Nemesis - 11. Chapter 11: Gangs of Chicago, Part 1: Apollo

Case: Gangs of Chicago
Part 1: Apollo

Gary

Nemesis needed a lot of cuddling before he would tell me what had happened in Georgia. I heard his hurt in his words and in his voice. He hurt for the boys who had been raped (even the older one); he hurt for himself because he had killed a man; and he hurt for the boys who had killed themselves. Nemesis told me that somewhere and somewhen Mark and Kevin had died when their bodies crashed onto the rocks. Later, that had been erased not only from reality, but also from their memories. Still, it had happened. Nemesis had been there. He remembered.

“How is Bobby?” I asked. “Did he … ?”

“Bobby’s human,” Nemesis said. “I told him it wouldn’t be real … even though it was. He trusted me; he believed me; and he forgot about it seconds after it happened, when reality changed. I didn’t let him see me kill the boys’ father.

“He saw everything else, though. He wasn’t upset. He saw evil, but he also saw justice and … in the end … he saw the good thing, the happiness that happened to Mark and Kevin. He saw balance, and he knows that is good.

“If the evil had not happened, then Mark and Kevin wouldn’t have had the courage to make the good happen.”

Nemesis

Gary hugged me, and kissed my forehead. I knew if I cried a little, he would kiss my cheeks. But, he wouldn’t kiss me on the lips. That was too close to sex stuff for him to be comfortable. I think he believed the instant our lips touched, our relationship would turn from Apollonian to Dionysian, from Platonic to sexual. He was afraid of that. So was I. I was so very afraid that if he ever did sex stuff with me, he would succumb to self-loathing, and I would lose him. I pushed that thought as far away as I could, and fell asleep.

The next afternoon, I was watching Gary work on his computer when I heard it. The call was strong, and full of pain. My tummy felt like it was on fire. I switched to chiton, touched my sword to make sure it was there, kissed Gary’s cheek, and popped.

I was in an alley littered with garbage. Amid stacks of pallets and overflowing dumpsters, two young boys were slumped against a wall. The littler one was holding his stomach with both hands. Blood flowed freely between his fingers. The other was bleeding from cuts on his arms.

Facing them were four older boys … mid- to late-teens. One held a knife. He slashed at the boy holding his stomach. The other boy tried to block the knife, and took another cut to his arm. This one was deep; he gasped, and fainted from the shock. The boy with the knife moved in.

I popped between the guy with the knife and the two boys on the ground. I held my sword to block the boy’s knife.

“That’s not a knife; this is a knife,” I said. I didn’t know where it came from, but it seemed appropriate. I swung the sword and smacked the boy’s knife, sending only enough power to force him to drop it.

“What the fuck?” That came from one of the boys in the back. “Where the fuck you from? Another fuckin’ fag?” His vocabulary seemed quite limited. I had to admire his alliteration, though.

“What the hell is he wearin’?” Another asked. At least he had a different adjective.

“He’s just a little kid … get him!” The third said. Ah, he would be the stupid one, the one who didn’t understand that a kid with a sword, one that glowed in the dim light of the alley, was a formidable foe.

I smacked the boy who had been wielding the knife with the flat of my sword, and sent enough power through it for him to feel the shock. He fell on his butt. A bright flash of power arced between him and the sword. He scrambled to his feet. Then, the four boys kicked, pushed, and shoved one another in their haste to run away through the obstacle course of garbage, pallets, and dumpsters. I put away the sword and then turned to the two boys on the ground.

I saw that the younger of the two little boys had been hurt too badly to live. His tummy was split open and full of blood. He was trying to breathe, but each breath was littler than the one before it. I looked at him the way Death had taught me, and I saw the light that was his soul flicker and dim. I was crying so hard I didn’t see the hand that touched the boy’s forehead, but I didn’t need my eyes to see the glow that came from the hand and went into the boy.

I blinked the tears away. There was another boy. He was about my age, and was wearing a tunic, belted at the waist. He had bent over the injured boy. The tunic didn’t cover his butt any better than my chiton covered mine.

Then, the boy knelt beside me. “He’ll be okay,” he said. His voice was a husky tenor that belied his apparent age. I stared at him. His hair was like mine: a mass of curls. However, his were black. They fell over his forehead and around his ears. He was cute. His butt was cute. Any time before this, I would have popped a stiffie. I didn’t. I didn’t feel anything sexual toward him. I wondered why not.

“Who are you?” I stuttered.

“Apollo, sometimes god of healing, at your service” he said.

“You’re a god? You don’t look like a … ” I said, and then realized how stupid that sounded, coming from a 12-year-old god wearing a chiton … and a sword. This guy didn’t have a sword. At least, if he were, I couldn’t see it. He was a god, thought. The boy on the ground? He was healed. Still covered with blood, still unconscious, but healed.

“Why … ?” I asked.

“It wasn’t his time,” the boy-god said. “This wasn’t supposed to happen.” Then, he stood up and morphed into an older boy: an 18-year old kouros: the naked, smooth, athletic ideal of Grecian male beauty. I’d stared at a lot of those when I was looking in museums and on the internet for Dike. His tunic had disappeared. He kept his sandals, though. That was probably a good idea: the alley was nasty.

“Is this better?” he asked. Then, he asked, “You’re Nemesis, right?”

He was beautiful, but still, I had no sex thoughts about him. I managed not to act like a bobble-head.

“Which is the real you?” I asked.

He morphed again into an old man. He wore a long robe. His hair was white. So was his beard. He had a long walking stick … with a live snake wrapped around it. I’d seen that, too, on the computer.

He laughed. “This is the most real me,” he said.

“Do you really want me to answer your question?” he asked.

Huh? was in my mind until I realized what he meant. Why didn’t I feel sex thoughts about the cute boy and the … hunky teen … ? I didn’t have to think about it, although perhaps I should have.

“Yes, please? Do you really know?” I asked.

The old man nodded. “You love Garreth. You want to have sex with him. That wish is so strong, that you can no longer find actualization … stimulation in others.

“You think that is a bad thing; however, in time you will realize that it is a good thing.”

Apollo touched the boy with the cuts on his arms. Then, he disappeared.

The two boys started to stir. One opened his eyes and saw me before I could change into school clothes or put away my sword.

Viktor

I woke up. Kenny! Where’s Kenny! I looked around.

I saw Kenny, lying in the street beside me. I had seen the boy with the knife open up Kenny’s tummy, and I knew he was dead. Until he opened his eyes and sat up.

“What … ? What happened?” Kenny asked. He seemed dazed; his eyes were wobbly and his mouth hung open.

I tried to remember what had happened. A gang had chased Kenny and me into the alley. They’d called us names. One had a knife. He had cut Kenny! He had cut me, too.

How come I don’t hurt? I wondered. They had cut me … and I’d fainted … but my arms didn’t hurt. I rubbed the blood, looking for cuts. There weren’t any.

I looked up and saw the little kid with the sword. I blinked my eyes, but he was still there. He was half-naked. Actually, he was mostly naked. Whatever he was wearing didn’t cover much of him. And he still had his sword.

“Who are you?” I asked the little boy.

“Um, my name’s Nemesis,” the boy said. “I heard you calling for help, so I came … are you okay?”

“I saw that kid stick his knife in Kenny’s tummy! I know he cut me … but Kenny’s okay … my cuts are gone … what …

“Oh, shit,” I said. “We’re dead, and you’re an angel!” And I just said ‘shit’ to an angel, I thought. I’m in so much trouble!

Nemesis

The boy covered his face with his hands, and cried.

I shook his shoulder, gently. “Look at me, please?” I said

When he took his hands from his face, I looked into his eyes. “You’re not dead. Kenny’s not dead. Trust me. I would know.”

It didn’t do any good. And now, the other one, Kenny, was crying. They grabbed each other, and hugged. They were both crying.

I didn’t know what to do, so I popped back home.

Gary

Nemesis popped into my office. He had blood all over his chest and arms. I panicked, until I realized that Nemesis was not hurt, but was upset, and needed me.

“What?” was all I got out before he grabbed me. “Two boys … they think they’re dead and I’m an angel! You’ve got to help!”

We popped into an alley where two boys sat, propped against the wall, holding one another and crying. Like Nemesis, they were covered with blood. Still, there seemed to be no wounds. I didn’t have time to think about that before Nemesis lifted one of the boys to his feet.

“He needs a hug,” Nemesis said, and thrust the boy toward me.

I grabbed him … I’d worry about blood, later … and hugged him.

“What happened? Why are you crying?” I asked.

“Kenny and me, we got cut up by LeRoy and his gang. We’re dead, and I don’t want to be dead!”

“What’s your name?” I asked.

“Viktor … Viktor Tchekov,” the boy said.

“Victor, my name is Gary, Gary Walters. And you’re not dead.”

Nemesis had pulled the other boy—whom I guessed was Kenny—to his feet, and was offering the same reassurances. The two boys broke away from Nemesis and me, and grabbed one another. They hugged, and cried.

Nemesis

There was a scuffling from down the alley.

“There he is!” a tenor voice called. “And there’s a big guy, too! And the two fags … ”

I turned to see a dozen boys and young men walking toward us.

“Nemesis? Can you get us out of here?” Gary asked.

I had popped too many times. “Not all of us,” I said. I drew my sword and stepped toward the gang.

“Fuck! The little kid’s got a sword!” one of the young men said.

Another drew a pistol from his waistband. “And I’ve got this.” He raised the pistol …

And then I did something Death had taught me. I morphed. I pulled the image of Phidippides from my mind, and morphed.

“What little kid?” I said. I was a 20-year-old in full Grecian armor. Actually, I was more than that. I added about three feet to Phidippides’ height. My voice boomed in the confines of the alley. “I don’t see any little kid.”

Once again, the gang pushed and shoved one another to get away. I remembered a beach vacation with my parents. We’d gone crabbing on the inland waterway. I remember watching crabs in a bucket, clawing one another in an attempt to escape, dragging one another down in order to elevate themselves.

Gary

Once again, Nemesis surprised me. I watched him become a giant Greek warrior. I watched the gang members scamper away. I watched Nemesis become my little boy. Then, I looked at the two boys Nemesis had rescued; they were still holding one another tightly, heads buried in each other’s shoulders. They were still crying. With luck, they hadn’t seen.

Nemesis switched to school clothes. We tried to calm the two boys down. Eventually, they cried themselves out; their sobs changed to ragged breathing. When at last they looked up, they saw what I hoped was a normal scene: a guy, and a kid their age wearing regular clothes.

The older one—Viktor—stared at me, and then said. “You said you were Gary Walters.”

“Yep, that’s me.”

“But I’ve got your rookie card!” Viktor said. “Not with me, I mean. At home.

“But you’re not dead!”

“No, Victor, I’m not dead and neither are you or Kenny. Something happened. Something wonderful happened. You … you … got help from some pretty special people.

“Um, this is Nemesis. He’s one of those special people. Can you … will you keep his secret?”

Victor and Kenny thought for a minute. It was long enough that I believed they had considered my question seriously.

“Yes,” Viktor said. “Um, I don’t suppose there’s any chance … I mean … would you sign the card?”

I laughed. “Sure, Victor. But first, we have to get you and Kenny cleaned up and home.”

Nemesis

I was exhausted and starving by the time I popped Viktor, Kenny, and Gary—one at a time and resting in between—to Erewhon. Bobby and Benji helped get the two boys cleaned of blood, and washed their clothes. By that time, I’d taken a nap and eaten enough I could pop them home … at least, outside the apartment building where they lived.

I did something else Death had showed me: I shifted time a little, like about four hours, so they wouldn’t get in trouble for getting home from school so late. By then, their heads were so mixed up with healing and popping and getting bathed by Bobby and Benji that I figured, what the heck. A little time travel couldn’t hurt.

I was getting ready to pop back to Erewhon when Viktor grabbed me, and hugged me.

“Thank you, Nemesis,” he said. Before I could react, he kissed me—on the lips. Then, he took Kenny’s hand and led him into the building.