Chapter 4: {What Comes After} (updated)
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(Two Days Later)
Both Jason and Daisy were off work that day. Daisy used one of her personal days and Jason just so happened to not be scheduled that day.
Unusual for him, Jason had woken up before Daisy. And he had somehow executed a perfect and stealthy exit from their bed without waking up Daisy. This was an extraordinary achievement to pull off, as Daisy was a notoriously light sleeper.
Jason had decided to make breakfast for Daisy and himself. Nothing fancy, scrambled eggs, two pieces of toast, and a pot of coffee big enough for both of them.
As the eggs sizzled on the skillet, Jason's mind began to wander. For some reason he found himself thinking about Citra and imagining what a life with her would have looked like.
Even after the two of us had liberated the Rook Islands from Hoyt and Vaas, what would have happened after that?
What comes after our victory?
Did agent Huntley know who Citra was? Did he have grand plans for her? Why would the American intelligence agencies care about the goings-on in the rural pacific?
Jason then remembered seeing a map of the pacific region in the bar at Thurston Town back on South Rook. Jason had only ever been to the rural and remote northern and southern islands of North Rook and South Rook. But he had seen local maps of the entirety of the Rook Islands and saw that north of North Rook there was a much, much larger island. The map simply labeled it as "Big Island" and it appeared to him to be at least six times the size of both North Rook and South Rook if they had been joined together.
He also remembered seeing a peculiar map in Willis Huntley's shanty hideout in Badtown. This was something that Jason hadn't thought of or remembered once in the last two years. But in his recollection, Jason distinctly remembered red dots and X's and circles on various locations on the map. Jason had only looked at the map for about five seconds, and at the time, didn't have a care in the world to find a pattern to the marked up map. Nor did he have any inclinations to ask Huntley about the nature and meaning behind those red marks.
Probably just some random C.I.A. shit.
The spatula moved the pieces of scrambled eggs across the scorching surface of the skillet. The various bits and pieces of eggs scattered throughout the sizzling skillet, reminded him of the scattered and seemingly endless small islands of the pacific ocean.
Jason once again thought of the temptress, Citra. The woman who never failed to seduce him. And even though he had always been in love with Daisy from the moment that he'd met her, Citra was the only other woman that made him question his love for Daisy. Which he finds ridiculous nowadays.
Daisy may not have been a queen or a leader of a tribe of warriors, but that's never be what I've loved about her.
I loved her smile. I loved happiness that she made me feel every time we joked and teased each other about the most nonsensical things. I loved the way that I never grew tired of listening to her talk about… well, anything. I loved the way that she called me her best friend. I loved the secrets and inside jokes that we could share with each other and never let anyone else know. I loved her big heart, and the way that she would try and help fix other people's problems even if it had nothing to do with her.
And most importantly… I just loved… her.
There were times however, while he and Citra were fucking, when he had completely forgotten about how much he loved Daisy. Citra never refused whatever outrageous sex acts that Jason wished to preform on her. The kind of eroticisms that Jason wouldn't have ever even considered asking Liza or Daisy if they were comfortable doing.
Including sexually deviant acts such as anal sex, and threesomes and foursomes with Citra and native girls, that Jason hoped were at least eighteen years old. Though he was so hopped up on whatever drugs that Citra gave him that he couldn't tell their age.
Good god, I hope that they weren't too young.
Jason almost grinned, but thought better of it.
The fucking was amazing at least. Especially when Citra gave me that special herbal tea that gave me an hours long erection. Citra would ride me for what seemed like several hours non-stop sex. Multiple orgasms for both of us were pretty much guaranteed.
But sex was all it was. There wasn't any love involved. No kissing, no holding onto each other after.
Neither one of us ever said "I love you" to each other.
These days, Jason was convinced that Citra never loved him, she only wanted to use him for her own purposes. Probably wanting to announce to Rakyat that Jason was the chosen one reincarnated or some other bullshit prophecy.
Would we have tried to create an empire of our own, built on the smoldering ruins of the former joint criminal empire of Hoyt and Vaas? Maybe we would have tried our luck at conquering the surrounding islands. Would we have taken over the rest of Indonesia? Maybe even expanding to the surrounding nations of Malaysia, Brunei, Papua New Guinea, hell… maybe we would have conquered the Philippines and Australia and New Zealand.
But how could a rag-tag militia army of barely equipped Rakyat numbering only a few hundred, take over the whole Pacific?
Ridiculous for me to imagine that.
Unless…
Maybe whatever "powers" I had could have merged with Citra's power. The power to cause even the most rational of men to cast aside all logic and 1reasoning to adopt an unwavering loyalty to Citra. And maybe, just maybe, this would have been enough to recruit more and more followers, even men outside of the Rakyat. Then she would have been unstoppable.
Jason shook his head disregarding the stupidity of his thoughts.
What the fuck is this? Lord Of The Rings? Is Citra supposed to be Sauron now? Or emperor Palpatine, like motherfucking Star Wars?
Come on Jason… you dumbass idiot.
She was just a hot, sexy, and horny woman, and not some supervillain.
"Do my eyes deceive me or is just a dream? How are you of all people up this early?" Daisy asked in a jaunty manner.
She walked up behind him and poked her arms around his belly, giving him a squeeze.
"I don't know? Maybe you are dreaming." Jason spoke but kept his eyes on the skillet. He didn't want to accidentally burn himself or the eggs.
Although, it was incredibly challenging for him to not drop everything and turn around to kiss Daisy.
"Hmm…" Daisy purred as she squeezed him even tighter. "I don't know, it doesn't feel like a dream."
"Well… I think that there's only one method to solve this mystery." Jason said.
"Oh you don't need to tell me what it is. I already know." She moved to Jason's side and used both of her hands to turn his head, and kissed him on the lips.
"Yeah, definitely not a dream." She giggled.
"Hmm, I'm still not sure. I think that you'll have to test your theory again." Jason said. Hoping for another sweet kiss.
He turned back to check on the eggs.
"Okay professor Brody. Let's test it." Daisy firmly pulled Jason's head towards her and gave him an energetic kiss followed by an obnoxiously loud moan as she pulled her lips off of him.
"Yeah, you know, I'm just still not convinced." He jested.
"Oh screw you too professor!" Daisy ran her hands through Jason's hair, messing up his already unkempt hair even more, and scolding him for his goofiness.
"Hey! You should be careful. You don't want me accidentally burning my arm on the stove. I won't look as handsome anymore if I get a scar on my arm." He said sarcastically.
"Oh no, not another scar! Anything but that." Daisy said sarcastically as she was walking away.
Jason heard her take her seat at the kitchen table.
So naturally, after the two had breakfast, the only thing that they wanted to do was to cuddle up on the couch.
But of course they had been delayed in making it over to the couch, they just had to make time for kissing as they sat at the kitchen table.
They had been immaculately dressed in their pajamas. Looking ever so proper, the two of them probably considered themselves to be professionally attired for that day's plans.
Plans that boiled down to absolutely nothing.
The two had been flipping through TV channels, when they happened to land upon a news station, and a peculiar news story.
Jason and Daisy watched the news feed on their television. And even with all that Jason had seen, the death, the destruction, the worst of humanity, he still felt impacted by the atrocities that were unfolding.
His knowledge of the nation was limited, but Jason did know several important tidbits of information about Yara.
The island nation was made up of a large island that was about 85% of the entire country's total land area. There was another smaller island south of the much more populous and main island. And in-between those two islands there was a sparsely populated archipelago of many tiny and shallow islands, rumored to only really be inhabited by a small number of people. And was the base of operations during the civil of the late 1960's and early 1970's. Those insurgents were antagonistic towards the "freely" elected Castillo regime. At that time, Anton Castillo's father was the president of Yara, and now it appears as history is repeating itself. Jason remembered learning about a communist revolution that toppled Anton Castillo's father from power. And in the year 2000, the nation's total population was only a little under eight million people. Three million of which live in the capital city of Esperanza. And more than half of the population was bilingual in English and Spanish, due to their colonial history.
I did alright in social studies at school. I remember doing a presentation on Yara in my freshmen year of high school.
Wouldn't it have been ironic if my area of geography that I was assigned was The Rook Islands? If I had learned about the Rook Islands, that would have saved me a whole lot of trouble.
On the television, it was announced that the Caribbean nation of Yara, had declared that all orphans, and any persons under eighteen years old, will be conscripted into the various branches of the military. Anton Castillo, their president, claims that the orphans need to be taken under the wing of the Yaran state and be provided with structure and greater purpose in their lives.
"They're just kids! And that dictator wants to take them away to join some brainwashing cult of personality. Child soldiers! It's sickening." Daisy was absolutely furious.
It sucks for the children. But we can't do anything about it.
All we can do here in America, is just turn off the TV and ignore it.
It's the sad truth of the matter. As much as I hate seeing innocent children being deprived of the ability to choose their own path in life, I can't go and save them.
My days of fighting are over.
"I know. It sucks doesn't it? But whatever." Jason spoke in an apathetic tone.
"But whatever? Jason, have a little compassion!" Daisy turn her head to glare angrily at Jason as they sat on the couch.
Shit.
Did I really say that.
She must think that I'm a heartless monster.
"I didn't mean it like that Daisy. I… well… I'm not sure how I meant it. But believe me. It's not like I don't care. All I'm saying is that there isn't anything that me or you can do about it. And that's just the sad reality of the situation." Jason explained.
They were both staring into each other's eyes, as if they were in a standoff.
Daisy obviously didn't like Jason's comment, as she crossed her arms.
"What if you had just done nothing when the people that you cared about had be kidnapped by some psycho? What if I, or Liza, or Riley had be whisked away to be slaves, and you would have never seen us again? Would it be just oh whatever then?!" Daisy snapped at Jason.
"Woah… calm down. I'm sorry. What's up with you? I've never seen you get this upset over a news story." Jason was concerned with Daisy's sudden and unusual outburst of discontent towards Jason.
It took a couple seconds, but finally Daisy responded. And in a much calmer state. She put her hands over her face.
"I'm sorry." Daisy said. Her words mumbled behind her hands.
Daisy sighed. "For some reason, this story just… really got to me. I think because of how much it reminded me of what happened to the two of us and our friends. The being taken away again our will, it just really resonated with me. I didn't mean to take it out on you." She said, much more calm than she had been just seconds earlier.
"Hey, come here." Jason put his arm around Daisy's shoulders and pulled her closer to himself.
Her head nuzzled under his chin. Jason stroked her left shoulder as he tried to ease her sadness and anger.
He never like seeing her upset in any way. Jason would even go so far as to always giving into Daisy and admitting his wrongness whenever they had an argument.
"I'm not mad at you. Really. It's fine. Don't worry about it." Jason said in a quiet and soothing voice.
Maybe I should fly out to Yara and kill this "Anton Castillo" guy. Would that set everything right?
At least it might cheer Daisy up.
"This will sound bad, but hear me out okay?" Jason inquired to Daisy.
Daisy sighed. "Okay."
"These kids, they were already orphans, so maybe it might not be so bad for them in the military. I mean to say… they will get somewhere to sleep, better food than they are probably getting now, and in some ways, it might be seen as a step up to join the military in that society. And they are only going to military education schools, they aren't old enough to be on the front lines. So they will probably be safe from any kind of combat." Jason tried to explain while not sounding like a calculating psycho devoid of compassion.
A long silence succeeded Jason's words.
"Maybe." Was all that Daisy said.
"It's not the same as when we were taken. I know that it isn't right, but this might be the best thing for them. At least they are going to be watched over and taken care of." Jason tried to put in perspective.
"I still don't think that I can ever see what those children will go through, as positive." Daisy said.
"I know. It isn't good. But I was just trying to make the best out of a shit situation." He said.
"Yeah I guess." Daisy sighed.
"Maybe we should watch a movie on Netflix instead of watching cable." Jason suggested.
Daisy didn't answer him. But since she hadn't voiced any objection, Jason changed the television's input and turned on their Apple Device.
With the Apple remote in his hand, Jason booted up Netflix and mindlessly browsed the wide variety of options.
Which one? There are stupid movies, serious movies, zombie movies, comedies, action, crime, so many things to distract a viewer with. But no matter how much these movies distract the viewer from reality, they will still not ever feel real.
At least to me. Not even fiction has the same effects on me as it once did.
"Let's watch something stupid and funny. How about it?" Daisy crawled into Jason's lap.
"No objections here." Jason said.
Daisy's legs curled up as her boney butt laid across Jason's lap. Her arms holding onto Jason's neck like a baby gorilla wrapped around it's mother.
"Okay Daisy, you're pretty heavy. I may have to sit you down." Jason grunted.
"Fine, fine, I'm moving, you old man" Daisy kidded.
Daisy crawled to sit at Jason's side.
"Well hey now, I'd still like to hold you." Jason told her.
"Okay. But you're going to have to lay down then since you're too elderly to support me in your lap." Daisy joked.
Jason laid his back along the couch and Daisy laid her slender body on top of his. He used his left hand to manipulate the remote while he held Daisy with his other hand.
"Elderly? You do realize I'm only like a year younger than you, right?" Jason tried to checkmate Daisy.
"Hey, but no one would believe you since you look like you're forty." Daisy made fun of him.
"Forty? Okay… I'll give you that one." Jason said, continuing this discord of ridiculousness.
"I know right? People see us out in public and probably assume that you're my sugar daddy." Daisy said.
"You know what they say about assuming?" Jason responded.
"Yeah. Out of you and me." Daisy lifted her head up to look at Jason with her ever so sexy sapphire eyes.
She smiled and kissed him on the lips.
The two of them lazily did nothing for the entire day, but watch Netflix.
And everything was just… perfect.
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(To Be Continued)
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