The sound of power tools buzzing caused Pax to groan and pull a pillow over her head. Her fitful sleep had seamlessly bled into an equally nightmarish reality. I almost prefer the demon, she thought to herself. At least he wasn’t noisy. She stretched her legs out slowly as she willed herself awake. Why do I feel like I've been hit by a truck? Oh yes, the sedatives to make Para weaker. Amara’s guestroom bed was extremely comfortable, especially when slightly sedated. Pax removed the pillow from her face so that she could release a giant yawn. She squinted one eye open before turning her head slightly so that she could look at her surroundings. A panoramic view of the ocean was visible through a giant pane of glass. It was several minutes before she realized she was staring. So this is why Amara lives on the waterfront. What a spectacular scene.
Pax pulled herself up onto her knees to better appreciate the view as she stretched out her arms. Except for the incessant roar of what was possibly a chainsaw or a power drill, it was a lovely morning—or afternoon. Realizing how high the sun was in the sky, Pax figured that the sedatives must have knocked her out and caused her to sleep well past noon. Pressing the palms of her gloved hands against her ears, Pax began to move off the bed before she noticed something strange.
There was a drop of blood on her pillow. Pax frowned, reaching up to check if her nose was bleeding. She ran her fingers over her lips to check if she had bitten herself. She glanced down at her pajama pants to see if it was her time of month. Finding no trace of blood anywhere on her body, she grew puzzled. On a hunch, she checked her chest again to see if there were claw marks. The memory of the creepy dream still lingered in her mind. Finding nothing, she shrugged. It was just one drop of blood—it wasn’t important.
She levitated herself off the bed and materialized downstairs directly beside Amara. The blonde woman jumped a little, and turned off the power tool she was holding. She pulled her safety goggles off her head and gave her friend a big smile.
“Don’t you love the smell of Kalgren technology in the morning?”
“I’d like the smell better if a Kalgren was frying me up some bacon instead of welding metal.”
“I’m not that kind of Kalgren,” Amara said unapologetically. She pointed one of her tools at Pax jokingly. “If you want to be woken up with breakfast in bed, you should go back to living with the other sibling.”
Pax smiled. “That’s not how he used to wake me up.”
“Ew! Too much information. Too early to hear that kind of thing. Especially after yesterday.” Amara shuddered theatrically. “Anyway, don’t you want to know what my genius mind has generated?”
“What is it?”
“Well… this thing isn’t finished yet; it’s a surprise. But I’ve been productive this morning! Here.” Amara reached into her pink lab coat and pulled out a phone before tossing it to Pax. “I took your phone and programmed it to emulate Para’s voice in addition to your voice. So if one of the boys calls you, and we’re not welded together at the moment—see what I did there? Then you can still take the call and just talk normally—it will sound like they’re speaking to Para. And if we are welded together, we can still sound like our individual selves! I did my phone too. Tell me I’m brilliant.”
“You’re brilliant. But since when do we refer to two guys who are over a decade older than us as ‘the boys?’” Pax asked as she began to play with the phone.
“Since they started acting like children,” Amara answered instantly. She pulled her goggles back down over her eyes and returned to welding things together.
Pax smiled, and continued toying with the phone as she walked out to Amara’s patio. She slid the doors open and headed past the deck into the grass which was still moist from the morning dew. She shoved the phone into the pocket of her pajama top as she stared out at the scenic water below the cliff. Walking to the edge, Pax could not resist jumping off just to feel the sensation of falling.
As she fell, the wind whipped her short black hair around violently. She was enjoying her own all-natural rollercoaster when her new phone began to ring. She paused in midair, levitating halfway down the cliff. Her hand reached into her pocket, and the vibration against her hand sent tingles of excitement through her.
She wondered whether it was Asher or Thornton calling. They had both called her countless times before, and she had never felt this excited. Whoever it was, he wasn’t calling her; he was calling part of her, part of her that existed in a dreamlike state. Yes, she might as well be dreaming when she was Para. That was exactly the way it felt. She was still herself, but not totally in control.
Para was a dream of falling. Even though Pax knew fully well in both her conscious and subconscious mind that she could control her energy to create an air-cushion beneath her to keep her from falling, for some reason she simply couldn’t fly in some dreams. As much as she tried, she was robbed of her powers. The most terrifying dreams were the ones where she was completely human, and completely vulnerable. However, Para wasn’t that type of dream; not the kind that robbed you of your abilities and ridiculed your insecurities mockingly.
Para gave pure power. She was the dream where you could fly endlessly through the open skies without a trace of fear or pessimism. Fly without needing a spaceship through the galaxies to distant planets. She was the dream where you tried to grasp the rainbow and it burst into a kaleidoscope of even more rich and stunning color which you could hold and twist in your hands. She was the dream of being born again, with all the wisdom and joy you ever possessed, multiplied to astronomical proportions.
Para was all of Pax’s fondest fantasies rolled up into one ball. The dream that her mother and grandfather were alive and well, that they had not been taken from her over a decade ago, and that their uplifting smiles and warm hugs were something accessible. She was the dream where the Asura gathered in a swarming army, and they were all attacking her family, but Pax somehow had the power to defeat them all—all by herself. Well, not by herself. With her best friend.
Para was mostly made of goddess. Literally. It was so challenging to suppress the energy which radiated from her skin that Pax had raided the hospitals where she volunteered for drugs to accomplish the feat. If not for this, Para would not have been able to hold a martini glass without it bending to her touch as though it were rubber. Pax could only imagine what it would feel like to test Para’s powers without restraint. If both girls could let loose and exercise their true strength when their bodies were joined… they would probably be the most powerful female demigoddess who currently existed! It would be incredible.
It was almost a shame that such great potential was being wasted on two foolish boys. On playing a game. But we deserve this revenge. They played games with our hearts. Why shouldn’t we play too? Pax felt a moment of guilt. When this is finished, I promise to use Para to achieve something good. She smiled, and allowed herself to continue falling to the rocks below. She still hadn’t withdrawn the phone from her pocket. She almost did not want to know who was calling.
Everything was new. Having always been Asher’s little niece, she had never seen him from this twisted, hateful, sexual perspective. She would never think the same of him again. After half a lifetime of belonging to Thornton as his woman, as his girlfriend; it was new once more. He looked at Para with an excitement that wasn’t in his eyes anymore when he looked at Pax. He had become too comfortable in knowing that she belonged to him, and always would.
She closed her eyes at the painful recognition that she always would. Even so, she understood the sense of new excitement she recognized in his face because she felt the same. It was not the feeling of falling in love all over again, but more the feeling of retracing her steps to find something she had lost: her individuality. How ironic that she had needed to completely coalesce her body with another human being in order to rediscover her individuality. It was the undoing and unraveling of the fabric of their lives which had been carefully constructed on a now broken loom. It was the demolishing of a fortress, stone by stone.
In truth, theirs had been an unusually friction-free relationship. They had both been abnormally happy. They hardly ever argued, except playfully. Thorn and Pax were both carnal, competitive people who loved to wrestle or pit their mental powers against each other. They had understood each other better than the average couple, and they had been through the lowest of the low moments together. Pax’s fingers tightened around her phone, and she considered chucking it out into the sea, never to retrieve it again. She did not want to answer the phone call. She did not want to hear his voice.
The humble beginnings of their relationship had occurred when she was only fourteen. It had started innocently enough—just a stolen kiss here and there. Pax had recently lost her mother, and her father had absconded to the mountains of India. She’d been alone, and she had focused all her need on the twenty-eight year old businessman who was a close family friend. She had chased after him for years, scaring away every other woman who looked his way until he relented. She was now twenty-six, and she recognized that perhaps she should not have been so adamant about pursuing Thorn.
She had been far too young to make such an important life decision about who she intended to spend the rest of her life with. She had been foolish and naïve, and now that she was twenty-six, which was much older and wiser… she would make the exact same decision. She would make it over and over again, a thousand times, for there was no one else for her, and there would never be anyone else.
If she had to assume the disguise of a different body each time, she would keep his love. Every time he got bored of her, she could simply change into a different woman. Every time he hurt her, she could find a way to slide into his heart from a different angle and hurt him back. It was not fair that Thorn had stopped wanting her because he knew she was his. Was there no reason to desire what one already possessed? Why did he want to be with the redhead in the pinstriped business suit he’d had on his desk, or with strange women in clubs like Para? Was the majority of their appeal that they were not Pax?
When she had been a broken-hearted and tragedy-stricken teenager, she had been plenty exciting. There was the feeling of this is so wrong but I can’t stop, combined with our parents can never know, and followed by the good ol’ we’re breaking all kinds of laws. That was all very well, but Pax had believed that there were certain things that would withstand the test of time. Disregarding the connections based on their special lineage, she had expected the I love you to remain, and especially the I respect you.
But Para had it. Instantly, and just because she was a beautiful stranger, Para had his attention. She wasn’t someone Thorn could easily have his way with at any moment of the day, because he was assured of her love. This thought angered Pax, but then so did almost every other thought. How long had Thorn been screwing around on her? Why didn’t he think what they had was special and electrifying? Why didn’t he think their love was worth keeping? She had.
Pax threw her arms out and levitated out over the water, letting the ocean breeze save her from her train of thought.
Did we just get a phone call? Amara’s voice projected into her mind. I was working. Why didn’t you take it?
Didn’t feel like it. Come out here and enjoy the water. This cliff is pretty.
Well, I guess I deserve a small break. Where are you? I don’t see you on the cliff.
Near the bottom.
You jumped off it? I can’t do that…
Pax rolled her eyes. Do you mean to tell me that the daughter of the Prince of Devas can’t even levitate? When there was no response, Pax flew up to the top of the cliff, moving so quickly that she wasn’t visible to the naked eye. She completely dematerialized, appearing behind Amara to push her friend off the edge of the cliff.
When Amara released a bloodcurdling scream, Pax could not resist a laugh, but she flew after her friend to ensure her safety. She was surprised when Amara was unable to catch herself, and she reached out to catch her under the armpits.
“Seriously?” Pax asked in surprise. “You’re twenty-eight years old and you can’t levitate?”
Amara only began to relax once Pax had deposited her safely on the beach. She took several deep breaths before she began laughing. “Ash used to toss me off that cliff all the time and say the same thing. I guess I was always too afraid to learn, but now I somehow feel ready.”
Pax shrugged. “I guess it’s the deva equivalent of women who are too scared to learn how to drive. So they keep putting it off, saying they’ll learn later just to avoid driving altogether. Then the next thing you know, they’re twenty-eight, and falling off a cliff, and they can’t do anything about it except let their heads get smashed on the rocks.”
“I think that analogy got lost somewhere in the middle,” Amara said with a grin. “On the bright side, I think my head might be naturally hard enough that even if I did go hurtling down onto jagged rocks, I’d get off with little more than a massive headache. Nothing a little Advil wouldn’t fix.”
“Shall we test that theory?” Pax asked gesturing up at the top of the cliff maniacally.
“Oh, Pax. I know you’re just trying to avoid the phone call. But it’s going to take more than almost-killing-me to distract me from the situation at hand. I am very, very upset.” Amara sighed and reached up to touch her temple. “Do you think merging together might be playing with our sanity? Give us brain damage?”
“In my professional opinion: absolutely.” Pax smiled and stretched out on a rock. “I have considered that it might be slightly altering our physical makeup.”
“I guess we’ll find out,” Amara said as she pulled out her phone. “Okay, enough stalling. It seems we have a missed call from both Thorn and Ash and there’s a text from Thorn.”
“Ooh, I want to read,” said Pax, sitting up and bolting to Amara’s side to poke her face over her shoulder.
The text message read:
Medea,
Please allow me to take you out for dinner.
I’m nothing like Jason.
Thorn
Pax growled at the phone dangerously. Jason had been Medea’s husband in the myth. The husband who betrayed her. “Well, I was having a good morning until I read that. It sounds just like him. Disgusting sweet-talker. You are Jason, Thorn! You are Jason. I think I need to be joined with you to think of a reply without exploding into a million pieces.”
“Yeah,” said Amara with a light nervous laugh. “Ash left a voicemail. Listen.”
The phone went to speaker and the voice began to play:
"Hi Medea! Ash here. I can't get the image of you out of my mind, and I keep hearing every word you’ve said replay in my mind. Unfortunately, I haven't heard you say nearly enough words, so there's way too much repetition. How would you like to help me with this problem? I'd love to treat you to lunch.”
Amara moaned, placing her face in her hands. “This is ridiculous. I need to be joined with you just to listen to this without getting depressed. Right now, I’m just Amara, and he’s trying his best to have sex with some girl he just met. It’s humiliating how little he cares… but when I’m Para, it’s a victory, it's just part of the plan."
“I don't want to answer either of them, Mara.”
“But we must. Do you want to go to lunch and dinner? What do you have time for, aren’t you scheduled at the hospital?”
“I’m the famous daughter of a beloved actress who tragically died. I can go into work whenever I choose. What do you want to do?”
“I don't know.”
“Let’s let Para decide,” said Pax. “She’ll know whether she’s the kind of woman who goes out with Thorn or Ash or both or neither. Get dressed and I’ll get some safe doses of sedatives ready for us.”
Amara nodded. “I’m going to reconfigure a few more features into the watch so that we don’t screw up and split apart in front of the…” The blonde woman twitched when her cell phone suddenly rang in her hand. She frowned, pressing the silencing button. “It’s my damned brother.”
“You should answer it. Don’t let my beef with him become your beef,” Pax warned.
Amara shook her head stubbornly. “Too late for that. There’s beef everywhere. We’re just swimming in beef.”
Immediately, Pax's cell phone rang. She pulled it out of her pajama pocket and looked back at Amara. “It’s your damned brother.”
“You should answer it,” said Amara.
“Why me? You hypocrite! I haven’t spoken to him in weeks.” Pax stared at the phone until it stopped ringing.
“Who are you kidding, Pax? You sat on his lap last night and shoved your breasts against him.”
"Not me, we!" corrected Pax, putting her phone back in her pocket. She jumped as it instantly started ringing again, and then growled loudly. Double-calling! Twice in a minute. Emergency? Someone had better be dying.
Before she could change her mind, Pax answered the call calmly. “Hello, Thornton.”
“Pax… finally.” There was a long pause at the other end of the line as both parties held their breath. They both seemed to feel as though a truckload of eggshells would be crushed if either of them breathed too hard. Thorn was the first to break. “Could you and Amara please stop ignoring my calls?”
“No. How may I help you?”
“I haven’t been able to reach you in over a month.”
“Does that surprise you?”
“Dad is getting worried. He said that he noticed unusual fluctuations in Mara’s life force last night, and yours too. He said you both seemed very weak or possibly ill. Have you been practicing?”
“I’ve been teaching Mara to levitate,” Pax lied. Amara nodded to encourage this lie.
“I hope you’re not getting her into anything too dangerous. Were you hurt or unconscious? Is everything okay?”
Pax remained silent, holding the phone and staring into space. The sound of his voice caused nausea and nostalgia to overpower her and render her speechless. Amara tugged on her friend’s pajama sleeve when she saw her zoning out.
“Paxie, are you there? Please speak to me. Do you know how long it’s been since I heard your voice?”
Holding her breath, Pax waved her fingers to telekinetically separate large boulders from the cliff. She spun her fingers around to make the gigantic rocks rotate in a macabre carousel. Amara began to back away from her friend nervously.
“Neither of you have called or visited. I’m used to seeing you both at the breakfast table at least half of the time, so I’m really starting to worry. I nearly flew over there last night to check on you…”
Her grip on the phone tightened and she felt her heat spreading throughout her body, intensifying and consuming her. All of the spinning boulders burst into flame, creating massive fireballs with solid, crunchy centers. Gumballs of doom.
“Thornton Vincent Kalgren, you had better stay away from here,” Pax warned in a whisper. The fireballs began to spin so fast that they created a burning ring of flame. “I nearly killed you, so help me.”
“Pax, I am so sorry. Sakra himself doesn’t know how sorry I am. But I swear I have tried to contact you thousands of times since that night, in every possible way. You blocked yourself off telepathically, and you won’t take my calls. I have tried to explain what you saw…”
“I understand what I saw,” Pax hissed. “I’m a big girl now, Thorn, and you taught me lots of things. I’d like to hang up now. First I’ll say this: your sister is fine, and I am fine. You’ll see us when you see us.” She moved her finger to end the call.
“Pax, wait… I miss you.”
Pax let loose a funny noise from deep in her throat. If there was ever such a thing as a final straw, this was probably a prime example. Bad move, Thorn. Wrong thing to say right now. She shifted the phone to her left hand, and let the other one extend out towards Amara. “Thorn, I have something which belongs to you. May I return it?”
The ring of blazing boulders began to descend until they spun around Pax. Amara had been sitting rather close to her friend, and she gasped and scrambled out of the way to avoid being struck by one of the deadly projectiles.
“I guess I left a lot of things at your place, Pax. I have a lot of your stuff as well. What is it? You can come and return it anytime. Pax? I just felt a strange surge of power…”
She hung up the phone, and returned it to her pocket in order to lift both of her hands. She dislodged several more boulders from the cliff and added them to the fiery blaze surrounding her. Many of the boulders narrowly missed Amara who was still scrambling away nervously. The crackling energy in the air sent Amara’s blonde hair flying backward and over her shoulders. Amara put her arms up instinctively and crossed them over her head, ready to block any boulders that flew her way.
Amara began to panic a bit when she saw glimpses of her friend’s red eyes through the wall of fire. Pax, you’re not going to hit me with that, are you?
The rock-and-fire missile only grew and Amara found herself sliding away and stumbling back into the cliff. There was nowhere left to run. She was trapped. Please, Paxie. I can’t block that. I’m not joking… killing me won’t piss Thorn off nearly as much as you think, trust me.
When she saw insane flickers of gold in Pax’s eyes she frowned. Can you just not aim that thing in the direction of my house? The property costs a fortune and… just let me upgrade my insurance first!
Pax closed her eyes and pressed her left hand across her abdomen. She exhaled and pressed her right hand over her left. In an instant she had transported herself through the air and landed right in front of Thornton, with her pre-made ring of fireballs spinning inches from his nose.
This is for you, she told him as she released her carefully collected mini-volcano at point-blank range. She didn’t wait for the aftermath as she teleported directly back to Amara. She collapsed on the rocks and curled up, staring dejectedly at her knees.
“Did you hurt him?” Amara asked with concern. The blonde playboy was still her brother.
“He’s not dead. He’s a deva. Unlike you, he’s the actually-tough kind. I think I might have broken every bone in his body and burned every inch of his skin, but for me and Thorn that’s basically flirting.”
“Pax,” said Amara, disapprovingly. “That wasn’t part of our plan. We decided not to let them have any physical contact with our individual selves while we’re doing this. Not to let them see us so that they won't get any hints.”
“He didn't see me,” Pax explained, rolling over and putting her forehead flat against the rock. All he saw was an explosion right in his face. How dare he try to apologize, try to tell me he misses me while trying to have sex with Para? I want to go back to sleep now for the rest of the day. Maybe I’ll hide in a dark corner of the basement and never leave again.
“You can’t. We have work to do with… Pax!” Amara shrieked. “Your teleportation thing worked!”
Pax looked up in surprise before frowning. “Yes, I can get it to work sometimes. Usually when I’m teleporting to him. Something about his life force. I guess I know it really intimately and I’m used to keeping track of where he is in the back of my mind. For many years, he was the only destination I really wanted to get to, so it became easy to dart across the world and be beside him in an instant. I wish it could work when I was trying to get anywhere else.”
Amara smiled. “Joining bodies is really doing great things for our friendship.”
“What do you mean?” Pax asked.
“You were able to teleport back to me,” said Amara triumphantly. “I guess you must be intimately acquainted enough with my energy too.”
Pax smiled in genuine surprise. “That’s right. I did teleport back.”
“You should practice that skill more,” suggested Amara. “I’ll help however I can. It could really help us if we ever get into a tight spot as Para.”
“That’s a great idea,” Pax said cheerfully. “I’ll work on it as soon as I finish bawling in misery in a corner of your basement.”
“What?”
“Kidding, kidding. Sort of.”