Chapter 6

Now when I tell you that the two of them had reached that terminal place of logic, their own wit’s end, I mean it in the most severe sense. Warren hadn’t the slightest idea of what to think anymore—what had happened and what should have happened logically just didn’t coincide. And I’m fairly certain that Livingstone felt the same way. He had exhausted nearly every line of reasoning and method of persuasion—short of the physical kind—to encourage Warren to join them. I would have guessed that he assumed that his final statement of Warren’s true loss and his quite dire circumstance would have had secured his good faith and will to cooperate with him. Rather, it had driven a wedge of impossibility between them, and I’m afraid the journey of Warren Spicks would have met a tragic, but necessary end.
But, ah, the grace of the feminine touch can never be underestimated. While most every human in the history of time has felt the touch of a mother, Warren, to date had felt only this perspective of the feminine influence. Growing with a brother, the masculine dominated the household. Not necessarily in punches and tackles of “love”—in the machismo of rough and tough physicality and exterior hardness—there were tender moments between the boys, snuggled next to each other in bed on a cold winter night, playing handheld video games. But this lack of a female peer—sister or anything through his high-school or college years that might have been called a girlfriend—left him fairly wanting in understanding the manners of a woman.
And while these two stood in the gas station, an expansive gulf widening between them—one unable to reconcile truth with reality, the other unable persuade that the two were one. Had the forces of their wills been of a physical nature, they might have summoned an earthquake, sundering the fiery foundations of the continent itself. And for a moment, soul to soul, I doubt any antagonism had ever reached such proportions: Livingstone powerless to convince, Warren immobilized by bewilderment. Neither could have taken a step towards each other had they been pushed. For several moments, their eyes locked, Warren imprisoning Livingstone Livingstone incapable of liberating Warren. The newspaper had fallen to the floor between them, face down, pages spread in a bulging fan.
Into this impossibility, how perfect, then, that Sofi should open the doors to the store and stride in between them. She must have sensed the standoff, that the two minds had backed themselves into such corners of resolution that compromise was quite unthinkable—Oscar would not let Warren go and Warren would not go with Oscar—and have deduced that her intervention might be the only solution.
She walked between them, as if they were frozen in time, and picked up the paper. She shook the dust from its pages and tucked it under her left arm. Glancing between the two with her disarming green eyes, Sofi grabbed Warren’s hand, first.
“Warren Spicks,” she began, and it immediately occurred to him that she had used his real name correctly for the first time, “you are in mortal danger. I say this because I am in danger myself by continuing to follow you. So let me be quick to help you avoid this danger, for the imminent threat hangs over my head as well.” She placed her hand on his shoulder and triggered a tingle that traveled the length of his spine.
She turned, hand still on Warren’s shoulder, to address Livingstone: “Oscar, you have been avoiding Warren’s every question. Give him a straight answer: tell him how we found him. He deserves some answers. At least from you.”
It took a moment for Oscar to reply, as if he doubted anything he said would enter Warren’s mind. But at length, he swallowed and answered: “Simple tracking device. Left pocket.” One of Warren’s eyebrows dropped while his left hand searched his pocket. He pulled what appeared to be a small, polished ball bearing from the pocket and held it up to the ceiling for a squinting inspection. A faint point of red light blinked from a small light on the metal surface.
“It was my doing,” Sofi claimed. “I assist Trent in his business. And keeping you alive, Warren, is, at the moment, my primary responsibility. I knew no one better to send to rescue you than Oscar here. And he returned you to me with incredible speed and efficiency. Indeed, you owe much to him. When you ‘slipped’ away, you were very much technically in my care, and he no longer had responsibility for you. Yet, here he is, as concerned about your survival as I am, which, ironically, is much more than you are at the moment.” Sofi paused, glancing between the two diametrically opposed beings. “I have no time for games, gentlemen. I assure you that your hunters, Warren, are tracking you with a ferocity rival to none. But I also promise you that we will elude them until you are safe.”
The last few words that Sofi spoke were carried to Warren with a tone that spoke to him much more loudly than the meaning of her words. Her words came to him with conviction and grace, tempered with the tenderness of the female voice. The sensation was entirely new to him, and it took him off guard, rendering him speechless for yet another restless moment. After he had processed what she had said, he turned to her with a blank face.
“Where is safe?” he asked.
Sofi did not hesitate to respond: “The South Floridian Coastline.”
Now, I dare say that while Warren felt himself almost incapacitated by questions (he couldn’t have blinked if he had tried), he found truth in Sofi’s voice. A sense of urgency tinged her words—she could not be lying to him, he decided which meant that Livingstone had also been telling the truth, which of course meant that his perceptions of reality had been completely false. This shift was a difficult one to comprehend, much less accept and move on.
In this moment of decision, Sofi sensed the difficulty of his situation and a degree of compassion entered her eyes. She must have looked upon his weary mind and decided to help him climb from his pit of questions—for she removed her hand from his shoulder, with it, took his hand and pulled him close to herself. “I want to help you Warren,” she all but whispered. She locked her eyes with his, drew him, trancelike, into her sympathetic embrace. “You cannot go back; you have too much to live for. Let me aid you, for you are more important than you realize.”
As I mentioned previously, this sort of plea was totally foreign to him—had she been acting, she might have secured his heart anyway, but judging the state of Sofi now, she meant every word she said, perhaps even more so than she believed at the time. She must have seen a seed of promise in Warren. And with every second, I bet she found herself in a sort of mental dance with Warren, guiding him from his hidden doubts and misty confusion. Like a rope being pulled taught her influence tugged at Warren’s soul—he felt her influence tightening, but rather than like a noose, she was a firm handgrip dragging him from uncertainty.
At last, Warren’s final defenses of logic and reason crashed around him and he surrendered to her warm embrace. He collapsed to his knees with the entirety of the world spinning around him and let the weight of his emotions flood from him. At first a slight whimper and a gleam of liquid at the corners of his eyes—but then he clenched his teeth and released a heaving sigh—a mournful expression for his lost family. Sofi held him tightly, stroked his back with a delicate touch. Warren rested his head on her capable shoulder and could only imagine the faces of his father, mother, brother, lost forever to the streams of time. Every resolution he had carried was now worthless, he exhaled them gladly now; Sofi’s every stroke lifted them from his back—lightened his load until he rested in his newfound freedom—and then he promptly fell into a deep sleep on Sofi’s shoulder.
*
Warren awoke on a yellow couch, next to a window with thin burgundy drapes pulled together. A curving glass coffee table stood in front of him, with a variety of magazines fanned out in a professional display. He blinked crustily a couple times, wiped his eyes on his sleeves to clear them, and stretched. The room he found himself in was artfully decorated, with several oil landscape paintings and fairly ornate decorative wood-work as trim. Several bookcases and an old grandfather clock leaned against the off-white colored walls.
He heard voices from across the room, emanating from the other side of an opening—at least, in another room, where the dark red carpet turned to tile. He followed their echoes, determined to find Sofi, the only person in the world he could think about. It surprised him—how quickly anguish of loss had faded from him. It had been bitter and overpowering when it struck, but now he almost worried that it had gone too rapidly. There was a desire in the pit of his stomach now, a longing which he imagined only she could fulfill for him. It wasn’t a romantic flutter or fleeting hunger for feminine love—Warren found himself anxious for conversation, to ease his mind’s questions by talking with her. She seemed to promise him answers with a simple care and honest concern. Which was less than he could say for Livingstone. If he never had to talk with the man again, that was fine by him.
When he entered the next room, he immediately found Sofi in a large comfortable chair, her legs crossed at the knees, hands anxiously set on them, listening with her ears and eyes. Livingstone slouched against one of the walls, near a dark fireplace, arms folded across his chest and wearing a poker face to rival the best. The speaker’s voice came from a behind a couch between him and Sofi. It seemed familiar at first, but when Sofi’s eyes lifted and stared beyond the speaker—who consequently rose and turned—Warren recognized it at once. There before him stood Trent Caramov, with those unrelenting blue eyes simultaneously welcoming and isolating him.
Sofi spoke first, to Warren’s relief. Her steady voice and calming smile soothed his heart. “You’re awake. Excellent: join us.” She motioned to a crimson armchair on her right. Warren smiled cautiously and walked around the couch to his seat, all eyes following him. He returned a slight nod of Trent’s and then glanced back to Livingstone, whose expressionless gaze disquieted him. “Now that we’re all here,” she began with a sweeping glance to all parties, lingering a bit on him, Warren imagined, “we can get to business.” She paused, as if waiting for someone else to begin the agenda. Warren felt uneasy about jumping in first, without knowing what exactly had been discussed before he woke and so decided to wait. But when several more uncomfortable moments passed, Warren cleared his throat and started with a question. “May I ask where I am?”
While he expected Livingstone to chime in with a simple destruction of the validity of his question, the man remained as silent as the wall he was leaning upon. Trent’s eyes flashed between Warren and Sofi—who took a breath of responsibility and volunteered an answer, “You are in what you might call a safehouse. Quite literally you are in my aunt Lizzie’s third story apartment here in the Springs.” The answer had given him nothing, and Warren imagined he had seen a twinkle in Livingstone’s eyes.
“So why am I where I am?” he wondered aloud—and wondered privately if he had seen Livingstone’s head nod slightly and a twinge of a smile play at his lips. Sofi again took the responsibility for answering his question.
“You, Warren Spicks, are being tracked by a brutal organization named “Mar” which your father managed to offend quite drastically. I don’t yet know the details, but because they didn’t stop with simply killing your family, I believe that they sense your life as a direct threat to their company. That’s as much as I could find out. So unless you can tell me something more, we shall simply assume that they won’t stop until you’re dead.”
“Well I can’t; I don’t even know why they burned my home in the first place.”
Sofi nodded and her eyes fell to her lap. “Well, if they think you’re too dangerous to be left alive, then we should assume you’re of great value to us alive. And on that principle, we’ve been operating for the past weeks.” Warren’s eyebrows fluttered upwards. “Yes, Oscar has been keeping an eye on your family—in case the Mar decided to attack them. We had hoped he might find out why exactly they had taken an interest in your father, why your father had plans to flee to Canada, what offence they had endured to burn your home and kill your family, and now why they wanted you dead as well. But none of this came to light, and we’ll just have to make do with it. Trent,” she turned, “how quickly can you get him to St. Barthe’s?”
The businessman grinned a beautiful, white smile. “Assuming we have to hit the waypoints: little less than a week…if he pulls his weight.”
“Wait,” Warren interjected, “what does that mean?” Livingstone didn’t even blink. But Trent wasted no time in responding.
“Pretend you’re a salesman at the non-waypoint stops, and do whatever we tell you to at the waypoints.”
“What waypoints?” Warren asked, immediately regretting it as he felt Livingstone’s gaze obliterating his question.
“Think of them as safehouses,” Sofi answered. Trent had opened his mouth to add something, but evidently thought better of it and said nothing. “Hitting the waypoints will keep you alive. As will Oscar. Keep close to him, Warren.”
These words had a marked effect on Warren who blew air out of his cheeks and glanced up at Livingstone, whose poker face hadn’t cracked a bit. Both looked upon the other with a great deal of mistrust. Warren felt him impossible to deal with, and Livingstone must have thought Warren impossible to instruct.
When Trent stood, all eyes landed on him. He pressed any wrinkles out of his suit with a fluid stroke and then lifted his chin to speak. “I don’t see any reason for me to linger here. It has been decided. Warren, you will meet me at 7:00 am tomorrow morning in this very room. I will send you a traveling kit with clothes and hygiene products, tonight. Have it with you and don’t be late. Sofi,” he bowed at the waist, “Oscar.” Livingstone only shifted his eyes to meet Trent’s. Sofi’s eyes however illuminated with epiphany.
“Oh and Trent. It’s imperative that we leave Warren’s real name behind. Oscar has taken to calling him Watson.”
“Good enough. Last name?”
Sofi searched the air for a moment. “Rawlins?” Trent nodded, bowed again slightly and exited the room. Sofi turned her attention back to Warren. “Remember that: in any public dealings, you are Watson Rawlins. Don’t forget,” she cautioned him.
“And is your name really Sofi Gio?” Warren asked, without looking to Livingstone for his approval of the question. Sofi just smiled and took a long blink. “And you’ll be best off calling him ‘Livingstone,’ you know?”
“Do you even know his real name? Does he know yours?” Warren asked.
Sofi glanced at Livingstone, suppressing a grin. “You are so full of questions. But let me tell you Warren, that you do not need our identities to be able to trust us. Know now that your life is in very capable hands and under the most extreme protection. It will take a nuclear missile to get to you—but right now, I’d be hard pressed to rule that out. So you can rest assured that around you, I will always be Sofi Gio—though it’s hard to say what Oscar will be from day to day.” Finishing, she stood, and with the most delicate touch, pressed her fingertips to the back of Warren’s hand. “There is a meal on the counter in the kitchen you can warm up if you like. Sleep well tonight, Warren. Farewell, Oscar.” And then she exited the door, vanishing like a dream.
And as a dream Warren tried to hold her image in his mind as long as he could, before shifting his gaze to the immoveable object, Livingstone, ever leaning against the wall. What felt to Warren like an eternity ticked away as the two of them stared into the other’s eyes. The pressure of those steady eyes made Warren want to stare him down. Of course, he tried, as desperately as he could to hold that gaze—but failed. After inspecting the carpet at his feet, Warren broke the heavy silence. “Livingstone?”
The hobo’s only reply was a blink.
“Thanks,” Warren said and got up to go find that meal.
Livingstone nodded slightly and a bit of a smile formed on his lips. “Attaboy,” he whispered.