INVISIBLE: PART 2 "CYRUS" (CONTINUATION OF VESPERS, FEATHERS, UNICORNS AND HORSES)
She pulls Cyrus close to her hip, then bends down to examine his foot. "I know you do baby, but you became very ill and almost died before, and I swore I would not let anything like that happen to you again!" "I know Mama, but look!" Cyrus' mother sees a dead cat lying in the street gutter. She softly slaps Cyrus' hand with the ladle, "You were not playing with that, were you?" "But Mama, look!" She looks again and the cat runs away. She quickly looks around and then rushes Cyrus inside. The door squeaks and screeches as she gently nudges Cyrus inside, but she looks back outside with concern and fear!
"Cyrus! Cyrus!" This sinister man comes out of his daze and screams, "Elizabeth! You think you can stop me!" His voice booms in the tunnel! Charles slowly wakes after being knocked unconscious. He rubs his head and he hobbles over to the train window to see what the commotion is and can't believe what he sees!
Elizabeth radiantly shimmers and broods over the train tracks. "Elizabeth, I found a way back! You cannot stop me!" "I already have!" "What? That is impossible! You are a figment of my imagination! You are dead!" Cyrus pulls out the root and lifts it towards her. Elizabeth laughs and this enrages Cyrus even more! Charles ducks his head down and remembers something he did for Gwendolyn and regrets it...
Footsteps tiptoe into a room as objects tick and whir and beakers glow and bubble. Each step taken, feels like Gwendolyn has entered an enchanted, magical book! "Gwendolyn...I told you, it is too dangerous for you or Sophie to come into my lab while I work!" "I know Charles, but you never stop working, so we do not ever get to see you. Ooo! What is this?" She curiously picks up a trapezoid-shaped metal object. "Put it down! Don't touch anything!" She drops it, alarmed by his incessant yelling! It doesn't break, but a compartment pops open, and beams of light shine on Gwendolyn's face. She is too amazed to be startled by Charles' urgent scolding.
"It is something that isn't quite finished. I, uh, I..." "What is it Charles? I have never heard you become speechless before." Gwen quietly laughs to herself. He tries to close the box but it shines even brighter! Charles distracts Gwendolyn with something else, but it is no use. She gives him a raised brow, but can't hold the intimidation very long. She smiles and is frustrated that she can't be angry with Charles even if she tried, because Charlie is her everything! "Okay Gwenny, come over here and I will show you what it does!"
He carefully carries the trapezoid in his hand and sets it on a table. "It is one of my inventions that will change the world!" "What does it do Charles?" He always melts under Gwendolyn's spell; her beauty, wonder and joy are boundless. She excites and mesmerizes Charlie! He gently takes her hand and places it over the compartment opening.
"There is a little metal ball inside of the compartment. It heals anything that is placed inside of it. It does this by generating large amounts of heat, which then detects where the source of the ailment in the body derives." "Why do you need to fix it? That is amazing Charles! What could possibly be wrong with that?" "It has a mind of its own Gwen; well, it has my mind! It becomes more and more advanced. It not only heals whoever, whatever it touches, I recently discovered it may give those who touch the metal ball, their purest, deepest desire!" "What? That is-" "I know Gwenny, you are going to say that it is impossible because-" "No, I was going to say marvelous! Miraculous! It is almost magical Charles! How revolutionary?" Gwen kisses him so hard, it leaves a red mark on his cheek.
"Mama! Mama! Why are you angry with me? I am not angry at you Cyrus. I am just scared!" She sets the ladle onto a counter and wearily sits down. Cyrus kneels down and puts his head on her lap. His mother brushes his hair out of his face and rests her hand on his head. "When that man...When he..." She begins to cry! "But Mama, look! I am better now!" He lifts her hand and looks into her eyes. "Cyrus, it wasn't right! I shouldn't have-" "Do you not want me to be with you? Do you not want me to be-" "No! No! That is not it! It is just that...what he did wasn't natural, but I had no hope! I never saw him in the village before, so I assumed he was a missionary. When he knocked on the door, I thought he was going to pray for me, so I let him in. I was so scared, so afraid, because in that moment, I truly lost you!
I thought he was going to pray over you, but he pulled a trapezoid metal box out of his bag. He told me that if he could put your hand in it, it may cure you! I cried, slapped him and hit him on his chest for saying such madness, but his eyes...his eyes, they were so certain!" Cyrus' mother is exhausted from the story, and begins to get up to cook, but Cyrus begs her to continue the story!
"Gwendolyn! I wanted to help people, so I took this box with me when I stepped in the machine over there." "What does that do Charles?" "It safely takes a person to other countries, but one only has a short amount of time before a portal opens and brings that person back here to my lab." "What? Really?" "Yes, I went to a country where everything was dusty and dirty. I knocked on a random door to see if someone needed help, but it wasn't a coincidence. There was a little boy inside who had just died! His name was Cyrus and his mother was weeping! She let me use the box on him because she didn't know what to do!"
"Yes! Yes! Go on!" Gwendolyn's eyes marvel and glow. "I put the boy's hand in the box and as his fingers touched the little ball, the light covered his entire body and then it went to his heart! His mother touched him and could feel the warmth coming from his body! Apparently, he had a weak heart, that is why he passed out and died; his mother immediately carried his little body inside and rested him on her bed." "Then what happened next..."
"He began breathing sharply and his eyes excitedly opened! He started to shake and I was afraid he was having an episode. Until then, I had never used the box! I wondered if I made a grave mistake by using it on a child, but then he sat up and grabbed his mother tightly! I knew that I would need to leave soon before the portal shut, so I quickly asked him what he felt, smelled, saw, heard! I asked him everything; I wanted to document every detail possible Gwendolyn!"
"Mama, Mama! Please continue the story." "Cyrus, after that man healed you, he disappeared!" "No Mama! You are making it up so that I will leave you alone." "No Cyrus! It is true! That is why-" "What Mama?" "I don't want anyone to know that you can heal things!" "Mama! It is a gift! It isn't bad!" "Cyrus! Listen to me! If people find out that you can heal things, if people find out that you were dead and that I let that man come into the house-"
"Mama! Don't worry!" "What if someone sees you Cyrus? They will want to hurt you, or worse, they will want to take advantage of you!" "Mama, but-" "No Cy-" "I healed Silvia's dog and I made Cecilla's bird come back to life!" "Baby! I know you think it is harmless, and that they will keep your secret because you gave them what they wanted, but it isn't good!" "Mama! How can you say that? It is part of me now!" "People will only want to take from you-" "The children actually play with me now and are my friends! I am finally happy! Why do you want to take that from me?" Cyrus runs outside and gets far enough away that his mother's call becomes more and more faint!
Charles ducks down low on the train and realizes that he has destroyed many lives with his inventions! Charles whispers, "This evil man...No! No! It can't be...He is Cyrus, the little boy I helped? What have I done?" Charles becomes frightened as he realizes that his machine didn't just take him to a different country, it took him to a different time period!
He also thinks back to how he let Gwendolyn put her hand in the trapezoid, not knowing what it was capable of. "I wondered what would happen if a healthy person put their hand in the box. Gwen wasn't sick and I wanted more data to add to my research. I thought, what harm could it do? I shouldn't have let my curiosity put my wife in such danger! I was so selfish and oblivious to how powerful my inventions were and are! I thought nothing would happen, but the trapezoid box amplified, magnified what Gwendolyn yearned for; it made her deepest desire come alive! The invisible has come into the visible."
Charles slowly raises his head to peek out of the train window. As he watches Elizabeth and Cyrus argue with each other, he suddenly remembers, "I gave Sophie that box after I took the ball out of it! What if it still generates the same energy? The toys I put in it will not only whir and tick, they will have minds of their own." Charles knows his inventions will continue to change the world and shape the future, but he becomes fearful, because he never realized his creations could potentially harm Sophie! "Oh, what have I done? Look what I've done to Cyrus! Look at what he has become!"
Charles chides himself! What he has created is gaining momentum and spirals into the visible world like a whirlwind. Charles ponders, "If this boy, who was once dead recognizes me, he will remember everything! Cyrus will know, I was the one who stepped into his mother's home in his childhood and ruined his life."
To Be Continued!