Mending the Mind of the Hero

Muck and mud

I'm not sure why I'm telling you this. You won't believe me. Maybe it never really happened. Maybe one day I dreamt it all up. But I swear to whatever gods will listen that nothing has ever felt more real.

It all began as most things do, in the muck and mud.

It was a Thursday, the day of thunder and fury, and true to itself, it seemed like it would never stop raining. Days like that my mother would always say that "the gods forgot to shut off the faucet". I'm not sure that the gods had anything to do with it, but the rain beat down on that day in a torrent of things to come.

I had to hurry. I've never been one to frolic or dance in the midst of raindrops, and besides. I had obligations. I was going to be late. So late in fact, that I did not see what was coming.

To be fair, if there had been a neon sign blinking out the story of those years, I would neither have believed my eyes nor been able to see what it was spelling out for me.

As I dashed along in those puddles, my vision was blurred by so many drops of water that I was lucky I hadn't run into a the side of a barn.

That's when it happened. Somehow, amidst the downpour and bustle of everyone trying to avoid the petty spots of wetness falling from the sky, the image became clear to me. The truck was not going to stop in time. The woman crossing the street that day had dropped some item or another, I can't imagine it was anything important. For a brief moment, time seemed to stop. I hadn't made the decision. There was nothing to decide. The woman did not deserve to die.

Of course I had no idea who she was. Where she was going. What her story was. I couldn't know how her family would take the news, how her loved ones would grieve. She was an innocent bystander in the great woven tapestry of life. I had to save her.

As I ran forward, my legs could not move fast enough. I sprinted as fast as I could and shoved as hard as my body would allow.

That's when everything went dark. That's when I woke up.

I was obviously dead. Where else would I be? Except I felt very much alive. I could feel the lifeblood of my body course in my veins.

That's when she walked in. The woman I had saved.

I hadn't the time to ponder her appearance at the time. I hadn't time to ponder my own existence. I hadn't time to ponder elementary math lessons. Time was of the essence. Time was the only important thing that day. Time and life.

Which is why I couldn't understand. Why was she here? Why did I feel alive?

The melody of her voice broke me from my reverie like the sound of a piano breaking steel.

"I understand you have many questions." She said, putting her hand to her chin, her arms crossed to prop up the delicacy of her fingers underneath. Her eyes seemed to scan me over as an antiquarian carefully eyeing a possible treasure.

I in turn, gazed back in her direction. She was beautiful, the evidence etched in her appearance and poise. She had the look of some angel tossed aside in a tragic war of heaven and hell. That's when I realized she was expecting me to say something.

I blinked. Sure, I had a countless amount of questions. However, circumstances as they were, I couldn't think of anything important to ask. So I simply nodded.

"I am Myrabel." She said, taking a slight step forward.

That's one question down.

I wasn't sure how to react. My head was spinning with the dilemma of accepting whether or not this was reality. Maybe I hadn't saved her in time. Maybe we had both died. That would explain how she looked like an angel. Besides, what else could have happened in the path of an oncoming truck? Death is the only answer.

However, an image of that frozen moment in time as she fumbled in the street glared brightly in my mind's eye. She was just as beautiful then.

I opened my mouth to speak, the questions caught in my throat.

Myrabel smiled in a gentle manner and did the speaking instead. "You're alive. You're well. This is real." Her eyes did their best to reassure me.

I did not receive the message well. Afterall, either the afterlife was some kind of odd trick, or I had gone mad. So many thoughts stirred in the midst of my consciousness. The most present of which was 'Is insanity the side effect of death brought on by oncoming truck?'

"The truck missed us." She smiled. Her eyes seemed to change an instant later. They darkened over with the pain that can only be brought on by an unwanted memory. "The truck ended up on its side. The driver was a good man." She said quietly, as if she were a general recalling the death of a fallen soldier.

That explained why I felt alive. It did, however, not explain the madness of such a situation. One moment I was forcing her out of the path of certain death, the next I woke up in this plain room of white with no scars and no memory to bring me here.

"This... isn't..." Myrabel hesitated. "This isn't Vermont." She said finally, but the hesitation in her voice left almost as many questions as the revelation itself. "Your action of selflessness brought the attention of... some people." She said. She was obviously having a hard time explaining the illusions I was facing.

Finally, I spoke. It seemed like I had been silent for decades. "It wasn't a selfless act." I stated, more flatly than I intended.

Her expression changed abruptly to confusion. "I... don't... follow?" She said.

"The act benefitted me as well." I said. I glanced around the room for the first time, to taking in my surroundings. Hadn't there been a bed? Did I awake standing up? What is this place?

As my gaze whirled around the room, mixing with the questions that whirled through my mind like a helicopter in a hurricane, Myrabel asked a question. "Your... benefit?" She asked. If she was attempting to not sound incredulous, she was failing. "How could you possibly benefit from dying to save someone else?" She asked. I slowly shook the spinning out of my head, careful not to shake anything important loose. 

"Because it is the death I've always wanted." My face showed no emotion. Myrabel's expression was becoming more and more etched on her visage.

"The death... you've always wanted? Dying for a stranger?" She asked, not grasping the concept of my wishes, tone of a desire for clarification in her voice.

"Dying a hero." I stated as flatly as I had the whole conversation.

That's when our discussion was interrupted. That's when someone else walked in. That's when I met Jeanne d'Arc