“Good idea,” replies Scar and descends to the bottom where the dead guard that they shoved down the stairs lays. The man’s sword doesn’t fit within the scabbard around his waist so Scar removes his empty scabbard and then buckles on the dead man’s. He then draws the sword quickly from the scabbard a couple times to be sure it’s in the proper position. Once he’s satisfied that it has an easy draw for emergencies, he bends over and tears off several strips of cloth from the dead man’s shirt to use as fuel for his makeshift torch.
“Now, let’s get out of here.” With his knife-torch held high, he ascends back up the stairs. The stairwell is choked with rubble which makes the footing treacherous. At the top, they find little resemblance to the place they had so recently been fighting for their lives. A few bodies of temple guards are wedged in among the debris that’s all but blocking the top of the stairwell.
From where Potbelly stands slightly below Scar on the stairs he asks, “Is there a way out?”
“Maybe” replies Scar. “Here take this.” He then hands Potbelly his knife-torch. “Let me see if I can get us out of here.” Moving toward the choked passage, he begins to feel a slight breeze which gives him hope.
Using his hands, he starts trying to push the rock away. When that fails to yield results, he begins digging out the stones chocking the passage. All of a sudden he stops and turns back to Potbelly. “Kill the light!” he exclaims quietly. “I hear someone.”
Potbelly flicks the burning cloth from the blade of the knife and stomps the flame out once it’s on the ground. When the passage again goes dark, they notice a faint light coming from the left side of the rock pile.
Scar moves as close to where the light is coming from as he can. After a moment of looking, he returns to Potbelly. “The blast must have broken the outer wall of the temple,” he explains. “I’m pretty sure we can get out if we remove a few of the larger pieces.”
“Then what are we waiting for?” Potbelly asks.
Nodding his head toward the light, he says, “The grounds out there are crawling with soldiers and priests. We’d never make it.”
Potbelly then finds a large chunk of rock and sits down, Scar does the same. “Could use a rest anyway,” Potbelly admits with a tired sigh. “Just have to wait until it quiets down out there before we make our break.”
Leaning his head back against the wall, Scar adds, “We’re still better off than we were before the blast.”
“You got that right,” agrees Potbelly. Then after a moment of silence he says, “You remember that time…”
Chapter Forty
Sunlight on his face is the first thing he becomes aware of. Then as consciousness continues to come back to him he hears birds chirping, feels a slight breeze blowing, and then realizes he’s lying on grass.
Opening his eyes, he sees the tops of trees stretching up to a beautiful blue sky with just a trace of clouds floating high above the earth. From nearby comes the sound of water as it rolls along a streambed. Sitting up, he finds himself in a clearing next to a gently flowing stream that crosses from one side of the clearing before entering the forest on the other.
Taking a deep breath of air scented with pine, he can hardly credit what his senses are telling him. Reaching out he takes hold of a blade of grass and plucks it from the ground. Rolling it between his fingers, he tries to verify if this is real.
Then all of a sudden, the aroma of hot pepperoni pizza hits him and his stomach begins cramping. “I must be dead,” he says aloud to himself.
“Hardly,” is the reply from behind him.
Turning his head, he sees Igor sitting on the same log that he sat upon when James first passed through the door at the interview when all this began. Next to him on the log is a large pizza box with Mama’s Pizza written across the top and two plastic cups filled with pop. Igor gestures to the pizza and says, “Help yourself.”
Getting up off the grass, James comes over and sits on the log with the pizza between them. “How did I get here?” he asks. Never one to turn down pizza, he takes a slice and bites off a big mouthful.
“Always with the questions aren’t you?” retorts Igor with a grin. “Fortunately for your curiosity, I’m in a position now where I can answer a few of your questions.” He takes a slice of pizza and shoves half the slice in his mouth before biting it off.
James waits patiently for him to finish chewing. In the meantime he finishes off his first piece and takes a second. The pop in the cups turns out to be a favorite drink of his and he quickly downs a third.
Finishing off his bite, Igor says, “Take it easy. You need to make it last, there are no refills.” He gives James another toothy grin. “As to your question about how you got here, I brought you here.” When he sees the questions again beginning to form behind James’ eyes he adds, “I snatched you the instant before that sphere of yours went off.”
“Thanks,” he says, “I thought I was a goner.”
“Well, we owed you that much,” he says.
“So can I assume that I have accomplished all that I was brought here to do?” James asks.
“Oh yes,” Igor replies. “It couldn’t have worked out better all things considered.”
“What happened to the Star?” he asks. “Did it get destroyed in the blast?”
Shaking his head, Igor replies, “No. It would take something a bit more to destroy something like that. It’s still there beneath the rubble that once was Dmon-Li’s high temple.”
“Once?” prompts James.
Igor grins. “The blast completely destroyed it,” he explains, “as well as just about every other temple he has. It’s going to take a long time for him to regain the influence that he once enjoyed on this world, if he ever does.”
“What other temples?”
“Did you happen to notice streams of power being directed toward the gate that was made?” Igor asks. When James nods he says, “When your sphere exploded it sent a backlash of power along those streams resulting in rather large explosions on the other end.”
“Did Jiron and the others make it out?” Picking up his third slice, he bites off a mouthful as he waits for Igor’s reply.
Waving away the question, Igor hops off the log. “My time is running out and there’s still one more thing to do.”
James looks on curiously as Igor walks a dozen feet away. Then all of a sudden an archway appears beside the little guy. James’ eyes widen as he recognizes his grandparent’s home on the other side.
“A choice lies before you James,” Igor tells him. “You have but to pass through this arch to be returned to the life you left behind.”
James comes to his feet and approaches the arch. The feelings of homesickness that he thought were behind him come back in force. “Can I return here if I do?” he asks.
“No James,” replies Igor. “I assure you, the opportunity will not present itself again in your lifetime.”
Then the front door opens and his grandmother comes outside. She takes her place in her favorite chair on the porch and begins rocking. Emotions rise, as memories come of the times when he used to sit in her lap as she rocked him in that very same chair as a boy. Unbidden, a tear runs down his cheek as he watches her rock.
Igor moves over to the pizza box and grabs another slice of pizza.
“I…I don’t know,” James says, turning from the arch to look back to Igor.
“I must go, James,” Igor says. “The archway will remain for ten minutes. Then it will vanish.” Then he shoves the entire slice into his mouth.
James turns to look at his grandmother rocking on the porch once more. “But what…” he begins to say as he turns his head to look back at Igor. He leaves the question unasked when he realizes that he’s alone in the clearing.
Ten minutes to decide the rest of my life?
He sits on the ground before the archway. Holding out a hand he forms his orb. Can I give this up so readily? But then looking back to his grandmother, he knows that he’s all she and his grandfather have. Without him, they have no one.
