by Schow, Ryan
I am my soul.
And my soul is beyond compare.
No judgment is the message floating into my field of being. A message from my guide. Or from God. Then the question is asked of me: Do you want to go back, or move forward?
I don’t answer.
OMG, what do I want?
In this state of all knowing, I should have the answer, but my phantom brain is conflicted. Not in a bad way. It’s simply a convoluted jumble of thoughts. It’s indecision. Like, which candy to eat?—or which movie to watch? Either choice will be an experience, it’s only what experience I wish to choose.
At this point, I honestly don’t know.
The Crazy Russian and the Corpse
1
The two days that Netty asked Brayden for passed with not a word from Gerhard. The only thing that changed was everyone felt like killing each other. No one really said it, but you could feel it in every look, every exchange, in the sour taste of the air they breathed.
Irenka wouldn’t even stay at the house anymore. They thought maybe she was at a nearby hotel because the last thing she did before grabbing all of her things was get all pissy and say, “You three are cancerous.”
Ever since yesterday, Netty’s been calling Gerhard every fifteen minutes. We’re talking OCD-like focus. Thirteen and a half hours of it. Right now, it’s official, she’s become a full blown lunatic. Moody as hell. And rude. She was in the kind of mood that had Brayden and Georgia secretly plotting her murder. If given the choice between talking with Netty and contracting AIDS, Brayden would opt for AIDS (no offense to the AIDS survivors of the world).
Brayden took walking-on-eggshells to uncharted levels. He was thinking, how much more of this bi-polar bullshit can I take? Looking at her alone wasn’t safe. And forget any interaction. Hell, if Brayden would have phoned the psychic hotline, the otherworldly servants of the Nether would have told him to run for his motherfreaking life.
The word sociopath came to mind. Pre-nuclear seemed more accurate.
At this point, even Brayden knew he had to leave while he still had the chance. But he didn’t. Which made him stupid. Instead of leaving, he sat like a drooling monkey on the couch glued to the TV. All he watched were news channels. And if there was but a hint of the Laurel Court situation he went nearly catatonic.
“Would you shut that crap off before I throw the damn TV out the window?!” Netty screamed. Firecrackers going off in his butthole wouldn’t have startled him this much. Whatever Abby saw in this Russian nightmare, he didn’t see at all. Sure she was hot in a normal, blonde Russian kind of way, but damn.
When she snapped, it was morning. But by the weary, nearly obliterated feeling of him, it could be midnight, or two A.M., or…whenever.
“I can’t, Netty. Sorry.”
“That’s it,” she snarled. “Get off your ass and get dressed, you’re coming with me.” He was too afraid to ask her where exactly they were going. His temper, however, was starting to flare.
Netty blazed down the hallway, her mood foul enough to muddy the air. Seconds later she was banging on Georgia’s closed door like the girl couldn’t set her on fire if she wanted.
He stood and headed to the room he was supposed to be sharing with Georgia, cautious, curious. He hadn’t showered in days and his hair hurt where it was coming in. His whole head itched. Georgia finally opened the door and Netty said, “Get ready, we’re going.”
“Going where?” he heard Georgia ask. She sounded drugged. And Brayden? He was trying not to be seen by Netty. Wanting to not be yelled at.
“Just get ready!” she snapped.
Netty disappeared into her own room, which was why Brayden felt safe joining Georgia. Dressed in her wife-beater tank top and a pair of G-string panties, she didn’t seem to care that he was staring at her. She just bent over and rifled through a pile of clothes on the floor. From the pile, she threw him a pair of jeans and a lime green shirt that barely matched.
She then dug her own outfit out of the mess.
The unwashed smell of his clothes made him feel dirtier than he was. And all these wrinkles in his shirt and pants? They looked permanent enough to survive even the mightiest of industrial irons. He was about to change in the bathroom when Georgia pulled off her tank top and picked up a white, inside out short-sleeved blouse. Her tits were breathtaking. She looked at him with nothing behind those eyes of hers. Not embarrassment. Not anger for him watching her.
Jesus, not anything.
“What?” she said, pulling on a pair of ripped Jeans short shorts. She was totally topless. For her lack of shame…holy shit, she could be French.
“You’re so sexy, and so scary at the same time,” he said. It was the truth and it left his mouth involuntarily.
“Why am I scary?” she said.
He pulled down his sweats, took off his shirt, then put on the dirty clothes she gave him. From his opened suitcase, she pulled out a pair of flip flops and tossed them to him. He slid in them without thought.
“Because…you’ve…killed people with your mind. And because you don’t care about things you should care about. Like how your…boobs are out and stuff.”
She put her feet into a pair of short cowboy boots. No socks. “The people I killed deserved it,” she said, turning the blouse inside out to make it right. “Well, not the first boy, anyway. That was not my fault.”
Brayden heard the story of how she was pitted up against another boy to fight for their lives and she ended up killing him. What a horrible thing for Gerhard to do. Not that it surprised him.
“It’s just creepy that you have all that power is all.”
“Better than boring,” she said without an ounce of humor.
It should have been funny, her saying that, and though it was true, Brayden didn’t want to watch his every word and action for fear of being turned into a crispy critter. She finally slipped on the blouse and he found he could breathe again.
Between her and Netty, his chances of survival were dwindling fast.
Georgia breezed by him—smiling that awkward, unpracticed smile—and ran her hand along his head. It was something she’d never done before.
Where did that come from?
“You look good,” she said. But not with much emotion.
Netty was suddenly at the door looking in. “Whenever you two are done blowing each other,” she said, “we’re going to the lab to get some goddamn answers.”
“Portable dumpsters are cleaner than that mouth of yours, Netty,” Brayden said, at the risk of having his face peeled off and thrown back at him.
“It’s how I cope,” she said. “Let’s go.”
“What if Gerhard’s not there?” Georgia asked.
“Not even the devil and his racer-red balls can stop me from finding out what the hell is going on, and that’s all you two need to know.”
“Okay,” Georgia said, stoic.
“Okay,” Brayden said, although he was thinking more about Georgia and her perfect face and body than their impromptu mission.
Two years ago, when he first began socializing with the butt-ugly Savannah and the three non-triplets, he developed a mad crush on Georgia. That was before he grew close to Savannah, and later Abby. Georgia looked a lot like she did back then, just darker, more dangerous. If she were a video game character, she’d wear a leather corset and thigh high-boots, bold make-up and carry a whip and a shotgun. She would be the kind of character guys like him would jerk off to and that had him thinking he might be as attracted to her as he was scared of her.
She caught him looking at her and said, “What?” to which he shrugged his shoulders.
The truth was, he could never be with Georgia because she was a fire-starting emotionless deity; and he couldn’t be with Abby because it didn’t matter what Gerhard did or said, she had been dead way too long to come back and not be screwed up. If she ever did come back, which he was sure she would not. If Gerhard could save her, it would be Stephen King’s Pet Cemetery, t
he real life version.
Fountain of Youth Serum or not, Abby was gone and Netty was the last of the three of them to accept it. And as for Georgia? He’d tread lightly, and try not to fantasize about her so much. Who in the heck knew what was going to happen if he set off either one of them?
He didn’t want to find out, that was for sure.
2
The key to Gerhard’s lab didn’t work. Gerhard changed the locks. Brayden and Georgia banged on the front door to Gerhard’s lab exactly fifteen minutes before Netty turned and left them both standing there for like an eternity. When she came back it was with a gigantic rock she got from God knows where.
“What the hell, Netty?” Brayden asked.
When the coast was clear, she heaved it through one of the lab’s front windows. She started kicking out the remaining glass, even as passerby’s watched in horror and suspicion. Who knew they were doing a daylight B&E? When the glass was cleaned out, Netty crawled through and opened the front door from the inside.
“Pussies,” she said.
Brayden tried to laugh. Georgia just stared at her. Down in the lab, Abby’s monitors showed her pulse and brain activity. They could hardly believe it. Right before the excitement could take hold, they heard the racket in the other room. Gerhard burst into the lab seconds later, sullied, stinking to all hell like booze, and vigorously pissed off.
“What are you doing in here!” he boomed. His five o’clock shadow was looking more like a three day shadow.
Netty seemed to forget who Gerhard really was or what the man was capable of, which Brayden imagined weighed into her decision to get right in his face and say, “I’ve been calling you for days!”
The thing about Russians is they have gigantic balls, even if they’re girls who have no balls at all. Something in Brayden really admired that, though he’d never admit it.
“I’ve been busy!” the new Gerhard shouted into her face. He had that look like he wanted to pull out her eyeballs and eat them with toast and mimosa’s.
“We’ve been knocking,” Georgia added, her tone less confrontational than Netty’s.
“We just want to know about Abby, and then we’ll go,” Brayden said, trying to be diplomatic. Whatever happened to Gerhard, it was bad because the man was seriously on edge.
“Well, she’s alive,” Gerhard snapped. “Sort of.”
“What do you mean, sort of?” Brayden asked, anticipation having its way with his heart.
“And why didn’t you tell us?” Netty said. She slapped him right across the face and said, “Do you have any idea what we’ve been going through?”
Turning to Brayden, he snarled, “Get this skinny Russian bitch away from me before I kill her.” The way heat vapors ripple the air above a fire was how Gerhard’s words made them all think he was highly flammable.
Netty caught her breath, then tried to slap him again. He snatched her wrist, spun her around, then used his other hand to grab a fistful of her hair, right near the scalp where it hurt most. He jerked her head back, then forcefully cupped a hand over her nose and mouth until her eyes flashed wide.
Gerhard’s expression was pure insanity.
Brayden wasn’t sure if he was going to kill her or not. He wouldn’t do that, would he? God, that look! he thought. Of course he would, if he could.
“Stop it,” Brayden said. He took a step towards the man. Netty’s eyes bulged, her struggle real, but Gerhard was in complete control. His wicked, spiteful grin alone pumped a vicious mixture of ice water and acid directly into Brayden’s veins.
“Little girls like this need to be taught manners,” he growled, leaning forward, laying his manic gaze upon her. “The first of which is to respect your elders.”
Her face was turning bluish-purple, her eyelids fluttering. She was kicking and thrashing in fits and bursts, the fight to breathe, to get free, diminishing. The way she squirmed and fought, Gerhard had that look that said he could give a shit less. Even as Netty tore bloody trenches in his forearms with her fingernails, he didn’t flinch.
“STOP IT!” Brayden boomed. He wasn’t sure what he could do against a beast like Gerhard, a monster who sent hundreds of thousands of innocents to their deaths in Auschwitz. He was inhuman. He had no conscience. No limits.
Brayden took a second step forward, fear moving like waves of molten heat inside him, and then he looked back at Georgia with the need for help burning bright in his eyes.
She didn’t seem to care. She could burn Gerhard to death, but it was clear she wouldn’t even try. Maybe she really did want Netty dead.
“What are you going to do, Brayden?” Gerhard snarled. Netty’s body was going limp. “You’re going to do what you always do, and that’s be a spineless coward. Even now your brain is bouncing all over itself trying to think of something you can do, but you can’t think of ANYTHING!”
Sadly, he was right.
Netty’s knees gave and Gerhard let her fall to the ground. She hit the concrete floor hard, knees first, then sideways where her head bounced lightly on the ground. She gasped for breath. Lying on her side, her hair fanned out on the concrete floor around her, she swallowed giant gulps of air. Laying like a dying fish on the shoreline, out in the waterless air. It was sort of like that.
“Keep your bitch on a leash,” Gerhard groused, looking directly at Georgia rather than Brayden. Then, turning scornful eyes on at Brayden, he said, “Because this one here’s busy pissing his britches.”
Netty started crying and just like that, the mania inside of her broke. She was vulnerable again. Human. Brayden helped her to her feet, held her quivering body close. He never took his eyes off the lunatic who was now Gerhard version 2.0.
“It’s okay,” he whispered into her hair. “You forgot who he is, what he’s capable of.”
Her shaking turned to helpless weeping in near dead silence. Still in his embrace, she set her chin on his shoulder, not letting him go. He knew she was staring at Abby.
Who was alive.
Gerhard started punching buttons on Abby’s canister’s instrument panel entirely too hard. Right then, he was a product of his own anger. We’re talking virtually homicidal. The machine mechanically moved from vertical to horizontal, the draining process already underway.
Gerhard said, “Her body’s alive, but she’s in some kind of a coma I can’t figure out. And she’s been dead too long to still have a soul, so if you can wake her up, if she isn’t a complete zombie, then someone other than me has to figure out what’s next. I’ve done my part. The rest is on you.”
“You’re such an asshole,” Netty muttered, her face bright red, still damp with tears.
He looked at her, his cheeks trembling from overshot adrenaline, his eyes blistering with the kind of rage reserved only for people in straightjackets and padded rooms, and said, “Best you learn that now. Lock up when you’re done.”
“We broke a window,” Georgia said.
Over his shoulder, almost like it didn’t matter at all, he said, “How industrious of you.”
When Abby was out of the canister and on the table, Gerhard covered her with a towel then left the room again. The three of them looked at her, then to each other.
Georgia said, “So what next?”
Netty and Brayden both shrugged their shoulders, and that’s when Brayden said, “Netty, you’re her oldest friend, talk to her.”
“What should I say?” she asked.
“I don’t know, but say something. Talk about your past or something. Touch her. I hear they like that. Being touched.”
“Okay.”
“We’ll leave you with her.”
“It can’t be just me talking to her,” Netty said, almost like she didn’t want to be left alone in the lab after Gerhard’s outburst.
“We’ll talk to her, too,” Brayden said, looking at Georgia, who failed to produce even one single emotion. “Or at least I will.”
Reanimated
1
Gerhard left the lab for a
n hour and still the three musketeers—as he had come to regard them—talked and talked and talked to the body. Then, after he had been back a good hour, thankfully, they left. In the silence, a fresh bottle of Blue Label in hand, he thought about Abby. About the chances of her soul returning to this reanimated flesh. Of all the unconscionable things he had done, of the numerous ways he circumvented the natural laws of evolution, this was certainly the most questionable.
Abby was on the gurney in front of him, a towel covering her female parts, her hair now dry and brushed straight.
In matters of death, his Fountain of Youth Serum made God irrelevant. And in matters of life, his and Dr. Heim’s ability to impregnate a host girl and bring children to term early and healthy made God equally irrelevant. Gerhard found a way to control all cycles of life: birth, aging, death.
“I am God,” he said aloud, even though he hadn’t meant to say anything. He thumped on his temple. What was wrong with his brain?
Then it occurred to him. Perhaps he was indeed Dr. Frankenstein, and Abby would still become his finest creation, his monster, his weapon.
She would be a different breed of muscle. Not like the seven foot, scab eating war machine that he made and Savannah killed. No, she would be different.
More capable.
His brain started to hurt, to slither in its shell, to feel like a dozen eels squirming in a small bowl of water. And then, right there in the middle of contemplating matters of life and death, Abby opened a pair of foggy, death-glazed eyes and looked right at him.
The bottle of Blue Label dropped from his hand, hit the gurney and tipped over, the amber liquid spilling everywhere. He grabbed it, sat it right-side up.
“Abby, dear,” he said, breathless, “you’re awake.”