Inveigle

Chapter Seventeen: Pathos and Logos

When I opened my eyes they were there. The two beautiful people from the gymnasium dream. Their arms were crossed and their eyebrows were knitted together.

The man spoke first, "Get up," he commanded. The woman reached a hand out to me and helped me up.

"We don't have much time," she spoke gently.

"Who are you?" I asked.

I must be going nuts. I thought, but the words echoed off the white around me. I felt my jaw drop. What the fuck? I thought, and again, "What the fuck?" echoed around me like I was in an underground tunnel. I turned around and saw nothing but white. I couldn't figure out if I was in a room, or space, or a void. There was no depth, no light source.

"There aren't any secrets in here, honey," the woman said as I faced around again. "This is your mind."

I put my head in my hands. "Am I crazy?" this time I asked aloud instead of letting the creepy echo ask for me.

"No," the man said. "Far from it. Your mind is very adaptive... quite... comfortable. Stop looking at us like that. Show your intelligence on your face. If you weren't capable of understanding we wouldn't be here right now."

"Logos, please, you're being very harsh. She's been through a lot today." The woman brushed a loose strand of hair behind my left ear. I felt giddy at the touch, warm and triumphant for no reason at all.

For an instant the man's lips loosened from the tight line he had them in, "You're right, Pathos. Explain then, so we can move on. Ethos does not keep a schedule without me. I've no idea what he will do next." He took his glasses off his face and rubbed his eyes as if massaging out other's ignorance.

"Have a seat, honey," Pathos almost sang. With a blink, we were in a garden, and a white marble bench was before me. I sat, the marble was cool to the touch. The shock must have been clear on my face.

The beautiful woman called Pathos laughed at me. But it was a kind laugh.

"You can make anything here. Give it a try, Cora."

I just stared at her. How did one make something out of nothing?

Logos cut in, "I'll give you an idea. It's always hard the first time. Visualize your favorite book."

The weight of the pages filled my hands. I looked down to see the battered and worn copy of Pride and Prejudice that I had in high school. I flipped through the pages, and the last page was torn in the middle from the time I stuffed it in my backpack too quickly. The white all around me began to change to a sunset pink.

"Good memories?" asked Pathos?

I nodded and set the book next to me on the bench.

"Please," I paused, "tell me what is going on."

"We are Logos and Pathos. Hmm, how best to explain this. I embody emotion, and my brother here is the embodiment of logic. Each of us is a silver of what humans refer to as the gift of persuasion. We are incomplete at the moment, as we are triplets, our brother Ethos, or you might know him as credibility, is harboring inside Ava Persim."

"President Persim?" I interrupted.

"Yes. You see we have never been separated before..."she trailed off. The most elegant, single tear I had ever seen glistened down her cheek.

I felt her pain, the separation from her family as if it were my own, "You want me to help you?" I ventured.

The tear dripped off her cheek and into the grass. "We can help each other," she smiled. "We've seen your mind. We can stay here awhile. We will help you, and in turn that will help us. We have seen your hate for what Ava Persim has done. I do not agree with her myself-"

Logos cut her off, "Human matters are always two sided, Pathos. See reason."

"The last time I saw reason millions of lives were lost." The affliction in Pathos' eyes was the last thing I saw.

The garden and the two beautiful siblings melted away, soon to be replaced by black. The bench beneath me was gone in an instant.

"No, she's waking up!" Logos rough voice cut through the nothing. "Listen Cora, you have our gifts. You can wield them like a weapon. You just have to use your-"

And then the endless black turned into a normal muted darkness. The back of my eyelids shut tight.