Chapter Eight: Power and Responsibility

Jess dragged Tommy down to her own common room and asked him to wait while she checked if her roommate was in. While he waited he grabbed a green Crayola crayon and colored in some seaweed on one of the giant Sponge Bob coloring pages. A few seconds later Jess poked her head out of her door and motioned from him to come in. Her roommate was gone. Thomas closed his hand around the sapphire around his neck and hesitated. He was full of excitement, worry, trepidation, and exhilaration. His stomach turned as three dozen butterflies beat their furious wings. He placed the green crayon back in the box taped to the wall and looked at Jess.

Jessica was waving her hand at him, waving him into the room. “Come on! ” She hissed.

He looked back towards the hall that would eventually take him back to his own room. This was a bad idea. He shouldn’t share this secret with anyone. He hadn’t even known Jess for a full day. He couldn’t know if he could trust her yet. But, she had been there with him. With the help of the soul transformation he had saved her dignity and possibly her life. Who else could he share this secret with?

“No one,” a small voice whispered in his head. “Trust no one.”

“Come on!”  Jess hissed again.

This is probably a bad idea, he thought. But he pushed the voice and the feelings of danger away and walked into Jess’  room.

Jess’ room was plastered in so many different colors and decorations that it took Tommy time to take in all of it. Jess had covered all the walls in the room with glossy wrapping paper covered in a skull and bones motif on a pink background. Taped to the walls were posters from half a dozen different bands, Gamma Ray, Nightwish, Linkin Park, and a variety of others. Most of the singers were made out in gothic and punkish styles. Some of them had long, flowing hair while others had their hair glued into tall spikes. A calendar featuring the world of Tolkien hung above the bed. Jess’  bed was made up with purple sheets and a striped blanket that was covered in lines upon lines of dark colors. Blues, and golds, and reds, and greens tore across her bed: Thomas thought that it was like looking at a rainbow in a dark dimension. He turned around in a slow circle, gazing at the entire room.

“It’s neat, isn’t it?” Jess asked.

Tommy nodded.

“The paper falls down a lot,” she said. “But I have lots of extra duct tape to put it all back up. My roommate hates me almost as much as yours does…  but not quite. This is better than teddy bears,” she laughed.

“It is. I’ve never seen anything so…  garishly fascinating.”

“Is that supposed to be a good thing?”

“I think so. This is definitely the brightest room I’ve ever been in.”

“Alright. I want to see.”

The butterflies in Thomas’ stomach turned into a tornado. “Now?”

“Yes, now!”

Tommy looked at the floor, refusing to meet Jess’ eyes. “Okay,” he murmured.

He held the sapphire necklace in his hands and stared into it’s depths. He remembered the feeling of having his soul merge with the Sapphire Soldier’s, the comfort of having it wrap around him like a blanket. He yearned for that comfort again, that feeling of protection and power; however, a part of him prayed that it wouldn’t work. Part of him hoped that this entire experience had been nothing more than a strange dream. Terrified that it would work; terrified that it wouldn’t work, he reached into the sapphire with his…  what? Mind? Feelings? Empathy? He wasn’t sure. But he reached into the blue stone with something and felt the Sapphire Soldier’s soul rushing towards him.

“Sapphire Soul Transformation!” The words burst from him in a shout he could barely control. The blue light flashed, transforming his clothes and body. Tommy and the soldier merged their souls.

Sapphire watched Jess through the brilliant blue glow. Jessica was squinting her eyes against the light, trying to see the transformation take place. As the light faded her eyes grew wide in shock and amazement. She stared at Sapphire  in silence, unable to think of anything to say. Sapphire stared back, leaning casually on her staff. Her hair had grown all the way down to her upper thighs; it had turned azure blue, and it was held in place by a large sapphire hair tie. They stared at each other for several long moments as the silence spun out between them. Then Sapphire dropped her gaze to the floor.

“Well?” She asked as her face turned red.

Jess didn’t say anything. Sapphire wanted to say something else, but she didn’t know what to say. The butterflies were still making their home in her insides, even after the transformation, and as the silence continued she felt them turning from a tornado into a full-fledged hurricane.

“Jess?” She whispered.

Jess took a deep breath, “Tommy, even your voice has changed. This is… it’s… amazing.”

Relief flooded through Sapphire. “Jess, don’t call me that. No one else can ever know who I am. I am called Sapphire.”

“You are called Sapphire? By whom?”

Sapphire pondered the question for long moments before she answered. “I’m not sure. But it’s true. I am called Sapphire.”

“Okay,” Jess said. “I love your hair. And that staff, it’s wonderful.”

“It’s an unfortunate necessity. And it’s cold.”

“It is?”

“Yes.”

“Can I hold it?” Jess asked.

Sapphire held the staff out to her. Jess pulled it away from her and gasped as the cold crystal filled her hands. Sapphire saw that goose bumps were already sprouting across Jess’ arms in little white prickles. Jess managed to hold onto the staff for several seconds before dropping it to the floor with a clang. She jumped away from it gasping as she shook her hands.

“God, that’s not cold. It’s frigid!”

“I did warn you,” Sapphire said, leaning down to pick up the frosty weapon.

“You know,” Jess said, “this isn’t how I thought it would be.”

“How what would be?”

Jess waved vaguely at Sapphire, “You, this, I mean, you’re a girl. Look at you!”

“I know.”

“I thought that I’d want to…  I don’t know. Dress you up, paint your nails or put makeup on you, or something! But…”

Sapphire looked at the floor and felt a few of the butterflies come back. “But what?”

“Tommy, no, Sapphire…  this scares me. What’s happening? What are you going to do? Who are you?”

“I don’t know what’s happening, Jess, and I don’t know what I’m going to do, or if I should do anything. But I am still who I was before you saw me turn into… this.”

“You’re a girl, Sapphire. You aren’t just dressed as a girl. You don’t just look like a girl. If you were to strip naked I would bet everything I own that you are a girl.”

“I know.”

“And you want me to believe that you are the same person I met this morning?”

Sapphire stared at the floor in silence.

“I like you; I like you a lot. I can tell that you are going to be a good friend, and I’m sure you are more…  weirded out by this whole thing than I am. But you should still figure out who you are, what you are.”

“I know,” Sapphire whispered.

“What does this mean to you?” Jess asked.

“I don’t know.”

“Well think about it.”

“I don’t know Jess! I haven’t had time to think about it.”

“You have time now.”

“Jess, I don’t even know how to start thinking about it. I don’t even believe it’s real yet. I’m sure that in a few minutes or hours I’ll wake up in my bed at home and find out that this is just some twisted dream about my fears of leaving home and going to school.”

“You can’t run away from this,” Jess said.

“Why not? I’m good at running.”

“Sapphire, running won’t solve anything. I’m going to tell you the most clichéd saying in comic book history. I don’t even read comics and I know the saying…  but it’s also true. ‘With great power comes great responsibility.’ I don’t know what’s happening to you, but if the half of what you told me about our encounter with the gang is true, and I’m sure it is, then for some reason you have power. What are you going to do with the responsibility?”

“Jess! Have you listened to yourself? Comic book history?”

“What do you mean?”

“Jess… my life isn’t a comic. I’m not a super hero! This is all new to me. I don’t know what I’m going to do with this so called responsibility. I’m not even convinced I have responsibility. And what do you want me to do? Go fight Doctor Octavious or something?”

“I know. You’re right. This is just so strange, I’m trying to get my head around it.”

“Me too, Jess. Me too,” Sapphire replied.

Sapphire knew that she should separate her soul and get some sleep. It was nearing four in the morning, and she was going to be dead all day if she didn’t at least get a few hours of rest. But she also knew that even if she went back to her room she wouldn’t sleep. How could she ever sleep again? She was already suffering from insomnia before tonight, unable to sleep because of the thoughts whirling and buzzing in her mind. What would she do now?

“Jess,” Sapphire said timidly, “this is going to kill me.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, I’m already torn between my sexual identity. Am I straight, gay, bi? I don’t know. And now… this. I’m a boy that transforms into some sort of mystical girl. And I like this, Jess. Being the way I am now is comforting, and I don’t know if that’s just because my soul is wrapped in the soul of another, or if it’s because of the physical changes that I’ve gone through. How am I ever going to figure out who I am after this?”

Jess wrapped Sapphire in a hug. “I don’t know, Sapphire,” she said, “but I’ll be here for you to help you figure it out… and I’ll try to be a little less pushy. I tend to get aggressive when I’m worried.”

Sapphire hugged her friend back, awkwardly holding her staff out of the way. “Thanks,” she said. “Can we sit and talk until tomorrow?”

“Let’s do it,” Jess said. “Screw sleep.”

Jess hopped onto her bed and sat cross-legged. She patted the bed in front of her, motioning for Sapphire to join her. Sapphire leaned her staff against the wall and hopped up as well, and sitting on the bed facing each other the two passed the wee hours of the morning talking about everything that was important, and some things that were not.