Odeya's car was small, and filled to the gills with scuba gear. "I'll drive if you want," Hank offered. "There's plenty of room in the Bentley."

"No," she said as an order. "I have more in the trunk. They are things you can use if they fit."

He sized up her taut frame. "For me?" he asked, disbelieving.

She returned the favor, equally sizing him up as he stood outside her car. "Answer me, and look at my face when you do. I know many people, and for them I do many things. Out of kindness perhaps, out of goodness, and out of my love for them most of all. Shall I not do the same for you?"

Unsure of what to say, Hank entered the car in silence. "So… we're friends?" he asked after they had begun moving.

She pierced him with her iced coffee eyes. "We shall see."

Odeya was a member of a scuba diving club that organized group outings. There were a dozen or so members at the clubhouse, along with a few guests like Hank. While he signed himself in, she rented two tanks of oxygen.

"We'll be exploring a cove with a series of caves," she said. "We must use closed circuit breathers because exhaled gas isn't allowed."

She sidled up to Hank. While his borrowed wetsuit was basic black, hers was sky blue neoprene, with curve hugging bright yellow highlights.

"It's dangerous," she warned. "You'll see amazing things."

Hank was happy enough to go diving, but Odeya was intimidating. And stunning in her sky blue wetsuit. The kinky locks of her bronze hair spilled over her shoulders. The scent of lotus blossoms and heliotrope, all on a kiwifruit base, rode on the neoprene rubber.

She smelled good enough to eat. "Tell me again why I'm here," Hank said as they headed for the cove in a support vessel, along with thirteen other divers.

Odeya spoke directly into his ear, so others on board couldn't eavesdrop. "More likely than not, someone with us harbors hate. It festers in them like Sin. They'll look upon us with contempt, for in their eye we'll be worthy of vengeance. Of their form of penance."

She drew closer and whispered. "They will look upon us as if to die."

Hank was aghast. "We'll die?"

"They'll look at us as if we should die. And you, the all-knowing Hank-sama, will take note of this act and prevent it."

"Ah… okay. How?"

"Did you not already save Rio's heart? Did you bless her and deliver her from torment?" Odeya spoke like Rio, almost mocking her. "Deliver us all, great goshujin!"

Hank reared back, to puzzle at Odeya's brown face. As it was with Aika and oftentimes with Rio, he wondered how he had managed to meet so many crazy women who liked talking cryptically.

Odeya was unfazed by his scowl. "You pay no attention to fear, so you'll show no concern over his hatred, and ease us with your faith." She scanned the people around her, to try to pick out any bad guys. "Death will be bayed by your presence."

Hank was unimpressed. He stared at the water near the boat.

"If you say so," he muttered.

While Hank enjoyed exploring the caves, Odeya spent her time observing the other divers. As her guest, he had to stay near her, so when she trailed after someone who seemed to be on his own, Hank dutifully followed. They entered a crevice lit from above by a blowhole. The rock ceiling was dry in some places, where glowworms had spun nests of silk. Their hanging flytrap threads made the cave look like a cathedral.

Odeya floated still and silent, watching the lone diver. A sunbeam streamed in from the blowhole and, along with a thousand glowworms, the cave sparkled with light. But the water around the lone diver held no light at all, as if a black cloud surrounded him. Like a gentle breeze twirling in circles, the blackness reached out towards other divers, to strangle them with whispery tentacles. In fear, Odeya gripped Hank's elbow as a tentacle managed to wrap itself around the throat of an unsuspecting diver. He convulsed, and the tentacle dissolved. The victim quickly surfaced, to fiddle with his respirator.

Odeya gave Hank a knowing look. The tentacles continued to prey on other divers, but were too weak to do any harm. After a minute more of observing this phenomena, Hank convulsed himself. Odeya trembled as filth poured out of his wetsuit from every pore and crevice. He was engulfed in black in an instant. Unlike the wispy tentacles of the hateful diver, Hank's cloud was voluminous. It grew toward Odeya, intent on devouring her.

She backpedaled ferociously to escape and drew her diving knife. After regaining her composure, she came at Hank with the willful intent of slitting his throat open. From within the cloud, he presented himself to her with arms out and palms up. He showed her she need not fear him, for the black cloud now trailed him like a cape, massive but under control.

Odeya!

She froze, awestruck. You're in my soul!

You see me in mine too.

You carry the sins of world.

I'm okay.

I'm afraid.

Hank lurched again, his face showing pain. Filth belched forth again, this time it being Rio's monsters and demons and grizzlies. They were too much for Hank to control. They swooped down and absorbed Odeya, but found her an unsuitable host. They then noticed the hateful diver. Roaring off, they entered his body, taking Hank's black cape with them as they left.

The diver swelled visibly. Odeya swam at him with her knife to gut him like a fish, but Hank grabbed her and forced her to surface. He took hold of the hand she held the knife in by the wrist, using his other hand to remove her respirator.

She sputtered and swore in Yiddish. "You yutz! Shtik drek! He'll fight with his brothers and kill them! He will defile their children!"

"You don't know that."

"In a world rife with whoredom, no man has mercy on another." She viewed Hank with the same contempt as she did the hateful diver. "You did this! I should kill you as well!"

He loosened his grip on her knife to see if she'd follow through on her words. "You're not that type of person," he said.

She attacked, almost sticking her knife up his nose. "Aha! And you, my handsome mamzer, don't know shit about me!"

"Yes I do. I've been in your soul. Remember? And you've been in mine, so you know me too."

With her knife still in his face, tears melted the ice in her eyes. "How could you do that?" she cried. "And why? Why did you do that to him?"

Hank searched for words as he gazed at the water. "Rio has… and I guess I've been too—she's been fighting bad guys for a very long time. They want to us dead, and…"

He fell silent, ashamed of what he had done. "There's so much evil in the world," Odeya said with understanding. "Bad people outnumber the good."

"I don't believe you!"

"Many paths lead us to Hell. Only one leads to God. Good people follow his law, but evil knows no such bound."

"Do you think what I did was evil? To that man? I didn't mean it."

Odeya stared at Hank, going deep into thought. "A winnowing is at hand," she said. "Souls will be gathered like wheat. Wind and fire will thresh us, separating grain from the chaff."

Of all the Reality Makers Hank had met since becoming a Dot, Odeya was the most troubling. She was so sure of herself, so convincing.

So gosh darn, goddamn scary. "I see it in my mind," she said. "A savior descends like a dove. We pave a way for him, through chaos and ash. He leads us not with a sword but with his heart, and through him the good Earth is saved."

"And you think that guy is me."

The ice in Odeya's eyes retrurned. "I know a way to find out."

At the end of their diving excursion, Hank showered and got ready to go, but found Odeya still in her wetsuit. She had washed her hair and again smelled like flowers and kiwifruit, with flip-flops on her feet and a dark zipper sweatshirt to keep her body warm.

"Suit up," she ordered. "We're not done."

"No. It's not my suit and it's gross. It's late and I want to go home."

Odeya softened. "Please. It's important."

He gathered up her gear and carried it to her car. "Thank you for taking me diving. I couldn't have done it myself."

Odeya drove slow while taking Hank back to Rio. She grew sad as the shoreline slipped away.

"What's wrong?" he asked when she sniffled.

Her face contorted as she searched for words. "Rio was so sure about you. She said you saved her from the devil!"

It was Hank's turn to search for words. "I don't know what to think, Odeya. Things happen, and they keep getting worse. It's like, you know… I should be happy. I have so many new friends." He gently touched her arm. "Beautiful women like you. But people are dying, and… am I to blame?"

Odeya almost smiled, but looked severe instead. "You must let me find out."

Hank huffed. Not with indignity, like the way Anna sometimes did, but with resignation. He eyed up Odeya in her blue wetsuit.

"I take it this 'finding out' involves water," he said, recalling his lessons with Aika in her bath.

"Fire and water are baptismal, but water holds greater power. Fire dies when confronted by water. Water never leaves us." Odeya eyes hardened as she returned his stare. "Just as hate dies when it meets love."

"And love lasts forever," Hank noted.

She drove past a bay where people parked seaplanes while in town for a visit. Hank guided her to a man-made tidal pool he knew about, where swells from the ocean would settle before entering the seaplane bay. Over the years, ambitious youths had further sculpted the pool, making one end deeper than the other. There, with boulders in the water to sit on, a bonfire pit lay on shore under an eroded outcropping. As Hank had often done as a teenager, he built a fire out of driftwood and lit it.

He sat on a rock in the water with Odeya as the day turned to dusk. The fire grew, and she unzipped her wetsuit to let out the heat. The musculature of her chest lay in contrast to charmeuse bikini cups covered with ocelot spots.

Hank couldn't help but take note of her body. The scent of the fire and her fruity shampoo were drilling holes of lust in his head. She noticed him as well, and, after a while and in silence, she stood before him and unzipped all the way, revealing her matching ocelot bikini bottom. He responded to her roving eyes by removing his shirt. Now seated before her wearing only a knee length pair of black Speedoos, Hank's alabaster skin glowed white in the firelight.

With the fire behind Odeya igniting her aura, her dark skin made her look like a shadow. Only ocelot spots could be seen, cupping her teats and crotch.

"God takes away sin when a person is baptized," she said as she drew near. "Have you been baptized?"

"Yes of course, as a child."

"Now you shall be as a man. I don't know you, but water will reveal you. Rise and present yourself."

He did as she ordered. Because of the pool's steep grade, he towered over her, as she stood in deeper water. Taking him by the hand, she closed the gap between them. Even so, with his height and the pool's different depths, his hips were in line with her midsection. Her gaze broke when his manhood bumped her belly, and her eyes fell to his Speedoos.

Her composure broke as well. "If the devil is in you," she quipped while smirking at his generous gift, "he has welcoming attributes."

He brought her hand to his mouth and kissed it. "I'm welcoming regardless," he quipped back.

A sigh escaped Odeya. Embarrassed, she gave a rare smile. Hank smiled back and everywhere in her, ice melted. She leaned towards him, only slightly, but he noticed and pulled her in. With the fire warming her back and he igniting her loins, she caved into his will. He gained control of Reality with her, and dragged her into his willingly.

"Lamb of God," she whispered, her head against his chest.

"Take away the sins of the world," he replied, almost reflexively.

"Have mercy on me."

"I will."

With Odeya guiding Hank's mind, the Universe opened for him. Or perhaps he had died and fell from it. Night took the color from the world, mingling black with white. The sizzle in his brain matched the cadence of the bonfire's crackle as she searched for welcoming spots on his torso with her warm wet hands. He nestled his nose in her hair and achingly inhaled its scent. Like he had done for Rio when she was bound to the pipes of her shower, Odeya brought more peace to Hank's soul than he had ever known. He squeezed her ass with powerfrul hands, lifting her to her toes to keep her hair in his face.

Eternity passed. Everlasting. Odeya was no longer a rival, a champion who sought to best Hank. And he was neither student nor master. Together, they became one.

Earthly reality returned for a moment when she began bending him backwards, her right hand working its way up his spine until she cradled his neck. From there, his mouth was one blessed inch away from her left breast. Flat and nondescript, its softness blended perfectly with hard pectoral muscle. A caramel nipple swelled beneath its bikini cup, luscious and ready for suckling.

"No weapon against you shall prosper," Odeya said as she dipped Hank's head in the water. "Those who hold judgment on you be condemned." She let him straighten up before dipping him again. "This is the heritage you shall receive as a servant of God."

Hank visited a world next door that seemed eons away. In it, he swam with Odeya, in water with fire and ice.

His fire. Her ice.

Their water.

"You may not kiss me," she said.

"That's not gonna happen, I'm afraid."

Although she let him ravish her, she dug her nails in his back, threatening to rake him bloody. He found lines of sinew on her neck, tracing them with his teeth. On his way down he found her collarbone, and traced that with his tongue.

She grabbed his ears and pried him off, speaking from a moment away. "Don't touch my lips," she demanded, stabbing with her coffee eyes.

"That request I will honor."

In his grasp, Odeya bent backwards, far farther than one ought to go. Her left foot rose to its toes, while her right one left the seabed completely. It traveled the length of Hank's leg, rising higher and higher, until she locked her calf muscle in the cleft of his buttocks. From this precarious pose, she dared him to drown her, much like how Rio had dared him to smash her skull on the floor of her quarters at Milton's while hanging helpless in his arms.

Instead, Hank laid Odeya's hair out on the water. Its bronze highlights caught the faint gasps of light the day still contained. Her face was centered in her aura like a sundial, with his beaming down at her fully. She exposed her throat and he sought to chew it, his eyes widening while hers closed.

Night fell and they never moved, the only life a roaring fire.

Odeya fed Hank trail mix she had made herself as they sat on towels while drying in her car. She rewarded him with a treat whenever he pleased her.

He made sure he pleased her often. "A man doesn't grow wise just by words," she said. "He becomes fearless first."

Hank had already proven he had no fear. It earned him a granola cluster popped in his mouth by his new friend.

"He is peaceful, he is loving…"

"Yes," Hank said in agreement while chewing his treat.

"Then he becomes wise," she said after popping in another. She put the next bit of trail mix in her mouth, and locked eyes with him as they chewed. "Tell me," she said after swallowing. "Do you know where your cell phone is?"

"Well… it's in the plane wreck, I suppose."

"Do you think it burned up? Is it broken?"

"It was far away, and the grass was damp. It might still be okay."

Hank was giving wrong answers, so Odeya ate the next treat. "Or perhaps someone found it, do you think, and now they know it's yours."

"Okay."

"Rio's luggage was on that plane."

"Yes."

"And yet she was not. And you live with her. People might find that odd. They might say that together, you caused the plane to crash."

"That's not true!"

Odeya again ate the next treat. "It doesn't matter what's true. What matters is what people believe. And if they believe you brought down a plane full of people, they will come after you."

Shocked and with nothing to eat, Hank's gaze fell to the floor. Odeya craned her neck, watching his eyes drop. She leaned towards his face to halt their descent, bending with her head low, until it was in line his navel.

She forced him to lock eyes with her. "I'm… I'm sorry," he stammered, not knowing what to say.

She dismissed him by raising her head and looking out her side window. "It's better to be strong than sorry," she told the gloom and dark.

"No. It's better to be kind."

She whirled to face him, ice glaring. "We'll find out soon, won't we?" She slowly closed her eyes. "I hear the oars of a boat in the night, crossing the River Jordan. For the moment I must forsake you, but with mercy I gather you in."

"Thank you," Hank said, his reward a sweet treat.

"What you did to that diver was wrong. You filled him with the devil."

"It's not my fault! It was… I don't know. He sucked it from me somehow."

"He'll use it to sin. He will commit murder."

"Do you think he'll come after us?" Hank's soul screamed to save others. Oh God yes! Kill me!

Odeya rewarded his selflessness with a granola cluster. "Everybody suffers," she said sweet. "It's a simple fact. But bliss is obtained by detaching oneself from the vagaries of the world."

She brought her lips near his while popping a treat in both his mouth and hers. "Take us with you when you go," she said before resting her head on his lap. "Show us the way."

Keep me forever, my Lord.