Chapter 3

The passing of time was no longer a blur to me, the way it had been just instants before. Time was moving, and fairly fast, but now it was more like a movie put on fast forward rather than the vapor trail it had been. And my memories were returning, no longer events to be observed, but actual pieces of myself and my life; just a trickle at first, but as one moment made itself known it was quickly followed by another, and another ... faster and faster and faster, until the trickle was a flow, the flow a stream and the stream a torrent.

'You know who he is?' the dark figure asked me only moments after I relived Carlie's death.

I looked closely at the pale skinned figure leaning over the sink, staring at his reflection in the bathroom mirror.

Tall, pale, shoulder length snow white hair, lanky and muscular, but not bulky ... I knew him. I recognized that face; the cold, dead pale gray eyes and the stony features that showed no emotion of any kind. He still looked vaguely like the red haired kid who'd gone off to college, but now the image was much more like the ghostly figure at my right side. Much, much more.

"He's me." I said. "He looks like you, but he's me."

'Is it any wonder he looks like me? This was the day I was born.'

"I don't remember that."

'No reason you should. Until a few years ago you had no idea I even existed.'

"So what, exactly, are you?" I asked dully.

'You tell me.'

I tried to care enough to think it thru, but couldn't care or be bothered. The pale figure nodded sadly, compassionately.

'I'm what you were, emotionally, before Carlie died. I'm your hope, your love, passion, curiosity, trust, your faith in yourself and other people.'

I snorted half-heartedly. "Pull the other one. I never had much of those kinds of feelings in the first place."

His translucent features thinned, growing chilly and callous. 'I am what you were, as well as what you've become since then. He, ' the pale figure pointed at the dark image on my left, 'has changed the both of us.'

'Thanks so very fuckin' much for remembering I'm here.' he snarled, causing tendrils of flame to erupt from mouth and eyes.

"When did he show up?"

'Later. We're getting there.

Frames moved past.

'And this guy? Who is he?'

"Harve Lattimor. He was responsible for Carlie's death. I killed him."

'Eventually.' the dark figure corrected me as we watched my final moments with Harve roll by.

I shrugged absently. "Eventually." I agreed, taking note of the fact that the sound of my own voice had become just as dull and emotionless as that of the young man we were watching.

The Reader's Digest version of The Slow-Painful Death of Harve Lattimor played out before me. I think had I been able to feel anything other than the endless agonies and death of my embryonic family, that I'd have been moved to tears and probably puked my imaginary insides out.

'I'm particularly proud of this bit here.' the dark me enthused gleefully as the mnemonic me shoved a burning branch into Harve's anal passage with workman-like precision.

'This is where he is born. Indifferent, arrogant, cold, heartless, cruel, barbarous, merciless, unfeeling, uncaring, angry, furious, powerful and self-righteous ... he is all the things you wished you could have been, things you learned from your father, your brother and your sister, Vickie Carter ... and from Harve as well. Your mother, Granddad, eventually Izzy and then Carlie showed you more positive aspects of yourself. You'd have been a much different person, if she hadn't died.'

"If." I muttered. The most profoundly pointless word in the English language.

The images moved on, unconcerned with my musings.

The Army, boot camp, my mother's funeral ... and Izzy returned for a brief, tear streaked cameo.

Years of lectures, training and constant emotional hell followed, alone by my own choosing, with only work, reading and running for company. And then came that day.

'The third pivotal event.' the pale figure narrated.

The balcony sniper ... shot in the head by an older, bigger, colder, more deadly version of myself ... the nut-job in the police station ... shot in the head by a more calculating, disinterested and lethal version of the boy I'd been.

My introduction to Lt. Col. Erickson ... the firing range beneath CID headquarters and the pig ... shot in the head by a less agreeable and more precise killer than I'd been with the deer.

Desert Storm and Saudi Arabia ... the heat, the blinding sun, the bone chilling nights ... and the Ghost ... the attack on the Kuwait border and the slaughter of the mortar squad ... more shots to the head by a man who no longer cared about living ... the letter from my father about Izzy's impending marriage.

The Mission ... the General ... the duel in the dunes, and my suicidal assault on the Iraqi compound ... broadcasting the agony and horror locked up in my mind, driving men insane and killing those who didn't kill themselves, or each other, without a second thought.

Wounded and in more pain than any one human being should ever have to endure ... walking thru the night ... sleeping thru the day ... and talking to the voices in my head...

"They were you two." I accused heatedly, with more raw emotion in my heart and voice than I'd felt in eons.

'Your mind was on the edge of snapping. You were ready to give up, lie down and die. But your will ... your desire to continue, no matter what, is incredibly strong. So your mind did snap. And the two of us, up till then no more than facets of your personality, broke free. He drove you on, overriding your desire to quit, and I provided the faces, the voices, the memories of the people most likely to compel your survival. We didn't want to die, and the only way to keep that from happening was to make you want to live.'

'And there was only one thing that could make you want to go on, even with the pain.' the dark figure said, almost reverently.

"Izzy." I whispered.

'You've loved her since you were old enough to know what love was.'

"But why? She hated me from the moment I was born."

'Don't remind me.' the dark image said harshly.

'People, especially young children, aren't the most rational of creatures. You loved her. It didn't seem to matter that she despised you. The truly strange thing is that once your talent emerged, her feelings for you changed. You'd buried your feelings for her years before, but then something about you started pulling her to you. Your talent found those buried feelings and desires and acted on them. We don't understand it any more than you do. But the attraction was mutual ... unwanted on a conscious level, but apparently inescapable. So we used it. And it worked. Reminding you of your love for your sister gave you a reason to fight on, a purpose, a goal.'

The desert went rushing past my eyes ... finding the allied outpost ... handing over my prisoners ... being evac'd to Germany and then to Washington DC.

Walter Reed ... Captain Rossi and Colonel DeBerg ... a letter to Izzy trying to ease both our troubled minds ... Auggie, Walt, David and Tim ... the woman with post-partum ... and Lilly. Brown haired, bright brown eyes filled with sorrow and stars and a smile that reminded me there was a reason for the existence of two sexes.

'Pivotal event number four. And your first real step back onto the path.'

Re-learning to feel the pain of other people ... re-learning to care enough that I was willing to ease their pain ... learning not to hate my talent, but to use it.

Dr. Wills, Mr. Jones and my introduction to the CIA ... Alex the undercover agent and friend Ivan, the diplomat/spy/murderer ... and blasting a dying tree with all the pain, anger and fury I'd been collecting.

Peg Driscoll ... little Peggy ... so very much like me, yet so completely different.

'You learned a lot from her; about people in general, but about yourself more than anything else. You learned how to reason out a problem, how to use your talent in a positive way, how to do what you didn't think was possible.'

"Our abilities are so similar, both of our minds fragmented ... how is it I didn't end up more like her?"

'You're similar, but not the same. Her trauma occurred much earlier in life, and it was much more profound than yours. She wasn't as well prepared for what happened to her ... or maybe you were just lucky.'

"Or maybe her mind fragmented before her talent showed up and that stunted the ability."

'Perhaps. Just another of the many things that we may never know for sure.'

Me and Peggy in the shower ... the two of us rolling around on the mats ... creating an emotional ring for the first time ... kissing Lilly for the first time ... sensing the attraction and love she felt for me ... feeling something similar growing within myself.

Returning home ... my father, so much older and smaller ... and my painful reunion with Izzy ... the shock and sorrow of discovering what her life had become.

Forgiveness ... and spanking ... pain, domination and sex ... a dream of death ... then death for real ... killing and more killing ... rejection and a drunken tantrum in the snow ... and meeting the darkness.

'I thought I was going to be stuck in your head, no more than an afterthought, for the rest of your pathetic existence. You have no idea how hard I had to push to get free.' he gloated.

"You aren't free. Any more than I am." I reminded him.

His pitch black face frowned and flames sputtered. 'Maybe not. But at least I don't have to pretend to be something I'm not.'

"Which I suppose means that I am?"

'Fuckin'-A it does.'

"And what, pray tell, am I pretending to be?"

There was a long drawn out pause. I looked from the darkness to the ghostly figure and back. Both of them stared at me, the darkness with scorn, and the pale image with sorrow and pity.

'Human.'

I shook my head. "This is an old argument. You're not a god ... and neither am I, no matter what extra abilities I might have."

'He's right ... this is an old argument and we won't get anywhere re-hashing it now. Let it drop. There's still a lot more you need to remember and there isn't much time left.' the semi-transparent me said decisively.

The darkness snarled and flared, but turned away to face the still speeding images before us.

Returning to DC with Izzy ... introducing her to Lilly and Peggy ... taking away Lilly's suicide inspiring pain over her lost children ... skipping down the Mall hand in hand with Peggy ... getting hit by the car, having already killed the driver ... fighting the second assassin ... being kidnapped ... more killing ... escape to the CIA ... the ranch ... sex and bonding ... interrogating Anya ... killing the CIA director ... crushing Rossi's mind ... dinner party at the ranch ... putting a man permanently asleep ... burning a boy to ashes ... blood and bullets in the snow ... coming a hair's breadth from dying ... duel in the halls of Congress ... going to Dover ... giving the President a woodie via network TV ... Charlie shot and smoked ... back to the ranch and ... babies?!

"I have children?"

'Yes, but wait and you'll see for yourself.'

Creation of numbers one thru five and the killing of the FBI director ... back to the hospital ... Billy-Bob ... the President and medals ... sending the preacher to his own personal hell ... release from the Army ... working for the CIA ... returning to school ... and taking care of three pregnant women.

It still makes me laugh to remember how much money we spent, on maternity clothes, baby clothes, baby furniture and blankets, toys, converting one of the bedrooms into a nursery. What did I care what it cost? They were happy, which made me happy ... that's all I cared about.

Lilly handled her pregnancy like a seasoned trooper, which of course she was, having already given birth twice. Izzy didn't have much trouble at all, apart from morning sickness. In fact, up till the final two months it was hard to tell that she was even carrying a child. Peggy wasn't so lucky. Being so small and petite she ballooned up early and suffered just about every sort of ache and pain it was possible to have.

And me, being me ... I spent as much time with them at the ranch as I could, when I wasn't at school or learning the ropes at the CIA. When I was with them we were linked, with me suffering right along with them, taking away as much of their discomfort as I could manage, rubbing backs and feet, massaging shoulders and legs and constantly feeding them reassurance of my love and affection, mountains of orgasm inducing sparks, and whenever possible, all the sex they could handle.

It's hard to believe just how horny three pregnant women can get. Needless to say, I didn't have much in the way of free time for the next eight months.

They went into labor at almost the same time. Two thirty AM, the 14^th of February, 1992.

Dr. Wills had arranged for a military med-evac chopper to be on stand-by and as soon as Peggy's water broke, I was on the phone calling it in. Moments later, Izzy's broke, followed quickly by Lilly.

It was as if the babies were determined to be born together. I figured, why not? They'd probably been conceived within minutes of each other during Peggy's little lust inspired orgy.

I had all their travel bags set by the front door and was carrying Peggy down the stairs, with Lilly and Izzy waddling slowly behind us, when the chopper arrived. Fortunately for all of us it was a calm night, no snow storm howling outside. The medics emerged and rushed the house, litters in hand. Lilly and Izzy were loaded and hauled out to the helicopter, with me, Peggy cradled in my arms, pulling tail-end-Charlie.

Lilly hates riding in helicopters at the best of times, and this wasn't even close to the best, so I stayed linked with all three, but focused my efforts on keeping her calm and relaxed.

We arrived at Bethesda Naval Hospital a little before four AM; the girls were registered then rushed off to meet their doctors and be prepped, while I was told to sit quietly in the maternity ward's lounge and wait. Fat fucking chance!

I proceeded to terrorize the staff, from techs to nurses and doctors, all the way up to the on-duty chief of operations. At which point it was decided the best solution to all our problems would be to put all three girls into one birthing room and me along with them.

I smiled, agreed that it was a particularly wise decision, and then released my grip on the throat of the naval Captain who was running the joint. Whereupon I was escorted to the birthing room by four rather large Marines with silly grins on their faces, gowned up and led inside by the floor's chief nurse, who was surprisingly delighted to see me. Apparently the girls hadn't been too happy at my being kept away and were extremely vocal about expressing their displeasure. I also gathered that Peggy was less than gentle with her use of her own abilities ... sharing her discomfort rather liberally with those who weren't inclined to do what she wanted.

I moved from table to table, wiping brows, holding hands, easing pain and generally sharing in the festive atmosphere.

I was roundly cursed, threatened with emasculation and punched more than once before the doctors arrived and the girls put on something resembling their best behavior.

Lilly's baby showed up first, just before six. Rose Blacktower came into the world quietly and with a minimum of fuss, a full head of raven black hair, and weighing in at seven pounds, six ounces.

As soon as Rose had drawn her first breath to start squalling, Izzy delivered her daughter. Isabelle Marie Blacktower, named for our mother, had as much dark hair as her slightly older sister, but weighed nine pounds even.

Peggy had trouble dilating fully. Ultrasound showed that the baby had turned and was out of position. There was no choice but to do a cesarean. She resisted, complaining that she wouldn't be able to wear a bikini in the summer, and that I'd think she was hideously ugly and deformed. I had to remind my swollen sweetie that I had many more, and uglier, scars, and she still loved me. I promised that, if necessary, I'd kiss her scar each and every day for the rest of our lives.

That did the trick. The doctor did the surgery and Patricia Blacktower joined the family, with as much dark hair as her sisters, but weighing only five pounds ten ounces.

The babies were cleaned up and rushed out, while the mommies were stitched back together, cleaned up and moved to their room, a big semi private that I'd coerced from the Navy Captain while I still had my hand around his neck.

I was waiting there when they were wheeled in, ready with kisses and hugs, feeding them strength, love, admiration, appreciation and the immense pride I could barely keep inside. They were exhausted and it wasn't long before all three were fast asleep.

I went down the hall and around the corner to the nursery and stood at the window, searching for the three new arrivals. They were easy to spot, lying side by side, and except for the difference in size, looked very much like peas in a pod.

I don't care what anyone says ... newborns are not beautiful or cute or adorable. They're ugly little things, every single one looks like a bad mix of ET, Winston Churchill and a couple cans of thirty weight oil. Fortunately for them, not a one had inherited my lack of pigmentation ... but they still weren't much to look at. But I had more to go on than just looks. I could feel my babies. They felt beautiful. So pure and unspoiled, knowing only that they needed and wanted. And they knew I was there, watching them, loving them, happy and grateful that they'd come. They kicked their legs and waved their arms and my heart felt like it was going to explode.

"Don't you worry, my little darlings. Daddy's here. He'll always be here for you." I promised softly. Then, as I had with my big girls, I linked with my tiny ones and very carefully let them feel how much they were loved and cared for ... and felt them relax, contented and warm, slowly drifting off to sleep.

Do newborns dream? Are their untutored minds even capable of imagination, of dreaming, at that early stage?

I think so, but I'd be hard pressed to prove it in any tangible fashion. All I have to base my opinion on are a few hundred hours of being linked with my daughters while they slept, monitoring their rest, keeping them at ease, at peace, feeling safe, protected and loved. Always loved.

For the first few weeks after we took them home I spent almost as much time with the babies as I did with their mothers, which was no easy trick, since the girls acted as if the infants were attached to them most of the time. Not far from the truth really. It seemed that no matter where I looked there was a topless woman with a little baby busily slurping away.

Eventually they forgave me for what I'd done to them (their words, not mine), and I was slowly welcomed back into their good graces and affections, especially when they discovered that I spent most of my nights sitting up with one or more of the babies, rocking them, pacing the floor with them on my shoulder, or more often than not just laying on the bed with all three of them asleep on my chest.

Late in April the girls decided they'd had enough of breast feeding, and so began the transition to bottles. The unpleasant transition to bottles. The babies were not pleased and they resisted. I spent even more time with them, feeding, changing diapers and calming unhappy little feelings. They felt rejected.

I could sympathize.

One morning in early May I sat my girls down in the nursery, put their daughters in their arms and explained to them how the babies were feeling.

The tears started flowing almost immediately. From all six of them. I did the first thing that crossed my mind, and linked mothers and daughters together.

The babies stopped crying first, sensing and greedily taking in their mother's love. And gradually, almost imperceptibly, they returned that love with their own.

The bottle battle passed into humorous memory.

I asked Peggy, out of the hearing of the other two girls, why she hadn't linked with Patricia before (we began calling her Tinkerbelle early on, because she was so much smaller than her sisters, but the similarity in the names Tinkerbelle and Isabelle got to be too much and we all just started calling Patricia 'Tink'). Peggy told me that she'd been afraid of accidentally hurting or frightening her daughter, perhaps scarring her for life. We worked together for about a week, getting mother and daughter more comfortable with one another and Peggy more confident in her own abilities.

That summer Izzy applied for and accepted a teaching position at the Guilliford Academy in Virginia, a highly prestigious private school for the children of politicians, diplomats and the hereditarily wealthy.

Peggy applied to the University, planning on a degree in Veterinary medicine.

She and Izzy started classes the same week, leaving the care of the babies primarily in Lilly's hands.

I'd never seen or felt her so happy. Lilly was born to be a mother, taking to it like a duck to water. I helped out when I could, but most of the time it seemed as if I were only getting the way.

So I concentrated more and more on my own schooling and, of course, work.

In October, following another one of Peggy's inspirational lust orgies, Lilly announced joyfully that she was pregnant again. Izzy and Peggy had gone and had their tubes tied, both deciding that one child was all they were prepared to have.

And on July 29^th 1993 my son, Alexander Joshua Blacktower was born. There was nowhere near the excitement at the hospital that there'd been for his sisters. They were better prepared the second time around.

When we brought AJ home, his sisters, who were just learning to walk, dropped their toys, struggled to their feet and awkwardly toddled over to his crib, demanding to see their new brother. I picked all three up in my arms, (we'd become quite proficient at the three of them using my right forearm as a bench, my left taking on the role of seatbelt) and held them over the crib so they could get a good look. They cooed, laughed, blew bubbles from their spit and drooled on his blankets.

Not the kind of welcome home I'd have looked forward to, but it seemed to make AJ smile a lot. Or it might have been gas.

I doted on my son, but no more, I think, than I did with his sisters. Early on I sat the babies down together and linked them, so they'd get to know one another better, and be aware of the feelings they all had in common. I never wanted my babies to go thru the kind of childhood I had. I was determined that, one way or another, they'd learn to love and care for one another.

The images stopped moving; not fast, not slow ... not at all.

'Freeze frame ... close up on the big pale young man with the shoulder length white hair, neatly trimmed goatee, three cute little dark haired girls standing before him and a four month old baby boy cradled in his arms ... notice the smile on his lips, the faint glint of fire in his soft gray eyes ... this young man is happy — he doesn't realize that from this point on his life will start to fall apart ... and he won't see it coming till it's almost too late.' the pale figure declaimed.

"Wha... ?" I started to ask ... and then the frozen image before my eyes warped, the center tried to move to the outside, the edges shifted to opposite sides and counter corners and when the laws of physics could no longer hold, it shattered into a billion tiny jagged fragments that made a bee-line for my nerves and brain. The movie was over ... no more standing back and watching my life play out before me ... the walls around my memories fell completely, the veils dropped and years of suppressed recollections, exact and complete in every detail, came out and swallowed me.

I remembered it all...

1991 had been a fast and busy year for me, and not just professionally. I rounded up three moles fairly quickly after I'd started working full time for Dr. Wills. It wasn't hard, and that was probably a mistake on my part; not making what I did appear to be more difficult than it really was. I was young, though, and eager to prove myself ... and they just made it so damn easy! No sooner would I step out of the elevators, coming face to face with yet another department I'd never heard of, when I'd start feeling that something was off kilter. I'd have the department head take me around, introducing their people and explaining what they did ... and BAM! It was as if they had lain across the middle of the corridor with a sign around their neck proclaiming to the world "I'm a Spy; please arrest me at your earliest convenience."

So I did. Arrest them, I mean. I wanted to do things the right way though, by which I mean turning the bastards over to the proper authorities for trial. I'd taken my girl's words to heart and had decided to cut as far back on the use of my talent as possible, while still allowing me to perform my job.

The problem was, I was the proper authority. At least I was the first level of authority. Dr. Wills made that quite clear.

"Son, you find 'em, you take care of 'em. It has to work that way. Either that or we've got to request the FBI and Justice Department step in and start an investigation. That's what we're trying to avoid, remember?"

So I began to ... not lie, really ... but to leave out certain details of my daily work when I talked to the girls.

They were all busy with redecorating the Ranch, legally changing their names, getting bank accounts and credit cards, new driver's licenses and just generally being pregnant. I really didn't think they needed, or wanted, to be bothered with the nuances of my day to day occupational tribulations.

So I turned the first one, killed the second and turned the third. I never said a word to my sweet, gentle, loving girls about any of them.

In 1992 I located and nabbed four more spies, and following the conversion of number three in September, who just happened to be in the employ of one of our country's staunchest allies, I received my first formal invitation to a foreign embassy.

Dr. Wills got quite a laugh when I showed him the engraved and embossed envelope and its contents.

"Looks like you've finally made the big time, son."

When I asked him whether or not I should ignore the invitation, he looked at me as if I were out of my mind.

"Ike, you never, ever pass up an opportunity to size up your enemies."

"Doctor, these people aren't our enemies, they're our friends." I objected.

He shook his head and smiled sadly. "Would friends be planting spies in our government's security agencies?" he asked me.

I frowned for a brief instant and then took a quick mental step forward. "How many do we have in their government?"

His smile grew fond and wider than it had been. "Ike, it's a sad comment on the world we live in, but the cold undiluted truth is that people can have friends, governments cannot." He raised the envelope and wiggled it slightly between his fingertips. "This government has been our ally for more than a hundred years now. Before that they conspired and aided a nation we were at war with, and prior to that we fought two separate wars with them. We've been many things to each other over the years, but friends ... that we've never been."

"What do you think they want with me? I mean, why the invitation?"

He leaned back in his chair and smirked. "Well, let me see now ... didn't you just finish digging out a deeply entrenched mole that just happened to belong to these folks?"

I nodded. Then it hit me. "They want to size me up."

Dr. Wills raised one eyebrow.

"How do they even know it was me who got him?" I wondered aloud.

The older man across from me was silent and trying very hard to clamp down on the silly-assed grin that was on the verge of breaking loose across his lips.

I curled my upper lip at him and growled slightly. "Either they have another mole in here or you ratted me out!" I said accusingly.

He lifted his hands to shoulder height in mock surrender. "I wouldn't do that, even to teach you as important a lesson as this one. No, this is all our friend's doing."

"How much danger would I be in, if I agreed to go?"

He stared at me long and hard, all trace of humor gone from his face and eyes.

"Ike, my boy, you're a spy hunter. No one likes having their spies found, and everyone hates having them turned into double agents. How much danger do you think you'd be in if you went?"

I returned his humorless expression with one of my own ... for about ten seconds.