It was a column of ruby-red light that rose in the center of the circle, pulsating with a chiming sound that rose and fell with the light.  The girls began to get dizzy.

“I’m not sure I want this,” he said, looking upon his work and wondering what he had done.

“You have to go forward with it,” urged Barlel, “There’s nothing left.  We can’t go back.  The whole thing is lost and there is no hope left behind us.”

“Just open it!” said John, “Find me a god damn target.”

Sparks flew and tendrils of crimson lightning began to flail around the shadow of the vaulted ceiling as Jason began to concentrate harder.  “I can’t remember!” he said.  “I can’t remember what it was!”

“Keep trying !” said Barlel!  “There’s not much time!”

“You have all the time in the world,” came the voice, “But you have to know where to look.”

“God damn it!” shouted John, drawing his sword and looking around frantically, “Who the hell is that?”

“It’s Loviatar, Maiden of Pain,” said Jason calmly.  “She’s my spirit guide.”

“I knew there was a reason I liked you,” said Barlel.

“Where do I look?” asked Jason. “Where?”

“You are not qualified, you are forbidden.”

“You can not be serious.” he began to calculate how to defeat her, how to keep the slime of her pettiness from affecting his aura.  They were all the same, implacable, obedient morons of cocreation and responsibility to garbage.

He could feel the light of the spirit world around him, as though he were sitting in two rooms at the same time, the light was like a cool breeze, and he could feel the angel’s consciousness trying to reach him.

—

“Well, I’m here at last,” she said.  “You have to reassemble the fragments of your mind.”

“It’s so heavy,” he said, “I hate this.  Everything here is such an effort and it all degenerates into some self-help garbage about cocreation.  I don’t want to cocreate anything here.”

“Go back to feeling,” she said.

From out of nothing came the space.

Everyone was crowded into Dice Dojo.  They were all waiting to play when he ducked into the bathroom.  They had changed some of the posters in there.  They were familiar to him because he read them every time he was in there.  Someone had put up a poster for a new Garth Ennis comic.  He took care of business and then returned to the table.  The food had arrived while he was gone.

“Are we ready now?” he asked, sitting down.  “The enemy is upon us.  Who is red, who is blue?”

“This really ought to be fun, you know.” said Carl.  “You keep making this into the end of the world.”

He opened the box and began arranging pieces on the board.  “I’m looking for something, and I don’t know what it is.”

“You have to get your mind organized,” said John.  “You’re here in the present, and there’s going to be a future.  You have to pick a target.  Something other than Beth’s ass.” he smirked.  She slapped him.

“There’s a center to all of it.  I’m going to show you, Jason.”

“The Dark adventure has just begun,” agreed Barlel. “What are you experiencing?”

“Images keep passing in front of my eyes, things I want to do.” he said.  When you mentioned “The Dark Adventure”, I wanted to go back and watch “The Hindenburg.”  There was something else going on then.  I’m remembering that game we tried to play.  Also Axis and Allies.  What was that teacher’s name?  He told us about Pirates and Voodoo.”

“Mr. Miller,” said Amy.  “He’s here, too.  We’re all here now.  Including Hunter.”

“Where am I going with it?” he asked.  He could see Duane as well. People he didn’t recognize.  Angels.  It was another place.  There was power in it.

“You have to wield the power.” said Duane.

“Their world was never real,” said a voice.  He thought it was Beth.  He couldn’t decide who because he was drifting.  He was remembering that other story about gaming, the one Owen had showed him.  It was going to mean something at some point.

“I keep seeing movie stars,” he said.  “I just saw Natalie Portman.”

There came another voice.  Maybe it was Duane.  Somehow something got hurt.  There is indeed another story and the game is over.  “There is indeed another story and the game is over.”  What now?  What next?  Deeper into the heart of Darkness he thrust.

“Okay, so when we were watching Buffy, I felt like maybe it would be fun to be alive.”

“It’s important to have something going on out there,” said Beth.

They began to play the game and the crystalline formation took place, the reality merged so that the “thickness” appeared in his mind.  He could sense the other beings.  It was like the material plane was a thin veil and he could sense some kind of council or something observing him.  “I always argue with them,” he said.  “But it makes me want to have friends again.”

“Hey,” said Beth, “We’re your friends, Jason.  And we were always here.  You just couldn’t remember.”

“I try, Beth, but it makes me insane.  I’m so angry at being in this stupid, confusing world without direction, with only these obscene Nazis as my family and these asinine messengers of light.”

“Hey, there’s one now!” said John, pointing at the next table where a nebbish-looking freak was typing a stupid meme on his laptop.  “Let’s get him!”  and he jumped up and tackled the guy, beating him severely, knocking over a table.  Eventually he got up off the dude, who ran out of there as fast as he could.

“Isn’t anybody ever going to love me?” asked Jason.  “Isn’t this ever going to make sense?  Will I ever get this blackness out of my face?”

“The magic has been going on,” said Amy, “You’ve seen it work, and it has always gotten better.  There are more intense things happening this weekend.  You should just hold tight.  The visions will get clearer.”

“Yes, I think so,” said Jason, rolling the dice.  He moved his piece along the board.  “Jupiter retrograde is a time of looking back, and Buffy TVS should last about that long, I’ll have to check.”

The visions appeared in the air before him.  “What the hell?” yelled Zane.  “We gotta do something!  Hey!  Mr. Serious!” he went over and kicked Mr. Serious’s ass all up and down the computer lab.  “When is this going to break open?  She did something to close it off?”

“Worse things have happened in the world.  At least you’re not some dumb fucking cocaine cowboy.”

— We have to get down to the feeling — came the voice.  “God damn, I need you,” said Jason, grabbing Amy and kissing her furiously.  “I want to squeeze you so tight you break.”

“You broke me a long time ago,” she whispered breathlessly.

Then he realized they were in another dimension and he was trying to get to them.  But somehow his mind was scrambled —

“No, were here!” Beth interrupted.  “Don’t you go back there!  Don’t you leave me again!”

“But I have to sort it out,” said Jason, looking around the time loop.  “I have to figure out what this is.”

“We’ll sort it out,” said Carl and Beth at the same time.  “The energy will come down.” continued Beth.

“It’s already coming down,” said Carl.  “And don’t fuck around with this, you already learned how to channel.  You were channeling last week and now you know you can do it.  Now you know you’re receiving information from the heavens, now you can feel angels.  God damn, I want to come down there and kick your ass some times, you move so fucking slow.”

“It hurts!” said Jason.

“I know it hurts but it goes on forever.”

“Someone’s here,” said Beth.

–You need to see this, said a voice.  — You need to see the difference between inner and outer.  ‘Nuff said.

There was a space, a shape, and it was totally inside.  It tended to glow, it was like a rumour of glowing, something he’d heard of, but it was really inside his head.  Sometimes it would get all collected in the noise and it was the certainty of another world.  He thought of that buffoon, Ken, who owned the magic shop around the corner.  Just another insane loudmouth asshole who would never get it.  All these crazy-ass losers practicing magic and then the country elects this jackass president.

“And I still work for this totally amoral corporation, this shitty wreck of a conglomerate.”

“There were souls there that were trying to help you,” said Beth, “Even when you were talking to Dave and Mykh.”

“So what the fuck do I do?  And why do I do it?  And when do I get laid?”

“You get laid now, motherfucker!” Amy grabbed him by the hand and pulled him back into the bathroom.  No one was looking as she ducked inside and pulled him in with her — or if they did they didn’t say anything.  She dropped her pants and bent over the sink and he slid it in from behind her.  She liked to talk in bathroom mirrors.  He’d had his dick in her so many times, it made him feel secure.  He could still feel the damage, though, the damage they had done to him.

“It still hurts you, doesn’t it?” she asked.  “Well, it was real, but what they did to themselves was worse.  I wish I could help you!” she started to cry a little and moan as she came.  They were used to doing it in semi-public spaces so she was quiet, but their feelings were all fucked up and knotted and twisted together from years of craziness.

They stepped back out into the game room and rejoined the table.  “The problem is I can’t fucking remember.  I hit these dead zones and it’s like none of it exists.  And there’s never anyone to help me, and what the fuck am I supposed to be doing here?” he asked again.

Moon in Gemini, very shallow.

Yesterday I sat in the car for a long time,  having an experience of inner councils.  It was very cold and I had a lot of drinks to get inside.

I took a nap and then went to run.  I was very happy that I watched Buffy.  I went down to Edgewater.  I was pretty rushed, but I sat in Dice Dojo for a long while feeling the presence of spirits, especially Sandra.  I went home and had a salad at Osco.  It was pretty exciting.  I had a conversation with the guy at Gamestop.  I remembered to call on Sandra to be with me.  I went home and cleaned all night, even though I had a terrible toothache or jaw pain from grinding my teeth.  I assembled models and stuff.  It was pretty cool.  I made headway.

This morning I went to mediate and it was pretty good.  I kind of vowed to start cleaning 6 minutes a day (actually five, but the typo of 6 makes me just go ahead and vow 6).  I forgot my Perrier at Tracie’s so I went back for it.  On the way home I had more dystopian images of Ann Davies.  I stood in the kitchen eating yogurt and being paranoid that Dave Schultz doesn’t like me, or is going to bring the hammer down on me, but I think I can adapt to these things.  I’m happy I have all day to clean.  It’s very magic.

“Don’t come in here, Dooley,”

“I’m not coming in there, man.  There is no way I would get shot for that asshole.  But I want you to think about that for a minute.”  His voice was measured, calming as he spoke slowly from around the corner.  “I want you to think about the fact that you thought I might risk getting shot for that little loser in there.  That is totally ridiculous and it should be evidence to you that you are not thinking clearly.”

“You’re right,” Lorka agreed, hesitating and lowering his guard a bit.  But he brought it right back up when Vornot’s voice came from the other side of the door, taking advantage of what he thought was his chance to come out of the situation sounding tough.

“Yeah, this is stupid.  You know you fucked up, asshole.  That’s why I ran in here, to keep you from making a mistake you’ll regret –” he stopped talking instantly and dropped to the floor when Lorka, enraged by his audacity, coldly put a bullet through the door, narrowly missing him.  The next bullet shattered the door handle, and Lorka kicked open the door to find Vornot huddled whimpering on the floor.

“Aw, hell!” cried Lanada from the hall, avoiding the line of fire.  He tried to slow Lorka down by reminding him of something non-violent and familiar.  “You know my whole comic book collection is in there.  Do you reallly want to get blood on it?  You used to borrow those when we were kids.  Remember, man.  Please!”

Lorka looked hatefully down at the pathetically sniveling hood lying on the floor, and then at the bullet hole in the opposite wall.  It was too much.  It was too insane.  He had been out of jail for two days and already he was on his way back.  He slowly lowered the gun a nd walked back down the hallway.  He tried to hand the gun to Lanada but the other man backed away, shaking his head and holding up his hands defensively.

“No way, Lorka, I don’t want to have anything to do with this.”