A BP&G adventure - Pockets; Heretic

[joegoda]

Holding the tiller in one hand, checking the gauges with one eye, dialing dials with the other hand and keeping an eye on the outside, Pockets was pretty darn busy. The path the centaurs had taken was much more narrow than he had ever expected to drive over. On one side, a gentle slope of sand, leading back to the desert where they had come. On the other side, a steep bouncingly deadly fall down a mountainside. Neither was what he wanted, and neither was where he was going.

If the path had been a river, the wagon was built to float across it. If the path had been a desert, the wagon was built to just roll across it. Even mountains were something Pockets had figured in, making the wheels extra sturdy with tread on them that would climb almost any grade, up or down.

A narrow path, much more narrow than the wagon was itself, filled with rocks the size of baby elephants, that was something all together different. He had to maneuver around and, sometimes over these large obstacles, causing the cab where he sat to tilt, to twist, to jostle. His kidneys would have been up around his Adams apple if they had not long since decided to vacate to safer territory.

"Damn, damn, crap, oh damn, oh crap," was the song he sung as he steered and turned dials, adjusting the torque from one wheel to another, feeling his way along the boulder strewn path like a blind man in a furniture factory.

A square of light hit him in the back, and he knew the closet door, the door between the wagon's cab and the living room of the mansion had swung open.

"Well! That was certainly bumpy!" he said, trying to sound more chipper than he felt. "Nothing to worry bout, folks. We're bout halfway down. The rest should be a piece of cake. I hope." A boulder showed itself from around the next curve in the path. "Oops! Big rock, BIG rock!" he cried out. The closet door banged shut behind him. "Oh damn, oh crap."

He pulled hard on the tiller, trying to go around the obstacle, while at the same time applying more torque to the starboard wheels. He felt the wagon hit the boulder, jostle upwards, and for a brief second, he felt as if he had beaten it, as if everything would be, as he had said, a piece of cake.

The world had a different idea. Perhaps it was because the center of balance might have been just a bit off center. Maybe a bird landed on the port side of the wagon at just the right, or wrong, time. Regardless, the wagon shifted upward, the starboard wheels digging in at the boulder until the tilt showed to be just past the forty-five degree mark. Just past it. Just enough past it that the tilt of the wagon kept going until forty-five became fifty and fifty became sixty, and then it didn't matter any more because the wagon had begun its less than graceful decent down the mountainside as a rolling mass of wood splinters and fabric, of wheels spinning away from their axles and bounding ahead of the wagon down and down and down.

"Glad that door close..." Pockets thought, right before he didn't think anymore.

Darkness. Simple and quiet. Empty darkness with maybe just a sprinkle of reddish pain, coming from somewhere beyond the man behind the curtain.

From nowhere in side the somewhere... or maybe it was the other way around because at this point Pockets didn't really care, he heard a voice. It was young, and sweet and familiar. Esmeralda called out to him gently, probing.

"Unk? You there?" the voice asked. "Are you anywhere?"

Pockets was wrapped in a wonderfully soft cocoon of nowhere, safe and secure and quiet. He didn't know where his mouth was yet, so he, of course, didn't answer.

"Dammit, Pockets." Esmeralda sounded desperate. "Are you alive?"

Gently and rumbling, like the voice of a too soft teddy bear too large to sleep in a playpen, Pockets heard his own voice say "Yeah, Esme. Alive, but a bit broken."

An ethereal sigh was heard. "S'okay, then. You can fix it, right?"

"Sure, kiddo. It's what I do. Go 'way, now. Unk is busy, busy. Love you, k?"

Gentle and soft, little girl kisses from lips not seen brushed on a cheek that was nowhere to be found. "K. You fix it, or I'll kick your butt." Pockets felt more emptiness fall in and knew the voice had withdrawn.

"Time to wakey, Chester, old man." Neurons fired back and forth between spots Pockets identified as his brain and he began to think, again. "Dammit, Esme. Shoulda left me dead," the brain grumpled.

Slowly he poured his self back into himself, as if trying on clothing that was filled with thorns. His left fingertips wandered back from somewhere, followed by forearms and his toes.

There was a massive pain in his right arm, once he remember what his right was, and he figured that he had broken his arm, in more than one place. His left arm seemed all right. He must have been shielding himself with the right, as he got tossed around.

His left foot reported in for active duty. His right tried, but failed. It was trapped under something. The easy chair, more than likely.

"Okay," Pockets mouth mumbled through broken lips, spitting out fragments that used to be teeth. "I'm alive. And it does not feel good at all."

Pulling his head back together, dim light filtered through bruised eyelids. "My eyelids are bruised? Damn... that must have been a really good fall. Wish I could have seen it from the outside." Something wet ran up from his mouth to his forehead, making his eyes sting even more, once a bit got into them.

Ran up?

He forced the fingers of his left hand up, fighting a heavy, heavy gravity, to his face. Pain called out from everywhere he touched. He felt his chin, wincing and groaning as he felt the shattered remains of what was once his chin.

"Damn. And I always liked my chin," His lips, split and bleeding, dribbled blood past his nose and again into his eyes. "Ah. Now it makes sense," he muttered. "I'm upside down."

Prying his eyes open, and yelling and gritting his teeth at the same time, which was not an easy task, he lifted his head to see what sort of predicament he was in.

His right foot was caught in the easy chair, as he suspected. The chair itself was no longer easy, and instead looked like a twisted batch of metal and wood, pounded down against the floor. His left foot was wedged, but much more gently than his right. His left arm was mostly free, just caught in what was left of the armrest, while his right arm was dangling free, albeit, numb and broken.

Moving his left arm, which was pretty much undamaged, he felt his way to see what had kept him from leaving the chair and bouncing against the walls of the wagon as it cannonaded it's way down the mountain.

The belt on the chair that he had used to strap himself in with held. He chuckled, painfully. "Small miracles."

Realizing he would have to be free from the chair to get out of this mess, he moved his right foot carefully. It moved, slightly. It wasn't broken, there wasn't any pain from it, but it was not, by any means, free.

Once again gritting his teeth and crying out at the top of his lungs, he forced his right foot to move, harder. It did, but not without a price. Pockets could feel something sharp dig in and knowing there was no help for it, he just yanked as hard as he could.

If there had been a toe on that foot, it would have either sheared off or foiled the attempt. Fortunately, he had lost it in an earlier misadventure years ago and the only thing that he lost was a goodly amount of skin from his right shin and foot and his shoe. His feet and legs were free, and the pull of gravity grew even heavier.

Looking down, he saw he was four feet from the ceiling, now the floor, of the former steering room. And he was in a sitting position. To fall from here, in this position, would be almost as bad as hanging where he was. He would surely break his back, or worse. The worse part he didn't even imagine, but he knew there was always a worse.

"And now, ladies and gentlemen, for the tricky part."

He looped his left arm through the arm rest again, and felt for the latch that would release the belt. He had designed the belt with a quick release, so that all he had to do was flip the top tab and the belt would fall away from him. The fingers of his left hand just barely touched the top tab. Good enough. He brought his arm out from the arm rest went to one of his ever-present pockets. He found the tiny screwdriver he carried in that pocket and pulled it out.

Wedging the screwdrivers tip into an open spot between two spars of metal, he pulled down and bent it, just slightly, so that he had a makeshift hook. Then, arm and hand, holding the newly formed tool, went back under the armrest of the chair.

Hooking the screwdriver's tip over the tab of the belt was the easy part. He thought a second, sent up a prayer to the Gods and Goddesses he didn't believe in, took a deep breath and pulled on the screwdriver. The tip, hooked into the flap, lifted it just enough that the belt clasp released and Pockets fell free from the chair.

His left arm, which was slipped into the armrest, screamed out in protest and agony, as it took the full weight of a falling Pockets. The arm held him until he could flip his legs under him, which also caused him to dislocate his left shoulder. The dislocation caused the arm to flop out from the armrest and Pockets fell down to the ceiling.

Landing on his feet on the solid surface of the ceiling, he immediately sat down, and thought, "Well... that wasn't so bad, was it?" He then passed out from the pain.

Darkness, though not so simple or so quiet. In fact, the makers of this darkness could have used a bit of training in the term dark. This was more like a Grayness, shot through with sparkles and green and red streamers. And noisy. The sound was like an organ gone mad, it's cacophony drowning out any semblance of the word quiet as the grave.

"No grave here, dear Pockets." A voice, soft, gentle, feather ticklish on the mind, whispered past the sound of the organ and rendered it mute. The macabre organ was replaced with the sound of running water, tinkly and serene. "No grave at all, for you."

Pockets found, through shear will, that he had a body here. Not bruised. Not broken. He lifted up his right hand and looked at it. "What the hell?" He looked around at the gray. "I'm not dead, I know that." He stood up.

"No. Not dead." The voice was female, and though a bit deep, it was musically soft and warm, and carried the undertones of someone that was used to laughing. If the woman that wore the voice looked as good as she sounded, Pockets felt he would end up giving his heart to her, just to be in her presence. The sound of the voice was that good. It made him feel good. It made him feel... whole.

Laughter like a bounding brook resounded through the gray. "Ah, my dear, what a delight you are. I would never want your heart, as it is yours, and yours alone."

"Who the heck are you, lady?" Pockets felt shyly surprised, or perhaps he was surprised as his shyness. "I mean, I don't want to offend you, but I can't see you. And I want to. I really, really want to."

"Chet," said the voice, "that is something that may never happen. We live in two different worlds."

"Two different worlds?" Pockets asked, raising his hands to try to catch a fleeting stream of red. "Where are you?"

"Somewhere else. Somewhere not there." The voice chuckled gently. "We have known each other for a very long time, though I knew of you far before you knew of me."

"I have never known you, ma'am." Pockets scratched his head. "At least, I don't think I have."

"You have, however briefly, known me. In wild thoughts, with your heart racing, with your mind bounding off on one of your wild adventures... You have known me."

Pockets pondered this. He had, after all, done some pretty incredible things, things that sometimes he, himself, didn't quite believe. "Okay, so lets say I've known you. Have I ever met you?"

Again, laughter, and the sound of a thousand bells like windchimes rolled through Pockets heart.

"No. We have never met. Perhaps we will someday. Perhaps we already are."

Pockets, looking around, said, "Okay, strange enough, but okay. Where am I?"

"This is part of that place you were in when you were between worlds. Between life and death, between dream and waking." Violins sprang from nowhere, playing a plaintive tune, and the words of part of a song drifted to him:

"And if you ever hear me calling out
And if you've been by paupers crowned
Between the worlds of men and make-believe I can be found."

"That's very... pretty." was all he could say, as a wave of sadness overcame him.

"Now, now, brave Pockets. There is no need for the sadness. Look at all you have! You have Bags and Grizelda, who love you dearly. You have the love of a child, Esmeralda. You have the love of friends near and far, like Capitani, who cherish you just as you are. And you have my love as well."

"How?" Pockets cried out. "How can you love me, when you don't even know me?"

"Because," the voice explained, "we are two of a kind, living in different worlds. Our hearts beat the same rhythm and our dreams fly beyond the realm of man. I know you, Chet. I've known you all my long, long life."

"I don't understand!" Pockets called out. "Why can't I see you?"

"Some things, no matter how hard we wish them to be, are not things to be, my dear, darling Pockets. Just know that I will be here, knowing you are, and you will be there, knowing I am, and both of us will know that we are loved."

"How do you know that I love you?" Pockets asked, a bit angry. "How could you possibly know that of someone that you have never met? I don't even know your name!"

"Because, Chet, you love yourself. It's just that simple. As for my name... you know it, you just have to look up on a moonless night to remember it." A wind blew through the gray, sending a warmth through him as if a hug had magically wrapped around him. "Now, go. Be alive. Live, Chet. Your adventure is not over yet."

"But..." he began.

"But me no buts, mister. You have a job to do. Until next time."

The sound of an orchestra tuning up wound around his body, lifting him up, tossing him about and around, and when it reached it's crescendo...

He opened his eyes.

"That was weird." He felt around himself with his left hand. His left shoulder hurt like the seven hells, but he managed to pop it back into place without fainting. He was battered, bruised, a bit broken, but nothing he hadn't felt before. One thing he had never felt before, though was a full heart. And his was. The empty loneliness that had haunted him all his life had, in one strange and wonderful moment, left.

His bloody lips cracked open a grim smile, and a tear fell from his bruised right eye. "Well, if I'm gonna live long enough to find out what next time is, I better get myself outta this." Levering himself up on his left arm, yelping at the pain from his broken right, he sat up and looked around at the shattered remains of the steering room.

"I've seen worse." He muttered. "It's fixable."