by David Beers
And even once returned, in a building that should have been empty—if not completely destroyed—people found her. People that wanted something. And these?
They had wanted the most hilarious thing Nicki could imagine. Nicki had hardly understood what any of the others wanted, but it hadn’t really been action out of her. The thin man, the crazy one, he had wanted to kill her. Or maybe possess her. Nicki didn’t know which. The kidnappers had wanted to take her somewhere, and the fat man who wore robes had wanted to force her in front of the Black.
All of these people wanted to do something with her, but they hadn’t wanted her to do anything.
These two women were different. They wanted Nicki to act, and what they wanted her to do … Well Nicki would have laughed at it if she wasn’t so damned defeated.
Kill the weapon.
That was when she slowly slipped into this unbeing, because what was the point in being? She wasn’t fighting the weapon, not with all the gray static in the universe.
Nicki’s father was gone, and she’d killed him.
So why not just stop being, just unbe.
Because whatever is happening on Earth, whatever is happening with the Black, none of it really matters in the end. Even the Black is going to wind up facing the creature that put me and you here.
The words spoken by the woman from that black world floated through Nicki’s mind. Laurel. As if reminding her of something that she was trying to forget. She forced them way, not wanting to think on them.
When Nicki finally understood her father was gone, her will to keep going died as well. Her will to survive. She didn’t even consider what her return might be doing to others, still not seeing what everyone else did about her. All of these people chasing her, hounding her, wanting her for something … the reason behind it all was lost on Nicki.
Yet in at least two other people’s minds, Nicki had taken an ungodly sized presence in them. One wanted to kill her, the other to contact.
The second one finally did.
Your father is with me. He wants you to know he’s okay.
The words were distant, somewhere deep inside Nicki’s mind, and not something she really wanted to hear. It could have simply been lost in the other voices—those from outside, as well as the memories that floated through from time to time.
Except for the mention of her father.
That piqued Nicki’s interest, and slowly, what consciousness still existed made its way to the words.
Your father is with me. He wants you to know he’s okay.
Nicki lightly touched the words with no more than a feather’s weight. Understanding came very clear then, of who had sent the message … yet, that wasn’t correct. Not only understanding of whom, but understanding of everything about them.
It was the thin, crazy man that had shown up at her house, a gun in his car and ready to strangle her.
Fear like an uncoiling snake ripped through Nicki’s consciousness, bringing her just a bit further out of her unbeing. Those sitting next to her in the transport saw her face twitch.
The thin man wasn’t lying, though—Nicki understood that as well, immediately. Her father was with him. More came to Nicki as she remained with the words, more about the man himself. His wants, his wishes, his fears, his hates. All of it flowing through her like water through a sieve. She resisted at first, tightening and not liking such knowledge. It seemed impolite, knowing so much about a person, but as the seconds passed, she relaxed some.
Finally Nicki saw where the man was, the very room he sat in.
I can see through his eyes, she thought—her first actual thought in hours. And she could. The man was staring straight ahead across some huge room.
That’s him! her mind shouted, almost against her will. That’s Dad!
Please, the man said. You’re hurting me.
His voice was a plea, and Nicki realized …
He’s near death, she thought. I can kill him right now. I can snap him out of existence.
She didn’t release him, but held firm, toying with the idea. Because he had come for her, hadn’t he? He had been ready to kill her without hesitation. And the other people in that room, those besides her father? Nicki couldn’t be sure, but she thought she saw the Pope too. Another person that had wanted to grab her, take her, use her.
Why shouldn’t she kill this man? She hadn’t been able to kill anyone else that tried to harm her, so why couldn’t this one hold the place for all of them?
Nicki teetered on a dangerous precipice, one she couldn’t see.
Rachel Veritros thought she was seeing it, though—perhaps for the first time.
She’d watched Nicki descend into a deep place inside herself. Veritros could hear Nicki’s thoughts, and although she’d tried shouting at the girl, tried to break through whatever barriers she’d erected—she’d been kept out, though this time by Nicki.
The girl simply wanted nothing to do with anything at all.
A thought occurred to Veritros, and when it did, she stopped her struggle.
What if this is beyond you? What if you never even had a choice? What if everything that’s happening right now has been ordained long before?
Now Veritros listened to Nicki’s thoughts, those of murder. Veritros did not have a clear view of everyone involved in this, but the ones she could see all had blood on their hands. No one was innocent, least of all Veritros.
And yet this young lady had been tossed around on a ship that sat in the middle of a hurricane, thrown from end to end, and she still had no dirt on her. She was as pure as one could be in such an awful, awful world.
Murder had never mattered to Veritros. The first—lifting that man high above the trees until he suffocated—had been the same as the last. They had always just been a means to an end. This girl, though, had never seriously considered such things before. Her hands were clean, and Veritros thought …
It’s not possible.
It’s simply not.
Yet, she had seen the woman inside the black glass house, and had that not been the Prophet’s mother, long dead? Stepping out from some world that Rachel didn’t understand and having a conversation with this girl? And what had she actually said? Rachel didn’t know for sure, but when Nicki returned to Earth, the devastation Rachel expected hadn’t returned with her. She thought surely the woman would tell her of the Ministries’ evils, and the need to destroy them all—thus wiping out any last hope of stopping the Black.
Yet, it hadn’t happened.
It’s not possible, her mind repeated.
Yet, Rachel Veritros thought she might be seeing clearly for the first time.
Because she herself had been given free rein to come and go to those that touched the Unformed. She had been able to hide, speaking when necessary and remaining quiet when prudent. Only now, as the end raced forward, was she kept away.
Listening to Nicki contemplate murder, Rachel prayed. Not to the Unformed, and maybe not even to a god, but she asked all the same.
Let her make the right choice. Please.
Jackson Carriage recognized that he couldn’t speak. The girl’s hold on his mind was too tight, his vocal chords nearly severed. And yet, if he didn’t do something, and quickly, she was going to kill him. It felt like a vice grip on his brain, large metal blocks pushing on either side, ready to squeeze him to death.
Unable to speak loud enough to be heard, Jackson stood up. His body was rigid and his eyes stared straight forward; he dared not look left or right, thinking to lose focus now would end him.
He took only one step, like a broken robot.
Daniel stood then, though he didn’t move. He only looked at Jackson.
He couldn’t step any further. She was gripping his mind, not letting it go, nor squelching it. She was waiting, seeing everything he saw—probably with clearer vision.
Daniel came then at a half jog. Jackson remained still until the man was on him.
“What’s happening?” Daniel said, his
voice a harsh whisper.
A thin thing, words barely escaping Jackson’s lips. “Make her stop.” Leaves skimming over pavement, barely audible, but it was all he could do.
That and hope Daniel understood.
“What do you mean?” Daniel asked.
“Make … her … stop.”
That was it, there were no more words. There was little time left. All she had to do was simply keep holding on, and Jackson would die. She was too strong, her presence too great. She was a goddess and he less than bacterium.
Daniel’s face furrowed, his eyes narrowing as he peered into Jackson’s.
“Nicki?” he asked.
Jackson could say nothing, could hardly think any longer.
“Nicki,” Daniel said. “Are you there? Are you in there?”
There was no answer. There couldn’t be, because Jackson couldn’t possibly do anything else.
“Nicki, it’s Dad. If you can hear me, I don’t know what you’re doing, but I love you, honey.”
Stop … her. Jackson thought the words, slowly, but he couldn’t say them. He cared nothing about these two, not anymore. He only wanted the pain to end, and if possible, to live.
“Honey, whatever you’re doing. Stop. I told this man to reach out to you. He’s doing it for me, baby. He’s not going to hurt you or me. Okay? I wanted to tell you that I’m safe.”
Jackson felt the pressure increasing in his head, the vice squeezing an inch tighter.
“Honey?” Daniel asked.
Jackson collapsed to the floor, Nicki releasing him and the pain flooding away like water rushing from a broken dam.
“Is he okay?” someone shouted from across the room.
Jackson closed his eyes, not caring what anyone else said. Adrenaline rolled through his body, sending tingles down his arms and legs. He let the darkness wash over him, understanding that he may not have met God, but without a doubt, someone in contact with such a being.
Nicki only partially released Jackson Carriage. She’d felt this type of thing before, yet she still grew bewildered at it. Complete power. She had felt it when the gray spread out inside the motel room, and then again inside the house in the sky. Now, inside Jackson Carriage’s mind, Nicki was a god.
Her body still remained motionless, though her brow was slightly concentrated. The two women next to her saw it, but only because they had been staring for such a long time. Had someone came upon her, they most likely wouldn’t have noticed.
Her consciousness was not at full attention yet, even with her father speaking to her.
Nicki hardly knew it, but she was controlling someone else’s entire mind with only a fraction of her own.
She was picking through Jackson Carriage, trying to understand if what her father said was true. She had released the man, though only barely. The urge to kill him … she’d never felt anything like it before. It had tasted sweet, like a rare chocolate. Had her father not looked in the man’s eyes, she would have done it.
Even now, having released him, the sweetness beckoned her. Taste me. Pick me up. Eat me.
She didn’t dip her mouth to it yet, her concern for her father stronger. This man had tried to kill her and she didn’t understand why her father would be around him.
Quickly she went through Jackson Carriage’s memories, nothing inside the man able to create any kind of barrier against her. She had an image of someone picking through notecards, reading one and then passing onto the next—yet that was far too slow. The details were instantaneous; the only thing slowing her down was her desire to make sure she missed nothing.
He’s lying, she thought, though not completely.
The thought only held the weight of a leaf falling lazily from a tree limb.
They’re coming for Dad, she thought. Those people down below.
Laurel’s words came again, unbidden and more forceful. Because whatever is happening on Earth, whatever is happening with the Black, none of it really matters in the end. Even the Black is going to wind up facing the creature that put me and you here.
They were heavier than her own thoughts, not something she could easily slap away.
Her consciousness took another step forward, closer to the surface.
What’s happening? she wondered as Jackson Carriage’s mind grew in importance. What’s happening there?
Jackson didn’t know completely. He only had snippets of the overall picture.
Taste me. Pick me up. Eat me. More words that weren’t hers, reminding Nicki of the sweetness death could give.
No, not yet.
There would be time for it if she wanted. Fully conscious, Nicki didn’t understand the power she held—though consciously, she ran from it. But in this semi-comatose state, it felt natural. She could do as she wanted and no one could stop her. Even these words that fluttered in and out of her mind—hers or not, they were empty. Powerless.
Can you hear me?
Inside the transport, Nicki’s eyes narrowed.
Inside her mind, her consciousness took one more step forward, though a small one.
It was the voice from before, the one with all that rage and fury behind it that Nicki had been frightened of. Now, though, she recognized the voice held no power. Perhaps it had, once before, but whatever it’d been capable of no longer mattered. Nicki was all powerful. Here, in this place, she could banish that voice.
You can hear me, it said. You have to wake up.
No, Nicki didn’t. Nicki didn’t have to do anything she didn’t want to, and waking—or whatever term should be used—was definitely not on that list.
The end is almost here, the voice said. Your father. The rest of the people with him. Even the people attacking him, they’re all doing this at Its direction. The Unformed’s. You have to wake up, because there is no one else that can stop It. There is no one left.
Her consciousness took a third step.
No, she thought. I don’t want to.
LOOK! The voice shouted, and Nicki did.
Daniel had been staring down at Jackson Carriage, lying on the ground, his body limp.
Moments passed, Daniel having time to register that the man was still breathing. Still alive, so if Nicki was inside of him, she hadn’t killed him.
And in the next instant, the psychopath’s eyes shot open, red veins running across the whites; his pale, sallow skin seeming to stretch as his eyes bulged from their sockets. His mouth opened wide, a black hole that looked limitless.
His head slowly turned and his unblinking eyes stared up at the windows.
“Nicki?” Daniel whispered, though the Pope was nearly to him. Others were coming too, and any wish that Daniel had of keeping Nicki’s name out of their heads was fading.
He watched as the skeleton like figure stared at the windows, watching the horror unfold as everyone else had for hours.
Do you see? the voice asked, and Nicki did.
She looked at massive windows that stretched from floor to ceiling, each displaying murder and chaos. She looked through eyes not her own, but watched people killing one another. People with static strands hanging from their hands.
Nicki had a vague sense that people were crowding around the body she now inhabited, but she didn’t care.
That is the end. That depravity is slowly making its way to your father, and soon, it’ll be there. Unless you wake up.
Nicki watched, not wanting to wake up, but horror draping over her consciousness the same as the strands had draped those killers’ hands.
He’s going to die, she thought. A simple statement, because those people would make it to her father. Clearly they were insane, but that static on some of their hands meant only one thing. The Black.
The Black was near her father.
Yes, the voice said. Yes.
Nicki hardly heard it, focusing only on that singular fact: her father was going to die.
Nicki’s consciousness finally came fully forward, her eyes taking in the transport around her. Somewhere she d
idn’t recognize, but also didn’t care about. She looked at the woman next to her—the weapon’s sister. Rebecca Hollowborne.
“We have to save him,” she said.
Nicki didn’t know it, but gray static filled her eyes.
Seventeen
The panel on the front window showed: ETA - 1 hr.
“David, are you okay?” Rhett asked, standing up in the back of the transport. Rhett had been watching him for the past half-hour, at first trying not to be noticed. As the minutes passed, though, he unconsciously quit caring.
David’s eyes were low, though not quite closed. Sweat sat in large droplets across his forehead, and his skin had grown pale.
Rhett stepped closer, any thought about the red marks circling his neck completely forgotten.
“David?”
He felt Christine step up next to him, but David’s eyes didn’t open. He didn’t move at all.
The other two in the transport didn’t move; no one said a word.
Rhett walked closer to the front, and still David showed no sign whatsoever of hearing him. Rhett went all the way to the front seat, standing just behind it, but where he could look upon David fully.
“Something’s wrong,” Rhett whispered.
David’s eyes were rolled into the back of his head, his eyelids twitching rapidly up and down. A large bead of sweat dripped down his forehead, over his temple, and then down his cheek.
Rhett reached forward slowly, and pulled an eyelid up. He could just see the bottom of David’s iris.
It was lit gray.
“I don’t know what’s happening,” he said, not needing to turn around. Christine had leaned over his back, her chest pressing against him, and was staring at the same thing. “I’ve never … Nothing like this.”
He heard her swallow in the silence that followed.
“David?” Christine asked.
No answer.
Rhett released his eye lid and the Prophet only sat there sweating.