Reality is perceptual and perpetual.

Featherstone wanted to begin 'removing layers'. Gareth couldn't heal if he didn't come to grips with the damage done. That was fucking hilarious. Heal. If Gareth had possessed any confidence or the slightest sense of self-worth he might have actually laughed. Heal. From shit that was worse than the living hell he could already remember? It really didn't matter who was to blame if those fucking memories were permanently in your head.

He mentioned to Dr. Azzawi that he felt that things were being rushed. She agreed. Until she had a talk with Featherstone. Then it changed to 'If it becomes too uncomfortable, tell him.' and that was a betrayal that hurt him badly. She knew he was incapable of being assertive. She knew. She had tried to reassure him by pointing out that Featherstone was one of the very best. Apparently nobody understood that Gareth O'Shea had justifiable reasons to be afraid. He had a horribly clear memory of his tenth birthday. Of spending the day being gang raped by his grandfather and his friends. Of being forced to have sex with a dog.

If he remembered that, just what exactly was there in his past that he couldn't face? How or why would anybody want to find that out?

.

"Zeus, how is any of this going to fucking heal me?" Gareth asked as they drove towards a dreaded session. Only his meds kept him from just collapsing entirely. "I'm not seeing how finding out even worse shit was done to me is going to make me less anxious or depressed!"

"He's an expert. He knows what he's doing. I mean there's clearly a reason to it." Zeus said but didn't sound entirely confident either. "Maybe it's necessary to, you know, give you new tools. For coping."

Gareth accepted defeat. He was already a burden to his partner. He had a thousand and one quirks. He was triggered by so many things that he literally couldn't keep track. Zeus was patient beyond all reason and incredibly generous with his compassion and love. He deserved better than Gareth was currently capable of giving. It would be selfish on his part to not take steps to become who Zeus deserved.

.

"We need to address some of these things that trigger negative reactions but for which you seem to have no explanation." Featherstone told him as they prepared for an absolutely bizarre 'field trip'. "I'll be right there. It will be safe. We will face this together."

Gareth didn't say just how stupid that statement was. Featherstone didn't have a physical aversion to the smell of diesel exhaust, grease, and oil. He wasn't the one who would feel nausea. He wasn't the one who would vomit if they stayed around the smell for long. Gareth already knew how to deal with this 'issue'. He stayed the fuck away from truck stops and rest areas.

So here they were getting ready to go to the 76th Street Diner. But not to the part Gareth was comfortable in. No, of course not. They would be going out back, into the truck parking area. It was a chilly September day. Trucks would be idling. It was going to be bad. That wasn't a self-defeating or counter-productive mindset. It was acknowledging reality.

He went along against his will. But most of his life worked that way. He had gone through the 'excercises' meant to balance him during the drive over. He grew increasingly upset as they drew nearer to the diner. By the time they were pulling into the lot he was mentally paralyzed. His mind knew nothing but dread. He didn't have fight or flight instincts. Neither had ever been viable. Instead he was frozen inside. Knowing there was no escape.

Not a single coping skill helped him when he stepped out of the car. His heart was already hammering and his bowels were cramping. Nevertheless he obeyed directions. Because that was HIS survival tactic. Do nothing to antagonize. Submit and hope there would be less pain that way.

Then he saw The Man. An ordinary trucker. Lanky, in jeans with a leather vest. Dirty hair in a ponytail and scruffy beard. Gareth didn't feel his bladder release its contents. The trucker looked his way and Gareth collapsed like he'd been poleaxed as he was hit by the worst panic attack of his life. His vision became bright flashes and blurred colors, there was a ringing in his ears, he began hyperventilating, and curled into a ball upon the dirty pavement. His muscles contracted so tightly he could feel his bones creak from the strain.

He was dying this time, he was finally dying and all the pain would finally end. He was going to Hell and and there would be a whole new set of pain there and he didn't care. He was going to Hell where he belonged. God must have finally grown tired of inflicting misery on Gareth O'Shea. He had never been a good boy. He had always been evil and filthy and foul. He had been doomed all along. He had never stood a chance.

He heard himself screaming and wondered how he had the breath for it. He could also hear his mother laughing. Laughing and laughing and laughing because although Gareth O'Shea begged God for mercy a thousand times there never was any. His mother was what God had given to him so that he would never forget just how bad he truly was and she loved his suffering just as much as she hated her only child.

.

Featherstone was fired by Zeus after Gareth was admitted to the psychiatric unit again. Having undergone a trauma induced psychotic break. And this one was far worse because this time a door had opened and what it let through was an ugliness that nobody should ever have to face.

He was trapped in a nightmare facing a monster far worse than his grandfather. He was there with the monster that had prepared him for, and given him to, his grandfather. He was there with the beast that had tortured him relentlessly in every possible way.

"This place was truly holy." Thurlcroft said. Much to my suprise. He perhaps had some minor form of environmental recall. "Those who destroyed it and cast all into ruin are mimicked by the new masters. Mankind is ignorant. It could learn but would rather not."

"That is both the tragedy and the poetic justice of what we are." Cysalla said and held tightly to her lover's hand. "The greatest efforts are always taken by those who seek to serve none but themselves. All that we could be remains only wistful imaginings."

That is my blessed and beloved lady. Vision clear and heart strong and never hiding behind ridiculous wishes for impossible fantasies.

.

"Does being the direct descendant of a sacred and holy saint guarantee you a place in Heaven?" Nicoćeasću asked of me a day later as we stopped to rest our livestock in the meager shadow of a short but sharp sided ridge. "My babasa has always said that few see the Highest Above because men love themselves more than they love God "

"Heaven wasn't made for us and God doesn't need our love." Thurlcroft said as he checked the dray horses of our wagon. "We aren't Original Beings. We're an afterthought. An experiment. One that's surely gone wrong."

"Saints and their lineages never see any rewards. Not of a sort you would wish. We remain bound to the world, adding our knowledge to those who come after." I said and screened from my perception long vanished grasslands and vast herds of grazing beasts. "It matters not if I have no children of my own. My lineage is not a single line passing through history. Somewhere a cousin or distant niece or nephew will follow me and I will be here, a soul bound to this existence by memories that I will then share."

"So all the ghosts you already see, you'll become one too?" Thurlcroft said and frowned. "If mankind ends itself, will you be released?"

"I haven't the slightest. I see the past, not the future." I said as the milky white sky over us itself only promised pain without a single answer. "I was given this path. I did not choose it nor have any say in it."

"No offense here visionary but better you than me." Nicoćeasću said and made the sign of warding against foul deeds. "I struggle enough with what I can see already. God gave you no gift in this."

"The only true gifts of value I've ever received have come from people." I said and turned to meet Nigel's gaze squarely with my eyes clear and hiding nothing. "A gift that cannot be shared is only a burden. An obligation that is imposed and cannot be refused."

"I wouldn't know. I've never been given anything in my life." Nicoćeasću grumbled but all I heard were words that were meant for other ears. Nigel and I spoke, with just our eyes, things the other two would like as not never comprehend.

.

I carry secrets and carry them well. Until they cease to be. For example I knew that Nigel Westham was the seventh generational seventh son of a seventh son. He himself was unaware because who amongst you normal lot remember your ancestry beyond at most two generations? He was quietly blessed and silently portentious and I only truly recognized his glow once I became sober.

You may know the fables and folklore of the seventh son but you can't comprehend the improbability of seven consecutive generations of seventh of seven. No sisters. Each seventh marrying and procreating precisely seven more. I believe that Nigel was the reason I could set my addiction aside. Because he healed me of it. Not purposefully. Not by a deliberate act of will. He wished it to be so and it became so.

I know what you do not. Fable and folklore are founded in truths that we gradually chose to deny. I myself am the seventy-seventh compendium of my line. The numbers never align so precisely by happenstance. Reilen and Cysalla are the first of their line. Nigel and I were perhaps the last of ours. Together the four of us complete a cycle. The end guiding the beginning to its proper place.

Chaos is simply the tipping point with enthalpy on one side and entropy upon the other. As individuals we seldom have any influence upon the balance. Occasionally though there are catalysts. Enthalpy can sometimes feed entropy but never the reverse. The first is fixed, the second affected by randomness. A catalyst can fix a system in place or direct it to change. What that means to humans is that our delusions of importance will always shatter at some point. We do not control things and never have. We pretend that when coincidence just happens to coincide with our desire it is by our will.

The Mother of All has no favorites. Watch long enough and you will see this proven time and time again. All have a purpose. Even if that purpose is to simply bear witness or to be a supporting character in a play that we were never given the script for.

.

Bikbulat Vodenichirov became the drover of our wagon after LaRue was bitten by a venomous spider and died. He either didn't notice the bite or chose to think it inconsequential until he collapsed and went into seizures. At which point all we could do is watch him die and dig a shallow grave which we covered with a cairn.

LaRue turned out to have been wrong. The ground did not break a shovel but it required considerable effort to lay him down.

"Did he curse himself with his statement?" Nigel asked me in a hushed tone as the cartsmith and drovers stacked rocks in the evening's lingering heat. "Are words more dangerous out here?"

"Words are always dangerous, my dear young man." I replied as the dust rising from the efforts of the others glowed golden in the light of the setting sun. "One can never tell just what or who might be listening. Never say what you don't mean. Don't challenge the world to show you up for a liar."

"It's a dangerous enough life already." Nigel said as he offered me his canteen. Of water. Just water. "The truth isn't something you have to try to remember."