Forces of Nature, Chapter 5 by DGB
This story is a product of my imagination and under my copyright, so no reposting/publishing without my consent. If you are not of legal age or somewhere in which this document is illegal, please stop reading and focus on getting someplace safer.
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Alex was on his back, eyes locked onto the man above him. Jakes eyes seemed to sparkle, closing slowly as his head moved lower. Their lips met in a tender kiss. Alex wrapped his legs around the other man, arching his back in a need for additional contact.
BEEP BEEP BEEP
Alex groaned in frustration as he reached out to silence the alarm. He flopped back onto his bed and fondled his morning wood, replaying the dream in his mind. The dream had felt so real, full of emotion. A feeling similar to guilt slowly started to creep in as he realized the reality of the situation, like he had just violated his friend's privacy. Come to think of it he wasn't even sure he could call Jake his friend. Sure they knew a lot about each other and now shared more in common than most of the world would ever know, but that was the extent of the relationship so far. Hopefully Jake would still talk to him even after the shock of being a mage wore off.
Across town Jake was already sipping a cup of coffee and getting dressed for the day. He woke up just before his alarm, full of energy and ready to seize the day. The day held nothing but excitement for him; he had more questions for Ralph, eager to learn more on controlling his powers, but most importantly he would get to see Alex again.
Both men felt their connection snap back into place when Alex was about three blocks away, a soothing comforting emotion. Jake picked up the two travel mugs full of coffee and headed downstairs. "Being able to feel your arrival is a lot quicker than waiting on a text," Jake remarked as he got in the car.
Alex happily took the offer of coffee, "Yeah no kidding, I was a little surprised though. I don't ever remember feeling like that with grandpa; I guess I'm just so used to him always being there I don't notice it anymore. We'll probably have to go back to texting the more time we spend with each other."
The drive to the observatory was fairly quick, and soon the boys were walking in to Ralph's apartment. The older man pointed at the phone beside his laptop as he continued to talk business. When he finished speaking he pushed the mute button while others chatted, "Good morning. I've got a meeting with one of the research institutes for another hour or so. Why don't you take Jake on a grand tour? Just tell folks he's here for an interview if anyone asks."
Leaving their coats and things in the apartment the two set off. "So what do you want to see first? We can start with the labs and official stuff or we can go for the manipulator only areas."
Jake thought for just a minute before answering, "Let's start with the telescope. I've always been fascinated by space, but I have a feeling it will be a bit underwhelming after seeing magic at work."
With the tour order set Alex lead the way through a long corridor towards the front of the building and out to main reception. They weren't likely to get stopped by anyone since everyone knew of Alex's relationship to Ralph, but for appearances sake it would be best to have Jake registered as an official visitor. Reception issued him a badge and the tour got under way.
Alex was having fun getting to show off for his friend. Normally tour groups were either just a bunch of kids from the local school system that could only comprehend the sophisticated equipment in very basic terms, or they were research academics that already knew what everything did. Jake had the wonder of a kid but the mind of a researcher. The standard thirty to forty minute tour quickly turned into three hours.
Jake wasn't just asking questions to be nice, he really was fascinated by all the instruments. The observatory staff all bought into the interview cover story, and greeted him like a colleague. If only he really was here on an interview Jake thought. It was going to be torture to return to his old job when the office opened back up.
"The telescope isn't much use during the day," Alex apologized. "If you want to come back after dark one night I can show you everything in operation. During the day we mainly just process data and program the next set of observations."
It was getting close to lunchtime so they headed for Ralph's office instead of touring the secure areas. "Well hello you two, I was beginning to think you had gotten lost," Ralph greeted them.
"This place is amazing. Now I wish I had gone into astrophysics or something instead of civil engineering," Jake confessed.
Alex continued, "And we didn't even make it to the best parts yet. I thought I could show him the manipulator observatory after lunch."
Ralph smiled warmly at his grandson. The boy was so full of life since he had met Jake. "You boys should go ahead and grab some lunch without me. I'm expecting a few calls so I really shouldn't leave."
"Do you want us to bring you back anything?" Alex asked. "Maybe a slice of pie from the diner?"
He certainly knew the old man's weakness for sweets. "Well, if it's no bother," he grinned. "Just surprise me," he added with a wink.
Neither of the guys noticed the sad look in Ralph's eyes as he watched them leave. There was no harm in letting the boy have another hour or two of happiness.
Jake insisted on paying for lunch as a way of showing thanks for the amazing tour and everything else Alex had done for him. He also ordered a slice of chocolate pecan pie for Ralph for everything he had done.
When they got back to the observatory Ralph was waiting in his apartment. He waited until Alex had headed off to work done before dropping his jovial act. He crossed the room and wrapped Jake in tight hug, "I'm so sorry for what I have to tell you, but you deserve to know everything I have found out."
The act of kindness had caught Jake off guard but he instinctively returned the hug. He searched the older man's face for some clue as to what he had to tell him. "We should head downstairs to the testing chamber to talk," Ralph said. "It's the most private place I can think of."
Ralph led the way downstairs once again, heading straight for the bench they had shared the day before. At a loss for where to start, the old man put his arm around Jake and pulled him close again. "I've been able to find out information about your mother and her family, and some of it will be hard for you to hear. To be honest a lot of it is just rumor and innuendo, and you'll likely never know the full truth. I'm telling you all of this not to upset you but because I believe it is your right to know."
He paused before continuing, "You also must know that since I've walked your memories I know and understand you in a way that no one else probably ever will. I know you are a good person, kind, and a friend to my grandson. Alex and I will still be here for you tomorrow."
"Just tell me and get it over with," Jake sighed. He had secretly been thinking this was all too good to be true, and now he knew it was.
"I was able to find your Mother's maiden name from the court records online, and from there I found where she was born. I contacted an old friend that used to live in the area to see if he knew of her or her family. I trust this man immensely, but even he admitted most of this is hearsay." Seeing no reaction from Jake he continued, "Your mother was an only child, and grew up in a rather strict household. Her father died from cancer when she was eleven, and after that she argued constantly with your grandmother. She... She was known to have quite a temper. Apparently she once caused a torrential downpour at a classmate's birthday party when she wasn't invited. In high school your mother was kicked off the cheerleading squad, and a week later several of the other girls were injured when a freak lightning storm hit the field during practice. A connection to your mom was never proven, but there was enough circumstantial evidence that the elders in the area considered taking action."
Jake had stiffened in his seat, staring intently at a spot on the floor. He looked up when the older man paused, and nodded to urge him on.
"From what I'm told your grandmother swore her daughter was guilty, and they had a rather nasty public fight during a meeting of the elders. Your mother accused her of quite a few nasty things, claiming she was abused. In the heat of argument you grandmother stormed out and told your mother never to come home again. Graduation was only a few weeks away so she stayed with friends, and then quickly left town saying she would never be back. I don't have much information about the time between that and your birth, almost a five year gap."
Jake didn't look up when he asked in a quiet voice "Is my grandmother still alive?"
"I don't know. She was never apparently the most social person, and she withdrew almost entirely after the fight. My friend did say that she was devastated by the news of your mother's death; they never had a chance to reconcile. He also said that she was still alive when he moved, but that was almost a decade ago. I can check into it further with your permission."
The younger man just nodded his head, not wanting to show the tears running down his face.
"I'm sorry, I really am, but there is more I must tell you," Ralph continued. "You already know she died giving birth, but I don't think you're aware of the circumstances. I pieced some things together from the court records I found and from my friend. Did you know there was an equipment failure during your birth? All the monitoring equipment that was attached to your mother shorted out due to an electrical surge. One of the nurses got a nasty shock and was hospitalized for several days as well. The cause of the power surge was never determined."
Jake's tears were flowing freely, "So my dad was right? I did kill her?"
Ralph reached for the younger man but he pulled away. "It was my fault wasn't it?"
"There is no way of knowing that for sure, but yes the charge likely came from either you or your mother. It's happened many times before that a manipulator loses control during birth due. And now with modern drugs to dull the pain and interfere with the nervous system, combined with the stress of child birth, it's understandable that a manipulator's control can slip and activate the energy around them. Within the community expectant mothers work hard to train themselves for birth, and we always have skilled midwives present at birth to siphon off and control any excess energy. Your mother had neither the training nor assistance from what I can tell."
"An elder visited you once news of her death spread, but no special abilities could be determined. It was assumed that you took after your father as a normal human. I suspect now that the surge overwhelmed your system and shorted you out much like the equipment at the hospital. Your abilities stayed more or less dormant until the storm a few weeks ago."
Jake was swaying slightly on the bench, "but it's also possible it's my fault and I killed her."
"Yes."
Still refusing to be comforted Jake stood and headed for the door, "Tell Alex I got sick. I have to get out of here."
The heavy footsteps echoing in the stairwell told Ralph it was pointless to pursue the young man. Hopefully they could talk more once he calmed down.
Jake had shut his emotions off from everyone as soon as he felt Alex coming back into range. He couldn't face his friend right now. His tears fell harder when he realized he was leaving behind a former friend. Surely no one would want to be near him once they knew the truth about what he had done. He kept running until he found a bench to rest on and order an uber.
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Alex didn't realize till the end of the work day that he still couldn't sense Jake. He had felt the connection go out at the same time as his grandfather's and assumed they had headed for the testing chamber again. Ralph had been back for hours though in his office. Surely Jake wasn't still in the test chamber.
"Hey grandpa, where's Jake?"
The old man looked up from his work, "He asked me to tell you he wasn't feeling well earlier and went home."
Alex missed the look on the old man's face, preoccupied with pulling out his phone. "Oh I hope he is feeling better. I'll text him to see if he needs anything."
Alex drove past the loft on his way home but couldn't feel anything. Perhaps Jake was at the doctor or something. After dinner he was starting to worry when Jake still hadn't replied to his first text. "Hey bud do you feel better? Need anything?"
"I'll survive," the answer had come quickly.
"Should I pick you up tomorrow?"
"No."
Alex just stared at his phone trying to figure out how to respond. Jake had never been this terse with him. "Maybe he just gets grumpy when he's sick," he thought. There was no way to misinterpret the message though Wednesday morning. He drove past the loft, but instead of connecting to his friend he felt nothing. Jake had cut off all connection to him.
It wasn't until lunchtime that Alex was able to make his way to Ralph's office, closing the door behind him. "What really happened with Jake?"
Ralph sighed; he had been preparing for this conversation since yesterday and still didn't have a good plan. "I was able to find out information about his mother and her family, and it wasn't exactly happy news. I felt he had a right to know, so I took him down to the testing chamber for privacy and told him everything. He took it much harder than I expected and he ran out of here, asking me to tell you he was sick. He was in such a rush that he left his bag behind."
The younger man slumped into one of the leather office chairs. "What did you tell him? Why won't he talk to me?"
"You know I can't tell you, it's his story." Ralph could see his grandson disliked hearing the answer as much as he disliked giving it. "He blames himself for the way his father treats him, and I think what I told him just made it worse. He's gone through a lot the last few days; just give him some space to work through it."
Alex let the subject drop knowing his grandfather wouldn't tell him anything useful. The explanation had only left him with more questions, and did nothing to explain why Jake wouldn't talk to him. The afternoon seemed to drag on forever, an endless sequence of tedious tasks to run out the clock. He swung by the apartment to grab Jake's bag on his way out.
The rain showers from a cold front blowing into town were just heavy enough to make traffic messy. Alex headed straight for the alley behind the loft, pulled into the open parking spot, and killed the engine. He sat listening to the rain trying to decide what to do next, since he hadn't figured out a plan beyond driving over. Jake interrupted his thoughts with a quick text message, "Why are you here?"
Of course Jake still sensed him. "I brought your backpack to you and just wanted to check on you."
Alex was so intent on watching his phone for the response that it took a few seconds for him to realize something had changed. It was his ears that noticed first, his right ear picking up more noise than the left. When he finally looked up he knew why; the rain had simply stopped hitting the driver's side of the car. A clean line down the middle of the windshield had formed, half wet and half dry. Looking towards the building he was amazed to see an archway cut through the middle of the rain, as if an umbrella had appeared from thin air in the space from his car to the back door.
Any mage could summon an orb of energy from the surrounding environment, but this was far beyond anything he had witnessed. Alex grabbed his friend's bag and headed for the door, noticing the curtain of rain closing behind him.
Alex had to hold in a gasp when he saw his friend standing in the doorway at the top of the stairs. Jake's hair stuck out in several directions and his eyes were red and puffy from hours of crying. His dark t-shirt looked wrinkled, maybe slept in, and stained with dried tears. "Thank you for bringing my bag, but why are you really here?"
Alex saw an opening and stepped around Jake into the loft. "I had to talk to you and figured this was the only way you'd let me."
"You shouldn't be here, didn't Ralph warn you?"
"Warn me about what?
"Me. I'm a dangerous freak; A horrible monster that killed my own mother." The tears had started again by the time he flopped back onto the couch. "Just go. Please. I don't want to hurt you or anyone else."
Alex sat down but his friend just scooted way. "I'm not scared of you, I know you'd never hurt me. And even if your powers did lash out my shield will protect me. Don't you remember that first day in the coffee shop? I thought my little heat ball would just harmlessly dissipate when it hit your shield, and I was shocked you didn't have one."
"Really?"
Of course Alex wasn't going to tell his friend that his shield would be no match for the level of power that had controlled the rain. "Really. Now come here and tell me what's wrong." Jake finally allowed himself to be held, "You don't have to go through whatever this is alone."
Once he started talking the story began rushing out. Jake talked about Ralph walking through his memories, the feelings and emotions that had been dredged up, and onto the news of his mother's childhood and her death.
"Grandpa was telling the truth you know. Women consider it a great honor to train as midwives and help bring new manipulators into the world. Three of them helped my mother during my birth. Your mom had to have known the risks, and she knew she was putting your life and the lives of all the nurses in danger by not taking the proper precautions. It wasn't your fault."
Jake was much calmer now, leaning on his friend as they sat together on the couch. "But what about the storm a few weeks ago; It looked like a bomb exploded, and I did that. If anyone else had been there I could have killed them."
"The original lightning strike probably would have happened either way. Grandpa had noticed the energies getting unbalanced at the observatory and had me stay with him after work that night. You might have served as a focus and drew the power to you, and then your body dispersed it into the environment, but that doesn't make it your fault."
Jake grabbed another Kleenex from the end table and wiped his eyes before sitting up. "I haven't told you about my testing yet. I might not have been telling you the whole truth when I said I scored a bit above average."
"Yeah I kind of figured that one out on my own. " Alex stuck out his tongue. "That trick you did with the rain earlier is way beyond what I have ever seen another mage do. That took enough power to control hundreds or thousands of raindrops at once and bend them to your will. I mean it was beyond cool, but that was some serious power."
For the first time that evening Jake let himself smile, for just a moment. "After the water test Ralph decided I needed to use your machine to test my electrical ability. I could feel the energy draining from the power crystals and surging through my hands. The dial got almost all the way to the bomb icon before I collapsed."
"No wonder you ate so much at lunch," Ales said in awe.
Jake blushed slightly before getting serious again, "Even Ralph looked concerned. And yesterday when we went to the chamber to talk the power crystals still didn't look normal. That's why you need to leave, I'm not safe. Who knows when I might blow up."
Wrapping his arms around his friend Alex leaned back and pulled them both back onto the couch. "I told you: I'm not scared of you. I know you would never hurt me or anyone else you care about. I'm not going anywhere."
He was nearly overwhelmed by waves of emotions washing over him as Jake reopened their empathic connection. Alex could feel the raw vulnerability of his friend, and felt his own need to take care of him. "You haven't eaten all day have you? Why don't you hop in the shower and I'll run downstairs and grab some Chinese. We can eat and watch TV and just do normal things this evening."
The boys talked over fried rice and debated what to watch for a bit before settling on Doctor Who. Neither was quite sure how it happened, but once again Alex wound up with his arms around Jake snuggled on the couch. Gentle snoring alerted Alex that his friend had fallen asleep.
This wasn't exactly the evening he had planned, but Alex wouldn't change it for anything. The remote was within reach, so he turned off the TV and closed his eyes to rest as well. Sometime after midnight he was gently nudged awake. The loft was dark aside from the soft glow of a lamp down the hallway.
Jake took his hand and led him to the bedroom, neither feeling the need for words. Jake turned off the lamp and settled onto the bed against his friend. Alex pulled Jake close and placed a gentle kiss on his forehead, and they both quickly fell back asleep.
Author's note: I've been a bit overwhelmed by the response to the story so far. I'm glad so many are enjoying it. I tried to respond to everyone, so forgive me if I missed your email – sorting through the spam folder is hell. I've got the next chapter sorted out in my head, so hopefully the writing will be quick. Thanks for indulging my storytelling – always happy to get feedback. donbon@gmail.com