Episode 1-4

Richard didn't know if he was either asleep or still unconscious. He found out it was neither when he started to hear the Drill Instructor in his head scold him for standing up on a crippled leg. That voice shut up when he realized that he was being carried into a forest thick enough to shade him from the sun.

He also heard the voice he heard before he blacked out humming a tune he couldn't quite place. It was melodious and mysterious at the same time, with a tenor that came from the emerald isle some millennia ago

He must have groaned then, because the Irish voice was accompanied with a soft, feminine hand that touched his cheek, making sure the blindfold is still there. He can smell lavender and cedar wood.

“er, Richard Kronos, Lance Corp--”

She laughed, a combination giggle, crackle, and songbird chirp. “Silly Marine. Ye be visited by a witch, not being abducted by aliens.”

A Witch, she said. Richard remembered Uncle Rudy mention something about a Witch. Not the glamorized version on TV or what televangelists warn about; the real kind. He didn't sai much about what she really was, only what little he knows, about her being rather good looking and that she had some good homemade pain gel he used on occasion. She also had a name: Shazell.

Whatever light the sunlight pushed through the trees and that blindfold went out. Judging by the noise of the footsteps, she must have went inside a building—the cottage she lives in no doubt, Richard thought—but he only heard one set of footsteps. Who was carrying him?

“There. Now we can have a litt'l privacy, y'now?”

It can't be her, even as he's lowered to some carpet with a pillow for his head. He's much too heavy to be lifted this easily, even without the brace on his leg. But as her hands cradled his hands—lavender filling every one of his sinuses—and pulled awai the blindfold. It was only her, with her youthfull face with skin that was clear, flesh toned, and unblemished. A purple gown that hugs her figure, and the pointed hat that she took off and set aside. Reddish brown hair flowed down her sides and back, accented with three streaks of white.

“It be only me, Handsome,” she almost purred out as she lit a candle—with her lips. “I don't need anyone.”

She sat to his right, as he laid down on a rug with a pentagram on it, his head at the top point. There was some vats and something wrapped in meat packing paper. About at the height of her hair there was eight candle holders, candles who were lit as she placed the candle she lit up to one and the flame jumped from candle to candle, around them both.

“Ai have me magick. Ai don't needa big hulking hunk wrapped a'round me finger t' help me out. Tho' I could a'preciate a friend o' two with cute faces an' noble spirits.”

“Could that be why you popped into my living room?” Richard said, neither knowing if he should be protesting, nor if he is at all.

She laughed again. “I popped in, dearie, when ye collapsed in ye living room, and mai ai sai that ye didn't do so well in stiffling yer scream.” She produced a cold wet cloth to his head and patted his shoulder. “Ye needed me help, and I be here, Handsome. I knew ye won't mind me.” She gave a wink and a cheery smile, knowing that he's not going anywhere.

He wasn't. He found out that he couldn't as much as move a muscle in his arms and the one good leg, and whatever's in that cloth, with a menthol aroma and a penetrating coolness, only relaxed him more. “Er . . . Shazell . . . is it?”

She looked back to him, her face brightened. “Ah, ye know me! ai be flattered, Richard.”

“What exactly are you're doing t--”

“Ai be stoppin' ye from squirmin', don't y' know.” She went back to his waist and undone his belt buckle. “Ain't every dai ye find someone come outta d' blue and take off ye pants. Oy, ai know. Ye fantasize about it. But how else am ai t' see ye bum leg?”

And when she did, she was shocked. Surgical scars went down the length of the leg, and round holes made by pins that went to the bone dotted the thigh and calf. The knee and ankle looked shattered under the skin, reduced to so many marbles in a sock. The doctors were able to put it back in one piece, but they wasn't able to do much else above keeping it attached to the rest of Richard.

“Och, look at it. What on earth happened to y' leg, Richard?”

Rich winced as Shazell poked at it. “Football Accident one Fridai Night. Got clipped and chop blocked at the same time—ow ow ow—by the school's rival team. Some said that they looked like they inten . . .”

The next surge of pain shot all through him. Shazell frowned at that. “Oh, dear, that won't do. Ai have t' do somethin' about ye leg.”

“Ma'am,” Richard said in a weakened voice. “I had surgeons worked my leg over and it's all they can do to keep it attached. Do ya think you c—”

She placed her hand on his mouth. It quieted him in an instant. It was the lavender combined to whatever was over his forehead. “ai have me wais. How could ai bring ye t' me house?”

He still couldn't answer. He didn't have one. She could materialize out of thin air and make candle flame jump like trained animals. He wasn't suret she can make stuff hover in mid-air, including him.

He didn't have time to consider it either. Shazell was already pulling out big handfuls of some light blue gel and spreading it over the top thigh of his ravaged leg. As the cooling gel contacted the skin, Richard felt a tingle that steeped into the skin, through the muscles, and into the marrow of the bone, as it did, he felt the tingle warm up into a gentle heat that replaced whatever pain that was in there. She progressed down the leg, to the knee, skin, and ankle, until the whole leg was aglow with the ice/heat combination. It felt that the leg was dunked in a 50 gallon drum the stuff and left in there, as the effects grew exponentially from what he experienced with over-the-counter version of this homemade concoction. It was so intense that it was making him dizzy.

“That be me homemade pain gel, Handsome.” She said as she wiped the stuff from her hands with another wet cloth. “If ye want anything stronger, it'd prolly kill ye.” She looked back up to him, seen the dazzled look in his eyes. “Ooop, it seems ai put on too much,” she said in a humored voice. “The glow be getting t' ye head.”

“wh . . . what's in that stuff . . .”

“Ai tell ye later, dearie.” She purred as she picked up a vial of a thick green liquid. She uncorked the bottle and, having lifted his head with a free hand, brought it to his lips. “Now then, make an Irish Wiccian girl feel welcome an' drink all this down.”

He couldn't resist her even if he wanted to. Between her voice as silky as her dress, soft voice of her lavender-scented hands, the relaxing contents of what was on his head, and what happened to his leg, he couldn't help but swallow the contents down. It tasted of honey, clover, and rum, and it coated his mouth and throat until it reached his stomach. When it got there, it started to warm up there, a warmth that spread out to his chest, belly, arms, the remaining leg, and assaulted his head in a warm dizzying sensation. Whatever cognitive parts of his brain still active made a note that this potion could be used as homemade NiQuil, and made a reminder to visit her whenever he got a cold.

“That's a good boy.” She said, and kissed him on the lips. It made him smile.

“You like me, do ya, Handsome. Maibe it be th' booze in the stuff, but ai know ye like me. Didn't wanna booze ye up this much, but at least ye be fine when ai break out th' really strong stuff.”

She put on some latex examiner's gloves and went for a second vat, which contained something that was dark green, mossy in texture, and rather pungant. She smoothed it over the leg just like what she did with the blue jell, caking it on in a thick laier came from the thigh, through the knee and shin, and stopping at the ankle. She then opened the package in the paper, which contained a long ribbon of seaweed, the kind that can be used for sushi, which she used to wrap over the laier of the mossy stuff.

Which was doing something to his leg, although he couldn't tell what. He could feel the muscles and bones in there heat up, melt, and even move. It was similar to what he felt in surgery, but he didn't feel one pinch of pain. Instead he felt like he was floating again; dizzy, drunken, and very light-headed from the combination of substances that she put on, over, and in him.

“There. She said as she patted his belly. “ai think ai let ye be for now. ai let ye sleep here, Richie. An' ye be back home be'fo ye wake up.” She then rolled over to her chest and cradled his head in her arms once again. “ai be sure ye be seein me again, ai know it,” she cooed as she stroked his chest. “ai would love to have ye be me friend, me handsome friend.”

Then she began to sing a soft song in a Celtic tongue and voice that echoed throughout Richard's mind, a voice that blended into the nature sounds of leaves rustling and brooks bubbling.

He found himself in the woods again, propped up against a tree. He must've been sitting there for a long time, because the tree has grown around him. Vines held his body so close to the trunk that the bark molded around his body, and roots covered his crippled leg.

He can feel the tree live and grow. Not just all around him but into him as well. The sap in the wood, light from the leaves, and water from the roots come through the tree's skin and into his own, as if he's been grafted into this mighty oak.

As the tree grew up, pulling him up until he stood, the bark started to cover his body, molding into his skin, until he couldn't figure out where tree ended and human flesh began. As it did the same thing to his face and all sensory input was lost, he could hear a through echo through his mind: Let me offer you my strength. We are of the same Earth, part of the same world. Let us be part of each other . . .”

He could now sense the world from the tree's point of view, even as he becomes part of that tree. He could feel the warmth of the sun in the branches that were his arms, take in the moisture of the soil with the roots that traveled up his legs, and hear the wind blow through the leaves around his head. Far from being numbed and deadened, Richard Kronos never felt more full of life, never felt more alive, and without a single bit of pain since he got his Eagle, Globe, and Anchor insignia.

He never dreamed this good of a dream since global terrorists parked fully loaded airplanes into a pair of tall towers.

Not that he could think of those things in this dream.

Nor did he cared.

It was a dream he hoped would never end.

It would be a dream he wished he'd visit over and over.

Something gave him the thought that he will, and of the woman who is as much a part of the earth as he is, a woman of nature and spirits and magick . . .

To Be Continued . . .

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