Parallels

'So I tell her that I don’t mean her any harm, I’m just using her as bait to grab Trevor. She practically freaks out laughing. She’s like, why would the Emperor save my sorry ass?'

Nina continued to circle with her eyes focused entirely on him. 'I mean, she was convincing. Really was. I’m about ready to figure that things were different on your side and then, wow, you show up. You did save her sorry ass. But man, I’m telling you, she couldn’t believe it. She was totally shocked by you showing up.'

The Major stopped and waited for him to explain.

'I just decided to…wait, what made you think that she was my…my ‘honey’?'

That knocked her a little off balance. He watched as she put together the words she wanted to use. 'What made me think that?'

She stepped close to him. The light streaking through the atrium fell across her body. For a moment, she was almost angelic in the glow. An illusion, of course.

'I thought that because here, in my world, I loved Trevor Stone, and he loved me. We were together. We lived together. We went to war together. We…wow…we partied together. Like you wouldn’t believe.'

Trevor swallowed hard.

'I shared his bed. I shared everything with him. All of me. Everything he ever wanted…he could have it from me.'

Her eyes…so beautiful.

'So,' his voice cracked. He stopped and licked his lips. 'So you just figured. You figured that on my world me and you…I mean, me and Nina were-'

'Lovers. Yes.'

'You were wrong.'

He stumbled away from her. The fly and the spider again.

'Was I?'

'Yes. You were wrong.'

'Okay then,' she conceded. 'I suppose so. I guess I was wrong. I’m glad then, too.'

'Huh? You’re glad?'

'Well, the Nina over on your world…I mean geez. I didn’t spend a whole lot of time with her, but I could see she wasn’t the type I’d think Trevor-or any guy-would go for.'

'What are you saying?'

'A real cold girl. I can’t see her warming up to anything or anybody without, like, a candle up her ass or something. A real waste.'

'A…waste?'

'You’re lucky you didn’t hook up with her. She probably wouldn’t know what to do with a man if she-'

'Shut up. You… shut up.'

'What do you care? I mean, you didn’t-'

He grabbed her shoulders but his reaction did not surprise her. In fact, she nearly laughed as he spoke his peace.

'You shut up about her. You have no business judging her. Look at you people over here! You’re getting your collective heads kicked in. She’s a better soldier than anyone I’ve seen in this whole place.'

She goaded, 'Better than all of us, huh?'

'Damned straight!' He shot.

'She could probably make a big difference over here.'

Trevor growled, 'She’d teach you a thing or two. You bet.'

'And I bet it makes you really mad…' she led

'Damn mad!'

'…that I look like her.'

Her words derailed his train of thought.

'Mad?'

'Half the time you look like you want to sweep me off my feet; the other half of the time you want to curse me. And not for kidnapping you. Because I look like her, but I’m not.'

Trevor realized his hands trembled on her shoulders. But did they shake because he stood so close to an image of the woman he once loved, or because he was angry with her for daring to resemble his Nina?

'What happened? If it was just a regular break up, I would’ve got that from her.'

Stone let go of her shoulders and retreated to the shadows.

She asked, 'Maybe you loved her but you never told her? Did you let her get away?'

'I don’t want to…I don’t want to talk about it.'

'Yes. Yes you do.'

She stood behind him.

So close.

Major Nina Forest repeated, 'You want to shout it at me. You want to scream at me how I’m an imposter in her body.'

How long had it been since he spoke of it? Who had he ever told?

It had been nearly six years since the mysterious Old Man-his supernatural benefactor-told him that he could not be with Nina. That revelation came at the same time they found Nina’s memory implant, courtesy of Voggoth’s The Order. In one fell swoop Trevor learned destiny forbade them to be together and found a means of preserving that separation.

'C’mon Trevor. We’re alone here…in another universe…far away. Tell me why you came for her; tell me why you love her but you’re not with her.'

He faced the woman who looked like Nina.

'A confession? Is that what you want?'

He paused. The flood of memories and emotion and…and loss… lapped over top the dam. It was not until that moment-the moment when he decided to let it come roaring out-that he realized how hard it had been to hold those flood waters at bay all these years.

'Nina was the only woman I ever loved; and she was taken from me.'

Oh, where to start? And if I start…will I be able to stop?

'She found my humanity and gave me a purpose beyond this whole save-the-human-race-crap. She gave me a purpose that wasn’t a burden, it was liberating. If I’m supposed to be the person to save mankind from Armageddon, then she was the one person who could save me from myself. A lifeline to my humanity. Without her…without her I can be…I can be…'

He did not finish the sentence, not aloud. In his mind the sentence finished with fields of dead aliens; attack dogs swarming a peaceful human village.

Trevor bowed his head, licked his lips, then continued. 'And I gave to her, too. We found out more about who she was; who she wanted to be. I think I…I think I unlocked a part of her that had been waiting to come to the surface. I could see our future. We would stay together and fight the fight. At night, we could retreat to each other and find happiness-real honest-to-God-happiness-in a rotten world. '

Nina spoke soft but with the tone of a detective trying to find the last piece of the puzzle. 'You said she was taken from you. What does that mean?'

'You felt your Trevor knew things about the world? He did. Just like I do. There are powers behind all this. I won’t say any more because, shit, I don’t know a whole lot more. But those powers told me I had a path to walk, and that Nina was not on that path with me.'

'Unless I’m really gullible, she doesn’t remember being in love with you.'

'That’s right. My Nina had been infected with a memory implant from Voggoth’s Order. When we removed it…when it was taken away…she lost a year’s worth of memories. She didn’t even remember meeting me. She…she went back to the person she was before we even met.'

'So you still love her?'

Trevor told this Nina, 'The woman I loved doesn’t exist anymore, do you understand? The memories and experiences we had together were erased. That’s what makes us who we are. The things we do…the things we remember. Take them away and we’re somebody different.' He exhaled loudly and repeated, 'She doesn’t exist anymore.'