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Submerged to his waist in the glowing pool’s water, Duncan was more than a little skeptical of its reputed magical powers against a Dark Quickening. Of course, he hadn’t thought Dark Quickenings were real before either, but now he’d killed a friend, nearly killed his student and was a threat to everyone he encountered. A small part of him desperately wanted to believe this was truly a holy spring, that somehow he’d be washed clean of this possession.
The rest of him was just possessed.
“Duncan? What are you doing?”
Uselessly, Duncan spun in place sloshing the water when he heard the unknown, male voice. The faint echoing quality to it made it difficult for him to identify which direction it came from in the dark corners of the cave. Though he’d questioned the need to carry the MacLeod claymore down into this cave when his battle was not a physical one, it reassured him to have it now.
“If you intend to possess me next,” said Duncan, “you must get in line behind my other victims.”
“Possession?” the voice asked, sounding perplexed. “I didn’t think that could happen to you.”
“Who are you? When did I kill you?”
“I’m not someone trying to possess you and you certainly have not killed me,” replied the voice, sounding amused at himself for deliberately answering the question in a fashion that didn’t entirely tell Duncan what he wanted to know. Then he turned melancholy and added, “You died saving me.”
A cloaked figure stepped out of the shadows as he spoke and lowered the hood to reveal himself to be a teenage boy, thin and disheveled. Nothing about him appeared modern. He wore a short sword or possibly a long knife in a scabbard with a rough hilt. Absently, he shook sand out of his hair and kept his hands away from his weapon, behaving unconcerned that Duncan was still threatening him.
“Name yourself!” Duncan commanded.
“I cannot name myself because I am not myself,” he answered, sounding serious this time. “Do you truly not know me?”
“I don’t,” Duncan replied. Though this wasn’t one of the Immortals he’d killed personally, he’d taken the heads of many evil Immortals who no doubt preyed on the vulnerable and genuinely young. Also, Duncan reminded himself, villains often took out their rivals: the good and bad.
“Disappointing,” the boy sighed. “Your presence gave me hope. May I try my reflection?”
Not wanting to disturb the surface, Duncan remained still as he nodded. He rested the claymore on his shoulder, but didn’t drop his guard as the kid approached the pool. Unfortunately, the lingering glow was bright enough to prevent the boy from getting a clear view of his own face reflected there. The whites of his eyes seemed almost blue which Duncan supposed was from some trick of the light.
Crouched despondently by the edge, the boy repeated his first question. “What are you doing, Duncan?”
Choosing his words carefully, Duncan answered, “I am here to free myself.”
“Not quite what I meant. Why did you drink the Water of Life?”
That question was not what Duncan expected. “I haven’t,” he said, gesturing to the pool around him. “No one mentioned it was a requirement. Did you drink the uh, Water of Life?”
“Yes, it is the cause of my current predicament. So, how were you ensnared then?”
“I’ve killed too many evil men and they want to live again through me to do more evil,” Duncan replied vaguely, lest naming them might summon them from the shadows as well. “I don’t know who I am anymore either.”
“I know you very well, Duncan,” the boy said brightly.
“Really?” Duncan asked in a neutral tone in response to the boy’s wild claim.
“Yes,” he sounded very sure. “I have always known you… oh, I see now why you don’t recognize me. You haven’t awakened your ghola memories.”
“What is a ghola?”
The boy looked uncomfortable and hesitantly explained, “Resurrected dead flesh. I’m afraid there is a stigma against them because they don’t have parents and are continuing to live when they ought to be dead. It isn’t as though gholas have a choice, yet they are abhorred as unnatural all the same,” he added, sounding apologetic.
Duncan concluded that description mostly fit what he knew about himself. “We call ourselves Immortals today. Even now, I must keep what I am a secret. Being possessed is jeopardizing that secrecy.”
“Know yourself and they cannot overwhelm you. Perhaps if I help you escape their clutches, you will be able to help me after all?”
It occurred to Duncan that this boy could be deteriorating in front of him, forgetting more about himself as they spoke. This ought to be a good thing, one less dead Immortal’s personality to wrestle, but instead he felt rather sad. Helping this remnant of a Quickening recover his own identity would surely only make him more dangerous.
“I will not bargain for my sanity,” he said firmly. “My brain isn’t a timeshare in a condominium.”
“Condominium,” he echoed, clearly unfamiliar with the word and well he should be. If how he was dressed was anything to go by, he probably had no knowledge of modern buildings. Yet, to Duncan’s surprise the boy suddenly said, “Yes, those are in the future. Let me assure you, I am not in the market to share space in your brain. It is impossible for me to possess you because we are not related in the slightest,” he continued trying to persuade Duncan.
Duncan didn’t like the sound of that. Yet, his reply also gave Duncan a glimmer of hope. Perhaps this boy had once fought off a Dark Quickening long ago. Of course, this was all in his mind, so anything could happen or not, regardless of reality.
Though he had every reason not to trust apparitions, Duncan decided to take a chance and said, “The ruthless personalities are usually the stronger, but not always. What have you tried so far to defeat yours?”
“I looked to the future,” he said. “Only now I face a new dilemma, a terrible purpose and a choice which, once made, will be irreversible. The thought of losing my humanity repulses me, while the voices of the past desire it greatly. I like having the option of death someday.”
He seemed unaware he lost his head long ago, didn’t even question how they were speaking to each other, so Duncan decided to refrain from disabusing him of the notion and instead answered, “You get to choose? Nice.”
“Truth. It stings,” he replied, amused again. “I shouldn’t laugh. If anything, I owe you an apology. Each ghola awakening, century after century, is agony for you.”
“It isn’t always that bad,” Duncan replied, thinking of the countless times he’d revived from fatal injury. “Is this why you are here talking to me? Are you a caricature of my fear of living more centuries, always killing to survive and watching those I love grow old and die?”
“Are you?” he replied earnestly. “Is it bad that I want you to live forever, but I cannot bear the notion of doing the same?”
“How do you know me?”
“I have always known you. You are the greatest sword master who has ever lived, a brilliant teacher and most importantly, you are my dearest friend,” he replied and there was no mistaking the affection in his voice. “You are too honorable and loyal to misuse your power to charm others. I have always admired your bravery.”
It sounded sappy and poetic. Duncan replied, “I don’t feel brave. I’m so afraid of myself.”
“Bravery isn’t the absence of fear, but the conquering of fear and the mark of a champion.”
“I don’t feel like an honorable man anymore. I’ve terrified my friends.”
“You must learn to forgive yourself. You know your friends will forgive you.” He seemed to know he wasn’t entirely getting through to Duncan. “You always have my forgiveness and that of my father. Oh! I am Paul.”
For a moment, Duncan thought Paul would weep with relief at naming himself and he envied the boy’s success. It sounded so simple. Banish the evil within himself by remembering who he truly was. Yet, it was anything but easy to do when the evil within was actively trying to make him forget.
“Thank you for bringing me to the future, Duncan. I knew you could help me. Now, I will return the favor,” Paul said with such confidence, Duncan wasn’t sure how to respond. Paul eyed the pool again and asked, “If your possession wasn’t caused by taking the Water of Life, then why are you standing in it?”
Feeling rather silly, Duncan replied, “I was told it might heal my mind.”
“Yes! The answer was here before us all along. The water is unchanged!”
To Duncan’s absolute bafflement, Paul spat into the holy spring. At once, the glow increased, obliterating his vision and Paul’s voice sounded distant, but Duncan could still make out the words.
"I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past, I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain."
Then Paul was gone, but rather than feel abandoned, Duncan felt stronger for it. As promised, Paul had not tried to control him and proved Duncan could rely on the good within him to fight against the evil. Fear was his real enemy.
As a new specter arose, this one a mirror image of himself, Duncan lifted his sword ready to dispatch it.