The Wandering Shadow: Chapter Sixteen
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Darkness. All around him Will saw nothing but darkness. At least at
first. Before long, points of light--in all different colors--began to appear in
the darkness, swirling and flowing as though disturbed by light but persistent
wind. He seemed to be floating among them, and yet he was independent of them.
When they moved he remained still, as though he were at the eye of the storm.
Where was he? What was he seeing? These were the thoughts that plagued him as
he watched the points of light flow around him.
As time went on he noticed that once in a while, a point of light would
go out, only to be replaced by another one, all in but a second's space. Or
were they simply blinking? No. He was sure of it. They were going out.
Sometimes one would be replaced by two, or a red one would be replaced by blue,
and so on. Little hints that when these points went out, they were gone for
good.
Something occurred to him. In all the time he had been here--for seconds
or eons, he couldn't really tell--he had yet to catch sight of any part of his
own body. True the points didn't create much illumination, but he still
should've been able to at least see the outline of his own form, shouldn't he?
He made the effort to look down, but he couldn't seem to move his head.
He tried to move his arms, perhaps to reach up and touch his own torso, but he
quickly realized he couldn't even feel his arms--or for that matter any part of
him!
Yet, he felt no panic. He returned his attention to the dancing points of
light. There was something familiar about them--comforting somehow, like the
presence of a loved one. These points...they reminded him of a simpler time, when
he was a child, and the world seemed so miraculous a place. In a way, he
felt...not happy, but content.
Hmm...but how did I get here? He wondered. He tried to remember...what was it he had
done last? He furrowed his brow--or at least assumed he did, as he couldn't feel
that either--and let himself become lost in thought.
It took what seemed like forever, but the memory finally came to him. I fought the Shadow of Anubis...but...that
doesn't explain where I am, or how I got here.
Again he thought, and this time, the answer came more quickly--or at least
he assumed it did, since he couldn't properly sense the flow of time. I didn't survive that fight. I'm dead,
aren't I?
He hadn't expected a response to his thoughts, certainly not what came
next. A familiar voice, saying something he had heard entirely too often since
he was a child: Would you stop being so
serious?
He tried to look around for the source of the voice, but couldn't move,
let alone see anything but the silently moving star points. It sounded so very
familiar though. After a moment of consternation, the memory came to him. Taylor? Is that you? I really am dead,
aren't I?
He heard an audible groan. Honestly,
would you listen to yourself? Probably can't even hear me, can you? Asleep for
a bloody week, and now you think you're dead. Lovely. I thought hallucination
was supposed to come during the fever, not after. Shows what the hell I know. I
mean really, would it have been so--
The voice kept talking, but Will no longer really heard what it was
saying. Asleep? Fever? Hallucinations? What was going on? Was he really just
unconscious? Maybe then...
Maybe I can wake myself up, he thought. But
do I want to? It so pleasant here. Peaceful. Tranquil, even. Why should I
leave? Why should I wake up?
The voice said something then that Will mostly didn't hear, but one word
did register in his mind: Jenna.
That one word...no, a name! It was important to him. More important than
anything else. He smiled. He could actually feel it this time too. Jenna was
his reason to wake up. Of course she was. How could he forget her?
He groaned. He was starting to feel other things too. His arms and legs.
The blankets covering them. And pain. Entirely too much pain. Then he felt a
warm presence, just a few inches from his face. A puff of warm air brushed
against his cheek.
The points of light began to fade away, all of them, all at once. Then, a
single line of light appeared in the darkness. It grew wider until he was
blinded by it.
His sight began to adjust to the light, and when his vision cleared, he
found himself looking into to very familiar green eyes, farmed by white fur.
They looked at him with both concern and anticipation. In front of the eyes was
a rather long nose--no, a muzzle!--of purest white, that ended in a wet, black
wolf nose.
Will smiled a bit wider, ignoring the pain he was feeling. His eyes
teared up at the corners as he realized what--realized who--he was looking at. "Jenna."
She nuzzled him gently, rubbing her muzzle and eventually the top of her
head against his face. He tried to reach up and place his right hand on her,
but found his arm couldn't move. He edged his head to the side so he could see
past her. His right forearm was set in a cast, and a sling was hugging the arm
to his chest. That's right, he
thought. The Shadow broke my arm.
Shifting his eyes to look just a bit farther, Will could see David,
sitting in a chair that was positioned at the end of the bed that Will and
Jenna currently occupied. He was wearing what appeared to be a pair of Max's
glasses, and had his attention focused on a local newspaper.
Without turning his head he looked over at Will and said, "Glad to see
you're finally awake mate. I was getting rather tired of playing nurse maid."
Will lifted his left arm and gently pushed Jenna off him--much to her
disapproval--and used his unbound left arm to push himself into a sitting
position against the headboard. Ignoring the pain in his torso he took a look
around. They were in the guest room at Max's house.
Will's mind was filled with questions. "David...what happened? What have I
missed?"
David sighed and folded the newspaper, setting it on his lap, taking off
the glasses and setting them atop the paper. "Where to begin? Well, to start,
you succeeded in destroying the Shadow of Anubis. So, you know, congratulations
on that. After that you collapsed. If I had to guess, I would saying firing off
that beam of yours took a lot out of you. You've been unconscious for about a
week."
Will nodded. "You said that before, didn't you? Just a few minutes ago."
"Yeah. Didn't think you were conscious."
"I...I wasn't." Will said. "But I was still aware of...well somethings. You
talking mostly. Wait...you replied to my thoughts though."
David rolled his eyes. "Nah. You were rambling. Something about being
dead, then someone named Taylor."
"Oh." Will replied weakly, not knowing what else to say. A few seconds of
quiet passes before he said, "Well, keep going, What else has happened? How did
we get here?"
"Well, after you wiped out the Shadow, I managed to haul my arse out of
the pile of artifacts and glass the bastard threw me into, and got some help
bringing you both back here. You--we--were all hurt pretty bad. I found a doctor
who was both willing to be discreet, and could use magic. He pulled the glass
out of my back, bound up your arm and ribs, and managed to full heal Jenna's
gashes, including re-growing the fur."
To illustrate this Jenna did a spin, showing ever part of her body. She
was in perfect health--aside from her lupine form.
"After that," David continued, "I spent the past week keeping you alive
while you were asleep. You had a fever too. It only broke yesterday."
"So if this Doctor was so great, why am I in a cast?"
David shrugged. "He couldn't really do anything with your internal
injuries. Not his area of expertise, he said. They have to heal on their own,
apparently. So, you know, you're stuck with a broken arm and some fractured
ribs for a while."
Will nodded. That explained the pain in his chest. Moving carefully, he
used his left hand to lift his shirt. His ribcage was wrapped in bandages, and
when he gently prodded a rib about halfway up his right side, he hissed with
pain. "Wonderful. Well, at least we're alive."
"Yeah. We are."
Will and Jenna both noticed the edge to David's voice, and Will frowned
as he remembered. "David, I'm sorry about Max."
David shook his head. "I've already mourned. Let's not dwell on it too
much, yeah? The city held a memorial service for everyone who died, and Max's
body is on its way to Arles to be buried. Hell, he may already be buried."
"He wanted to be buried there?"
David nodded. "His will was pretty specific about it. He was to be buried
in Arles, and everything he owned was left to me."
Will blinked a few times, not quite registering that at first. "He...left
everything to you?"
"Yeah. I guess...I guess he didn't have anyone else. This house. The one in
Arles. Everything inside both. All mine now. I think I'd rather not have them,
truth be told." I'd rather have my
brother back, he lamented silently.
Will let a moment of silence pass, and then he asked the question that
was weighing most heavily upon him. "David...what happened to the guard? The one
the Shadow was possessing?"
David sighed. "He died. He didn't survive the destruction of the Shadow.
Or rather, he didn't survive the way you destroyed the Shadow. He er...wound up
with a hole in the middle of his chest."
Will could thing of no response that would suit what he was feeling. He
had never taken an innocent life before. He wasn't even quite sure how to
process it. He had known, beyond any doubt, that when he destroyed the Shadow,
it would also be the death of its host...but at the same time is seemed too
surreal.
Then a single image broke through the haze of his mind. A single memory.
In the moment before he had lost consciousness, he had seen the guard's body
falling. He had seen the gaping, smoking hole in the man's chest, the wound
having been almost instantly cauterized by the heat and energy of Will's blast.
Just that split second mental image was enough to make him feel sick.
Physically sick.
Will was taken by the urge to vomit. He slammed his left hand up against
his mouth, clenching his eyes shut. He tried his best to steady his breathing,
but even his best effort wasn't enough. A moment later he leaned over the edge
of the bed, dry heaving. There was nothing in his stomach to purge, which made
the experience painful enough on its own, but as a small amount of bile dripped
past his lips he was racked with pain emanating from his fractured ribs.
He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and--shaking horribly--managed
to push himself back into a sitting a position. He was breathing heavily, and
he couldn't help but notice that both Jenna and David looked at him with
concern. Jenna edged close to him and nuzzled him gently. You're not alone love, she thought. I'm here. It'll be alright.
Though he had no way of knowing exactly what she was thinking, he
recognized her intent, and responded with a one armed hug, gripping her
tightly. A moment later he pulled away, and let out a shuddering sigh.
David eyed him, showing an odd amount of concern. "What's all that about
then?"
"I...I remember. The guard's body. Falling. It was--" Will shook his head
and clenched his teeth, fighting the urge to start retching again.
David licked his lips, almost nervously. "Guess we both came away from
that thing pretty screwed up, eh?"
Will lifted his head, a questioning look in his eyes. He got the feeling
that the illusionist wasn't just referring to losing Max.
David laughed, a hollow, emotionless sound. "Don't you remember? I
touched the Shadow's mind. Or...minds. I still here their voices sometimes, at
the back of my mind, when I'm at my most relaxed. Makes trying to fall asleep a
bitch. Haven't been able to get decent sleep without pills for the past week."
"This is different David," Will said with a shake of his head. "I...I
killed someone. Not even just that. I sacrificed him. I decided that his life
wasn't worth saving...if it meant the Shadow's continued existence. I'm a god
damned murderer."
"Didn't you tell me once that you've killed before?"
"No." Will answered. "You asked me if I had, and I didn't reply."
"Same thing as a yes though, wasn't it?"
"Yes. Before this though...I only ever took lives when I had no choice."
David raised a brow. "You didn't have a choice this time either, did you?"
"I...I don't know." Will admitted. "At the time--and even now--it seemed like
the only option. But...I just don't know."
Jenna sat back from Will, her face showing as much concern and sympathy
as it was capable of doing. She didn't know what else to do. A thousand
comforting words raced through her mind, but she couldn't give voice to even
one. She didn't have any ideas, and was rather surprised by what David said
next.
"Will...you can't let it consume you. We all...we all have things in our past
that we regret." Jenna could swear she saw David's eyes tearing, if only just
at the corners, but then she though it was most likely a trick of the light. "There
are somethings that never leave us. Things that haunt us every time they cross
our mind, when we least expect them. Failures. Losses. Mistakes. And yeah,
sometimes even deaths, whether we caused them, or were merely impacted by them.
We've all got guilt though. Everyone. Unfortunately, some of us--you, me--we live
with more guilt than average people. When we look back...we wish we hadn't. That's
gonna be your whole life now mate. Every time you look back to this time in
your life, you'll wish you hadn't. But you can still overcome it. You can still
move past it, even if you'll never forget it."
David stood from his chair and set his newspaper down on its cushioned
surface. He stepped up to Will's side and placed a hand on his shoulder. "I'm
older than I look Will. I speak from experience. It may not be right away, it
may not even be for years to come, but this too shall pass."
He removed his hand and left the room, quietly closing the door behind
him. Jenna stared at the wood of the door for a moment, finding she had a new
level of respect for the illusionist. She looked back to Will then, and was
surprised to see tears running down his cheeks. She almost never saw him cry.
She moved in close, pressing the top of her head to his chest. He wrapped
his one good arm around her and pulled her close, burying his face in her fur.
Though he was silent the entire time, Jenna knew he spent the next ten minutes
in tears. Finally, when he seemed to have none left, he laid down, hugging her
tightly. She watched in silence as his physical and emotional exhaustion took
hold, and he fell asleep.
She yawned widely and--feeling fairly worn herself--she too fell asleep,
held close in his embrace.