Short Story

Persona Amissi

He woke slowly, like a giant rising from the earth. He didn't even know where exactly he was. He saw sunlight filtering through a window about two feet away from the wooden floor he was sleeping on, but it didn't even register in his brain that he was inside for a few more minutes. The room he was in was a fairly small one and looked as if it came straight out of the 1800's- not a single thing in sight used electricity. Where is this?.. I think I would remember if I sold the house and moved... well, it'll come back to me in a second. It must be the morning. Yet, an hour later, he still did not know where he was. This can't be right. Why am I here? Where is here?.. and why can't I remember where I should be?... Sitting upright in his bed, he looked at himself and was surprised to not even recognize the clothes on his body. Drawing up his right arm, he was awed to see the entire length of it was covered in scars. He stared at it with his mouth agape, and would never have noticed the man in the corner if the man hadn't suddenly started laughing. Turning in the blink of an eye to face the man who had apparently been there for quite a while, he was about to ask a question, but the man spoke first. "I suppose this is where you say 'Who am I?', though I'm sure seeing me is going to bring back some of it." The man laughed more, a deep laugh that somehow

managed to be menacing. The man was dressed in a black suit that covered most of his body, with black shoes and a black bowling hat but white gloves. He was leaning against the wall with his arms crossed, still grinning. The man in the bed responded, "I was actually going to ask how long you've been standing there, but your question might be a better starting point." Suddenly, the man in the suit stopped grinning. "It seems I have less time than I thought I would today... Chariot's already starting to wake up, and he gets violent if he's left in the dark too long. How troublesome new members are... you're going to have to remember most of this on your own this time. Oh, by the way, your name's Morgan. Strength. My Servant for however long you feel like living. Remember yet?" Seeing the comprehension on Morgan's face, he said, "Well, I'll be off. Orders are where they always are. Good luck, as always!" And before Morgan could ask any of the many other questions on his tongue, the air around the black-suited man seemed to tear open and seemed to swallow him whole. And Morgan remembered. Well, most of it. Morgan was that man's Servant, as he'd said. And he remembered that he was about twenty-five or twenty-six...at least, he was, before he met that man. Regarding his "work", he couldn't remember all of it, but he knew that people on the brink of death were granted strength and virtual immortality in exchange for service. He also remembered that none of the other Servants he ever chanced upon knew not

what he was, as nobody really was given much of a chance to think about it. Better stop thinking about it... I know this got me wiped a few times before... It was a pain to forget nearly everything every time he went to sleep or every time that man became even somewhat displeased, but Morgan knew that he would have never signed up for this mess if he didn't have a good reason. And he knew he did. He just couldn't remember it.

---

Ten minutes later, he was running across the grasslands at a speed he thought only locomotives could fly. The papers were in an envelope in his pocket. The first one read thus: "Go south along the coast until you reach a town. That will be the city of Johnson, Virginia. You should find another Servant there waiting for you. The task this time should be fairly simple; meet with my agent in the Maragidyne Inn in the south portion of town to pick up some goods, and deliver them. This could probably have been done by humans, but it is important to me, so you should take this seriously. Don't mess this up, and keep it low-profile. P.S. watch out for Nathaniel." He did not know who this Nathaniel was, but he felt a chill at the name. He'd heard the name before, but the memory wipe had taken care of the details. The next sheet of paper had an image on it. It was a small girl around the age of twelve or thirteen with long black hair with dark eyes, and below her

picture in plain type was the word "HERMIT." That was one little oddity of that man; he seemed to obtain much amusement by giving people callsigns like "Hermit" and "Strength" and "Chariot." That was also one of the things he wiped your memory immediately for, whether you were doing your job or not; he didn't want anyone to know. Not like it mattered to Morgan. He turned the paper over, but he didn't see a name anywhere. That man just made things complicated for no reason. Last in the small envelope he was given was a map of the surrounding area. It was rough and not detailed, but it was enough. What amazed Morgan was the speed at which he could run. He was running much faster than anything living should have been capable of moving, but he wasn't becoming tired at all. The power he had seemed limitless, and the only reason he didn't go any faster was because he thought he might drop something and not realize it until a few miles down. By noon, the city of Johnson was already in sight as Morgan stood on the crest of a nearby hill. It was a fairly small town with a few private docks and a handful of family-run businesses; definitely rural. He began walking down the hill more slowly, so that he wouldn't stand out more than necessary. With a tiny town like this, being completely invisible was impossible. Why pick ME for this job? Stopping at the side of the first run-down building that signified the edge of town, he leaned back against the barren wall and closed his eyes. Instinctively, he reached out with his mind, letting it wander over the city. Morgan somehow knew that he could sense other people like him at will like this because the power

they were given tended to leak out and spill over their surroundings. Ignoring his ragged breathing, he tried for over five minutes, but he couldn't detect anyone like him in the city. Right as he was about to give up, he heard as clearly as if someone was standing right next to him say, "Hello. My name is Rena. What's your name?" For a second, Morgan really did think that someone was next to him. Snapping his eyes open, he drew a knife from the right side of his pants in a pocket. Swirling around, he held out the knife at the deserted alleyway, alert. He heard a soft laugh and the girl's voice again. "I thought you knew about our telepathy. Or is it because you can't detect me? Concentrate on my voice." Finally, Morgan could tell that it was indeed the telepathy that people like him inherited. In wonder, he asked her, "Why couldn't I sense you? I've been looking for a while now..." "Why? Isn't it obvious? It's my specialty. Hiding. Here, I can show you." And suddenly, a girl appeared quite literally out of thin air in the alleyway that Morgan was looking at. She was in a crouching position, her long black hair blowing over her short body. As she was rising, Morgan realized that the girlRena, she'd said- was even smaller than he'd first thought. She was incredibly small, and she looked no more than ten. She wore a white dress with a small red ribbon in her hair. "You... don't have anything... something nobody else can do?... like me hiding..." For some reason, she wasn't comfortable speaking out loud.

"Besides inhuman strength... nope. Maybe that has to do with that name he gave me? Strength." "Um... you should still... be able... to do something.... else... sorry!" And with a hissing sound, right before his eyes, she melted into the dim alleyway. He could feel her presence this time since he felt it before, so he wasn't surprised that Rena talked to him in his head this time. What he was surprised about was how her voice turned melancholy. "...sorry. I really don't like being around people... especially men bigger than me. It makes me a little uncomfortable..." "It's no problem. If you can stay like that all the time, it'll be fine. Actually, it would even help, in the case that we're attacked... it wouldn't sit well with me if a child got hurt before my eyes." Morgan felt a surge of something akin to relief and happiness- mental laughter?- and she said, "Don't judge me based on my looks. I've been trapped in this living hell for years now.... oh, it's almost time. You remember the place we have to meet?" Morgan nodded. "Then let's go. I'll be watching your back when nobody can see mine."

---

"HURRY! Do you want to die?... Rena?.... no!" Looking back over the red-hued forest dyed by the sky, Morgan felt a rush of adrenaline pump through his system- adrenaline that should have been used up a while ago. Rena had fallen down face-first, as if her legs had suddenly given out on her, about a dozen feet behind him. That man, that insane, homicidal man, was still following them. A few hours previous, Morgan and Rena had set off from the designated meeting place with the goods in tow. Judging by the weight of the sleek black suitcase and the group that they retrieved it from, there were likely illegal weapons inside. The haggard-looking thugs they met at the inn seemed glad to be rid of the goods and told them to go north of the city along the beach to a small alcove on a cliff. Soon after that, the pair had left without incident. Well, there was one incident- a man named Nathaniel. He was tall, skinny, and wore a gray mustache that protruded out of the sides of his face on both sides. He was garbed in worn blue clothing and looked like a battle-tested Confederate colonel. He had no hair and his face was as hard as dirt. Morgan felt such animosity that it was almost tangible when he passed a battered window near the city outskirts. Glancing to the right, he saw a man in a long chair lazing with a cowboy hat over his head. He seemed asleep, so Morgan convinced himself it was just his imagination. Five miles later on the grasslands, Morgan realized he was being followed. As he was relaying his

suspicions to Rena, precognition screamed out to him and he dived over behind a nearby tree as a bullet tore through the air behind him. Peeking his head to the side of the tree, he saw the very same man from earlier firing off two revolvers at him. Frantically pulling back, Morgan thought, "Rena! Get behind him!" "Okay... just give me one seco-" Rena was cut off as her cries filled the air. That man had somehow guessed where Rena was, even though she was completely invisible. Blood flew through the empty air. "Run over here!" He felt her come closer. Shaking, Morgan decided that the only course of action they could take would be to run. He knew they could at least run faster than humans, and he didn't particularly want to get shot- he didn't know if he was bulletproof and he didn't want to find out. As he prepared to run, he heard the dull crunching and snapping of bullets hitting the tree they hid behind. "It's not gonna hold out much longer... ready, Rena?" He looked to his side and was surprised to see her there. She nodded, gasping ragged breaths. And at that moment, an explosion went off at the base of the tree, and Morgan took that as the starting signal for the race to begin as he headed towards a nearby forest. It only lasted about five minutes. As he saw Rena fall behind him, he knew that running was now out of the question. That man- Morgan just knew he was the Nathaniel that the dark man had talked about- was coming into sight behind them. He was as fast as

Morgan, if not faster. In the span of a few seconds a few seconds Morgan spent backtracking and picking up Rena, Nathaniel crossed hundreds of feet. Morgan asked the man, now grinning triumphantly with victory as he aimed the gun at Morgan's head, "What do you want from us?! We've never met you!" A cynical smile replacing his triumphant one, he said, "Oh, so you've become the Devil's servants, have you? No matter, no matter. All of you are just as wretched as he is. That villain just happened to be more clever than the lot of you. You're all the same. Your very existence threatens us all!" "What the hell are you talking about? The only reason I do this is because I don't know what else to do!" Morgan said, despaired. "I don't even know who I really am!" "The Devil tempts you with power, just like The World does. Don't try to fool me, boy! I've been hunting your kind for the past two hundred years!" "...what? Wait, who ARE you? And what's my kind? Who's the Devil? What do you mean by power? And who am I?!" Morgan yelled. "Why don't you ask the demons of hell when you get there? Die!" The revolver seemed to rise in slow motion. Fear kept Morgan from moving- fear of death and fear of never knowing. He saw the bullet fly toward him. And he saw it disappear into his head, and he lost consciousness. As he fell backwards, he thought he saw a shadow darker than the night in front of him... and that shadow... was laughing...

----

The sky was white. The ground was white. Everything was white. Even as he woke up, he knew that he was still not awake. He looked around but it was all blurry, everything was blurry, he couldn't see because the light was everywhere. He wondered where he was. "You are in my dream."

The clear voice startled him He looked

around. He didn't see anyone. He just saw white. Pure white. Then where had that voice come from? Had it come from the light? "Look behind you." And when he turned around, he saw the figure of a woman. The air shimmered around her, making her ethereal form appear as if he was looking at someone on a hot summer day. The light shimmered off of her long hair- he couldn't tell if it was black or brown or even green- and no matter how he tried, he couldn't make out more than the outline of her body. But one thing about her he was sure; she was beautiful. "Do you remember what just happened?" He didn't want to think about it. It was too depressing, too realistic. He didn't want to go back to that reality right now. Dreams were so relaxing...

"You're going to wake up soon, regardless. There is a choice you have to make. I'm here to inform you that you have that choice." Choice? What choice? If I'm not dead now, I'll forget everything tomorrow. That's my life. "The beginning will not end. You still do not know who you are, I guess." Of course not. I'm not psychic. "But I am. And I know who you are." He couldn't think. This person knew who he was? Then who is he? Who... am I? "You are the Fool. You are one who should be an equal, treated as a servant. You are one held by oaths to the Devil. You are powerless now, because the Devil steals your strength. You are the one who never ends even when logic defies your existance. And you must awake." A flood of images. Battles, grand battles, a flood of water rushing against his face; lightning jumping like a snake in fast forward across the ground, aiming to electrify him; a man, conjuring curved blades out of thin air, slicing to the bone of his arm. Deaths, many deaths, despite his strength. Yet he was always alive. Why? Who was he? "You know now. You don't need to keep thinking that." Yes, he knew. And he knew there was only way to escape this endless cycle of amnesia. As the light began to brighten even more, he realized it- who

she was. And feeling a debt of gratitude, he promised her that in three weeks time, he would be in this same city. Perhaps not as the man he was now, but he would be there nonetheless. "Then October third, we will meet again. Farewell." And then the brightness intensified even more until suddenly he found himself lying in the grass, bleeding but still alive. For now.

---

That man was there, waiting. Not the crazy man- the dark man. With his regained memory, however, he realized that this man was far more dangerous than that Nathaniel had ever been. Brushing the crusted blood off of his sleeve, he looked up into that dark man's eyes, for the first time in a long time actually knowing who he was. The dark man started chattering, mostly to himself, since the dark man did not know that Morgan now remembered. "So, Strength, you've woken up. I really wish you could have taken care of Judgement, but I guess it's too much to ask of those such as yourself. Such a pity, but definitely not a waste! Oh no, definitely not a waste..." Smiling slightly, Morgan began to walk over to the case of contraband that had fallen nearby in the previous scuffle. "You don't have to call me that any more, Abbadon. I know who I am. Lies should leave a bitter taste in your mouth,

but for one as you, your mouth must be so foul that it doesn't make any difference." The dark man stiffened for a second- but it was almost too short to even call a second, as he immediately relaxed again, though the smile was wiped from his face. "I'd thought that you would have remained oblivious for a little while longer. There's a rebellion in Anery, and you would have been so useful.." "Always using others to do your dirty work after three hundred years, still? You truly deserve the title of Devil." "As you deserve the title of Fool. Remembering will accomplish nothing. I can just make you forget. You can't have failed to remember that fact if you've remembered who you are." As if wanting to test him, Morgan reached down and opened up the black suitcase at his feet. The sleek black handgun felt natural in his hands as he pulled it up to eye level, aimed at the Devil. That man just laughed, and Morgan grimaced- he knew how futile it was, but it was necessary. Morgan aimed the gun at the Devil's head. Due to his supernatural speed and skill, the bullet that followed should have hit dead on. But as Morgan pulled the trigger, he felt an invisible jerk, pulling the gun's tip ever so slightly to the right. The bullet just missed the Devil's bowler hat as that man stood there laughing. "I applaud your tenacity, Fool, but that won't be enough! I've set oath upon oath on you, and I have made sure that you will never do anything to harm

me! You should remember; I am more thorough than anyone else when it comes to this. You will never be able to harm me, and if you do anything that causes me discomfort, you will feel unimaginable pain. You can't resist me, your oaths to me will last until the day you die- and for one life. Hell on earth for the life of one woman... I'll never understand why you chose that path." Turning around, Morgan stayed silent for a few seconds. When he finally replied, he sounded tired. "Of course you don't understand. You only get happiness through the pain of others and materialistic ambitions. You'll never understand.... I am going to be joining her soon. Just wait and see. You think you have dominion over me forever? Maybe because you speak so many lies, you'd believe your own. No way out of this? That's laughable. The only thing that lasts forever is ME, not your words!" And he raised the gun to his right temple. The Devil had only a moment to take in the scene, and a moment was not long enough for him to do anything. Morgan pulled the trigger and the bullet ripped through the side of his head as, if in slow motion, the impact from the shot flung him skyward a few feet. But on the right side of his face, where there should have been torrents of blood, there was but one thing: ethereal blue shards, shooting outwards as if someone had punched through a glass pane. His entire face seemed to become a blue mosaic as more shards splintered outwards. The look on his glass face was one of relief- a release from the servitude he was forced to suffer for years upon years.

At the top of the trajectory of his short flight, the glass shards flashed a bright green for a split second- and then turned to blood. The sharp panes of glass became liquid as it all splashed to the ground around Morgan's corpse. It made a sound as if water had suddenly dropped from a bucket onto concrete. And then all was still. The Devil, released from what seemed like paralysis, walked forward in stupefied silence. He stopped before the corpse. Though covered in blood, it seemed to the eyes as if his neck was simply a stump- as if the head had never existed. The Devil stood completely still. Completely still- except for his fist. The veins showed taut on his skin as he balled his fist and punched the corpse. "You want freedom so bad, do you? Well, have your freedom for now! I'll find you! I WILL find you! Two things happen to my enemies; you can't die, so you will become my slave again. Mark my words!..."

---

He paid the cabbie with fumbling fingers before pulling himself out of the cab. He took in the fresh country air deeply and savored the sweet dusty smell of the nearby carpentry shop. Setting off down the road, he walked down the street for a few seconds before the cafe came into view. The sight of the Lincoln Cafe- tiny and built out of logs so long ago that the manager himself probably

didn't even know- made him even more nervous. He actually considered staying out in the street for a moment before his better sense pushed him forward. He opened the door by its brass handle. The inside smelled of pancakes and syrup. Before him stood an older man- in a place this small, it's possible he was the owner himself- who took one look at him and said, "So you're the guy, eh? She's waiting in the back. Can't miss her." Gathering up his courage one last time, he nodded to the man and walked around the center wall that separated the two sides of the cafe. She was there, reading a newspaper- exactly as he remembered her in the dream, and exactly as he remembered her from the tearful parting twenty-three years ago. He sat on the opposite side of the desk. "Hey. I'm back, Marisa." And with a smile whose radiance was not marred by the passing of time, she looked up into his eyes. "Welcome home, Gareth."