Interlude:  Sanctuary

The team of the Balance needs a rest; they need to realize that life goes on, even after the death of Bob Brannigan, Captain Gonzo.

Laura Greene has a family she can return to for solace.  Mike Roberts has a science fiction convention he can go to, and friends to go with.  In their own grief, they forget that Stephen Wolcott has only himself.

Silent and alone as usual for the weekend, this once he cannot bear it.  Retreat into himself is no solace; his mind, unstable since he got his powers, is now cast adrift!

He's on the edge of Chasm that only recently has he climbed upward from - he reflects solemnly in a relatively lucid moment.  So long as he is within Chasm, he has no perspective upon those he must live with.  If he crazy falls back in now, years of agony will have been worthless! 

He ranges out into the rainy night.  He usually goes for relative solitude, beyond sense of all human intrusion, but this time ••• he doesn't know what he's looking for.

He aims for the quiet streets nearby, as he usually does, and wanders aimlessly.  No help for him there.  He need try something else.

He heads back toward campus.  The streets are more crowded there, outside the stores and bars.  If he relaxes his control just a little, he can feel the thoughts.  They are all preoccupied with their own enjoyment, and would not accept the local telepath telling them his problems.

There is no help here.  He properly expected none.

But there must be some way to find one who can help!  If he gave up on solving problems like this, he could never solve problems!

He stops at a bar where he can tell that Christine Lassiter with the band Stances is playing.  He knows Chris: he has shared adventures with her.  She had mystic power over fire and ice during their adventures; indeed he shared the power with her, when he was near by her.  However, he cannot share his life with her·: she will not have the danger.  He Wishes he could refuse danger, but he cannot do so, so long as any Dart of society might strike against him.

Even so, might Chris  be able to help him tonight?  Anyone who might understand him would do.  So he goes within.  But the bar is crowded with people.

Stephen remains in the doorway, watching the stage.  Chris bursts into flame, and ice whirls around her!  She still retains her fire and ice powers, he thinks.

The crowd stares at him.  He is now coated in frost, and flame whirls around him!  It is his reaction to her mystic power: he too controls fire and ice, when near her!

The attention, the music and the noise are too much for him.  He escapes outside.

Chris notices his entry - and can feel his turmoil !  He still has the fire and ice powers they gained together - and he's in torment!  She halts for a second.  But by the time she can do or say anything, he is gone.  Ducked out the door even as she cries, 'Wait!'

Julie Moretti is on the run tor her life.  On the night that the Balance busted up a gang lord meeting, she picked up some files from one of the criminals.  They belonged to Louis Giambetti.  one of the Detroit crime lords.  They were incriminating, but obviously not the full story.

Giambetti tracked her down.  He was scared of what she knew already.  (Of course a criminal should be afraid of the truth in her·hands! 'The truth is a weapon she can use!)  At first she thought to bargain and somehow get the full story.

That must not be what the crime lord had in mind, she thinks as she runs.

Stephen finally ends up standing beneath the rain on campus, deserted as ever on Saturday nights, on a bridge overlooking the river.  He has found none to accept him.

That is enough!  He now requires mind to mind!  Perfect communication!  There must be somebody in this metropolitan area that speak to him can do that way - By whatever Higher Power there is he SHALL find said person.  His solution shall be!

He stops where he is and casts his mind out.  All can feel it.

To one his mind could be salvation.  She runs for it.

To a few his mind could be hindrance.  They pause a moment, but finally continue.

To several his mind presents an unaccustomed demand.  At the first sign of hesitation it moves on.

To several his mind presents an unanswerable question.  At the first sign of pause it moves on.

But he finds a place - an assembly of several - who might understand.  He enters contact - but is suddenly disrupted.

Stephen has been knocked against the concrete.  A girl lies upon him.

Mentally he senses that she is pursued for her life - and her pursuers are nearly upon her.  He doesn't have time to subdue them mentally!

He throws her over the bridge railing, and hangs onto her as he jumps over himself.  They fall into the river together.

They hit hard.  And Ellipsis can't swim.  Julie ends up dragging him to a safe rock.

The hit men have to get out of their car to verify the hit.  As they approach their victims, Ellipsis (revived) steals their consciousness from them.

Louis Giambetti suddenly finds his hit men incommunicado.  Oh, shit: it must be the Balance, and he knows what they did to Dominatra - Dominatra of all people.  He runs for his life! 

But first he sets one of his hirelings, an arsonist, against the escaped reporter.  He has to destroy those files somehow! 

Stephen begins to pick himself up from the river: there might still be a present danger which is protected from his senses!  But his recent slash wounds, obtained the night Bob Brannigan died, still hurt, especially after falling in the river just now.  He finally struggles UP at about the same time Julie does, sopping wet and exhausted after her desperate run.

'What happened?" she says.

He has to speak, normally, and only with words.  It is an effort.

“Those who attacked you are dealt with.  But we still must leave this place." Stephen begins to stride toward a nearby lecture hall, but stops and winces in pain.  He has to lean on Julie to walk to the building.

As they settle in an abandoned classroom, Stephen thinks: He had found someone - several ones - he could talk to mind to mind, who could understand.  And now he's lost them.

Julie wants to return to her apartment.  But Stephen, recovering from his exertion (and now pissed off, as Captain Gonzo would put it), authoritatively states that if she'd enjoy having another chance to die tonightl the apartment is the first place she should go right now.  He can help avoid her death, but he has to rest first.

He can sense how reluctant the girl is to acquiesce.  But she sees the force of logic none the less.

For the moment they go to a dark booth at a local student hangout.  When they've seated themselves, Julie begins to chew Stephen out for being uncivil.  (How dare he talk down at her? Just like her father!) 

Stephen begins to respond, but Julie gives him no chance to interrupt.  Stephen's frustration, powerful all evening, rises till he can no longer contain it!

Sanctuary 
I lost it 
Now WORDS 
l HATE WORDS 
He Is Dead 
I CAN NO UNGER BEAR IT!

But he Must contain it; humans would not understand!

All noise and activity among the other patrons stops for a moment, then slowly picks up again, where it left off.

Julie, stopped in mid-sentence, gapes at Stephen.  He is trembling, face down, palms on the table.

She felt thoughts - jumbled, agonized and powerful- and they're his!  He had no trouble projecting them - he had to fight to contain them!

She recognizes him now! Ellipsis! Ellipsis - the unknown man (mutation?) with unmeasured mental power! 

She asks in a tremulous voice, "Do you always feel like this?"

He must communicate somehow, he realizes...  he shakes his head “no”.

Julie remembers what's happened to Ellipsis - she was there!  She recalls her table mate not as a mutation, but as one of the Balance - the hero team of Michigan!  Ellipsis was one of the capable heroes who fought Dominatra as she watched.  He made the crime lord flee, and saved Julie's life - only to find his teammate Captain Gonzo dead.

Julie asks, ·”Would it help to- uh, talK about it?”· To a newspaper reporter?!!  he thinks.

“I can keep a secret if I have to!" she responds. 

She responds to his thought!  She might understand!  But ••• ·

“Not ••• here”,· he finally speaks.  

--

In the doorway of a public schoolhouse, facing its play field and the houses surrounding it, they finally stop.  Ellipsis speaks - verbally, and mentally when the words are lacking.  He speaks of his failure ••• he made the decisions that allowed Captain Gonzo's murder!  

His uncertainty ••• Was Ellipsis subconsciously seeking death, and did Captain Gonzo stumble into it instead?  Even if Ellipsis can convince himself that this IS not so, his teammates might disagree!  

His loss ••• Captain Gonzo, Bob Brannigan, was, so far, the only  human who could relate to him - and try to do things with him, as a friend!

His problem ••.  He supposes he must try to fit in with other people somehow, in all that he does.  And he's succeeded!  - but he's going backward now!

But more importantly, his decisiveness in the leadership that he's assumed seems inversely related to how deeply he cares about his decision.  It was okay before he met and formed the Balance·, but it's declining now.  And...

His mental power is only restrained by his sanity.  But his power grows ever stronger, and his sanity is slipping!  His emotion is so great now, and...

...None there are who may even listen.

"I'II help.  I'll try to help,” Julie says.

But he's not sure where to start!

“·You've already started.”

--

Later they return to her apartment.  Ellipsis, now rested and recovered, can determine whether it is safe.  As they approach, he gets multiple mental impressions of a fire nearby.  Julie says, ·oh, no! ' and dashes for her home.  Stephen chases her, shouting, ·Wait! " 
Julie's apartment is in flames.

Julie stops in shock.  As Stephen catches up, she begins to run into the building.  But he mentally speaks, "It could have been you in there." As she stops again and shudders, he walks up and puts his arms on her shoulders.  She backs into him.  In response, he wraps his arms around her.

After the blaze is extinguished, very little is left.  There is no trace of the arsonist.  With Morningstar and the Mighty Tim absent, the Balance is handicapped for the weekend.  Julie accepts Stephen's offer of lodging in his apartment.

--

Postlude: 
The following Friday night Laura Greene sits in the Maranatha Christian Fellowship meeting.  During the witness session one of her brothers in Christ tells of someone whose father just died and went to join his mother.  He tells of the man's grief at being alone in the world.

Laura thinks of Stephen for the first time in more than a week.  She rushes out of the meeting to call him.

A stranger - a girl (Julie) answers.

As Laura hangs up, she says to herself, "I should have known he'd come through it better than I did.”