Encompassing Love (24 page)

CHAPTER 39

“Just when I thought I knew him, after a few thousand years, he changed again.”  -- from the book of Sara

As Renfield walked through the door he had an odd sense.  He didn’t see them in the living room.  He made for the kitchen and then the family room.  No sign of them.

“Sara!”  He yelled out.

“Renfield!”  He hears her yell back and notes the tone that something is amiss.

Renfield heard the urgency in her voice and began running while clicking in the direction of it.  In the bedroom, he saw Sara staring into the closet.  “What’s going on?”

“Illumna has started clicking and she thinks it’s funny.  Talk to her, Adam!”  Sara stands and turns around to face him.  “You’ve a guilty look on your face and it’s not about this.  So out with it.”

“I came by to tell you that Illumna has a sister.”  Renfield looked into the closet and saw Illumna wave at him.  He smiled but understood why her mother was annoyed.  He kneeled down and said, “Hey fart, don’t annoy your Mom.”

“I am annoyed!  What is this about her sister.  That’s not new news.  Which you are you?  I am assuming you know that because you look older.  And dusty, by the way.”  Sara asked.

“Yeah, there’s that.  Way ahead of now, linear.  I’m talking about another sister.”  Renfield explained.

“Good, Renfield.  So you came by to brag about your conquests.  I have other issues if you didn’t notice.”  Sara points back to the closet and then notices Illumna is no longer in it.  “See!”  As she begins to storm out of the room on the hunt for Illumna Renfield grabs her arm and she looks at him with razors for eyes. “Adam!”

“Sara, here’s the thing…”  Renfield lets loose her arm, clicks, reappears with Illumna in tow, giggling.  Then he continues his sentence as if nothing happened.  “This gets confusing…”

“Like you turning out to be married to my mother?  That level of confusing?”  Sara takes Illumna from his arm and heads to the kitchen.

Renfield follows, “She’s about to click ag…never mind.”  He clicks and then reappears in front of the refrigerator little Illumna was standing next to.  Again, with Illumna in tow, giggling.  He looks down at Illumna, “Not funny, Daddy has to make nice with the mean Mommy.”  Illumna’s eyes go wide and she gestures to be let down.  Renfield lets her down and she runs off to grab a toy.

Sara looks at him and then says, “You’re good with her.  Maybe you should be around more.”  She throws up her hands and then says, “No, wait, you’re too busy with married life and running around being ‘Mr. Baby Maker’ for everyone.”  She grabs the bottle of milk and an apple and start to the counter.

“Listen, I…”

“How about this.  You get her to eat this apple”, she says while slicing it thinly, “and I will listen to how you took another woman by storm and got her pregnant, Adam.”

“Actually Illumna prefers bananas.  Solstice likes apples.  Joy is kind of keen on peaches.  You like grapes.”  Renfield clicks again and is back with a handful of freshly picked grapes and a bunch of bananas.

“Don’t woo me after your telling me about another woman Adam.”  Sara peels the banana, slices it into a small bowl and then walks into the room where Illumna is playing and hands it to her.  Then she returns to the kitchen, picks a grape off the vine piece Renfield brought her and says, with while chewing, “You’re acting weird. Was she hot?”

“You happened to me?  You.  As for is she hot, even when you don’t even look like you, kinda sorta.  So yeah, I’d say so, Sara.  I’m trying to tell you, it’s you.”

The grape goes flying through the air as Sara spits it out in shock.  “I don’t know what you’re getting at, but there is no way we can have another child!  It’s crazy enough when Solstice comes over.  I can’t keep up with both of them, let alone another.”

Renfield starts to chuckle at the irony.

“What?  I’m serious.  Do you know Solstice asks the oddest questions and then Illumna chimes in with the oddest answers.  I can’t deal with two of them let alone three!  How can I be pregnant, Ren?  You’ve been out and about.”

“Yeah, that’s where it gets confusing.  But I you can deal with more than one child able to click.  You’ve done it twice.  Not linear, but you do it more than very well.  Both times as a teacher.”  Renfield states.

Sara looks at him and says, “You’re being serious about this, aren’t you?”

Renfield grabs at his goatee, “Yeah.  Kind of completely, sort of.”  Then he leans in to her.

“Adam, we need to talk.  Not now I have to deal with Illumna.”  Sara pushes at his chest.

Renfield reaches for her arm, “We’ll be back in approximately a second.  I don’t have her accuracy, but Illumna won’t do anything stupid in a few seconds.  It’s not like her.”  Then he clicks and the sound of the waterfall is deafening.  He points to a break in the trees and gestures for her to move there.

Sara begins to walk in the direction he is gesturing to and notes how quickly the tress, as she passes them, lower the decibels of the waterfall.  Then she sees the rays of the sun piercing through the area he points to and the lushness of the greenery around her.  She smiles but then frowns and says, “We just left her all alone there?”

“Yeah, funny thing about time is that when we get back she won’t know we were ever gone so she’ll be on her best behavior.”  Adam grins at Sara.

“She’s never on her best behavior” Then she rethinks that statement and adds, “Never mind, except for when you are around and as far as she knows, you are around.  I get it.  Ok, explain.”  Sara capitulates.  “And just so you know I like the silver in your hair.  It makes you look distinguished, even though I know you are a brute.”

Renfield grins again and waits, silent.

Sara looks at him completely annoyed and unable to grasp the point of all of this.

A few moments later Sara says, “I don’t think we’re alone.  I think they are watching us.”

“Well then, let’s take center stage!”  Renfield replies.

Sara begins to say something but inebriated by his kiss, she instead pulls at his body harder.

Suddenly they hear a loud growl and Sara tenses.  Renfield doesn’t stop.

“What was that?”  She asks.

“Nothing of concern.  I’m sure they’ll deal with it.”  Renfield responds.

Sara relaxes back into being with Renfield, but then she hears the unmistakable sound of a gunshot.  “What’s going on?”

“I think it’s dealt with.  You’ll probably hear that a third time, I’m guessing it will be towards the ground.”  Renfield pulls at her hair and twists her body.

Sara moans forgetting what she is hearing and then as the third blast happens she grabs at Renfield’s face.  “Are you trying to get me pregnant?”

“Nope, that is a long story.  I can stop and explain it to you.”

“Not now!”

As their intensity towards each other increases Sara can hear parts of his mind open to her and she begins screaming, “I understand, I understand.  Oh my, keep going, I understand!”  Then they both disappear in a flash of light and a concussive boom rings out through the jungle.

A few feet away a different version of Tomorrow looks at a different version of Adam, “What was that?”

Adam assumes she is referring to the gun and then he sees her click to his side and grab it.

CHAPTER 40

“What I saw was not real.  What I felt was not me.  What I did I would not do.”  -- from the Book of model KRY-1-CT-A1

“So these synths.  You’re thinking that this Venetia was one of them?”  Persistence asked Tomorrow.

“Well, most were.” Tomorrow considers her wording and corrects herself, “Are.  I don’t know when we are Persistence.  I am kind of new to my former memories.  Sometimes I wonder if I have been, all along.”

“No, Sara.  You raised Brian and I.  We didn’t always like it, but you did your best with us.  It couldn’t have been easy knowing how different we were.”

“Thank you, but consider that those memories are installed.  So that sounds like I am a synth.  I was made in the factory.  I was born after the martyr, but I was conceived before that.”  Tomorrow began to wonder at her own life.

“Time is confusing, Sara.  I don’t fully understand what you and Renfield did to merge with your pervious memories, or lives, or however I should say it.”  Persistence held out her hand to Sara.

“We lived another life, we had an epiphany.  Every memory was as one.”  Tomorrow stood quickly.  Adam and Bob also merged memories.  What if?”

“No, I know Adam and Bob.  I think something happened to Bob after that moment.  My guess is he tried something and Stephen caught on and used it against him.  I don’t think he was a synth when he went there.  If he was afterwards, it’s because Stephen figured something out and the plan failed.  Bob and Adam did not get along well, but neither would have endangered their own.”  Believe me.  Brian and I spent far more time in nothing with Bob than even you can claim in lifetimes.”

Sara looked at Persistence remembering the years she was around to perceive the time flow while the two of them grew old enough to understand more than she was giving Persistence credit for.  “It’s odd, I distinctly remember being Sara, but I know I am Tomorrow.”

“Yeah, sounds weird to me too, but you raised me and your personality is not too different, after all of these years.  Or whatever you would call the time from me being small to you thinking I’m pregnant.”  Persistence then said, “It’s not my first child, obviously, so yes, I know the signs.  Thank you for reeling me in.”

“No problem, you’re not the first pair of brats I’ve raised.  Wait, no.  You were the first, but I didn’t know that at the time.”  Sara chuckles.

“You’re worried about both of them, aren’t you.  You don’t just love Adam.  You are his other half.”  Persistence stops talking and then begins again.  “Joy is your…”  She stops again.

“We lost a lot.  Joy is…”  Tomorrow begins to cry.  Persistence puts her arms around the woman who raised her.  At that moment they both reappear and they see Joy.

Tomorrow gasps at the horror of the device she is connected to and the tubes running in and out of her.  Persistence clicks to Joy, Tomorrow clicks to a mind she hears.  “Planning is over.”  Sara says to Renfield and Conan.  “Move now!”  She clicks again, finds Venetia in bed with someone she knows.  Venetia looks confused, but not enough not to move as Tomorrow leaps towards the bed with a deep vengeance in her eyes.  Tomorrow reaches to the neck of the man Venetia was with and pulls hard.  Her hand suddenly feels empty.

“Well, I didn’t expect that.”  The man is standing behind her smiling at her.  Then Tomorrow watches as Conan appears and draws his attention.  She watches as the man smiles then clicks behind Conan and pushes his spine into his heart.  She sees Conan begin to drop while the man smiles at the body, but then she notes another figure and turns her head to the presence she knows.  He grabs her and they reappear in their first camp.”

“What were you thinking?”  Adam yells at her.

Tomorrow begins to cry.  “I taught that young man.  He helped us!  I taught him!  He helped, Joy?”  She was in shock and Renfield knew it.

He turned to pick Joy up off the floor.  She hazily looked up at her father.  He clicked.  He yelled to Persistence, “Do something!”

Her face goes pale, “My husband is dead or you wouldn’t have to go back.”  Persistence looks at Joy and walks to the water supply to rehydrate her.

Renfield pauses.  “Conan was a hero.  Not that it helps, but you should at least know that.”

“He was good to me.  I was happy.  You got him killed.”  Persistence continues what she is doing as if the facts of her current loss are just benign.

Renfield realizes Persistence is also on shock.  He cannot think of anything to say, but it reminds him to grab his own wife so he clicks and then reappears.  Then he sees Persistence with her wrist in Joy’s mouth.  Persistence looks at Renfield and says, “She needs nourishment.  I don’t need anything anymore.”  Persistence  is conscious but clearly fading from the blood loss.

Adam grabs Persistence and clicks.

“Sir, we’re going to need her name and your name.  Please fill out these forms.  We have her on an I.V.  Do you want to tell us what happened?”

“Huh?  No, I’ll leave that to someone else to explain.” No longer caring who saw what, he clicks.  Renfield feels the breeze of nothing and everything although there is no wind.  He looks upwards from his perspective, knowing there really is no particular up or down here.  He yells out.  “Lucy!  I’m home!”  No one hears him.  He thinks about Tomorrow.  Then the cacophony begins.

“Hello, Adam.”

“Fuck you, Bob”

Brian cuts in, “He knew.  He’s been here longer than any of us.  He and you merged, so you knew!”

Persistence thinks in, “No.  He didn’t know.  It was after.”

Brian responds, “Which one of them didn’t know, Persistence?  What are you getting at?”

“Calm down, Brian.  He’s the only one of us still alive in almost every timeline.”, Persistence remarks.

Brian says, “That’s why I trust him the least.”

“Yeah?  It’s why I trust him the most.  Plus there is still Joy and there is still Tomorrow.  Bob has been here the longest.  I think grandfather is right.  He knows something we didn’t learn.”

Brian thinks to Renfield_2, “You only know possibilities or you would not have made mistakes.”

Bob responds, “True, but more possibilities than you.  I’m not sure about him.  We are here viewing our own futures, he’s lived it.”

“Umm, just saying…I can hear you.  If you were corporeal I would most definitely kill you right now, Bob.”  Adam’s mind explodes with anger at many things.  He realizes Persistence is there because she is in nothing, but he just left her in a hospital because she had slit her own wrist to feed his daughter.  It’s maddening but he knows how this place works less than the other three do.  He gets the concept, it is nothing therefore there is no time, therefore there is no then, now or later.  However, Adam also knows that what happens in the universe changes what they see.  He remembers the before and after, but like them not while they are there.  So he concludes that something changed since they aren’t discussing the current perils.  The problem is, he can’t know when it changed and that riles him.

“I have the good fortune of you exiling me to billions of years of watching.  You have the misfortune of knowing almost everything I had to see.”  Bob thinks to Adam.

“It was an agreement.  Why did you help Stephen when you were supposed to stop him?”  Renfield asks.

“He’s been here.  He’s already heard this conversation as well as others.  Don’t be so naïve, especially since I know you know that.”  Bob responds and all of them feel Brian become suddenly absent.

Persistence hears both of their thoughts and thinks out, “We can’t know what he knows.  None of us has the same experiences.”

“Not true.  You and Brian’s were close enough.  You know where he went.”  Renfield tries to think directly to her, but realizes that won’t work because she has blocked her mind.

Renfield notes Persistence is no longer there and feels Bob’s anger as Bob says, “I’m trying to help!”

“Yeah, too little too late.  Want to see a trick?”  Renfield asks.

Bob says, “Don’t even consider that or you will never meet Tomorrow.”

“First, let me be clear, I hate the name Bob.  Second let me be clear, I don’t like you no matter what I call you.”  Adam explained.

“Yeah, Adam, you’re kind of a jerk yourself.”  Renfeild_2 responds.

Then as the two sides lock into thought against each other at speeds of consideration that are mind boggling even to themselves a spark of something comes to be and they both brace themselves.

“I suppose I’ll be seeing you over the next few billion years.” Renfield comments.

“I suppose this is why you are first, Adam.  I look forward to meeting Tomorrow all over again.”

“Whatever, Bob.  I met her first, then I created you.  I also created Joy.”

Bob thinks out in his last moments.  “You named them.  Solstice, Illumna.  How did you keep this from me?”

“I was first, Bob!”  Renfield relaxes his mind.

Both of them feel the inrush of everything all at once and then they explode into everything as nothing ceases to exist.