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The Ghost of You: Part 2 (Somebody Call a Doctor) - Corey Smith - 09-21-2019 The cerulean lights passed over the contours of Lux's skull, and she ruminated on how difficult she found it to truly sit still. Her entire life has been an unceasing momentum, responding to or heading off threats. It took her years to get over seeing sleep itself as some sort of sinful dereliction of duty. But those innate, almost neurologically ingrained, impulses still bubbled to the surface in quiet moments like this. HELPER, her diminutive robot assistant, closed his mouth, eclipsing the light that had been scanning her features. He hovered silently for a few seconds, processing the data. A ball of anxiety worried her stomach as she awaited his verdict. GOOD NEWS, LUX! YOU HAVE A CLEAN BILL OF HEALTH! HELPER announced proudly, the sensor flaps of his “ears” giving a little waggle. Lux looked down at the floor. The worry had not dissipated. You found nothing? NOTHING! YOUR BRAIN SCAN WAS COMPETELY NORMAL. WELL, SO TO SPEAK. I DIDN'T FIND ANYTHING OUTSIDE THE ORDINARY FOR A PROFESSIONAL WRESTLER WHO INHABITS THE BODY OF A TEENAGE BOY WHO WAS IN A NARCOTICS INDUCED COMA! His chipper tone added a disorienting punctuation mark to the bizarre nature of his declaration. Lux quirked an eyebrow, and if it was possible for HELPER to have looked sheepish she imagined he did now. IT IS ADMITTEDLY A SMALL SAMPLE SIZE. BUT I ASSURE YOU I FOUND NOTHING THAT WOULD ACCOUNT FOR THE SYMPTOMS YOU REPORTED. Lux grunted in reply. I wish that made me feel better. With a sigh, she laid back on the bed, and found herself gazing up at the tacky popcorn textured ceiling of her hotel room. I know what I saw HELPER. This wasn't a hallucination....it was real! It was THERE! BUT YOU SAID THE CAMERA MAN DIDN'T SEE IT? AND IT DID NOT APPEAR ON CAMERA? The robot offered timidly. Lux scowled. Those WERE the facts. I'm not crazy. OH OF COURSE NOT! BUT YOU ARE UNDER A LOT OF- There's more to it. Lux blurted, and immediately cursed herself for doing it. But he had to know. WHAT DO YOU MEAN? Seeing.....that boy.... She grimaced. ….isn't the only strange thing that's been happening to me. Lux propped herself up on her elbows now. There's something wrong with my memories. LIKE...AMNESIA? She shook her head. No....it's....God, it's hard to explain. She stopped for a moment, trying to filter her frustration into words. There are gaps in my memory, kind of like amnesia. But it feels like...like.... She looked at HELPER now, fresh fear written on her features. It feels like everything that's happened to me is changing. Being edited and rewritten. But it's not done yet. It feels like my memories are a puzzle, and some pieces have dropped away. I know that pieces were SUPPOSED to be there, but I cant remember what they were. And that the image that remains is....shifting. The picture keeps morphing and every time I try to focus on it it just gets blurrier. HELPER's ear flaps lower, a behavioral quirk he was programmed with representing concern. LUX, I DON'T KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS. But Lux had a nagging suspicion that she did. Her mentor and friend Orlu often had conversations with Lux late into the night as the time travel project that would ultimately became a desperate 11th hour gambit to stop Aiwass neared fruition. Conversations about the nature of time and theoretical physics. If what one remembered of the future, even as they went back in time to change it, was something immutable for that person. Or, if as the past was altered and thus the future rewritten, if those alterations would be reflected in a person's subjective experience. In short, Lux reasoned, her memories of what is to come could be mutating and adapting due to what she is doing now in 2019. Or what someone else was doing in response to Lux's actions. Lux shivered. If that was true, it was proof she was having an impact. Or SOMETHING was. And that when it came to the future of the human race, everything was still very much in the air. Lux surprised herself with a shuddering intake of air as panic threatened to take hold. It was in moments like this that the sheer enormity of what she was doing threatened to devour her. HELPER seemed to notice something was wrong and drew a bit closer. ARE YOU OK? I'll be fine. It was unconvincing for sure, but HELPER didn't push. However, he did alter the line of questioning, diverting it to a path that was less world altering but no less an emotional minefield. LUX, I GET THE SENSE THIS BOY YOU SAW IS SOMEONE FAMILIAR TO YOU. Lux nodded. He is. Her face went slack. I killed him. 2029 Anatoli Bolgin. Rank of Army General. Supreme Commander of the Russian Ground Forces. Puppet of Aiwass. My next target. I had been housed in the body of a 47 year old Yugoslavian spinster who died of a surprise brain embolism. She was, quite frankly, doughy, out of shape, and hardly an ideal vessel for assassinating a high ranking warlord from a country that was already being torn asunder by borderline psychotic levels of paranoia. Thankfully, looking nondescript had its advantages. I was on a two month timeline to infiltrate Bolgin's house staff and earn the trust of his family members and cadre of bodygaurds well enough to slip a knife into his aorta and hopefully leave without a trace. A tall order to be sure, not to mention needing to learn a near encyclopedic list of cleaning products to play the part of the indispensable housefrau. He had a child, naturally. This wasn't a first for me, but try as I might targets with kids always gave me pause. I also knew from experience that, oddly enough, when you were posing as household staff the child's opinion of you was often make or break. Once before I had almost lost control of a mission off the back of an especially bratty child who insisted I left bleach stains all over her prized blazer. I probably did, but screw her anyway. His name was Pavel. He was a waifish boy of 13, with somewhat hawkish features, unruly jet black hair, and a palette of light freckles that emerged from hiding in the sun. The sun being his natural enemy, it seemed, because in those summer months he was never without a black umbrella to serve as a bulwark against it. Rumors abounded amongst the staff that he had some kind of skin condition. I would later get him to admit that he carried it because he just hated sweating, but mostly because it gave him an air of mystery. Of course, that revelation would come weeks later. Because our first encounter went something like this. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ He was sitting in his father's immaculately curated courtyard, a colorful beach towel splayed out beneath him, black umbrella propped up against the imported Elm tree that towered over him. It was Lux's second day assimilating into Bolgin's staff, and despite a learned reticence Lux knew she had to start making inroads with the man's son. She slowly approached him, doing her best to look demure. She positioned herself so that she was not eclipsing the light filtering onto his book. [Hello there. My name is Jana. I'm the new housekeeper. Your name is Pavel, right?] She paused, but the boy didn't look up. Canting her head a bit to read the cover of his book, she was mildly surprised to see that he was reading Kafka. [Interesting choice for a young man.] Still silence. Lux groused inwardly. [I'm sorry, is my Russian poor?] [Your Russian is fine.] He finally looked at her then. [I just want you to piss off.] Lux set her teeth, eyes narrowing. Her mind raced as her years of training in basic psychology spun through her mind's eye. Pavel's stare never wavered. Lux smiled. And then she snatched the book from his hand. [What the hell?!] Lux held the book aloft just out of his reach. [Perhaps you should be reading a treatise on manners instead?] Lux aimed for an air of smirking indifference, but the hammering in her chest would have suggested otherwise. Pavel glowered, and she noticed with some bemusement how quickly his freckles sprung to the fore when his face flushed. [You're kind of a bitch.] He muttered. But then, a small smile appeared. [I think we'll be alright.] Lux returned his smile, and his book. It was difficult to not whoop openly at the small success, especially considering it was admittedly rare that her read on someone was this spot on. [I'm glad to hear it. Anything I should be aware of before I tackle the young sir's bedroom?] Shutting the book, he bore a cheeky expression as he considered her. [I jerk off in all my tube socks.] Lux grimaced. [All of them?] [Yes.] [Well then what do you wear under your shoes?] He lifted up a leg, dextrously angling it so his toes almost touched his chest. [I don't wear shoes. I am like the American's Huck Finn. But more literate. And with better taste in music.] [What kind of music do you like then, Huck Finn?] He looked up, playfully tapping his chin a few times. [I'm fond of the Arcade Fire.] [They are hipster trash and you should feel bad.] Lux allowed herself a chuckle. With an astonished look that Lux wasn't quite sure was assumed or legitimate, Pavel shook his head. [Who ARE you?!] [I am Jana. And I have decided I should not like to clean up your room full of spermy tube socks.] ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ He was a weird little shit but I liked him instantly. Pavel would never have spoken the words, not early on at least, but I could tell he liked me too. On a superficial level, I suppose it was because I didn't take any of his shit. On a deeper level, I think it was because he could give me shit and not have to fear anything more than a playful rebuke. My presence became a shelter for him, a place he could be himself without pretense or shame. I accepted him unconditionally, and quickly found that what I had supposed about him was true. Like many traumatized teenage boys, his cynicism was a bulwark against the world. I showed him he could drop his shield. He took a gamble and did. And all the while I knew he would come away from the experience feeling he had gambled and lost. And that haunted me. Little did I know at that point how much he truly stood to lose. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ She saw him reflected in the floor length mirror of the parlor first. He stepped into the room with a melodramatic flourish, a tiara on his head inlaid with precious stones. Just then, it struck Lux whose tiara that was. Turning about, she intended to set in on chastising him, but Pavel beat her to the punch. [Ohhhhh...look at me! I am CZARINA DIMA!] Pavel spoke with the effeminate cadence of a high class Russian woman drunk on her own self importance. He was, of course, doing a reasonable impression of his step mother. And the tiara was hers. Lux shuddered to think what manner of countermeasures he had destroyed or circumvented to get at it. [GATHER ROUND PEASANTRY! GATHER ROUND! For today, I bestow upon you the highest honor! Yes you!] He pointed at Lux and she found herself descending into a giggle despite knowing that Dima or Anatoli's sudden presence would bring death to both of them. Pavel hopped up on a chair and spun himself around so his rear was facing outward. [BY THE ROYAL DECREE OF THE CZARINA, YOU ARE PERMITTED TO SUCK THE SHIT STRAIGHT OUT OF MY ASS!] Lux rushed to close the parlor door, but mostly to try and conceal the fact that she was about to collapse into hysterical laughter. She wheeled around on the boy and attempted to scold him, but the laughter broke responsibility's seal. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I knew it was profoundly stupid, letting him in. Letting down my defenses. I was here to destroy his sense of what is normal. I was here to murder his father and anyone else who got in my way. I was here to fill his home with blood. Nevertheless....I persisted. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Something was wrong. Pavel had been secluded in his room for the better part of the day. A rainy day. Nothing soothed Pavel like a rainy day. They had stood together under his umbrella, reaching out beneath it's cover to let the droplets dance over their fingertips in silence. Pavel always smiled when it rained. Lux knocked at his door, but there was no answer. She knocked again. And again, finally getting a response on the third attempt. [Go away!] [It's me!] [Still go away!] Lux brought her arm down, poised between options. She opted to invade his privacy. Pavel was sitting in his bed, and curiously he averted only his face as soon as she entered. He hollered at her using the wall as a surrogate. [What the fuck is your problem?! What if I was jerking off?!] [Well then I would have a lifetime of nightmare fuel.] She approached, and he turned violently away from her. So violently Lux stopped abruptly. [Pavel, what's wrong?] [GET OUT!] [Pavel....] [I DON'T EVEN LIKE YOU! I JUST PRETEND TO SO YOU CAN FEEL LIKE YOU'RE MY MOMMY! YOU HAVE A STUPID, INSIPID MOMMY COMPLEX WHICH I PLAY ALONG WITH AND.....] Lux lunged at him, surprising him. And she gasped. Violence had been written on his face. Anatoli was the author. He had signed his work with the intractable immunity that power brings. This boy would walk about battered and bloody and no one would say a word. [Please don't look at my face....] Pavel's voice was toothless. Weak. And it wasn't until that moment that Lux knew how heartbreaking that was. [Don't look....] She slid down beside him on the bed, and he didn't fight it when she encircled him in her arms. Lux held him well past sundown. Neither of them spoke. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Three days after that I killed Anatoli. Dima was gone that evening, out fucking her masseuse. Anatoli stayed in his room, drinking and mourning the loss of the firmer erections of his youth. I slid a stiletto blade into the base of his spine through the front of his throat. Before he died I spat in the same eye he had blackened on Pavel. It was stupid but I couldn't help myself. In fact, I was full of stupid ideas that night. I would have had 30 minutes to make my escape. That was how often the guards rotated to check in on Anatoli. But more than enough time to make my escape. More than enough time to avoid being captured and endangering our entire mission. And yet...and yet...I found myself making a hard right down the hall to Pavel's room and shaking him awake. He was confused by the torrent of pressured speech I battered him with. I told him he needed to come with me. That I could take him away from this. I could save him. Naturally, he looked at me sympathetically and sleepily but didn't understand. Why didn't I just leave him in his bed? Why didn't I just fucking leave him in his fucking bed?! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Lux leaned against the rugged bark of the tree, chest lit like a furnace. She tried to limit her movement lest her broken ribs grind painfully against each other again. The pain threatened to cripple her senses, but she knew she had to stay alert. Even if only to ensure Pavel's last moments of life were peaceful. His head was in her lap, and if one didn't know any better they would think he was a typical unafflicted child drifting off to sleep. The darkness concealed the truth of the blood clotting his night shirt. Pavel was gut shot, and Lux still wasn't sure if Anatoli's guard had done so accidentally, or because they thought he was a co-conspirator. In the end, it truly didn't matter. A faint smell of urine was also present, and Lux cursed this additional indignity being heaped upon the boy. She cried. She wept stupid worthless tears that wouldn't change anything. Perhaps they were even selfish tears, guilty tears. Because Pavel could be truly asleep in his bed now instead of bleeding out in her arms miles from the nearest town. She caressed his inky curls. He moaned in response, and his eyes opened to slits. [It hurts.] [I know. I'm sorry.] She wiped away a tear. And then, stupidly. [I killed your father.] [I know.] His ensuing breath was a deep rattle. [It's fine. He was an asshole.] A sputter of a laugh escaped Lux's lips. Pavel didn't smile, but he wanted to. Suddenly, his thin body bucked as pain coursed through him. Lux took hold of his shoulders. It seemed like something to do. Like taking a single bucket of water to a raging forest fire. [Tell me what's happening.] Pavel gasped. [I want to understand.] [I....I don't.....] [Explain this.] Her tongue worked idiotically, her brain a waking liability as she tried to make sense of his request. [Um....you....you were shot in the stomach.] He gasped in reply to another wave of fresh agony. [What...what is happening?] [What do you.....?!] [Explain!] Lux sobbed, and then brought a hand to her mouth to squelch it. Taking a deep breath than inflamed her chest, she pressed forward. [Based on the area of the wound, it is highly likely the bullet punctured your stomach.....] [That is...bad.] He wheezed. [You are losing a lot of blood and....and....your stomach is likely leaking....] Lux swallowed. […..leaking stomach acid and bacteria.....but the blood loss is....] She steeled herself. [I can get you to my extraction point in about four hours.] [No you can't.] [I will.] Gritting her teeth, she snaked her arms under Pavel's body and tucked her legs up under her. She bit back a pained cry and lifted him up. Pavel screamed. The broken edges of Lux's ribs pressed together and reseparated. [PLEASE STOP! IT HURTS!] [We have to go. We have to keep moving!] Pavel screamed again, shattering Lux's heart. She put him down again, sinking to her knees and laying him gently in her lap as more blood pumped from his wound. Her own torso hitched in fresh agony. Lux took hold of Pavel's hand, interlacing her fingers in his. [I killed you. I killed you.] The words were muttered like a perverse prayer, her fingers working over the boy's cooling knuckles like rosary beads. [You can't carry me all that way....] The assassin squeezed her eyes shut as an impotent respite from his truth. [I don't blame you. I don't hate you.] The boy's voice shuddered, forgiveness pouring out like a breathless staccato. [Just hold me.] So she did. Until the end of the world. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Are you there, Doctor? It's me, Lux. Our view transitions into an office fit for a psychiatrist, perhaps? It's all oak wood shelving and leather. You can practically smell it through your screen. Lux is laying down on a couch, emulating that most cliché of therapy scenes. But at the head of the couch is an empty chair with a notebook and a pen sitting on the cushion. So what do you make of that? It feels strange, talking about it out loud like that. I've never actually discussed it with anyone. Lux smiles, with a touch of sadness. Which makes it doubly strange that I'm telling YOU, Doctor. You know, some would say that I've just rolled over and bared my belly, handing you one of my worst traumas. The mighty Doctor D'Ville, master of mind games, despite what a certain awkward Kiwi might insist. But yes, doctor, I WANTED you to have this. And I wanted to have it too. Clearly it's something I still have to confront. Lux shifts a bit in the seat, looking straight up at the ceiling. Mostly though, I wanted you to know you can't haunt me. I mean, you COULD. But there's an awfully long line. It's crowded in my head, Doctor. And I know that that's kind of your thing, deep delving into people's psyches. So I thought I should warn you that.... She pauses. …..that nobody haunts me quite like I do. It's funny that you started with that little soliloquy talking about war. I do have a bit of experience there. And I don't disagree that war is, in some ways, an inevitability. It's also sexy. Let's face facts, nothing gets the blood pumping like a good fight. It's universal. Hard wired. A nation becomes a NATION during times of war. It becomes a common topic of conversation. A default, like the weather or “Go local sports team.” You're never alone in war. Soldiers are never alone either, except with them, that feeling lasts long after the fighting's done. The lucky ones keep the company of the living. The brothers and sisters in arms who weathered the storm with them. The unlucky keep the company of ghosts. Take a wild guess which one I am? Hint: when I traveled back in time to 2019, my side was LOSING. So....yeah....long story short....crowded. And they...heh....you know, the shrinks, say that it's healthy to try to let those ghosts go. But try as I might, I cannot conceive of anything more disrespectful. So my dance card stays punched. And all my deceased little lovelies, like Pavel, they stick around. Lux stops suddenly. Are you listening? She shakes her head, looking a little perturbed, but doesn't actually turn about to look at the empty chair. I mean, here I am, trying to make this about US. Trying to build something here with YOU, Doctor. But I guess it just seems like you're absent. Not listening. I'm sure that's not true. A man with your pedigree, I'm willing to give you the benefit of the doubt. At any rate, I'm sure you're not slumming it up with the two biggest fecal streaks in the XWF. I'm sure you're not just shoehorning your presence into another half hour protracted scat joke, something that in recent weeks seems to be making a resurgence. No, you're the Great Doctor D'Ville! I mean, even if you were having some difficulty struggling with your place in the world, struggling to find some new rich experience to relight that pilot and draw you out of yourself, something that'll make you say hallelujah again.... A sharp look at the camera ….surely, SURELY, you would find something better than some lazy glorified pratfall full of tired dick jokes and toilet humor. Surely. Lux suddenly sits up, and sees that the chair is empty. Surely not. She frowns. Maybe I wasn't clear enough when I said I wanted DOCTOR D'VILLE, scourge of the XWF. Not some third wheel comedy shtick. Not some old man shaking his fist at the clouds and bemoaning how Facebook and smartphones are destroying the world. By the by, been there, seen that. It ain't Facebook. She pauses. Maybe Twitter though. I'm not getting the monster vibes here, Louis. And it's more than a tad disappointing. You're bedding down with clowns. With rubbish. When you could TRULY be throwing down with the one who is next in line for a shot at the greatest goddamn championship in the history of this sport. So I'm going to hang my hat on a possibility that is growing more remote by the minute. I'm going to HOPE that this is all a prelude to something more. Because I can't prove that I can slay the Medusa if she just lies down and TAKES IT. Doctor, here and now, you need to make a choice. You need to choose if you're the kind of forerunner who simply hands over the torch, or the kind that keeps right on running and makes the poor schmuck in the dust pray they can catch you. I know which one I WANT you to be. The question is if that's what YOU want to be. Because by all means, you're perfectly free to spoil a big return on hijinks with a thin veneer of pseudo-philosophy to try to keep it up out of the dregs, but I really wish you wouldn't waste my time doing it. Be something worth slaying. Or step aside. Lux gets up off the couch and moves over to an old radio on the desk nearby. Her hand finds the power button, and then she turns the dial ever so slightly, allowing a familiar tune to begin to play. We see Lux round the desk and depart just out of focus, as the shot focuses in on the radio. The following morning. Lux awoke in yet another random hotel room bed, and immediately felt something was amiss. It wasn't the barely familiar surroundings, that had lost it's novelty after her first couple months of being on the road with the XWF. No, it was a weariness of body despite having just awoken. Dimly, Lux remembered that Corey had told her he was going to play cards with Rox and some of the other members of the backstage crew last night. But she had woken up after Corey had had a particularly late night before. This felt different. It felt wrong. Tossing the thin sheet off her, she saw that Corey hadn't bothered to change before bed. His white t-shirt was sweat stained and smelled terribly. Lux also became aware of, for lack of a better term, a dullness in her head. A mitigating influence symptomatic of....what? Swinging her legs onto the beige carpeting of the floor, she rose and started to make her way towards the bathroom. But going vertical hit her like a shotgun blast, and she was forced to brace herself on the nightstand. What the fuck....? She huffed before righting herself and fighting her way into the bathroom. Going to the shower, she flicked the knob for hot and ran her hand under the stream for a moment. She caressed her face with some of the dripping water before going to the mirror and.... ….huh? One of her nostrils was encrusted with blood. Immediately, she prodded the bridge of her nose, but nothing seemed broken. There were no signs of bruising on her face. Corey, what did you....? Lux's heart dropped down into her guts. She pulled a shuddering hand away from her nose, her mouth worked open in a silent “oh” of shock. And then her rage covered the distance between her fist and the mirror. Swift and awful and unthinking. Her knuckles smashed into the glass, over and over, an anguished moan passing between her lips with each blow. The glass shattered, collecting in the sink. Lux's knuckles had already begun to swell, but she ignored it and looked down into the fragments, seeing her face and Corey's refracted endlessly. How could you! She howled at Corey's reflection. HOW COULD YOU?! Corey didn't answer. But somebody else did. I was using that. Lux turned, and saw Pavel standing just behind her brushing his teeth. Flicking the toothbrush from his mouth, he failed to catch a bit of paste as it dribbled down his chin. We need to talk. His hand shoots up, and he taps two fingers gently on her forehead, sending everything straight down into the black.