Fiction 1
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"Canadian Shield," by Richard J. Waters, Copyright 1993
Prologue
"Is that you, Demon? Have you come for my soul?"
The man spoke with a raspy, faint voice, betraying both pain and extreme exhaustion. His back was turned and I had advanced on him silently, yet he knew me.
In the old days, I would have laughed at the dramatics; his and mine, both. Now: murder in my heart; or maybe rough justice. Hell! Call it "tough love," I don't care.
"I've just come to see that your body dies, Priest." I walked toward the front of the chapel and then right around the pew that he sat on. Turning my back to the altar, I confronted him yet one more time. One last time.
He spoke again, after a moment: "You seem to betray a certain impatience." That belated remark was addressed to the shotgun tickling his cassock; loaded, unlocked, trigger taut.
Europeans may truly have a bit more class than the rest of us.
"My time is tight, old man. I'm on the run . . .."
"What keeps you, then?"
"I'm tired . . .." I wanted to justify myself, but I ran out of steam.
The priest just looked disappointed in me. He didn't beg for his life, though; he didn't care.
That in particular annoyed me. I said, "It’s just fatigue. That might slow me down a little but it won't keep you alive. So please don't count on any mercy, Father. Not even a coup de grace."
It was then that he seemed to smile, unexpectedly; presumably at my poor French or the incongruous "Please." But the right side of his face was totally concealed in shadows, so I could only see a little less than half of that perceived smile. And if I knew half then of what I know now, it would not have been so unexpected.
He knew it hadn't ended. Not by a long shot.
At this point though, the priest sat mostly in darkness, turned slightly away from me, perhaps avoiding my inspection. In this little scarce-lit world, his shadow and mine looked like twins.
The demoralizing thought occurred then: That only someone like this, a man who had fallen, risen, and fallen again all the way to Hell, could help to put my own moral eclipse into some sort of perspective for me.
Perhaps.
"Why else would you come this far to find me again, if not to kill me?"
Why indeed? Then again: perhaps not.
I couldn't answer him at first, to tell him how the dead cried out to me. And I was no longer sure whether it was his soul or mine that was first in line for damnation.
His chalk voice scratched at the black silence again. "I had to do what I did," he said, "nothing. I did not help to kill them. And I could not have saved them. There was no choice. It was either that or see my entire life's work destroyed. Surely you can see that. It was your people or my people; one side or the other; that simple."
Still, my thoughts remained locked up.
"So, why?" he snarled. "Why are you here? What do you want from me?" The angry demands were prodding at my trigger finger to end it then and there. But he deserved less than the mercy of a quick death. He deserved to know why he was going to die in great pain; not a martyr, only a failure.
Some self-discipline would be required on my part: a little detachment; a structure to channel a glacial fury.
Eventually, I was able to respond, to pin my thoughts down. His angry questions were simple. Very simple, really; best answered by an immram, a form of myth favored by my people. Starting with one aided, a death-tale, it would end with another: his.
My people? Well, we are different from others. From any and all others, anywhere, really. We must begin with my people.
The beginning, then.
From the beginning, I told him why I was there and then I told him what I wanted from him. It took some time.
If I can be of help, e-mail me at: Travellers' Rest.
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