Cat's Pajamas by James Morrow

Temujin traveling to Urga and allying with Wang Khan… our hero falling to the Mongol arrow and hiding in a cave… Bortai returning to her depraved Tartar father… Jamuga inadvertently leading Kumlek’s henchmen to his blood brother… Temujin struggling beneath the weight of an ox-yoke as his captors march him toward Kumlek’s camp (an image that inspired one of Stuart’s students, in a paper that received a B-minus, to call Wayne’s character a Christ figure)… our hero standing humbled before the Tartar chief… Bortai becoming conscious of her love for Temujin and forthwith aiding his escape… Temujin arriving half-dead in the Mongol camp…
    At no point in this cavalcade of nonsense did either Temujin or his mother acquire a perceptible shield against the omnipresent radiation. But then, as my third major scene hit the screen—Hunlun treating her son’s wound—something utterly amazing occurred. A rainbow aura, glowing and pulsing like Joseph’s Coat of Many Colors, materialized on Hunlun’s head and torso as she uttered the line, “Would that I could cure the madness that possesses you!”
    It’s the pot, I told myself. I’m high on hemp, and I’m seeing things.
    â€œGood God!” I gasped.
    â€œYou’ve done it, Ms. Rappaport!” shouted Kieran.
    â€œI see it too!” cried Duke. “She’s got a damn rainbow around her!”
    â€œWang Khan—he will betray you into disaster,” insisted Hunlun, “or rob you of your spoils in victory.”
    But then, to my dismay, the crone’s anti-radiation suit started to dissolve.
    â€œConcentrate!” cried Kieran
    My cloak continued to fade.
    â€œFocus, Egghead!” demanded Duke.
    I stared at the screen, concentrating, concentrating.
    Hunlun insisted, “Were you not blinded by lust for this woman?”
    â€œLust?!” echoed Temujin. “You, too, are blind, my mother—blinded by your hatred for her.”
    â€œShields at maximum, Ms. Rappaport!” shouted Kieran. “We’re going to make you well!”
    In a full-spectrum flash, red to orange to yellow to green to blue to indigo to violet, Hunlun’s aura returned. “Daughter of Kumlek!” she sneered.
    â€œWay to go, Ms. Rappaport!” exclaimed Kieran.
    â€œCongratulations!” cried Duke.
    â€œEven if you were right about Wang Khan, yet I would venture this unaided,” said Temujin. Sealed head to toe in her luminous armor, Hunlun glowered at her son. “For I will have Bortai,” he continued, “though I and all of us go down to destruction.”
    The scene ended with a dissolve to Jamuga riding through the gates of Urga, whereupon Kieran picked up the remote control and stopped the tape. It would be best, he explained, to quit while my triumph was at its zenith and the quantum vibrations were still folding back into the space-time continuum.
    â€œSounds reasonable to me,” said Duke.
    â€œSoon it will come to pass that the gamma rays never even penetrated your body.” Kieran ejected the cassette. “Ms. Rappaport, I must applaud you. By reweaving the cosmic tapestry, you have conquered your past and reshaped your future.”
    â€œThat aura wasn’t real,” I said, wondering whether I believed myself. “It was an illusion born of Jack Daniels and marijuana.”
    â€œThat aura was more real than the bricks in this building or the teeth in my jaw,” said Kieran.
    Duke caught my eye, then waved his shot glass in Kieran’s direction. “Told you this guy’s a pro. Most swamis don’t know their higher planes from a hole in the ground, but you’re in good hands with Doc Morella.”
    â€œI hope you’re not jealous, Duke,” I said. “There was no aura. It was just the booze and the dope.”
    â€œI’ve had a full life, Egghead.”
    For the third time in a week