Changing of the Guard

Part Two: Forces

Cover: Two young children in their parents' bedroom. One is laying on the bed with a large, ugly bullet-wound in his chest. Blood is everywhere. The younger child is holding the gun, with a horrified expression on his face. A wisp of smoke is rising from the barrel. Text under the image reads: "...never again..."

" ee, I told you I knew where he hides it," said Todd. The twelve year stood on his toes, balanced on a battered desk chair. He was reaching up into the top of his father's closet. "Here it is, right up here."

"I don't know, Todd," said Jason. The boy, no more than seven, looked around nervously. Even though he knew their parents weren't home, he couldn't dismiss the feeling that their father was going to come bursting into the room at any second... belt drawn and ready to whip them both. "Maybe... maybe you should leave it alone."

"Stop being a baby." Todd grabbed a large shoebox from the top shelf. He got down from the chair and set the box down on his parents' bed. Jason stared at him with admiration, and looked at the box with more than a little fear.

Todd opened the box, revealing the contents.

It was a .38 semiautomatic handgun. The gun shared the shoebox with a carton of bullets, a soft rag, and a small bottle of strange-smelling cleaning oil. Todd grabbed the gun and held it in his hands.

"Wow..." Jason gasped. His big brother was holding his father's gun. Until this moment, Jason didn't think his brother could get any cooler... but now he was holding the Great Taboo in his hands. The Gun. "Wow!"

Todd turned the weapon over and looked at it from a few different angles. He pointed it at an imaginary figure by the window.

"Bang!" he mouthed. "Yer dead."

"Can I hold it?" said Jason. He knew his brother wasn't going to let him hold it, but he had to ask anyway. "Please?"

"Huh? You? Hell no."

"Aww, c'mon Todd!"

"No."

Time to play the trump card.

"I'll tell dad."

Todd scowled at Jason.

"I will! Honest!"

"See, I was gonna let you hold it anyway, but since you wanna be a little snitch I won't even let you LOOK at it any more!" He started to put the gun away.

"Awww, Toooddddd," Jason whined. "Iiii waaannnna hollld iiiit....."

Todd looked at him and shook his head.

"Okay. Fine." Todd hit the magazine-release on the side of the gun. The full magazine popped out of the handgrip and slid neatly into Todd's outstretched hand. "Here." He handed the gun to Jason. Jason held the heavy chunk of metal in his hands as if he expected it to grow hot and burn his fingers off. It didn't.

He just looked down at it.

"That's all you gonna go?" said Todd. "Put it in your hand like this-" Todd took Jason's little fingers and wrapped them around the handgrip. The gun was so heavy he had to hold it with two hands. "Now put your other finger and put it through here. You seen how they do it on TV."

Jason adjusted his grip and held the gun properly... or as proper as he could given the size of his palms.

"That's it," said Todd.

Jason smiled. He was holding It. The Gun was in his hands. Just like Dad. Just like Todd. Just like the people in the movies. He felt the nervousness fade away... yielding to new sensations. Triumph. Invulnerability. Manhood. The smile widened.

"Woooow!"

"Okay. That's enough." Todd reached for the gun, but Jason jerked away from his big brother.

"Uh-uh. I ain't through holdin' it."

"Boy, please," Todd chuckled. "You ain't doin nothing but sittin there starin' at it. Give it here; I gotta put it back."

"No."

"I said give it HERE!" Todd reached out and grabbed the gun. Jason pulled back. His right index finge, firmly placed on the trigger, pulled back as well...

BANG!!!

The gun roared and kicked in Jason's hands like a thing alive. The noise was like a thunderclap on a quiet night... loud and terrifying. Todd fell back onto his parent's bed as the gun fell from Jason's grasp.

Too scared to scream, Jason looked down at the gun. He didn't even know what happened until he looked up and saw the blood on Todd's T-Shirt. There was a hole in the center of his chest, and blood still leaked out of it.

Todd wasn't breathing.

He was dead.

Jason had shot him.

It took the terrified boy several seconds to even draw a breath. And when he did, it was only to scream-

"AAAAAAA-"

Jason sat up in the white bed and shattered the silence with the most ear-splitting scream he had ever made. The nurse in the room dropped her clipboard, and the clatter snapped Jason's brain back to the present.

"What?" He looked around. He could tell he was in a hospital, but why? His head throbbed painfully, and he felt dizzy. He could still hear the echo from the gunshot... even though it had happened years ago. His brother was dead. He'd killed him.

Jason saw the nurse. Her plump, but otherwise attractive frame was surrounded by a deep orange aura, in which a few tiny dots of inky darkness darted to and fro like microbes. Most of them seemed to be gathering on the side of the nurse's body closest to Jason.

He pointed at them. They responded by squirming around with increased vigor.... trying to reach out to him.

Jason opened his mouth-

"Dear God if you SCREAM like that again I swear I'm gonna have a heart attack," said the nurse. She was still trying to catch her breath, and seemed completely oblivious to what was going on in the air around her.

"I'm s-sorry," said Jason. "Where... where am I?"

"Sansforth," said the nurse. Sansforth Memorial was Rock Springs's oldest hospital, located in downtown Rock Springs. "Some folks brought you in."

"Sansforth?" Strange memories came floating back to him. He remembered why his head hurt. He also remembered why the black dots on the nurse's aura made him nervous. It hadn't been a dream.

"Men in an alley," Jason mumbled. He felt the bandage around his head. It covered a nice-sized bump on his forehead. "Ouch."

"Yeah. Ouch. Not too bad though-"

Suddenly the door opened, and an older man entered. He wore a white coat and had a stethoscope draped around his neck. His aura was a murky black morass that rotated slowly in the air around him. The sight of it made Jason's stomach churn.

"I hear you're awake," said the doctor. "Actually I think the whole floor knows it now." The old doctor smiled. "I'm doctor Stein."

He approached Jason, and Jason leapt off of the table and backed away from the man.

"Uhhh... what- what's going on here?" Jason eyed the doctor warily. Why was this man's aura so... evil.

Yes. 'Evil' was the only way Jason could describe it.

"Now just calm down, you took a blow to the head."

"Uh-huh," said Jason. He moved to place the bed between him and the doctor.

"Some people found you in an alley a few hours ago. You were unconscious. You have a concussion. Not a serious one, but it's still a concussion. You should be all right soon. You had no ID, so we just let you rest here until you woke up. How do you feel?"

The doctor reached across the bed, trying to grab Jason.

"I'm fine!" Jason grunted as he twisted away. He was too slow, and the edge of the doctor's twisted aura brushed Jason's arm.

There was a familiar flash of darkness...

"Dear GOD, Stein! You're EXPERIMENTING on these people against their will!"

"They're comatose, Winston.... they don't HAVE a will."

"But their families-"

"I'm not going to let sentimentality prevent me from making the medical discovery of the century!"

"This isn't about discovery! This isn't about curing cancer... it's all about YOU!"

"YES IT IS! But if I restore LIFE and HOPE to the world, what DIFFERENCE will my reasons make?"

"But you're KILLING people!"

"Every discovery requires study... and sacrifice."

"I'm going to the police-"

"You're going nowhere."

"L-let go of me, Stein!"

"No. You haven't seen what I've done."

"Yes I have! Let GO of me!"

"No... you've only seen the fringes of my research. The tip of the iceberg. Come with me... let me show you the rest. Then you'll understand."

"I understand. I understand you're a MONSTER!"

"No. I am a GOD!"

"Let me g- STEIN! What are you DOING!!? Put that down! HEL-"

The vision vanished as quickly as it began, leaving Jason even more shaken than he had been before.

"Oh, my God... what did you do?" he said as he backed away from the doctor. "What did you do to Winston?"

"What?" The doctor's smile faltered. "Who? What are you talking about?"

Jason looked into the doctor's eyes... which was difficult to do with all the darkness swarming around the man. Jason wanted to believe that the doctor had no idea what he was talking about... but there was something in his eyes. Something about the way his smile winced when Jason spoke...

"You killed him didn't you?"

"Nurse... I think he's delirious. We'd better sedate him."

"Yes, doctor."

The nurse turned to leave the room.

"I think you'd better leave now, Jason," said a familiar voice in Jason's head. "You don't have time to deal with this..."

Jason didn't question.... he just ran. He vaulted over the hospital bed, flew past the doctor, and bolted for the door. The nurse moved to stop him, but he shoved her violently to the side and burst out into the hallway. Passing nurses and patients turned to look at him... all of them were illuminated by colorful auras dotted varying degrees of inky blackness.

"Oh, God... what's happening to me!?"

"No time to explain. Right now you need to get out of here."

Jason sprinted down the hall. A nurse shouted, and by the time some burly male nurses appeared, Jason had already hit the stairwell.

"Second floor! They'll be expecting you on the first!"

"What?"

"DO IT!"

Jason was on the third floor. He ran down one flight of stairs and stepped out into a crowded hallway. People turned to look at him.

"I... I..."

"Ignore the people. Take the elevator to the first floor."

"But you just said-"

"They're expecting you to come out of the stairwell, NOT the elevator. You'll have enough of a surprise to make it to the front door."

"Wait, wait, wait..." said Jason. "What am I doing? This is a hospital, not a prison. I should be able to just walk on out of here.

"Do you really want to try that?"

Jason shook his head. The people in the hall were still staring at him... probably because he'd just been standing there having a quick conversation with himself. He walked calmly to the elevator and took it town one floor.

It was just as Donovan had said. There were a few security guards gathered around the stairwell, which was around the corner from the elevators. Jason walked right through the lobby, and was halfway to the doors when someone shouted.

"HEY! HEY YOU!"

Jason ran for the door. He was away before anyone could do more than look at him. He ducked around a corner and hid behind a parked car. He was outside, but still within the hospital complex. His condo was a full nine blocks away.

"I'm running the hospital," said Jason. "I can't believe I'm running from a hospital."

"By the end of the week, you'll be doing a lot of things you won't believe. But first we have get away from here."

"Any ideas?"

"Yeah," said Donovan. "Start walking, and when you get home... stop."

etective Marilyn Dobbs sat down at her immaculate desk and took a few minutes to gather her thoughts. She tossed her car-keys into the top left drawer, where they nestled among her spare pistol, atube of dark raisin lipstick, a canister of police-issue mace, and her box of emergency chocolate. There was also a hand mirror and a comb, which she used to put her shoulder-length hair back into place.

Finally, she started flipping through the neat stack of papers that sat in her in-box, searching for a specific group of notes. The fact that they weren't where she put them yesterday immediately began to annoy her, and the smooth brown skin of her face twisted into an unhappy scowl.

"When ya gonna clean up this desk, Dobbs?" said her partner, James Royce... who's own desk looked as if someone had upended a recycle-bin on top of it. "It's a mess."

The large, red-faced cop sat down on the corner of Marilyn's desk, causing the wood to groan in protest.

Marilyin slowly raised her slender, feminine middle finger and aimed it in Royce's direction.

"It's Saturday. I promised my daughter some shopping, and I'm here with you instead. Don't start."

Royce chuckled and tossed the missing notes on her desk.

"Since you were late I started without ya."

"And since this is supposed to be my day off, you can feel free to finish without me, too," Marilyn started paging through the notes... three pages of details concerning a mysterious, and very deceased John Doe. "What do we have?"

"The nerds say there wasn't any alcohol or drugs in the guy's blood... what little of it he had left."

"What's that?"

"He was short a gallon or so. Wasn't in the car, either."

"And still driving ?"

"Yeah. Not very well, though."

"But it wasn't the crash that killed him."

"Nope. They guy shoulda been a corpse long before he hit that pole."

"What about the knife?"

"Just a knife." Royce shrugged. "Those things don't have serial numbers, ya know."

"Well maybe they should. So somebody rips this guy a new one... Stabs him in the back... And yet he still manages to drive into downtown from... from wherever this happened."

"Yep."

"No drugs."

"Nope."

"What about witnesses? What about this Jason Brooks guy?"

"Checks out. No priors. Got his statement stapled in the back there."

"I see it."

Marilyn read the brief report.

"I'm gonna want to talk to this guy agai-"

Marilyn's phone rang. She snatched it up before the sound could annoy her any further.

"Second precinct, homicide. Dobbs here..... Yes?..... A what?.... An explosion?... This is homicide, why are you calling me about an explo-... oh... oh... uh-huh..."

Marilyn grabbed a notepad and pen from the top right drawer and began scribbling notes. Royce leaned to read them, eliciting another groan from the desk.

"...Okay.... Okay... uh-huh... We're on it."

She hung up the phone.

"What's up?" said Royce.

"Looks like we may have a lead on where the rest of our John Doe's blood went. Come on, I'll explain on the way..."

" ight back where I started from," said Jason. Freshly showered, he sat on the edge of his bed, amid some clean clothes that he lacked the energy to put on. His mind was reeling from everything that had happened since he'd awakened... and from everything that the damned voice in his head was telling him. He fingered the bump on his head, and wondered if it were possible for a concussion to cause hallucinations even BEFORE you were hit.

That didn't seem likely. Maybe the whole thing was just a dream.

Or maybe that car last night had actually hit him... crushing him against the lamp-post like a bug.

His broken body was still laying there on the street, and everything that had happened since was just the final, chaotic flashes from his dying brain cells.

Of course, that would mean he was dead.

"I'm dead, aren't I," said Jason.

"No. You're alive. For now. But that can change rather quickly... believe me, I know. Hurry up and get dressed. We've got work to do, and we've wasted enough time already."

"What? Look... assuming this isn't a dream - which it IS - then why should I do anything you say?"

"Because I'm your Guide. I came before you. I've been where you are and I know things you don't."

"Care to explain any of it?"

"I explained this to you on the way here. You weren't listening."

"Well pardon me. I saw a man die last night... which you say was YOU... I've been mugged and I'd just run out of a hospital, so excuse me if I had a lot on my mind. Not that it matters anyway. None of this is real... right?"

"Yes, it is real. You are awake, and this is not a dream."

"Uh-huh," said Jason. Everything certainly seemed real enough... especially the pain from his head. But wasn't that how dreams were supposed to be? You could never tell you're dreaming until you wake up. But THIS dream had certainly gone on longer than most. And the details... his dreams had never been this detailed before. At least not most of them. There was always the one about the gun...

"Well what the hell IS it, then?" said Jason. "Earlier you said that I was come kind of... of..."

"Warrior. Crusader. It's gone by many names over the millennia, but I'm partial to the last one. Their history goes as far back as the ancient druids... maybe even further."

"Druids. Right. As far as I know, there weren't any black druids, so how did I get to be one of these crusaders?"

"When I died, I passed it on to you."

"And you did that because....?"

"I don't know."

"What do you MEAN you don't know!!? YOU'RE the one that did this to me! And now you're saying you don't know why? What the f-"

"I died in a church outside of town. Because of what I was... what you are now... I came back just long enough to pass the gifts on to you, so that YOU could carry on the fight. I chose you because your aura called to me... I don't know why or how, but there is something about you that made you suitable beyond anyone else I encountered."

"Oh yeah, and just how many people did you encounter after you 'died'?"

"A few. Not many."

"Figures. And how does this explain what happened to my eyes? How come I'm seeing all these colors and... things. That's not real, is it?"

"Like I've said a dozen times already, you've been given certain gifts, which you must learn how to use-"

"That doesn't sound like an answer to my question, Don."

"Donovan. And your answer is called Discernment. Your mind is attuned to the darkness within people. You can see it. You can reach inside it and see what secrets it holds."

"But I can't turn it off."

"No."

Jason started rocking back and forth on the edge of the bed.

"So... every time I see somebody. Every time I get close to them-"

"With practice, you can learn to see past it and operate like a normal person."

"But I won't BE a normal person."

"No."

"You know, it's a good thing you're a ghost... because if you weren't I'd be kicking your ass right about now. Assuming all this was real, anyway."

"Why wouldn't it be real, Jason?"

"Because this is.... I....you... that's a trick question."

"Jason, there are forces in this world that are beyond any of your current knowledge or experience. Some of them are... malevolent."

"Evil."

"Some people call it that."

"And what does this have to do with me... as if I don't already know..."

"You're warrior. It's your job to fight these forces and destroy them whenever possible."

"Yep. I knew it. Now I KNOW I'm dreaming. What... I'm a superhero or something? I'm supposed to go around looking for evil so I can kick its ass?"

"No. Not exactly."

"What does 'not exactly' mean?"

"It means that, usually, you won't have to go out looking for anything. In most cases they will come looking for you. Now we need to-

"Hold it!"

"-get moving. Get your clothes on so we-."

"Hold it!"

"-can get out of here."

"HOLD THE $%*# PHONE! What do you MEAN this stuff will come looking for me!?!"

"It's another one of your gifts, Jason. Attraction... these malevolent forces will be drawn to you. Some will be unaware of it, other's will. Either way, finding them will usually not be a problem... they'll be all around you."

"WHAT!"

"And if you don't want them to find you sitting half-naked on this bed, then you'd better get dressed and get moving."

"Oh great!" Jason pulled on his clothes. "I'm an evil-magnet, is that what you're saying?"

"Yes."

"And you call that a GIFT!?!" Jason grabbed his brown trenchcoat from the closet. "Where can I exchange that #@$#%!?!? Take it BACK!"

"No. I've indulged you so far, but now we have to get to work."

"WORK!?!? Work on getting me OUT of this freaky club you signed me up for!"

"We have to check on something. And on the way, I have to finish telling you about your gifts."

"I'm not so sure I want to know."

" 'm not so sure I can do this."

Following Donovan's instructions, Jason had driven to a rural area on the outskirts of town. He parked by the side of the road and walked until he came to an old church. Police where everywhere, as was a crowd of onlookers. That was the problem... people. They were crammed in so thick that Jason couldn't see what it was they were looking at. He would have to get close, which would mean more auras with dark stains.

There was plenty of darkness there... nothing like what he'd seen around the doctor, but every single person had some taint on them. As Jason got closer, the slowly rotating auras began to stretch, bringing the dark spots closer to him. It was just as Donovan said. Darkness was attracted to him.

Jason halted about twenty yards away from the edge of the crowd.

"I'm not getting any closer," said Jason. "Not to this..." He pointed at the glowing crowd.

"You have to."

"You know what'll happen."

"Only if you let it. The visions only come when you give them power."

"I don't remember giving any power to the other ones I had."

"Your attention. Your fear. When you focus your mind... intentionally or unintentionally... that's when the visions come."

"So... I have to unfocus my mind?"

"And not be afraid. Just focus on something else... like their faces. Or try to see whatever it is they're looking at."

"O-kay. This isn't going to work, though."

Jason approached the crowd. He gasped as the glowing mass of their collected auras reached him. He backed away.

"I ain't doing this."

"Just let it pass," said Donovan. "It's easier than you think."

Jason took a deep breath and focused on a black woman who was standing near the police officers. She was tall, and her clothes fit her lithe frame quite well. Her aura was mostly clean, but he tried not to look at it. He focused on her face as she talked to the cops. Jason wondered if she was with them.

He wondered if she had a gun. The sudden revulsion at the thought made it even easier to ignore the auras from the crowd as they washed over him.

He felt nothing.

No visions, no voices. As long as he focused on something OTHER than the auras, then he didn't receive any of the unpleasant effects of touching them.

"Hey, this works," said Jason.

"huh?" said an elderly man, who must have thought Jason was talking to him. Jason didn't even look at the man's aura. He could see it... but he didn't look at it. He just pretended it wasn't there, like background conversations in a crowded room.

"Ask him what's going on."

"Uhh... I said what's going on out here?"

"Some kids vandalized the old church," said the man. "And burnt up a car."

"Burnt up a car?" said Jason. He pushed through the crowd... taking care not to let his concentration slip. He kept looking at the woman he'd singled out. A detective? She turned to look at him, and Jason quickly looked away. Instead, he focused on the large burnt-out automobile that was sitting in front of the church. "What the hell?"

All that remained was a portion of the car's twisted, blackened frame. Make, model, and year were completely unrecognizable. The rear half was missing entirely. Bits of charred debris dotted church's yard, and the ground surrounding the car was as black as tar.

"Burnt up, hell....," mumbled Jason. "somebody blew that thing to pieces."

"Get closer to the police. Try to hear what they're saying."

"Yes, massa," Jason whispered.

He backed away and circled around toward where most of the police were gathered.... including the dectecive he'd been looking at earlier. He got as close to them as he could without looking suspicious, and listened.

"...blood inside leading to a second set of tire tracks outside," said the woman. She was talking to another man. There were three uniformed officers gathered around them. "By the time the lab-nerds get back to us on the blood, I will already want to know where those tracks went."

"You already have an idea where?" said one of the uniforms.

"Downtown. There was a car wreck last night. Driver looked like he'd been worked over pretty bad before he even got behind the wheel. Lost a lot of blood. How this fits with the bomb in the car, I don't know."

"Heh, this is the nineties," sair Royce. "Nobody needs a motive to blow else somebody up... they just do it 'cause it's fun."

"Drug deal gone bad?" said another cop.

"Maybe. But there was no drugs or money in the car we found."

"Maybe he and the driver of that car had a little religious disagreement," offered the other detective. "You know, Church-Rage."

"Ha-Ha, Royce. When does your world comedy tour start?"

"Well, hopefully that skeleton has some DNA left in it to identify."

"If not, we're outta luck. Dental records won't help us here... not without a skull."

"DAMN!!!"

Donovan's sudden mental shout nearly broke Jason's concentration. Jason quickly moved away from the cops and the rest of the crowd.

"What was that about?" he whispered when he was out of earshot.

"No skull. He got away."

"Who got away? Who was in that car?"

"The thing that killed me. I blew it up, but it's still out there."

"What do you mean, 'thing'?"

"Let's get out of here."

"No, no, no... define 'thing'? What 'thing'?"

"We have to find something. I didn't want the police to find it in the car, so I dropped it out of the window not far from here. If Brite's still alive, you're gonna need it. Hopefully the police haven't picked it up."

"What are you talking about?"

"My sword."

"Your what?!?"

---

"Who was that guy?" Detective Dobbs said as Jason walked away.

"Who?" replied Royce. "That guy that's been starin' at you? Damned if I know. Seemed mighty interested in what we were sayin' though. Or it could be those tight slacks you're wea-"

Detective Dobbs silenced him with another middle finger.

"You want me to stop him?" offered one of the uniformed officers.

"Find out where he's going. If he's got a car, get his tag number."

The cop walked away, and Marilyn turned back to the crime scene.

"So," said Royce. "Do you think the skull is out here somewhere, or did it get pulverized in the explosion? I'm thinking it got blown to smithereens."

"You left out an option," replied Marilyn.

"What's that?"

"Maybe somebody took it."

"What the hell for!?!"

"You said it yourself, Royce. These days motive is irrelevant and unnecessary. Sometimes people are just plain crazy."

he woman walked quickly down the sidewalk, her nervousness showing with every step. Every few seconds she'd turn and look behind her, as if expecting someone to be there. She saw no one... the sidewalk was deserted as far as she could see. But she looked again a few moments later just to be sure.

"What's her problem?" Rock whispered from the alley about a block ahead of the woman.

"I don't know what it is now," replied Joel, who was standing behind him. "but I know what its gonna be in a few minutes."

The ducked back into the alley watched the lady walk towards them.

"Two in one day," whispered Joel.

"Hope she's got more money than that guy did this morning."

"Shhh..."

They could hear the woman's high heels clicking on the sidewalk.

Ka-click

Ka-click

Ka-click

When she reached the very edge of the alley Rock leapt out at her.

He saw the gun a second too late. She had it in her hand, and pulled the trigger the instant she saw him. The gun made a strange sound-

pfffft!

-and a tiny dart appeared in Rock's neck.

"Huh? HEY!" Rock hit the ground.

Joel emerged, his own weapon pointed right at her. Had he actually been trying to shoot her instead of just scare her, he may have had a chance. He hesitated. She fired.

pffft!

The fast-acting tranquilizer put them both down within two seconds of being shot. The two men lay crumpled on the sidewalk like large piles of dirty clothes.

The woman put the tranquilizer pistol back into her purse, and retrieved a small radio. She pushed a button and spoke into it.

"Come," she said.

A large brown van screeched around the corner and came to a quick halt right in front of her. The rear doors opened. Three men got out and quickly loaded the unconscious thieves into the back. Meanwhile, the woman climbed into the passenger seat.

"Good job," said the driver, an older man with a large scar on the side of his face.

"Yes," the woman replied. "But these fools are just the beginning. Our lord and master will require more than this if he is to return. Much more."

"Blood must flow," said the driver.

"And Lord Brite will rise," she replied. "Our lord will rise once more."

To Be Continued...

copyright 2005 by Dark Icon Entertainment
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