“Yes,” he said. They spotted immediately that he was more subdued than his usual self, gently holding his niece’s hand. “How’s Mum?”
“Freaked out,” Erika said. “Her son just came back to life and her mother’s Alzheimer’s is miraculously cured. All she got in explanation were second-hand accounts of the vague nonsense you told us. Why did you do it like that?”
“If she doesn’t want to show up for family meetings, then that’s what she gets,” Jason said, his father nodding in approval.
“Jason,” Erika said. “This isn’t like sorting out Great Aunt Marjory subscribing us all to Christian Quarterly. You came back from the dead.”
“Yes,” Jason said. “Twice, thus far.”
“What do you mean, twice?”
“First things first,” Jason said. “Before we can start, I need to change your understanding of what is and isn’t possible.”
“Are you completely certain you didn’t join a cult?” Ian asked.
“You have to see for yourself, Dad,” Emi said, standing next to Jason.
“Come on,” Jason said.
He traded Erika’s crate of alcohol for her daughter and led them across the lower deck and through the tinted glass doors that slid open at their approach. Inside was a sprawling lounge, with soft chairs of white leather and glass walls running around three sides. They put the crates down by the bar and looked around at the opulence.
“There’s a bloody mezzanine,” Ian said, causing the rest to turn their gazes to the upper level. “God damn, Jason.”
“Hiro, Taika and Emi have already seen what I’m about to show you,” Jason said. “Today, we’re going further than what I’ve revealed so far. It’s going to take a while, so expect to be here for the day.”
“What about all the stuff you told us before?” Erika asked. “Being a mercenary in Africa.”
“Everything I told you is true,” Jason said, “but also incomplete. There’s something very important that I left out, and much more to tell. I’m going to begin by showing you something. Then something else and something after that. One impossible thing after another until your perspective of impossibility itself undergoes a fundamental change.”
“Bro, you sound like one of those guys with a TV show that explains magic tricks. You’re pretty big into melodrama, hey.”
“Taika, I’m trying to set a mood here,” Jason complained. His family chuckled.
“Sorry, bro.”
“Stop dancing around it, Jason,” Erika said. “What is it you’re going to show us?”
“Alright,” Jason said.
He opened a portal arch, which rose up from the floor. The black obsidian arch, filled with darkness, was incongruous with the lavishly appointed lounge.
“I’ll be waiting on the other side,” Jason said and stepped through.
The others went through the same startled examination of the arch that Taika and Hiro had done upon their first exposure to it. They walked around, examining the arch Jason had vanished into from both sides, peering into the darkness. Erika checked the floor for a mechanism it had used to rise up while Ian ran his fingers over the arch.
“This is solid stone,” Ian said. “Is he a magician now?”
“Not a magician, Dad,” Emi said. “A wizard.”
“A wizard,” Erika said disapprovingly. “I don’t know what your uncle has been telling you, Emi, but he is not a wizard.”
“Come find me, then,” she said and dashed through the portal herself.
“Emi!” Ian called out, then immediately followed her through the arch.
“What is happening?” Ken asked as his family vanished one by one.
“It’s a lot, I know,” Hiro told his brother. “I also know from experience that once you step through that door, everything changes. I don’t think there is a way to prepare for what comes next.”
Ken nodded at his brother, squared his shoulders and marched resolutely into the portal. That left Erika with Hiro and Taika.
“Don’t look at me,” Taika said. “I’m going to get the rest of those drinks.”
Hiro gave Erika a sympathetic smile, placing a reassuring hand on her shoulder.
“You’re looking for answers in a world that’s making less sense with every passing day,” he said. “I’ve been there. Very, very recently. We both still have a lot to learn.”
He held out his hand for her to take and led her towards the arch.
The point at Castle Bluff had a paved and railed lookout area that ran along the cliff face. Further back was a park where much of Jason’s family was throwing up on the grass. The winter wind blew in off the ocean, making the park trees hiss like snakes as the wind savaged its way through the leaves.
Jason stood at the railing looking out. Emi was beside him, holding his hand as the wind whipped her hair around her head. There was no one else out on the bluff on the blustery day.
Despite being the last of the family to arrive, Erika recovered the quickest, looking around disbelievingly at their surroundings. The portal was still there, taunting her with its impossibility. As she stared at it, Taika emerged, putting a hand to his stomach until it settled. He glanced around, nodding with approval, then made his way to Jason.
“Did you want me to go get the mixers and stuff, bro?” Taika half-yelled over the wind.
“Thanks,” Jason said. Despite not speaking loudly, his voice oddly cut right through the wind. “When you get back, stick around, yeah?”
“I thought maybe it was a family thing?” Taika said.
“I got you caught up in all this,” Jason said. “I’ll see you through it all the way, brother.”
“Thanks, bro. Alright, I’m going to do that drinks run while you’re showing them stuff here, yeah?”
“You’ll have time,” Jason said. “They’re a stubborn bunch. I mean, look at them. They just got teleported and they’re staring at the sky like it owes them money.”
Taika glanced over at Jason’s family, who were starting to recover and, as he said, looking at their surroundings in suspicious disbelief.
Erika, having recovered, also made her way to Jason, and held out a hand towards her daughter. Emi ignored the hand, moving past it to embrace her mother in a huge hug.
“Emi,” Erika said, staring at Jason over her daughter’s head.
He had turned from the railing and leaned back against it, watching her with sparkling eyes. There was an ease to the way he leaned against the rail, a confidence like nothing she’d seen from him before.
Confidence wasn’t an area in which Jason had ever been lacking, but this man before her was different from the cocky boy who thought he was smarter than everyone. This was deeper, less forced and more assured, as if he feared nothing the world could throw at him. She felt it strange that she suddenly had that certainty about him, to the degree of it being suspicious.
“What you’re feeling is my aura,” Jason said. “Not that nonsense they take photos of in new age shops, but the real thing.”
“Jason, that’s ridiculous.”
“I did warn you. Look at where we are, Eri. How did we get here?”