Chapter 29

Soldiers have different rituals while they wait to ship out. Some spend the last hours with their wives or girlfriends; others go through their equipment again and again to make sure nothing is forgotten; still others get drunk enough to feel immortal.

Jason and I played catch.

His death made the hours of waiting the emptiest of my life.

It took Rachel awhile to realize she had nothing to do with it.

I sat in the dining hall surrounded by quiet Siblings and Alyssa. Some of the sorority sisters were sitting next to out table watching Rachel disapprovingly. She was having dinner with my ex-roommate and the three Tau idiots. From the sound of it, they were enjoying their meal immensely.

The sisters decided they had enough and stalked out of the dining hall. Rachel watched them leave with a tight smile. Alyssa's lips pressed together in anger. She got up and started towards their table.

"Alyssa," Doris Alex barked.

Her lover froze and turned around.

"It's not necessary," Doris Alex said.

"But..." Alyssa said plaintively.

"Whatever you might think, Alyssa," Doris Alex told her. "It is not about them."

Alyssa looked from Doris Alex to me to the other table. Her jaw set but she returned quietly. The Tau idiots laughed. Alyssa moved my hands out of her way so she could sit on my lap. I had not eaten most of my meal so she decided I needed feeding. I chewed and swallowed what she put in my mouth mechanically.

Rachel stood up and walked over to our table with my ex-roommate in tow. She gave the three idiots courage enough to walk up to our table with her. Rachel sat down and pulled her playmate into the chair across from me. The other Taus sat in the chairs the Siblings emptied to move to my side of the table.

"See I told you, Joseph," Rachel said brightly. "These are my friends. This thing between you guys is just a misunderstanding."

"It's hard to misunderstand being handled by animals, Rachel," Doris Alex with a dangerous glint her eye.

She might have baited the Taus into the assault, but Doris Alex was not the type to forgive weakness. Rachel looked at the three idiots and a spate of anger crossed her face. Had it been any other time, I would have admired her willingness to cut herself to spite me. She turned away from them and stared into my eyes.

"You told me taking a formal logic class was the best thing I could ever do in college," she reminded me.

I did not bother to nod.

"I want to take one next semester, can you tutor me if I get in trouble?" she asked with a wide smile.

Alyssa traced my ear with tiny kisses.

"Alyssa," Doris Alex admonished. "It's not time for that yet."

"It's only foreplay," Alyssa said with a pout. "I want to make sure when he's inside me I cum just from the anticipation."

"Don't worry about cumming when he's inside you, Alyssa," Janet said. "I know I can't help it so you won't have any problems."

The Siblings nodded their heads in agreement to her statement. The three idiots' jaws tightened as if they were trying to find enough brain power between them to say something intelligently cutting.

"You know, Joseph," Melisa said looking at Rachel. "I think I'm going to call Anna. You remember her; the old woman in the wheelchair you met in David's house. I think if I told her that David deserved a really nice Christmas present and that you..."

She pushed her chair back as my ex-roommate leaned forward angrily.

The cocking of a.45 was not a sound most people at the table were familiar with. My ex-roommate was not likely to ever forget it after his recent experience with Anna and me. He froze and turned his head towards me. His tension was palpable to everyone at the table. Alyssa looked from him to me and then back again. A feral smile touched Doris Alex's eyes as she sensed his fear. Melisa pulled her chair back to its original position and crossed her arms.

I took a deep breath. It was a close thing; so easy to have pulled the trigger, ripping a bullet through his gut and cutting his spine in two. I could have stood up, handed Alyssa to Doris Alex and walked the line of Taus putting a bullet in each of their heads. Samantha would get me the information I needed on the way to the two other assholes. The world would corner me eventually, but there would be a few less impolite assholes by the time I was done. I kept a mental list of people that felt their opinion had to be shoved down everyone else's throats. The world owed me Stephanie's rapists; the ones on my list would be a public service before I retired to a small plot of land.

Jason whispered his disapproval. I sighed knowing how bad it had to be if Jason was the one talking sense. Killing these fools might make getting to Stephanie's rapists harder; not significantly, but enough to make me un-cock the gun.

"Why are you sitting at my table?" I asked the three idiots.

They stood up immediately and backed away like their guardian angels were tugging them out of harm's way. I turned to look at my ex-roommate.

"Go away, Joseph," I said.

I tapped the gun against the bottom of the table. Rachel and Alyssa looked at the table curiously. My ex-roommate stood and backed away quickly. I turned my eyes to Rachel.

"Your friends are leaving," I informed her.

She gave me a hateful look before getting up and walking out with the Taus. Alyssa gasped when I pulled the gun from underneath the table and put it back in the holster at my back.

"You're not allowed to have that in school," she whispered to me.

"I have a permit to carry a concealed weapon," I told her.

"Oh," she said pursing her lips. "Why?"

"I did some pretty nasty things to people who have friends and family that don't think they deserved it," I said. "The federal government is hoping that if those friends and family come looking for me, nasty things will happen to them too."

She nodded unsurely and reached for my fork. She stuck the fork in her mouth instead of mine.

"That's my food," I pointed out. "I thought you weren't allowed to touch my food."

"You're not doing anything with it," she said with a shrug. "Plus things have changed."

"They have?" I asked.

"Yeah," she said. "I don't want to fuck you anymore; now I have to fuck you."

I was cleaning the 9mm's after their second test shoot when Doris Alex dropped off Samantha's folder. Jeremy completed his delivery in a more timely fashion but equipment is easier to acquire than trustworthy information. Samantha had waited for the second Thursday after I was told to deliver what I needed.

Doris Alex sat down to my right. She smiled at seeing Malia and Michael playing in the pool. The two were well on the way to an active in-pool fuck.

I did not look at the folder. I wanted the guns ready for action since I was leaving the next morning for Stephanie's home town. I cleaned the guns with machinelike precision as my mind wandered back to the day before my first mission in uniform. Jason and I were playing catch while the Master Chief watched.

The officer walked up behind him.

"Commander," the Master Chief said with a salute.

The greeting was acknowledged with a nod.

"Can I ask a question, sir?" the Master Chief asked tentatively.

He received another nod.

"How the fuck did these two get in, sir?"

The officer laughed and shook his head.

"I'm one of the best at my job, Master Chief," he said. "If I weren't military, most of the people on this base couldn't afford to sit on my couch to be told what was wrong with their heads."

The Master Chief sat up to pay closer attention.

"I've given those two every test imaginable," the officer continued. "There isn't one Jason can't beat, or that doesn't spit David out as perfectly sane."

"They're juggling knives to relax, sir!" the Master Chief said. "It wouldn't be a problem except they're not very good at it."

"Look again, Master Chief," the officer said nodding at us. "They're not juggling, they're playing catch... and they're trying to hit each other."

"What?!?" the Master Chief turning back to us.

There was a lull in the conversation. I wondered if they realized that while they were out of Jason's hearing range, I could hear them perfectly. The thought evaporated as Jason hid the next throw better than usual. I had to get out of the way rather than try to catch the knife.

"Shit, they're fucking crazy," the Master Chief declared.

"You make sure your men are okay before you ship out," the officer pointed out. "These two play catch with knives; same difference."

"You're telling me they're not crazy, sir?" the Master Chief asked in amazement.

"Oh no, Jason's so fucking crazy I won't be alone in the same room with him anymore, unless David's there with us," the officer said with a shudder.

"What about David, sir?" the Master Chief asked curiously.

"Master Chief, David's so utterly sane that you and I are closer to Jason than to him on that particular scale."

"Sir, he's playing catch with knives!"

"Yes, but he's good at it," the officer replied. "So it's on par with you going down to the shooting range."

The Master Chief looked at him like he could not believe the words that were coming out the officer's mouth.

"How did they get in then, sir?"

"Like I said, I don't know of a test that Jason can't beat," the officer said tapping his thigh. "He's a complete sociopath. If it weren't for David, there would be a trail of bodies behind him. The worst part is that because there would be no motive we could understand, finding him would be like looking for a needle in a haystack."

"What do you mean if it weren't for David, sir?"

"I would say Jason's sociopathy is that he doesn't believe anything except David is real, not even himself," the officer said thoughtfully.

"He's in love with David?" the master-chief asked incredulously.

"Listen to me carefully, Master Chief," the officer said angrily. "Jason does not believe anything except David is real. Deep down inside where you believe in God, Jason believes we're all figments of David's imagination."

"That's fucking crazy!"

"Certifiable," the officer said. "I just can't prove it."

"What?"

"I have no idea what tied Jason to David. I have their background checks; there's probably a moment where Jason saw something in David that he lacked," the officer said almost talking to himself. "Be very careful fucking with David where Jason can see it, Master Chief, there's nothing to stop one figment of the imagination from killing another. "

"Shit! Nobody had to tell me Jason's dangerous. But what about David, Sir?" the Master Chief said looking at me calculatingly.

The officer studied me for a few minutes before replying.

"David is..." he said finally only to sigh. "I wish I could explain it to you. Every test says the same thing; a perfect example of sanity with almost no subconscious. Not that he can control his subconscious mind you, but that he doesn't have much of one."

"You make that sound like a bad thing, sir," the Master Chief said.

"Master Chief, the rest of us are crazy compared to him and HE knows it," the officer replied seriously. "Convincing David that anything outside of him has to be considered is like trying to make a real atheist care that something is a sin."

"I still don't understand why that's bad, sir," the Master Chief said.

"Take my advice, Master Chief, always be polite to David. Your life depends on it," the officer said sincerely.

The master-chief turned back to us.

"Why don't you help kick them out, sir?" he asked.

"They play catch with knives, Master Chief," the officer said. "Jason will kill anyone without a perceptible change in heartbeat. As for David, if you ever decide to give him a reason to kill you tell me first. I'd like to be out of the state to make sure I'm not in his way. The universe spit out men like these two so we better have some on our side as long as we don't know how many more there are out there."

I lay the 9mm's on the table and sat back.

The Commander should have asked me. I would have told him what caused Jason to bond with me. I decided to kill my monsters; they knew it and tried to beat the purpose out of my eyes. I shoved the fear out of me and into them. They sent me back to the system rather than be trapped in their lair with me. The social worker figured out what happened to me and hid it. I decided to kill her too. Jason is the one that brought me back. He promised he would never let anyone do that to me again; he was twelve but I believed him. Jason filled the emptiness inside him with me because from my eyes he learned there was another choice. Monsters can be killed as easily as a little boy's soul is destroyed.

Rachel opened the door to the pool house and walked in angrily.

"Jesus fucking Christ, she has to be in love with you," Doris Alex said in frustration.

Rachel had grown quiet the second week after I was told about Stephanie's rape. She figured out that the quiet in the house had nothing to with her and the Taus. She stalked towards the table. She blinked at the sight of the guns but sat down anyway.

"What did you do to Joseph?" she asked.

"Why?" Doris Alex asked with amusement.

"I'm not talking to you," Rachel told her in annoyance.

"Watching Malia and Michael made me horny; I was thinking of a quickie so you better give me a damn good reason I should delay," Doris Alex told her.

Rachel looked at the corner Michael and Malia were in. She did a double-take noticing that they were grinding against each other and that their bathing suits were floating in the pool.

"Joseph won't come over to the house," Rachel said.

"What do you see in him?" Doris Alex asked shrugging Rachel's statement aside.

"He annoys the shit out of David," Rachel replied.

"Oh..." Doris Alex said very surprised her question was answered truthfully.

For the first time, Doris Alex studied Rachel seriously.

"At least, I thought he did," Rachel continued. "I'm not so sure this is about him anymore."