Not The Sun - 2. Chapter Two: Creators and Enablers

02 ~Creators and Enablers~

"You are a Creator," Jordan said. "I am the Enabler."

"What?" Brandon asked. He felt nervous and jumpy after what had just happened and was having trouble focusing.

"You can sit there at your desk and draw all day long and not be able to do what I just did. You can Create; place something into existence in another reality that was never there before. But you can't bring it into existence here in this reality. I can."

"I...I can't believe this," Brandon said. He was still staring at the pencil like he expected it to do something.

"Take it easy. We talk about this later if you want."

The soothing tone that Jordan used annoyed Brandon. "I'm fine!"

"Okay. Try something else. An object, something simple."

Brandon picked up the pencil he had drawn earlier and pressed it against the paper. The tip broke off and Brandon swore quietly, throwing it aside. He thought for a long moment then drew a hot dog garnished with onion and mustard, tucked into a thick bun.

Jordan performed the same trick... placing his hand over the image, the other one gripping Brandon's, and seconds later, the hot dog was there, smelling wonderful. Brandon's stomach growled.

"Is it safe to eat?" he asked.

Jordan smiled. "What were you thinking about when you drew it?"

"How hungry I was and how nice a hot dog would taste right now."

"Go ahead then."

Brandon bit into it tentatively then closed his eyes in appreciation. It was delicious. He finished it off in several quick bites then belched roundly. Jordan laughed.

"So..." Brandon said, "Don't get me wrong. This is amazing. Absolutely fucking awesome. Really it is. But I still don't see what this has to do with Leia."

"Okay. So we've established that you can Create, I can Enable. Correct?"

"Yeah. I draw it and you bring it over here."

"Good. Now... all Enablers, we have a little bit of psychic ability." Jordan stopped talking as Brandon rolled his eyes and frowned. "Not a lot. Not enough for me to open up a 1-800 number or anything like that. But a little. That's how I knew you were my Creator. I felt it when you drew that picture of me the other day; that's how I knew."

"You can feel when I draw you?"

"Yeah. Everybody can. It's... kinda like a deja vu, a sensation that crawls over your skin and is gone before you really noticed it was there. I can feel whenever you draw me, or if another Creator draws me." Jordan looked down and almost shyly asked, "Can I see the sketch you did of me?"

Brandon hesitated. He suddenly felt nervous about showing Jordan what he had drawn, but couldn't find a good reason to tell him no. So he flipped back through his sketchbook and showed him the first one he had done.

Jordan smiled. "This is from Physics."

"Yeah."

"It's good."

Brandon felt the warm glow in his stomach and face he always got when his work was complimented. "Thanks. You can have it if you want."

"Nah. I don't need anything else to encourage my vanity," Jordan said with a perfectly straight face, and it took Brandon a few seconds to realize he was joking and cracked a smile.

"So, if I drew you, does that mean that there is another you in another dimension?" Brandon asked.

"No. I already exist, so you can't create me. Anything you draw that already exists is just a replica."

"But I just drew a hot dog and it works. And hot dogs already exist."

"Yes, but that particular hot dog did not. It was formed in your mind."

Brandon frowned. "I don't get it."

"I don't expect you to," Jordan replied. "This is still new. The more you use it and get used to it, the easier it will be to understand what is within your ability to create."

"Okay. Leia?"

Jordan sighed and looked sad. "Leia. Did she tell you how she got pregnant? Did she say who the father was?"

"She fell in love with one of the Untouchables. She wouldn't tell us which one."

"Did her story seem at all strange to you?"

Brandon frowned. "A little... Why?"

"It's false, a fabrication."

"I don't get it," Brandon said slowly after a moment's consideration. "Why would Leia make up such a story?"

"Well, she has half of it right. She really is pregnant. But she didn't get pregnant from an 'Untouchable', as you call them. She didn't get pregnant from anyone in our school."

"Then... who?"

"Leia... I'm sorry, this is going to be hard for you, but I think Leia was raped."

Brandon dropped his Coke. He felt it splash on his feet, and when he looked down, he saw the dark brown stain spreading slowly over the carpet, but couldn't bring himself to move to right the can. He felt frozen.

Jordan picked up the can, left the room and came back a few minutes later with a handful of paper towels.

"Your sister is home," he informed Brandon, beginning to sop up the spilled soda. "I'm sorry, but I thought it would be best to go ahead and tell you straight."

"I...I don't think I like the conclusion I'm coming to. How do you know this?"

"It's complicated... I had nothing to do with her condition, aside from knowing about it." He lifted the towels and threw them in the trash. "Leia was raped, and that's how she became pregnant. This was very traumatic for her, understand?"

Brandon nodded numbly.

"I'm just speculating here, but I think what has happened is that she was so traumatized by what she went through that she made up this whole cover story to tell everyone who knew, and that she found so much comfort in this story that she absorbed it... started to believe that it really happened the way she said it did."

Brandon pressed the heel of his hands against his face. This was so unbelievable. "Her story didn't ring true to me, but I wouldn't have thought..."

"I'm sorry to be the one to break this news to you," Jordan said.

"How do you know? How can you know?"

"Well, that's where things get complicated. I need to let you know that there is another Creator/Enabler team at work here," Jordan said, his face growing more serious. "I can feel them. They can probably sense us as well. I can't feel Creators as a separate entity, but I can feel other Enablers, and I know when they find their Creator, their other half. I think this team is partly responsible for what happened to your friend."

"How so? Did one of them hurt Leia?"

"I don't.... think so." Jordan's face looked a little strained, as if thinking this hard was painful. "I know they are involved somehow, but not... directly."

Brandon shook his head.

"I know," Jordan said, sounding apologetic. "Look... I can't say too much right now. There's more that you have to know, about what's going on now, before I can answer all of your questions. I hate having to ask you to trust me without having anything to back it up, but that's what I need you to do. Your friend Leia is in some serious trouble and you need to do what I tell you to do if you want to help her. Just... please, trust me, please."

Brandon shook his head again. "I need more than that. I need to know that you weren't the one who hurt Leia, and if you're not... I need to know that you're not. I don't think that you would be the type of guy who would hurt a girl like that, but then again I hardly know you, and you are privy to the details of what she went through. That is very suspicious. I want to trust you... but I'm not the kind of guy who can do anything on faith alone."

"I know she was attacked and it's connected to this other team. I can't tell you exactly how, yet, but the two are linked. I'm not even entirely sure what's happening, but I have a theory."

"What theory?" Brandon asked. His throat was sore and dry.

Jordan was about to reply when there was a knock on the door.

"Bran?" Kelly's nervous voice piped through.

Brandon got up and opened the door. "What is it?"

"Um... Mom is on the phone. She wants to talk to you."

Brandon took the phone and gave Jordan an apologetic look before stepping out into the hallway. Jordan ran his fingers through his hair. Shit, this was hard. He was trying to explain something that he himself didn't really understand that well. He knew he would have to go through a demonstration with Brandon to fully convince him, especially once Brandon made it clear that he didn't want anything to do with him. But he had a feeling that even after all that, Jordan still had a way to go before he could get Brandon to trust him. He would just have to keep at it.

"Sorry," Brandon said, coming back inside. "It was my mom asking what we wanted for dinner. I couldn't really think of anything, since I just had a hot dog." He smiled nervously. "God, I still can't believe it."

Jordan got to his feet. "I better go. It's getting kinda late," he said. "Listen, we still have some things to talk about, with Leia and stuff, but that can wait, I guess. I think you should have some time to digest this so you'll have a clear head the next time we talk."

"Fine," Brandon said. He didn't hear any condescending tone in Jordan's voice, and he was feeling overwhelmed, like his head was stuffed full of information and he needed time to sort it out. "That would be cool."

"All right." Jordan got to his feet. "I'll show myself out. See you at school tomorrow."

"Okay," Brandon replied, obviously distracted. He listened to Jordan leave the house, could faintly hear the hum of the engine as Jordan's car started up.

He walked to his desk and picked the pencil up that he had drawn. The tip had broken off and Brandon re-sharpened it then turned it over in his fingers, examining it. They had made this, Jordan and himself. He had drawn it with his own hands and Jordan made it real. He turned his sketchpad to a clean sheet and wrote Leia's name out with the pencil.

Leia. He thought of what Jordan had told him and his stomach clenched. Raped. God, how horrible that would have been for her to have to make up another story just to deal with the fact that she had gotten pregnant from it. Unbidden, an image of her face came to mind, her pretty, made up features twisted in pain as she was violated. His stomach turned and he closed his eyes, willing the nausea to go back down. Sometimes his imagination was a little too vivid.

Brandon stared at his ceiling that evening, the hot, hard beats of heavy metal music pounding in his eardrums through his headphones. He had given sleep an hour's fair chance, but it hadn't come. He couldn't stop thinking about Leia; what Jordan had told him. Could it possibly be real? This was all so weird. This morning he had been worried about one of his friends being pregnant, now he was worried about said friend having been raped, and on top of that, his classmate could turn his drawings into real objects. He grabbed his pillow and pressed it against his face. Weird didn't even begin to cover it. This was some fucked up shit.

He did eventually fall asleep and dreamed. He dreamt of when he was little. He, Leia, Alexis and Andrew had gone to see Star Wars in a vintage theater in town that showed old classics. Afterwards, they went out to play in the yard and Leia had been instantly christened "Princess Leia". Andrew and Brandon had played Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker, respectively, and Alexis played whomever she wanted whenever the fancy struck her. One time she had named herself a Jedi Knight, and when Brandon "Skywalker" had informed her that there were no girl Jedis in Star Wars, she answered that observation by giving him a whack on the back of his head with a long, thin branch that she wielded as her lightsaber.

However, in this dream, he held a real lightsaber instead of a branch or broomstick, and it glowed blue-white and hot in his hand against the descending twilight of his backyard. Alexis was also there, holding a bright pink lightsaber that was almost as big as she was. He couldn't see where Andrew was, but he could see Leia. She was dressed just like her namesake from the movie, with the cinnamon bun hairstyle and everything. She was grasping a doll by its tangled blond coils of artificial hair. The eyes on the doll were blacked out.

"Don't worry, Princess," he heard himself say. "My name is Luke Skywalker. I'm here to rescue you."

She stared at him, started to offer a shy, hopeful smile. Then a figure, huge, scary and all black, appeared, literally out of thin air, and grabbed Leia, a large hand covering her mouth and nose so nothing was visible but her big scared eyes, and then they were both gone. He turned to Alexis. "What's going on?" he asked.

She shrugged, her lightsaber swinging around and cutting off the top of her head, revealing her brain nestled in her open skull, pulsing the same neon pink of her lightsaber, a harsh glow in the darkness. "She got knocked up."

Brandon blinked eyes that felt gritty and tired. He had not slept well after his odd dream about Leia. He had estimated about four and a half hours last night and that just wasn't cutting it. He was exhausted. He glanced up once during Math, caught Jordan's eye and smiled before dropping his eyes back to his textbook and blushing. Jordan caught up with him after class. "Hey. Can I drive you home today?"

Brandon hesitated. He always let Andrew drive him home and liked being able to talk and hang out with him for a few uninterrupted minutes. "I really don't want to talk at my house," he said carefully. "But I can meet you somewhere this evening."

"Okay. Any place in mind?"

"There's a Barnes and Noble not far from my house; how about there? Seven o clock?"

"Sure thing," Jordan said easily before turning and walking away.

Brandon was able to leave his house and catch a city bus as soon as his mom got home and he didn't have to keep an eye on Kelly any longer. He got to the bookstore a few minutes later than agreed on, searching the aisles before finding Jordan in the cafe, drinking a coffee and reading. Brandon ordered a frappuccino and sat down across from him. "What are you reading?"

"Catcher in the Rye," Jordan said, marking his place and shutting the book. "By Salinger."

"Is it good?"

"Okay so far."

"Have you read any of his stuff before?" Brandon asked, even though he had no idea if Salinger had written anything else.

"No. I usually just go to the classics table and pick a book at random. Sometimes I get a winner, sometimes I don't."

Brandon was a little impressed that someone would read those dusty boring classics without having to. “So... I’ve been thinking about the stuff we talked about yesterday,” he said slowly. “It’s pretty... extreme.”

“I know. Questions?”

“Yeah. How do you do... that thing? Bring stuff over? I mean, do you actually reach into another dimension?”

“Not really.” Jordan picked a messenger bag up off the floor and stuck his book inside, then rummaged around and pulled out a deck of cards, shuffling them briefly.

“Okay, let’s say this deck of cards represents all the realities in existence.” Jordan pulled a card from the deck and placed it on the table face up. An ace of diamonds. “This ace is our reality, where we exist right now.” He pulled another card from the deck. A queen of spades. “This one represents another reality, like the one you got the hot dog from. So we have this reality here--” He put the Queen on the bottom of the deck. “And ours here.” He put the ace on the top. “See how they are separated here, with all these others in between?”

“Yeah.”

“So, what I do is this.” Jordan took the Queen, turned it over, and slid it up so it rested on the top of the deck, over the Ace. “These two realities are touching now, see? So what I do is bring another reality up close to this one so it’s easier to bring something over. And I can do that with any reality, just like I can do that with any card." He performed the same thing with an ace of hearts, a king of clubs and a nine of clubs. “Just take whichever reality you drew that object into and bring it up against ours. There’s still a barrier between realities, because can you imagine if they started to mix together? --but I can get through it. All Enablers can.”

Brandon ran his hands through his hair. He still didn't get it. “Okay. I’ll buy that. I’ll buy it because I saw it for myself yesterday. But what about Leia? How do you know about her?”

Jordan looked down at the cards and began to shuffle them again. “It’s hard..."

"...to explain, I know," Brandon finished. "Go ahead. I'll believe you if I'm able. Promise." He took a sip of his drink and watched Jordan's hands smoothly manipulating the cards.

"You know how I said I have a Psychic link with other Enablers, correct?"

Brandon nodded. "Yeah."

"Well, I can sometimes tell when an Enabler is at work. Bringing something over. And... Well... I felt an Enabler bring something over. Something big, something powerful. An Enabler expends a lot of energy by bringing simple things over. This thing nearly killed him. It was very big and complex. I..." Jordan closed his eyes and took a breath. "It's animated. It's living. I was able to link with it, and that has never ever happened before."

"You keep on saying it," Brandon pointed out. "If this is the person who raped Leia, and I'm assuming that's the point you're getting to; it's gender specific. He, right?"

"It's not that simple, but for the sake of this discussion, you're right. We'll call it a he."

Brandon frowned. “What do you mean 'it’s not that simple'? If she’s pregnant, it means she was attacked by a guy. God, you make it sound like whatever hurt her wasn't even--” He broke off mid sentence. “Oh, God. Oh, God, tell me I’m wrong,” he whispered.

Jordan looked away and ran a hand through his hair. “I-I hadn’t wanted to tell you that. Not this soon.”

Brandon covered his mouth with his hands. Part of his frappuccino belched its way back up into his throat and he swallowed it back down with an acidic burn in his chest.

Jordan glanced up at him. "There's a bathroom near the graphic novels section if you need to throw up," he said.

Brandon had no intention of throwing up, but that was a battle he already knew he was going to lose. He raced through the store and into the restroom, falling down on his knees and throwing up all the contents of his stomach. After a minute, he laid his head down on the toilet seat, his stomach still jumping and heaving even though there was nothing left to come up.

The door swung open and he could hear footsteps stopping right outside the stall. He had been in such a desperate hurry he hadn't even bothered to close the stall door. "Are you all right?" Jordan asked. His voice echoed slightly in the room, empty aside from the two of them.

"How can you ask me that after what you just told me?" Brandon managed. He didn't bother to lift his head, liking the coolness of the porcelain against his face.

"I didn't tell you anything. You came to that conclusion on your own."

"Is it wrong? Tell me I'm wrong."

"I can't," Jordan said, kneeling down near him. "I can't tell you that you're all the way right either. I'm not sure what it was that got Leia, just that it was something this other group created... and it is extremely, extremely difficult to create a human being, never mind to bring one over... but it's far more easy to bring a creature that is simple, not as complex."

Brandon shook his head. "No."

"No to what?"

"No to all of it." Brandon lifted his head and turned to look at Jordan. "It's bullshit. I don't believe what you are telling me. It's all wrong. Leia was seduced by one of my classmates, probably you, and you're just feeding me that stupid story to throw me off or something. I don't know why you thought feeding me such a ridiculous, elaborate fantasy would work, but as soon as I am able to get to my feet again, I'm going to beat the shit out of you."

Jordan grabbed him by his shirt and physically hauled him to his feet. "If you don't believe me, don't trust me, you are damning her."

Brandon shoved him away. "Give me one good fucking reason to believe you. Do that and I'll listen to what you have to say."

"Why would I lie to you?" Jordan asked. "I know as well as you do that she hasn't revealed the identity of the father. She can't name him; she never will. That would be too close to the truth, too close to unraveling her tightly woven delusion. Knowing all this, why would I bring any of this up in the first place if I was the father of her child when it would be just as easy to hide?"

"Guilt."

Jordan smiled. "If I would ever do something like that to a woman, then I think guilt would be the least of my problems. And I wouldn't be able to relieve any guilt I would have been carrying by lying. I've told you things, shown you things that were impossible a few days ago. I know asking for your belief is a lot. But there are events going on here that we need to take control of. I can't do this without you. We're a team, whether you like it or not."

Brandon turned away, flushed the toilet and walked to the sink, turning the water on, watching it flow into the drain. "Is it true?"

"I fear that it is."

"So you don't know for sure?"

It was obvious from the expression on Jordan's face that Brandon glimpsed through the mirror that he was right, but Jordan didn't want to admit to it. "Don't get your hopes up. I'm still trying to ferret this group out. I'm worried."

"Why?" Brandon washed his hands, then cupped them under the stream of water and collected some to wash his mouth out.

"Whoever this group is, they're powerful. More so than us; much more so. And, judging from their actions, they're not exactly on the best path, morally or ethically speaking. Either that or they just can't control what they bring over." Jordan leaned on the sink next to Brandon. "I need you to do something. I know this is going to be hard, and I hate having to ask you... I know you're Leia's friend."

"Christ." Brandon turned off the faucet, closed his eyes. "Just spit it out so I can go ahead and say no."

"Just hear me out?"

"Go ahead." Brandon's head was pounding and the inside of his mouth felt sour. He just wanted to get out of there.

"See if you can get any details about the pregnancy, especially the father, from her. She won't want to give them, but try. And see if you can convince her to abort."

"What the hell? Why?"

"If she is carrying some fucked up hybrid child, think of what that could do." Jordan said. "The pregnancy could kill her if she carries it to term. And what kind of thing could she give birth to if she does make it? There's no way she would survive giving birth, and whatever it is that she's carrying... it needs to be destroyed. It doesn't belong here."

"Leia doesn't believe in abortion." Brandon couldn't even believe he was having a conversation about this.

"Well, make her believe."

"She's one of my best friends. I can't tell her to do something she doesn't believe in."

"Well, then you've just condemned her to die."

"Goddammit, that's not fair." Brandon snapped, opening his eyes and glaring at the boy standing next to him.

"None of this is fucking fair!" Jordan said, really losing his cool for the first time since Brandon had started talking to him. "For Christ's sake, stop being such a fucking child! You should know by now that fair doesn't exist anywhere besides TV movies and fairy tales. I know it’s not fair, what happened to your friend, but we can’t help that. It’s happened and I can’t undo it. All we can do is try to fix what we can, and that means killing the... thing she’s carrying. It’s not a child, Brandon. Whatever she’s pregnant with, it’s not a baby.”

“Okay." Brandon gave the entire thing a mental eye roll. “Okay, fine. But what if I can’t convince her?”

“Then we will resort to Plan B. Where I will get her to tell me.”

“And how the hell are you going to do that?”

“I know someone who can use hypnosis to figure out what happened and a hypnotic suggestion to convince her to take the necessary steps to abort the creature. Normally I’d go ahead and try it, but with her mind and psyche in such a fragile state, we'd have to be extremely careful. I doubt you’ll be able to convince her, but I’d feel better if you try first.” Jordan paused and took a breath. “Is that agreeable to you?”

“I guess.” Brandon left the bathroom, went to the cafe to pick up his bag. He looked out at the window, watching his reflection stare back at him in the dark glass. He saw Jordan approach behind him. “If it's not human, than what the hell is it?” Brandon heard himself ask, watching his reflection's lips move as he asked the question.

Jordan looked up and met his eyes in the reflection. “I don't know. Nightmares walk this earth every day.” He pulled his bag up over his shoulder and chucked his cup into a nearby waste bin. “Need a ride home?”