Chapter 56
Peter was sitting on his favorite rock overlooking Mermaid Lagoon and a smile was on his face. He was thinking back to the day he got to see his parents and Papa Angie again. They had met at one of the state parks north of Boston called Breakheart Reservation. May, Parker and Angie drove through the scenic entry of the park down to the beach and waited for a preplanned signal from Peter. Across the lake from them was a large stone faced cliff face and that is where Peter would send the signal that all is clear. Peter quantum tunneled to the top of the cliff face and mentally scans the surrounding area for anyone who might be spying on them. His scan show no signs of such activity so he sent the all’s clear signal. May, Parker and Angie simultaneously heard a voice in their mind say “Never is an awful long time.” And they knew it was okay to proceed. They made their way around the lake by following a trail that lead to top of the cliff face. Peter ran to them a group hug ensued for a long period of time.
They spent the afternoon talking about Neverland and how Mister Blue was teaching Peter and the boys about their abilities. May had packed a basket of food to have a family picnic and there was plenty of good eats including Papa Angie’s magic pastries. The afternoon went by quickly as they chatted and soon it was time for Peter to return to Neverland. May hugged Peter tightly and told him how much he meant to her.
Deep in his heart Peter didn’t want to leave. He wanted to stay within the warmth embrace of his mother’s arms. He had always felt safe there in the light of her love. Parker and Angie both told Peter they were proud of him for being the man they always knew he could be. Peter hugged them both then popped out of existence back to Neverland.
Peter was still feeling the warmth of their love deep down in his soul when a voice filled his mind that he did not recognize. The voice said “So you are the one called Peter that James hates so much.” Startled back to reality by the voice peter looked around to find the source. Standing behind him some ten feet away was a beautiful young woman that looked as human as himself but with a familiar blue hue to her skin. “Who are you? Are you a Soavas? Your skin color is the same as theirs but your features are that of a human. How do you know of James? “Peter said shooting out question after question. The blue skinned female laughed a pleasant laugh that transformed in to a beautiful smile on her face. “I am very much like you Peter Garrison. A little bit human and a little bit Soavas. I was created by them as a guardian for the place you sent James.
Unlike James, or the others condemned there, I can come and go as I please. They believe me to be one of them by a cover story that the Soavas planted in their minds. A misfortunate child who couldn’t control her abilities and destroyed thousands of lives with a single raging thought.” replied the young woman.
Peter felt his mind being probed by her and immediately tried to block her attempt and found it impossible to do. Emotionally he felt like he was being robbed of his individuality and she felt this emotion.
The probing stopped and she looked at Peter and said “Please accept my apology for being so rude. I had no right to probe your mind without your consent. I have been dealing so long with the likes of James that I forgot my manners. As a guardian it is my responsibility to keep the thoughts of those like James under constant surveillance. Please allow me to introduce myself. I am Amora Scull daughter of Caleb and Miranda Scull. I sense what you are thinking. Doctor Scull had no wife or children. Well in your reality that is a true statement, but I am not from your reality. I am from a parallel reality to yours. A planet called Earth like yours but it exists in another time dimension from yours. In that reality my father was nothing like the Doctor Scull you know of.
He was a kind and learned man. Like your Doctor Scull he was a leader in his field of genetics, but he was not corrupted by his knowledge. His research was not to advance the human race for profit, but to help it. His research was in mutating the human DNA to improve its resistance to all forms of diseases that plagued mankind. Look into my memories and see for yourself.”
Peter closed his eyes and made telepathic contact with her mind. He felt no resistance on her part and easily made contact with her. He felt a warm familiar relaxing feeling fill his being. A feeling that he knew he had felt many times before, but he couldn’t remember when or where. An image of his birth mother flashed through his mind and immediately he realized the feeling was the soft touch of a mother’s love. An image started to form in his mind and as it came into focus he saw a hallway with three doors on either side of it. In the center of the hallway stood Amora pointing to the first door on the left motioning for him to enter. Peter walked over to the door, turned the knob and pushed the door opened. Inside the room he saw a man and a woman with their backs toward s him. The woman appeared to be holding something in her arms and the man was looking down on it. They started to turn in the direction from which Peter was watching and he saw that the woman was holding an infant child. Peter recognized the man to be Doctor Caleb Scull but this version of his seemed less sinister than the one he knew. There was softness to his appearance and a feeling of love and joy emanating from him. He understood what he was observing and felt the family bond in a love that can only be shared by a parent and their child. Just like the love that he shared with his birth mother Fawn, his adopted parents and Papa Angie. He also shared this feeling with the Lost Boys; his brothers.
Peter turned and looked at the image of Amora and she was pointing at the next door on the left side of the hallway. As Peter walked away from the first door it simply faded away into the wall of the hallway. He turned the knob on the second door and pushed it open. Inside he observes Amora at about two years old and her parents. He hears them talking about her special abilities and how to control them. Peter remembers when he was at that age and how he could hear the thoughts of every living, thinking creature invading his mind. May and parker had helped him to isolate himself from the thoughts that he was hearing. Unlike Amora parents, who had the Soavas to aid in her development, his parents had to play it by ear. He hadn’t realized just how much of their life’s they had sacrificed for him until now. As he watched, he saw and heard almost the same advice and rules that his parents had given him about the responsibility of his abilities. At that moment he felt a kinship with Amora that he had never felt before about another person. Not even his parents or Papa Angie. He looked back down the hall at the image of Amora and saw her pointing to the third door.
Through the doorway Peter watched as Amora played with other children in a playground. She was laughing and enjoying some play time that she rarely had. She interacted with the children with no fear of what they thought of her. They all seemed to know her and accepted her for what she was. A little blue skinned girl who was a lot of fun to play with. She used her abilities openly among them and entertained them with tricks which the children thought was some kind of magic. She would make the see saw go up and down with no one on it or make characters that the children loved appear to entertain them. All was going well until a little boy who looked to be a couple of years older than Amora came over and pushed her down. “My Dad says you’re a freak of nature and you don’t belong here with us.” he said to her laughing. Peter felt no anger or resentment coming from Amora. The emotion he felt coming from her was pity. She got herself up off the ground and smiled at the boy and held out her hand to him. He looked at her and stated to laugh at her again and said “I’m not going to touch you freak. No way, Jose.” Amora kept right on smiling and kept her hand held out to him. He was still laughing and taunting her when his right arm extended out to meet her extended hand.
He had no control of what his arm was doing. He stared at it and fright and despair filled his eyes. As soon as their hands touched the boy whole facial expression changed. The muscles in his face relaxed and the fright was gone from his eyes. With a soft and sorrowful tone in his voice he uttered “I’m sorry for what I said. I understand now. My Dad was wrong in how he spoke of you. I wish you could show him what you just showed me to make me understand.” Amora still smiling released his hand and walked away. Though she was still smiling Peter felt sadness fill her mind and soul. She knew there were people in the world that didn’t see her as human but as a monstrosity of alien origin. She knew this prejudice came from humanities inability to cope with something they truly didn’t understand. This is why the sadness filled her. She was not sad for herself but for people like that boy’s father. He was incapable of dealing with the unknown and the only way he could deal with it was hatred and violence. Little did she know how her actions taken would affect her life?
The doorway started to fade out of existence and Peter turned and looked one again at the image of Amora. There were tears in her eyes and a felling of sadness was emanating from her. She nodded her head to the door on the right at the end of the hall. Peter crossed the hall and opened the door. The image he saw through the door way was Amora and her father. She had both of her hands on the side of his face and both seemed to be in a trance. He watched for about five minutes before she removed her hands from his face and said “I have your knowledge and experience now. Together we can change the suffering of world. “This image faded away and was replaced by an image of Amora and her father accepting a Nobel Prize for creating a cure for many diseases that plagued mankind. Peter turned to the image of Amora and said “Your father was nothing like the Doctor Scull that existed in my reality. Our doctor shared his knowledge with no one. He saw his knowledge as power and riches. Your father gave all he knew to mankind.” Amora nodded and pointed to the next door. The fourth door faded as did the others into nothingness.
Peter turned the knob on the fifth door and it swung open by itself. An image of Amora and her mother, Miranda filled the opening of the doorway. They were in a brightly lit room sitting on a couch facing each other. In a tone that exuded love Miranda said “You are very special my daughter and your existence will change the world as we know it. You will be the mother of a improved race of humans, but that does not mean that you or your offspring are better than the normal person. You must remember that we are all created equal and no matter what talents or abilities we possess we are no better than out fellow humans. You were created to bring the human race to its next step in evolution. You much teach mankind to move away from violence and greed and set them on a path of higher learning.” Amora looked deep into her mother eyes and responded “I am one against a multitude of people who fear change and cannot accept that which they do not understand. I have reached out to many who felt this way and changed them by giving them what I know to be the truth. This has caused some to believe that I am manipulating their minds and see me as a threat sent here by the Soavas race to control mankind. I know that what they think is not the truth. Their thoughts and action are controlled by the fear of change.” Miranda nodded and said “Nothing is perfect in the whole of existence. There will always be an opposing opinion that you will have to battle. That is the balance of things as the Soavas have taught you. You must not worry about the negativity that other people feel. You must address the positive in a true and honest manner. If you do that they will eventually see the goodness and hope you are bringing into the world. Do not let their fear and prejudice sway you from your destiny. Love them like a mother loves her child. Accept them for all their faults and shortcomings and feed them kindness and hope so they may find the path that you follow. No love is greater than the love of a mother for her children. A true mother would sacrifice her very soul to save her children.” As she spoke those words the image and doorway started to fade away. Peter looked back at the image of Amora standing in the hallway. A stream of tears were flowing from her eyes and down across her cheeks and a greater feeling of sadness came from her that touched Peter’s very soul. He did not understand the sadness she felt. The memories she shared with him were fill of love and joy but with each door there grew a greater sadness in her. Amora pointed to the last door but did not look at it. Instead she turned her head to face the opposite wall and said “Behind this door you will find many of the questions you seek about me. It represents the worst day of my life.
Peter now felt a great sorrow mixed with the sadness she emanated. Would opening this door make Amora suffer even more sadness and sorrow? He could not bear to be the one to burden her with such dire emotions. In his mind he heard Amora say “The sadness and sorrow will always be behind that door whether you open it or not. What you are seeing has already happened and it can never be changed. The emotions you sense are the emotions that reside within these memories. I feel these emotions each time I recall these memories. Nothing could ever take them away. They will always be a part of me.”
Peter walked to the door and reached for the knob to open it. Unlike the other doorknobs this one felt warm to the touch not cold like the others. Just touching the knob caused the door to fall away into an empty blackness that lied beyond the door. Peter felt himself being drawn through the doorway and tried to steady himself by grabbing the door frame. The pulling force he was experiencing was greater than the hold he had on the door frame and he was sucked into the blackness. He could see or hear nothing as he fell through the dark abyss. He only felt the sensation of falling and spiraling inward. All at once the darkness and the falling sensation were gone. Peter found himself standing in the downtown area of Boston across the street from the State House on Beacon Street. A large crowd of people, consisting of everything from news reporters, religious fanatics and people of all colors and sizes crowded the stair entering into the state house.
Peter tried to read their thoughts to understand what was going on, but couldn’t seem to make a mental connection with anyone. The voice of Amora filled his mind and she said “This is just a memory that you are seeing. These people are only part of that image and since I did not scan their thoughts you cannot perceive them. Those thoughts are not a part of my memory.”
Peter crossed Beacon Street and found an opening in the crowd to ascend up the stairs to get a closer look at what was happening. As he reached the furthest place up the stairs he could ascend the front doors of the state house opened. There he saw Amora and her parents exiting out the door and they were surrounded by ten of Boston’s finest policemen. They waved to the crowd of people that were cheering them as the descended down the stairs. Peter tried to mentally scan the feeling going through Amora’s mind at that moment. At first he felt joy and nervousness coming from her. Then in an instant that feeling changed to one of fear and horror.
Two gunshots rang out and echoed through the state house plaza. One penetrated through the throat of the Amora’s father severing the jugular vein. The second hit Amora’s mother in the middle of her forehead blowing out the back of her skull. Instantly a force field surrounded the two fallen bodies and Amora. She had created it as soon as she heard the shots being fired, but it was not in time to save them. A third and fourth shot were fired but they simply were absorbed by the surrounding field. Amora bent down to help her parents but as soon as she laid her hands on them she knew she could not save them. She could have corrected any of the physical damage done, but she could not call back the life force that had departed from their bodies.
Amora’s abilities could not reverse the process of death.
Peter watched as she rose from the bodies of her slain parents to a standing position. Tears ran down her face and the fire of anger and revenged reflected in her eyes. The field that surrounded her faded out of existence and the police officers surrounded her again. Peter sensed her scanning the area for the culprits that had shot her parents. From trees across the street located in the Boston Commons came a loud screaming of two voices. The sounds of the screams were getting closer with each passing second. Eventually two men wearing camouflaged clothing and face paint came floating out of the Commons and up the stairs to where Amora stood. Each seemed to be experiencing a great deal of pain throughout their bodies and it made them appear to be having a convulsion. They hung there in mid air for about five minutes screaming and spastically moving before they suddenly drop to the ground. They lied there motionless but the sounds of them crying stated that they were still alive and breathing.
Amora wiped away the tears running down her face with the sleeve of the shirt she was wearing. A quiet stillness came over her and Peter felt a peaceful feeling emanating from her. The two men lying at her feet turned and looked at her with fear in their eyes. They were waiting for her revenge to bring them to the door of death and push them through it. Peter could sense their fear but he found no regret in their mental thoughts for what they had done. They believed what they did was right and the only regret they held was not being able to eliminate the child. Amora took two steps forward toward the two men and knelt down and place her hands on the top of their heads. The two men’s bodies seemed to drop into a relaxed state as soon as they were touched by her hands. Amora hands started to glow with a warm golden light that seemed to be absorbed by the bodies of the two men. Several minutes passed before she removed her hands from their heads and stood up.
Peter felt a surge of emotions now coming from the men. Where once they felt no regret for what they had done now existed guilt so great it was overwhelming to try and comprehend. Both men started to weep and beg forgiveness of Amora for what they had done. She said not a word to them. She simply smiled and vanished out of existence from the stairs of the state house. The last thing Peter saw of the memory before him was the Boston Police rushing in on the two men and examining the bodies of Amora’s slain parents.