings
known as The Kindred—a folk so fierce and ugly that they inspired the 
Norse legends of Trolls. 

But even The Kindred are a little leery of my fiancée. They call her the
‘Hellspawn'—for reasons I've yet to learn. She hooks me up with an AI 
weapons system that won't work unless I identify myself as ‘Herman 
Goering'. 

Now I have a crazed black bodyguard—who until recently was a crack
dealer—who runs around impersonating JEB Stewart and tells me' The 
South will rise again'. I should have stayed in the asylum. Now tell 
me, have I missed anything?” 

“You left out the Tuatha De Dannan,” Lemuel started helpfully. 

“Wait a second” Laura began. “You also have several cousins with no
eyes, myself being a prize example. But there's more”, She added 
sweetly. 

“Make my happiness complete, ” I said resignedly. 

“Our latest intelligence reports indicate that your brother has allied
himself with the Remnant,” She said. 

“Who in hell are The Remnant? And why are y'all so intimidated by them?”
I asked. 

“When the Kindred decided to move down from the northlands and mix with
men—At least outwardly—The Remnant stayed behind. We haven't heard from 
them in over a thousand years. We were largely convinced that they had 
gone into oblivion,” Laura said. 

“A year ago, your cursed brother didn't know the Kindred existed. Now
he's resurrected The Remnant!” Lemuel spat out. 

“Be fair Lemmy, it isn't Bucky's fault if The Remnant still exists,”
Laura reasoned. 

“No but it's his fault for getting them to take an interest in the
affairs of men, once again,” Lemuel countered. 

“Not necessarily, our analysis shows that given the continued existence
of Remnant, they'd quite naturally monitor the affairs of The Kindred 
very closely—from a distance, as it were,” Laura argued back. 

“Modok, do you think some of The Kindred are big and scary? We're
lightweights compared to The Remnant. Long ago, when The Kindred 
decided to cast their fate with mankind, we made a conscious decision 
to be more like men.” 

“We had far more control over our form back then. We became smaller, and
less hairy. We also began to think more like men. We may seem violent, 
impulsive and instinct-driven to you. We are—compared to men. The 
Remnant would make us look like men by comparison,” Lemuel mused, 
partly to Modok and partly to himself. 

“The Remnant are very powerful and very evil. They scare me,” Laura said
quietly. 

“Are these Abominable Snowmen bullet-proof?” Modok demanded. 

“No, they're mortal,” Laura admitted. 

“Then you ain't got nuthin' to worry about. As long as JEB Stewart is a
member of the kinfolk, the Yetis will have to come through me,” Modok 
boasted—though I had no doubt about his sincerity. 

“That's KINDRED damn it all to hell! KINDRED—Not Kinfolk, how the hell
you gonna be Kindred, if you can't even say Kindred?” I demanded. 

“Leave him alone. His heart is in the right place,” Laura said. 

Later after Laura and Lemuel left, Modok leaned closer and lowered his
voice conspiratorially. 

“I think that red-haired girl Laura likes me. She's been making eyes at
me.” 

“Are you mentally challenged? Has it somehow eluded your notice that
Laura doesn't have any eyes? She's just like my brother. My brother has 
no eyes.” 

“Not just like your brother. You told me you brother was evil. Laura is
sweet. Besides, you know what I mean about making eyes at me,” Modok 
insisted. 

It wasn't worth arguing about. No one listens to me anyhow. 

Chapter Seventeen 

Bucky was holding our people—Including Pretty—In a stronghold in rural
Minnesota. That was a far piece from the main concentration of Kindred. 
The logistics of bringing overwhelming force to bear were daunting. 

We didn't have any big planes. Even if we had, a planeload of Kindred
would have been far too tempting a target and we couldn't risk losing 
that many Kindred to one LAW rocket—or whatever. We had to transport 
over two hundred heavily armed men over the roadways—hopefully without 
arousing the notice of Bucky, or the Laws. 

Lets face it: most Kindred can pass for human; but they're ungodly ugly
humans. I'd guess the average Male Kindred is about Six-five. He'll 
weigh in about three seventy-five, with muscles like a champion Power 
Lifter and a big belly too. 

He'll generally have abundant jet-black body hair, big nose and big
chin, pronounced supra-orbital ridges and a modest set of fangs. Most 
of them wear bib overalls and speak in an exaggerated drawl—playing to 
the stereotype of the stupid, inbred, man-mountain, Mountain William. 
It doesn't work nearly as well when you have a whole crowd of them 
milling around in one place though. Kinda sets folks to pondering... 

But there are Kindred like Bucky and me, who have generous amounts of
human blood and look more like normal humans. Lemuel and Laura would 
have fit into that category, except for the missing eyes. They had 
several brothers and sisters though, who had the standard number of 
eyes. We also shared some other cousins that fit that the general 
description of “Human”. 

There were also a number of people like Modok. They'd fallen in amongst
The Kindred for one reason or another. They'd grooved on the scene and 
been adopted into the tribe. So far as The Kindred were concerned, they 
were just as much Kindred as if they'd been born Kindred. 

People who'd lived close to the Kindred for generations would have had
to be pretty thick, not to realize that The Kindred were a peculiar 
people—a people apart. Many of them knew about The Kindred, but country 
people are big on minding their own business. There's been a certain 
amount of intermarriage over the years too and there have been a number 
of alliances formed. 

Suffice it to say, we tried to have someone who looked at least halfway
Human to be the driver of most of the vehicles, most of the time. We 
also took great pains to avoid giving the Laws any excuse to pull one 
of our vehicles over. 

“Modok, if you ask me one more time if we're there yet, I'll poke out
one of our eyes and make you look like Lemuel,” I threatened. 

He knew that we hadn't made it to Minnesota yet. He was asking if we'd
gotten to the agreed upon mileage for him to take over driving. I don't 
like to let others drive me, so I was loath to let him take over even a 
few minutes ahead of schedule. I assumed that he shared my distaste for 
being a passenger but he had other things on his mind. 

“Do you think that I have a chance with Laura?” He asked me. 

“Modok, I don't know what to tell you. She's blind. That means that she
can't see how ugly you are. She's Kindred. That means she's moody—even 
more than a human female. She'll have a dowry, so it won't matter that 
you're flat broke. The Kindred Doctors cured your addiction. No one 
will have to worry about you ever becoming an addict again. 

I don't know. I know it's a radical course of action but why don't you
come right out and ask her?” 

Modok seemed to have a special talent for annoying me. Nonetheless, we
managed to arrive at the designated assemblage point without incident. 

Bucky's fortress was largely underground. There was chain link fence
around the place and sentries inside the fence and out. I had the 
Goering coat on, of course. I also had a new gadget—a set of safety 
goggles. They not only protected my eyes; but they monitored my 
brainwaves. At the mental push of a button, I could choose to see a 
virtual image from any of my miniature aircraft. Or I could use the 
goggles for night vision or infrared. Modok had a similar pair. 

I sent a score of tiny stealth planes, with silenced Guns loaded with
poisoned darts. In one massive first strike, they wiped out all of the 
above ground sentries simultaneously. Kindred sprinted forward from all 
four point of the compass to breach the fences with bolt cutters. In 
less than a minute, they'd laid entry charges at all five of the 
entrances. Selected teams went in, while others stayed topside to guard 
against an attack on our rear. 

Kindred are generally big and they have scant use for small-bore Guns.
Every one of them carried some sort of .308- M-1As, H&Ks, Saigas 
mostly—along with some very sophisticated Kindred designed belt-feds. A 
lot of them carried a twelve gauge as well. 

I had an H&K .308. It was the first one that I'd ever owned; and I was
real pleased with it. I had a 1911A1 on my strong-side hip (the right). 
I had a seven shot; four inch L-Frame S&W .357 (pre-lock, of course) on 
my left hip; and another in a left-hand appendix cross draw. I had an 
eight and three eighths inch Smith 29 .44 Magnum in a left side 
shoulder holster. I had a custom Bowie with a fourteen-inch blade, and 
a few hideouts blades and Guns. I also backed up my H&K with a .30 M1 
Carbine slung over my shoulder and a six-pack of fifteen round 
magazines—with a couple more in speed pouches. All my Guns, except the 
H&K were bright nickeled and all my pistols and knives were stag 
handled. 

Notwithstanding, as I led the way down the tunnels, my main weapons were
the miniature Confederate Air Cavalry helicopters, on temporary loan to 
the Luftwaffe. While the tunnels were wide enough to drive a car 
down—and even pass for that matter—the tunnels were a bit tight for my 
planes to maneuver in. 

We carried several small planes though, just in case a need for them
should arise. Although we had a general idea how the tunnels were 
arranged—both from official blueprints and through all sorts of 
sophisticated scans, they didn't tell the whole story. Bucky had 
deviated from the official plans and we couldn't know everything there 
was to know about the tunnels from outside. 

The small helicopters were invaluable for scouting around corners and
though open doorways. They didn't warn us of the ambush though. One of 
the sidewalls dropped straight down into a slot prepared for it, 
revealing a squad waiting in ambush. The Air Cavalry helicopters buzzed 
and fired away like angry hornets. I had time to shoot a couple of 
Bucky's minions and I felt a half dozen bullets impact the Goering 
duster. 

Then the stock on my H&K exploded in my hand from multiple hits. It
numbed my right hand momentarily and I dropped the rifle. I drew the 
.357 from my left hip and got in a quick head shot before all the 
hostiles were down. I did a quick tactical reload and reholstered the L 
Frame. While we paused momentarily, I got out my Carbine and divested 
myself of several magazines of .308. 

We met a few lone gunmen along the way but the choppers took care of
them. Finally we entered into the large central chamber. The chamber 
was over a hundred feet below the ground. The tunnel floors had 
consistently led downward—With the occasional descending stairwell for 
good measure. All the tunnels seemed to converge on this one big 
central chamber and then they branched out again- going ever downward. 

The chamber had a round floor of perhaps sixty or seventy yards across,
with an elevated platform about twenty feet high and twenty feet in 
diameter. There were maybe twenty-five or thirty rows of seats 
surrounding the floor, each row a couple feet higher than the last. 

Most of the seats were occupied. Something about the whole situation
told me that they'd be mere spectators to whatever happened. It was 
more than a hunch—an absolute certainty—a knowing. 

My brother has no eyes. He stood on the platform with Pretty and three
of The Kindred in stocks. He turned his eyeless head towards me and 
smiled. 

“I've been expecting you brother. You are so predictable,” He said. 

He was holding a silver colored rod in one hand—about thirty inches
long, with a big metal ball on one end and a smaller ball on the other. 
I looked a lot like a twirling baton—only heavier duty. He walked over 
to one of The Kindred and touched him with the larger sphere. Some sort 
of purplish lightning came out of the wand and a Male Kindred screamed 
in agony. 

Kindred are less sensitive to pain than humans and very stubborn to
boot. The fact that he had made a Kindred cry out—particularly a 
male—was shocking. The man screamed for a few heartbeats. Then he 
either died or passed out. 

I was straining to get to the stage where Bucky held court but dozens of
his followers blocked our way. None of them were armed. They didn't try 
to attack us. All they tried to do was obstruct our forward progress. 
Bucky was moving towards Pretty with his wand. I ordered the 
helicopters to attack Bucky but once they got close to him, they seemed 
to be crushed by an invisible hand. 

I called my remaining ‘copters back and set them to mowing down the
unarmed herds. I was shooting as many of them, as fast as I could, with 
my Carbine—headshots only. I took no pity on them. They were part of 
what was going down—armed or not. 

“You see my brother? He's good at killing the unarmed and the innocent.
He killed our parents,” Bucky said in a big rabble-rousing voice. 

I screamed in rage to hear him accuse me that way. I didn't want to
shoot him. I wanted to seize him, tear at him with my teeth, throttle 
him until he expired, rip his head clean off his body and eat his 
liver! 

The world danced in a red haze to my enraged eyesight. I'd finally
cleared a pathway to the stage and I bounded up the stairs 
two-at-a-time. I saw Modok and Laura running up the stairs on the other 
side. 

I'd tried to tell Modok that it wasn't his fight and that he could be
killed. He'd insisted on coming along. Now seeing him and Laura, I was 
almost as concerned about their welfare as I was Pretty's. That's the 
hell of fighting wars side by side with your kin. Of course Laura 
fiercely resented any suggestion that she couldn't do anything someone 
with eyes could do. 

Just as I cleared the last stair step Bucky reached Pretty, but as he
touched her with the wand, instead of purple fire enveloping Pretty, a 
bright orange flame enveloped Bucky. He didn't scream in pain. He was 
far more powerful than an ordinary Kindred but you could see the flames 
had hurt him. He staggered backward dazedly. 

“You wonder why I'm called the ‘Hellspawn'. It's because I can command
the orange flame. You think that you're something to marvel at, eyeless 
one? I was born into slavery. I'm over three hundred years old. You 
mean no more to me, than an insect,” She shouted at him. 

I shot at Bucky's head a half dozen times with the Carbine. One round
actually connected with his head but it was only a superficial wound. I 
got a couple rounds into his shoulder and one into his left forearm. 
Somehow he was largely deflecting each round. I put a fresh magazine 
into the Carbine but Bucky had regained his composure. 

Fifteen rounds whistled off into space going every which way, hazarding
friend as much as foe. I dropped the Carbine and drew my Bowie with my 
left hand. That's the way I'd been taught. Ambidextrousness is the 
goal; but the default condition is: right hand- Gun hand; left 
hand—Blade hand. Bucky was no more than ten yards away and I didn't 
think that I'd be as easy to deflect as a 110 grain Carbine bullet. 

Then everything went black. It wasn't an ordinary darkness. This
darkness almost seemed to have substance. It blocked my infrared as 
well as my night vision. It even seemed to dampen my echolocation and 
my sense of feel to a large degree. I tried to push through the 
darkness towards Bucky. 

“Who is The One True Light?” Bucky catchetized his minions. 

“The Eyeless One!” They shouted back. 

“Who is The One True Light? Who is The One True Light? Who is The One
True light?” Bucky shouted at them. 

“You are! You are! You are!” They shouted back maniacally. 

I drew both my .357s. I couldn't shoot at Bucky—blinded by the darkness
as I was—there would be too much chance of hitting Pretty, or Modok, or 
one of The Kindred. 

Nonetheless, a four inch .357 Magnum is both loud and bright. I haven't
seen any figures, which is louder—a four inch .357 or an eight inch 
.44? My vote goes to the short .357. I fired fourteen rounds into the 
ceiling as fast as I could pull the triggers. 

The muzzle blast tore a hole in Bucky's darkness, just as I'd thought it
might. I could see a few feet around me. Bucky was rolling on the floor 
and holding his misshapen head. The bright orange flame surrounded 
Pretty once more. This time it burst first her shackles, then the 
shackles of the three Kindred. 

Laura was also down on the floor holding her head- though I later
learned that it was from Bucky's darkness and not from my .357s. I 
tried hard to get to Bucky but the closer I got, the thicker the 
darkness became. It actually checked my forward progress like trying to 
wade through invisible molasses. 

“We have to get out of here before Bucky recovers,” Pretty screamed at
me. 

I could barely hear her through Bucky's sound deadening aura. I could
hear Bucky's dead headed followers loud and clear though. They were 
yelling some kind of chant about the One True Light. On a hunch, I 
shouted my own slogan. 

“I am the Light Breaker! All servant's of The Eyeless One should fear
me!” 

Bucky had an amplification system keyed to his voice—and our voices were
similar enough... 

Laura had fallen much closer to Bucky than anyone else. She wasn't
capable of walking and no one seemed able to reach her. Bucky was 
between us, so if I could have gotten to Laura, then I'd already have 
gutted my brother like an eyeless pig. My brother has no eyes. 

Then I saw Modok attack Bucky with every aircraft that he had. None of
them got very close, but I noticed the darkness weaken a bit more. 
Modok had a PPSH 41 with an 80 round drum magazine. It was his pride 
and joy. He emptied the Magazine in Bucky's general direction while 
walking slowly forward. 

I could see his facial veins swell, from fifteen yards away. I decided
to help him. I drew my .44 Magnum and sighted carefully on Bucky's 
chest. I fired six evenly spaced shots, about a half second apart. I 
don't know if it worked, or not but something did. I saw Modok pick 
Laura up. Moving away from Bucky seemed far easier than moving towards 
him. 

I ordered half my remaining helicopters to escort Modok; and left him to
fend for himself. I had problems enough of my own. Pretty's confinement 
had left her too weak to walk without aid. Most of Bucky's dudes seemed 
to have gone catatonic—but there was a substantial minority that seemed 
to have gone on a general rampage—attacking friend and foe with equal 
enthusiasm. They didn't fight well, but they were enough of a threat to 
occupy my full attention. 

I didn't notice that Pretty had picked up my forgotten Carbine ‘till we
were back to our vehicle. 

“I know how you'd hate to lose a Gun,” she told me. 

“What's with the orange flames? And what was that blanket of darkness
that Bucky used? Is there a way to defeat it?” I asked her desperately. 


“I'll explain it to you later. Right now I need to rest,” she said—just
prior to passing out. 

Chapter Eighteen 

We made it back to our stronghold without incident. We traveled as fast
as possible—even to the point of exceeding the speed limit. Bucky's 
troops would have taken longer to mobilize. It would have been 
difficult for them to catch up to us, without being very conspicuous. 
Knowing that, I doubt that they even sent out pursuit. 

Nonetheless, we couldn't assume that, so we split up and each group was
on full alert all the way home. When we got back, we all crashed and 
caught up on some well—needed rest. Fourteen hours later, we called a 
strategy session. 

As I have said—Kindred ability to organize only goes up to a certain
limited number of individuals. I seemed to have been appointed leader 
of our sub-clan, with Lemuel, Laura, Modok, Cletus and Earl as my 
Lieutenants. 

That's how we'd plotted the attack on Bucky's stronghold. We'd planned
the assault on a single point of the fence and one of the five 
entrances. We hadn't even had quite enough people to handle that, so 
several autonomous squads had joined us. We'd simply told them what we 
intended to do and what we intended—Through necessity—to leave undone. 

We formed the cutting edge. They made their own plans as to how they'd
back us up and provide a rear guard. We'd shared what we intended to do 
with the other sub-clans and they had planned their own assault on 
other points in the fence and other entrances. It would have driven a 
human military leader to distraction but it worked tolerably well for 
the Kindred. 

“He's not going to quit. We need to organize an attack as soon as
possible, while we have an advantage. Nothing less than total victory 
will do,” I said. 

“I'm not sure that we can kill your brother. He is even more powerful
than I am,” Pretty interjected. 

“I thought you told me you were twenty years old, back when we first
met,” I Said. 

“I first told you that it didn't matter. When you asked again, I said
that I had twenty summers. That wasn't a lie. I did have twenty 
Summers—and many more beside. I didn't lie when I told you that I was a 
virgin.” 

“And having me teach you?” 

“That was in earnest. Though I've lived long, I'd never studied
Mathematics, Electronics, Programming or much of anything technical 
until you showed me how easy it all was.” 

“What exactly are you?” I asked. 

“I don't know exactly. My mother died giving birth to me. She couldn't
summon the orange flame; but my grandmother could. What little I could 
gather from the few other slaves from our area, my mother and I were a 
race apart and the last of our kind. They thought we were divine. 
Perhaps that is why the true God punished us—for presumption.” 

“Whatever scanty information my mother may have possessed, died with
her. I first summoned the orange flame—quite unconsciously, at the age 
of sixteen. When I was twenty, it had grown strong and reliable enough 
that I could rely on it. I escaped, and excepting the time your brother 
has held me captive, I've been free ever since.” 

“What's the deal with the aura of darkness Bucky seems to project?” I
continued. 

“He seems to draw all the light out of an area. I've never seen anything
like it,” Pretty said. 

“Our memories are long. Some of the Kindred have over twice Pretty's
summers. We have books going back thousands of years and chants and 
stories over twice that far. We have encountered Pretty's ancestors 
more than once. We've met many non-human species. We've never seen 
anything like it anywhere,” Lemuel added gravely. 

“Why did it affect Laura so much more strongly than the rest of us?” I
asked. 

“In some way, Bucky's eyelessness facilitates him drawing energy—if
that's the correct term—from some very powerful and almost certainly 
evil source. Anyone eyeless would be much more susceptible. I wasn't 
even on the podium and it hit me hard—and I have one eye”, Lemuel said. 


They all gave me a funny look—all except Laura, who didn't look at all. 

“My brother has no eyes. It not my fault!” I said. 

Maybe I protested a bit too loud. I had often wondered. 

Maybe I'd been the half of the egg that wanted to separate. Maybe I'd
kicked Bucky in his eye buds somewhere early on and caused him to 
develop abnormally. I can't prove that it's not my fault that my 
brother had no eyes. I thought that perhaps they were reasoning along 
those lines too. 

“Of course you aren't to blame—like I'm not responsible for Laura,”'
Lemuel stated. 

“What's that violet colored flame Bucky was using?” I asked. 

“That was a product of technology,” Pretty said. “If Bucky truly could
command a violet flame, it would be hopeless.” 

“Why so?” I asked. 

“Think of your spectrum: ROY G BIV- Red; Orange; Yellow; Green; Blue;
Indigo; Violet. Violet would be the most powerful emanation by far—but 
it wasn't an emanation—just a purple machine-made pain ray,” Pretty 
explained. 

“Well then, I can only think of one more question then. Why do Bucky's
followers call him ‘The One True Light', when he broadcasts darkness? I 
mean my brother has no eyes. They don't call him ‘The Argus-Eyed'?” 

“I met an Argus-Eyed onetime,” Pretty said. 

“So have I,” Lemuel added. 

“Argus was a single individual, not a race; and he's supposed to have
died long ago,” I protested. 

“Only in the Greek's Mythology and they had the facts crossed a number
of times in the old legends,” Lemuel said. 

“Tell me about it!” Pretty agreed wholeheartedly. 

“There was quite a bit of speculation in Transcendentalist circles back
during the nineteenth century—way back before Lasers were even a 
theory—that a light so bright that it instantly burned out the retina, 
would be perceived as darkness,” Modok said. 

“Damn Modok, you really wearing the Kindred library out,” I said. 

“Are you implying that I couldn't have studied Transcendental Philosophy
back when I was a drug addict, and a dope dealer?” Modok asked. 

He sounded genuinely aggrieved. 

“Gosh no, Modok. I'm sure lot's of Crack dealers study New England
Transcendentalism,” I apologized. 

“Damn straight! Anyway, maybe a complete numbing of all moral sense is
perceived by the carnal being as liberation and enlightenment,” Modok 
said. 

“Modok done been deep,” I said dryly. “Look, can we get nuclear
capability in a reasonable amount of time? I think the risk that Bucky 
poses to all mankind is great enough to make any collateral casualties 
acceptable. If the Kindred can't stop him, then mankind can't. If we go 
down, he'll rule the world for centuries. I doubt that mankind would 
ever fully recover.” 

Just then a messenger came running into the room. 

“The Tuatha De'Dannon are here. They say they have an urgent need to
speak to Light-Breaker,” he stammered. 

“Come along everyone,” I said. 

“They didn't summon us. They summoned you,” Lemuel objected. 

“You're hankerin' to see them ain't you? Anyway, y'all have as much
reason to call them kin as I do. Pretty represents a people in her own 
right; and I believe that since Modok shed his blood in my service, 
that he's legally as much my brother by Kindred law, as Bucky is. 
Besides that, I am in charge here. I won't have my authority questioned 
by a bunch of Haints from Southern Indiana,” I said. 

“Aren't you from Southern Indiana?” 

“I'm not a Haint,” I retorted. 

There was six of the Tuatha De' Dannon. They were tall; exceedingly
fair; and they all had long straight flaming red hair. Their eyes 
seemed almost hypnotic. 

“You are planning a Nuclear Strike against the eyeless one, “ one of
them began, without preamble or the formality of introducing himself. 

“No, we're not psychic” another answered. “We extrapolate from what our
own tactics would be, were we in your position.” 

“However, we have knowledge and perspective that you lack. All the elder
races have united and they bid you stop. You must find another way.” 

“Tell all the elder races to bug off. I will stand alone against them.
I'll defeat them all, one at a time or all at once. Matters not to me,” 
I said, feeling the great wisdom that comes with blind rage. 

“You might very well be capable of that. However, even success would
bring defeat, in the end. The last of the Tuatha De'Dannon, the 
Kindred, and the Hellspawn—even allied with all mankind and 
supplemented with your mechanical soldiers—wouldn't be able to stand 
against The Bitch. 

It isn't even really a matter of power. She's practically immortal—Even
by our standards. She's very devious. Over the long haul, she'd wear 
you down. Many humans are susceptible to her voice—Particularly in 
these degenerate days. You can't afford to destroy the other elders 
that way.” 

“Who is this ‘Bitch' you speak of?” 

“Have you not heard of Gaea—The Great Earth Mother? She exists as an
emergent consciousness—from a combination of all living things—with the 
exception of the self-aware: the elder races, some of mankind and Dogs. 
A few of the other fairly advanced mammals are partly—Or in individual 
cases—Completely free of her influence.” 

He paused, and another who hadn't spoke yet, picked up the narrative
thread. 

“She is for instinct and against logic. She favors the hive—The
Collective—over the individual. She is the ultimate meta-hive, the hive 
created from other hives and swarms of hives,” he was Chanting his 
words now. 

“She is the great collective. She has always struggled to keep
intelligence from arising or failing that—to keep it stunted, 
perverted, and in her service. She means mankind no kindness.” 

“Wait a second. You're trying to snow me. There is one source for the
evil in the world. It isn't Gaea. It's Satan, the Devil, Lucifer, 
Beelzebub, Old Scratch. He has many names but he is one. He's 
masculine, as are all his henchmen. You can't fool me. There is no 
Gaea.” 

“Oh but there is. We didn't know that you were aware of the fallen one.
Let us say that Gaea is a not quite sentient tool of Satan—far larger, 
with far more number-crunching power than your Luftwaffe, but very 
similar in concept.” 

“So what are we to do then?” I asked. 

“The elder races have called an All-Thing. You and you brother will
attend. You'll settle your differences in hand-to-hand combat, before 
the assemblage. I only hope that you can prevail—Though I see little 
hope of that. Your brother is tapped straight into Gaea. If he manages 
to summon the Darkness, you will be lost.” 

“I don't think so,” I said all singy-songy. 

One good chanted Rap deserves another. 

“He tried his Darkness on me and Pretty, Laura, even Modok. We not only
survived—although it was a close thing—but I could earnestly argue that 
we'd won.” 

“How could any of you have survived in the face of such pure demonic
evil?” The first speaker marveled. 

“Wait a second, did you say that the Darkness is Demonic?” I asked. 

“The roots of Gaea reach straight down into hell.” 

“Well then, there's your answer,” I said. “I am a Christian. A Christian
can't be possessed by a Demon. He has the Holy Ghost inside of him. The 
Holy Ghost is all-powerful. It's laughable to think of him being 
displaced by a demon.” 

“Although a Christian can be oppressed and thwarted by demonic forces at
times; he can never be possessed by them.” 

The Tuatha De'Dannon were all flabbergasted. 

“We didn't know that it was possible for Kindred to become Christians.” 

“Oh it's quite possible. Most of them are. Isn't it possible for you?” 

“We aren't human. We don't stand in quite the same relationship to the
creator as y'all...Actually, I don't know. This raises a number of 
questions....” 

“The eyeless female is a Christian?” asked one who'd yet to speak. 

“Saved; Sanctified; and Baptized in the Holy Ghost- with the evidence of
speaking in other tongues” Laura Stated in with satisfaction. “ Member 
of The Church of God in Christ.” 

“I'm an Elder in The Church of God in Christ” Lemuel stated. 

“I just got saved a few weeks ago. I've been Saved; and Sanctified; and
baptized in water; but I'm still waiting for the Baptism of The Holy 
Ghost” Modok Chimed in. 

“Isn't the Church of God in Christ a black church?” one of the Tuatha
De'Dannon asked. 

“Historically it has been a black church. Even today, for historical
reasons, most of the members are black but we prefer to say that we're 
a Multi-Cultural Church, since everyone is welcome. Actually, most of 
our churches around here are about fifty-fifty, fifty percent 
human—fifty percent Kindred,” Lemuel explained. 

“You may have a chance against your brother then, Here, take this,” one
elder said, while handing me a sword. 

“This is a Cold Steel ‘Hand-and-a-Half-Sword' ,“ I said in puzzlement.
“They cost about three hundred fifty bucks.” 

The elder shrugged. 

“It's as good as anything we could make. It does have some custom Runes.
We've retempered it and rewrapped the handle. Hope you groove on the 
ivory and the semi-precious stones.” 

He then handed Lemuel a set of coordinates. 

“Be here a few days before Mid-Summer, The duel is on Mid-Summer's day.
We'll talk more then. Bring all your people. There will be a general 
truce.” 

With that the Tuatha De'Dannon rose and walked out—leaving me with a
hell of a lot to ponder. 

“By the way, where's the rendezvous,” Modok asked. 

“Somewhere in The Brooks Range” Lemuel told him distractedly, as he
studied the paper. 

Chapter Nineteen 

We arrived at the All-Thing a couple of days ahead of time, just as the
Tuatha De'Dannon had suggested. It had all the trappings of a medieval 
freak show. 

Well, I guess in this context, I'd better be more specific. It looked
like I'd imagine that a medieval freak show would have looked. I'm not 
old enough to remember first hand—though some of the oldest of the 
Kindred might. A couple of the Tuatha De'Dannan claim to have set eyes 
on Solomon's first temple-though sometime after Solomon had passed 
away. 

Modok and I walked around. We saw some big hairy nasty dudes—maybe nine
foot tall, stinky and oily. They all had a single blood-shot, 
fist-sized eye in the center of their foreheads. 

“Lemuel was right,” I told Modok. “They do seem an unsavory lot.” 

Apparently they also had ears like fruit bat's. One of them gave me the
finger and cursed at me in Spanish. 

“Chinga tu' madre!” I hollered at him, while returning his bird. 

“Yo momma!” Modok contributed. 

Somewhat beyond the Cyclops's encampment we ran into some short little
men. They were no more that five-foot tall—at most; some were two or 
three inches shorter—but they had chests and arms as thick as my own 
and their shoulders were wider and their arms longer. Their legs were 
short, but very thick. They come running up to greet us. 

“You're the Light-Breaker, aren't you? My name is ‘Ivan'. I'm from
Siberia. Just want to let you know that all us Dwarfs are on your side. 
Do you want a beer, or some Vodka?” 

All the while, he was vigorously pumping my hand. The Dwarfs were a
rowdy and talkative bunch. I thought that if I lived, it would be well 
worth my while to visit them sometime. At present though, we just 
wanted to extricate ourselves without alienating any allies. We needn't 
have worried. They're blunt-spoken people and you can't hurt their 
feelings. 

Then we passed some dudes that looked for all the world like some
Woodland Indian extras from a Daniel Boone movie. I'd have to query 
Lemuel about them. We also passed some oriental looking Centaurs. They 
wore Samurai armor and carried oversized Katanas and Wakazashi. One of 
them cantered up to me; and gave me a deep Martial Arts bow—keeping his 
eyes on me the whole while. 

“We support your cause,” He said. “However, we have sold some of our
Sword-master's best work to the eyeless one. We wanted you to hear this 
from us. A warrior wouldn't want to win a duel because his opponent had 
inferior equipment. That would not be the way of Bushido.” 

“Man, wish you'd have consulted with me beforehand. Hell, I'll take a
win over Bucky any which way I can. I wish that you would have given 
him a sword with a glass blade,” I said. 

The Centaur Samurai laughed uproariously. I guess he thought that I was
joking. 

I'd just gotten to my tent, when a wee diminutive humanoid, about a foot
tall came flying up. That's right, he had a pair of transparent 
gossamer wings coming out of his shoulder blades. 

“I have something for you,” He panted. 

It seemed to take him a great deal of effort to fly—but hey.....I can't
fly at all. Far be it from me, to criticize. 

I extended my hand cautiously. He placed Jenkins's cosh in the palm of
my hand. I hadn't seen it since before the gunfight in the Michigan 
Forest. 

“It may bring you luck. If you lose something in the woods, odds are the
Faery Folk can find it for you.” 

“Ain't y'all from Ireland?” I asked. 

“Originally yes, most of us emigrated to The Sovereign Nation of Indiana
shortly after the potato famine—lots of us in Kentucky too.” 

“Just when I think things can't get any weirder,” Modok said. “I'm glad
I'm from St. Louis.” 

“And who do you think”, I asked him,” Was behind building the St Louis
Arch?” 

I was just messing with Modok. So far as I know, the Great Arch was
purely a human endeavor—though I think a few Kindred were on the 
construction crew. 

Soon enough it was Mid-Summer's Day—time to kill Bucky. A Samurai
Centaur showed up with a live cobra. He gutted it with his bare 
hands—without killing it first. He popped the still-beating heart and 
the cobra's gall bladder into a shot glass full of grain alcohol. 

“Drink,” He said. “There is power there.” 

I wasn't keen on drinking bile, but I respected the spirit in which it
was offered. Then the wee folk showed up with some kind of ginseng, 
Mushroom and honey concoction. Then one of the elder Kindred wanted me 
to drink a big shot of Scotch with a crow's eye in it. Finally, Modok 
wanted me to drink a cup of coffee, with a generous amount of crystal 
meth stirred into it. 

Just about everyone had his own favorite pre-event sports drink to give
me a wee-bit extra. Personally, I thought the massive doses of Anabolic 
Steroids that I'd been taking for the last ten weeks, were a bigger 
edge than all the pre-event elixirs put together. 

Win if you Can. Die if you Must. Always, Always Cheat. 

Earth and Sky Last Forever. Old People Are Poorly Off. Do Not Be Afraid.


It is Always A Good Day To Die. 

What is the Way of The Warrior? Simply This: Whenever a Choice Between
Life And Death Exists; 

A Warrior Chooses Death... 

My father had taught me that poem long ago. I rehearsed it to myself a
number of times—Like a mantra—as I approached the improvised Arena. 

In a short while, I would either avenge my parents or die trying—or
perhaps I would die while avenging them. Either way, a chapter of my 
life was closing. I paused momentarily, before entering the ring. I 
strained to catch every last bit of the moment's elusive qualia. 

I had my Cold Steel Hand-and-a-Half Sword firmly clutched in my strong
left hand. I'd been doing all sorts of gripping exercises almost 
compulsively, all my life. To a Warrior, the human body is, above all 
else, a pistol firing platform—and a strong grip is a good start 
towards a stable firing platform. 

I'd also made a practice of doing wrist, bicep, and shoulder work with a
sawed off sledgehammer, more or less continuously, while concentrating 
on something else. Because the left was my blade hand, and to counter a 
natural right-handedness, the sledge had always spent about 
three-fifths of the time in my left hand. 

Bucky stood in the circle with a mammoth Katana in each hand. The blades
were about four foot long and as wide as my palm. Musashi said that one 
needn't lose merely because the enemy had a longer blade. He also said 
that it was false to die with a weapon still undrawn. 

I'm not so sure about that. I only had two hands—and I had several
blades. I also had a .38 Chief's Special and a Walther PP .32ACP—the 
Guns were only in case it became apparent that I couldn't win “fairly”. 


I didn't know what the penalty for “cheating” would be. In all
probability, if I shot Bucky, I'd never leave the All-Thing alive but 
then again, neither would Bucky. 

I did draw my main back-up blade. I seldom look at a Bowie without
thinking that it could stand to be a WEE bit longer. I bought a lot of 
my custom leather from Kid Coteau. He also made custom knives. It was a 
bit outside his normal envelope, but I'd talked him into making me a 
full-bellied Western styled Bowie with a fourteen-inch blade. 

When I'd found that I was going to have to fight Bucky with Cold Steel;
I'd managed to get Kid to make me a nineteen-inch short-sword version 
of the Bowie and I'd sent a big enough bonus, to make it a seven-alarm 
rush-order. That was the blade that I drew with my Gun hand. 

Although we were supposedly identical twins, Bucky had grown to be much
bigger than me. I'm a little over six foot—one of the few men who can 
legitimately carry three hundred pounds without being obese. In fact, 
muscle and bone being much denser than fat, no one would believe that I 
weighed over two-thirty, or so. Bucky made me look small. He was both 
noticeably taller and heavier. He waved his giant Katanas around like 
wands. 

The way of the Katana is a sweeping slash. Sometimes it's aimed at the
head, arms, or legs—but the abdomen is the prime target. The way of the 
Broadsword is the lunge, the thrust. 

The Way of The Warrior is: Attack! Attack! Always Attack! The Way of
Strategy is to Win. 

I was more than a bit poogly about Bucky's much greater reach but it
would have been false not to carry the fight to him. I lunged as soon 
as Bucky was in range. 

Time to dance Bucky. 

A duel between two skilled Saber fighters is generally a long-range
sniping match. Each fighter aims primarily at his opponent's sword hand 
and forearm, because they're generally the only things within reach. 
Once you damage the client's forearm badly enough that he drops his 
sword, finishing him off is academic. 

Bucky was standing square to me, so his chest was within my range but I
was standing in profile, so my sword hand came into his range first. He 
tapped my sword just far enough to one side to make it miss, and then 
he aimed an attack at my left wrist. 

We went through a half-dozen feints, attacks, and counters. Every time
our swords touched, Bucky's Katanas rang in a cheerful but 
business-like CHING! 

Bucky kept circling to my left—trying to get around behind my sword arm.
I tried for awhile to stay in a linear western dueling stance; but 
finally I was forced to turn my right side more toward Bucky to keep 
him from getting around to my left. With my right side more exposed, I 
found need to bring the Bowie Sword into play, to parry attacks to my 
right side. 

I finally managed to plow a respectable furrow deep into Bucky's right
forearm but an instant later he knocked my Broadsword from my left 
hand. It was a trick. He came in for a killing stroke, leaving himself 
wide open. I pitched my Bowie Sword underhanded. 

It hit him just below and slightly to the right of his zyphoid process
at the bottom of his sternum. Five or six inches of the blade protruded 
through his back, just beneath the bottom of his right shoulder blade. 
It had been a masterful dance but he'd lost. 

That would be cold comfort, if he managed to take me with him with his
explosive counterattack. I had a pair of Cold Steel Butterfly Swords. I 
drew them with a flourish. They had fifteen-inch blades; and sword 
trapping upturned back guards. 

I retreated and went on the defensive. Bucky couldn't keep up this pace
long, with a sword through his vitals. I think he'd forgotten all about 
my broadsword. I managed to work my way over to it. 

A quick throw left Bucky with a Butterfly Sword stuck into his high left
pectoral. The dive forward roll that I followed up the throw with got 
my Hand-and-a-Half Sword back for me—though in my right hand this time. 
A couple hammering attacks caused him to drop the Katana from the 
weakened left arm. 

I maneuvered in close. I attempted to pin Bucky's right foot to the
ground with my left hand butterfly. Left-handed knife throwing isn't my 
strong suit. It didn't stick in Bucky's foot, but it did penetrate 
Bucky's boot deeply enough to draw blood. 

The foot wasn't my main objective anyway. I just wanted to free my left
hand to seize the handle of my Bowie Sword and yank it out of Bucky's 
chest. He'd bleed out faster without the sword partially sealing the 
wound. I also managed to twist it around enough to widen the wound 
channel. 

I took the Broadsword and contemptuously slapped the Butterfly sword
from Bucky's left shoulder. My follow-up stroke cut him to the bone 
along his brow line- if he'd had eyebrows or a brow line. 

I stepped back. Baring outrageous provocation, I was ready to go into a
prolonged strategic retreat and let nature take its course with Bucky. 
It shouldn't take him long to bleed out. 

Bucky started broadcasting his darkness again. It was weaker this time.
It really didn't seem to have much effect except to darken the noonday 
sun somewhat. 

Then I heard a strange noise. It was only one noise but I have to
compare it to two noises to describe it adequately. You know how, when 
one of the jackasses drives by with the mega-loud stereo—only he's far 
enough away that all you hear is the bass? 

Imagine that sound being so loud that it causes the ground to shake. Now
you know how the Hip-Hop spin-doctors manually move a record back and 
forth to make it stutter? Well, this noise kept repeating itself like 
the start of some Rap albums. But it got progressively louder. 

Bucky went down on all fours, like a drunk getting ready to puke. I
thought he was starting to bleed out. I gathered up my Butterfly Swords 
and got my Bowie and Hand-and-a-Half Swords back into the “proper” 
hands. Then I retreated a few steps and watched Bucky warily. 

His arms and legs shrunk while his body grew thicker and longer. His
head grew until it was longer than a horses face and wider too. His 
neck lengthened. His auxiliary brains- where his eyes should have been- 
became softball-sized spheres on the end of long slender antennae. They 
moved in odd rhythms—like a slug's eyestalks. As the booming noise 
stuttered, Bucky would move three steps forward in his metamorphosis 
then two or three steps back. 

There were just enough more three-steps-forward, than three-steps-back,
that the metamorphosis proceeded ominously, but glacially—nowhere near 
glacial enough to be reassuring though. 

I sheathed my Bowie Sword and advanced upon Bucky. 

Slugs seriously weird me out and only the residual brotherly love that I
felt for him could have impelled me forward. I took Jenkins' cosh and 
slapped one of Bucky's eye stalks a powerful blow but only to get his 
attention. 

Some of the orange flame that Pretty had been teaching me to use (and
that I'd been holding in reserve, and not needed) flowed across the 
cosh and all across Bucky's head. 

Bucky's head reverted to its normal configuration momentarily—looking
uncanny as hell, on the end of the long thin neck. 

“Bucky, you damned fool, I know that you THINK that you sold your soul
to whatever in hell haint that you have on your speed dial. Think 
again. The Bible says that all souls belong to the Lord. You can't 
transfer ownership of something that you don't own. Scratch is the 
Prince of Liars.” 

Suddenly I felt very tired and weary. I paused long enough to draw a
couple sobbing breaths before continuing. 

“You're dying. It's too late to remedy that. Do you want to go meet
Jesus and Mother and Father again? Or do you want to spend all eternity 
backstroking through the Lake of Fire? Time is past short. Make up your 
mind, NOW!” 

“Pray with me,” Bucky's eyeless head gasped. 

Something told me that I should put my hand on Bucky's head. As I've
said, Slugs seriously weird me out. Bucky's body was staring to look 
more like a giant slug all the time. I'd have rather have ran my right 
hand though a meat grinder; but I gritted my teeth and disobeyed my 
instinct. 

Bucky didn't have time to be long-winded. 

“Lord, I was wrong about so many things. Jesus, save me!” was all he had
time to say. 

Immediately the life went out of his eyes. His head instantly reverted.
The leprous slug flesh tried to engulf my hand. Some sort of 
transparent force field prevented it momentarily; then some force 
outside myself knocked me thirty-five yards away. 

“Meddling fool! You cost me this soul; but this flesh is mine; and the
flesh of his followers. And you can't close the portal he opened for 
me,” a shrill voice hissed from the slug. 

“Can't never did anything” I said—Hoping the very triteness of it would
make it even more infuriating. “Why if there were no stronger threats 
than you in the World, I wouldn't need toilet paper. I'd just grab one 
of y'all's punk arses up and wipe.” 

Darkness started flowing out of Gaea—Darkness that put Bucky's Darkness
to shame. At high noon, on the longest day of the year, in the land of 
the midnight sun—There was naught but darkness. I pursed my lips, in 
contempt for the power of my client's resistance. 

I Threw bolt after bolt of orange flame at Gaea. I was no more than
holding my own, but the hue of my pyrotechnics started to darken. I was 
throwing green thunderbolts at Gaea—then blue green-blue—indigo. Slowly 
the flames were progressing toward violet. 

When I got to violet, Gaea started to shy away from the blasts. I
thought that I had the battle won. I hastened to press my advantage. I 
walked toward the abomination. 

“This is Herman Goering, calling in an all-out AIR STRIKE!” I said. I
had neither the Goering Duster, nor the transmitter- didn't matter. My 
mind reached through time and space, to summon the tiny planes. 

Some of my new planes had phosphorous, and magnesium, thermite and
napalm loads—Powerful weapons against Darkness. Two of the 
planes—somewhat larger than the run of the mill—swooped down to put a 
long barreled .44 Magnum in each of my waiting hands. I quickly draped 
the bandoleer full of .44 Speed Loaders—which a third plane handed off 
to me—over one shoulder. 

I could throw the violet flame with my mind. Might as well fire some
Keith loads into Gaea with my hands. 

Pretty started hitting Gaea with her orange thunderbolts. Modok's
Confederate Air Cavalry joined in the attack. Every elder race joined 
the fray, with whatever powers and weapons they possessed. 

Still, we couldn't quite drive Gaea from this plane. Then I realized
what was missing. I said a short prayer. Many of the assembled had been 
amazed at the power of the violet flame. The violent flame was nothing 
compared to the power of the white-hot flame that flowed down my arms, 
trough my hands, and into Gaea. 

The difference was that the violet flame was my power. It was a part of
me. The white-hot flame was not my own. It only worked through me. 
Given the right circumstances and faith, it could have flowed through 
anyone—even Modok—or my Friend Jenkins, had he still been with us. 

In less time than it takes to tell, there was nothing left of Gaea—or
the mortal remains of what had once been my brother Bucky. 

“She's not dead you know. She'll never be dead while there are heretics
who want to worship this Earth instead of God the Father and Creator,” 
one of the Tuatha De'Dannan told me softly. 

He put his hand upon my shoulder. 

“It is almost time for us to part—for now. We'll meet again—many
times—In the near and the Far Distant future. We have many things to 
share with you. 

The Kindred and the Tuatha De'Dannan are one people now. You and your
cousins are the best of both races. Still, it is almost time for us to 
go home and rest for awhile.” 

He paused for so long that I though he had finished. 

“But before we take our leave, we need to share one last revelation—one
last Blessing, along with a Fearsome Curse, but it is not quite time.” 

“Go ahead and celebrate. Enjoy getting to know some of the elder races.
Catch up on your rest. But before you leave this place, we need to make 
one more revelation to you. Only when you become aware, will healing be 
truly possible.” 

“I'm sorry, could you be a little more vague and enigmatic?” I said. 

He smiled and shook his head. 

“It would be cruel to cast any shadow over your victory celebration.
It's nothing you can't deal with”, He said. 

Then he was gone. 

I've come to believe that he was wrong about that Last. 

Chapter Twenty 

It was three days after the duel. The Tuatha De'Dannan had summoned
several of the Kindred—In short, all the Kindred that carried their 
blood—Including me. They'd also specifically requested that Pretty and 
Modok be there too. I was making my way to the meeting in some haste, 
when I was hailed by a big hairy humanoid. 

“Hail Light-Breaker,” He said. 

“Howdy.” 

us that that no one tried to solicit our aid.” 

“Sorry, what can I say? It was a tense time.” 

“It also pains us that the Kindred have stayed out of touch for so
long.” 

“Two years ago, I didn't know the Kindred existed. Eighteen months ago,
I became a sub-clan leader. Two weeks ago, I was elected war chief of 
the Kindred by unanimous acclaim. Y'all done been estranged for over a 
thousand years. Cain't lay that rap on me.” 

“No, but you can preside over the reconciliation.” 

“Cool dude, get in touch with me. Don't mean to be rude; but I've got a
prior appointment.” 

“You're on the way to talk to the ancient ones, aren't you? How can you
bear it? Those dudes weird me out.” 

Yes, a remarkable statement to come from what—to all intents and
purposes—was a talking Yeti. I mumbled an ambiguous reply and hurried 
on. 

“I never introduced myself. My name is ‘Brian' ,“ the chief spokesman of
the Tuatha De'Dannon began. “We're all going to get much better 
acquainted as time goes on.” 

He paused to let that sink in. 

“The eyeless gene was something we unintentionally inflicted on
ourselves eons ago. We thought we'd long since eradicated the root of 
the evil. Like many evils, it was merely biding its time. When we 
decided to graft our branches onto the Kindred, we inadvertently passed 
the blight on to your people. We're sorry. It was unintentional.” 

“What is the deal, with the cross-pollination? What is the point?” I
asked. 

“You see the last of us before you. Is there a woman among us? We are
very long-lived, even by Kindred standards, yet we lose fertility and 
die out. We've been dying since before the recorded history of mankind. 


Long, long ago, we created the Hellspawn to carry our traditions after
we were gone. They had a brief day but although they lacked much of our 
power and wisdom, they shared our infertility from their very 
beginning.” 

“Am I sterile then?” Pretty asked. 

“No. It is a good thing. You throw the last of your created genes into
the mix, for the new Tuatha De'Dannan” 

“Pretty's race is artificially created?” I asked. 

“Yes.” 

After a long pause, he added, “We called you here today, because we hold
it within our power to cancel the eyeless gene. It is our liability and 
our wrong to right.” 

The tent was filled with a blue healing light. The bone sloughed away
from Lemuel's missing right eye. He dug at the cavity with his right 
fist and within a few moments he had a right eye. 

Laura grew eyes. Apparently they were a bit weak at first because as she
looked at Modok, her new eyes filled with tears. 

I had about three-dozen cousins who shared the Tuatha De'Dannon
heritage. Eight of them were missing eyes—Some like Lemuel-had one good 
eye. Some had none. All of us carried the eyeless gene, manifest or 
not. 

When it was over, all my cousins had two good eyes—and the blight had
been burned from our DNA. I could feel the healing in the air. 

Brian shifted his gaze to Modok. 

“Modok, is it truly your desire to dwell among the Kindred?” 

“Yes.” 

“You have the strength and determination but why do things the hard way?
It will be easier if you truly are Kindred.” 

And what they did to Modok passed my understanding, but somehow they
rewove every strand of his DNA—right there on the spot—right in front 
of God, and everyone. Modok stood altered, a hybrid Kindred/Tuatha 
De'Dannan—just like the rest of us. 

“You'll find all your adopted Kindred similarly transformed,” Brian
said. “And all of your kin will start to take on some of our power, 
wisdom and longevity—some more than others but all will have a 
worthwhile transformation. Before the end, all of you will have the 
full measure of our power.” 

“There's one more thing that we have to correct. We can't heal you,
Light-Breaker until you see your deficiency.” 

His words chilled and frightened me like nothing else that I'd ever
experienced. 

“NO!” I wailed piteously. There was only darkness there—the darkness
that had claimed my brother. My brother has no eyes. 

“My brother has no eyes!” I screamed defiantly. 

Suddenly the mood had changed—the whole ambience. I'd been grooving on
sunshine and hope and feeling in the midst of a bright fairy-tale. 

Then all at once, everything had turned Grim and Gothic and Noir. I had
the drowning, sinking feeling that I'd stumbled into an Eldritch 
nightmare—The only slender hope that I had to keep from losing my 
sanity forever—from being cast into a bottomless abyss of darkness and 
madness and nightmare- was to wake up. But there could be no awakening 
from this shrieking night horror. It was the one and only reality. 

“My brother has no eyes! My brother has no eyes, but I can see!” 

“No one disputes that you can see. You see very well indeed,” Brian
stated. 

“My brother has no eyes. He was claimed by the darkness.” 

“You resisted that call, didn't you? And in the end, you even freed your
brother.” 

“God freed him.” 

“But you forgave him. That took courage—and goodness.” 

“Why would no one have told me?” 

“You project the Image that you hold of yourself. They see you with
eyes, even as you see yourself with eyes.” 

“Then my brother has no eyes- AND NEITHER DO I!?!” 

I fell to my knees and cradled my ugly misshapen head in my arms. 

“Damn you all to hell Brian! You've destroyed me! Now all that's left is
death,” I said weakly. 

There was only one thing left to do. I knelt on the floor. I started to
partially remove my jacket and to kneel on the sleeves. My Bowie was 
sharp enough for Seppuku. I drew the Bowie back with both hands and 
prepared to thrust it into my abdomen. I was no better than my 
brother—an eyeless, evil mutant that should be hunted down and 
exterminated without the slightest hint of mercy or forbearance. 

Then my skull rolled down off my eye sockets; and eyes emerged. 

“Damn you to Hell Brian! Changing what I am can't alter what I was.” 

“Maybe you're right—though it seems at odds with your Christian doctrine
of forgiveness. Yet, maybe it's your geas to live on even when you'd 
very much prefer to blot out your shame in death. Maybe you haven't yet 
suffered enough for what you were. The Kindred have need of your 
leadership.” 

So maybe Brian was right. It has been a very long time since we last
spoke—though I have every confidence we'll meet again. Brian said we 
would and his word is golden. 

Pretty waits in vain, for me to take her to wife. I am evil and deserve
no wife. 

My touch could defile one of God's own angels. Modok tries to be a
friend but I deserve no friend. The Luftwaffe waits in vain, for me to 
don the cloak and call an airstrike. 

Pretty raises Bloodhounds. Sometimes they try to lick my hands and be my
buddies-but although they pull at my heartstrings I ignore them. It 
would defile them to be my Dog. 

I strive to lead my people, and cut out anything and everything that
might bring me pleasure. I deserve no pleasure. I have even given up 
the greatest satisfaction known to man—I no longer carry a Gun. 

Sometimes I think that my geas is more than I can bear. A human
lifetime, I could tolerate. A Kindred lifetime I could stand, but I am 
Tuatha De'Dannan. 

My brother has no eyes, neither do I. How I wish that I'd stayed in the
Mental Hospital. That would have been better than this. 


Tweet