Scarecrow Gods (19 page)

Through it all, he’d managed to suppress the terror of his childhood. Then when the personalities came, they explained it to him. They described how during the forgotten times they had been his protectors. He told them he didn’t remember. He told them it didn’t happen. They told him he’d never have to, that’s why they were there. It had been their job to protect him, to cloud and destroy painful memories. Like the mystery of the three dozen dime-sized scars upon his back, or the scar that looked like a set of human teethmarks along the inside of his left thigh. The voices said they knew how those happened, but they’d never tell. They said he didn’t want to know. They said it was for his own good.

But the voices scared him. He wanted to get away from their constant conversations. He argued, he begged. When they refused, he told them to go to Hell. They said they’d already been there. He told the voices that they weren’t real. They insisted they were, and to prove it, they took control.

At first the voices had been friendly, speaking to him in his dreams, sometimes surfacing to protect him like the time he was in jail and the tall thin man had tried to make him a wife. Margaret had stepped forward as his champion. Big, busty Margaret, unwilling to take shit from any man, much less one with a tiny pecker. Yes, Margaret had been a friend.

And Little Ernie. John had been shoplifting. Not stealing to be cool like all the other kids seemed to be doing—no, this hadn’t been a pleasure trip. He’d been starving and needed food to survive. Still, the law didn’t care about the reason and neither did the little Romanian behind the counter. Little Ernie would have none of it. He took control and beat the man with a salami log until he lay huddled and weeping on the floor.

Then there was Nancy who liked to sit in the corner and pull the stuffing out of things, like pillows and stuffed animals and a white poodle with a collar naming it Maxi.

John sat beneath the broad arms of the saguaro and found himself screaming and laughing at the memories of his friends, his nemeses,
himself
. So many of them, he’d never known and he’d have never known if it hadn’t been for that brain-butcher of a psychiatrist who’d sat unfazed as John split and splintered, becoming too many for one. The man had ignored his pain. Perpetually unfazed, he’d readily supplied an answer for every shriek of John’s many. The psychiatrist had sat on his leather chair with only slightly raised eyebrows as Rufus came forward, took control, and threw him from the fifty story window of the high-rise office. When the little prick hit the sidewalk, he was still gaining speed.

John stood and lifted the sack of pure white sand. He emptied the contents in a thin circle around both him and the saguaro, the effect to isolate him from the world. Next he grabbed a pouch full of salt and flicked its contents onto the ground within the circle. He was skyclad, unfettered by clothing—as pure as a babe under the Sonoran sun.

“With salt, I consecrate thee and bless this circle. In the divine names of the Goddess and her consort, the Horned God. Blessed be.”

He dropped the pouch and sat facing north. He screamed at the world, at himself, the ragged howl cleansing as the anger spewed upon the wind.

Yeah, they’d helped him, but they all had one thing in common.

They were angry.

Too angry.

And that was his problem.

He could never achieve the necessary purity within his mind as long as he was angry. Even at rest it was a continuous rage. John had patterned his entire existence upon the necessity to free himself from the splintered halves—to become not only normal, but superior. The knowledge was his. He’d learned from teachers in distant lands. He knew secrets that were thought to be only myth. He could travel at will and incorporate his being with another.

If only his selves would cooperate and allow him that small perfection he desired, he could educate the world by command and lethal authority. He had so much knowledge to give, so much information to spread, things that could improve the lives of so many. There needn’t be any homeless. There didn’t need to be any doctors or hospitals or asylums. There were cures for everything. God had provided the secrets of the universe to the world. The One had melded it into the DNA and allowed evolution to perfect the machine. Yes, John the New Baptist had so much to show the world…if only he could help himself a little bit first.

He willed his anger down deep into the hollowness of his legs as they crossed in front of him, the lotus position simple after thousands of days of practice. He concentrated on nothing, allowing the hatred and rage to dribble through his soul.

He began by purifying his ethereal sheath, the
pranamaya kosha
. He couldn’t see it, but his aura was most certainly a swirl of dark colors, reds and blacks spinning around his
pranamaya kosha
. John’s vision turned within as he traveled along his body’s internal highways. He swept all negative energy before him, sending it to the pile, concentrating on the perfectness of nothing.

His physical sheath, the
annamaya kosha
, was in a constant state of purification. Other than the
Karmic Tea
, not a single drop of alcohol or non-organic mixture had passed his lips in over a decade. He’d been fasting for twenty-four hours and his body sang. Soon he achieved his
atma puri
, and he entered into the City of His Soul.

His self a calmed void, he lifted a shell encrusted bota bag from his feet and pulled out the stop. Carefully, he tipped the bag to his lips and felt the heady mixture of yarrow, mugwort, opium and datura sear his throat. The black edge of the opium bound him to the earth, but it was the datura, favored root of Native American spirit masters, that allowed him to fly free. The yarrow connected him with the Horned God of the Wiccans, Achilles to the Greeks, and protected him from psychic assault. The mugwort was for his namesake and granted him favor from John the Baptist, the original, cast down by the followers of Jesus for speaking the truth. His own mixture, John called it
Karmic Tea
and the potion had proven itself many times.

The bitter datura overpowered the other ingredients as it sought to unfetter his spirit. It took precious energy to maintain his place upon the plane. He couldn’t leave too soon. That would be foolish, wasteful. He had a mission, and until he’d excised his current demon, there’d be no travel. He held fast on the
ajna
, the last of his psychic knots that would send him free of his body, and concentrated on his
Chakras.

John invoked the twin Gods of the knots. Calling upon
Sakti Hakini
first, “I am that I am that I am that I am…” began to flow from his lips in an unending monotonic stream.

As he chanted, he began to shape his energy. He massaged his aura until it met at the midline and became a blinding line of energy, bisecting him both in the
pranamaya kosha
and the
annamaya kosha.

He addressed the second God of the knots, the multi-faced creator,
Kali
. “I will I will I will I will…” replaced the previous mantra, intonation absent as he concentrated.

He concentrated on molding the energy until it was a tight oval of power, a concentrated essence from which he could perform the necessary actions to exorcise himself. John ensured that the
ajna
was still blocked, then moved up to his crown
Chakra.

Called the
Sahasrara
, its mastery allowed him the wide-open spaces of his mind. Like a surgeon, he could enter the realms of thought where he could reshape, repair and remove. There’d be no chant for this. He’d already left his senses far behind. The circle would protect him from without, while the yarrow would protect him from within.

He envisioned a serpent, rising from the nastiness of his stored and isolated hatred. He formed it from the rage and it became
Shiva
, master of the
Sahasrara.
With one last check of his
ajna
, he entered his own mind.

And it was the blue of calm. There was no sky, no land, no air. It was his mind and it was how he willed it to be. He saw in every direction at once and he saw forever. He admired the solidity of his mind and the hue. He’d been in too many minds, and other than the time he’d been allowed to spend in the tranquil mind of Swami Abhayamudra, his was the most seamless.

Except…

John felt a minute tick of anger as he watched dark motes dancing, disrupting his landscape. Like dirty crows, they scavenged through memories, consuming details, transforming them to their own benefit. He allowed the entities their freedom. He’d gather these fragments in time. Like the others, they’d surface and he’d exorcise them. Deconstruct himself. So many, yet there was always time. If not in this life, then the next. He could wait. He didn’t want to, sometimes he almost refused to, but he could wait.

A whiteness flitted across his vision and he pinned it.

It fought, struggling to free itself.

He willed it shape.

It took form.

He willed it speak.

Yo, Johnny boy. What up?
asked a scrawny middle-aged black man. The fragment was pure seventies.

Like always, John wondered at the form. It was something he refused to control. The form had been created by his mind long ago and it revealed the pure essence of the fragment. To change the form would only make the fragment harder to control.

“Who are you?”

Just another one of the flock
, drawled the man as he patted the edges of his Afro.
They’re hiding somewhere around here. They’re afraid of you.

“Do you have a name?”

Sure. Call me Mason.

“Mason,” said John softly. “Did I know you or are you a construct?”

Did you know me?
parroted Mason, acting hurt.
Did you know me? Hell yes, you knew me boy. I was your idol. I was your man. Hell, if it wasn’t for me, you would have died.

“Show me,” commanded John.

A memory surrounded him and the fragment, the blue coalescing into a darkly vivid truth.

Mason was dressed in a crimson robe holding the hand of a young John, a boy he only remembered through pictures. Before them was a swirl of dark shapes. His mind was still unable to show him the entire picture, or unwilling to allow him evidence that he’d even had a childhood.

John felt the strength of Mason’s grip, and then extra pressure as the man squeezed too tight. Half a child, an adult John twisted and stared through young eyes as Mason glared at a shadow.

“It’s not his time,” the man had said. “Use the other.”

It had been a command. They were strong words, fueled by a hearty soul. Mason was a protector. The real man had saved him from something. He’d kept John safe. A warmth suffused John and the scene disappeared, the blue more full.

“You saved me.”

Fuck yes, I saved you. Hell, boy. We always knew you were somethin’ special. That is, those of us with the gift. It was your father who was always tryin’ to use you, make hisself more powerful like he was some kind of fuckin’ Abraham.

“Why now? Why come forward now?”

John wanted to ask more. This was new. He wanted to interrogate the fragment about his past. He wanted to know, maybe unravel the whole, but he knew better. The fragments were tricky if you let them. They were always truthful, but they could keep you going. They would answer your questions as they were asked which was not always what you wanted. The format of the question was imperative. It was as if the fragments knew of the
ajna
and sought to keep him busy until he ran out of energy.

Momentum
, came the answer.

“What?” The question escaped too quickly. It was an invitation for the fragment to elaborate. John told himself to be more careful.

Momentum. We feel some events happenin’—some unhappinin’. The shit’s deepenin’ everywhere and seems to be slidin’ towards you, boy. You know we got your best interests at heart, so don’t be worryin’ about us. All I can tell you is what I know and what I know is that the others decided it was my time. They thought if you saw me, you’d know your trouble, but shit, boy, ain’t nothin’ can get you as long as we’re here. Hell, that’s our whole purpose. You’re one strong motherfucker and with us at your back, ain’t nothin’ that could stomp us, so leave us alone why don’t you?”

John bit back a question and thought carefully. Very carefully. This was taking too long.

“How do you represent my trouble?”

You mean little ol’ Mason?

“Answer!” Again, John found himself arguing with a fragment, arguing with himself. It was time to take charge and end this.

I am the most like him. We are both protectors. Our appearance is similar.
The fragment shrugged.
All else is invisible, but his disturbance has been known to us. You’ve been too busy to notice, but he’s strong and clouded.