Chapter 15: Vulcan Caleb

Pain, the likes of which I had only ever felt once before in my life, lanced through my chest. I felt like my heart had literally been ripped out. I couldn’t believe what I had done. I had threatened to destroy the twins and abandon Jules, and I’d felt nothing at all - at least not at the time.

I was on my knees, on the floor of the lobby of the Steadman’s mansion, sobbing. My grief and self-loathing threatened to consume me. I desperately needed to apologize to the twins and to Jules and beg for their forgiveness. I needed to explain myself, even though, at that very moment, there was no explanation, excuse, or justification that would have allowed me to forgive myself. The idea of someone else forgiving me seemed absurd. It was more that I deserved to beg – to be that pathetic and remorseful.

When I looked up, though, I was alone. Only Terra, the biggest of the dogs, was with me, and she sat, her head on my shoulder offering what comfort she could.

I understood. I had badly hurt just about everyone that had believed in me and betrayed them in the worst possible way. I had deliberately suppressed my emotions, knowing what effect it could have on everyone around me: on the twins, for whom my love was supposed to be irrefutable, enforced by the bond; on Jules, whom I’d promised I would always love, protect, and look after; on Dean and Cheryl, to whom I’d made those same promises about their daughter - and I supposed that should be ‘daughters,’ since everyone had seemed so sure that Ness would make five as soon as she turned eighteen. I was no longer sure of that. In fact, I thought it more reasonable that she’d never want to speak to me again. I’d included her in the bond more than a week ago, only to abruptly reveal to her the coldest, ugliest side of myself.

I examined the bond, dreading what I might find there. As I expected, I felt loss, anger, and betrayal from each of them.

For a long time, I knelt on the lobby floor, clinging to Terra and sobbing into her shoulder; for her part, she sat and allowed it. Eventually, the pain receded enough for me to regain some semblance of rational thought. At first, I felt relief, but then I recoiled. Rational thought was the hallmark of that other version of me. I felt caught in a trap. If I tried to think rationally about how to begin to repair the damage I’d done to the girls and to the Steadmans, I was essentially thinking about how to best manipulate them to stay loyal – exactly like he would. The alternative, though, was pain. It was just pain, with no plan for how to ever make it stop.

“Finished feeling sorry for yourself?”

I looked up to see Dean, sitting on the stairs, watching me. I had no idea how long he had been there. His face was grim. I released Terra with a final pat on her shoulder. She huffed gently into my face but otherwise didn’t move. I sat back on my, finally noticing some physical pain - in my knees, from the hard floor.

I looked up at him.

“Many times, in the Corps, we had to make hard decisions,” he said. “We had to take action that we knew might cause pain, suffering, or even worse to innocents. ‘Collateral damage,’ they called it. Most of the time those decisions were made way above our heads, but that didn’t mean we didn’t feel the effects. We were the tools – the weapons – after all. We actually did the deeds. We had to believe, in those cases, that the damage we were doing was outweighed by the result we achieved - that the suffering we inflicted on those innocents was justified by the fact that we were helping to stop worse atrocities from being perpetrated on others or preventing more deaths and suffering further down the line.”

He gave me a hard stare. “Convince me that the damage you did tonight to my daughters was justified - that you weren’t destroying Jules’ faith in the only thing that kept her alive just for petty, self-centered pride.”

“I love Jules,” I started, but he interrupted me.

“Yes, I know,” he said, “but unlike most people, you can switch that love off when it becomes inconvenient. How do I know that is not her future? That at some point you are just going to get bored and decide you have had enough of the weird girl?”

“Don’t call her that,” I snarled at him, my anger rising.

“So, convince me,” he repeated. “Explain why what you did to her, to all of them tonight, was justified.”

“I had to show them that the girls weren’t a convenient handle by which they could force me to do what they wanted,” I said, “because once they got the idea they were, it would never stop. They wouldn’t just be a chink in my armor; they’d be the obvious one – the one to use over and over again, especially if I got more powerful overall. It would start innocuously enough: suggestions and hints from the girls that I should do this or that – happy wife, happy life – but at some point, I would push back. What would happen then? How long would it be before the hints became something more? How long before they put one or more of the girls in the firing line, to force me to do something I wasn’t prepared to do for them, but would do to save my girls? And how long before they miscalculated, and one of the girls got hurt or killed because I couldn’t save them?”

“If you join the FBI,” he returned, “you’ll have to follow orders in any case. Why would they need to coerce you?”

“Oh, come on,” I scoffed. “Yes, I would have to follow LAWFUL orders. I don’t believe that you are so naïve to believe that there might not be occasions where the powerful Psi, who can strip someone of their power from half a mile away, read someone’s mind, or even kill someone without anyone around being any the wiser, might at some point in their career be required to do something else.

“And it’s not just Dianna. She’s just the tip of the spear. The whole organization needed to be shown that using the girls to try and force me into anything just won’t work. I’m sorry if it offends your sensibilities, but I would much rather Jules hate me, but be alive and whole, than for her to be secure in my love as she is bent over, and butt fucked by some demented Psi they’ve thrown her at to try and force me to do something or to punish me for not doing something that I had refused to do.”

He stood up and looked at me.

“As a Marine, I can accept your reasoning. Tactically it makes sense. You needed to remove the girls as a potential lever that might be used against you. As a father, they are MY girls, and you hurt them. I know you think you did it to protect them from greater harm in the future, but I can’t forget that they are hurting now. Make it right with them, Caleb, because right now, powers or no, the father in me wants nothing more than for you and me to go outside.”

I nodded, sadly wondering if I had irreparably damaged our relationship. Despite the ‘sugar daddy’ jibes, I really looked up to Dean. I respected him and valued his friendship. I hoped that I hadn’t destroyed that.

He stood aside, and I slowly ascended the stairs. I could see that the twins were in our room, and Jules and Ness were in Ness’s room. I could feel strong emotions from all four of them. The twins just seemed to be lost and betrayed. I could still see love, but it was muted, and tempered by the other emotions. Jules was angry - furious, even. Ness was confused and hurt. She didn’t understand what was going on.

I decided that I would go and see Jules and Ness first. I hoped that the twins would have a better understanding of what had happened.

Cheryl was standing in the passage outside of her daughter’s room. She strode up to me as I approached. Before I could say or do anything, she hauled off and slapped me. My head rocked to the side, my ears rang, and pain blossomed in my face.

By the time I had recovered, she was clinging to me and sobbing into my chest.

“Don’t you ever fucking do that again,” she sobbed. “I thought we had lost you, Caleb! Promise me: never again!”

“He can’t make that promise,” said Dean, softly, from behind me.

Gently, he disengaged his wife from me and took her into his arms, where she continued to sob. He nodded towards the door to Ness’s room.

“Go on,” he said.

Without knocking, I pushed the door open.

Jules was sitting on Ness’s bed, holding Ness, who had obviously been crying but appeared to be all cried out. They looked up as I entered.

“THAT FUCKING BITCH!” Jules exclaimed. “I can’t believe I fucking apologized to her, and all the time she was using her power, manipulating me just to get to you.”

“Caleb?” Ness asked softly. “Is that you? Is it the real you?”

“Jules, Ness,” I began, “I am so sorry.”

Ness leaped off the bed and threw herself at me, grabbing my shirt and burying her face in my chest, finding more tears.

“I was so scared,” she sobbed. “I thought you had left us, that you didn’t love us - love me - anymore.”

I put an arm around her, leaving the other open, hoping her big sister would come and join us, but Jules stayed where she was on the bed.

Eventually, I put both arms around Ness and just held her until she ran out of tears once again.

“Do you love me again?” she asked in a small voice.

“As long as I am capable of feeling love,” I said, “I will always love you.”

She turned liquid brown eyes up at me. She was so like her sister. “Promise?”

I leaned down a little and planted a gentle, chaste, kiss on her lips. “Promise,” I said.

She shivered and put her head against my chest. She was still sniffing, but I could feel that she was comforted and reassured. I also felt something else that I decided I didn’t want to investigate too closely.

Gently, I disengaged and led her over to the bed, sitting down. Immediately, Ness climbed into my lap and curled up, exactly as her sister often did. I smiled a little, and then looked at Jules.

“Jules?” I said gently.

“I’m PISSED!” she said. “You scared the living shit out of me when you went all green-blooded emotionless Vulcan on us, but I get why you did it. She needed to know we couldn’t be used against you.”

“They needed to know,” I corrected her. “It wasn’t just her. I’m sure Maggie had something to do with it too.”

“Why do you have to work with them at all?” she asked, and then immediately said, “No, you don’t need to answer that, I know. It’s a ‘with us or against us’ situation. If it’s not the fucking FBI, it would be the fucking NSA or the fucking CIA or any of the other fucking agencies, and they are all a bunch of fucking cunts.”

“Your language is getting worse,” I said, smiling at her.

“I cuss when I’m pissed,” she said, “and right now...”

“Jules,” I broke in, “you know I never really stopped loving you, don’t you?”

“For as long as you are capable of feeling love?” she asked, echoing what I had said to Ness. “Just promise me you won’t do that again, unless you really really, REALLY have to. I was so scared that you weren’t going to come back.”

“I promise,” I said. I didn’t want to tell her that I nearly hadn’t. James had warned me how easy it was to get locked into that state, and I had struggled to find a reason to come back. Somehow, a dog had dragged me back over. I still didn’t fully understand that bit.

She leaned in and put her arms around me - around us both - and we sat for a long minute, enjoying the closeness.

“You need to go talk to the twins,” she said eventually. “They are hurting.”

“I know,” I said. “They not only think their grandmother betrayed them, but that I did too.”

I looked down at Ness to find she had fallen asleep. Gently I lifted her with my TK and stood up. I laid her down on her bed, and Jules curled up around her.

“I’ll watch her,” she said. “You go and make up with the twins.”

I nodded and headed for the door.

“Caleb?” she said as I was just about to close the door behind me.

“Yes?”

“Don’t make them scream too loud,” she said giving me a grin. “It’s a big house, but sound carries at night.”

I smiled at her as I closed the door, but I could feel the sadness in my face as surely as in my heart. I doubted very much we would be making those kinds of noises.

When I pushed the door open into our bedroom, Mary and Amanda were both lying on the bed. Amanda was on her side, with Mary behind her, holding her. Both had their eyes open, staring fixedly at nothing.

I closed the door gently behind me, not wanting to startle them, but neither of them moved. Either they didn’t notice or didn’t care that I had come into the room.

I was at a bit of a loss as to what to do. I looked at the bond. Amanda was heartbroken. She felt betrayed and abandoned. Mary, too, felt betrayed and abandoned, but she had a much angrier feel to her. I couldn’t read either of their auras, although both had a lot of deep blue - sorrow. There were so many other colors visible that I couldn’t begin to interpret the whole picture.

I walked to the side of the bed, so I would be in both their eyelines, and neither moved. The bed creaked a little as I perched on the edge and reached out toward Amanda.

“Hey,” I said gently.

She pulled away from me, retreating back into the safe embrace of her sister, a look on her face resembling fear. Her rejection hurt, but it was nothing that I didn’t deserve. I had done far worse to them.

Mary sneered at me. “Happy now?” she asked. “Not only have you broken her heart, but you have also wrecked our relationship with our grandmother. Is that enough? Did you get your revenge on the big bad Eversons? Or are you after actual blood as well? Did you want to completely destroy our family?”

“I never wanted revenge,” I said sadly. “I just wanted you to see what she was doing, and...”

“Yes, well now we’ve seen,” she snapped. “The blinders are well and truly off. But now what, Caleb? What the fuck are we supposed to do now? Everyone we loved is gone. You discarded us like a used condom, and Dianna was so fixated on you that she forgot that we were anything more than tools. What do we have left Caleb? What?”

“We have...”

“WE???” she yelled. Amanda started a little, but didn’t seem to come out of the trance she was in. “There is no fucking ‘we.’ There is you and there is us. You made it pretty clear that Amanda and I were nothing more than an encumbrance to you. What was it you called us? ‘A chain,’ linking you to Dianna. You are no better than she is. All you were ever interested in was dumping your cum in either or both of us.”

“That’s not true,” I said, “I love you - both of you.”

“THEN HOW COULD YOU DO THAT TO US?” she screamed at me. “You knew what would happen when you suppressed your emotions - how that would look to us over the bond - and you knew that you would have no qualms about severing the bond if we became inconvenient to you. How did you think that would make us feel, Caleb? Wanted? Loved? Appreciated?

“You know how it felt when you blocked the bond last time - how devastated we both were - and yet you calmly contemplated doing it to us again, knowing that you were safe. You wouldn’t feel a thing in your happy little emotionless cocoon, but Amanda and I would both be destroyed. Not only would we each suffer the agony of the bond being broken, but we would also feel it from the other, while we watched them being tormented by the agony.

“Tell me something worse you could do to us because I can’t think of a fucking thing.”

I hadn’t even considered that. When I had hatched my plan, I had had no intentions of ever breaking the bond, but they didn’t know that. Moreover, it was clear to me that my emotionless self, cared little for what my emotional self would or wouldn’t do. ‘Vulcan’ me would have separated the bond without a second thought if he had thought it was necessary, and his threshold for necessity would probably have been a lot lower than that of emotional me.

In addition, Mary reminded me that they would have not only felt their own pain, but that of their twin as well, added to having to watch that twin being tortured. I felt sick to my stomach that I had even contemplated putting them in that position.

“Mary,” I said, “I’m sorry. I was trying to protect you - all of you.”

“Protect us?” she snorted. “You mean like the Dutch sailors protected the dodo? With that kind of protection, I think we are better off taking our chances. Perhaps we should go find Harold and take up with him. At least he was honest with himself about what he wanted from his women.”

That just made me mad.

“Honest?” I asked incredulously. “Is that word even in the Everson dictionary? Who was it that started this little charade? Who was sent to spy on me at school, to ‘keep me safe?’ Who was it that arranged for that little orgy at my parents’, supposedly so I could concentrate on my training? Your grandmother started all this, and you played your part, so don’t you fucking dare talk to me about honesty.

“And as for saying that all that I wanted to do was to use you and Amanda as cum dumps, tell me: who was it that initiated that orgy? Who was it that insisted on ‘sharing?’ Who was it that practically demanded that Louise rape me so you could get a go on Josh’s cock? You have a very selective fucking memory about what has gone on in our relationship. All along, you have been ignoring the fact that your grandmother has been using you to try and control me, and then suddenly, when you can no longer hide your fucking head in the sand, It’s all my fault.

“Well, I’m very fucking sorry - sorry I finally opened your eyes; sorry I loved you enough to try and protect you not only from her, but from yourselves; sorry that I couldn’t think of another way to show her that you were no use to her as leverage against me, so she would let you be - so that you and Amanda and Jules would be safe from her - from them.” I was winding down, my anger dissipating and sadness creeping in to take over.

“Mary, Amanda,” I said, my voice cracking, “I’m sorry.”

“Caleb?” It was Amanda. Her eyes were filled with tears but now focused intently on me. “Please don’t be mad. I tried, honestly I did. I tried really hard to be good and not do anything to make you angry. I just wanted you to love me - to love us.

“When I saw you tonight, with no love in you, I thought it was over - that you were done with us. I was so scared, and after Dianna had gone and you wouldn’t come back to us ... you just looked at us with those empty eyes, like we were just... things. I couldn’t take it.

“Please, Caleb; please tell me you still love us - that I didn’t drive you away. I promise, if you give me a chance, I’ll do better. Just please give me another chance.”

I looked from Amanda to Mary, whose eyes were also streaming with tears.

“Mary?”

She closed her eyes, resting her forehead against her sister.

“Please, Caleb,” Amanda repeated.

I reached out and cupped her cheek. This time she didn’t draw back but pressed her face into my hand.

“Amanda, my love,” I said, “you weren’t to blame. None of this is your fault, and I never ever stopped loving you, in here.” I tapped my temple. “I had to turn off my emotions for a little while, but that wasn’t your fault. It was the only way I could think of to protect you - to keep you safe and to keep us together forever. Look at the bond now. Tell me what you see - what you feel.”

I saw her eyes glaze for a second as she internalized, examining the bond. Fresh tears sprang from those beautiful tawny eyes, but she smiled.

“It’s true,” she said. “I can see it. You do still love us.”

“More than ever,” I confirmed, “and that is never, ever going to change.”

She reached for me, and I allowed myself to be pulled down into her embrace. She clutched me to her as if her life depended on it, whispering, “Thank you, thank you,” over and over again.

Mary was holding her so tightly from behind that I couldn’t return the embrace, and I was wary of putting my arms around Mary, as she still seemed mad at me. Then she opened her eyes and looked up at me, her eyes filled with pain.

“Oh Caleb,” she said. “Please. I’m sorry.”

I wrapped them both up, pulling them to me, holding them tightly against me, never wanting to be separated from them again. Unconsciously, my power flared, wrapping us all in love - pure and innocent.

I woke up hot, still fully dressed. Apparently, we had fallen asleep, exhausted by all the emotional trauma of the previous day.

Groggily, I saw someone - or rather two someones - standing at the foot of the bed: Dean and Cheryl. I shook my head a little to clear it and was about to say something when Cheryl, smiling, put her finger over her lips, indicating I should be quiet. I looked down at the twins. Mary was still behind Amanda, and they were both fast asleep. My arm was still around the pair of them. I looked to the other side, to find not one, but two dark-haired girls curled up in the same position as the twins, cuddled up under my other arm. Ness, and Jules, both also fully dressed, had obviously decided to join us at some time in the night.

Carefully lifting all four girls with my TK, I extracted myself and slid down the bed, following Dean and Cheryl out of the bedroom.

“I didn’t even know...” I began.

Dean shook his head. “I know,” he said. “I guess she just needed to be near you. After yesterday, they all did. Why don’t you go get a shower in the main bathroom? Cheryl is making breakfast, and we can wake them up with breakfast in bed.”

I nodded. He turned to walk away.

“Dean?” he stopped but didn’t turn around.

“Caleb,” he said, “we’re good.”

I nodded again and he went downstairs while I went and got showered.

When I joined Cheryl and Dean in the kitchen, breakfast was almost ready. Cheryl came over to me and turned my head, gently feeling the side of my face where she had slapped me the night before. I winced slightly.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I shouldn’t have done that.”

“It’s fine,” I said. “I deserved it. I’m sorry I put you all through that.”

“I was so scared that you weren’t coming back,” she said. “What did it, in the end?”

“A bit of everything,” I said. “What Amanda said started me thinking, and then Jules. One thing that really resonated with emotionless me was what Dean said about battle fatigue. I remember thinking about that, then Terra stuck her nose into my hand. I started to pet her ears, and it made me feel good, and I guess that’s when everything came back.”

“Handy to know,” said Dean. “Maybe if you ever have to ‘go there’ again, getting you to pet one of the dogs might be a trigger for a way back. What happened after that?”

I knew exactly what he meant. It had been very, very loud.

“When I dissociate, the emotions don’t go away,” I said. “They just get deferred. So, when I come out of it, every emotion that I would have felt just hits me all at once. I guess I got a bit overwhelmed. That was one of the reasons that logical me didn’t want to come out. He knew that it would hurt, and there was no real payoff for the suffering he knew was coming.”

“Wow,” he said. “I didn’t realize. So, you didn’t get away with it after all. You just got hit with it all at once.”

“Kind of,” I said.

Cheryl loaded up a couple of trays and we all returned to our room, where the girls were still asleep. I prodded all four of them through the bond, trying to wake them as gently as possible.

Amanda’s eyes opened, and for a second I saw concern when she didn’t immediately see me where I had been last night. I touched her leg and she looked down, relief evident in her eyes.

“Breakfast,” I said, indicating the trays that Dean and Cheryl were holding.

Ness was the last to wake, and she looked sheepishly at her parents when she realized where she had been caught. They chose not to comment, merely handing her a plate and fork.

It was highly inconvenient for so many people to eat breakfast on a bed like that, and after a short time, Cheryl, Dean, and I decided to take ours back to the kitchen and finish there while the girls ate theirs and then got showered and redressed.

It was only then that my parents made an appearance. I was shocked. I had totally forgotten that they were even there - as, I think, had everyone else. They both looked sheepish.

“Did Dianna leave?” asked my mother.

I nodded. “Last night,” I said. “Let’s just say we had a difference of opinion.”

“We heard,” my father said. “Your mom wanted to come and get involved, but I persuaded her to leave it for you to sort out.”

“How are the girls?” my mother asked, earning a little more respect from me in the process.

“Jules was pissed when she found out that Dianna had been using her power on her and her family,” I replied. “Ness was shaken up, but she’s okay this morning.”

“And the twins?” asked my father.

“Are still a bit fragile,” I said. “They finally opened their eyes to what Dianna was doing - how she was using them - and it hurt them. By doing what I did, I didn’t exactly help either. We still have some healing to do, but I think we will get there.”

“What did you do?” asked my mother.

“I’d rather not talk about it,” I said.

She looked like she wanted to press, but she decided against it.

Ness came into the kitchen and seemed surprised to see my parents there too. “Have you guys eaten?” she asked.

My father shook his head, and Ness headed for the stove, pulling a face when she saw the mess that Cheryl had left. Within fifteen minutes she had made breakfast for my parents and dropped another plate in front of me as well. As usual, I was hungry. She cocked an eyebrow at her parents, but they both shook their heads. She started on the clean-up.

Nobody felt like doing much for the rest of the day, so we spent it just lounging around the house, chatting about inconsequential things, and eating the meals that Ness cooked at lunch and dinner time.

At evening beer time, Dean and I sat out on the deck. My father came out with us, but after about fifteen minutes, he excused himself and went back inside. Dean looked at me and I just shrugged.

A few minutes later, Dean spoke. “I never had to make one of those decisions,” he said quietly. “The ones I talked about last night. As I said then, they were above my pay grade, although we had to act on them. What you did last night was a judgment call, and we don’t yet know if it worked, but you genuinely had our girls’ best interests in your mind, and that’s all anyone can ever ask of you.

“You did well, Son,” he finished.

“Thanks, Pops,” I said, without irony, using the last of my beer to swallow the lump in my throat.

He raised an eyebrow at me, but then nodded.

When the rest of the family came out on the deck, we spent the evening chatting. Jules was reading the Everson Grimoire that Dianna had loaned her. Apparently, Dianna had either forgotten it, or was honoring her promise to let Jules have it for as long as she wanted.

“In every book I’ve ever read either about magic or with magic in it,” she began when I asked how she was getting on. Then she interrupted herself, starting again. “Granted that all of them were fiction, but anyway: spells and rituals are always portrayed as being a little bit like computer programming. You assemble all the ‘code’ you need, apply power, usually called ‘mana’ or something similar, and there you go. I was hoping that these rituals were going to be like that - that I would be able to ‘dissect’ it and tell you exactly what it was supposed to do by looking at its construction.”

“I take it that’s not the case?” I queried.

She shook her head. “These are all over the place. There are no constants - no similarities between rituals that do similar or the same things.”

“Well, that kind of makes sense,” I said, “when you consider that most of them don’t seem to work. Maybe that’s why. You might be right that there is a ‘programming language’ for rituals, but since the only one you have in there that we know works is the bond, you have too small a sample size to investigate. If the rest are just pure gibberish...”

She sighed, accepting the logic. “I can’t see all of them being duds,” she said, “but without knowing which ones work and which don’t, I can’t really do much more with this book. The only useful bit of information I found is the name of the person who created the ritual. Perhaps if we find out more about her, it might help us understand it a bit better.”

“For that,” I said, returning her sigh, “I guess we would need access to the fabled Everson Library. I don’t see that happening any time soon, if ever.”

Jules took my hand. “Maybe, now that the lines have been drawn, things might settle down between you and Dianna. If you are going to be working together, you are going to be interacting with her. Perhaps one day...”

“I hope so,” I said. “The twins were devastated to lose her. Yes, they are pissed with her - and rightly so - but she is the only parent they ever really knew. They need her in their lives, just not controlling them.”

I looked across at where the twins were sitting talking to Ness, Cheryl, and Dean. They were subdued, and I could feel sadness and loss from the pair of them. I pushed love - now able to separate out the ‘horny’ - to the pair of them, and they both looked across at me. Amanda smiled, though a little sadly. Mary just looked, a blank look on her face, and I knew that despite what had happened the night before, she was still mad at me. I wished it were otherwise, but I was also still mad at her. Of the two, she was the one who had been so anti-Compulsion, who lectured me about abusing my powers, and yet had turned a blind eye every single time Dianna had done just that. Her bias - hypocrisy, even - grated, and I knew that she and I were headed for further trouble, despite the bond. In fact, I was dreading how the bond might react to our strife. I felt less confident than ever that I truly knew or understood what it was.