by Cate Farren
"Don't try to get up," Jane urged him. She tried to help him but he flinched, as if her touch was poison. "You haven't walked in a very long time."
"I need to stretch," he complained. "I can't stay cooped up here. Besides, it sounds like there's going to be a battle any time soon. You need me to be up and fit."
"The shapeshifter has been taken care of," Trent revealed, grinning.
He knew what that meant. He actually felt sorry for their enemy.
"And what happens when Loki realizes his scout isn't coming back?" Jared demanded. “He’s going to send someone to look for them.”
He was starting to feel trapped. All these people in this tiny little room...
"His scouts go missing all the time," said JJ.
"We need to be ready," Jared insisted.
There's too many people in here. I'm feeling crowded. Claustrophobic.
"I just need some air," said Jared, frantic now. “Please!”
He pushed past his mother and son, ignoring their protests. He was trying to be upbeat but it was all too much to process at once. He needed to be away from them, at least for now. He needed some alone time.
"Be careful," his mother called.
He emerged from the building onto a field of white grass. He was surrounded by literally thousands of ramshackle wooden buildings, massive circus sized tents and decaying brick structures. There were maybe millions more supernaturals, all going about their daily business. He saw a market, and a communal space where werewolves and Fey played. An elderly Fey woman walked past him and smiled. He didn't know where to go. He was hemmed in at all sides by people and constructions. Even the sky felt like it was falling on him, burying him.
Clover is dead.
"Are you okay?" JJ asked. He sounded worried.
"Leave me alone," Jared shouted.
JJ grabbed his arm and said, "I've wanted to meet you for so long."
"I'm not your dad. I'm just some vampire."
Jared regretted the words as soon as they came out of his mouth, but the damage was already done. His son looked at him as if he's been physically assaulted.
"No, you're not my dad," JJ stated, his eyes hard. "The man who raised me was Duck Young Kwan and to me he'll always be my father, even though he died so long ago I can barely remember his face."
Jared nodded, glad he had someone. "Was he good to you?"
"He was the best."
He pushed aside his jealousy for the moment. There wasn't anything he could do about it. His son had been raised by a good person. He seemed to have turned out fairly normal despite the chaos of his shapeshifter genes. JJ also seemed to be a vampire too. He could tell from his smell. How was that possible? He didn’t think shapeshifters could become vampires. Had JJ become a vampire so he could be there when his father was resurrected, or did he just not want to be alone?
I know nothing about him.
"Look, I'm sorry for being snappy," said Jared. He looked up into the sky. There were two moons. "All this seems to have happened in an instant for me. One minute I was being stabbed in the chest by Lydia and the next I was here. I just need time to...to acclimate."
A gaggle of small flying supernaturals soared over the town. They seemed to be fairies. They left behind them a wake of magical dust like an airplane’s jet trail.
JJ looked pained. "You...you didn't go to an afterlife?"
"No,” said Jared. “Like I said, there was nothing in-between death and life. It was instantaneous, at least to me. An hour ago I was proposing to Clover, and now..."
It wasn't an hour ago, though, was it? It was over three-thousand years ago. He'd been ash for three-thousand fucking years as everyone he loved either died or suffered through immense trauma. This world was alien to him, as was the people he'd known back then.
"Don't tell anyone," JJ whispered. "Most people here believe in an afterlife."
"I don't plan on staying," Jared stated.
JJ looked angry. "You're leaving?"
"What is there for me here?"
"There's me."
Jared couldn't take this any longer. He wanted to scream. He wanted to return to the dark tranquility of death.
I want to die.
Jared couldn't look his son in the eye as he said, "You don't need me. I'm an anachronism. I don't belong here."
"I know what I said, but you are my father," JJ stated. "I want to know you."
"She's been dead for three-thousand years. This world is barren without her in it. I can't..."
"Jared..."
"Stop! Can you just leave me to be on my own for a while? I have a lot to process. I need to grieve."
JJ nodded and walked away. Jared made his way through the maze of people to a small clearing beside a giant tent. He could smell food being cooked inside and it made his mouth water. He ignored it and sat down on a fallen log. He closed his eyes, taking in all his senses at once. It was an easy way for him to not think about anything.
Clover...
He opened his eyes. It was dark. The two moons hung like Chinese lanterns in the purple black sky. It was beautiful.
He stood up and stretched. He figured he'd been meditating for well over eight hours. He didn't feel any better, but at least he'd put some time between his death and resurrection.
For the next few days he wandered. He met people trying to get on with their life. Most of them couldn't remember the old world. Those that did either didn't want to go back or lived in complete bitterness. Jared didn't understand why these people didn't just settle down. The fact that most of them lived in tents or wooden huts just proved they thought they might go home one day. Loki had won. They could never beat him, not now.
This new Earth was slightly different to the one he knew. The two moons took some getting used to. It meant that night-time wasn't nearly as dark as it should be. The air was different too. There was no pollution, or very little, which meant his blood supply from willing humans tasted fresh. The grass was white. Strange fruits grew on trees. Dodos were kept in farms. Foxes were kept as pets. Giant cows called irks pulled carts and were used as meat. It was all eccentric, but pleasant.
Jared missed television.
He sat in front of a small outdoor stage. A group of players were rehearsing some sort of musical. It seemed to be about Loki and Trent. Jared had a weird feeling it was just Wicked with some things altered. When one of the players started belting out “Defying Gravity” his suspicions were confirmed. He couldn’t help but laugh.
"It took me forever to find you!" a voice called.
Jared looked up, shielding his eyes from the sun. He smiled.
"So you are alive," he said.
"What can I say?" she said, sitting beside him. "I have Dracula's blood in me. I can't die."
Sutton smiled and took his hand. They watched the rehearsals for a while, laughing when one of the player's fell over. It felt good. It reminded him of the time they watched reality shows together.
"I go by a different name now," she said during a break in the rehearsals. "I got bored of Sutton."
"I liked Sutton," Jared admitted. "It was classy."
"You do know it wasn't my real name, right?" She laughed at the shock on his face. "Nobody in sixteenth century England is actually born with the name Sutton."
He'd never thought of that before. The name just suited her, like she'd literally been born with it.
"What is your real name?" he asked.
She smiled warmly. "The same name I go by now – Sarah."
Jared nodded, understanding. "You look like a Sarah."
"Sarah is a simple girl with no pretensions."
"You were never simple."
He pulled her into a hug, wanting to cry. Here was someone who truly understood him next to Clover. Sarah was his best friend, his mentor, his aunt. She was a reason to not feel so maudlin in this Clover-less world.
Aside from JJ, that is, even though he reminds me of Clover.
"I'm so glad you're back," she ad
mitted. A shouting match was going on behind the stage. He imagined the players were a feisty lot. "For a while there I didn't think you'd ever come back to the land of the living. But it is hard the first time, and you only have a quarter of Dracula's blood in you. It took me three hundred years to come back. I'm actually surprised anyone cared enough to even try. Are you really thirsty and really horny?"
Jared squirmed, embarrassed to actually admit it. Aside from the angst of his resurrection he'd felt something else; a horniness so empowering he was surprised he hadn't tried to hump a tree. Was he technically a virgin again now?
"I'll take that as a yes," said Sarah. She laughed and patted his shoulder like a soldier in arms. "There's a special vampire place down near the river. They'll set you up with blood and a nice body to snuggle up to."
"You mean a brothel," he said.
"Brothel is such an ugly word. We prefer the term whorehouse."
Jared laughed, feeling happy. "I missed you."
It had been a long time since he'd seen Sutton, even before his death. After he'd returned from the hell dimension with Clover his mentor was already gone, having fled to England after being framed for murder. It really had been an age since they’d talked like this. It felt good. It felt normal.
What could she tell me about death? Had she heard the voices too?
He hadn’t heard them himself in a while. Perhaps they were just an aftereffect of death. Perhaps he’d imagined them.
I keep telling myself that, but I didn’t imagine them. They were real.
He looked away, feeling his skin goose bump. “What...what did you see when you were dead?”
Sarah shrugged. “Nothing. Disappointing really, I suppose. I never really believed in that religion stuff, despite my mother being Catholic. But I suppose a part of me wanted to see her again. I miss her.”
Sarah had never talked about her mother before, not ever. It was a subject which was difficult even for her.
“I heard voices,” Jared revealed. He looked at the sky, feeling like something was tugging at his memory; something malevolent, rotting. “Whispers. I couldn’t quite make out what they were saying but they scared me.”
Sarah’s eyes widened in fear. “Oh God. They were real?”
“You know after you have a really bad nightmare and you wake up and you literally can’t move because you’re so scared? That’s what thinking about them makes me feel.”
He needed to change the subject, but he wanted to know more. He had to know more.
“Everyone who’s ever died and come back has heard them,” Sarah explained. She shivered. “They’re sometimes pretending to be relatives, pulling you towards the light, or sometimes they’re just vile, evil voices, tormenting you.”
“What are they?” he asked.
“Who knows? I don’t plan on dying again any time soon.”
Sarah looked away, indicating the conversation was over. In a way he was glad. Did he want to know more? Did he want to know what evil things were out there, waiting for them?
She pulled him into a hug. “I really did miss you. Things have been more than terrible without you. The things Loki has done to our world...”
“Come on,” he said, kissing her on the forehead. “Let me get you a drink. Tell me all about it.”
“You told your son you wanted to be alone.”
“I couldn’t talk to him.” He looked away, feeling ashamed of himself. “He has Clover’s eyes.”
JARED ALMOST DROPPED his cup of warm blood in shock.
"Wait a minute," he asked, barely able to form the words. "Are you saying out home, our Earth, is a utopia?"
Sarah sighed miserably. "Depressing, right?"
"Not really. It sounds kind of good."
He vaguely remembered his mother saying something similar upon his resurrection, but he didn’t register it at the time.
Sarah sighed. "Unless you're a shapeshifter it's a bad thing. All supernaturals were culled, same as the humans." She drank some more blood, lost in her memories. A group of shifters started singing in the background. They sounded drunk. "That's our world and we want it back. It doesn't matter if Loki has turned the place into a paradise for shapeshifters."
"You've been here for three-thousand years,” said Jared. “You haven't done such a good job of taking it back."
"We gave up a long time ago. Now all we wanted to do was live in peace. But you already know Loki has been sending shapeshifters to thousands of parallel Earths, searching for us. He won't stop until we're all dead."
He sighed and drank from his wooden cup, savoring the taste of the blood. The humans that lived here tasted fresh, their blood unpolluted from years of refined sugars and other environmental contaminants.
"You look miserable," she stated. She patted his hand. "You're alive! You should be shouting from the rooftops."
"What is there for me to be happy about?" he asked.
"You have me. You have your son."
"What am I supposed to do now?"
Sutton grinned. "Those hot twins are giving you the eye. Kyra and Kyle are insatiable. They'd fuck anything."
Jared grinned and looked across the crowded tent. Kyra and Kyle were certainly an attractive pair. They were wearing matching crop tops and hot pants made from a scruffy denim. They both had curves, and bulges, in all the right places.
He grinned. "Why not?"
Chapter 17
Clover yawned and sat up. Her throat felt like sandpaper and her lips were dry. Her dead felt like it had been hit with a hammer. The last thing she remembered was driving off with Loki, leaving her father behind in the care home. The rest was a blur.
I'm in Saskia's house!
She ran to the window and looked out. She could see the Primordial Womb, shining so bright she could actually feel its immense power throb inside her head. This thing, whatever it was, was the source of all things supernatural. Was it a living thing, or just some sort of cosmic oven?
She laughed. Cosmic oven.
The thing that disturbed her the most wasn't the Primordial Womb. It was the hundreds upon hundreds of rows of shapeshifters. They were standing rock still, mostly unformed, though still humanoid in shape. There had to be thousands of them, maybe millions. Were they waiting for orders, or did they need to evolve more before they could move and think?
You are my cousins.
She felt something stir inside her. One of the shapeshifters turned its head to look up at her. It mumbled something in her mind before becoming still again.
"What are you doing?" Loki demanded.
She turned to him, ignoring the fact that he'd snuck up on her. "What's wrong with them? Are they supposed to be like that? It’s creepy."
"They're waiting for orders." He watched her for a moment. "You were talking to one of them."
She shivered. "Not on purpose. I felt myself drawn to them. One of them in particular whispered something in my mind before I had a chance to block it out." She tried to remember what it was they said. “I think they were curious.”
"All shapeshifters are linked to me and to each other. You were just instinctively homing in on on that."
She shook her head. "I don't want them inside my head. I have enough going on in there as it is."
"It's okay. They won't bother you as long as you don't bother them."
He set a tray of food down on the bed. She looked around, recognizing the room she was in. This place once belonged to Frankie. It even still smelled like him. There were photos of her on the wall and posters of The Big Bang Theory and Frankie's swimming certificates. She suspected the closet was still full of his clothes. The fact that Rose had kept her dead son’s room intact was either sad or disturbing. Maybe both.
I still miss him.
"How did I get here?" she asked.
Clover felt uncomfortable. She still felt partly responsible for Frankie's death. If only she'd told him she didn't love him long ago he never would've died that night.
"You can'
t know where we are," Loki stated. "You do understand that."
"You think I'll betray you?" she asked.
"I don't trust anybody."
He left her to her meal. He didn't lock the door. It was pointless. Where could she escape to even if she wanted to? She didn’t know where she was, and even if she did she’d probably need magic anyway.
Jared flickered to life in front of her. He seemed perturbed.
"Where are we?" he demanded. "I feel confused."
She ignored him and went back to the window. The shapeshifter that had tried to talk to her was silent now. She thought furiously at him or her but got no reply.
"Where are we?" Jared demanded.
"If only you could kiss me," she mused. She turned back to him. His form was flickering. "I'd do anything to have you kiss me and tell me everything is going to be fine."
"Clover..."
"Can you believe what that thing is out there? It's like looking into the face of God. I can feel the energy that's coming from it. It's so powerful..." She laughed bitterly. "But there is no God. No nothing. After we die..."
When Gable Trent had died briefly in the hell dimension he'd seen something that had traumatized him so much he had to confide in her. She wished he hadn't. She couldn't live with what she knew and not feel utterly terrified. She knew the truth about life after death. She knew everything.
"What do you mean?" Jared asked.
"Jared..."
She couldn't say the words out loud, not even to herself. When Jared's form vanished she just laughed.
JARED SCREAMED WITH frustration. He tried to home in on Clover's life force but it was useless. He couldn't find her.
"Why are you screaming?" Sutton demanded.
She was sat on the edge of his bed, painting her nails a garish purple. Vishanti the bodyguard was standing by the door, looking in, concerned. When he saw that nothing was wrong he went back outside again.
“Loki has taken her somewhere,” he explained. “I can’t get through to her.”
Sutton appeared deep in thought. “Father was right then. He is in another dimension.”