by Peter Fang
“Lies! I saw it with my eyes. Manfred talked to me before his death. I saw that you took his life away.”
The queen laughed. “And you just said our mind trick won’t work on you. June did a masterful job on your mind and you don’t even know it. It’s just wonderful—”
“Enough!” Meredith growled and threw Elise's body at Maria. Elise's limp body turned in the air and straightened like an arrow.
The wolf jumped in front of Maria and clamped down on Elise in midair, and then flung her body to the ground.
Elise coiled her legs and absorbed the impact with her hands. She swung with her legs, striking the wolf’s head broadside, knocking it unconscious.
While Elise fought with the wolf and Maria, Meredith saw the zombies charging at her. She growled and waited until the four zombies got close to her; then she grabbed one of the zombies by its head and leaped thirty feet into the air. At the apex, she swung around and slung the zombie from her hand at of the zombies below like a sling shot. The four zombies’ bodies clashed, and their bones cracked into pieces. Meredith then made a looping circle as she came down and swooped at Maria at full speed.
Koda saw Maria was not able to fend off both Meredith and Elise, so he drew his pistol and fired multiple rounds at Meredith until the clip was empty. The shots registered with Meredith’s body but they had no effect on her. She spat a bone-chilling laugh and then wrapped her long body around Koda and bit down on his neck, injecting a toxic stew of venom into his flesh.
Koda felt a dull pain pressing down on his spine. He struggled to move, but his body was already paralyzed. Meredith tossed Koda’s body aside and stared at Maria. She heard a growl behind her. When she turned, a large tiger leaped down from the stairs.
“Calling in the ancient spirit to help?” Meredith spat at the ground. She didn’t stop her attack at Maria, but her head turned 180 degrees to size up the tiger.
With a thunderous roar, the tiger charged Meredith—its maw open, revealing its saber-like fangs.
Meredith slashed her tail around to fend off the tiger; its longest posterior claws hooked the tiger's body, and a long segment of the tail ensnared the tiger in a tight grip.
The tiger tried to bite Meredith, but it was a futile attempt.
Meredith drew the tiger close to her face and caressed it with almost motherly care. “Aww, my Queen, I knew you were going to call upon the tiger spirit. Is this the tiger that you saved? I’m surprised that it’s on your side; didn’t it kill the warlord’s boy, but you ended up paying for it, right?”
Elise pinned Maria to the ground and unsheathed Kizu from her hand. She cocked her arm and aimed Kizu at Maria’s heart.
Maria tried to block with her arm.
Elise saw a scar on Maria’s arm—the scar with a heart shape. The shape was unmistakable and was almost identical to Elise's own. Elise dreamed about it for decades, and the memory of her little sister back in the dollhouse came roaring back. She froze, and their eyes met.
“Sis?” Elise dropped Kizu. Torrent of emotions came flooding back and it broke Meredith’s spell.
Maria picked up Kizu and stabbed Elise between her armor-plated skin and into her heart.
Elise let out a cry and collapsed to the ground.
Meredith screamed in agony and retreated into the dark night. She landed quietly onto a barren ledge. Her dark shadow resembled a statue juxtaposed with the concrete structures. Her eyes were closed to recall the spell she was waiting to use. “Listen only to me, Koda Xi. This is your awakening––listen only to me.”
Koda felt a jolt in his body, and his connection with the queen and Maria severed abruptly. His boy was calling to him, urging him to exact revenge.
Meredith urged on, “Your enemy was never far from you. Look around you and you shall see him. I have brought him before you for the justice you seek.”
Koda felt the hatred welling up. It was an old feeling that had driven him since the day he lost his family. Now, something inside of him fanned it back to life. Koda searched for his target as the spell controlled him. His eyes met Maria’s, but he saw Matt staring back at him; there was a dagger in his hand, and it ended in his boy’s bloody chest.
Meredith yelled, “What are you waiting for? Are you going to let Matt get away with it? Kill him before he gets away again!”
Koda screamed as he leaped towards Maria. His mind was filled with blind anger and despair; years of anguish acted like a spring-loaded latch, and someone just needed to know how to trip it into action.
Maria noticed Koda’s face turned dark, and then he moved in to attack her.
“Koda––what are you––doing?” Maria stumbled back from Elise, and she felt the dark spell on Koda as he got near her. “Koda! Meredith set a spell on you––fight back!”
“You die! You DIE!” Koda repeated the words as his fists swung at Maria.
Maria stepped backward to avoid Koda’s onslaught. She noticed Koda’s body changed as he prepared for a second attack. His skin transformed as claws started to emerge on his face and down his neck. Numerous sharp teeth sprang on his arm.
The tiger leaped in front of Maria to protect her. It bared its dagger-like teeth and growled at Koda’s mutated body.
Koda rolled his body into a ball and bounced into the air.
The tiger leaped into the air, caught Koda’s body, and pulled him down to the ground. Koda’s body snapped backward and caught the tiger’s head with his spike-like hands.
They rolled into a ball on the ground; fangs and claws exchanged and the sound of battle thundered in the alley. No one could hear the noise, as the powerful spell cloaked them from detection.
Maria sat up from Elise's motionless body and started to retreat. She reached the throat of the alley before Meredith flitted down to block her from exiting.
“Where are you going? Hand over the queen and I will let you die swiftly. Don’t you know she is just using you, like all of the blood children before you? I have been watching you. There are no proxies here for your queen to take over, like what she did with the maid at the hotel. Yes, I saw that. It was quite a treat to see you guys take out Gretchen. But do that again and I will kill her. Try it, I dare you!” Meredith started to laugh hysterically.
Maria backed away from Meredith slowly, guarding the queen's box with one hand and pulling out a dark blade in the other. The blade did not reflect light and appeared to have a rough surface.
“What is that toy you have there? No weapon can defeat me, and I can read your mind. I’m ahead of you before you can even form thoughts. Your Queen can’t help you this time. Now hand her over to me!”
“Come and get her!” Maria taunted.
Meredith’s eyes narrowed, as her smile froze and dropped to a death glare. Her shifting body moved so quickly that Maria barely saw her shadow get near. She ducked just in time to avoid a powerful blow to her head. From a crouched position, Maria swung her dark blade at Meredith in a half-moon arch, bottom up. She felt the blade hit something but it stopped dead in its tracks. The force shook Maria's hand so hard that she almost lost her grip.
Maria knew the second attack was going to follow, so she put her hands up in anticipation, but the blow came from a different angle and she felt her ribs crack as Meredith’s tail whipped from the side and caught her upper body. The impact threw her ten feet into the air and she landed hard on her shoulder. Her dark blade tumbled away into the alley.
“Where is the queen?” Meredith walked towards Maria and smiled. “How clever...you think embedding it in your body will prevent me from finding it?” Meredith sliced Maria’s clothes away and saw the golden box lodged inside Maria’s back. There were spider legs extending out of the box, wrapping themselves around Maria's body. The queen’s human torsos were half-exposed, and her face was covered with spider hairs.
“How heinous! And I thought I was the morbid one. Maria, you do realize you are just a slave, and she will feed on you until you are bone dry, right?” Meredith sunk
her claws into Maria’s back and pulled on the box, but the queen’s legs refused to let go.
Meredith screamed, “After thousands of years inside that little world, it’s time to come out, don’t you think?” Two more arms grew out of Meredith’s side, and they slashed the box with their long nails.
Maria’s pupils dilated. White lights blinded her until she saw herself back in the old dollhouse room. She heard their dad coming upstairs. The door opened, and their dad’s large boots stepped into the room. He was holding a cigar, and he walked over to Maria’s cage. He bent down and pulled Maria out. Maria clawed with all her might trying to stay inside the cage, but her dad’s strength prevailed, and she was in the air hanging upside down. She felt the burn of the cigar on her arm.
Maria screamed.
Nearby, Elise's limp body twitched.
With a strong pull, Meredith finally pulled the box from Maria’s body. Blood streamed from Maria’s back, and the queen’s legs thrashed in the air.
“What do you say now, Queen? Not so powerful anymore, huh? Ha, ha…” Meredith let out a creepy burst of mirth.
The ground shook, and everyone froze to feel the tremors.
Seconds later, Lão Chóng breached the ground and caught Meredith’s legs. It started to pull Meredith underground. Meredith lost her grip of the queen, and the box fell to the ground.
The box scurried back to Maria and lodged itself back onto her back.
“You pitiful, underground low-life!” Meredith slashed the worm with her tail and claws, but Lão Chóng’s thick armor gave it enough protection to fend off the physical blow. Meredith snarled and cast a spell to freeze it from moving; then she pushed herself away from the worm’s jaws and tried to hook Maria with her claws.
Maria tried to crawl away, but she was too slow.
“No more games. This is where both of you end!” Meredith caught Maria's legs and towered over her, ready to strike, but a sharp pain knocked her back. Meredith turned and saw Elise had sunk Kizu into her tail; her blood turned red to green—the blade was tipped with Elise’s poisonous blood. The only way to stay alive was to cut off her tail.
Meredith swung her body around and sliced Elise's body with her blade arms. The blade made an arch across Elise's body, cutting her in half.
Elise's body parts rolled to the ground, and she did not move again.
Meredith sliced her tail to tried to stop the poison, but she didn’t make a clean cut; the poison spread to her abdomen. In a state of panic, she started to cut herself up, trying to stop the spread, but it was too late. Meredith swung her arms wildly as the toxin reached her chest. Finally, she stabbed herself in the heart and fell to the ground. The toxin continued to eat her body until it covered her face. Her entire body turned purple as her last words expired. “Manfred, my love, come…”
Smoke escaped from Meredith’s lips; her body changed back to human form. She shed her scales, and acrid smoke billowed away, revealing an older woman’s wrinkled body; her skin and muscles soon boiled away until only a charred skeleton was left.
The three boxes that were hidden inside Meredith’s body broke free and quickly crawled onto Meredith’s body.
Koda’s mutated body collapsed to the ground as Meredith’s spell wore off. The tiger jing let go of Koda and stepped back into the shadow.
Maria slowly got up, holding her hand against her ribs, tempering the sharp pain of the injuries as she slowly rose to her feet. She walked over to Elise’s mutilated body and knelt next to her.
“Don’t touch her. Her blood is full of poison,” the queen warned.
Among the badly mangled stumps where Elise’s limbs used to be, her face was crisp and unscathed.
Maria whispered to the queen, “She looks familiar. Do I know her?”
“Yes, you saw her at your company’s party. That night you fell violently ill,” the queen reminded her.
Maria gasped. “Yes! Why did she hesitate when she had the chance? I wish I could read her mind.”
“We won’t know for sure, but when she died, her spell was broken, so I reanimated her to kill Meredith.”
Maria sensed the queen knew the answer but was reluctant to tell her. She looked down at Elise’s blank stare and begged, “Please just let her go; don’t let Lão Chóng take her.”
The queen whispered, “I’ll do one better. Her body can’t be saved, but she could be reborn.” She cast a spell and a fire lit up on Elise's body. Her corpse quickly dissolved into a stream of smoke and drifted into the dark night.
“I also have one job for her to do,” said the queen.
Maria searched the ground and found her dark blade next to Elise’s Kizu, still lodged inside Meredith’s charred tail.
“I’m keeping her blade. It’s only fitting for someone that saved my life.” Meredith cleaned the Kizu and wrapped it around the dark blade’s scabbard.
The tiger jing returned to its domestic cat form and jumped onto Maria’s shoulder––it was the Maine Coon. It licked her paws and attended to the wounds on her body. Maria turned to check on Lão Chóng, but it had already retreated underground.
“That was a close call, wasn’t it?” Maria finally exhaled. She finally felt the threats were gone.
The queen replied, “There have been worse instances, but this was pretty bad.”
“What to do with Koda? He’s not dead yet.”
“He won’t remember anything. I’ll make sure of that. He will be a great asset to us tracking down other blood children.”
“What to do with Baobao and that regrown Manfred’s corpse...?” Maria wondered if the two would come back and haunt them later.
“They are finished with me. Manfred is trapped between two worlds, the worst kind of hell. Baobao is merely an empty shell, and it will rot away after Meredith’s dead.”
“Wait, I have one more piece of unfinished business with Ansen.” Maria looked pensive as she bring herself to speak.
The queen sighed. “Let’s make it quick.”
Blocks away, Elise’s ashes settled on a female teenager sleeping next to a library. She was with a group of runaways, and most of them were asleep. She saw images of a heart in her dream, then there was a searing pain on her arm.
“Shit!” She sat up from her dream, then pulled up her sleeve. A red, swollen heart was on her forearm, oozing with blood.
A guy next to her rolled over and asked, “What?”
“Nothing, just a bad dream,” the girl replied. “I need to take a piss.”
“Then go; don’t wake up everyone.” The guy snorted and went back to sleep.
She stood up, took a deep breath and centered herself. She hadn’t felt this good for as long as she could remember. She thought it was already daytime until she saw all the stores were dark and the street was still deserted. She checked her watch and it showed 3:03am, but the clock hands were not moving.
A car passed by with its bright headlights shining her way. She winced, and then she realized she could see in the dark.
She instinctively faced south; her eyes zoomed through trees, hills, and even houses before focusing on a residence.
It was the Dao monk’s house, the monk that helped Gretchen. Even from that distance, Elise could tell Shao was a descendent from one of her oldest enemies. His remote molecules gave off a special scent that recalled an ancient memory.
Time to pay your debt, Shao.
Part V
Ripples in Time
Changes what comes after, and before
37
An Unfamiliar Face
Ansen opened his eyes but could not remember where he was, and for a long while, the only thing he was aware of was the pounding headache. He looked around and realized he was in a room, hooked up to an IV unit and heart monitor. He tried to get up but could not feel things from the chest down. Am I paralyzed? He realized he didn’t know what date or what time it was, and he could not even remember his name. It was like being trapped in someone else’s mind. To the side, the
shades were drawn, and it appeared to be dark outside.
A station nurse with a blue uniform came in to check Ansen's vitals. Ansen tried to raise his arm to get her attention, but she just pushed his arms down. She greeted Ansen with a curt smile and tugged his bed sheets tighter around him. “Try to relax, sir, you had an accident. The doctor will be here to check on you shortly.” Before Ansen could reply, she turned away to check his vitals on the nearby monitor, then left the room.
Ansen shut his eyes and let the stillness in the room calm him. He searched his mind to recall what led him to this hospital, and the last thing he remembered was getting shot in the apartment. He could feel the soreness in his body as if someone had hit his body with a sledgehammer. The room started spinning, and he fought the urge to vomit by breathing slowly. Then, the dizziness dissipated. He felt exhausted but could not fall back to sleep. Images of his childhood came flooding back between different phases of his life. Finally, it all converged back to Maria—how he met her; how they fell in love. The horrible events that happened in the past seemed like a dream within a dream. He liked to remember the good times they had together, but some of the more negative images leaked through.
Ansen felt Maria’s presence. She was tickling his throat––something with legs, trying to crawl out. It continued to move up his throat until it was in his mouth. Ansen involuntarily coughed, and something fell onto his chest. He looked down his chest and saw an arachnid crawler. It was hard to make out is shape because it was gossamer-white, and its outline blended into the white bed sheet. It crawled quickly towards Ansen and stopped near his chin.
“Maria?” Ansen struggled to see through his blurred vision. His eyes felt heavy, and he could not form coherent thoughts.