Music – Page 10 – A Piece, of the Sky

Dan stood by the window of Hod’s study, watching the storm outside. The fire cracked and popped in the hearth. Hod sat on a huge, scarlet armchair, patterned with subtle, yellow flowers, in his magenta smoking jacket, – with the black, velvet trim – the paragon of fine sensibility and sophistication.

“I wouldn’t have taken you for such a dandy,” Dan remarked, still looking out the window, holding his familiar snifter of whiskey.

Hod also had a snifter on the table, at his side. In his delicate fingers, he held a cigar, Honduran tobacco. As he took a drag, the butt burned crimson. “Do you know why you’re here?” he said.

“I haven’t the slightest idea,” Dan answered, finally turning around. He was in a black blazer, no tie, no socks, burnt sienna loafers. A Persian rug lay between them.

“Do you know why serial killers act the way they do?” Hod asked, taking a sip of whiskey.

Dan came closer, into the light of the flames. He could see a bleached skull and a golden Solar System ellipse on Hod’s desk, “Again, I haven’t the foggiest clue.”

He chewed slightly on the end of his cigar, even though he wasn’t supposed to do that, “The first step, is that serial killers – or unsubs, as we call them – won’t, or can’t, communicate with the entity that’s really bothering them.”

“Like their mothers or ‘the system,’ right?” Dan guessed.

Hod nodded, “Their own lives are chaotic, confused, frustrating. They won’t, or can’t, establish control, in what we consider to be ‘normal’ life.”

“For whatever reason, they don’t feel like they’re getting their due,” Dan added again.

A degree from Yale, lay behind glass, glittering in the darkness beyond, near the bookcase, “People break up; people get rejected. These are things that happen to everyone – but to the unsub, they are stressors. Why?”

Dan put out a hand and leaned on the mantelpiece, “The problem lies in the way the unsub thinks…”

“Yes,” Hod answered, looking at Dan directly for the first time, “Rob Ressler thought so, too.”

“You know,” Hod said, getting up and topping off his whiskey, “unsubs crave power and control; they just wall it off into one area of their lives. This process of reasserting power and control, though, eliminates the one witness to their great exhibit of dominance – the victim.”

“The nature of their crime thus becomes serial!” Dan realized, slapping his hand on the mantel.

“Correct,” Hod said, as he turned back around. Where his head had been, when he was seated in the chair, was a photo on Hod’s desk, of himself, Sebastian and a sandy-haired teenager.

“Your son?” Dan indicated the direction, with a slight movement of his head.

“Yes!” Hod raised his heavy eyebrows and looked behind him, picking up the frame, “Jon’s visiting his aunt this weekend.” He smiled for the first time that evening.

Dan looked wistful, “It’s a hard job, isn’t it?”

“Indeed,” Hod replied, solemn, setting the picture back down.

“Why did Cai bring me into this?” Dan wondered aloud.

Hod laughed, “That lothario with the curls, wearing coats redolent of Lord Dracula’s cape? The anti-avatars we’ll be hunting, are like the unsubs I mentioned, if not worse…”

The blood in Dan’s veins dried up. “Really?” he rasped.

“Of course,” Hod spread his arms wide, glass in one hand, cigar in another, “You didn’t think the spirit world was some sort of heaven, did you?”

Rain beat a staccato on the windowpane. Dan set his snifter down on the mantel and looked at his shoes on the 18th century rug. “He really pulled the rug out from under me, eh?” Dan said, glancing up, with a painful, rueful grin.

“The earth is shaky beneath everyone’s feet,” Hod intoned, as he reclined in the armchair once more.

Music

“In the Light” – Led Zeppelin

“Hold my Hand” – UNKLE

“Sweet Child O’ Mine” – Guns N’ Roses

“Diamonds are Forever” – Shirley Bassey

Alli was sitting at the house in the field, burnt out, twisted out, more than thirty years ago. The moon floated overhead; the flowers tossed in the evening’s gusts. A little lantern sat on the porch between them. Page, the Thunder Avatar, sat in the adjacent rocking chair.

She was dressed like a young professional. Her tall, lanky frame was graced by a slate pants suit and an obsidian blouse. Her raven hair flowed like silk and caught the deep blue of the sky, the spinning, sparkling stars – like a kindly, modern Morgan le Fay. Clear water had nothing on her almost translucent blue eyes, bright and burning in the dark.

“Aro didn’t tell me you would be this humble, this small,” Page began.

“Well, I am very short,” Alli admitted, embarrassed.

“So, you went to Dartmouth,” Page said, leaning forward, peering at her in the darkness.

“Well, you did go to Yale,” Alli answered, heat rising in her cheeks, a substitute for a blush.

“Yes, I went to college around the same time as you,” Page said in a soft voice, turning her drink on the armrest of the chair.

“Your mother served as the Lightning Avatar, the diplomatic head of the Atevars. What was that like?” Alli wondered, in awe.

Alli heard her smile, “It wasn’t that immense, really. I thought about going to the State Department, in this world, but I just became a lawyer.”

“This is the first time anyone in my family has even heard of Atev, much less became any of the Three Avatars,” Alli confessed, spreading her hands wide – a placating gesture.

“Oh, don’t worry,” Page murmured, reaching across the divide – the gap between their wooden chairs – her hair falling into her face, her right hand sporting a gold Yale ring, “You’re not going to be out of your depth. And I am sure your parents knew about how permeable this world is with Atev.”

Alli sighed, with Page’s hand resting on hers, breathing in the Thunder Avatar’s perfume – a heady feeling. The woman was a snowy pale, accentuated by her bright, red lipstick. Alli, by contrast, was folded into a warm, comfortable, pearl fisherman’s sweater.

She glanced up and knew Page was looking into her eyes, in the night. She squeezed Alli’s hand, “I know it sounds trite, but whatever comes our way, we’ll face it together.”

Wind rustled through the grasses and crickets chirped in the underbrush. The odd firefly winked in and out, working its way back to the main road. The two held hands, staring out into the void.