NO RIGHT PATH

 

In fleeing a future that only wishes to take from him 

(not too different than our present, right?)

Richard Blaine is flung into a fiery limbo ... wbere up is down and wrong is right ... not unlike our present politics.

NO RIGHT PATH

“War breaks more than lives. It breaks minds.

 I have seen too many officers trapped in the grasping responsibilities of their unrelenting command.

Observed too many officers drawn and quartered by opposing needs that demanded immediate gratification.

Years of such punishment breaks minds. General Eisenhower’s was one such mind.”

 – Rabbi Lt. Amos Stein

 

The world was suddenly flame.

I smiled with a face I couldn’t feel. In fact, once again, I couldn’t feel my entire body. The cessation of pain from my throbbing wrists was more than welcome.

Sentient certainly knew how to show a guy a good time. I expected a curt come-back.

But like so often in my life, I did not get what I expected. Perhaps she was busy getting us the hell away from the Harvester and its hellish future.

I wasn’t complaining.

‘For once. Now, hush! I am concentrating.’

Easy for her to say. You try to think of nothing. Not a thing. Can’t be done this side of death.

I focused on the icy flames swirling about my body or mind or soul or whatever it was that made up my perceptions.

Flames.

They look like objects but are really processes.

Humans are like that as well. No human actually is complete. He or she is in the process of becoming.

But becoming what? We answer that question with our choices.

We all write the script of the movie of our life “on the go” so to speak.

That endeavor is tricky. We don't get the luxury of time to reflect, muse, or ponder at leisure.

Life is a harsh mistress. As we struggle, she flashes us that "beauty-queen" smile: all sharp teeth and no heart. And in her games of chance, the House ultimately wins.

We plan and prepare. Life gleefully throws her monkey wrench into our preparations.

We must write our lives in the crosshairs of illness, accidents, wars, dysfunctional humans, and our own inner demons.

We are all in Life's crosshairs, and none of us know when she will pull the trigger. We just know that she will.

OOOF!

I went from standing up to sitting down. Hard!

‘Next time, I will ask you to think non-stop, driveling nonsense since you seem compelled to do the opposite of what I ask.’

I blinked my eyes to clear them.

‘Where are we?’

‘On the stone bench in front of the dreary hospital in which I have placed the illusion of you laying near death’s door. Do not worry. On this bench, you are clothed in the uniform you wore aboard the Rocinante.’

‘I don’t know about death’s door, but I was certainly in her neighborhood back there in the future.’

‘Oh, just so you know: in that future, the Third Reich won this conflict.’

‘What?’

‘Do not let your ego become inflated. Your absence merely prevented you from being the needed catalyst for the progression of certain events necessary for victory.’

‘At least I know I serve a purpose. There are many in this damn war that do not know even that.’

‘I believe you are mistaken.’

‘Both our opinions are rooted in our experience. Both of them are true. It's just that we've had different experiences.’

‘You have no idea. At least, I have been spared your constant maudlin yearning over that Helen Mayfair.’

“This time, you are mistaken. She is in my heart like music at the edge of silence.’

There was a bellow of outrage distant from us. It roared from the front of the hospital. I grinned crooked. Leave it to the Army to make a building grimmer and more utilitarian than seemed possible.

It had the oddest portico over its yawning porch. But then, you should never judge a porch by its portico.

‘You think such things to irritate me, do you not?’

‘No, I’m just me.’

‘More the pity.’

Two men stormed their way to my bench. Both of them I knew. One from news reels and the other from sailing into Hell beside me.

Former MI6 operative James Cloverfield had once left me to die alone, but then, thought better of it --- and for that I thought better of him.

He had charged into certain death with me on board the Rocinante. He was family … at least an orphan’s definition of the word.

When everything goes to hell, the people who stand by you without flinching -- they are your family.

Winston Churchill, fuming as I had never seen him do on the news reels, stopped directly in front of my bench. He looked as if he didn’t even see me as Cloverfield tried to calm the man down to no avail.

‘He does not see you. I have nudged you a tiny layer back in time.’

As an orphan, I had sympathy for his unhappy childhood, redeemed only by the affection of Mrs. Everest, his devoted nurse.

Reading his adventures with a wandering Texas Ranger, Samuel McCord, in 1895 Sudan fired my young imagination.

He married the beautiful Lady Lucille Wentworth in 1910.

 It was a marriage of unbroken affection that provided a secure and happy background for his turbulent career.

“Turbulent” was the exact word for his mood at the moment.

“How dare those Military Policemen deny me access to Major Blaine’s hospital room?”

He pounded his massive chest. “I am the bloody Prime Minister!”

Cloverfield sighed, “They were merely obeying the direct orders of General Eisenhower, the Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces for Overlord.”

“And I am the ruddy Prime Minister! I have half a mind to charge up those steps and dare those cretins to arrest me!”

Cloverfield sighed, “You know how unstable Eisenhower is when it comes to Major Blaine. Besides, my friend is not even conscious.’

‘Sentient, would you nudge me back into reality and have my voice sound like King George VI?’

‘I am not your servant! Yet … I am curious as to just what your devious mind plans to do.’

My whole body tingled as my foot might have done when going from being asleep to becoming fully awake.

”Prime Minister.”

He jerked in place as if bee stung. He wheeled around. “Your Majesty, I ….”

He froze as Cloverfield exclaimed, “Bloody Hell! I just left you, looking like Hell’s Vomit not a heartbeat ago. No, wait! That was a savage trick whipped up by your Dark Passenger, was it not?”

“Yes,” I answered and turned my eyes to the still shocked Churchill. “Who was the sorriest at the return of the Prodigal Son?”

The Prime Minister shook off his shock as a washed dog might have done to the unwanted water. “I seem to be unaware of that particular verse of Holy Writ.”

“The fatted calf.”

As the two both snorted, I said, “Please do not be the Fatted Calf in this scenario.”

“You are lecturing an elder statesman, young man!”

“Yes, sir. But I learned the hard way in New Orleans that anger is just anger.”

I sighed, “It isn't good. It isn't bad. It just is. What you do with it is what matters. It's like anything else. You can use it to build or to destroy. You just have to make the proper choice, choose the right path."

“Constructive anger," Churchill said, his voice dripping sarcasm.

“Sometimes called resolve," I said softly.

"Resolve has overthrown tyrants and freed prisoners and slaves. Resolve has brought justice where before there was savagery. Resolve has created freedom where before  there was nothing but fear."

I tried to reach him somehow. "Resolve has helped souls rise from the ashes of their horrible lives and build something better, stronger, more beautiful.”

Sentient sighed within my mind as Churchill’s face hardened.

‘A man who believes he knows everything can learn nothing.’

‘I had to try.’

‘Last time you did that, you lost your hands, remember?’

‘I never claimed I was a fast learner.’