Chapter 14: When a Lion Sees Red

“When a lion roars in the darkness it is always wise to turn the other direction.”

Excerpt from the diaries of Panpar

∞

Whitney couldn’t hear or see a thing when she woke up. Her time in the grey was over, and it was back to being blind and deaf. Her lack of sight and sound didn’t prevent her from knowing something was very out of whack, however. She could feel the vibrations in the air from Tommy’s raging fit. The ground shook from what he was doing, and there was no doubt who was doing it. She was aware of him, of his anger, of his blind rage, she could feel it coursing through her body, extending from him like a burning fuse raging toward a stick of dynamite, ready to blow the moment the fuse reached the red tube filled with powder.

She was aware of other things too. She was aware of the shadows surrounding both her and Tommy. She was aware of the vibrating walls of her prison cell, she could feel every nuance of every vibration as Tommy thundered his mental fingers against the walls of his cell, causing them to crash outward, sending those vibrations outward like ripples in water. She was also aware of the insecurity Tommy’s outrage was causing within the shadows surrounding them.

Most of all she was aware there was a shadow close that shouldn’t be there at all and it was getting closer. That shadow felt familiar. Whomever that shadow belonged to was someone she knew very well, but knew from the other side of the veils.

There were two other shadows she did remember and they had no business being there. Her aunt and uncle were close and someone needed to be very convincing if they wanted to keep the lights burning within their eyes.

Whitney slipped into Tommy’s mind and he threw her back out like a grumpy housewife throwing out her lazy husband. She didn’t even know he could do that. He had never done it before, but there it was. He shut her out of his mind, unable to make the connection she had always been able to make.

Whitney could feel the skin her bracelet provided covering every inch of her skin, including her face. She imagined it retracting, going back to the outfit she wore at the mall, and she got up from her bed. She began to find her way to the nearest wall. With no idea where she was, never seen before through any pair of eyes, so she was, in effect, completely blind, and utterly deaf.

The first thing she came to was a table. It was the kind of table surgeons use in an operating room. What is this thing doing in here? She thought. Her hands fumbled along the top of the table and her fingers began to run across terrifying things, sharp things, things with motors, and things used to cut metal. Was she almost the subject of an operation she hadn’t come to get?

Someone had a lot of explaining to do, and Panpar’s warning or not, she just might let Tommy have his way.

She began to make her way toward the wall, her mind swarming with Tommy’s rage, as if it were leaking into her. Her fingers finally touched against glass and she began searching for what could be a doorway. A few of the shadows outside of the room began to back away. She started hammering her fists against the glass. “Let me out of here!” she yelled. “If any of you want to live more than ten more minutes let me out, so I can calm him down!”

She had no idea whether or not anyone could hear a word she was saying or not. She had no working ears relaying information to her. All she could do was hope, because once Tommy got out of that room all hope would be crushed.

∞

“No, you’re right. You’d definitely need blue skin to work at Wal-Mart,” John replied.

They headed in the opposite direction from the way they came, and Jim had no idea how much further they had to go, but already he could begin to hear the sound of someone banging on metal. “How much further,” he asked.

“The elevator’s right there,” Margraves said as he pointed ahead.

“So how do you change your eyes from silver, to brown like that?” Jim quizzed.

At first, she didn’t answer. She just walked along side of him as if he hadn’t asked anything.

“This isn’t good,” she said instead of answering him. “Argimos rejected her quint’a mak’et.”

“Quinta what?” Jim asked.

“This is how we hear and see. Quinta means to join. Mak’et means two minds. The joining of two minds. It is also what you saw when my eyes changed from their natural color to hers,” she said nodding to the woman who was standing behind her. “They’ve found me my own personal guide dog,” she finished with a smile.

“Ha, ha, very funny, Jo,” the woman said from behind them.

“Wait, you mean you are seeing and hearing everything through her?” Jim said as they got to the elevator. The director began to hammer the down button in time with the Leighton boy’s hammering from below.

“Are you sure you’ll be able to calm him down?” the director asked Jo-Karna, his eyes beginning to show his stress as he rubbed his knuckles. They all waited for the doors to open.

“No. I’m not. Have you ever seen a lion, a bear, a dragon, and a dog fighting over a meal? That is what we are up against, and the worst part is all of these animals are one being and that being has the added advantage of being able to move mountains with his mind. If we die, our deaths will be worthy of the ribbon,” she finished with a smile.

“That’s what I like about you, Jo,” John said. “You are always so upbeat. How about we figure out a way not to die today, eh?”

“You fear death, Mi ... John? You don’t seem like a coward. The Prim never fear death unless it is dying without a sword in our hands, which reminds me. You are still going to keep your promise, right. My condition for helping you was a sword. A good one.”

The door to the elevator opened and they all quickly stepped in. “I don’t know why you want a sword, Jo. Wouldn’t you be happier with a gun?” John asked. “Like mine. I showed you my gun. You didn’t like that?”

“Your gun is way too small for my hands, John. It is much better suited for you than it is me.” Jo-Karna got quiet again and then shook her head no. “Your people are stupid. Jo-Laina is trying to get them to let her out, but they just ignore her. Do they not realize they will all die when he breaks out of his prison?”

“Can you read her mind or something?” Jim asked her.

“Not exactly, no. Nevertheless, I can feel everything that is happening down there. I can feel her beating against the walls of her prison. I can feel the vibrations of her voice as she hollers out to them and I can feel the vibrations of their idiotic mumbling replies. They have no clue what to do. They are like chickens that have lost their heads to a farmer.”

“You can feel all of that?”

She nodded, pulled a tuft of her brown hair from around her ear. “With these,” she said as she caressed one of the three appendages that stuck up from the top ridge of her ear. “They are like radar in a sense. I like this word radar. We don’t have this word on Bolimar, but that is what it is like.”

The door to the elevator opened again and they all poured out of it. The small box of the elevator opened up into the hangar and as soon as it did, Jim could see why they called it the hangar.

The room itself was huge. They were below ground and the term “hangar” confused him, because that reference made it seem as if they were going to a place that stored planes. There were no planes within the large open room, but it was big enough for planes. The only things inside of the hangar were the two boxes their “prisoners” were in. These boxes were brought specifically for their guests. The only other things inside of the hangar were tables set up with computers on them, wires running everywhere, some to each of the boxes and some trailing off toward the far wall. Jim could plainly see Whitney as she continued to bang on the door separating her from everyone else, and he could hear her begging, but not one of the soldiers stationed around those boxes made a move to let her out, and neither did either of the two lab geeks staring at her.

They were, as Jo-Karna suggested, ignoring her.

Tommy pounded furiously and the sounds of his punches sounded more like battering rams than fists. The black metal had fist shapes protruding outward and more were appearing as he continued his barrage. “Let!” bang, “ME,” bang, “OUTTA,” BANG, BANG, “HERE!” BANG!

“Let her out,” Jo-Karna commanded as she began to head to the glass box containing Whitney.

Two of the soldiers stationed in front of Whitney’s door raised their guns toward the tall grey-skinned woman that headed for them.

“Fire those weapons and I’ll make you eat them. After I yank out your teeth first,” Jo-Karna spat. The soldiers didn’t back down, but they didn’t fire either.

“Lower your weapons and open the door,” Margraves commanded.

“But?”

“Are you questioning orders?” Margraves asked.

“Yeah, I am,” one of the soldiers replied. “No way are we letting these freaks outta their ca...”

Jo-Karna moved with an impossible speed. One second she was ten feet away from the soldier. The next, her fist had connected with his jaw and the soldier was tumbling backward. She snatched at the small metal linked chain around his neck as he flailed his arms for balance. She tore the chain from around his neck, and the next thing they all knew she was sliding his card through the reader next to the door handle.

“The only freaks in this room are the ones carrying guns,” she commented as the door clicked and she pulled it open.

∞

Whitney saw many shadows over her lifetime. She grew up with shadows. When she was young, they scared her, as she grew older they comforted her. Every one of them becoming a lantern, letting her know she was not alone, but surrounded by others, even if divided from most of them. Those shadows represented the living forces of people and those living forces were the very soul of the planet they were all living on. Those shadows were the souls of the world but they belonged to more than just the people they resided in. They belonged, as a whole, to the collective of souls, every one of them just as important as the other, every one of them, mattered.

But, the one who let her out of her cage was very different. While the rest of the shadows around her were a dark grey, barely contrasting against the black backdrop that was her world, this one was much lighter. She knew, from the very moment it flashed across her dark vision it could, in an instant, become blacker than the color of her world was, it could become darkness itself. If it needed to. The owner of that shadow would always do whatever needed doing, without regard to her own safety, because the owner of that shadow knew, just as Whitney knew, keeping the shadows glowing was what really counted.

When that shadow opened the door to let Whitney out, Whitney didn’t hesitate. The closer that shadow was to her, the closer she felt to it, as if her shadow wanted to join with the other and she let it.

Whitney reached out to the owner of that shadow, reaching out partly with her arms, but also with her mind, the way she normally only did with Tommy, but once with Kat. Now there was another person she could piggyback with, but only when they were touching, skin to skin.

Jo-Laina, a voice called out in her mind.

“He kicked me out,” Whitney said. “I don’t know what to do, but he’s freaking out! He’s going crazy in there.”

“Calm,” Jo-Karna commanded. “You must find yourself.”

Jo-Karna took Whitney by the hand and began to lead her toward Tommy’s shadow. She could see his shadow, drawing his fists back, thrusting them into the door, and not holding back.

“Call out to him, Jo-Laina,” calm him down.

Whitney nodded her head. “Tommy! It’s all right. If you calm down we can let you out!”

“LET ME OUT NOW, WHITNEY! LET ME OUT SO I CAN TEACH THESE MOTHER...” BANG, BANG, BANG!

“Language, Tommy!”

It probably wasn’t the right thing to say to him at that moment, and she immediately regretted her habitual response. Tommy went ballistic and began to pound even harder at the door. He pounded so hard the huge metal hinges began to quake.

“I swear I’m gonna kill every person out there, Whitney. So you better stand back!”

What do I do? Whitney thought to Jo-Karna.

Quint’a shock’to, Jo-Karna thought back, and Whitney’s mind supplied the translation.

To join two minds into one.

But he won’t let us, Whitney thought to her.

“He will not have a choice,” Jo-Karna replied. “You are Baran-Dak-Toi, blood from the grey, and he will submit to your commands.”