THE ONLY EASY DAY IS YESTERDAY
"The Journey of Jeremy Keller"
by Oldscout
The wind blew through Jeremy's jacket giving him the feeling of
flying. The roar of the old Harley was music to his ears. He knew
Mandy was still with him, he could feel her presence but also kept an
eye on her in the mirrors. She rode a smaller and newer bike. At first
she had been hesitant to take one of her own, she said it had been
decades since she had ridden. Jeremy couldn't help but feel proud for
her as she took to it so quickly.
They had carried Mandy's bike in the back of the truck for most
of the night until they had spotted a good place to dump the truck.
Hopefully by the time anybody found it, they would both be well
established with new names.
A sign passed telling how many hundred of miles it was to
Seattle. "If your ever in trouble and need someone you can trust," the
voice said "look up my friend, Duncan MacLeod, in Seattle."
The long thruway stretching in front of Jeremy faded and was
replaced by the long curving causeway leading from Saudi Arabia to
Bahrain. Jeremy rode in an Army Humvee following a long line
vehicles traveling to the island nation.
After a cursory stop at customs, they took him to the Navel
station and dropped him at the front gate. As the guard checked his
papers, Jeremy noticed one very obvious addition to the ships in the
harbor. Parked close to the main gates was a large cruise ship, the
Cunard Princess.
"Where did that come from?" Jeremy asked as the guard handed
his papers back.
"They brought that in for R & R, Sir." the guard said.
Jeremy just shook his head and said "What a novel idea." then
headed for HQ. After he had worked his way past his unit who had all
thought him dead, he approached Commander Parker's office and felt the
rush of another immortal.
The Commander met him at the door before he had a chance to
knock. "Welcome back Lieutenant." Parker said as he ushered Jeremy
into his office. "I see you weren't as lucky as everyone thinks you were."
"No, Sir." Jeremy replied. "My rebreather failed."
"Have a seat, Jeremy," the Commander said indicating one of the
chairs in front of the desk. "From your reaction, I assume you know
what you are?"
"Yes, Sir, a Saudi sensed me when I woke up." Jeremy replied
"He told me who and what we are and about the Game."
"Your lucky, sometimes people are immortal for a long time
before they find out who they are." Parker said.
"Sir, may I ask you something?"
"Anything," Parker replied "I guess its on me to try to help you
deal with your new life."
Jeremy leaned forward "Sir, did you know what I was, before..."
Commander Parker finished the question "before you died? Yes
I did, you see, as you get older and more experienced you can sense the
seed of immortality in a person. The problem is what to do about it, you
can't just approach somebody and say 'Excuse me, do you know what
would happen if I stuck this knife in your heart?'"
"So you do nothing?" Jeremy asked.
"No, if your an honorable man, you can keep an eye on the pre-
immortal and be there for him when the time comes." Parker responded.
Jeremy nodded accepting his superior's reasoning, then thought
for a second "One more thing, Sir, for now."
"Yes?"
"Can you tell me how old you really are?"
Commander Parker laughed and got up from his desk "That's a
very hard question to answer, let me show you something." He walked
over to a wall motioning Jeremy to follow. The two men stood in front
of a small framed picture. It looked like an illustration from an medieval
bible. "I've shown you my collection before, Jeremy. I collect these old
texts, or what remains of them. But I never told you how specific I am
in my collecting."
Parker took the picture off the wall and handed it to Jeremy.
"Look at it very carefully, it is over 700 years old, hand drawn in a
monastery in Spain." He got a far away look in his eyes "The complete
text took two years to complete."
Jeremy looked up from the illustration "You drew this?"
"It's all I collect." The Commander replied "I lived in that
monastery for over a hundred years, we lived such private lives nobody
noticed anything unusual. Best I can guess, is that during my first years
there, I fell from a stool in the library. I thought I had just knocked
myself out." He hung the picture back on the wall. "I had no idea what I
was until crusaders stopped on their way to the Holy land. Among them
was one of us who told me what I was and convinced me to go with
them."
"You were a crusader?"
Parker started to laugh and changed the subject. "You know, I
pick up a lot of my own work pretty cheap."
"Why is that, weren't you any good?" Jeremy said with a smile.
"On the contrary, I was so good my work stands out. The only
problem is it spans over a hundred years. All of the scholars are
convinced the later works are all forgeries, copies of the earlier master
pieces."
"So you can pick them up at bargain prices."
"You know it drives those people nuts. If any of them bothered
to believe what their expertise was telling them, they would have a true
mystery on their hands."
Commander Parker turned to the Lieutenant "Son, let me give
you this one word of advise, don't ever allow yourself to live for the
game. It'll end up that being an immortal is all you know how to do and
you'll stop living this fantastic life you've been given. There have been
so many of us who have moved through the ages and never enjoyed
themselves, never enjoyed the pleasures of being alive, never simply
lived."
"I'll try to remember that." Jeremy said "Thank you, Sir." Jeremy
got up to leave.
"One more thing." Parker said with a very serious tone to his
voice "If your ever in trouble..."
There was a surge in the quickening then Jeremy felt nothing.
He looked behind him and saw that Mandy was gone. He had just
passed an exit so he pulled over and looked off the bridge at the exit
ramp. He saw Mandy driving quickly off the ramp and on to a local
road. Ahead of her was another motorcycle, a 'rice burner'.
to be continued.........