“You went through worse after getting here.”
“I did,” Farrah said, “but at least what I went through was simple. You’ve been fighting through a tangle and we both know you get caught up in your own head, while I can think in nice, clean lines. I see my direction and I walk it, while you can’t help diving into the weeds. You need to step away for a while and find your way back to a straight path.”
“I was thinking the same thing,” Jason said. “I’m going to start by letting Erika take over the family stuff and pulling out of Network activity while I get my aura control in order. Then I might take off for a bit.”
“Some time to clear your head would do you well. You may wish to get away from home altogether.”
“I think I will. I’ve been to another world, yet there’s so much of this one I haven’t seen. It might just be time to remedy that. I’ll need you to watch over things while I’m gone. I’ll take most of the Shades with me, but I’ll leave one so you can always reach me and I can check in. One for Emi too. If something happens, Shade can get her to you.”
“How long will this sojourn of yours be?” Farrah asked.
“I don’t know,” Jason said. “As long as it takes that I can come back without losing myself.”
“Really?” Erika said. “Everything that’s going on and you want to take a gap year to bum around backpacking?”
“This is new to you, Eri,” Jason said. “For me, everything has been going on for a while.”
They were on the roof deck of the houseboat as Jason explained his intentions.
“Jason, do you really think that now is the best time to be traipsing off?” Erika asked.
“I won’t go for a few weeks, but yes. I have responsibilities that I’m not ready to meet. I need time, Eri. Time away from monster armies and interdimensional invasions. From secret societies and from family so caught up in their own revelations that they don’t stop to think about what I’ve been through, even when I recorded THE ENTIRE BLOODY THING!”
He got out of his chair and paced to the edge of the deck, drawing a sharp breath he didn’t need and slowly letting it out. He leaned on the railing, looking out over the water. The day was overcast, painting the sea grey.
“I’m sorry,” he said, any emotion washed out of his voice. “That wasn’t for you.”
“Yes, it was,” she chuckled. “I want you to yell at me. You always box everything away and hide it behind a clown mask. I’m glad that you’re willing to open up.”
“I need time, Eri,” he said again, still staring out at the ocean. “I’m dangerously off balance and I can’t afford to be. My mistakes can really hurt people and my failures…”
He hung his head.
“How am I meant to save the world?” he asked, his voice cracking. “How can that be on me? Two years ago, I was selling staples and rubber bands. You know what a mess I was. How can anyone expect me to not bugger this up?”
Erika moved up to Jason and put an arm around his shoulder.
“I always knew you could do great things, Jason. I was more thinking state parliament than fighting evil, but still.”
He snorted a laugh, in spite of himself.
“This whole thing is absurd,” he said. “It has been from the beginning. I took a lot of stupid risks because in my head, it never felt quite real. Then Farrah died, and all of a sudden, it was, but I just kept taking risks because I felt invincible. Then I was grabbed and someone tried to feed me to the Builder. That hit me for six, but eventually, I was back to risk-taking because that’s what had to be done. And we did get it done.”
Erika sighed.
“We’ve been so caught up in all the strangeness you brought home that we never thought about the fact that you went through all of that and more. And you had to do it when you were lost, alone, and in danger. We see the way you are now, and don’t think about how you must have been then. Now I can’t help thinking about how much you didn’t put in those recordings.”
“There was some crazy stuff,” Jason said. “Me and this guy, Hiram, got shot off the side of a mountain by a magic waterfall. It stopped all of a sudden, and we were trying to figure out why when it started up again. We were fine, because magic powers. That was my third day.”
“I can’t imagine.”
“That’s nothing,” he said. “I met gods, Eri. Actual, honest-to-goodness gods. Standing in their presence, you can feel the divine power blasting over you. It’s like a tsunami with a superiority complex. If they want it to be anyway. They can tone it down, but they generally don’t. Reap the wonder of the masses and whatnot.”
“I’m not sure how to respond to that,” Erika said.
“You said you want to come with,” Jason said. “If you do, you’ll see them for yourself. Gods aren’t shy.”
She sighed again.
“I want to be here for you, little brother. But you talk about these things, and I don’t know how to empathise, as much as I want to. You’re describing things so far removed from anything I know. I guess that’s the problem, isn’t it? Farrah is the only one who really understands what you’ve been through.”
“In so many ways,” Jason said. “We both know what it is to wake up in a strange world. What it is to die. I died, Eri. I know you’ve all been ignoring it because here I am alive and I’ve been known to say some outlandish things, but it happened. I died. It was violent and painful and I wasn’t expecting to come back. I felt that certainty that my life was over.”
“I can’t imagine. I keep saying that, but it keeps being true.”
“It’s not just the things that were done to me either. It was the things I did. I killed people. I saved people. I’ve been a hero saving lives and a monster reaping them. I found companions who mean everything to me; only you and Emi mean as much.”
“I want to see that world,” Erika said. “I want to share your experiences. See those wonders and understand those horrors.”
“If that’s still what you want when the time to go back comes,” he said, “then I’ll take you. There’s still plenty of time to decide, one way or the other. I can’t make promises about the other side, though. It’s a world where my power is insignificant.”
“I can’t not go,” Erika said. “Not now that I know what’s out there. Ian’s the same. I know he plays the straight man to his wife and daughter, but he has a beautiful passion in his soul. I married him for a reason. And as for our daughter… Well. At this stage, if we tried to keep her from the other world, she’d never forgive us.”
“Farrah and I have been talking,” Jason said. “If you’re really serious about coming with us, you need to start making some big choices now.”
“Such as?”
“Taking Emi out of school. She already knows more than most kids do by the time they leave high school. What they have left to teach her won’t matter in the other world. She needs proper, intensive training.”