(TLO) Chapter 46: He Is Not Jabari (Patreon)

There was a numb sensation in Seth’s hand when he woke up, some piece of pain between his fingers. That was the first sensation he felt. The first thing he saw, however, was Timi, sitting across from his bed, staring with a worried look in his eyes. When their eyes met, Timi’s expression eased a bit, but it still held worry, perhaps a fraction of what had once been there.

Sound came to Seth next. He heard the whispered mumbles of his brothers, pieces of knowledge and information passing from lips to ears as much as gossip.

He let himself lay wherever it was that he laid, allowing his mind play out its wakening. The headache that had plagued him at the end of the test was gone now. The constant thumping like the herald of a particularly vain marching band was not even a thrum now. It was gone as if never having been. For that, he thanked whatever deity his father favored. Oddly enough, he realized he’d never learned if his parents were actually religious. They never went to any church or building of worship and never possessed any holy book. But in this day and age, people rarely did. Most held their faith in their deities more by heart than by action. It was simply the way of things. Though there continued to exist those who screamed their faith in all their actions. The Christians. The Muslims. The Buddists. The Nordic.

It was a matter of time when Seth moved again.

First, he tested his hands and found them wholly in his command. His body was not fatigued and he was not starved. Next, he tested his feet. They obeyed him just the same. Knowing this, he raised his hand so that he could see what caused him pain.

There, between fore and middle finger, was a slight piece of plastic tubing inserted into the back of his hand with a needle. The tube traced all the way up to an iron pole beside his bed. At its top hung a bag of clear urine-colored liquid.

They had him hooked up to a drip.

“All of us got the same thing,” Timi said.

Seth looked at Timi and offered him a brief, weak smile. When he took his attention from the boy, he did not look back up to the drip. In fact, he ignored his pierced hand completely. There was something about having a tubing connected to him without his permission that felt like a violation.

Sitting up on his mattress came easier than he expected. The vertigo that came from rising too quickly was nowhere to be found.

Around him, in their room brightly lit in pale orange light cast from orbs fixed against the walls as high as the ceiling, at least four more of his brothers whispered amongst each other. They exchanged words he could not comprehend. They were in their room, far from the world outside where they were supposed to be.

Barnabas talked with Forlon off to one side in conversational voices. Both boys had developed a sort of love-hate friendship in the past year.

Forlorn thought Barnabas too effeminate, and made no work of concealing it. He pointed it out every time he saw it, and employed as many words as he could in describing it as negatively as his creative skill allowed him. Then there were times when they would sit, and talk, and laugh, and exchange what was perhaps friendly banter.

Barnabas on his part showed he was the one holding the friendship in place, and it led Seth and their brothers to believe he wanted it. So they did nothing to intervene on it despite how berating it sometimes was. Toxic was the best word used to describe it.

Seth’s attention wandered away from both boys. It panned past Timi, and settled on Borriovani’s lying form, motionless on his bed. Like Seth, the boy was hooked up to a pole from which a bag of drip hung. Unlike him, the child was hooked up to three, so that one had to be channeled into his neck. Seth shook visibly at the sight. Still, the child lay motionless. He displayed neither pain nor discomfort.

Beside Borriovani’s bed, Fin and Jason were engaged in some conversation about something. When his eyes landed on them, they fell to silence. They returned his gaze with something that touched on the edge of forced friendliness. It was done poorly. Jason looked at him like a farmer watched his fat livestock. Fin looked at him as if he’d kicked the boy’s grandmother.

Seth frowned at that but thought nothing of it. Those two had an easy enough friendship to understand. Competition burned at the foundation of it.

Fin strived at every chance he got to be just as good as Jason in whatever world existed where he couldn’t beat the boy. From the events of the past year, there seemed no world where he outclassed Jason in any of the lessons the seminary deemed important enough to teach. From the use of the sword to fighting without weapons, Jason was the better brother of the two. It, however, did not stop Fin from continuing to try.

On the opposite side of the room Salem did little in concealing his voice as he spoke, which was unsurprising even now, considering the boy had always been loud.

He regaled Bartholomew with tales of a cock fight he’d seen as a child. He painted the story in colorful words, most of which Seth was certain Bartholomew did not understand. But there was something rhythmic about the way he told it—as was always his way—that had Bartholomew entrapped in his words.

Listening to Salem tell a story was like listening to a poet sing a song. Often times he was quite animated when he told his tales, hands gesturing and arms flailing. There would be a smile and a laugh, a frown and a scowl. Sometimes he would come alive with his words so that most would be dragged into his tale, entwined in his web of words and emotions.

There were times, too, when he was still. Times when he allowed his words do all the narrations. With them he would bend reality in the mind, create worlds of color and darkness. He would rearrange the very nature of the listener’s mind so that one would see only the things he wanted them to.

This tale, was apparently an easy one. It carried jokes with it and easy smiles and chuckles. But it was no less appealing.

Salem told his story of a rooster dying in battle, beak cracked and eyes bleeding. Feathers waning and wings broken. He painted it to seem as though it was a story of a great Baron at the doors of death for greater reasons than most men die for. It irked Seth to find himself almost lost in a story not even intended for him after just waking from a test.

Luckily, Bartholomew broke Seth from the weave of Salem’s words.

Somewhere in the story their brother chuckled in a sound that was so very near a giggle and silence came as all the brothers awake turned to look at him. It was odd to hear the boy giggle and his silence showed his embarrassment.

Suffice to say, Bartholomew did not meet any of their gazes, and it was a while before the boy was ignored again.

Seth continued to study their room as it lulled back into a comfortable noise and accounted for two empty bed.

Norman was missing. And so was Silverfang from the tribe Ukunti.

Norman had been something of a lackey for Forlorn in the past year. He was more a forgotten shadow that lived to please the boy; the servant to the failed royalty, of sorts. Besides that, he practically had no personality of his own and never stood out. He was mediocre, sufficient to continue existing but not enough to stand out. That he had attached himself to the servitude of Forlorn had come as a surprise to no one.

Silverfang for his own part had served as a nemesis to Seth, finding every chance he could to torment Timi since he knew Seth would fight back any direct confrontation. They had come to blows over him antagonizing Timi more than once, often tussling on the ground like children who weren’t being taught by Barons. To find him absent bothered Seth more than he thought it would.

For Norman’s absence, Seth could not bring himself to worry. He’d shared the same room with the boy for an entire year but hadn’t truly been close to him. They might as well have been distant cousins. They rarely spoke unless on occasions where all the brothers spoke. In training, they met occasionally and he remembered sparring the boy a number of times. Save Forlorn and Barnabas, he doubted there existed a brother in the room who cared.

A moment later, tired of having nothing else to do, Seth laid back down and closed his eyes. There was a chance he could fade back into his dream, but he was too tired to care.

Have you seen these? One of his minds thought a moment later.

Seth sighed but did not open his eyes. “Seen what?”

These notifications. They’re ludicrous.

They probably were.

Curiosity gnawed at Seth. The idea of what notifications had come up while he had been under was tempting. Still, he kept his eyes closed, blamed fatigue for it rather than his stubbornness, his grudge against a collection of thoughts that had tried to… tried to…

His eyes snapped open.

His memory was gone.

It was not a sense of forgetfulness. It was not the feeling of having forgotten a name or an equation or a friend. It was not the fading away of memories due to one reason or the other. The feeling was still very much alive. The grudge. The sense of betrayal, as if a father had had his children no longer bear him any regard. It was like waking from a dream and knowing how the dream made him feel, yet having no recollection of it.

Seth frowned now. Anger danced at the top of his mind where he had expected to find frustration. But he knew he could not be frustrated. The absence of this specific memory was already accepted. He had no idea when but knew he had since accepted it.

“Are you guys responsible for this?” he asked in a low whisper.

For what? a mind asked.

“The test,” he answered. “I can’t remember it.”

Of course you can’t. Do you remember all your dreams?

Seth shook his head quietly. “I can’t remember anything. Not even where we were.”

We were in your head, another mind answered. And quite frankly, I don’t think we want to remember. We don’t like how we’ve felt since we woke up.

True, another chimed in. But look at all these notifications.

Before Seth could protest against it, his vision was filled with a cascade of writings.

Fracture Quest [Ensure Unity].

Objective failed: [Keep All Minds Intact 1/3].

Consequence: [Memory Loss].

…

Fracture Quest [Ensure Chaos].

Objective Passed: [Sow Discord].

Reward: [Dots of Supremacy].

…

Fracture Quest [Usurper].

Objective Failed: [Defeat Fragments 0/3]

Consequence: [Broken Will].

Seth turned away from the notifications, confused. He did not remember any of these. Apart from the [Test of Fear] he remembered no other quest.

“What’s a fracture quest?” he asked in a low voice.

Silence was the only answer he got.

“Alright,” he sighed. “How am I failing and passing quests I don’t remember taking? And what memory have I lost?”

As he asked, he rummaged through his mind, searching, seeking. His family came to him easily. He remembered Jonathan and his protectiveness. Derek and the dislike he had for him. He remembered Jeremy’s lack of respect and home training. He remembered his mother’s exuberance and his father’s stoicism. He remembered Natalie. He remembered his travels with Jabari and the orb of lightning he hoped was still hidden away in his room.

Slowly, he came to the conclusion that the memory taken from him had been the memory of the test. Strangely enough, he’d also gotten the consequence of a broken will, which was odd since part of his reward for the [Test of Fear] was an increase in mental resistance. But a mental resistance to what, he wondered.

“Also,” he continued, accepting his situation slowly since he could not influence it, “what’s a dot of supremacy?”

This question got an answer.

Don’t worry about it, a mind replied.

“What do you mean don’t worry about it?”

It’s a mind thing. You wouldn’t get it.

We could try explaining it, another mind offered. He might get it.

We don’t even think it’s possible, another opposed.

“You don’t think what exactly is possible?” Seth asked, hating being kept in the dark.

Later, came the response. Someone’s coming.

Seth shifted his attention as the notifications dissolved. Beside him Timi slowly eased himself onto his bed so that he took up a little space at the foot of it. There he sat and watched him.

In the last year Seth had been Timi’s only friend. It wasn’t something he boasted, neither was it truly worthy of bragging rights. The other children looked down on the boy and thought him weird. To Seth, Timi was just different. With his light brown skin and hair like wool he already stood out amongst them.

There were a few children of similar race amongst those within the seminary; children with signs of African blood within them, and Seth suspected they actually came from the continent. But this was not the reason their brothers thought Timi odd. No. Timi had himself to blame for that one. His constant insistence to spread rumor and his uncaring attitude towards informing them it was a rumor did this.

Seth watched his friend—his only friend, if he was being honest—watch him through worried eyes. He had his suspicion on why the boy was here but wanted to hear Timi say it. The boy, after all, had a penchant for talking. And true to form, Timi spoke.

“You’re talking to yourself again.”

Seth gave him a small smile. “I know.”

“They’ll think you’re crazy.”

“They already think we are crazy,” Seth answered. “It’s kind of hard to care now.”

Timi fell silent at this, pondering, contemplating. His lips twisted in a childish frown as they always did when he was left with something to think about. The silence stretched for a few seconds, louder to them than even the continued conversation of their brothers before he spoke again.

“Rumor has it you might be worse than me.”

Rumor has a lot of things, fatso, one of Seth’s minds replied, and Seth held back a smile. His minds liked the boy, but they also liked picking on him. On a particular occasion when he’d asked the reason they picked on him if they liked him, the answer had been simple: we aren’t hurting anyone. It’s not like he can hear us.

Seth afforded his brother a simple look, as he felt Jonathan had often afforded him, before answering, “I probably am. But don’t put too much stock in rumors. They aren’t always right.”

As much as his words were true, Seth didn’t believe them. Whatever rumors Timi listened to, he was smart enough to know which was worthy of his attention. His words were rarely ever wrong, and only because there were only two kinds of rumors he shared: those that could be proven to be right, and those that could not.

However, none of Timi’s rumors had ever been proven wrong. In them there were neither lies nor falsehoods. But there was often deceit. There was often a touch of ulterior motives Seth had come to learn Timi knew nothing about. It was as if some of them had been told deliberately, so that he would hear and believe.

Timi put a finger to his jaw, a tick he had when he was taking something seriously. He scratched it lightly, then heavily, then rigorously. Then he frowned.

Seth smiled as he watched him. Timi had always been easy to confuse. Their brothers took great pleasure in it, seeing the concerned look in his eyes. Every time he was confused he looked like a child who had been lied to. Each time he would look to Seth and ask questions no boy his age should, and Seth would tell him whatever the truth was. Perhaps this, too, played a part in their friendship. The trust. The loyalty.

“What was it like?” Timi asked.

“What was what like?” Seth asked, confused.

“Your test,” Timi clarified. “What was it like?”

We don’t think fatso would like to hear the answer, a piece of Seth’s mind chuckled.

Just tell him some random story about four boys who look alike fighting each other, another said.

Really? Another piece asked with the sense of a frown. Four boys who look alike? There’s a name for that, we know?

Do we?

Yes. It’s called quadruplets.

So… Twins, if there were four of them?

Just tell him something nice. It’s not like we remember.

They seemed to be reaching a conclusion when another cut them short.

But we don’t lie to Timi.

Another scoffed. What he doesn’t know won’t hurt him.

Seth frowned at this, then scoured his memory. In them he found one thing true. He did not lie to Timi. He couldn’t find even the barest whisper of a memory where he had lied to the boy. At least not intentionally.

That’s because he doesn’t ask difficult questions, a mind retorted. Tell us, what would we say if he asked about our family?

We’d say nothing.

Would we really? The response dripped with accusation, perhaps a touch of malice too. Do we really think we can deny the boy?

Seth sighed, seeing no reason he could not deny Timi.

“He’s not Jabari,” he said in response to his minds.

“What?”

Seth looked up at Timi. “What?”

“Who’s Jabari?”

We’re slipping, a mind warned. Truth or lie?

Ignore it, another mind added hurriedly. There’s always ignorance. If we don’t answer, then we don’t lie.

“A priest I met once,” Seth told Timi. “He was a troubling man.”

It’s official, one of his minds thought. We’re retarded.

“You knew a priest before coming here?” Timi asked, interest piqued, curiosity at the nature of his test forgotten.

Seth nodded.

“What was he like?”

“Annoying.” Seth scratched at an itch close to where the drip pierced his hand. “Quiet, too. I suspect he thought himself infallible.”

“He must have been powerful.”

Seth’s mind pulled him to the ship that no longer existed, the crew that did not get a chance to become something more. Collateral damage, Jabari had called them when they had arrived on land, even though he hadn’t asked. It dampened his mood. Suddenly he did not want to speak on this subject.

Still, he answered. “He thought he was.”

There must’ve been a finality in the way he said it because Timi asked nothing more on the subject. He simply sat where he was, staring at nothing. His mind seemed to be wandering slowly, as if he was a child in a new place, taking in new things and wondering which would be most interesting.

Seth prepared for the question that would come next when a sudden burst of movement to the side of the room drew everyone’s attention.

At the edge of the room Borriovani struggled. He trashed and tossed as if held in a particularly vile seizure. Seth worried the boy would break the needle in his arm, but worse, the one in his neck.

All the brothers in the room had a new problem on their hands. Seth found himself hoping he would not get a surprise quest.