The Aperture

Chapter 17

Consequences

Stripped down to a simple pair of blue overalls and rubber slippers, Alyndia whiled away the hours in the recreation room where the other patients of the psychiatric ward were gathered during the day hours. The walls of the room were painted pastel blue. Most of the patients quietly played cards or checkers at one of the round, folding tables scattered throughout the room. Others sat at various places staring off into space with empty expressions, as if listening to some radio show that only they could hear. A television blared a sitcom in one corner of the room. This television sat on a high shelf fixed to the wall above the corner of the room, away from tampering fingers. The remote control was nowhere to be found. Evidently, only the nurses could change the channel. A squabble broke out over an improvised game of Yahtzee in which only four (instead of the normal five) dice were present. The head nurse, a stout woman who smelled of starch and hairspray, took the game away from the two combatants after one of them threw the dice at the other, scattering them everywhere. After that, a thorough search by the patients and the nurses turned up only three dice.

The windows to the room and the rest of the ward were made of frosted glass that allowed outside light to enter but did not allow the patrons of the ward to view the outside world. Bars outside the windows projected hazy, striped silhouettes on the opaque glass. Four video cameras in black globes, placed at strategic locations on the ceiling of the rec room, kept an eye on the activities.

The hours passed slowly in the room. Alyndia spent a great deal of time sitting on the couch watching the television that no one else seemed to be watching. Alyndia thought of Gerald and where he might be at that moment. She missed him badly. It occurred to her that he probably had no idea that she had ended up in a psychiatric ward.

Lunch was brought to the patients on trays and served on the rows of Formica-topped tables with bench seats on either side. Alyndia had a difficult time eating the bland, unseasoned food with the flimsy plastic eating utensils the hospital courteously provided. Near the end of the meal, she resorted to using her hands to pluck out the boiled string beans out of the sectioned dish, as did many of the other patients.

Later in the afternoon, the nurse called and escorted her into a comfortable office where a balding, middle-aged man with a scruffy, auburn beard and round, wire-rimmed glasses waited for her. The walls of the small room were lined with shelves of books, and on his desk were stacks of paper, on top of which sat a plastic human skull, which was used as a paperweight. The air in the office was redolent of Old Spice aftershave, which Alyndia instantly recognized, as MacGregor used to wear it.

The man was standing beside his desk when Alyndia entered. He held out his hand to her, and they shook. He introduced himself as Dr. Gilbreth. The nurse left. He bid Alyndia to have a seat in one of the warm-looking, crescent-shaped, brown leather chairs before the desk. Alyndia casually noticed his window was clear behind open vertical blinds, and there were no bars.

“Ms. Constance Bain—I’m glad to meet you finally,” he said in an amicable tone of voice.

“What am I doing here?” she asked.

“The proper question is not what you are doing here, but rather, why are you here?” The doctor narrowed his eyes at her. “Allow me to ask you first: Do you yourself have any idea why you are here?”

Alyndia shook her head. The way he looked at her made her feel guilty as though she had committed a crime, although she did not know what crime it might be.

He adjusted a few of the pages in an opened folder before him on his desk, lining up the edges of the pages. Alyndia spotted a few different black-and-white photos of Connie in the file, along with some official-looking documents.

“Let’s go over the facts, shall we? It says here that you are 34, born in Madison, Wisconsin, on July 16. Graduated with honors from the University of Wisconsin with a degree in political science and minor in mathematics—that’s an unusual combination, I might add. You were an intern at an aerospace firm when you were accepted into service with the CIA twelve years ago and have since maintained a perfect record with them. Your hobbies are model aircraft, mountain climbing, and martial arts. It says here that you’re an expert marksman and that you were studying for your pilot’s license before the accident. You’ve been all over the world and speak at least three foreign languages.” Gilbreth looked up from the information in the folder. “I can’t tell you much more about your personal life, Ms. Bain. But I’m sure it’s just as distinguished. Your agency does not provide me with anything else. Apparently its classified.”

“What does the agency have to do with this? Do they know I am here?”

“Yes.”

“How could they let this happen to me?”

“Come now, Ms. Bain. The agency apparently cares about you very much; otherwise, you would not be speaking to me at this moment.”

“Are they the ones who sent me here?”

The professor nodded once in response.

Alyndia sat back in the leather armchair, allowing it to envelop her. “I feel like I am in prison. What have I done wrong?”

“You’ve done nothing wrong. That is, you have not broken any laws that I know of. But according to the report here, since you woke up from your coma, your personality has undergone a dramatic, unprecedented change. Questions were raised by your supervisor, Roger Watkins, and your partner, William MacGregor, that you might be unstable. Naturally, due to your top secret clearance and the sensitive nature of your work, the agency is concerned that you might be a security risk.”

“I see.”

“Also, there is the matter of the suicide attempt.”

Alyndia wasn’t sure what the Gilbreth meant by this. “What suicide attempt?”

“Your partner William MacGregor claims that you put a loaded, semi-automatic pistol up to your head, and if he hadn’t stopped you when he did, you would have pulled the trigger.”

Alyndia thought back on the incident. She had no idea she was holding a weapon at the time. “I had no intention of suicide. You have it all wrong.”

“That’s exactly what I want to hear from you—your side of the story. Can you tell me what you were doing with the gun pointed at your head?”

“I was looking at it.”

“You were looking at it?” he asked, incredulity in his tone. “Could you clarify what you mean by that?”

“I was just examining it.”

“Correct me if I am wrong, but it seems to me that someone in your line of work would certainly know what a gun looks like—especially if it’s a standard-issue firearm that has been in your possession for many years. So, explain to me again why you had a loaded gun pointed at your head.”

The room fell silent while the professor stared at her, waiting for an answer. She had no adequate response to his probing questions. She felt like crying. Without saying anything further, the doctor took off his glasses and began wiping the lenses with a tissue he pulled from a box on his desk. He checked his glasses in the light after each time he wiped them. Still, he said nothing. Then it seemed to Alyndia that he’d forgotten he’d asked her a question, and now was ignoring her presence in his office. Alyndia felt he was playing a game with her.

Finally, she spoke. “I can’t tell you why I was looking at the gun. I can only tell you that I wasn’t intending to end my life with it.”

The doctor leaned back in his leather chair and gazed at her thoughtfully. “I suppose I’ll have to take your word for it. Tell me. Since you woke up from your coma, have you had any attacks of dizziness or vertigo?”

“I felt sick the other night. But I think it was the wine I drank.”

“How about headaches. Have you had any headaches?”

“No.”

“Feelings of numbness in your extremities?”

“No.”

“Voices in your head giving you messages or telling you to do things?”

Alyndia smiled. “Not at all.”

“Before your coma, did you ever have bouts of anxiety or depression?”

Alyndia thought back on her days in Roggentine. Loneliness came to mind. She decided to open up to the doctor about this. “I have felt lonely from time to time.”

“You have? Have you ever felt like ending it all because of it?”

“No. I haven’t felt that way.”

The doctor narrowed his eyes at her again. She suspected he didn’t believe her.

“What can you tell me about your family, Ms. Bain?”

“I have three younger sisters. My father died when I was a teenager, and my mother is dying in the hospital as we speak.”

“Does it bother you that your mother is dying?”

“Well, yes. She is my mother, after all,” Alyndia replied after a pause.

“What was your relationship with your family like before you learned of her illness?”

Alyndia didn’t like these questions. She began to sense that the doctor was asking her questions that he already knew the answers to.

“I did not speak to them for many years.”

“Why not?”

“The relationship was strained.”

“You didn’t speak to them for, let’s see…” He paused to do a mental calculation.

This was a question she did not know the answer to, and she felt safer not bluffing it. “It has to do with the death of my father. It’s a painful memory. I prefer not to discuss it at this time, as it has nothing to do with why I am here.”

The doctor pursed his lips at this reply. He nodded slowly. He seemed to feel that the answer was reasonable. He leaned forward in his chair and flipped through a few of the papers in the folder at this desk. “When you applied for the agency, you were given a battery of psychological tests to determine your personality type and your compatibility with the type of work you would be doing. The agency has provided me copies of the results. What we’d like to do is give you these tests again to recast your profile.”

“I don’t understand why you would want to do this.”

“Well, I don’t know you personally. But evidently, your employer is concerned about the personality change you’ve undergone since you woke up from your coma.”

“I understand.”

“You see, descriptions of your behavior are very subjective. For example, who cares whether or not you like hamburgers or tofu for lunch? But what we need to do is determine exactly what changes have taken place since your awakening. We need an objective measure.”

“Do I have a choice on whether I should take these tests?”

“The choice is yours, of course. But I recommend that you take them, or else your stay here may be longer than you’d like.”

“And what if I fail the tests? What will happen to me?”

The professor laughed out loud at this question. “Ms. Bain, you cannot fail these tests. You simply answer questions, and then we rate your personality traits based on your answers. The tests will help us to know you better.”

Alyndia nodded slowly, wondering exactly what they would learn about her through these mysterious tests.

“Now, as for the question of what happens to you, if you’re not dangerous to yourself or others and you’re not deemed a security risk, you will be free to go. We cannot legally keep you here at the hospital for arbitrary reasons. As far as your position with the agency goes, I can guarantee nothing. I must advise you, however, that the results of the tests will be turned over to the agency for review by their psychological staff. There is always the chance that you may be disqualified from further service with them.”

“You mean they might release me from the agency?”

“I’ll concede that it’s a possibility.”

“That’s not so bad,” Alyndia concluded, voicing her thoughts.

The doctor raised his eyebrows. “You’ve spent twelve distinguished years with the agency. You’ve been all over the world for them and done many things. And from what I gathered, you enjoyed your work immensely. For all of this, I’d expect you to be in tears right now at the thought of being kicked out of the agency.”

“As I told my partner Will, I’m trying to make meaningful changes in my life.”

Dr. Gilbreth nodded slowly while scrutinizing the look in her face. He adjusted his glasses higher on the bridge of his nose and closed the folder on his desk. “That will be all for now. I have you scheduled for an MRI tomorrow morning at 7:30am. It will take about an hour. You’ll spend the rest of the day taking the tests I told you about. Do you have any questions?”

“Yes, what is an MRI?”

The doctor cleared his throat. “It’s a diagnostic test. MRI means Magnetic Resonant Imaging. We’ll use it to take a picture of your brain and also measure blood flow, blood volume, and check for signs of edema. From this information, we can tell if you’ve sustained a brain injury and, if so, how severe it is.”

“Is it a difficult test?” Alyndia asked, baffled by everything the doctor had just told her.

“Not at all. All you have to do is lie still.”

Alone in the thinly padded hospital bed that night, bathed in the eerie light of the moon, her mind raced over where Gerald, her lover and friend, might be at that moment. She thought it bitterly ironic that she traveled across the barriers between worlds, braved the Wild, just to be locked in an asylum for those of unsound spirit. It should have been so simple. All that needed to be done was to put the bracelet on Elise’s wrist. That’s all. The frustration of how such a simple act could go so wrong drove her mad. She wanted to scream out loud.

She tossed and turned in the uncomfortable bed for what seemed an hour after the lights in the room went out. There were a dozen other women in the room with her. Judging by the sounds of their snores, none of them had any trouble sleeping. After some time had passed, a nurse entered the room. Immediately she walked up to Alyndia.

“Having trouble sleeping?” the nurse asked her in a hushed tone without turning on the light.

“Yes. How did you know?”

“We know everything. Is something bothering you?”

“The bed isn’t the most comfortable I’ve ever tried to sleep on.”

“I’ll agree with that,” the nurse said. “Would you like me to get you something?”

“Could you?”

With that, the nurse left the room. Alyndia tried to remain still from that moment on. She wondered how the nurse knew she was having trouble sleeping. She thought that perhaps the nurse was spying on her using the same technology that MacGregor had used to record her interrogation of Gerald at the police station. The technology in this world can be sneaky, she thought.

Her thoughts returned to Gerald. She wondered what she was thinking at that moment. She wondered if he yearned to be with her as much as she yearned to be with him. They no longer had to meet through an aperture. Her flesh was as his. They could touch. The possibilities of what they could now do together were endless. She brought her fingers to her lips, then she closed her eyes and tried to recreate the feeling of his warm lips against hers she’d felt earlier in the day.

She broke into a smile when she recalled their meeting earlier in the day. He was just as sincere as she was, even when he thought he was talking to Connie. She decided she would richly reward him for her show of loyalty to her when they met again.

A few minutes later, the nurse returned with two paper cups.

“Hold out your hand,” the nurse said.

Alyndia did as she was told. The nurse emptied a single white tablet from one of the cups into her hand. Alyndia stared at the tablet, wondering what it was.

“What is this?” she asked.

“Halcion.”

“What is Halcion?”

“You said you were having trouble sleeping, didn’t you?”

“Is it a herbal remedy?”

“Better than that.”

“I’ve never heard of it. Will it help?”

“Of course,” she replied with a hint of impatience in her voice. “Now swallow.” Her eyes quickly scanned the other beds in the darkened room. “Do it now before you wake up the other patients.”

Alyndia swallowed the tablets as she was told. The nurse then gave her the cup of water to wash them down. Once she finished the water, Alyndia settled into the bed. The nurse adjusted the blankets for her and then left the room.

Alone again, except for the breathing of the other women in the room, she stared through the gloom into the ceiling. There were many things in this world that were mysteries to her. She wanted desperately to learn them. She felt foolish, and she had made several missteps since she entered the world. Nevertheless, she had spent months preparing herself for this experience, and she had done so with the same intensity that she learned mysterious celestial spells that carried her soul to this far-away place. She was determined to make good of her opportunity to live in this world, not only so that she could revel in the love she cherished but also so that her sacrifices were not in vain.

After about ten minutes, she started feeling drowsy. This lethargy was accompanied by a mild sensation of well-being. It was not an unpleasant feeling. She decided to allow the drug to take its effect on her.

She had almost nodded off to sleep when she thought she heard a man’s calling her name in a quiet, hoarse voice. She tried to ignore the voice, thinking her mind was playing tricks on her. Now she felt a chill in her breast. She pulled the thin hospital blanket closer to her.

“Yes,” she said out loud to the voice.

“Alyndia, Daughter of Alitrea,” the voice said. Now she felt a cold draft on her face.

Alyndia opened her eyes. To her shock and surprise, the shadowy face of an old man floating above the bed, staring into hers. She closed her eyes and pressed her head deeper to pull away from the face that radiated cold. This isn’t happening, she thought.

“Alyndia,” the voice said, its tone more insistent than the last.

She opened her eyes again. Standing beside her bed was the dim, shimmering apparition of a bent old man, dressed in a robe of her world. Cradled in his arm was a small, opened box from which a haze of colorful rays emanated. The man looked vaguely familiar to her, yet she could not place where she had seen his face before. She sat up in her bed to have a better look at him. She swooned with dizziness from the sedative the nurse had given her.

“Who are you?” she asked.

“I am Calicus of Roggentine,” the apparition said, his voice sounding far away despite his proximity to her.

The name sounded familiar to Alyndia. She felt as though she ought to know him, but for some reason, she found it difficult to organize her thoughts at that moment. Finally, it came to her who he was. He was an arch-wizard, one of the most powerful in the land, but one who most learned in the old magic of the ancestors, esoteric spells forgotten by all but the oldest and most learned of sorcerers. Although he was well-known in her city, she had met him only in passing at a Thesbis Festival years ago.

“Yes, I remember you.”

“You have committed an unconscionable act, Alyndia. You have displaced the spirit of another from her vessel of birth.”

“It was not my intention to do so.” Alyndia pulled back the hospital gown to show the apparition the healing burn on her wrist. “I spiritually bound myself to the bracelet. She put it on, though she was not supposed to. She perverted my spell.”

“You should have warned her before she put on the bracelet.”

“I could not. I was unconscious in the ether.”

“So it was. In any case, you must vacate the vessel you now occupy and return to your own.”

“It is not within my power to do so. In any case, I will not!” Alyndia said, speaking louder than she intended.

The woman in the bed next to hers stirred, but she did not awaken. Alyndia remained silent for a moment until the woman settled back into her drug-aided slumber.

“I am here to be with the man I love, a man who loves me as I love him. For the first time in my existence, I will be happy.”

“Alyndia, you may have broken Spiritual Law. Are you aware of this?”

“And so?”

“I will present this matter to the Council of Theroda in a fortnight. They will decide whether a law has been broken.”

“I am confident that the Council will rule in my favor when all the facts are presented to them.”

“But even if you are not found guilty, you must consider the fate of the soul you have displaced.”

“What of her?”

“Her soul exists in the vessel that was once yours.”

A chill ran down her spine on hearing Calicus say this, for it confirmed her worst fear.

“I suspected such a thing. Sometimes I receive odd physical sensations. But no matter what the Council decides, I choose to remain here. This is where I live now. With every passing day, my spirit and thoughts are further woven into the fabric of this world.”

“So is hers on Cerinya, Alyndia. And just as you do, she walks and moves and speaks the native language.”

“Where is she now?”

“She has voluntarily taken up a quest,” Calicus said, his voice wavering in the ether.

“Which quest? Are you talking about the visit to the Calphous Wall?” Alyndia laughed. “That was a trivial matter. Any elemental spellcaster can easily replace me on that trip.”

“No. Chaos has returned, and Connie is venturing into the Outer Realms to help put an end to it.”

On hearing this, Alyndia rose to her knees on the bed. “What? That is impossible!”

“It is true.” Calicus explained to Alyndia the nature of the quest and its goals. Alyndia listened, scarcely able to believe her ears.

“She knows nothing about our world. She’ll be helpless,” Alyndia said. “She can’t even cast spells to protect herself.”

“I’m aware of that. But some of your abilities may remain with her. She may eventually learn.”

“Maybe—she doesn’t get killed first, and even still…” Her voice trailed off. “I do not care what happens to her, Calicus. You say what you want to the Council, but I wash my hands of this situation.”

“Ah, but you cannot! A vestige of your spirit remains in your former vessel, just as part of hers remains in the vessel you now occupy. The connection between you spans the Wild.”

“It is a very weak connection at best.”

“Yes, but it was yet strong enough for me to trace you to this world.”

“In time, the cord will thin and break of its own accord, and then we will be entirely separate.”

“That is very likely. But until that time comes, if one of you should perish, then the other will follow.”

Alyndia’s eyes filled with tears on hearing that. “That can’t be true.”

“Indeed, it is. You evidently do not fully understand what has happened to you.”

Alyndia glared at Calicus. “I don’t understand. If you knew she could die, why didn’t you stop her from going on that quest?”

“I did warn her, but who am I to tell her what she can and cannot do? Her will is strong, and she was not easily swayed.”

“That idiot!”

“She also successfully persuaded the quest leader to bring her along. It was ultimately his decision on whether she should go, not mine. He acquiesced.”

“She’s going to get us killed. I just know it.”

“If it makes you feel any better, I did give her an amulet of protection, and she is with a very strong group. So, she at least has a chance.”

Alyndia wiped her eyes. “Calicus, there is nothing I can do to reverse that spell that brought me here. I cannot return to Cerinya by my own means, even to save my own life.”

The woman in the bed next to her awoke and suddenly sat up in her bed. She looked around the room with a blank expression. She seemed unable to figure out where she was. Both of them ignored her.

“Perhaps the man who aided in bringing you to that world can help you.”

“He cannot. He is not a wizard as you are.”

“Haven’t you retained any abilities from our world?”

“No. None have carried over, and there is no way for me to project my soul into the Wild as I could in Cerinya. The spirits of this world are bound very tightly to their vessels.”

“You must try.”

“I have. Oh, Calicus, what’s done is done. No matter what happens with Connie, I cannot go back.”

“I understand from Connie that you now live in a magic-poor world and cannot cast spells. Still, you should explore what other options there are at your disposal.”

The woman in the bed lying next to her spoke. “Listen to the old man, Miss. He seems to know what he is talking about.”

“You mind your own business!” Alyndia shouted at the woman.

“Excuse me!” the woman said in a sarcastic tone.

Alyndia continued, “But Calicus. Hear me out. I have traveled far to be with my love in this world. I took many risks. I was even lost in the Wild. It was only by luck that I made it here. Most of all, I don’t want to lose my love now that we are so close.” She wiped her eye. “I do not want to return.”

“But what if Connie is slain?”

“What happens to her is beyond my control. I must accept that and live my life here as best I can.”

He said something, but his voice had become garbled and unintelligible. She could only make out the tail end of what he said: “...irresponsible of you.”

“One moment with my love in this world is worth a lifetime in Cerinya,” she shot back quickly.

Now Calicus’ image began to flutter and fade.

“Where are you going?” she asked him.

“Already my spell weakens,” Calicus said, his voice barely intelligible to her. “…enormous amount of energy to project here.”

At that moment, Alyndia realized the nurse was standing in the room next to her bed, staring at her.

“Why are you sitting up on your bed like that?” she asked. “Lie down. Right now.”

Feeling slightly foolish, Alyndia absently lowered herself to the bed while keeping her eyes fixed on Calicus.

“Isn’t there another solution to this?”

“Alyndia, we must undo this act you have committed.”

Now his voice was beginning to flutter and fade with his image, which in a short time had become a silvery shadow of which only the edges were visible as a white frost.

“Think on this, Alyndia,” he said, his voice barely audible.

“Depart from me in peace, Calicus. I have arrived here to be with the one I love, and this time will come to pass.”

The nurse turned to the aisle between the beds to see whom Alyndia was speaking to. Seeing no one there, her eyes returned to Alyndia. She didn’t bother asking Alyndia to whom she was speaking. It was not a worthwhile question. Not in this place.