Praetorian Series [3] A Hunter and His Legion (56 page)

“That’s the mother of your unborn child, Jacob!”  He countered
, pointing, but he sounded more amused than angry.

“Yeah,” I said,
staring at Helena as she gyrated seductively by the door like she could just barely contain herself and was just dying to jump me.  I glanced at Agrippina, who was biting her lips and beckoning me with an outstretched hand, and I pointed at her.  “But she isn’t!  And… I mean… this is
my
fantasy, man!  Come on!  When am I ever going to get the two of them wearing outfits like that in the same room together again?”

“Probably never, Jacob, and belie
ve me, that is for the best.”

I crossed my arms and
pouted.  “Fine.  So that’s it, then?  Just two options?”

“Would you like a third?  I suppose I could arrange that.”

He clapped his hands and a third door appeared from nowhere, and again a leg popped out, this one just as sexy and shapely as the first two, but when the figure emerged, I saw that the leg belonged to a red bikini clad Artie.

I threw up a hand to cover
her from view.  “No!  That’s okay!  Just two is fine!”

“Are you sure, Jacob?
  Perhaps four would be best?”

And again, a fourth door emerged, and a fourth leg appeared, but this one was hardly feminine
, at least not by my standards.  Out emerged Boudicca, looking everything like a female version of Arnold Schwarzenegger, striking show poses in her black thong bikini.

I threw up
my other hand to cover Boudicca now, but placed extra effort in keeping Artie blocked.  I tried to focus on Helena, who was now bending over and running her hands up her legs slowly, Agrippina doing the same, only turned around.

“All right,
all right, enough!  I get it!”  I shouted, squeezing my eyes shut and turning away.  When I opened them seconds later, all four women had thankfully disappeared along with the last two doors.

I sighed in relief and put my hands down
, looking at Merlin angrily.  “Some spirit guide you are.”

“Whoever said I was, Jacob?
”

“Fine,” I said as I
stepped forward, looking toward the door the Helena apparition had recently abandoned.  It was a copy of the cottage’s original entrance door, and one I assumed would lead to the outside world.

“What happens if I choose this one?”  I asked, not taking my eyes off of it.

“You will leave, never to see me again.  While I cannot speak with any certainty, I believe if you were to choose this door, you could convince Agrippina to leave you alone as long as you stayed as far from Rome as possible.  You would be able to live out your days with Helena and your children.”

“Children?”  I asked.  “As in more than one?  I thought you couldn’t see anyone’s future but your own.”

“I speak simply with an intuition that I have honed over a great many years, Jacob.”

“I see,” I
said, deciding to finally look at him.  “Could we be happy?”

“You
could.  Very happy, I would think.”

I gestured
toward Agrippina’s door with a hand.  “And this one?”

“Your answers, Jacob.  Nothing more.”

I was at a crossroads, but even with all the doubt my mind could surely come up with, there really only seemed one door I could possibly consider.

I
stepped forward and reached out to grip the handle of Agrippina’s door and looked back for Merlin, but he had disappeared, only to be replaced once again by Helena.  She was still wearing that wonderful green one piece swimsuit with the deep V, but she wasn’t exuding any of the slutty qualities she had earlier.

I
stepped away from the door and moved toward her, but she held out a hand and stopped me.

“Don’t, Jacob,” she said.

“But…”

“It’s all right, my love,” she said
, her eyes practically shining like green lensed flashlights against the color of her swimsuit.  “This decision was yours, but right or wrong, I’m here to remind you that I will always support you.  I know you may not believe me after what happened because of the orb, but you have to believe it in yourself before you can believe it in anyone else.  Just remember that I’ll always be there for you.  No matter what.”

And with that, she winked out of existence, leaving me with little more than the memory of her in the swimsuit and
the idea that I knew she was right.  Helena would always be there for me.  As long as I remembered that, I would never have to doubt anything ever again.

I turned and faced Agrippina’s
door, took the handle firmly in my hand, and tugged it open.

With a deep breath, I stepped through.

***

My first thought upon crossing the threshold was that nothing had happened.  Even before the door had closed behind me
, I could tell that this room was exactly like the last one.  Bathed in a sea of darkness, I wouldn’t have even been able to see my hand in front of my face if not for the light coming off the door behind me.  I turned to see that it was still there, a reassuring presence, my mind convinced I could at least go back if I wanted.

I shook my head at it, the motion causing me to catch something
else out of the corner of my eye.  I looked to the right and saw the other door there, the one Helena had presented and the one that would have supposedly led me out of this mad house.  I cocked my head at it, confused at its presence, when Merlin’s voice interrupted my inspection from behind me.

“Did you really think I’d give you the opportunity to pick the wrong door?
”  He asked.  “It isn’t like you are not, in fact, solely responsible for the systematic destruction of the entire space/time continuum.”

My eyes grew wide,
every single one of my fears emerging at once at the statement.  “I am??”

“
No, not even close,” he said playfully, “but you aren’t exactly doing anyone any favors by staying here.”

I turned to face him. 
“But you said Helena and I could be happy here.”

He angled his head away from me.  “
Let’s just say you’re not doing anyone
else
any favors then.”

I shook my head
, closed my eyes, and allowed my heart rate to slow itself.  “So I didn’t really have any choice at all, did I?”

“You did, Jacob,” he said.  “This is merely a representation of how little a choice it was to
you
.  In your mind’s eye, as some might say.”

M
y frustration at all his games continued to grow, but when I opened my eyes, I found myself in a new location, with Merlin nowhere to be found again.  I didn’t even bother looking behind me this time, knowing that it too would have been filled with the same expanse of nature that lay before me now.

The tra
nsition from the claustrophobic black room to this outdoor space was jarring.  I threw a hand up to shield my eyes from the sun’s intensity, but I wasn’t nearly fast enough to stop it from washing out my eyesight.  I clenched my eyes shut again, but after a few moments, reopened them.  I didn’t focus on anything right away, giving them the time they needed to adjust, but when they did, the view in which they took in was simply breathtaking.

I stood atop a low hill
with a series of other hills spread out in front of me, and small clumps of tree scattered off in the distance.  Judging by their foliage, I figured it was summertime, but it didn’t seem excessively warm, even though the sun was shining brilliantly with only a few puffy clouds spattering the sky.  Off to my left, a large group of birds fluttered off, briefly silhouetted by the sun before disappearing out of view.  It was like a painting – the large ones with beautiful rolling vistas the size of entire walls found mostly in art museums.

I took in a sharp breath of air, more enthralled than surprised at what I was seeing.  After what seemed like endless months of desolate, wintry Britain, this locale was awe inspiring.  I wasn’t even sure I’d seen anything like it in all
the years of my life.  I looked down, finally taking notice of a small settlement located at the center of two hills.  Without a thought, I took my first step toward it, deciding there was no point in waiting for Merlin.

On my way down I noticed my feet below me, and saw that I was again wearing my combat boots.  I checked the rest of my body and found that I was back in my old outfit.  I sent my left hand into its corresponding carg
o pocket and dug around for my glacier glasses.  Luckily, they were still there, and I fitted them over my eyes.

“Does wearing your sunglasses make you feel like a badass, Jacob?”

I turned to see Merlin walking beside me, back in his old man tourist outfit, now complete with a wide, circular brimmed straw hat.

“
Only at night,” I said.  “Now, however, I just want to protect my eyes from the sun’s deadly, dastardly radiation.  Wouldn’t you?”

“But would i
t surprise you to learn that those aren’t really your eyes you are using to perceive this world?

I rolled my head
toward Merlin and lowered my glasses with a finger to look over them.  “I think you should know by now that I’m past surprises.”

“You do seem to be pretty perceptive.”

“Damn straight,” I said, pushing my glasses back to cover my eyes.  “So where are we?  Scratch that… when are we?”

“I believe I can answer both questions by
simply replying with: the founding of Rome.”

“No shit?”  I said, more excited than surprised, glancing at the little settlement between two of the landscape
’s handful of hills.  In a moment of clarity I tried to count them, including the one Merlin and I were descending, and tallied seven in total.  “Well, shit.”

Merlin chuckled beside me as we sauntered down the hill.  “This
really is all very stimulating for me as well, Jacob.  To borrow one of your many wonderful expressions, I thank you from the bottom of my heart.”

I turned to look at him.  “You like all th
ose, huh?  I’m so happy for you.  Really, I am.  It’s not every day that a simple human can have his mind invaded by an alien creature against his will and forced into some kind of vision quest that, while it does have its perks in the form of near naked ladies, has been something of a trip.  And not a good one at that.  So I’m really glad I could help you out, Merlin.”

“Are you fishing for the truth behind who or what I am?”
  He asked.

“For a guy who doesn’t even need a Vulcan mind meld to read my mind, I would think you should already know.”

“Oh,
Star Trek
!”  He exclaimed.  “A wonderful series.  I only wished you’d watched more of the spin off shows or read the supplemental books.  A little more depth to that universe would have been fascinating!”

I shook my head at him, almost horrified at what he was saying.  “So what exactly did you do to me?  Download my entire m
ind onto a hard drive and then watch every single thing I’ve ever experienced in super fast forward, absorbing everything I’ve ever seen or done, even the things I can’t remember?”

“You really have seen too many movies, Jacob.”

“That isn’t an answer!” I growled.

“Do you really need one
, at this point?”

I turned back to the settlement which was just coming into focus as we grew closer.  “I suppose not.  It’s just that you could have asked first, you know?”

“I apologize,” Merlin said with a chuckle.  “Next time, I’ll be sure to ask.”

“Yeah,
you do that,” I said, knowing that if there ever was a next time I was pretty sure I’d run like hell away from him.  But for now, I had to work with the man, so I gestured toward the settlement, and turned to him.  “I assume this is still a part of my vision quest then, and that we didn’t actually travel back in time?”

“I wish you would stop referring to it as that, but yes, you are basically correct.  Do not worry about interference, for they won’t even sense our presence.”

“Oh, wonderful,” I said glumly.  “I always wanted to be part of an extreme interpretation of Dickens’ classic Christmas tale… I just didn’t know it’d be
this
extreme.  Just don’t turn into the Ghost of Christmas Future on me, Merlin.  That guy was terrifying.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” he
answered, and I rolled my eyes as I watched him marching beside me, his arms swinging wildly with each step, a large closed lipped smile permanently plastered to his face.

“By the way,” I said, “you looking fucking ridiculous in that outfit.
”

Merlin looked offended.  “You clearly have no sense of style, Jacob.  This fanny pack is perhaps the most amazing invention I’ve ever seen in all my years.  Observe.”  He paused for a second so that he could twist the pack to the front of his body and unzip it.  “There is ample storage space within this compartment and its location around my abdomen is most comfortable
and convenient.  I can place a great many objects in here.  See… I have here my magic wand, a packet of pixie dust, a deck of tarot cards, a travel-sized crystal ball, a pocket edition of the Necronomicon, my passport…”