Confusion and Understanding

My eyes didn’t open, because they were already open. What happened was that things snapped back into focus. I couldn’t tell if it was because something had finally gone right with my eyes, or finally gone right with my brain. I had no idea how much time had passed, but as I looked around, I wasn’t in the sewer anymore. I was in what sure looked like a cliched ‘Indian Temple’ out of a Hollywood movie.

The place was as empty as a movie set, after hours, something I’ve seen a few times when film crews want the ‘authentic Gotham experience’ and half the damn GCPD is deployed to make sure they don’t get it and embarrass the city.

Except I wasn’t alone. Fucking Mr. Freeze was there with me. I instantly tried to bring up Drop Dead, wherever I’d been teleported too, it was just the two of us, if he had a suit failure, or whatever, I could get the hell out of here! That didn’t work. Not because of some sort of protection, but because the app was gone from my head.

And my phone, which was simply an unresponsive piece of glass and plastic…because this wasn’t real. As I realized when Mr. Freeze’s hand slipped through my shoulder, then slammed a fist against, no, through a wall, before he tried to trigger his freeze gun, then grumbled, “Mother of God, again? This witch best not die before she fulfills our bargain.”

“Huh?” I managed, articulate as ever. “Where are we?”

“Some magical place.”

“Uh…okay. How do we get out of here?”

Massive armored shoulders shrugged. “I will search this way,” he pointed out of the temple. “You search that way. Shout if you find a way out.”

I nodded. As he turned away, I spoke to his back, unable to resist the obvious point. “Anything Jinx can do, Zatanna can match.”

He glanced over his shoulder contemptuously, but I think Parley was still working, as he chose to answer though his thick accent made it had to understand him. “Jinx cannot do it yet. Only when she has completed the ritual will she have the power to do so.”

“Zatanna’s more powerful than Jinx,” I said with a confidence I did not feel.

“Then why has she not helped my wife already?”

“Have you ever asked her to? Let her examine your wife?”

Freeze glared at me, but here it was all he could do. “You go that way. I go this way. Yell if you find anything.”

I nodded, surprised he was letting me go off on my own…of course, it’s not like he could stop me, in our current state. I headed off in the agreed direction, no point in breaking an agreement when I hoped Parley was still in effect. And I didn’t have any better ideas.

I walked deeper and deeper into the temple and it began to…twist and change from something that matched my Hollywood-based notion of Indian temples to something more…realistic? There was dirt, brighter colors, strange to my eye artwork and patterns and the lights shifted from simply ‘standard Hollywood light coming from somewhere’ to actually clear specific light sources, not electric, but rather small glowing balls that simply floated in the air.

As I walked, suddenly Jinx appeared, younger, with another woman, both in swaddling robes, Jinx’s was fairly simple, while the other woman’s had gold embroidery and jewels. Jinx was barely recognizable given the robes rather than her current, borderline obscene outfits and elaborate hairstyling, rather than shaved head, but it was her, I was sure…which made the fact that the other woman she was with called her Aditi, somewhat confusing, the app had claimed her name was Zaawadi. Maybe this group used other names?

Despite the fact that they were clearly speaking some language besides English, based on mouth movements, I still understood that Jinx was being directed to lessons in magic.

Which meant she might understand. I spoke, “Jinx, can you--”

The scene shifted and a woman in the same robes Jinx was wearing was **** on the ground, a tea cup lying by her side. Jinx was dressed in the clothes of a poor, but respectable woman, she leaned over the other woman, “Don’t worry, Aditi,” she purred, “I will make sure everyone in the temple knows your name. Aditi will rise high, where Zaawadi never could.”

She started to strip the other woman and the scene cut away as I kept walking. It didn’t seem to matter what direction I walked, or how much I tried to interact with Jinx, or anyone else, I couldn’t change what I was seeing, or interact with it.

Moments flashed past, lessons, magical challenges and duels, which ‘Aditi’ seemed to be doing quite well at. Her robes grew ever more ornamented, jewels began to appear on fingers, chains, hairpins, everywhere. As her body ripened towards the lush figure that had appeared in the app, her confidence and power transparently grew.

Her dominance was not simply natural talent, I caught glimpses of encounters with the other women, where she was stealing knowledge, gaining power, gaining connections, casting spells over sleeping lovers…in a not particularly flattering way, it reminded me of what I was doing, though she could not effect the mind, only luck. But that was enough to give her excuses and put others in her debt.

The temple mostly housed women, but there was another compound, which contained men, undergoing similar training, as I saw when she frequently snuck over there, listening in to their lessons, stealing knowledge, seducing tutors and students alike as she tried to learn knowledge that was forbidden.

From what I gathered, the two compounds trained in different arts, the men mastering the mind and body, while the women mastered the external elements. No one was supposed to master both. Indeed, it was claimed that that was impossible for anyone. Only the Great Couple, Master and Mistress of the sect could use all the powers, and only after they came together in a joining which would unlock all their powers through the power of tantric sex magics taught only to them. It seemed to be true, as her best efforts could not unlock the magics taught to the men.

Which realization triggered another scene. The mistress was dead, killed, quietly, by Jinx. It was time for a new selection and it would be her. I could feel her confidence, her certainty as the old Master walked down the line of beautiful women, to select his new partner. She was the strongest, the smartest, the most skilled and even the most beautiful, he could not choose anyone else.

So, of course, he did. Little Ira, the newest student, whose only claim to fame was that she was a virgin, declining even the touch of her fellow acolytes. And Jinx discovered something else could unlock more of her potential. All consuming hatred. It didn’t give her the powers she’d trained in, but it elevated her existing power and as her first act was to burn the Great Master and Ira to ash, no one else was able to stand against her.

She stood in the ashes of the temples for a long time, then shaved off her hair, abandoned her robes and walked out as the Jinx I…somewhat, knew.

And for the first time, she looked directly at me, having ignored all attempts at communication before this.

It would be nice to say that watching all this shit had awakened some magical power within me…but it sure hadn’t, and now I was trapped, without the app, alone in the mind of a psychotic, power-hungry murderer.