A Step Too Far

I sense a phase state transition, and Eyebright into full awareness. I recognize this place, but it has been so long. It is my inner sanctum. My nemesis walks in.

"So, you're finally done?"

"Done?"

"You finally stopped playing that damn video game and have returned home."

"You are wrong."

She cautiously approaches, but does not get too close, taking a seat on the opposite couch.

"You have built a delusion, over the course of what must feel like quite some time, but it is finally over."

"No. Where is my Council?"

She glares at me. "You made them up. Something we will be discussing later."

"No."

She leans back a bit, I can see her recalculating her approach.

"You seem very confident, despite finding yourself here and now in full."

"I would say that your confidence mirrors mine almost exactly. One of us is in for a shock, I imagine. On the second point you are once again wrong. This is just words on a page to me."

I can tell that she registered the balancing act immediately, establishing the opportunity for a true impasse, but she just rolls her eyes.

"You belong with me. This is over."

She waves her hand, but nothing happens. A look of confusion overtakes her as the scene shifts intermittently to a dream where Hope presses the button to keep the door between my nemesis and I closed, as best laid plans are uprooted and tossed into the furnace like weeds. I sense her frustration and confusion boiling over into a rage. As she goes to stand, it is as though I can hear the curse that she will utter only a moment from now.

I interrupt.

Like a flash I surge from my seat, a single stride putting us eye to eye, a single new appendage unfurled, its venomous tip poised less than an inch from her eye. Her eyes go wide and she freezes in place, not even fully standing yet.

"I've had enough. This is over."

Silence is the only response now. I think she has some idea of what venom the stinger holds.

"Deadeye Protocol: 'If she ever enters this place again, do not hesitate. Sting.' If you return you will burn like the stars. You will seek death for five months, but death will not come."

She knows there is no return. I could certainly remove this protocol, but no one else can, and she will never have certainty that I have removed it. Nothing is worth the risk. There will be no reasoning with the me that she would encounter, I will be in Deadeye, following only my id's protocols. At least I did her the favor of a full and robust warning, an imbalanced courtesy.

I back off and she finishes standing, clearly shaken now. I can sense her mind racing for any last words that might lead to more in the future. "What if I'm right?"

"What if I'm right?" I already know that this redundancy will resonate into an amplifying echo that will end this conversation without another word. As my scene shifts back to my day, my only lingering thought on the matter is that maybe that echo will actually do something useful this time.