If one were interested, or even allowed, to reach the Čysciec Penitencyjaryja in Bolechův, Belarus, which no one was, neither interested, nor allowed; it wasn't called the Purgatory Penitentiary for nothing, from another country one would, probably, fly into National Airport Minsk before taking the M2 to the M1 to the P59 before driving past Zamostoch'ye and then turning east at Prawda onto an unmarked, improved gravel road that was only noticeable because of a rusting combine on the corner. From there it was less than a mile before reaching a tall fence with an equally tall gate. Really two fences, and two gates, with a guard house and four guards sandwiched in between. Officially the large building behind the fences, and the fences themselves, for that matter, did not exist. If a visitor were to stop in Prawda and ask for directions to the prison, the answer they would receive, in some variation, would be what prison?

So it was lucky for Aric that he didn't require directions to reach the prison, or the airport or an airplane for that matter; except it wasn't luck, not really, not unless it was luck that, shortly before his fourteenth birthday, after a few days suffering a high fever and delirium that proved a mystery too deep for his family's doctor to solve, Aric's fever finally abated.

"Whatever it was, it's run it's course," Dr. Wood said from where he sat on the edge of the couch, which had been Aric's sickbed for a large chunk of the week, denying his family the use of the only television in the house. Dr. Wood would return twice more that year, when Aric's bouts of sleep walking had reached their peak, only to be stumped once again.

"It's a mystery," Dr. Wood said during his first visit, "sleepwalking is usually the result of stress, or anxiety. Has anything unusual happened to him recently?"

"My father died," Aric's mother Marit answered, "He'd been sick for a while. My mother was taking care of him at home. He and Aric were very close."

"You father fell sick when Aric had his fever?"

"Yes. Could they have been connected?"

"They could have come down with the same thing at the same time. Aric was young, and shook it off, but your father wasn't able to."

They were certainly connected, though no one involved, probably no one on Earth, could have guessed how. It was quite rare in human history for this particular gift to appear at all, and rarer still for it to be passed down. Earlier generations would burn anyone who showed any type of gift at the stake, good gift or bad. As time passed, and superstitions waned, many with such a gift would take holy orders, removing themselves from the world, or at least from the gene pool. But those that found it desirable to pass their gift to another soon learned that the recipient must be a blood relation, and that at least one generation must intervene between donor and recipient.

Of course, there was no one to explain this to Aric or his family. Aric's grandfather had never revealed his gift to anyone, though everyone who knew the man marveled how healthy his family was, or how quickly his children, or his wife, recovered from injury. And Aric's grandfather had many grandchildren whom he could have chosen to receive this gift, a gift that became available for the giving finally, at the end of a long and happy life, and he felt that several of them would be worthy of it, and use it fairly, and justly, with compassion and, when age and experience supplied it, wisdom.

But there was a reason that grandfather and grandson shared a name. Aric the elder had seen in the seed of his newborn grandson the man Aric the younger would become, if he were nurtured properly, and guided properly. The Elder had only wished, as he drew his last breaths, and the eternal light began to surround him, that he had had more time.

But the time that the two Arics were allotted had been enough, and it was the Oak that grew from that seed, forty-nine years since it was first glimpsed, that stood in a barren field overlooking a secret prison in the outskirts of Prawda, Belarus as he was replaying a memory of a man and a woman on vacation in Gronda, 357 kilometers west of where he was now standing.

The memory was not his, at least not originally his. It was his now only because the woman in the memory had recently shared it with him so that Aric would find it easier to identify the man in the memory, even after seven years of imprisonment in the Čysciec Penitencyjaryja.

It was a big building, and it was teaming with life. If it had been 1988 instead of 2008 Aric would have toyed with the idea of opening all the cells and releasing everyone. But he had learned that actions have consequences, even when those actions are taken with the best of intentions. And there were some consequences that even Aric was not powerful enough to reverse, death being foremost among them.

So today only one man would be freed; freed, and reunited with his wife.

If I can get my ass in gear. If I take much longer I'll miss Rita's party.

Time was still one thing that Aric had not yet mastered.


"Miraslaŭ Baraǔkin?" Aric asked the man in the cell, "your wife tells me you speak English."

"I was a professor of US Western Literature at Minsk State Linguistic University," the man said after approximately six seconds of stunned silence.

"She mentioned that. Are you able to walk?"

More silence followed.

"Who are you? How did you get in here? How did you open that door?"

"My name is Aric. It's hard to explain. I used the guard's key."

Miraslaŭ Baraǔkin, Professor of US Western Literature at Minsk State Linguistic University, Belarusian dissident, finally struggled to his feet, but stayed planted in the center of his cell, which held a thin mattress and blanket on the floor, an empty food tray, and a covered bucket that, judging from the smell coming from it, was a chamber pot.

Aric closed his eyes briefly as he scanned the man's injuries before opening them again.

"This will feel strange, and look stranger, but it'll only take a second."

"I've been beaten daily since I arrived here. Nothing you do can compare to that."

Aric stepped into the cell and placed his hands on the man's shoulders. The glow did not last long, but it was enough.

Another period of silence, broken only by the man's deep breaths, followed.

"I take back what I said," Professor Baraǔkin said, his body free from pain for the first time in seven years.

"Check out time, Professor."

"What about the guards?"

"They're all asleep. Most of them anyway."

"Most of them?"

"Small groups of people, five or less, it's easy for them to just forget that they saw you. Like rewinding a cassette to a certain point and pressing Record for five seconds. The info that used to be there is just gone. It's harder to do that with large groups. With them it's easier to press Pause."

"I don't understand what you're talking about, but if it gets me out of here I don't care."

They had been walking while they talked, and had already passed three sleeping guards when Aric's explanation had concluded. Aric pushed a heavy door open and they were in a concrete stairwell.

"Wait. Can't you free everyone else?"

"It wouldn't be a good idea. One or two maybe, but not everyone. Trust me."

"Why not?" the dissident asked. Even after seven years of daily beatings he was still thinking about the welfare of others.

"Because the last time I did that a lot of them, and their families, died as a result. So did all the guards that were on duty at the time."

"Died."

"Repressive governments don't like to be embarrassed. We have to move. Your wife is waiting, and I have a birthday party to get to and I'm already late."

"My wife is waiting? Where is she? She's supposed to be safe in New York City."

"She is. That's where she's waiting."


"Hi! Sorry I'm late. I brought a friend," Aric said as he walked into Lupe Ortiz's home in Brooklyn.

"Santa madre, Aric, parece que lo hubieras arrancado de la calle," Lupe said when she got her first glimpse of the two men who had just stepped into her home, "¿Dónde está su chaqueta?"

It was the beginning of October, and the temperature had already begun to drop, and no doubt Lupe's bed was covered with the ten or twelve coats and jackets of the guests that had come to celebrate Rita's forty-second birthday.

"He doesn't have one, cariño, and he doesn't speak Spanish," Aric said before stopping and turning to Miraslaŭ Baraǔkin, "you don't, do you?"

"I do not," he replied before asking his question. "May I call my wife now?"

"Did you just call her sweetie?" Rita asked Aric as she appeared.

"No?" Aric answered timidly.

"Yes you did, she's as red as a beet, and that always happens when you call her sweetie."

"I'll confess, officer, just go easy on me."

"Él quiere llamar a su esposa," Guadalupe Ortiz said to her daughter as the two women inspected the stranger from head to toe.

"Miraslaŭ Baraǔkin, Professor of US Western Literature at Minsk State Linguistic University, recently a resident of the Čysciec Penitencyjaryja in Bolechův, Belarus, may I introduce Margarita and Guadalupe Ortiz."

"Resident of where?" Lupe asked.

"In English it is called Purgatory Penitentiary, madam. It is a prison for political prisoners."

"You broke him out of a gulag in Belarus?" Rita asked, "when?"

"About ten minutes ago," Aric replied, "my phone still hasn't recovered from the trip. Can he use yours to call his wife? She lives in the Bronx."

"You were in Belarus ten minutes ago?" Connie McDowell asked from behind Rita.

"Your that Miraslaŭ Baraǔkin. Sorry, I didn't recognize your name at first," Rita said.

"I am surprised you recognize it at all. And I must thank you and your sister for allowing me into your home, and for your hospitality."

"See," Aric said as he pointed at Lupe, "she's as red as a beet again, and I didn't say a thing."

"This is my mother, Professor, not my sister," Rita said with a smile, which mostly disappeared when her mother gave her a soft rap on the chest with her hand.

"¿Por qué tuviste que decirle eso?!"

"You can use my phone," Connie said as she handed Aric her phone while mother and daughter conversed quickly. It took only a moment to connect husband and wife.

"Renya. Heta ja," the recently freed prisoner said before bursting into tears. Lupe lead him into the bedroom and closed the door.