by R. E. Vance
But I knew enough about my old commander to realize that nothing the general did was coincidental. Her echolocation abilities alone must have told her about this rift the moment it happened. And being a good soldier, she hadn’t immediately engaged. Instead, she’d done what our training demanded: secure the perimeter, control the controllables, then deal with the fucked-up rift in reality.
What she didn’t plan for was my uncontrollable desire to run into that very same fucked-up rift in reality. My unpredictable nature forced another part of our training to kick in … SSBS: Stop Stupid from Being Stupid.
“What are you doing?” I screamed, scrambling to my feet, determined to get past the aigamuchab and to my wife.
“She’s right,” Bella said. “You can’t join me on this side. Not without first knowing what’s at stake.”
“Bella,” I said, “is that you? Really you?” My voice was desperate and as destroyed as I was, Shouf’s actions jarred me enough for some of my training to kick in.
And my training was all about magic and illusions, and how they could be used to devastating effect.
That person might not be Bella. Hell, for all I knew, that was some nine-armed, praying-mantis-like demon who would literally bite my head off mid-hug.
But that was Bella. Bella!
Training be damned, I thought as I tried to push past General Shouf. I’d rather die to the illusion of her than live another fifty years in this reality.
Bella raised a hand. “Promise me that you won’t come charging through.”
“Bella, I—”
“Promise me.” Her voice was firm, resolute—the tone she used to end any one of our thousand arguments back when she was alive. That voice could command a glacier to swim against the currents, and it stopped me in my tracks.
“I promise.” I no longer struggled against General Shouf.
When Bella was sure that I wouldn’t move again, she rubbed her hands against her thighs like she was trying to flatten the creases in her dress. That was something Bella always did when she was about to say something difficult to hear.
“Yes, it’s me, Jean. It really is.” A tear caught in her eye, reflecting the lights on the prison island.
She sounded like her, she looked like her … All the nervous gestures and tics that make a person who they are.
“Prove it, Specter,” General Shouf said, her voice shattering me back to reality.
“Shouf—” I started, but the aigamuchab lifted a silencing hand.
“This specter could be an illusion feeding off your memories of her. A trap designed to lure you inside.”
“But …” I stopped. The general was right—this could be any number of things, all of them bad.
Only one option good, I thought, looking at Bella.
But whereas I was trained (and that training was kicking in), Judith was not. “It is her,” she said, and the normally stern, hard ghost of my mother-in-law floated uneasily. “That’s my daughter.”
“I have travelled everywhere, and never have I seen such a rift between worlds. Nor have I witnessed the return of one long dead. That is not your daughter, but a construct, an illusion,” General Shouf shattered at Judith.
Judith looked away, unable to bring herself to look at either General Shouf or Bella. She appeared overwhelmed and retreated into herself, silently floating toward and away from the portal, as if caught in the gentle ebb and flow of a current.
Judith didn’t know what to think, and she was waiting for evidence of what I knew she was praying for … That this was, indeed, her daughter Bella.
Bella took General Shouf’s accusations in stride; the only indication that they’d had any effect on her was the continuous rubbing of her hands against her dress. “How?” Bella asked.
“How what?” General Shouf said.
“How can I prove to you that I am who I claim to be, when you will just say I’m feeding off his memories—or all of your memories, for that manner? Anything I say or do will be attributed to that. The only thing I can do is point to the logic of what’s happening here.”
General Shouf, confident I wasn’t going to try anything stupid like jumping through a portal into—quite literally—Hell, turned to face Bella. She folded her arms in the way a teacher does when preparing to hear some bullshit excuse from a student. “Go ahead. What is happening here?”
“The angel Penemue’s grief has created this place”—she gestured around her—“which shouldn’t be possible. I can only assume a Creation Crystal is somewhere nearby.”
Now it was Bella’s turn to fold her arms, mocking the general’s bravado.
I started to speak, but General Shouf lifted another silencing hand. I took it without protest because, manners aside, the aigamuchab was far better equipped to sniff out a trap than I.
“Perhaps, but Creation Crystals are not something about which mortals are aware. Jean is.” She pointed at me. “But his knowledge of such magic only came to him after you died. Which is proof you are feeding off his memories.”
That thought hit me like a ton of bricks. General Shouf was right: I had only recently learned about Creation Crystals when I stopped the apocalyptic monster Tiamat from destroying Paradise Lot.
It was during that encounter I’d learned how the crystals were used by the gods as—for lack of a better word—batteries to power the creation stuff, like heavens and hells and life. You know, the gods’ equivalent of tinkering.
“So, if this is you,” the general continued, “then step through the portal. Reunite with your human mate and live.”
I pointed at Shouf. “I like her argument.” Oh, how I wished my wife would take just a few steps forward. Into our world. Into my arms.
Bella shook her head, staring down at her feet the way she always did when she really wanted something, but knew she couldn’t have it. “I fear that if I step through, I won’t be able to get back inside. This portal may be a one-way valve in … but not out.” She looked at her mom, a tear finally escaping her eyes. “I want nothing more than to step out and give you the biggest, baddest hug ever. But I can’t—not with so much at stake.”
“Oh, honey—” Judith said.
“At stake?” General Shouf shattered, her voice cutting through any hope of a sweet moment happening here. “What is at stake?”
Bella turned to General Shouf, pursing her lips. I knew that look. She had a secret to tell and wasn’t about to spill it … not to the aigamuchab, at least.
General Shouf must have sensed that this would be a dead end, because the Other waved a hand. “More trickery. You claim to be a spirit of this man’s long-departed wife. But spirits are the intact essence of the dead. That can no longer be, for when the gods left, death became final. There are no spirits, no beings to occupy any of the heavens and hells. There’s nothing.”
“True.” She gave the general a wry smile. “But there can be exceptions. Paths in and out that can be accessed with knowledge and …”—she turned to me and gave me the familiar I have a surprise for you look—“I’m going to blow your mind with what I’ve learned up there.”
She pointed to the heavens above.
“Up where?” General Shouf turned to me, her muscles tense as she tried to make peace with what she was seeing and what she knew. “I need information, soldier.”
“It’s a long story.”
“Bullet points, then.”
“Six years ago, with the help of several powerful Others, Bella was trying to locate Heaven—as in, capital-H Heaven. They found where that plane of existence hid, and a particularly powerful Other sent Bella’s soul there.”
My heart literally sank as I said those last words. It was more like they butchered Bella, killing her with all the ceremony of an Aztec human sacrifice. And I had been powerless to stop them. At the time I had thought she was dead, until that same Other who had sacrificed her came back and, through more insanity, temporarily opened up Heaven with Bella in it.
“Heaven?” Genera
l Shouf shattered. If she found that little tidbit of information disturbing, she made no show of it, simply asking the one question I’d been asking myself since seeing Bella. “If you are trapped in Heaven, then why are you here?”
Bella shook her head. “I don’t know. All I can say is that I felt a great sorrow rise up before I was drawn here, to this place. I saw the rift, heard Jean’s voice … and well, you know the rest.”
“But you knew that it was the angel Penemue’s construction. How?”
She nodded. “Heaven and Hell have certain rules, and one is that entry can only be granted by a gatekeeper. I think he summoned me here to play that role.”
“Why you?” I asked.
“Heaven and Hell require a human gatekeeper—the capital-H versions, at least. And since I am literally the only human soul left in either domain … voila.” She gave a curtsey before rubbing her hands against her dress in that impatient way.
I gave her a look that said, What’s that about? It was the same look I’d given her a thousand times when searching for an answer to a question neither of us wanted to ask out loud.
Her eyes darted to General Shouf, then me. “Like I said, I’m here to guide you through this place, should you choose to enter.”
“Enter why? To save the fallen angel?” General Shouf scoffed. “The angel has chosen his fate.”
She said it like that was a preposterous idea, risking your life to save someone who’d chosen damnation. It wasn’t something she would ever consider, but then again, she was a heartless, ruthless hunter whose every instinct was for the kill. Saving a life was the very antithesis of what she was created for.
And she didn’t know Penemue. He was my friend—my best friend—and I would happily walk through Hell if it meant helping him.
And given what lay before me, it seemed that was exactly what I was about to do.
So therein lay the crux of the problem: walk into Hell guided by someone who may or may not be who they claim to be, and risk being trapped inside forever.
But my friend was trapped inside, and I’d be damned if I stood around and did nothing.
Plus, Bella was dead. Medusa was dead. Sinbad was gone. Penemue was in Hell. Who did I really have? What did I really have besides the damn hotel? I was in a dark place, and dark places offer up extreme thoughts.
“Yes,” I said. “I have to try.”
“You fool,” the general shattered.
“Maybe,” I said. “But right now, in there is looking a hell of lot better than out here. At least I get to be in there with her.”
“An illusion.”
“Could be,” I said. “But given how crappy my life has been lately, I’d rather be in there with a lie than out here facing the truth.”
“I agree,” Judith said.
I spun toward her. “Really?”
She floated toward the portal, stopping at the threshold. “I’m a poltergeist and stuck living in a hotel with you. Why wouldn’t I?”
Well, at least we were in agreement.
Dark Forests and Cold Mother-in-Laws
I pushed past General Shouf with enough force to let her know that there wasn’t a force on this Earth or any other that would stop me from stepping through that portal.
The general didn’t try.
She knew when a soldier was lost. Her only hope for me now was that I’d somehow come back from this one on my own.
But stepping toward Bella, I knew there was no coming back. No way. Saving Penemue or not, I would stay in Hell with her. Hell or Heaven—or whatever domain she was in—it didn’t matter, because I would never return to this life or the living again. Not if I could help it.
There is this girl whom I love very much … and I was done being without her.
Stepping toward Bella was one of the perfect moments of my life. My heart pumped with anticipation as I crossed the threshold, my hand trembling as I reached out to her.
What I wouldn’t give for one touch, I thought, remembering the dreams I had about her in the years after she died. Every night I dreamed of her, and they were always the same. I could see her, speak to her, but I could never touch her, because as real as she felt, she wasn’t really there.
But this was different. It had to be. She must have felt the same anticipation I did, because she stepped toward me the second I crossed over, and like two young teenagers about to have their first kiss, we awkwardly embraced, our bodies trembling as we connected.
The awkwardness slid off us as familiarity returned, and like any muscle memory, we fell into the old ways. It was the little things, like how her hand would cup the outside of mine, how I would caress her neck with the tips of my fingers. The smell of her. The taste of her.
I shivered. This was unequivocally my Bella.
“It’s you,” I said, tears blurring my vision. “It’s really you.”
“Yes, my love, it is,” she whispered, and she kissed me the way she did the day I proposed to her all those years ago.
Later, I would muse about how General Shouf clicked her pervy little tongue as she watched our embrace with her echolocation abilities. She was probably building a 3D model of us in her memory for later use.
And then there was Judith, who I knew was fuming at the thought of unworthy Jean touching her daughter.
But right then and there, I didn’t care. No, that’s not right—I didn’t know. I was so consumed by the feel of her that the world around us—both worlds around us—faded away.
I swear to the GoneGods, I would have taken her right then and there. But before my hand could find her more intimate parts, my perfect moment was ruined by one loud, judgmental and unnatural throat-clearing.
“Ahem,” Judith said. “As sweet as this is, it’s not the time.” Evidently I’d woken her from her shock by stepping through the portal, and she had come through herself, floating close to the threshold.
It made sense: Bella was her daughter and the only family Judith had left. If anyone had reason to cross the boundary into Hell, it was Judith.
But that didn’t mean I had to like it.
If I had telekinetic powers, I would have pushed her away, but given I’m just a plain old human, I settled for gritting my teeth and rasping, “Judith, this isn’t exactly the time to—”
“Jean,” Bella said in an admonishing-but-playful tone. “She’s right—we don’t have time. We’re in danger here, and if we’re going to have a chance to save Penemue, we need to move.” She turned, staring off into the distance behind her. “Already he is building permanent constructs. If he gets too far, too deep, we won’t be able to get him out.”
It wasn’t so much her words, but the way she said them that jarred me. There was a deadly seriousness to them, a quality I’d heard only in the most desperate times.
Looking past her for the first time, I took stock of our surroundings. Sure, we were in an eerie forest, but it wasn’t just that. We were standing in a forest filled with trees that looked dead, even though moss-green leaves still clung to their branches. The trunks were enormous, their branches twisted and gnarled, their roots knobby and far-spread, perfect for tripping over in a forest so dense, I couldn’t see more than fifteen feet beyond where we stood.
And it was silent. I don’t mean middle-of-the-night quiet—I mean silent. No rustling of leaves, no chirping of crickets, no random creaking of branches. Nothing. It was like we stood in a picture of a forest rather than an actual one.
“How do you know what Penemue is doing?” I asked.
“I can feel him. Ever since he called me here, I can sense him, and what I know is that he’s constructing his prison as we speak, building it to the perfect specs needed for maximum punishment. If he completes this place, he’ll be lost to us forever.”
“Oh good,” I said. “A time limit.”
“Sacrificing your life for the twice-fallen angel is a fool’s errand,” Shouf said to me.
Bella and I shot her a look as our answer.
“Fools,�
� General Shouf said.
“Fine … fine!” Judith growled, and I could feel her release a bit of her psychic rage. “Then if there’s a time limit, then let’s get on with it.”
Now that Judith had floated through the portal, her ghostly body had formed legs—which she noticed for the first time. Looking down at the two feet she hadn’t seen since the days the gods left, she said in surprise and joy, “My feet! Look at them. They’re back.” She wiggled ten bare toes.
“I’m surprised they’re not hooved.”
Bella elbowed me gently and said with a chuckle, “Jean, seriously. Be nice.”
If Judith thought my joke was funny, she made no indication of it. She scowled. “I need shoes.”
“Ahhh, no you don’t,” I said, my attention divided between wanting to reach out to Bella and my need for my anti-aphrodisiac of a mother-in-law not to tag along. “You’re not coming, so if you don’t mind …” I pointed at the door. Well, at the floating portal acting as the beaded curtain between Hell and Earth.
“I’m coming,” she said, stomping her foot.
“Hell no,” I said.
“Hell yes,” she said. “In fact, Hell is calling us right now, and—”
“I swear to the GoneGods, Judith, if you don’t step back right now, I will—”
“I am coming!”
“Why, because you want to save Penemue? Last I checked, you put him in your ‘dislike’ bucket with pretty much everyone else you know, so …” I gestured for her to walk back through the portal in a less than gentlemanly way.
“Jean,” Bella said. “Be nice.”
“You know damn well why I’m coming,” she hissed in such a way that I knew nothing short of physically throwing her out of Hell would stop her. “And if you think I’ll stand by and let you—”
“Mother!” Bella rolled her eyes. “I swear to the GoneGods, I thought death would spare me from this constant bickering.”
Which only made Judith double down.
And as if to punctuate her determination, I heard an actual hiss as Marty slithered in, forking his tongue at me as he narrowed disapproving eyes at Bella.