by Brian Byrne
“Victor!” he croaked. His throat was like a desert again; it sounded like he hadn’t uttered a word in days. He called Victor’s name again and the smoke parted, and for a split second he got a good look at his face. Victor was staring down at him but his eyes, like last time, were devoid of any recognition. His mouth was shivering, opening and closing so rapidly he could only be speaking gibberish. Unlike last time, however, his skin wasn’t grey. Not even a little bit.
“Happy birthday.”
Marty’s entire body hardened. He recognised that voice from a single syllable, never mind an entire sentence. He looked for the source, and there, at the far side of the cavern, stood the man in maroon. Only this time his disguises were gone.
If seeing his history teacher’s doppelgänger for the first time was disconcerting, seeing his dad’s had to be the most perplexing thing he had ever witnessed—magical mirrors and shape-shifting kidnappers included. So many emotions were running through his head (and indeed, his face) that he couldn’t decide which one to settle on. Part of him was relieved to see his dad again. It made him think, for the first time since he’d arrived here, that he wasn’t so far from home. But the rest of him knew better. The rest of him knew that now, more than ever, looks were deceiving. He couldn’t let himself be fooled, even if he could recall this man’s face from some of his earliest memories.
Marty opened his mouth to speak but nothing came out. What could he say?
His dad’s reflection smirked. Marty had never seen his dad smirk before—smile, yes, but never with the malicious intent he was witnessing right now. The hairs on his neck tried to stand but couldn’t—they, like Marty, were paralysed with sheer bewilderment.
“It’s funny. You look like him, yet you evoke absolutely none of his beauty. You sound like him, yet you have none of his charm. You are just a boy. It’s miraculous you made it this far, but you did have protection. You had him.” The man’s eyes didn’t waver but Marty knew who he was talking about. “But no matter—he has been fixed, and now you are finally on your own. You will face him by yourself and yourself only.”
The man in maroon disappeared into the tunnel behind him and for a moment Marty was alone. Then, without warning, the temperature skyrocketed. Marty went from uncomfortably warm to miserably hot so quickly it was nauseating. Beads of sweat ran down his forehead, underarms and back. The air became thinner and more difficult to breathe. Marty fanned himself with his hands but it was no use. His breathing fast and shallow he stumbled backwards, away from Victor and towards the tunnel he’d leaped out of just seconds before.
“It’s time you faced Master Black,” Marty heard his dad’s voice announce, and a moment later he reappeared. Beside him, from the depths of the same tunnel, Marty saw the outline of someone else. Wiping sweat from his eyes he watched as they stepped into the cavern.
And just like that Marty was staring at himself.
*
For a long time Marty’s reflection just watched him. Marty stood flat against the wall. The hairs on his neck had found their feet and now stood bolt upright. Sweat poured from his every orifice but he didn’t wipe it away. He couldn’t. He was transfixed. Forget what he thought about his dad’s doppelgänger—this was the most perplexing thing he’d ever experienced. There was no contest.
This was how Marty would look when he died. That was the best—no, the only way he could describe what he was looking at. It was Marty’s living, breathing corpse. His skin was the colour of concrete, his cheeks so far sunken it looked like holes had been gouged in them. And his eyes: he had none. On the other hand, his hair was bright orange, just like Marty’s.
The reflection frowned, but not in anger or even disgust. It was something else, something so impossible Marty wouldn’t let himself believe it. His doppelgänger opened his mouth, and slowly, smoke began to billow from it. Dirty black smoke, like a stranger was living deep inside of him. Like everything that is bad and wrong and evil emanated from his very person. And suddenly Marty understood. It was him. He was the one who had brought darkness—and indeed, the dark—to Violetville. He was the one who created the strangers, the River of No Remorse. He was the reason Victor Blume, and thousands before him, had lost themselves.
“Come.” He spat out the word with the smoke. The moment Marty’s reflection spoke Victor shuddered. The smoke parted again, this time letting go of him completely, and he plummeted into the gaping hole and out of sight.
Finally, Marty found his voice. He screamed.
Marty ran, not after Victor, but after his doppelgänger. But he’d only taken a few steps when white hotness exploded inside of him, forcing him to his knees. He cried out and as he did the heat started to fade again. That’s when he realised: the heat wasn’t coming from his surroundings. It was coming from him. Something down here had set it off. No, not something; Master Black. Marty’s doppelgänger was dangerous; that much was obvious. The sudden explosion of heat proved how dangerous he could be.
Marty tried standing up, but before he was fully upright his dad’s reflection grabbed him by the front of his t-shirt and shoved him backwards. His legs were weak and he stumbled, grunting as he toppled foot over head towards the centre of the cavern, towards the gaping hole which had just devoured his friend. The ground vanished and the hole ate his legs but he threw out his arms and caught hold of the edge. He saw a foot, pain ruptured his face and the hole swallowed the rest of him.
*
He broke my nose.
The fall had knocked him out. Or maybe it was the kick to the face; he couldn’t tell. Either way he found himself in utter darkness again. He didn’t know how far he’d fallen, but the curve of the stone underneath him told him it hadn’t been a straight drop to the bottom. His nose had a pulse of its own and when he licked his lips he tasted blood. Dully he wondered how long he’d have to wait before it healed itself again.
He got to his feet, testing his weight on each limb to make sure nothing else was broken. Apart from a few grazes and a slight headache he was unharmed. Maybe the heat had protected him during the fall, too. But what about Victor? He didn’t have any special healing powers.
After a quick inspection of his surroundings Marty found a single path onwards. He called out Victor’s name, but he was worried that even if Victor could hear him there was a good chance he wouldn’t be able to call back. But he refused to think about that right now. He refused to think about anything beyond finding his friend. His voice bounced back at him and for some reason made him feel uneasy. He started walking, calling out at intervals, and after a while the echoes began to change. They no longer bounced back; instead they travelled onwards, far ahead into what must have been a long tunnel.
His feet collided with something hard and he heard it roll away. It sounded hollow, not at all like a rock should sound. But what else could it be? When he collided with another one he bent down and picked it up. It was round like a rock, but there were holes. Two circular ones side-by-side, an odd triangular one, and finally a wide and gaping one, almost like a mouth.
Marty gagged. He threw it from his hands and it bounced away, echoing horribly as it went. It was a skull. He was no expert, but it felt human. What if there was no way out? What if he was trapped down here, doomed to starve all over again?
“Marty?”
He jumped. He jumped like a victim in a bad horror movie jumps when they find a masked serial killer in their closet.
“I’m over here.”
Marty couldn’t see anything but still his eyes widened. “Victor?”
“Yeah, it’s me. Happy birthday, by the way. I’d no idea.”
“What? Oh, thanks, I’d sort of forgotten to be honest—wait, you’re okay?!”
“Sure I’m doin’ all right I suppose.”
“You’re doing all right? What do you mean you’re doing all right?! You were tainted!” Marty sounded upset but he could already feel himself deflating. His relief was a physical thing.
; He heard the sound of approaching footsteps and then Victor was standing next to him. “I’ll let yeh in on a little secret. I faked it.” He started walking away again.
Marty could hear the pride in his voice. It reminded him of the time he first showed him the roses. “You faked it,” he repeated blankly, following the sound of his companion’s footsteps.
“After deh stranger nearly threw me intuh deh river I realised I needed teh be more careful. Especially with you around. So I started stuffin’ me undershirt with roses as a sort’ve backup plan.”
Marty inflated again, this time with anger. “I thought you were tainted! I thought you were gone!”
“C’mon, Marty. What other choice did I have?”
“You could have at least given me some sign you were all right. I don’t know, like a wink or something.”
Victor laughed. “A wink? Marty, do yeh’ve any idea how powerful dat boy is? If he knew I was havin’ him on he’d ‘ve killed me on the spot.”
“I guess. You could have told me about all of this sooner, by the way.”
“I know. But yeh have teh see it from my point’ve view. I didn’t believe it first. I didn’t want teh. For yer sake, I mean. And besides, I had no idea how yeh’d react. I thought it’d be like deh girls all over again—and it sort’ve was, in the end.”
“You mean you couldn’t trust me.”
“Okay, I suppose yeh could say dat.”
“I didn’t trust you either.”
“Well, no matter. I was always of the mindset dat if somethin’ is supposed teh happen, it’ll happen. Seein’ yer double didn’t surprise me as much as it should’ve. It was like deh last piece’ve deh puzzle. As soon as I saw him everytin’ slid neatly inteh place. Yer deh one who’s supposed to put an end teh him, I know it now.”
Marty knew it too, but that didn’t stop his stomach lurching at Victor’s words. “How, though? How am I supposed to stop him? Just think of all the things he’s done.” Suddenly he was breathless. He’d known it for days but only now did the idea of actually having to save this place feel real. The thought alone was so unbelievable that sheer terror was the only thing keeping him from laughing out loud. His doppelgänger had brought darkness to an entire world. He’d killed the sun—or at least put it somewhere its rays went unseen. And what had Marty done? Given Lissa a piggyback? Narrowly avoided burning to death in a house fire? His train of thought went off the rails. Victor didn’t know. He didn’t know his home was gone.
“I saw how he affected yeh.”
Marty shook his head before realising Victor wouldn’t be able to see it. “It was unbearable. I think the heat was trying to keep me from getting too close. It was trying to protect me.”
“Maybe,” Victor said. “Or maybe gettin’ close is deh very ting yeh need teh do.”
At this, Marty was stumped. “What do you mean?”
“Didn’t yeh notice? Marty, I’ve spent deh past I don’t know how long bein’ tortured by dat boy. He wanted teh know tings. At first he asked about random tings, like how I discovered deh roses, or how I managed teh keep a step ahead of deh strangers for so long. But den he started askin’ about you. And once he did he didn’t stop.”
“He tortured you?” Marty couldn’t recall seeing a single mark on him back in the cavern.
“It wasn’t dat type‘ve torture. Anyway, I tink deh only reason he didn’t kill me is because he knew I’d lead yeh to him.”
“And after all that he didn’t even attack me. He didn’t even try.”
“Tink about it, Marty. Yer his reflection. How is it he can destroy thousands’ve lives but not yers? How is it he turned away and left yeh here without even makin’ sure yeh were dead? He’d never trust his dad with anytin’, definitely not sometin’ as important as dis.”
“But then why did he leave?”
“I heard him talkin’ about yeh. He’s known yeh existed for a very long time. He sent deh reflections into yer world because he didn’t want teh have teh deal with yeh himself. He’s scared of yeh, Marty.”
That did it: Marty laughed out loud. “You’re joking.”
“I’m not jokin’ in deh slightest. I don’t tink yeh were the only one who felt pain up dare. He’s just better at hidin’ it.”
“So what are you saying? I just need to get close to him and hope he faints first?!”
Victor nodded. “Until yeh learn what else yeh can do.”
*
The ground was just beginning to slope upwards when Marty heard it: voices. At first he thought it was just the sound of his own echoes as he told Victor everything that had happened since Mortimus visited—leaving out, of course, the part where his henchwoman burned the Rose to the ground. He wanted to tell him, but how could he? He couldn’t help thinking he was to blame for it.
Then the voices became groans and he realised it was something else entirely.
“What is that?” he asked, coming to a stop.
Victor’s footsteps stopped, too. “It sounds like—but no. It can’t be.”
Victor picked up the pace. Marty was going to ask him to slow down when, up ahead, he saw something. It looked like an opening to the cave. An exit. A way out. That’s when he spotted them: bodies.
The exit wasn’t an exit, but an entrance.
To the River Of No Remorse.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The tunnel opened at one side of the river. Marty followed Victor towards the edge but stopped just short of it. The stench was worse than ever now.
“Is someone there?” a voice called.
Marty blocked his nose and leaned over for a better look. It was a long drop, maybe ten or fifteen feet. There, standing next to a pile of mismatched body parts, was Alana Adams. There were several others, too. Some were just beginning to sit up. Others were wiping their eyes. It was like they were waking up from a really long sleep.
“Get back!” Marty hissed at Victor, but it was too late: she’d spotted them.
“Victor? Is that you?!” Alana came closer, stumbling across dozens of corpses as she went. The others noticed, too, and before very long everyone was calling out to him.
“What’s going on?”
“Why are we down here?!”
“Look! There are dead people everywhere!”
They started panicking, running back and forth. Some of them tried climbing the wall but they didn’t get very far.
“Everyone!” Victor said. “If yeh’ll stop for just a minute I’ll fill yeh in on what’s bin goin’ on!”
One by one, the captives stopped trying to escape and looked back up at the tunnel. As Victor began explaining what happened, Marty realised something. All these people had reverted to their past selves; they had become untainted again. Come to think of it, that wasn’t the only thing that had changed. It was still dark out, but it felt warmer now. Sure, that might have been down to his new powers, but there was something else, too: while the faces in the clouds were still there, they were beginning to disperse, to morph into something unintelligible. Into regular clouds. Slowly, the dark was leaving this place.
Hold on a minute, Marty thought. If the dark was leaving, it must be going somewhere else. Which meant his doppelgänger must be going somewhere else.
“Master Black is leaving,” he said. “He’s leaving this world and going into mine.”
Victor broke off mid-sentence and turned around. “What makes yeh tink dat?”
“All along I’ve been wondering why he wanted to kill me. It wasn’t just because he’s scared of me. There’s more to it than that. He wants to corrupt my world, but he doesn’t want to do it while I’m there. He thinks I’m a threat.”
Victor’s entire face went flaccid. All of a sudden he looked just as ragged as his doppelgänger. “Yeh need teh go after him.”
“But we’re trapped!”
“Am, excuse me?”
Marty leaned back over the edge. Sure enough, Alana had been eavesdropping.
“I think I
know how you might be able to get out of here. We’d like to help, if you want.”
*
“I’ll lower yeh down as far as I can. Deh bodies should break yer fall.”
Marty locked hands with Victor and lowered himself over the edge. When he was hanging flat against the wall Victor got down onto his stomach, lowering him farther still.
“Okay, whenever yer ready!” From here Victor looked like nothing but a disembodied head and pair of arms.
Marty pushed out from the wall and let go; air rushed passed him and he hit the surface, stumbling but remaining on his feet. Victor was right—he barely felt the impact at all. Marty watched his companion copy him and together they set to work.
With the help of the prisoners they carefully lifted the bodies, placing them on the ground next to the wall. There were at least a dozen people helping out; soon they’d built a makeshift staircase all the way up to the railing. Marty tried to offset the sick feeling in his stomach by thinking about all the extra bodies that would pile up if he didn’t stop his doppelgänger, but still felt pretty awful as he crawled to the top.
*
Running.
Marty was exhausted but he couldn’t slow down. They’d come out of the river on the wrong side of town which meant he was farther from home than ever.
“Hang on!” Victor gasped as they raced over a footbridge. “Sure yeh can’t use deh mirror! It’s broken!”
Marty wasn’t listening. He was entranced. It was hours until curfew ended, but for the first time ever, Over There was alive. The streets were suddenly crowded. As he weaved in and out of the cheering crowds, he saw a familiar face: Maggie Botch. She was hugging a heavy set man whom Marty recognised as her husband. Like the people in the river she’d reverted to her old self, as if a switch had suddenly been flicked. Maggie didn’t see him as he raced past, and he was glad. He couldn’t share their happiness. Because the end of their darkness meant the beginning of his.