Cold Fire

touched on a truth. He had been special in some way, a gifted child. Now that she had reminded him of it, he saw in that early gift the seeds of the powers that had grown in him. But he didn't want to face it. Denial was his shield.
    “What have you just remembered?”
    “Nothing.”
    “Come on, Jim.”
    “Nothing, really.”
    She didn't know where to go with that line of questioning, so she could only say, “It's true. You're gifted. No aliens, only you.”
    Because of whatever he had just remembered and was not willing to share with her, his adamancy had begun to dissolve. “I don't know.”
    “It's true.”
    “Maybe.”
    “It's true. Remember last night when The Friend told us it was a child by the standards of its species? Well, that's because it is a child, a perpetual child, forever the age at which you created it—ten years old. Which explains its childlike behavior, its need to brag, its poutiness. Jim, The Friend didn't behave like a ten-thousand-year-old alien child, it just behaved like a ten-year-old human being.”
    He closed his eyes and leaned back, as if it was exhausting to consider what she was telling him. But his inner tension remained at a peak, revealed by his hands, which were fisted in his lap.
    “Where are we going, Holly?”
    “For a little ride.” As they passed through the golden fields and hills, she kept up a gentle attack: “That's why the manifestation of The Enemy is like a combination of every movie monster that ever frightened a ten-year-old boy. The thing I caught a glimpse of in my motel-room doorway wasn't a real creature, I see that now. It didn't have a biological structure that made sense, it wasn't even alien. It was too familiar, a ten-year-old boy's hodgepodge of boogeymen.” He did not respond. She glanced at him. “Jim?” His eyes were still closed. Her heart began to pound. “Jim!” At the note of alarm in her voice, he sat up straighter and opened his eyes. “What?”
    “For God's sake, don't close your eyes that long. You might've been asleep, and I wouldn't have realized it until—”
    “You think I can sleep with this on my mind?”
    “I don't know. I don't want to take the chance. Keep your eyes open, okay? You obviously suppress The Enemy when you're awake, it only comes through all the way when you're asleep.”
    In the windshield glass, like a computer readout in a fighter-plane cockpit, words began to appear from left to right, in letters about one inch high: DEAD DEAD DEAD DEAD DEAD DEAD.
    Scared but unwilling to show it, she said, “To hell with that,” and switched on the windshield wipers, as if the threat was dirt that could be scrubbed away. But the words remained, and Jim stared at them with evident dread.
    As they passed a small ranch, the scent of new-mown hay entered with the wind through the windows. “Where are we going?” he asked again.
    “Exploring.”
    “Exploring what?”
    “The past.”
    Distressed, he said, “I haven't bought this scenario yet. I can't. How the hell can I? And how can we ever prove it's true or isn't?”
    “We go to town,” she said. “We take that tour again, the one you took me on yesterday. Svenborg—port of mystery and romance. What a dump. But it's got something. You wanted me to see those places, your subconscious was telling me answers can be found in Svenborg. So let's go find them together.”
    New words appeared under the first six: DEAD DEAD DEAD DEAD DEAD DEAD.
    Holly knew that time was running out. The Enemy wanted through, wanted to gut her, dismember her, leave her in a steaming heap of her own entrails before she had a chance to convince Jim of her theory—and it did not want to wait until Jim was asleep. She was not certain that he could repress that dark aspect of himself as she pushed him closer to a confrontation with the truth. His self-control might crack, and his benign personalities might sink under the rising dark force.
    “Holly, if I had this bizarre multiple personality, wouldn't I be cured as soon as you explained it to me, wouldn't the scales immediately fall off my eyes?”
    “No. You have to believe it before you can hope to deal with it. Believing that you suffer an abnormal mental condition is the first step toward an understanding of it, and understanding is only the first painful step toward a cure.”
    “Don't talk at me like a psychiatrist, you're no psychiatrist.”
    He was taking refuge in anger, in that arctic glare, trying to intimidate her as he