Homesick

The rain appeared the moment Sally arrived in Eindhoven. The sky had gradually grown dark over the spires of the church on the corner and, without warning, one great breath of wind carried a sheet of water in its wake, slamming the building hard with a sound that resembled a bag of marbles dropping on a tile floor. The curtains blew far into the apartment as the windows swung open from the force.

Jackie made a frustrated gesture and went to fasten the windows with the antique brass mechanism. Even then, the wind continued to whistle through the panes and deliver a shower against the glass, blurring the view outside.

Jackie pushed against the frame, convincing herself of its strength, and then climbed back up onto the marble kitchen counter and went back to painting her toenails. Sally watched from the kitchen table, a cup of coffee in her hands.

“What do you think of rose, Sal? I found a new shade in the market yesterday.”

“On your feet?”

“Yeah. I’ve seen a lot of purple this year, but not much rose.”

“Why not go half and half?” Sally joked.

But Jackie raised her head, as if inspired. “Now there’s a thought!” Then she pouted, gesturing to the rain outside. “With the weather like that, I doubt I’ll be able to show it off.”

“Sure you will.” Sally grinned.

“Well, to you maybe,” she said with exaggerated glumness.

“Isn’t that enough?”

She smiled mischievously and went back to her painting. “Of course, it’s not like I have to worry about you. You’re the one trapped on a ship full of men.”

“I’ve been thinking about that,” Sally said, returning her smile. “It’s possible I might be bi after all. Ian’s looking pretty cute lately. That or I’m getting desperate.”

“Well, suit yourself,” Jackie laughed. “Just spare me the gory details if there are any.”

Sally sipped her coffee and looked out at the mounting rain.

“Good coffee?” Jackie asked. “I haven’t tried that blend yet.”

“Fine,” she remarked with a shrug. “But you know I don’t have your refined palette. Then again, since I’m not really drinking it, who knows what it actually tastes like? I could be missing all the subtleties.”

“No sleepless nights at least,” she said, squinting to dab color onto her baby toenail.

“I guess that’s true.”

Sally watched Jackie work with genuine admiration. Then she looked with respect at the paintings that hung in the kitchen. Like the painting Sally had taken into space, these scenes could only have been created by Jackie. Some were of architecture, while others showed people doing the most mundane things, but from a perspective so innocent and pure that some deeper meaning was revealed. In one scene, a man walked a dog along a cobbled street in front of a tavern. Sally had been there when Jackie sketched it. She’d also seen the man with the dog. But, until Jackie painted it, he’d only been part of the background. Jackie had looked at the street for almost an hour, waiting patiently for what she described as inspiration. She also listened. There was music coming from the pub that evening and the sound of laughter. But it wasn’t until the gentle ringing of the dog’s collar appeared faintly in the distance that Jackie grew focused. The man and the dog meant something very real to Jackie, and now Sally could see it too. It was an attitude, perhaps. A way of life. Like all Jackie’s work, it contained the essence of something more real than the moment itself.

But that described Jackie as well. She wore crystals and lit candles, not because she wanted to rebel against an established society, but because she saw something in them she liked. She wasn’t trying to be anything but herself. That was why she was able to touch so many people with such beauty. Sally sighed, not wanting to tell her what she knew she had to, but knowing she couldn’t put it off forever. It might have seemed a trivial matter to most, but they had never kept even small secrets from each other.

“Jackie, there’s something you’ve got to know.”

Jackie snapped to attention, her eyes wide.

“Oh, no, it’s nothing dangerous!” Sally held up her hands. “I’m sorry. I know whenever I’ve said that lately it’s meant something terrible was about to happen.”

Jackie smiled and sagged with relief.

“No, this time it’s more by way of confession.” She pulled the athame from her jacket and held it out for her inspection.

Jackie reached for it, but Sally held it back. “Careful! It’s very sharp now.”

Jackie took it by the hilt and gently felt the edge. “Cool!”

“But I’ve ruined it, haven’t I?” Sally asked with the tone of a parent who had accidentally stepped on her child’s toy.

“No, why would you say that? You can still use it as an athame. We just don’t usually sharpen them. There are no rules, you know. You could use a pencil if that’s all you had, or even just your finger. It’s a mental thing. By pointing and drawing shapes in the air, you visualize things. You can draw a smile to be happy, or whatever symbol you want to concentrate on. It’s just a way of focusing your attention. The athame itself is only a tradition, like the magic wand. Some people get caught up on styling, but it’s really just something to doodle with.” She eyed the blade with interest. “Why did you sharpen it?”

“Well, it wasn’t for doodling. I needed a weapon when the aliens were onboard and, believe it or not, this was all I had!” She laughed, relieved to have everything on the table. “I gave Ian the gun because I knew he could use it better than I could.”

At this, Jackie’s face dropped. She stared at the knife as if remembering something. She sat down at the opposite end of the table and turned the blade over in her hand.

“I’m sorry, Jackie. I know this must have meant a lot to you. You didn’t give it to me to use as a weapon, and I did have to use it. It even has their blood on it now. I wanted to tell you before you found out in the official reports.”

Jackie looked at her. “Did it save your life?”

“I think so.”

“Did you use it against someone greedy and lustful?”

Sally paused, surprised by her question. “Well . . . yes. Why?”

“Do you still have the sheath?” She looked to her with an expression that contained little of Jackie’s usual innocence.

Sally tugged at her jacket, freeing the leather holster from the inside. She set it on the table.

“Look at the markings.”

Sally held it up to the light and squinted at the indentations. “I see a woman with six arms. Is that it?”

“That’s Kali. She’s an Indian god. You call on her if you want protection. She can be very fierce. She’ll either be your best friend or she’ll kill you.”

“Like the Mafia?” Sally joked.

“Sort of.”

“I thought you said this athame was English.” Sally eyed the blade again.

“It is. But the sheath isn’t necessarily the original. It didn’t have one when I bought it and this was the only one that fit the blade.”

“Okay, so what’s the significance?”

Jackie swallowed hard and sipped at her drink. “Sal, when I bought this I wasn’t shopping for you. I wasn’t even looking for an athame that day.” She looked down, as if confessing a crime. “When I saw it, I knew you had to have it! It wasn’t for me! You needed it! And I knew it was supposed to protect you from something evil. Something having to do with lust or greed!”

“But you got this for me over a year ago,” Sally said in bewilderment. “How could you have known about the __”

“I didn’t know! It doesn’t work that way, Sal! I only knew you needed it and that it would protect you from lust or greed!” She looked to the ceiling and sighed, as if her next words would be difficult. “But I thought it was a spiritual thing. I thought maybe it would be some kind of shield for you, or that you’d use it to center yourself!” Her voice built up more anxiety. “Either that or I thought I was supposed to use it when I thought of you! Thank God!”

“What?”

“I almost didn’t give it to you!” she said, her face quivering. “I came within inches of asking for it back so I could use it when I visualized you! I’d have given you a painting instead, or some other useless trinket when you needed this!”

Sally looked at the blade with new interest. “I have to admit, it sure came in handy.” She turned the blade against the light, watching the gleam travel from end to end. She remembered the fight, playing it back in her mind with a shudder of revulsion. “I never used a knife this way before. I never imagined I could. But the odd thing was, even though it was scary at the time, it was almost fun. I don’t know if it’s good to tap into those kinds of feelings. I never knew I had pirate in me.”

“Maybe you had some help.” Jackie tapped the sheath. “Kali would be pretty good with a sword and she’d probably have loved the challenge.”

Sally smiled. “Well, with six hands, I’d say she’d have had an unfair advantage!”

“It’s not funny!” Jackie snapped. “You never take this stuff seriously!”

Sally backed down, taking Jackie’s hand with a penitent look. “I’m sorry, I know this means a lot to you. I wasn’t trying to make light of it.”

Jackie nodded, composing herself again. “It’s not that I think there really is a Kali, complete with six hands. You understand that, don’t you?”

Sally wasn’t sure how to answer.

“Kali’s just a name for a force of nature. She’s a symbol. But symbols can be powerful, and they can sometimes reside in things. Things can be ‘charged’ with their energy like . . . batteries. Then you can put whatever face on that symbol you want. If you don’t like Kali, you can use Al Capone instead. Don’t you see, this is all symbolic! But it works!”

Sally nodded slowly. “I can accept that. But you’ve also got to admit it could just be an interesting coincidence.”

“No such thing, Sal. The tapestry of life is not that simple. There are no threads just for show. They all lead somewhere.”

Sally smiled. “I love you, Jackie. Please never change. I’ll try to keep an open mind for you.”

Jackie sat back against the wrought iron chair and closed her eyes, as if physically weakened by their exchange.

“I’m just glad those animals are off the ship and we’re still here. And thank God we leave in two days.” Sally took another sip of her coffee. “If we’re careful, we might just get out of this unscathed.”

“Two days?” Jackie perked up with a start. “You leave in two days? You didn’t tell me that before!”

“I didn’t think it mattered,” Sally stammered, trying to interpret her concern. “That’s when we leave orbit. We’ll be perfectly safe until then. After that it’s just a routine flight. Of course, we’ll still be out here for another six months __”

“That’s not what I meant.” She looked frustrated, as if she’d been trying to communicate something vitally important to a person who didn’t speak her language. Finally, she sagged in defeat. “Look, maybe we should just drop this. Forget I said anything.”

There was an awkward silence.

“Jackie,” Sally sang her name. “I’m all ears, Kiddo.”

With a moment’s effort, Jackie resigned herself to action. She got up slowly and walked past her into the living room. “Come,” she said.

Jackie’s easel stood in the middle of the room on the hardwood floor. A new painting sat on its ledge, obscured by a protective cloth. The floor was littered with spent tubes of acrylic paint of various colors, many of which had been stepped on, spilled, and ground into the woodwork. Her palette was propped up on the side of the easel, drops of hardened paint of all colors drawing crude arrows in the direction of the floor.

Sally looked critically at the stains on the hardwood and whistled with disapproval. “They’re not going to like this!” she said, scratching at a blob of red acrylic.

“Forget that!”

Sally rose, confronting Jackie’s concerned face. She took a breath and waited.

Jackie saw her effort and relaxed some. “I didn’t really want to show you this, Sal. I was trying to ignore it, but now I can’t.” She lifted the cloth with shaking hands. “I had another dream!” she said, suddenly having to fight back tears.

But, though Sally didn’t deliberately ignore her distress, when the covering was removed she could only gasp in awe at what she saw beneath it. There, in full color, was an incredibly accurate rendition of the Kelthy and a realistic view of the planet! Between the Kelthy and the planet were two figures fighting. Sally could make out one of them as herself. The other was an impossibly strong-looking man with a torch in his hand and fire coming from his eyes and ears. Superimposed in the background was a portrait of Sally watching the fight with an expression of anger and perhaps despair. It was as if she was helpless to prevent the battle, but forced to watch it. This part of the image looked strangely familiar to Sally, though she couldn’t say why. The face was translucent and vaguely distorted. Behind it, almost invisible in one corner of the painting, was a gray full moon.

“My God, Jackie! That’s beautiful! I’ve never seen you do anything like that before!” She hovered over the picture, viewing it from different angles. “The detail is incredible! I love it!”

“I don’t!” Jackie said, drawing her attention back to her. “It’s another premonition! It could mean anything! And, whatever it is, it scared the Hell out of me!”

Sally put her arms around her, seeing the depth of her fear for the first time. “I’m sorry,” she said with as soothing a voice as she could. “I wasn’t thinking of it as a premonition. I just saw it as a picture. It’s good work!”

“Sal, I don’t think this is over yet,” Jackie said, dabbing at her tears. “That image was very strong! I painted the whole thing last night and I couldn’t stop until it was done! I was exhausted afterwards and I slept until you came!” She looked back at the painting and then turned away. “The worst thing is, I don’t know if you can do anything about this even if you know it’s coming!”

Sally went to her, unsure how to comfort her.

“And there’s something else odd. For some reason, I don’t get a strong feeling you are in danger. Maybe someone else is that you care about. But, whatever it is, it’s pretty damn big, that’s for sure! And it happens in two days!”

“How do you know that?”

“Because the full moon’s in two days! Look at the moon in the picture!”

Sally glanced at the painting and sighed. “Yes, I see that, but . . . New Ontario doesn’t have a moon __”

“But we do!” Jackie cried. “And it’ll be full in two days! Now, don’t tell me that’s a coincidence!”

Sally stood back from the painting and thought for a moment. Then she turned to Jackie with a determined expression. “Let’s get one thing very clear, Jackie Elizabeth. I’m not Wiccan, I don’t understand tarot cards, I don’t know crystals, and I don’t know candles. But I’m not stupid either.”

Jackie sighed.

“No, hear me out! Maybe I like my science cut and dried. Maybe I prefer to believe in things I can measure and control. But, when you get one of those funny feelings in your bones that keeps you up all night and makes you paint something like this, I know damn well there’s something to it!” She swallowed hard, taking on a betrayed look. “And I do take it seriously! Now we will dissect this and we will find out what it means!”

Jackie sighed. “I didn’t mean __”

“It’s okay, I probably deserved that.” She took her hand and led her back to the easel. Then she walked forward and appraised the painting again for a long, thoughtful moment. “Nice job on the ship, by the way. Except . . .” She froze.

“What?”

Sally took a magnifying glass from Jackie’s kit, held it to her eye, and scrutinized the ship more closely. Then she turned to Jackie. “Where did you see that symbol?”

Jackie moved closer, trying to see what Sally was referring to. The Kelthy had the flags of the nations supporting the program painted on each of its modular compartments. On the compartment encompassing Sally’s quarters was a Canadian flag. Elsewhere there was an American, a British, and a Russian flag. The UN flag was also displayed on the compartment that held the mess hall and recreation room. But on the compartment Sally pointed to, in a rather obscure area and almost out of view, was a twisted symbol resembling two links of a chain.

“Did you see this in a dream, too, or did you see it on the news?”

Jackie stepped away from the painting and searched her mind. “I can’t remember. It just belonged there, that’s all.”

“That’s the symbol of the Masters,” Sally said, taking her shoulders.

Jackie sucked her breath.

“But why would it be on the ship? Why not the planet? Are you sure it’s supposed to be on the ship?”

“Yes, I’m very sure! But I don’t know why.”

Sally held her, unsure if she were trying to comfort her or be comforted. She stared at the painting with mounting fear, scanning it for other clues.

“Who’s that I’m supposed to be fighting? It doesn’t look like Darm even at his best.”

“Oh, that’s Lucifer,” Jackie said, as if relieved to talk about something she did understand. “But that could mean lots of things.”

“The Devil?”

“Oh, no, Lucifer,” Jackie corrected her. “He’s not really the Devil.” She laughed. “But the Christians started calling their devil ‘Lucifer’ to scare the pagans. No, Lucifer’s neither good nor bad. He’s supposed to help the sun shine and care for the crops, that sort of thing. He’s only thought of as evil when the sun gets too hot and scorches the land.”

“But he looks like the Devil.”

“The Christians again! Even their Bible never describes exactly what the Devil looks like. They just gave it the face of a pagan god to try to convince us we were worshipping Satan.”

“Well, yes, but he’s on fire!”

“Lucifer’s the god of fire. I told you, this is all symbolic! Fire is a force of nature. It’s neither good nor bad, but it has a place in our lives. Ancient civilizations just gave it a face to help understand it. And they gave it a name, too. ‘Lucifer.’ In fact, that’s what they call matches here in The Netherlands. They call them ‘lucifers.’”

Sally was now transfixed on the painting, showing more interest than Jackie had expected.

“Jackie, suppose this is the devil and not your Lucifer. Suppose we’re talking about temptation?”

“Then he’s tempting you? Were you tempted?”

“No, not me, but somebody else on the ship.” Sally moved closer and then stepped back. “That’s why I’m seen here as being angry. Maybe my fight with temptation already happened.”

Jackie looked on.

“Don’t you see?” She pointed to the faint but unmistakable chain links. “That symbol is on one of the aft compartments. I don’t live there. But they were looking for a traitor.”

“Then you’re saying somebody could be tempted to help the Masters? But how could that be? The way you talked about them, they’re monsters!”

“They are, but so are many of us. Jackie, Darm made me an offer. He tried to get me to sell out Earth and bring the Masters’ way of life here. They offered me the chance to become a Master on Earth. I could have been serviced day and night by brain-dead slaves!”

Jackie snorted. “But that’s ridiculous! Isn’t it?”

“Maybe. But maybe not. If I joined them it might have become possible.”

“And you think somebody else may have?” She squinted. “Ian?”

“Hell no, not Ian! He practically killed one of them getting her off the ship!”

“But I thought you said Vlad wasn’t with you, and he’s the only other one.”

“Yes, but he could have heard about their offer on the headsets. And I have no idea what he was doing in the shuttle bay all that time. At least I don’t know for sure. I just assumed . . .” Sally’s face grew tight with concern. “And he’s clever! He could have put something in that ship. We blew it up, but what if he left them some kind of communication device?” She pinched her lower lip. “He could have left it for them to find or engineered it to survive the explosion. Vlad could have contacted them after they landed.”

Jackie’s face puckered in disbelief. “Do you think he would? I mean, really, Sal, that would be low!”

“Look, Jackie, I’m supposed to be objective. I can’t punish people for things I can’t prove they’ve done, but Vlad’s racked up enough circumstantial evidence to put him permanently on my watch list!”

“But to sell out Earth?”

“To sell out Earth, I don’t know. I’d like to think that wouldn’t be one of his menu options, but I can’t rule it out.”

Sally stared at the painting in wonder. “He’s lazy, he’s greedy, and he tried to override my commands and leave for Earth without us. He’s also a coward. He would have run rather than attempt the rescue in the first place. All in all, the man’s a flake and I don’t trust him as far as I could scream in a vacuum.”

“What will you do?”

She shrugged. “That’s the hard part, there really isn’t much I can do except watch him. But I will, I can promise you that! It’s bad enough I had to give him amnesty once, but if I find out he’s a traitor, I’ll pull a Captain Bligh on him!”

“Will you hang him from the yardarm?” she joked.

“More like keel hauling in this case.” Sally smiled. “But in a vacuum instead of an ocean and without a space suit. Similar result, but not quite as pretty.” She took Jackie’s hand. “Thanks, kiddo. If there’s a problem, I’ll find it.”

“But we can’t even be sure that’s what this means! In fact, it may mean nothing at all!”

“I’ll watch, Jackie,” she promised. “I’ll keep an eye open! Now that Scott’s in constant therapy with Dr. Poole, it’s not like all my time is taken up with him. If Vlad’s turned traitor, I’ll find out. And remember, I’ve still got Coolie on my side!”

“That’s Kali!” Jackie laughed.

“Try not to worry,” Sally said, drawing a deep breath. “To be honest, right now I think the safest thing to do is recharge our batteries.” She looked around the room. “Things are going to get busier now that we’re getting ready to leave, and I may not be able to come back as much. If you don’t mind, I’d like to fill a prescription.”

Jackie looked at her quizzically.

“For what seems like forever, I’ve been bringing New Ontario with me whenever I’ve come here. Now, for at least one hour, I’d like to leave it back on the other side of the fold. Can we do that?”

“I suppose,”

“For one hour, I’m here in The Netherlands with you. Can we try that?”

“Sure.”

“Let’s talk about the market. You can show me what else you bought, we can watch TV, or we can just sit around doing nothing at all but being here instead of there. Fair enough?”

“That sounds like a good prescription.”

No further words were needed after that. They both turned away from the painting in unison and walked under the archway to the hall where the stained glass window bathed the floor in green. Sally glanced at the colors, trying to see them as more true than before. For one hour, she would not look back.