"Where am I?"

The gentle faced red haired woman stood up at the sound of Jack Wallace's voice. She smiled upon him kindly, but her eyes could not conceal the concern.

"You're in a hospital room Jack, you had a small accident. You fell off of the ladder when you were cleaning the gutters and were out for awhile."

Jack Wallace lay in bed, he had raised his arms off of the bed, opening and closing his fists while watching his forearms bulge as he flexed his limbs.

"I'm a powerful one aren't I?" He said to no one in particular, lifting the sheet to take further note of his body. The body was strong and in tune from years of hard exercise. "Yes, I am a powerful one indeed."

Jack turned his attention away from himself, studying the red head standing beside his bed. Her hair was pulled into a ponytail. She donned thick-framed cat eyeglasses. She also wore a pair of bell-bottoms and long jean jacket coat with fur around the collar, each piece of clothing far more expensive than they looked. If she were anything like her Los Angeles counterparts, she looked like she was taking great pains to hide her beauty behind her hip "nerd-chic" look.

"I should get the doctor," she said. His strange behavior was throwing her off balance.

"Fuck the doctor. Just tell me, who are you? My daughter? My wife? My sister? My secretary?" Jack asked.

"I'm Kaetlin. I'm your girlfriend." The pain from his lack of recognition and aggressively changed demeanor showed clearly on her face.

"Really? But you're, perhaps, what, twenty one, twentytwo ?" Jack began.

"Twenty-three." She corrected.

"And I'm like thirty, right? Maybe older because I seem to have a pretty nice house, at least the dreamscape's version of it was." He stopped to ponder his situation, "Am I fucking you?"

Dreamscape? Fucking you? Kaetlin was growing more uncomfortable with the conversation as it proceeded. She wasn't sure what brain centers were knocked out of whack from that fall, but she didn't like the end result. She looked over her shoulder trying to catch the attention of a doctor.

There was no one within earshot. She would have to go out of the room and grab one. She decided not to let him see how upset he was making her. After all it was Jack, not her, who was lying in a hospital bed obviously suffering from head trauma.

She answered him far more calmly than she felt, "You are thirty-four Jack. And yes, we are intimate. Now... I'm going to get the doctor." She turned quickly on her heels, practically dashing out of the door.

In the background she heard Jack say to himself, "Cool. I'm a fucking stud."

After meeting with their patient, Jack's doctors debated in consultation quietly among themselves in the hallway. The malpractice ramifications of releasing a man who didn't have anything resembling a full memory back onto the streets loomed large on all of their minds. The doctors were wary of their patient's demands to be let go immediately, especially coupled with his girlfriend's concerns.

She had pointed out Jack's radical change in behavior, leading the doctors to believe the head trauma was perhaps more severe than they were seeing. Although the patient did have a point (they had done the tests, there was nothing physically wrong him). If he wanted to leave AMA (against their medical advice), they couldn't stop him. Plus, there was something oddly persuasive about him, even knowing they were in the right. They all found it difficult to argue with this charismatic man. They decided to stall his exit while hedging their bets with further tests. Barring his complete refusal, they could probably keep him another nine or ten hours.

As the hallway conference went on, Kaetlin Cox sat against the wall watching the enigmatic behavior of her boyfriend. In tentative, exploratory manner, he had rubbed his entire body with his hand. He now, at least as much as Kaetlin could determine, was lightly squeezing his genitalia underneath the sheets with obvious delight.

Kaetlin hadn't said a word to him since she went to retrieve the doctors. He was always a man of confidence, some would say ego, but that's what she found attractive in him. However, he was never crude and rudely direct like he was now. It was like he was consumed by something dark, despite his being oddly... alluring. When she asked the doctors about the altered personality quietly beforehand, they couldn't assure her this would pass, however noted they didn't see evidence of anything large enough to cause a wholesale change in personality. At least in the long term. Nevertheless, one of them gave her his card and told her to call him if this behavior persists.

Despite his best efforts, Jack was not able to waltz right out of the hospital once his tests were finished. He apparently needed time just to get his motor skills in sync. When he tried to walk, his motions were spastic, slightly out of control as though his brain was firing the wrong signals to his limbs. He moved around the room in a jerky fashion for some while, cursing his every misstep. Kaetlin had never seen anything like this, it was as if Jack's puppet master had gone mad, it only alarmed her even more. Not allowing her to recall the doctors, Jack was insistent that it was just a "glitch" and he would work through it. As good as his word, after some half an hour of intense concentration, he began moving with far more fluidity.

Kaetlin wondered to herself, what kind of person calls not controlling their limbs a "glitch", giving it no further thought than a cramp. Something was wrong here. Jack was hiding something, but she couldn't imagine what it could be.

Once in the passenger seat of the car, Jack became visibly less agitated and his mood moved slowly toward near giddiness. During the drive he watched everything race by the window carefully. It was obvious, to even the most casual of observers, that he was seeing this landscape for the first time. If it were not for his disconcerting habit of fondling his genitalia with palpable pleasure, he would look the part of your average first time Miami tourist.

Sounding more reasonable and calm than in the hospital, he turned and spoke to Kaetlin, "Sorry about all that back there. The hospital, I mean, with the rude questions and the doctors. This knock must have really done something screwy," He grabbed the back of his head in emphasis. "I'm a little sketchy on the memory, but things are starting to feel right. I'll be fine soon enough. I just wanted to apologize that's all.

Kaetlin nodded, but he didn't sound completely sincere. It reminded Kaetlin of the plastic apologies offered by politicians with their hand caught in the cookie jar by their mother. This was not the way the Jack she knew, would go about apologizing. His strong suit was making a selfdeprecating joke of even the harshest things, always doing it in a boyish and charming fashion. Still, Kaetlin decided, this was a welcome change from his behavior in the hospital. Perhaps, as the doctor said, he would be normal soon, this change of demeanor she was seeing was just the first step.

"Kaetlin, sweetheart?" the endearment sounded hollow, "are you in school, or do you have a job or something?"

"Actually Jack, I work for you."

"For me? Really? Also you're my girlfriend as well? Interesting. Any way, that's really good to hear because I have some business I need to take care of in Los Angeles actually. I would love to take you out there with me." He smiled warmly, seductively. Kaetlin wondered how he could so casually mention flying to the West Coast for business, while she was fairly certain he, at this point, had no idea what he did for a living. This was Kaetlin decided, beyond just a knock on the head. He was up to something. What was it? Some sort of insurance fraud?

"Are you sure you're okay Jack?"

"Not as okay as I'm going to be in Los Angeles, darling."

Again, he similed the smile of warmth and seduction. While it was definitely not one, which would have made it to the face of pre-accident Jack. Kaetlin found she was afraid of it, but at the same time she found the raw power of it exciting. It was unnervingly magnetic. She, despite herself, began to get the warm feeling of becoming turned on.

He snored beside her, asleep for over an hour. Kaetlin sat up, her body still wired with feeling. She wasn't even sure how it happened so quickly. There was a knowingness, and a compelling presence in Jack that seemed to have that made it all happen so fast. One moment they were talking, the next moment they were in bed together.

Of all the times they made love it had never been like this. Jack was at once clumsy like a teenage virgin within his own body, yet almost prescient in anticipating her needs and desires. His lovemaking carried none of the confident nonchalance usually associated with it. Every touch she made to his body was greeted with near child like wonder. When Jack plunged deeply into her, moaning and shaking with his own orgasm, he did the unfathomable, and kept attending to her until she had hers.

She exploded in orgasmic delight, even as his refractory period was ending. He sat above her, hard-on in hand, marveling at his own stiffness. They continued to slither together in wet sweaty harmony until Jack, seeming to understand her body as well as she guided his hard-on for the last time creating a dual orgasm which made Kaetlin scream in delight.

Afterward now watching him sleep, she quietly masturbated herself again thinking about their sex. Whatever had gotten into Jack, it was at the same time gentle, uncertain, firm, and rough. But she had also seemed to feel... something... when they were in closest contact of sex,. It was something seductively and powerfully strong, although in an almost savagely dark, frightening way. It was like making love to a great beast, a beast that knew all the pleasures of satisfying a woman.

The following morning Jack looked more confident and relaxed. His jerky movements were completely gone, and he possessed a sense of self-satisfaction.

Kaetlin was already downstairs on the outdoor patio reading the paper when he came down. She began to hand the sports section over. She knew how Jack needed to check up on his hockey scores first thing, however he waved it off picking up the front page. He read the paper with great interest, absorbing every word of every article; much like last night where he spent hours-absorbing CNN and the newscasts. His only comment, other than the occasional non-specific sound of surprise at certain events, was the enigmatic, "I've been gone a long time."

Putting the paper down, he smiled at Kaetlin. "So, honey..." Even after sleeping together, she was still uncomfortable with the indifferent way he used endearments. Jack must have picked up on this, because he started again anew without it,

"Kaetlin, as I said last night, I know this is rough on you. I greatly appreciate that a woman like you, who could have any man, is willing to at least try for a awhile to stick through this. So don't take this the wrong way, but... explain to me exactly why I am a thirty-four year old man, with a twenty-three year old girlfriend, and am living here?"

He made a wave of his hand to indicate the considerable size of his home, "While you're at it, maybe you can explain why a man who appears to have gardeners and housekeepers, is climbing on ladders risking his neck cleaning out his own gutters?" The entire time he spoke, he continued with his new, extremely distracting, habit, of casually stroking his penis through his pants.

"You occasionally like to do things yourself. Like the gutter. It goes with your fitness thing," she shrugged. This conversation was surreal to her. She decided she was going to skip over the part about their relationship completely. Despite it being Jack sitting across from her, memory loss or not, she couldn't shake the feeling she was talking to a stranger.

"You're a senior vice president for a financial firm," she continued, thinking about how to explain the rest of the information delicately, but accurately, "your father runs the company, owning something incredible like sixty percent of the stock. When you go back to work you may catch vibes that you were given this position because of your... connections... but you are well qualified, and have proven over time that... "

Jack held up his hand indicating for her to stop, "No need to flatter me. I know how those positions work. In fact, you wouldn't feel you had to tell me I was well qualified, unless of course, I wasn't. So... I'm a figurehead of sorts. A well paid vice president on the payroll because my father runs and owns the company.

Fascinating. I must be a big fucking deal. Do I even bother to show up every day? Probably not, nothing in this house indicates work crosses my mind for a second. I don't even own a computer, but I have a hell of a set of golf clubs. Well this will make getting the time to make this LA trip a breeze, he paused for a moment before saying, "not that I give a shit about keeping this job one way or another any way."

He stopped his musings, focusing on Kaetlin, "I hired you right out of college didn't I? Never mind, if you're twenty-three I had to have. I hope at least I was the one who got partially used, and you seduced me into hiring you, as much as the other way around. The other way around would bore me. Nevertheless you look like a woman smart enough to use those feminine charms of yours to nestle yourself into the good life. If so, I respect you for it. If not, don't tell me."

He sat quietly in thought for a long while. He seemed to make an internal decision, and changed gears, "How fast can you be ready to hit the Coast?"

Kaetlin was still stunned. She was more than disoriented by Jack Wallace's new, detached honesty, and brutally selfassessing mode of thinking. She wasn't sure she wanted to be around this man, at the same time she was becoming further drawn to him. There was something exciting about his self-analysis; completely without pretension or selfdoubt, like an actor getting his mind around a character for a film.

There was an undoubted power, inconceivable self-confidence that surge within him. Here was a man not the least bit concerned he didn't remember or understand any of the world around him, as if he himself were bigger than any worldly circumstance. Yet his lovemaking held an uncertainty, despite its power, that Kaetlin found newly endearing.

She imagined for a moment this is what it was like for those who fell in love with serial killers. She knew it was at this point she should get off of this train that would surely derail. Whatever plans he had in LA, could not be for the good. Yet, all of the wavering protestations forming in her mind were unable to come out of her mouth. Instead she said, "I can be ready this afternoon."

Jack looked her up and down with his eyes, almost sensing his new hold on her, before saying, "Wonderful."

Jack packed his bags upstairs in his bedroom. Socks, underwear, a few shirts, and a few pants. That was it. The single pair of well-heeled black shoes on his feet would go with everything he had. For so many days of clothing, it was going to be an incredibly sparsely packed bag.

"It's unbelievable how easy men have made it on themselves. It used to take me two suitcases for a trip like this," Jack said to the room at large. "And this fucking thing," he said, groping his groin for the untold time that day, "is great. But how they get anything done with this weighty, hypersensitive thing always there is a mystery to me. After awhile, you have to figure they become able to ignore this constant rubbing feeling putting them on the verge of getting hard all the time. Otherwise men would fuck everything that moves," Jack laughed and said, "Wait, they do try to fuck everything that moves."

He stopped in his tracks, listening for Kaetlin. She apparently was still packing downstairs. Realizing he had speaking aloud for quite some time, Jack admonished himself and turned his speech inward. "This is not the Dreamscape," he thought to himself, "speech and thought are not the same. You know the rules, it hasn't been that long."

Nevertheless for "Jack Wallace", who was no more than the sprit of LM looking through Jack's stolen shell, it had been a long time. What was merely a few years to those on this side of death, was far longer in a plane where time moved backward and forward at once, where fleeting moments are years, years are fleeting moments.

Moreover Jack had quite a bit of work to do now that he was alive again. Certainly he was planning to pay a visit to... Lucy Maya... that impostor... to pay her in kind for destroying her soul and nearly condemning her to drift in pieces throughout eternity. However, he had much more in store than that.

He looked down at the bulge in his pants. The very thought of vengeance had made this new toy between his legs grow in response; hate and sex tied into one stiff feeling. What kind of animals were men, the former LM wondered in equal parts amazement and disgust. He wasn't sure, but he knew he was going to find Kaetlin, making sure this did not go to waste.

Warm, but not Miami humid, Southern California. Kaetlin still loved it here, even though she didn't see Los Angeles through the same magical prism as she once did. She had been here a few times with her father as a girl falling in love with the mystique of it all - Hollywood, films, the glamour. She discovered as she became older that this was the stuff of make believe. Granted, being in the right neighborhoods you could see a film star sitting in the booth next to you while eating. However, you were more likely to see a disillusioned want-to-be film star serving you your breakfast, or dealing drugs on the street.

She and Jack had been in the city for a little over a week. Jack had rented a fully furnished luxury apartment. Jack left her largely to her own devices during the day while he "took care of business". She asked him a couple of times what he did when they were apart, however he would only discuss it in the most vaguest of terms despite intense prodding.

At first, Kaetlin suspected another woman, his sexual appetite which was ravenous and continuous (they made love several times a day). He never came back to her smelling of another woman or a fresh shower. She thought briefly that perhaps he was involved in shady dealings, although being associated with such actions were far too inconsistent, extremely difficult, with his memory loss. Kaetlin was fairly certain the memory loss could be no act.

Having sorted these issues in her mind, she became more relaxed. As with all things that begin feeling odd, the strangeness wore off, as they became more routine. After awhile, Kaetlin felt as if this was almost normal. He gave her a credit card in her name, telling her to entertain herself in any way she saw fit, which she was able to do easily. With her days occupied she obsessed less over his.

Two weeks to the day after they arrived, this routine changed. Jack came home, announcing an old friend of his was arriving from out of town and would be staying with them for a short while.

Kaetlin greeted this latest pronouncement with great reservations.

"An old friend?" Kaetlin asked. This revelation made her vary wary, "how is it that you can remember an old friend, but not your damn middle name?" She had become agitated.

"My middle name's Albert, isn't it? I'm not really sure why I remember my old buddy though, the brain being such a funny thing and all."

Jack shrugged off her concerns as he did them all. He reached into the refrigerator and pulled out a cold slice of pizza. Kaetlin didn't cook, so all prepared food in the rental apartment was takeout or delivery.

"That says nothing Jack. And you know it. Where did you meet this guy? I mean... this time... here in LA?"

"Well originally I met him in LA, but he doesn't live here now. He's in prison, or more accurately, getting out of prison. Tomorrow. I'm going to meet him at the bus station. To keep him out of the half way house and such. I had to hire him on as a driver, personal assistant, and so on. The parole board jumped at it. I was surprised at how far my name... dad's name it turns out... goes."

Kaetlin was upset and pulled him back on track, "Wait, wait, wait. You said nothing about meeting a prisoner when we came down here, no less having one stay with us. I don't know if I can deal with this."

Jack was smiling his enigmatically charming smile. Once again Kaetlin was swept up in the serial killer girlfriend's feeling of being willing bound to someone exciting, passionate but dangerously unknown.

"Don't worry," Jack said, "he was in for a white collar crime."

Of course he was, Kaetlin thought as she sighed with relief. It was embezzlement, fraud or something equally non-violent. Recent strange behavior or not, what other kind of criminal could someone of Jack's ilk know anyway?

"So what did he do to land him in prison... this whitecollar crime? Tax evasion? Fraud? Why are we putting him up?"

Jack finished chewing his mouthful before delivering the punch line, "Well, he went in because he shot... an old friend of mine through the chest. I figured we'd put him up for a while because I was the one who convinced him to do it. Even more than that," Jack smile wickedly, "I can say with complete earnestness, he made me the man I am today."

Kaetlin watched him for reaction. Surely he was kidding. He had to be.

While LM ran things, Lucy Maya had never been in a bus station. LM was fairly certain that the previous owner of this current body, Jack Wallace the blue blood, had never been in one either. Taking note of the neighborhood this particular Greyhound station was in, it was no wonder why. But here they were.

LM/Jack watched Arnie Williamson step off of the type of vehicle he formerly held a license to drive. The Presidency may differ from prison in every way possible, but they obviously both aged a man just as fast. Arnie at once struck Jack as having grown ultimately defiant yet quietly broken. This was a man who had obviously suffered the worse prison had to offer, only pure survival allowed him to build his outward shield of bold resistance he really didn't feel. Jack noted with some irony, that Arnie's spirit had been as shattered figuratively, as his had been literally.

Although Arnie was given a description of Jack, he wasn't exactly sure who he was looking for, so Jack approached him to shake hands. Arnie at once seemed glad almost in awe of Jack's presence. It was through Arnie's solemn eyes that reminded Jack exactly what he was, a spirit of a woman once twice dead, returned in the body of a man.

Arnie whispered tentatively, "Lucy"?

"No, not Lucy. I don't belong to that name any longer. Nor do I allow myself to think in those terms. Let's get this straight, Lucy is the woman with a hijacked body, living a life that rightfully should have been mine. I am," he bowed theatrically, "Jack Wallace. I am a product of extreme wealth whose only job in life is to do just barely enough to keep my father off of my back. I have more money than I can imagine spending, and no one to account to. I am, perfect for what lies ahead Mr. Williamson."

The sun caught the former bus driver's round spectacles, making it look for a moment as if his eyes sparkled upon hearing the revelation.

"That is why it made perfect sense that, you as a former bus driver, and I, being all about giving people a second chance at life, came to this agreement that you would drive me around town. Just what the parole board loves to hear - gainful employment."

"Now," Jack said placing his hand between Arnie's shoulder blades, "Let's get you a real suit, and maybe a steak. I'm sure prison grub is shit."

Despite himself, Arnie ate his streak greedily. Jack had been right, prison grub is shit and it had been years since he had a good meal. In fact, when Arnie was a free man earning bus driver's wages, never had a steak quite like this.

Arnie watched his new employer. Even knowing what (and who) he was. Jack Wallace was an odd collection of attributes. Jack was obviously a very fit, powerfully built man, in the easy way of gyms, running and perhaps the occasional manual labor when he fancied it. His body did not have a ruggedness to it. His manner was easy going, but nevertheless contrived. He had the occasional, but definitive female affectations of his current owner, which simply came across as being somewhat effeminate as opposed to what it really was, female. Nevertheless because of his well manicured, obvious cultured looks and clothing, Arnie was certain much of Jack's behavior was being contributed to his upper class pampered life.

But Jack also had the underlying, energy of the afterlife... not just the afterlife, but something else, something stronger... radiating from him. It was magnetic almost certainly couldn't be missed, even by those who didn't know of his origins. Arnie wondered how this was interpreted by those who happened across Jack's path. Intense sexual attraction maybe? Or perhaps, charisma - the kind which makes men go to war and down poison drinks to please their leaders? However they interpreted it, Arnie could feel it now, as he felt it in his dreams so long ago. This was the power, which made him shoot a woman in the chest and give up his own soul to bring LM in the form of another back into this world.

As Arnie listened to Jack speak, he realized Jack didn't just have a simple plan of destroying the invader of his old body and have her meet the eternal tortures. Jack had a long thought through plan, which would wreak havoc on her and all those who protected her.

The small voice of reason in the back of Arnie's mind told him that what Jack had in mind was going way too far, but he was long past listening to the voice in the back of his head. He was enslaved. With a creeping smile, he let the words flow over him willingly allowing himself to get pulled into Jack's scheme. All the way in.