19 – Take Me to Church

In that moving box again, Jaggar held tight to reality, and to Leilani. The travel ripped at his eyes and the line down the center of him, trying to rip him in half. He held himself together mentally with a grip born of practice, squeezing his eyes shut against the pain.

When they stopped, he knew without looking where they were. Sand. Dust. Grit blowing against his face. Heat. Sand. The Sinai Desert in the summer. Which might as well have been Hell.

Reveille played, the first bugle notes startling him, which meant it was 6:00 in the morning, and they were at the base where Jaggar had first lost himself, and first found himself.

Jaggar opened his eyes, stark fear falling in on him. He’d been in the Army, he’d been in the Marines, too. He’d been a cryptographer, and a sniper and a counter-sniper, too. He’d been green to gold, which meant he’d started out enlisted, lying about his age, doing the only thing he could think of to get away from Serenity after Eventine and Harlan had gotten together, then he’d taken the classes and jumped through the hoops to become an officer, doing two more tours that way. He’d been in enlisted boot camp when the females had died. Harlan and Burton and Wade and others had begged him to come home, but he’d been caught in the contract he’d signed. And he’d been destroyed.

“No, Lele,” he moaned, desperation falling in on him. “Not here. Take us away from here. Take us anywhere but here.”

Leilani turned sightless eyes to him, her face stricken. “Where is here?”

In front of them was a temporary Army base. Drab tents were lined in perfect rows, and in front of them, the base church, marked by a small white cross on a black background.

Military-age Jaggar stumbled in front of them, no older than nineteen or twenty, heading for that tent, looking like he was falling-down drunk. Jaggar could smell the liquor coming off of himself in waves. There was blood on his uniform.

“Chaplain!” he yelled toward a tent marked with a cross. “I’ve got a confession!”

A chaplain dressed in a military uniform came out of the tent, a captain with the same cross on a band on his uniform. He crossed his big arms and watched Jaggar stumble around a few times, then he grabbed Jaggar by the back of his neck and forced him inside the tent.

The Jaggar still outside the tent felt sick to his stomach. He didn’t remember ever going inside the church on base. He didn’t remember this incident at all, and still he knew what night it was. The last time he’d ever drunk. The next day he’d thrown all his liquor away and sworn off the stuff.

“Is that you yelling?” Leilani asked him in a trembling voice. She wasn’t pressed into his side, was barely holding onto him, was maybe pulling away from him a little bit.

Desperate times call for drastic measures. The truth was his only option. He would lay himself bare at his mate’s feet. “That’s me,” he said, his voice not strong. “This is a bad place. I wish you didn’t want to see this.”

She frowned, looking like she might bolt. “Did you… did you do something you weren’t supposed to?”

“No,” Jaggar said, raising his free hand, to his temple, looking out at the blue sky and the baked earth. “Yes,” he said. “No,” he said. Shit.

He tried again. “I did what I was told. This is an Army base. We were rocketed constantly. We had snipers trying to take us out even when we were sleeping and eating. This is a place of death and it could sneak up on us here and now. It comes from anywhere and everywhere, the death and the fear and the pain and I don’t want you to see any of it.”

From inside the tent, drunk Jaggar was yelling. Leilani drifted that way, obviously trying to make out the words.

“I killed a man,” drunk Jaggar yelled. He didn’t speak for a second. “On orders,” he almost hissed.

Leilani trembled and almost pulled away from him. Jaggar held fast to her hand. He tried to explain. “I killed a lot of men, Lele. That’s what we did. I was part of a sniper unit. This was the first time I killed someone. I-I remember drinking, but I don’t remember this.” His face burned. “I never drank again, but that first kill, it was hard on me. It changed me.”

Leilani faced him. Her fingers clutched at his again. She moved in a little closer. “I want to go inside,” she said. “I want to see.”

What could Jaggar do but what she asked? Nothing. He gave in and began to take her that way, but just-that-quick they were inside, at the very end of a multi-denominational chapel with metal folding chairs for seats, a stage and podium and row of lit candles at the other end of the tent. She’d moved them with her mind. Jaggar was almost used to it.

Then-Jaggar was in the back row, sitting on a chair, his head lolling back, his arms hanging to the ground. He was breathing hard, his stomach lurching occasionally. Jaggar was so glad Leilani couldn’t see him, and this time he didn’t even feel bad. This view of himself from the past disgusted him, and he would wither in shame if she saw it. It was bad enough that she could hear it. He pulled her to a chair near his past self and sat her down, then sat next to her.

The chaplain hurried back with a bucket, setting it next to Jaggar. “You throw up in here, you hear me? I’m not cleaning up your puke, soldier.”

Jaggar rolled his eyes open, then grabbed onto his head with both hands. “I killed a man this evening, and I don’t know why,” he slurred. “Only that I was told to.”

The chaplain sat down next to him. “You’re a soldier. That’s what you do.”

Jaggar’s eyes dropped shut again. He squeezed his head hard, then he hit himself in the forehead.

“What’s that line down your face?” the chaplain asked.

Jaggar snorted, then chuffed, his face going instantly obstinate. “Medical condition,” he said, his hands still up. He squeezed his head. “Fuck, fuck, FUCK!” he said, shouting the last word.

“You drank too much, Lockport. It’s just going to get worse.”

“You don’t understand,” Jaggar said. “It’s inside me. It hurts.”

“What’s inside you, Lockport?”

“It’s a… a tumor. I can’t get rid of it. It’s always been there, it will always be there.”

“A tumor?” the chaplain’s face showed disbelief.

“No, not a tumor,” Jaggar said, squeezing his head. Then he dropped his hands and stared around the small, empty chapel, then back at the chaplain. “Do you know what it’s like to be divided? To be in pain every day, all day long?”

The chaplain didn’t speak for a few moments. His voice softened. “You mean like God and the devil, son?”

Jaggar snorted derisively. “God,” was all he said, his voice dripping with hostility. “Not… Him.” Jaggar stared at him for a long time, then he pushed to his feet, his head hanging, as he tried to make his way out the door. “I don’t belong here,” he mumbled. “I don’t belong anywhere.”

The chaplain stopped him. “No, son, sit down. You belong here. Everyone belongs here. I understand. You’re angry at God.”

Leilani squeezed now-Jaggar’s hand, pulling him out of the moment, which he was immensely grateful for. He’d been losing himself in this conversation he didn’t even remember.

Then-Jaggar stared at the chaplain for a long time before speaking. “I hate God.”

“No, son, no. You don’t hate God. You just don’t know God. God would not give you pain, would not sentence you to something like a tumor.”

Jaggar watched himself struggle with the chaplain’s words, which were so opposite to what he knew. Leilani was clutching him again, moving so close to him she was practically sitting on his chair. Any other time he would have loved it, but at that moment, he was barely holding himself together, wondering what she must think of him.

“I don’t believe in God,” drunk Jaggar finally said, his tone matter-of-fact. “Not your God.”

The chaplain shook his head. “The battlefield is not a good place for those who don’t believe in God. If you can’t find sanctuary in the church, His home, there is nowhere for you.”

Jaggar didn’t respond for a few moments. The chaplain touched him on the arm. “You need to sleep it off. I have a couch for you. I’ll call your CO.”

Jaggar shook his head, pushing to his feet. “I’m late for formation,” he said, but the chaplain was able to get him back into the chair. Jaggar plopped back down and the chaplain sat next to him.

“You know what you need, son? You need a mantra, one that will help you through these moments of un-faith. That’s why you drank tonight, because you weren’t able to quiet the pain in your mind, but I can teach you how to do that.”

He patted then-Jaggar’s hand. Now-Jaggar shook his head in utter disbelief. This had really happened?

The chaplain spoke again. “That’s why we go to church, to find that place inside ourselves that does not hurt ourselves or others. People who have found that place can help you find it.” He was quiet for some time, before he spoke again. “It does not have to be church, son. It can be fishing. It can be spending time with someone. It can be anything we love. Tell me what you love, son.”

Drunk Jaggar didn’t speak. He only shook his head and swallowed hard. His eyes shone.

“I can suggest a mantra for you. I like to use ‘God’s love fills me,’ but that might not work for you. That’s why I want to know what you love.”

But then-Jaggar slumped in his chair, almost snoring. The chaplain patted him on the shoulder.

“Take me to church,” Jaggar whispered, running his thumb over Leilani’s palm. The phrase took on a new meaning in his mind. He thought back quickly and could not remember when his mantra had ‘started’. It seemed to always have been a part of him.

He thought harder, going over his military service, remembering when he’d finally gotten out and returned to Serenity, but still not able to pick out the exact time period he’d adopted the phrase. His throat lumped and he wished for just a moment that he could speak to the chaplain to tell him what his suggestion had meant to him, what it had done for him. It had changed his life. It had put him back in control.

The chaplain stood up, arranged Jaggar on the chairs, feet up, boots still on, then got a blanket, and covered Jaggar with it. He retreated behind a flap in the tent.

Jaggar could only stare at himself, touched by the human’s kindness. Leilani’s hand touched his face, pulling him out of his reverie. He looked at her. She was smiling at him, a small, soft smile, that made his heart jog faster.

“I’m glad we came in here,” she said.

He shook his head. “I’m disgusting,” he said softly. “I’m sorry you were here.”

Her expression went alarmed and she shook her head. “No, not disgusting. Complex.”

“Take me to church,” he muttered. “It was born here.”

“What is that?” she whispered.

He motioned toward the back where the chaplain had disappeared, then remembered she couldn’t see. “His suggestion about the mantra? It was good, no, great. I got very good at using mine, and I could always call on the mantra to provide me with calm and focus when I needed it. It’s powerful, but dangerous, too, like your time travel.”

She frowned at that, then asked a question. “Dangerous?”

He gazed into her eyes, thinking how beautiful she was, then he got a whiff of her sweet frosting scent and it scrambled his brains slightly, making rational thought hard. Drunk Jaggar snorted a thick blackout snore, pulling Jaggar back to what he’d been about to say.

“I’m a code breaker for the KSRT, a kind of intelligence officer. My friends, Canyon and Timber-” she startled at the names and he watched her for a second, not speaking. When she didn’t say anything, he went on. “They gather intel on the fight against Khain, what people are saying about him, possible sightings of him, talk on the Internet that could be about him, and together we examine and classify all of it. If it’s in code, I break the code. When it seems unbreakable, that’s when I have to… do that thing that I do.”

She closed her eyes and just listened like she enjoyed the sound of his voice. A thick desire to kiss her filled him. Instead, he kept talking. “I-I don’t have a name for it, but Timber calls it ‘when Jaggar goes bye-bye’.” He smiled at the thought of his friend, then frowned at the thought of himself. “Basically, I think so hard, I use my mantra so extensively, that I lose myself. My mind goes somewhere else. I can break any code in this state, but I pay for it with a little piece of my present. I forget who and where I am. I go back to this time in my mind.” He motioned around them. “Back to my days in the military. Back to my training. It’s a blessing and a curse. If I’m alone, I sometimes strip my clothes off,” he said, his face heating at the memories of ‘waking up’ naked, with other people around. That’s why he always did his deepest work in his office, with the door locked. “The beast doesn’t like the clothes, so I take them off. Sometimes I wake up in my office, naked, with no memory of the last few days, but always with all the answers to my questions in front of me.”

Leilani squeezed his hand. “Tell me about the beast,” she whispered.

Impending doom flashed through Jaggar just that quickly, as flaring silver lit up his vision, and he moved, pain clutching at his eyes.

Leilani had traveled them to a night-time-when, at a hole in the ground, shored up with cracked, earthen blocks. Jaggar did not recognize the hole or what was going on at first, but quickly, reality fell in on him. It was a foxhole, and the male inside the foxhole was clearly dressed as the enemy in the desert, a rifle and a grenade launcher next to him. A sniper who had picked off his fellow soldiers one at a time. Jaggar could see their base in the distance, close enough for the range of a rifle.

“No,” Jaggar said under his breath, the doom he’d felt a moment before picking up momentum and running for them. “No,” he said again, as the sniper squeezed his trigger, a shot firing into the night. Then he fired again and again, then twice more, his breath becoming ragged and fast in the way of a soldier who sees his impending death.

The beast loped out of the darkness, a hole in each cheek, one ear freely bleeding, and two holes in the fur at his back, blood streaming down from them.

The beast dropped lazily into the hole with the sniper, and the sounds of the kill filled the night. Jaggar grabbed Leilani around her shoulders, pulling her in close to him and curling her into his body, trying to keep her from hearing the frenzied cries and the bloody snarls.

“Take us home, Lele, take us home, I’m begging you.”

Silver light flooded the desert.