A Measure of Justice

Carter let out a sigh.

"Okay. I read you. But I’m telling you, you don’t want to hear it. Now take some good advice and leave well enough alone."

"If I’d done that, I would have finished what I started last night and we’d both have a lot fewer problems by now. Or a whole lot more. All I’m asking is you give me the chance to show you I’m sincere in my desire to share your trials and tribulations. The way you’re acting now makes me feel like all the rest of the world has for the past four years. Nobody wants to trust me. You’re making me feel closed out. It’s like there’s a wall between us. I don’t want to tear the wall down, I just want you to trust me enough to let me come inside it for a little while."

Carter shook his head. "You sure don’t give up, do you?"

"Not when it’s important to me."

"You drive a hard bargain, Sugar."

"You have to sometimes in order to get a good deal."

Carter nodded.

"You’re not going to let up on me, are you?"

"Nope."

"Well then, make yourself comfortable, honey, and try to keep an open mind, because you won’t believe three-fourths of what you’re about to hear."

The sun was setting when Silvan Carter Lynx finished telling Shanli Rae Jonquil his life story up to where he stumbled on her. He didn’t mince any words or leave out any details. The truth she wanted, the truth she got. When he was done, they both lay silent. Sugar was on her side resting her head in her hand. She had listened to Carter without saying a word.

"That’s about it, love," Carter said as he looked off into the mountains to the east.

Sugar watched him for a moment then raised up and took his face in her hands and kissed him long and lovingly on the lips. She pulled away and laid her head on his right shoulder with her arm around his waist and closed her eyes.

Carter reached up with his right hand and stroked her silky hair, then moved his arm down around her waist. They lay there holding each other, not saying a word. An hour later they were both asleep.

***

All of a sudden, Carter felt something nudge him in the back and a huge shadow went gliding over him and down into the ocean. He kept fighting and pulling against the current. The giant shadow turned and came back. Carter turned his right eye in its direction. He tried to focus on what was coming toward him at a very high rate of speed.

‘Couldn’t be a shark in these frigid waters,’ he thought. "Maybe a killer whale?’

The giant sea creature came back and nudged Carter again. It swam up and over and all around him. He could feel it’s body brush by, but in the darkness couldn’t tell what it was. The creature bumped him again, pushed him for twenty yards, stopped, then started swimming around him in circles once more.

The push broke the tug of the undertow. Carter pulled with all his strength toward the surface glare he could barely see. He looked at his depth gauge. Ninety feet.

The creature came back and hovered next to him. It nudged him and swam at his side. It was too close for Carter to identify, but he figured if it was going to eat him it would surely have done so by now.

With the help of the sea creature, Carter made it slowly back to the surface. The pain in his head began to subside. He gained some use of his left arm, so he began to pull hard with both arms. His left leg was still paralyzed. The mysterious creature kept swimming with and around Carter as he struggled to get to the surface. Every thirty seconds or so it would push him upward with it’s nose.

Finally, Carter made it to the outer edge of the undertow. He fought with all his strength to break free. He almost made it, but his strength ran out. He was completely exhausted and had to stop to rest his aching right arm. He felt himself being sucked back down by the powerful water currents. He tried to fight but it was useless. All of his strength was gone. The undertow was too strong.

Just as he was about to give up and let fate have its way with him, the giant creature came brushing by him. In one last fighting effort, Carter reached out and tried to grab ahold of it. His hand slid along the full length of its smooth body. As it moved down along the tail, Carter felt a protruding fin. He grabbed it and held on with all of the strength he had left.

The creature began to pull Carter through the water. He could see the light of the surface coming at them and was completely out of the pull of the undertow. A few seconds later, Carter and the creature broke the surface. Carter let go of the fin and spit out his mouthpiece. He gasped and gulped the cold northern air into his lungs. Something hit him in the back of the head. He turned to see if it was the mysterious sea creature. It was a chunk of free-floating ice. Carter grabbed a

hold and rested.

As he held on to the chunk of ice, he felt the creature brush him beneath the surface.

"I don’t know who or what you are, friend," Carter said, looking down at the giant shadow swimming playfully around him, "but thanks. That’s one I owe you."