Title: Highlands

Author: Jemisard

E-mail address for feedback: kalika@senet.com.au

I was not so old when we met, though I could hardly say I was that young either. I had entered a period life so commonly referred to the "Middle Age", which makes it sound like a malady to be cured, an insanity, or worst of all, a period of history.

Though not of the Highlands, they have always been my home. There is something so right about the rolling fields of heather, the craggy mountains, the ancient ruins that stand proud among the rocks they once oversaw.

I remember, in a childhood long gone, clambering over the rocks and ruins, laughing and smiling as my father watched over me, making sure I was not hurt with my reckless games.

Then, later, I returned, not being able to climb the rocks. It was something that wasn't done at my age. It was unseemly. So instead, I gazed over the valleys and fields and pretended to know so much when I felt like I knew nothing.

I came back once more with Erik, and was no longer able to climb over the ruins. Instead, I told Erik to go ahead without me, to enjoy the things of a youth that was stolen from him.

But, determined as ever, he lifted me up, laughing, to sit with him at the very top tower still standing, to over look what we called our fiefdom, and played like children who had never been outside again.

When we ended, I didn't know what to do, nor where to go. No parent was willing to send their child to a school where they would be taught how to be different, not until someone else had done it first.

So, as always, I found myself heading back to home. Back to my Highlands and ruins and rolling fields.

I sat by the ruins that I had played in as a child, and as an adult with a lust for life, and I wandered how dreams could come true. Everyone one of my dreams was gone. My lover, my school, my hope to adopt a child someday.

It was the falling rocks that alerted me to the fact that someone was there. I turned to look at him, a wild child, sitting up the top of the highest tower, dirty, filthy in fact, with a band wrapped around his face. He tipped his head and peered at me, before scampering back down into the stairwell.

It was painful, but I forced those crippled legs to aid me move across the ruins where my chair wouldn't go. It was hot and humid, but it didn't matter all of a sudden. The heat of the season could be forgotten for a while.

He watched me, silent, eyes hidden, glowing a demonic red, like sprites from the old myths. I smiled at him, and he sort of smiled back, head cocked like a predator, intently studying me, before he swung up onto the old window.

We sat there with one another for an age, while the sun set in the distance, casting a red glow across us. Night fell slowly, and still neither of us moved, the glow from that band showing as a single elongated eye in the darkness.

Eventually, I asked him who he was. I heard nothing but a slight shift of rocks, and his mind left.

-------------------------------------------

I returned there the next day, early in the morning. He was sitting there, waiting for me, head cocked, before holding out a leg of meat to me.

He was trying to feed me. It was touching, if macabre. Like a cat that brings home rats for its family.

I took it with a smile. It was cooked, though barely, and I forced myself to eat a few mouthfuls, him watching me intently while I did.

When I held it out to him, he took it back, apparently satisfied that I had no intention of harming him.

I tried asking him who he was again. He leant forwards, mouth mimicking mine, before smiling and laughing.

He couldn't have been older than fifteen.

I wheeled closer, and he didn't run. I held out my hand and asked him who he was.

He held out his hand to me, a metal band on his wrist jingling as he did so. I recognised the style, if not where it was from.

It was a lab band, used for marking experiments.

---------------------------------------

It took me two weeks to get a word from him, and that was only "Stay" but it was a start. He barely spoke English from what I could tell.

I decided to take him home when it became apparent that he had no memory, no identity. He would be the son I couldn't have.

I named him for the county I found him in, but gave him a last name separate to my own. I named him for our meeting, so neither of us could forget it.

Scott. Scott Summers.

The End