The ballad of two
Part eight
What lies beneath.

vs. Jason Snow

/ / /

Two days ago

"I remember the first time that I saw snow; I remember how much it affected me.

I know that sounds pretty weird to you guys, living here, but to me – a kid that grew up in Arizona – it was something special; something awe inspiring. I know what you are thinking and you are right. It does snow in Arizona, but what you have to remember is that I lived out in the desert, on the reservation, and while it got cold … bitterly so … I don't remember it snowing there. At the higher elevations it was probably different, and I know now that places like Mount Humphrey have snowcaps all year round, but back then all I knew was the life that I led.

… and that didn't include snow.

One year, though, probably when I was about six or seven, my mother had to attend a conference on something or other in California and we … Jay and me that is … were lucky enough to go with her. I think that she traded the ticket that she had been given for some cheaper ones but however she did it she did it. It was the first vacation that I can actually remember taking and the fact that she agreed to take Jay as well only made it that much more special. Thinking about it now she probably agreed so that she wouldn't have had me underfoot all the time. I don't mean to make that sound wrong, or nasty, in any way it is just that I know what sort of kid I was and if it had just be my mom and me then she wouldn't have got any work done at all. With Jay there I had someone else to keep me occupied.

Anyway, like I was saying, we got on the plane and headed out to California. Obviously I was so excited that I got hardly think straight and was planning everything that I would do when we got there. Surfing was top of my list. Don't get me wrong I loved living on the reservation – as hard as it could be for a white kid – but ever since I first saw surfing on TV I wanted to do it.

I suppose that I really should have checked with my mom about where we were going before I got it into my head that it would be like the movies; that is life though, isn't it? Sometimes the fantasy is better than the reality.

I don't really remember anything much about arriving in California, I was too tired. It was my first long flight and I can vaguely remember getting off the plane and then into a car. The rest is a blur. I know that we arrived at the hotel simply because I woke up in it the next day. Jay and I shared a room next to my mom, the bathroom shared between us both and so any disorientation I felt when I opened my eyes was quietened when I saw him sleeping in the next bed beside me.

It is hard to explain the relationship – the bond – that I shared with Jay back then; that I still share with him. He was the first friend that I made when my mom and me arrived on the reservation. Like I said it wasn't exactly easy. I was so different from everyone else, and I don't just mean on the outside. Sure, being the only white kid on the reservation made me stand out but with everything that I had gone through in my life – with everything that I had seen, heard and even felt at the hands of an abusive father – I wasn't as 'strong' as the other boys my age. Even the younger ones knew that I was different, almost like they could sense it.

I used to think that it was part of their heritage. You know what I mean, the fact that in the past they had been hunter-gatherers; they had been warriors. That sort of stuff is part of the psyche, the racial memory if you will, and even though they hadn't had to use a bow and arrow to survive for many generations – Wall Mart wasn't that far away you know – there was still something about them that kept them apart. There was something about me …

You know, there are two sorts of people in this World, simple as that. There are the strong and the weak. There are the predators and there are the prey. I could see it in their eyes, every time they look at me; every time they laughed at me as I feel for yet another of their so-called 'harmless' pranks. They were the wolves and I was the rabbit – soft, vulnerable, weak. Maybe they didn't know what it was about me that made them feel that way, maybe it was something that they could feel rather than see because even though I was the 'white ghost' to them I don't think that that was the only reason, I think that …

Anyway, like I said Jay was different. When I looked at him I didn't see the same thing in his eyes. He never mocked me or treated me like I was different. Sure, at the start he may have ignored me, r at least tried to, but never out of malice. He was simply that sort of boy. He was an orphan you see, and had been brought up by his grandfather who was not only a pretty powerful man within the tribe itself – he was their Shaman – but was also starting to bring some money into the tribe itself through his business. Jay seemed to be as alone as I did, or at least was a loner while I was simply alone. That all changed, though, on the day that six of the boys from the reservation school decided to get more physical with me than usual. The blood was running freely down my face from the punch to my nose before I even realised that I had fallen over. I could feel the hot patch in my pants as I wet myself, I couldn't help it really, all I could see as they stood over me, laughing … as I tasted my own blood … was my father's face that last night when he …

I don't know what he did, to be honest, I don't even remember him arriving but I do remember his hand on my face, gently holding me under the chin as he looked at my nose. I lost myself in his eyes – they were the most vibrant green that I had ever, have ever, seen – and felt the flush of embarrassment as he caught me staring. He simply smiled as he helped me to my feet and walked me back to my house. He didn't say too much that day, he didn't mention the stain on the front of my jeans, but he didn't need words. He was beside me and he had stopped the beating before it could really begin; I had been thinking of my father as the boys beat me and to my childlike mind it was almost as if Jay had saved me from him when he saved me from them.

It was no wonder that I fell in …

California. That is what I was talking about, wasn't it? When I woke up in the strange hotel room I couldn't actually remember where I was or how I had got there. I felt a small stab of terror in the pit of my stomach thinking – ludicrously – that perhaps I was back at 'home'. Not the reservation, of course, but back there. Back with him. My father. When I saw Jay's face though, so calm in sleep, I was safe.

I got out of bed, softly so as not to wake him, and opened the curtains. I wish that I could explain in words what I felt when I looked out. Everything that I knew about California I had learned from the television. Sun, sea and sand. Looking out of the window I didn't see any of that; in fact, at the start, I didn't see anything at all.

White.

Complete and total.

People assume, you know, that black is the sum of all colours and that white is the absence of any. That isn't right at all. It is easier to think that way simply because if you close your eyes, if you are in a room where there is no light at all, you cannot 'see' the colours. In actuality black itself is the absence of colours.

When I looked out of that window, however, when I first saw the thing that would become known later on that day … mere moments later … as snow I didn't know that. I just assumed that everything had been wiped out. That there was nothing at all there. I know now, looking back, that it was pretty stupid to scream out like I did but hindsight is such a great thing you know. At that time I just though that something terrible had happened and reacted to it.

Jay and my mom were beside me within seconds of each other, each one consoling me as best they could as I stood there – palms pressed to the windowpane – in absolute terror. You would have thought that I would have realised what it was but all I can say in my defence was that I had just woken up and my mind was still filled by the nightmares that haunted me at that time – that still sometimes haunt me – and I suppose that I hadn't quite woken up. It only took a few seconds for my mom to explain what was happening.

When she told us – Jay and me – that we were in Sierra Nevada it made perfect sense to him. He assured me that he was laughing at the situation, and not me, but I wasn't sure. He was always better at geography than I was and I still didn't realise that California had snow. What can I say? I was a little slow on the uptake back then.

What? Why I am babbling on about snow like this instead of answering your question.

Well right after breakfast Jay and I headed out into the grounds of the hotel while my mom got some time to herself to prepare for the seminar. I was fascinated, almost in awe, of the fact that the ground moved, that I left footprints behind in the malleable whiteness. Jay's smile never left his face and I couldn't tell – still can't really – if it was because he was also enamoured by the winter landscape or if it was because he was just enjoying watching my reaction to everything. The thing is that I felt so free there. There was no dark shadow of my father haunting my thoughts, there were no other boys from the reservation there to torment me or call me names … though admittedly, in that place, the name 'white ghost' would have been very apt. There was simply nothing to stop me from loving life itself. I know that sounds very profound for a child but that is simply how I talk about it now. Back then I didn't know what I was feeling but now I do.

It was freedom.

We spent hours out there, exploring the grounds and simply enjoying each other's company. We invented – so we thought at the time, and I was devastated to find out it wasn't true – the concept of snow angels when I accidentally fell down a slight slope and scrambled to get up again. When Jay pointed out the form left behind we laughed until we cried, ice forming on our eyelashes but we didn't care. I threw myself from the next slope that I found, determined to make another snow angel, a better one, simply so that I could hear Jay laugh again. It was a sound that I hadn't heard too much off before; he never really seemed to have anything to laugh about, you see.

He didn't that day either.

It was my own fault; I know that now just as I knew it then. I looked down from the slope and saw the unbroken blanket of snow piled up in dune like waves of pristine whiteness. I didn't think, I just threw myself into the air and let the deep snow catch me, cushion me, embrace me. It didn't, I didn't know – couldn't have known – what lay beneath the snow's surface.

For the second time in one day Jay rushed to my side as I screamed. The snow, obviously, was only a matter of inches deep. It just looked like it was more. When I landed there was nothing really there to break my fall apart from the frozen, and unforgiving, ground itself. I was sure that I was dying – or already dead – as all I could feel was burning, never-ending, all-consuming pain. I didn't know the word back then but now I would call it agony. I had bruised my coccyx, you see, and it felt like I had broken my back. I lay there, screaming and crying … just like I seemed to do far too often … and held onto Jay as he held on to me. I knew that I would die if he left, that the pain would swallow me whole, but he didn't; and so I didn't.

My mother found us like that, a few hours later when it was nearly dark. Many people were out looking for us but it was my mother that found us. Maybe that is a natural instinct that mother's have. She was crying and shouting at the same time. We were both nearly frozen to death, far too close to hypothermia to be safe, but Jay was worse of than I was. He had taken his jacket off and laid it over me, holding me close and giving me his warmth. His life. She told him, she shouted at him as his blue lips chattered uncontrollably, that he was a stupid boy for not going to get help.

He didn't let me go, not even then, he just looked at her and said that he wouldn't leave me alone.

He never did."

/ / /

Now

"So, what is the news from the lab?" Mike Silver's question was asked in a calm and controlled manner, a tone that belied the emotions that were broiling just under the surface. Just a few weeks ago he had re-opened a closed case, a missing person case that may have become a murder case, and given it to one of his best friends in the whole World to handle. It should have been simple; it should have been just another case for Joe Russo. It wasn't

Jay Phoenix. A wrestler missing for almost exactly two years. His blood – fresh – found coating a straight-edged razor wrapped in a towel. Ember. Another wrestler who somehow seemed to be linked to the case, even though there was no direct evidence to prove that; and with one of the industry's top lawyers working for him seemingly no way to find that evidence.

The only thing tying Ember to Jay Phoenix was his own confession that he had murdered the man; the man that he claimed was his own brother. A claim that couldn't be substantiated, or even used, simply because it was whispered to the detective who was meant to be in charge of the case. The same detective who had been viciously assaulting Ember when he confessed.

The same detective, Mike's best friend, who he had – two days previously – had to suspend. At least he hadn't had to arrest him though; not yet.

"Unbelievable," Mike muttered to himself, "you wouldn't get something like this in the soap operas."

"Sorry Captain?" Mike glanced up quickly, forgetting for a few seconds that David Johnson was sitting across the desk from him, files laid out on its surface.

"Oh, nothing David," Mike said with a sigh, "just talking to myself. So tell me, what did the lab guys find out?"

"Well, the first thing" David said as he opened one of the files in front of him, "is that the body that was found definitely isn't the missing persons."

"Jay Phoenix," Mike added, "he does have a name David."

"Yes sir," David stuttered, "sorry sir." Since working on this case David had been partnered with Joe Russo who had done most of the talking in the meetings with the Captain. He had had the advantage of knowing, and working with, the Captain for many years. David wasn't that lucky and still found it rather uncomfortable to be thrust into the limelight, so to speak.

"So?"

"Well the body is older than the missi.." David started then caught himself, glancing up to the Captain's face before studiously burying himself back into the files. He had them pretty much memorised, and didn't really need to read through them again; it helped, however, to not have to look into the Captain's face. He knew that the old man was trying hard to hide it but the pain of the past few days was evident there. David's grandmother had used to say that the eyes were the windows into the soul and David could see how much suspending Joe had hurt Mike. "…older than Jay Phoenix by about forty years."

"What?" Mike asked, incredulous. He had been given a verbal report that a body had been found not far from the location that the razor had been and that the assumption, therefore, was that it was actually Phoenix. "How the Hell did they make that mistake?"

"I don't know, sir," Mike admitted, "but it looks like they put two and two together …"

"… and got five!" Mike interjected angrily. "So, apart from egg on our faces and some screwed up arithmetic what do we have?"

"We have some interesting stuff from the cup that Ember was drinking out of," David said, looking up to see what Mike's reaction would be. He had walked into the office a couple of days ago, just in time to see Russo hand over his badge and sidearm in fact, and announced that he had something to finally get a trace from Ember from. They hadn't been able to get a warrant to check Ember's DNA – and his lawyer had refused point blank to give it over voluntarily – but there was nothing stopping a discarded cup from being brought in. The silver lining to the black cloud that was Russo's attack on Ember in a public place was that the cup had been knocked flying; and picked up by David in the confusion.

"Interesting?" Mike asked with a sigh. Interesting wasn't a word that he would have chosen to use about this case, or anyone involved with it at all. Fucked up he thought to himself, but then again that is two words.

"Well we already knew that there would be traces of that black lipstick that Ember wears on the cup" David stated, all business now that he was in his comfort zone, "but we also got a pretty good lip impression. Did you know that lip impressions are nearly as unique as a fingerprint?"

"Really?" Mike asked with a small smile. "Imagine that, nearly thirty years in the force and I never realised that."

David Johnson had the good grace to blush, the colour only slightly noticeable on his ebon skin; but more than noticeable enough to Mike.

"… and does that help?" Mike asked, not pushing the joke … or David's embarrassment … any further.

"Actually," David admitted with a sigh of his own, "not really. There are not many lip prints on record so we haven't found a match yet."

"… anything else?"

"Well this is where it gets interesting, Captain," David said with a growing smile. "We found traces of another material mixed in with the black lipstick, something similar. It was white greasepaint, you know, the sort used in theatre or the movies."

"What?" Mike hadn't thought that anything else could surprise him about this case anymore and wasn't sure if he liked being proved wrong about that.

"Yeah, white makeup," David reiterated. "The lab guys have tested it and are positive that it has to have come from Ember himself as it is mixed in with the black paint."

"So," Mike asked with obvious confusion, "what does that give us?"

"Well," David stated simply as he closed his file and stared directly – for the first time – into the eyes of the older man, "it tells us that Ember isn't just hiding behind the mask."

/ / /

Two days ago

"Mr James," the plain clothed policeman asked, his voice calm, "that is all well and good but telling me about your childhood experience of winter isn't answering the question is it?"

Rick James sat back in his chair as he stared at the two men across the table from him. It wasn't his first time in the police station, he had been here a few times in the last few weeks, but it was his first meeting with these two men.

… and his first time in custody as well.

Prior to that he had either been chasing the police officers in charge of looking for his missing friend or actively helping them put pieces of history together. That was then, though, that was before he had taken a gun from one of them and tried his best to blow a man away in cold blood.

That was before he had heard the man known only as Ember admit to killing his best friend, Jay Phoenix. Rick admittedly didn't remember every second of that day but he could recall the words that were whispered by Ember almost as if he was speaking there and then.

"I am not Jay Phoenix," Ember said, his tongue brushing against Russo's ear, "but you were nearly there. Just a few seconds of difference and you may have got it right. I am not him, just his brother … just his brother."

Russo reached up and grabbed Ember by his shirt and, even sitting down on the ground, had enough power to launch him away from him. Before he could, though, Ember managed to spit out one last retort.

"… and just because I KNOW that you can never prove it," Ember snarled, "I will let you drown in the knowledge that I killed him … I killed Jay Phoenix!"

He remembered seeing the gun poking out of the waistband of the black detective's toursers and even remembered thinking to himself how easy it would be just to take it from him. He didn't actually remember doing that, but the feel of the cold, hard, metal in his hands was stil with him.

So, too, was the pressure of his finger squeezing the trigger.

For a split second, as the fat detective – Joe Russo – had pushed Ember out of the way of the gunshot, Rick could have sworn that he heard Ember call his name; could have sworn that he had heard Jay's voice. He knew, though, that that wasn't possible. That that wasn't true.

Jay Phoenix was dead. He had heard the police man say so and had heard Ember say that he had killed him.

Jay was dead and Ember was still alive. Jay was dead and so, for Rick, nothing else really mattered anymore.

"Mr James," the detective prompted, "just tell me, please, why did you try to shoot that man?"

Rick looked up at the detective and tried to wipe the tears away from his eyes but cursed silently, frustated, as the chains that locked his wrists together throught the hoop on the leather belt around his waist pulled him short. His shoulder's slumped, his body language showing the defeat that hs spirit had already admitted.

"He took everything from me," Rick said quietly, "he killed him and then lied about it. He said that he was Jay's brother …"

"He didn't kill anyone that we know off, Mr James," the detective interjected, "I don't know where your Jay Phoenix is but I can tell you that we haven't found his body."

"… but I heard that cop say …"

"It was a mistake, Mr James," the detective admitted, "I don't know whose body they found but it wasn't Phoenix. So out of your reasons for trying to kill that man the only one left is that he 'lied' about it. That isn't a good reason to shoot someone, is it, even if it is true."

"I know it is true," Rick almost shouted, "he said that he was Phoenix's brother but that isn't true … Jay never had a brother!!!!"

/ / /

Now

"So you are telling me that we have Ember's lip print that we cannot identify with anyone, and some of his DNA from that cup" Mike stated simply, tiredness evident in his voice, "as well as traces of makeup, and nothing else?"

"Well …" David started, then gave up with a shrug, "yes, that is about it sir."

"… and the only thing that we have to even link this so-called 'crime' to Jay Phoenix" Mike pointed out, "is his blood found on that razor near Ember's apartment?"

"Have you stopped to consider that the two things could be linked in themselves?"

David and Mike both stopped and stared at the elderly man who stood in the doorway. A crisp grey Armani suit was worn causally with an open shirt and a long white plait, nearly to the waist, fell over his shoulder and kept his hair tidy. Weathered brown skin gleamed and piercing green eyes stared out across a hawkish nose.

"Who the Hell are you," Mike asked in consternation and confusion, "and what on Earth are you talking about?"

"Earth and Hell, how apt" the older man muttered to himself before addressing the two men directly. "My nom-de-plume, so to speak, is the Shaman, but you may call me Keme Red-Eagle. I am Jay Phoenix's grandfather."

Seeing the shock and confusion on the two men's eyes the older man, Jay Phoenix's grandfather, approached them both and stood beside the table, his eyes hooded and haunted.

"As for what I am talking about," he stated quietly, staring directly into the eyes of Mike Silver, "can only be answered with a question of my own."

"Have you heard of the chimera?"

/ / /

To be continued