by R. R. Virdi
“Gluttony’s suh sin,” I slurred. The flickering intensified and I turned toward it. I sucked in a breath through my teeth. It was a Way into the Neravene. Nightmare Before Christmas was laying the psychic whammy on everyone in the asylum and was going to scuttle. The phage planned on returning after everyone in the building had been reduced to dribbling wrecks. After that, it was easy pickings.
Wobbling in place, I didn’t pose much threat to the phage, even with the stake in my hand. Ignoring me, something I took great offense at, it jumped into the Way. I leapt after it, sending the weapon arcing after the creature. I felt the stake bite. It drove through the meat of the phage’s calf. Hooked to the monster’s leg, I was dragged along as it passed into the Way.
Chapter Twenty-Six
The impact rocked my body, but I resolved to hold onto the stake. My eyes stayed shut. The muscles in my face contorted as the ligaments in my shoulder screamed. I twisted and wrenched the weapon from the phage’s body. A death rattle came from its throat. It echoed around me.
Opening my eyes, I found myself in a place sapped of ordinary color. Well, that’s not fair; it was ordinary for what it was. Ghostly blues and crumbling architecture surrounded me.
The place hadn’t changed a bit since my last visit with Ortiz and Lizzie. Good. It was the break I needed.
The phage’s pale form stood out like a candle in the night. I wasn’t the only thing it had to worry about now. String-like trails of ichor streamed down one of its legs onto the deteriorating floor. The phage adopted the posture you’d expect—one of an injured, cornered animal. It was ready and willing to take any risks to survive.
Gulp.
The monster’s head was on a swivel, like a small bird wary of an attack. A silhouette stood off a few feet behind the creature. Its eyes dilated, darting over our surroundings.
“What’s the matter, Gus?” I panted. “Not where you were hoping to end up? Panicked and took a wrong turn?”
“Quiet, fool!” he hissed. “You’ll attract them.”
“Yeah.” I smiled, giving the creature a light shrug. “It’d be a shame if someone went hollering after the residents. I could see how that’d be bothersome for you. I don’t think the asylum ghosts will take too kindly to you trespassing in their domain.”
Gus’ eyes ballooned further. His lips trembled and he moved with jerky motions as he rubbernecked to look behind. The phage mirrored his every move.
I cupped a hand to the side of my mouth. “Yodelayheehoo—mph!” My triumphant exclamation was cut short as the air left my lungs. A dull fire ebbed in my gut as the phage grew further away. I was vaguely aware of the stake falling from my hands and the fact that my feet were no longer touching the floor. My hip took the brunt of the landing as I rolled over broken ground.
And then the ground was gone.
The ceiling pulled away as I sank. I reached out. Fingernails struck the jagged drop-off, and slipped. In situations like this, the last thing you’re supposed to do is look down.
I looked down.
Crap.
Blackness, the sort that’s so deep you get the idea that it doesn’t have an end, filled the area below me. Clawing at the edges of the destroyed floor, I fought for whatever grip I could. The insides of my palms felt like I’d been holding barbed wire as I climbed back up. My elbows creaked from the exertion.
I’m too old for this shit.
The phage stood still. Its body was tight and hunched, waiting for any surprises. As long as it was preoccupied with being on the lookout for ghosts, I could take advantage of the situation. My chest ached for a reprieve I couldn’t give it. One deep breath wasn’t enough to soothe the stretched feeling in my lungs, but it’d have to do. My legs wobbled the first few steps as I broke into a run. All I had to do was grab the stake, overpower the phage, stab it and win.
Easy…
A thin line of tissue within my calf chose that moment to feel like a fraying cable. I willed it out of mind and sprinted toward the phage. The stake was only a dozen feet away and the phage’s attention was elsewhere.
The fraying cable snapped.
My calf shuddered and seized. Every step caused the area to pulse with an acid burn.
The apparition of Gus spun about. His lips peeled away as he snarled. Following its illusion, the phage moved to face me. Its arms splayed out like it was waiting to hug an old friend. Never mind the horrible array of hallucinogenic carrying tendrils whipping about its body. It rushed to meet me, passing the stake as it did.
I set my teeth as my speed increased. We were about six feet apart and closing fast when I left the ground. My shoulder burrowed into the creature’s gut. A rubbery impact followed as it doubled over. I drove it to the ground. Spittle left my mouth. A satisfying ache filled the small bones in my left fist as the phage’s head snapped to the side. The ache and pleasure jumped hands as I knocked its skull to the other side.
“Whaa!” I swatted at the slender appendages as they tried roping themselves around me. The phage seized the opportunity and bucked. The right side of my body hit the ground a foot behind the creature. Before it could get to its feet, I scrambled, clawing at the ground on all fours.
“There’s nowhere you can run from me in this place!” Gus called. The phage’s rasping followed the declaration.
A series of steps echoed behind mine as I continued my frantic scuttle. Casting a nervous glance back, I could see the phage closing in on me. I took a literal leap of faith and dove. My arm shot out and I hoped for success.
It felt like someone had broken a two by four across my chest as I thudded to the floor. A five-fingered shackle locked itself around my ankle. The creature gripped with enough force to crumble stone. And my fingers scraped across wood.
I offered no resistance as my leg was yanked. The limb was nearly pulled from the socket. The small of my back twinged as I squirmed. I swung as hard as I could. My ankle was relieved of the hydraulic-like pressure and I hit the floor, again.
Gus screamed out with the sort of rage that leaves your tonsils feeling swollen. The monster clutched its wrist in its good hand, breathing like it was having an asthma attack.
Suck it, Vader!
Ragged breaths left its lungs as its hands quivered. Dark fluid dripped from its palm. The only thing stemming the torrent was the object lodged in it. In a single motion, the creature grasped the stake, wrenched it free, and flung it toward me. Splintering wood filled my ears as the stake hit the ground where I had stood a second earlier. I stopped rolling and leapt to my feet. A razor-lined hammer struck the side of my head. The world spun. Maybe I was spinning. It was probably both. Remembering how to stand was an issue as I rubbed a hand across my cheek. Salty moisture from my fingers found its way into the talon-like marks on my face.
The lower half of my jaw clicked as the muscles in my neck fought to keep my head attached from the following backhand. My back came to rest against the wall and the phage seemed to rise. Slumped against the hall, I regarded the only advantage I had. The point of the stake had shattered, as well as a good fourth of the upper portions of the weapon. A much cruder thing was left behind. The tip now resembled a jagged crown of wood. Not ideal for impaling a monster.
Gus followed my gaze to the ruined stake. His lips spread wide into a smile that was all teeth. “It’s over.”
He was wrong. It wasn’t over. I had lost the only object capable of killing the creature is all. It’s not over.
Holding up its punctured hand for me to see, Gus spoke on behalf of his creator. “To do unto you as you have done unto me.” The hole in the phage’s hand leaked streams of plum colored ichor. Each of its fingers jerked like the severed tail of a lizard.
I groaned and pushed against the wall in an effort to get to my feet. No dice. It wasn’t over. A chilling band formed around my neck. The tip of the phage’s tendril settled near my temple.
Stroking my skull in a major display of creepitude, Gus continued speaking. “Relax,” he urged
. “It’s over.” He spoke as if he could read my thoughts. “Young Elizabeth will die. Your friend Ortiz will die. Every single person in the asylum will die. Maybe I’ll end Katherine as well, start anew somewhere else.”
The grip around my neck wasn’t tight. I had no gas left in the tank and the bastard knew it. I struggled nonetheless.
“You let them down,” Gus went on. A growl formed in my throat as I fought harder. The noose tightened, cutting off the snarling protest. As I sputtered, the phage’s slit of a mouth twisted into a skeletal smile. “But it’s not the first time is it?”
The muscles in my throat rippled as I summoned what moisture I could. A globule of foamy spit struck the phage’s abdomen.
The phage made good on its threat. The edges of my vision dimmed. It was like ink clouding through water. Everything went black. My head felt like it was in a clamp. Hot wax replaced my blood, too thick and scalding to be pumped properly. I felt heavy. My insides burned and I saw all the wrong things.
A pale greenish-blue blanket was kicked to the floor. My gaze was drawn to what was happening on the bed. The pastel purple nightgown rippled as a woman thrashed against an unseen assailant.
“Marsha!” I breathed.
Her hands clasped her throat. The woman’s heart shaped face lost color, and her eyes bulged.
My heart skipped as I clambered atop the bed, shouting, “Ortiz!” Marsha’s eyes bulged. Adrenaline fueled her frantic motions as I struggled to pin her down. Recognition flooded Marsha’s face. She understood what was going to happen. Her features slipped into a silent plea for help, one I knew I couldn’t answer.
“My God!” came a voice behind me.
“Help me!” I begged Ortiz, my voice strained. “Help!” I shouted as best I could.
Ortiz was there in an instant. She held Marsha down while I tried to figure out what was choking her. Finding nothing, I switched to administering abdominal thrusts. Marsha’s gasping slowed. My tempo quickened in response. The gasping stopped prompting me to breathe a sigh relief until I heard something else. Marsha’s motions ceased and a sound like gurgling water came from her throat.
“No, no, no, no, no!” I dribbled.
Reality snapped back into jarring clarity. My lungs felt leaden as I breathed against the wall. The phage’s limb was still wrapped around my throat. Gus looked like he’d just enjoyed a five course meal. The disconcerting smile only grew. “Painful memory?”
“Fuck you,” I gurgled in an ever-so-witty riposte.
“Marsha Morressy died six months ago—because of you.”
I wanted to tell him that he should’ve been more concerned about himself. After all, I was going to kill him, too. I just needed to be free of his grasp, his mind fuck abilities, and get my hands on the stake.
Details…
“Get. Out. Of. My. Head,” I said in a tone that could’ve scoured steel.
Gus chuckled. “Oh no. It’s such an interesting place to be. Remember, I’m in everyone’s head here. But yours—yours is a particularly desirable place to be. The guilt! Oh, the guilt. All the others you’ve let down. The ones you’ve failed…” He trailed off as he touched on something else. “The ones you’ve lied to.” His smile transcended a human look altogether. The phage wore the same expression. Imagine the smile painted onto a scarecrow, thin and stretched too far across. “All the suffering.” He released a pleasurable moan.
“You need a new fetish,” I muttered.
“I like my vices the way they are. They’re so fulfilling, and you seem to be forgetting something.”
“Oh yeah?” I spat.
“Before departing the asylum”—he stopped and cast a look around the halls—“the real asylum, I reached out and touched the minds of everyone within its walls.”
I swallowed, knowing where this was going.
“How long do you think it’s been for them?” Gus and his scarecrow-esque puppeteer smiled. “An hour—hours?” he stressed the plural. “Days? Time has a way of slipping by rather fast in this place. Do you think there’s anything left of a single person back there? Do you want to go back and find out?”
Bristling, I balled my fists as my weight shifted from bracing against the wall.
The phage breathed and dark vapor came over me once again. Everything warped.
Something acrid clung to the inside of my nose. Anyone who’s burnt their finger knows the particular smell of burning flesh. Multiply it a hundredfold. Particulate matter sticks to your nostrils, refusing to let go. It’s a cocktail of iron-rich blood and bodily gasses. The body, if you could call it that, looked like something from Pompeii, minus the coating of volcanic ash. The figure was positioned much the way a toddler would sleep when having a bad dream. Curled tight and pulling away from something.
Rick. He was a security guard at the museum during my last case in New York. He was a complete tool. A porcine-faced dude with a bad attitude. But he didn’t deserve to die the way he did. Another tally on the list of casualties over my cases. Every death of an innocent was like an iron weight pulling me down. And I was already drowning.
The images were pulled as fast as I had seen them. The phage’s tendril shivered in excitement against my throat. “They’re palpable, you know?” Gus said. “Fear. Anguish. Suffering. Even to your kind. You just have to open up to it.” Gus ran a tongue over his lips as the phage leaned in closer. It lowered itself so its head was on the side of mine. It opened its mouth and inhaled. Both of them shivered in pleasure as the phage breathed in.
“I’m flattered. Creeped out a little, too, but I don’t swing that way.”
“Don’t worry,” Gus assured. “You’re not to enjoy this anyway. This is more for me than you.”
Selfish prick.
“How about another?” he asked.
“How about you take your tendrils and—” I never finished my sentence.
No!
Ortiz stood a dozen paces away from the Ifrit. She was strong, confident and without a weapon. I tuned out the exchange of words. Shutting my eyes did nothing to stop the images. Ortiz’s face twisted into a mask of revulsion and pity as she regarded the creature. A figure lay on the floor, pointing a revolver at someone past the Ifrit. I watched myself smile, holding the gun in a quivering grip. The Ifrit’s black lips peeled into a smile. A horrible pulsing white light hovered above its palm. The Ifrit’s smile widened and the throbbing light fled from its place atop the creature’s hand.
And struck the area above Ortiz’s left breast.
I waited for the scene to pull away like the others but the phage had no intention of letting that happen.
Ortiz’s eyes lost their focus. They widened in search of an answer to a question she couldn’t understand. Then...Camilla Ortiz fell.
The distant me on the floor exhaled. “Oh, God.”
Black swirls of ink overtook my sight and I tensed, waiting for it to return to normal. Every ounce of my body contorted. I prepared to charge the phage and bash its brains out.
Ortiz stood about a dozen paces away from the Ifrit, chin thrust up, iron tones in her voice. There was an exchange of words and glances. The vision of me on the floor wore a wolfish grin. A hideous orb of white light hissed past and buried itself in Ortiz’s chest. She fell in slow motion. A snowflake melting before the Ifrit’s fire.
It looped again.
The muscles in my eyes ached. My throat felt stripped of lining. I couldn’t find my voice to scream.
Phages are assholes. Nothing made it more evident than when the memory looped for the fifth time.
Gus’ voice slithered into my ear like cold oil, slimy and prompting my body to jerk. “You’ll endure it. You’ll endure all your failures until there’s nothing left of you.”
I wanted to spit back a reply, but it felt like I had stepped into an industrial freezer. The tips of my fingers tingled, and a winter morning’s air stung the insides of my throat. It was irrefutably spring in New York, yet a December chill filled my body, dulling my
senses. The cold helped ease me out of the phage’s mind trip.
It faded and I was back in the warped asylum. I looked past the phage, taking note of the walls. Crystalline structures formed over them. It was beginning to look like glass screens in the frozen food aisle. My breath came out in a plume of fog. I couldn’t help it. A few coughs left my lungs before clearing into laughter.
Gus and the phage took a step back in unison, eyeing me like I was insane. I laughed harder. The icy coating on the walls grew, layering until the inevitable happened. The sound of glass cracking filled the halls in perfect synchrony. The laughter was possessive now. It took hold of me and ran away. My laughter rang over the shattering ice to the point they became giggles.
“Stop laughing,” Gus bellowed.
My head rocked to the side as the phage’s fist drove me to the ground. Copper filled one of my cheeks. Spitting, I let out a weak chuckle. “Oh, man,” I groaned. “You’re not seeing it, are you?”
Gus remained motionless, but the phage titled its head, turning slowly to look around.
“This isn’t your domain.” I dropped my voice to a dangerous whisper. “And you’re trespassing.”
It happened without transition. Gus, the phage, and I weren’t the only things in the hall anymore. By my count, at least a dozen beings stood twenty paces off from us. All of them were dressed in simple garments resembling asylum attire. All of them stood eerily motionless. All of them exuded a haunting beauty. All of them were pissed.
The cold ring around my neck disappeared as the phage pulled its tendril away. It turned to face the crowd of newcomers.
“You…” I coughed. “You’re a popular fella, it seems.” Gus glared cold murder at me. The ghosts inched forward with hungry looks in their eyes. “Think about it. I’m pretty sure you’re responsible for a fair few of these folks and their ghostly predicament. So I imagine they ain’t too happy to see you here unannounced and all.” I grinned.