The Liberation of Juliet

“It should be just below you,” Bailey stated over the biocranial earpiece. “The insertion point is act one, scene five, line one hundred and ten. The masked ballroom scene of Romeo and Juliet.”

“Ok, I’m at scene three now,” Naomi replied watching the lines flash before her eyes in a blur, “I should be there soon.”

“Are you sure you want to continue? This is your fifth insertion this week, there is no telling how this new technology will affect you. When you left the Odyssey you were constantly saying epithets and remember how you couldn’t stop speaking in iambic pentameter after your last insertion into a Shakespearian play? Keep in mind that this insertion is on a different scale. We haven’t attempted anything as large as Romeo and Juliet before,” Bailey warned.

“I cannot rest, the universal suffrage of women drives me forward. How can I rest while the literature of men continues to deceive women of this generation to submit to further oppression. It was fate that led your genius to discover the literary insertion device and now I must use it to remove all patriarchal characters from literature. If we stand united there is hope yet and this invention of yours may well turn the tide.”

“Well once I discovered that the imagination of readers creates a matrix framework which can be entered into physophysically it was easy for me to create the correct mental state which uploads the mind into that matrix. Yet without your vision this great tool could have further supported men’s dominance by educating young mouldable minds with lies. It was your vision that drove me to use it for good. Your name will be forever recorded in history,” Bailey said with great adoration.

“We must be liberated from our vindictive dictators of the opposite sex. Their malevolent domination which results in our atrocious servile state must be overturned, for the cause of feminism. I must press on and remove the male supremacy in all great literature no matter the consequences to my health or sanity,” Naomi replied with grim determination set in her face. “I see the insertion point, I’m going in.”

Immediately her senses were flooded. The imagination of millions visibly manifested their emotions and passions into the objects of the room. In every line and verse she could see a multitude of thoughts and inspirations. The thoughts of the love impassioned readers shone like brilliance bringing the whole room into light. The envies of single maidens and the longing of young men accentuated the masked figures sweeping across the floor as they danced. Yet it was clear the focus of this collective intelligence was not on them but rather on a young couple standing near the entryway. Halos of adoration from aficionados surrounded their dual silhouette. While their faces expressed a subtle combination of the desires of the love stricken and the crushed hope of the heart broken. This crushed hope deepened Romeo’s dark eyes and strengthened the ardent intensity with which he gazed upon Juliet’s radiant complexion which was illuminated by the desires of the infatuated imaginations.

Never before had Naomi experienced anything like this. The range and depth of emotion from the readers was unparalleled in any other book she had been inserted in before. The sheer strength of the emotions bore into her very soul until guilt stricken she began to question her very reason for coming. She stood before the most beautiful and precious thing she had ever witnessed which had been constructed over hundreds of years by millions of people pouring out the very essence of their souls. Yet her sole reason for coming here was to destroy the central core of it. She felt as if she was an assassin in the Queen’s court or a sinner in the Holy of Holies. She was only broken out of her trance by Bailey’s voice.

“Quick the prologue to act two is just about to start. You must find a way up to Juliet’s balcony and lock the door so Juliet can’t get out,” Bailey urged over the earpiece, “It should be through the main entrance and over the orchard wall that will be on your left. Remember all we need to do to extract Romeo is hold fast to him while he is alone. Then I can bring both your characters out at once. Since he has only seen Juliet with her mask hopefully he will think that you are her.”

So Naomi left the room and made her way through the orchid to the balcony which she quickly scaled using the equipment she brought with her. After fastening the door she gazed up at the stars and could not help but notice the romantic ambience around her; though she quickly crushed the thought.

“But, soft! What light through yonder window breaks?
It is the east and Juliet is the sun! –
Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,
Who is already sick and pale with grief…” Romeo began below.

“He doesn’t waste any time. I only just got here that was cutting it close,” Naomi muttered to herself, yet she couldn’t help but feel a thrill of excitement, or was it something more?

“It is my lady: O, it is my love!
O, that she knew she were!
She speaks, yet she says nothing: what of that?
Her eye discourses; I will answer it.
I am too bold; ‘tis not to me she speaks
Two of the fairest stars in all the heaven,
Having some business, do entreat her eyes
To twinkle in their spheres till they return.
See, how she leans her cheek upon her hand!
O, that I were the glove upon that hand,
That I might touch that cheek!
Yet forsooth how strange, the glove is not there
Though the hand was gloved in Capulet’s hall.”

“Oh no you forgot the glove, you’re meant to be wearing it,” said Bailey chastising, “You’re starting to make mistakes. I knew you were pushing yourself too far.”

“Ay me!” Naomi exclaimed and then quieter to Bailey, “I’m fine just focus on the mission.”

“She speaks
O, speak again, bright angel! For thou art
As glorious to this night, being o’er my head,
As is a winged messenger of heaven
Unto the white-upturned wondering eyes
Of mortals that fall back to gaze on him
When he bestrides the lazy-pacing clouds
And sails upon the bosom of the air,” quoted Romeo with eyes upturned to what he thought was the object of his love on the balcony. He paused so enraptured that it arrested his tongue and as Naomi looked down she couldn’t stop her heart from beating faster.

“This is your cue Naomi,” said Bailey, “You’re meant to tell him to reject his name.”

“Got it,” she said into the earpiece and then aloud she said, “Romeo, where are you Romeo. Reject name and then we can get together. After all if you name the rose something else it is still going to smell the same, right?”

“Not very elegant,” commented Bailey.

“Well I haven’t completely memorised my lines.”

“I take thee at thy word:
Call me but love, and I’ll be new baptised;
Henceforth I never will be Romeo,” continued Romeo.

Naomi had read these words beforehand and they seemed lifeless on the page but now they took on a new meaning. Here was Romeo risking his life in his enemy’s stronghold just to be able to meet his love again. Though little did he know that his true danger was the very object of his desire. She felt the gasp of a thousand readers and the enthralled suspense of a thousand more bear upon her soul. These feelings of genuine concern combined with her own conscience and began to convict her of her Judas like intentions. Naomi felt a strange change come over her and when she spoke she said words filled with emotion and feeling.

“This place is death considering who thou art,
If any of my kinsmen find thee here
Furthermore there is danger you know not
which lies even closer than the Capulets,” she said surprised at her sudden change of speech.

“And what love can do, that dares love attempt;
Therefore thy kinsmen are not let to me.
I have night’s cloak to hide me from their sight;
My life were better ended by their hate
Than death prolonged, wanting of thy love
Love lent me counsel, and I lent him eyes.
I am no pilot; yet, wert thou as far
As that vast shore wash’d with the farthest sea,
I would adventure for such merchandise” And again Romeo punctuated his sentence with a piercing stare of love that bore into her very soul. This look of love infused with the passion of so many readers began to create forbidden and long exiled feelings in Naomi’s heart. These feelings went beyond guilt but rather stole into her heart with the warmth of love and kindled there the flame of passion.

“Oh you make me blush,” Naomi said before she could stop herself.

“Very good that was the next line. Now you are supposed to declare your love and make him swear his,” guided Bailey over the earpiece.

“My love for you Romeo is like ... is like,” and there she was stuck. The slow wit of her tongue betrayed her when she needed it most. As the seconds of this silence dragged on in ever increasing anguish she began to understand the hearts that had created the desires and emotions that manifested this world. She was awed by lover’s passion and sympathized with the broken hearted. Yet it was with those with cold hearts who had never used them for any other than a source of anger and ambition that she most pitied. Then with sudden shock of epiphany she saw that was what she once was. It was then that she embraced the passions surrounding her and was quickly swept into love’s sweet muse. Inspired she said these words.

“One glance of you and stolen is my heart
yet tis one theft, I stay the better of.
Long life love belongs to us lovers less
the veil of marriage be too the veil of death.
As sun shines on the moon and gives it light
so Romeo shines love, and gives me life
that moon would look unto the sun all night
it t’would but for the earth of feud and strife
but now the orbit of feud we shall brake
instead the orbit of love we will take.”

“Lady, then by that blessed moon I swear,
That tips with silver all these fruit-tree tops,” replied Romeo

“O, swear not by the moon, th’ inconstant moon,
That monthly changes in her circled orb,
Lest that thy love prove likewise variable.” Naomi answered surprised at this new exuberance over taking her.

“What has gotten into you?” questioned Bailey equally surprised but she was interrupted by a rapping at the balcony door behind Naomi as Juliet tried to open it.

“What shall I swear by?” Romeo answered ignorant of the commotion above him.

“Do not swear at all; but come up to me
rise the climb and so be perch’d together,” Naomi said realizing her time was short.

“With love’s light wings I’ll o’er-perch these walls
For stony limits cannot hold love out,” Romeo replied as he began to scale the wall, then Bailey’s voice crackled over the earpiece.

“Good and once he is up there all you’ll have to do is grab hold of his arm and I can pull you both through. That will be another successful extraction,” said Bailey triumphantly. However the transformation in Naomi’s heart was complete and the thought of extraction was not on her mind. She reached up to the head piece in her ear and pulled it out, severing the connection.

“What are you doing?” exclaimed Bailey. “I cannot bring you back until you restore the connection. What can you be thinking to do such a thing!”

“I only wished you knew my thoughts and felt these feelings and be enlightened by the truth of love as I have been. Love is the liberator not the oppressor and I will embrace him fully,” Naomi concluded and with that she dropped the equipment and crushed it beneath her heel.

Then the door was shaken by a firmer hand, rattling it against the very door frame. Naomi could just hear the muffled voice of Juliet.

“Quick nurse, open this door for I sense Romeo and not all bodes well.”

Fearing the intrusion Naomi reinforced the door with one hand and with the other she steadied herself to lean over the balcony. It was in this way that she met Romeo’s upturned face with welcoming lips. After they kissed and embraced she urged, “Alas already our presence is known,
from fair Verona it is we must fly
and soar into a joyful lifelong love.
Know you any who would join us into one,
And aid us in our self-imposed exile?”

Upon hearing the battering of the door Romeo quickly replied, “Aye! Far away we must be travelling,
for feud threatens even the strength of our love.
As to our being wedded, I know one
who would be willing to assist our plight
and give wisdom to make our next step true.”

Then Naomi wrapped her arms around his neck and both descended from that famous balcony. When Juliet broke through the door with the nurse’s help it was just in time to see the shadowy pair leaping over the garden wall and escape with new found love into their future happiness.