by R. R. Virdi
Gus’ appearance waned. Out of all the things occupying the hall, he became the most ghost-like. Hunched, arms out wide, the phage looked like it was ready for one hell of a fight. One it was, by the look of things, definitely going to get.
Coughs shook my body as I rose to my feet with support from the wall. Cold needles pricked at my fingers. I yanked my hand away from the frost-caked hall. I shook my freezing hand. “This is the part where you might want to turn tail and run.”
The phage whipped its head to look at me. A low hiss passed its lips before it turned back to the ghosts. Every one of them moved toward the phage.
“Think about it, man,” I said. “They’re stuck like this, in here, because of you. They’re broken, angry, because of you! And now you’re in their domain. Powerful creature or not, you’re not playing with the home field advantage.”
The creature turned to sneer at me, which takes skill when you have no eyes and a paper-cut-thin mouth.
“Best get a-bouncin’, man,” I advised. “Open a Way and get out of here. You might not want to ever come back.”
Gus flashed back into clarity. His neck tensed and teeth bared. “You’d like that wouldn’t you? Have a chance to escape, maybe get back with your friends. If I perish, you’ll follow!”
“Uh, pretty sure I won’t, pal. See, I made good with the ghosts here on account of my good friend, Lizzie.”
Both the phage and Gus flinched.
“Yeah.” My voice took an edge. “You remember her, don’t you? Innocent young girl you tied up below the asylum. Were planning on doing God-knows-what to. A little girl who’d just been through hell to get her sister back!”
Gus lost the clarity he had just regained. The phage took a step back from the approaching cluster of ghosts. “If anything happens to me, there’ll be nothing left of her. Of your friend—of anyone back there.” His lips peeled back as he snarled.
“Something’s going to happen to you. I just can’t guarantee what exactly. I’ve never seen ghosts pick a phage apart before. Should be…informative. Plus, what can you do to stop them?” I stopped as a thought occurred to me. “You can’t, can you?”
Gus’ eyes grew wider than before. He looked like he was hunting for a bomb shelter.
“They’re not living any longer. You can’t feed off ghosts, meaning…you can’t affect them. You can’t hurt them—at all!”
The phage took another step back and something clattered against its heel.
Burying the numbness, and the pain, I rushed forward, crashing with the phage into the wall. “Get ‘em!” I roared, hoping it wasn’t presumptuous of me to order around the gaggle of ghosts. Pain raced through my collarbones as the phage’s forearm smashed into the top of my chest. Stumbling backward, I let myself fall to get clear of the oncoming horde. It’s never a good idea to stand in front of a group of pissed off paranormal entities.
Heels kicking against the floor, I pushed myself away from the phage as the first of the ghosts made contact. What I saw next made it feel like I was breathing compressed oxygen. Chilling air nipped my insides as the spectral being swiped at the phage. Four lines appeared across the phage’s chest, deep, oozing more of its blood before slowing. The fluids crystallized into icy streams over its body.
Ortiz and I had gone through one helluva time trying to hurt the sucker as much as we did. Heck, just one of the ghosts managed to put a hurting on it. And that was all it took.
A scene from a wildlife documentary unfolded around me. Tendrils shot out trying to grab the ghost, passing through without effect. More ghosts crowded around, like hyenas surrounding a wounded animal. Every visible inch of Gus’ body quivered. The phage’s body mimicked him. It was about time the bastard got a taste of fear.
The phage made no attempt to move. It was motionless inside a group of hostile spirits. I rose to my feet and walked over to retrieve the broken stake. It may not have been perfect, but I was banking on the notion that it still held the potential to gank the phage.
A flash of light pulled my attention away from the weapon. Space tore; a Way hung past the group of ghosts. The phage made its move, blurring into motion.
Big mistake.
Fast movements are not the best course of action when surrounded by multiple predators. Especially when you’re on their turf.
With a unison that had to be telepathic, the asylum’s ghosts converged on the phage. Frickin’ shark-week happened before me. My eyes struggled to keep up with the amount of action. Ghosts rushed the phage, clawing, snarling. Hell, some were biting. Tooth-and-nail fighting. A cloud of Myrk puffed into existence causing me to lose sight of the phage.
As the ghosts reeled away from the toxic gas, I bolted toward the doorway suspended in the air. Tall, thin and ugly burst out from the dark mass of smog. It hoofed it toward the opening. My lungs squeezed tight in effort. My legs and joints howled in protest from the temperature. I ignored them all, focusing solely on catching the phage before it crossed through the Way.
Being trapped in the twisted asylum did not seem like a good idea.
I gained on the phage, its movements slowed by the Sixth Sense beat-down it had received. The creature's left arm looked like a twig someone had stepped on, multiple breaks in the bone. It hung in a grotesque fashion. Lengthy gashes marred its back, looking like it'd been mauled by a big cat.
I smiled and pumped my legs harder as my hand tightened on the stake. Just a bit closer. One swift plunge and the stake would be buried in the back of the phage’s skull. The phage turned its head, never breaking its stride as its appendages flared into motion. Myrk rushed to fill the space between the monster and me. It seeped into my nostrils and mouth, burying itself in my lungs.
I fell.
A flurry of nightmares sprang to greet me. It was a cocktail of everything Charles and I feared. Dim halls with shadows darting through them. The skin at the base of my neck pricked. The lights waned further. Darkness consumed me. All of it transpired within a second.
“No,” I breathed.
I pulled myself back, leaping out of the fumes. The phage stopped a little more than a dozen paces away. Its slender lips stretched. It leapt—
—the magical passageway flared like a crack of lightning in the dark.
The Way had shut.
Concrete solidified in my gut. The phage was wounded and needed to heal. To feed. And there was an entire asylum full of people waiting on the other side.
Ortiz.
Lizzie.
I'd failed.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Freon pumped through my arteries. My insides went cold. An army of woodpeckers assaulted my skull. A staccato beat of knocking was all I could hear. I stood motionless, staring at the empty space where the Way had been seconds before.
“No,” I breathed, harder this time, as if my denial would force the pathway open again. My knuckles ached from how tight my fists were balled. A pressure cooker nestled in my heart. “No!” My fist bounced off the nearest wall. The roar tore through the halls, followed shortly by its echo. With military snap precision, I turned to face the remaining ghosts.
They were immobile, blending into the eerie surrounding like fixtures. Spooky, spectral, dangerous fixtures.
“What?” I barked.
Every ghost bristled in unison.
It's never a smart idea to yell at a bunch of ghosts, especially when you're standing in their living room.
Cold vapors emanated from their bodies and crept along the hall. Another layer of ice formed over the already frozen walls.
Holy shit!
I didn't budge, at least visibly. “Do something.” The ghosts had no obligation to me. I may have helped with the Shadowvore problem but that was more Lizzie's doing. And I wasn’t Lizzie. She was trapped with a hungry supernatural horror. “Do something!” My throat ached, my body quivered and I could feel my heart quicken. The muscles in my jaw went rigid for a few seconds. I didn't have Lizzie's gift of communicating with ghosts, all
I had was my anger. I used it.
“What? You bastards can only do something if the phage is prancing around in your stinkin' corner of the Neravene?”
Their faces flashed, eyes narrowing as they stepped closer.
I swallowed. “Lizzie fought to save your intangible asses. I fought to save your asses! If you don't want to leave and face the phage outside your plane, fine! I get it; I really do. I'm not asking you to fight. I'm asking you to just do something!” My voice cracked. “Please.”
The ghosts continued their silent march toward me.
I wasn't going to fail another person. Not again. My feet shifted of their own accord, bringing me closer to them. “That thing is responsible for so many deaths. For making some of you like this. There are innocent people back there. People I'm supposed...” I trailed off.
Moving became more difficult. My skin grew paler and frost lined my lashes. My teeth chattered. “If...if you let this thing get away...” I broke off as I fought to breathe. The temperature plummeted further. “You'll be just as responsible for any future deaths. You'll be no different,” I said, letting as much heat as I could fill my voice. “And I'll come after you next!”
It wasn't as intimidating as it could've been, what with me being a Gravescube. My clothes stiffened. A coating of soft ice formed over them. We moved another step closer to each other. “That child,” I began, my voice hardening as I spoke. “That little girl is braver than all of you put together. You have power. Real fucking power! And you can't use it to help a child? You're not people! You're hollow shells. Empty, cowardly, self—”
The air in my lungs felt solid, freezing and cutting off my voice. One of the ghosts appeared beside me. I hadn't registered its movement. Fingers brushed across my throat, causing my neck to harden.
Let's rumba, spooky. I shifted my weight to strike. Looking into the ghost's eyes, I stopped. They were downcast. The former man's head was bowed. Pale eyes looked away as his mouth twisted into a grimace. Looking past him, I saw that every other ghost wore a similar expression—pain, sadness, regret...shame.
The ghost before me pointed to a spot behind my head. He gestured with a slow wave as I turned around. Stark white light cleaved through the air with the sound of tearing fabric. Invisible talons raked the space behind me. An opening was gouged into existence.
A Way.
For once, I had a good idea of where this particular one would lead me. I turned a fraction, looking over my shoulder. “Thank you.” I inclined my head. The ghosts returned the gesture, some of their lips even spread into smiles.
Turning back to the Way, I set my jaw and the muscles in my hand contracted. I threw myself into the opening with a snarl, hoping the phage would hear me before I emerged.
It was like a train leaving the station and entering the darkness of a tunnel. The brightness of the Way was replaced by the dimness of the Asylum under-works. My vision adjusted and part of me wished it hadn't. An itch drew my gaze to my forearm. A whole hour had passed in about fifteen minutes of dealing with the phage in the Neravene.
Nine hours was still plenty of time. I hoped.
Katherine Robinson was curled on the floor like a sleeping infant. I would've thought it peaceful if it weren't for the slender white being crouched over her. The phage's remaining tendrils wormed their way into Katherine's nostrils, ears and mouth. One of the limbs found a way to burrow into the soft tissue of her trachea.
“Just in time for the finale,” said a smug voice from behind me.
Impulse took hold and I spun around, swinging with a haymaker. I might as well have tried to punch smoke.
“Lizzie!” Her body slumped against the wall. At first glance she would've appeared to be at rest. First glances are often wrong in my business. Her body jerked at random intervals, beads of sweat fell down her face. I turned to the far side of the room where another figure sat. Her arms were hugging her knees tight to her chest; worse, unlike Lizzie, her eyes were open.
“Ortiz!” My scream failed to register with her.
Her eyes were unfocused like she was under the influence of some drug. She muttered something that only she could hear. Ortiz looked like a child in the midst of a silent nightmare, rocking slightly as she endured the mental terror.
“Stop it, now!” My voice dropped to a low, threatening growl.
Gus broke into laughter. “Or what?”
I waved the stake. “Or I'm going to redefine what it means to have a woody. I’m going to jam this through your windpipe!” A soft sigh, much like relief, pulled me away from threatening Gus.
An ink-like discharge pooled from Katherine's ears as the first two tendrils slipped out of her skull. The ichor leaked from her tear ducts, mouth and the hole in her throat. Her body lost what remaining strength it had and collapsed entirely. The phage took her by the shoulders, easing her fall to the ground with more care than I would've expected from a monster.
Another person dead on the job. Katherine may have been responsible for other deaths, but she wasn't exactly in her right mind. She was driven to do those things by the phage's manipulations. The muscles in my throat knotted, choking out most of what I wanted to say. “Bastard!”
“Me? Why?” Gus thrust his chin in defiance. “I didn't kill her. You did.”
“Yeah? How do you figure that one?
Gus' image blurred out of sight. A flicker over my shoulder told me where I'd find it. I moved in a cautious turn, working not to prompt the phage into any sudden action. The creature took its time rising to full height to face me. With an exaggerated wave, it turned its wounded hand over for me to see. Viscous fluid no longer wept from the puncture. The edges of were stitching closed by some unseen force. The rest of the phage remained the grisly battered sight it had been upon leaving the Neravene.
“You'll never have any idea how hard it was feeding on her, putting her through that.” Gus dropped his gaze to the ground.
“Whose fault was that?”
“Yours,” he countered in a matter-of-fact voice. The monster looked poised to jump me any second now. My palm itched from the stake. Its weight was reassuring. “Think about it. I took on the appearance and personality of her son.”
“Her son died!” I snarled. “You're a bastardization. You toyed with her head, made her think she was okay! You preyed on the love she had for her son and the pain his loss caused her. You gave her a glimmer of hope and strung her along with it!”
“I saved her from becoming a nonfunctional mess,” he argued. “I gave her happiness and she, in return, did what any mother would. She took care of me, fed me. Looked out for me, cleaned up after me. In the end, she was ready to die for me. She wanted to give her life for me. She was protecting her son, giving her life—”
Charging forward, I drove the stake toward its heart. My rage echoed through the room. The phage bobbed to the side but wasn’t quick enough to avoid the splintered edges of the weapon. Reeling back, it cupped the area around its brow where the wooden implement had glanced it. A serpentine hiss came from the surrounding flesh. The skin crackled and looked like necrosis would begin any moment now. “You're a monster!” I declared.
A battering ram impacted my gut. Hell, my feet left the floor. Electric jolts sparked throughout the vertebrae in my neck as an explosion went off beneath my chin. I didn’t remember the flight but I sure as hell remembered the landing. Someone was playing the xylophone on my flippin' ribcage. I couldn't make out the damage to the supporting bones. Ow seemed like as good a prognosis as any.
“Monster?” Gus spat back. A cold, damp rag fell atop my brain. Everything went numb. Thinking became cloudy and my body convulsed. “You pushed me to this. If you had left well enough alone, my mother would still be alive!” he screamed. I managed to groan between the fit of coughs jarring my ribs as I lay on the ground. “The only deaths I've caused are to feed and to sustain myself. What about the ones you've caused?”
I sputtered a trio of coughs. They translated to: “Shut the fu
ck up.” So I was a cough off. I didn't have it in me.
The feeling inside my skull grew. A nauseating oily presence snaked around my thoughts. “You want to know what a monster is—a real monster?” he asked.
Planting the butt of the stake against the stone tiling, I pushed down, using it to help me rise. But the phage had other ideas. The small bones in my wrists ground as it clamped down on them. With another ribcage-shaking thud, the phage pinned me to the floor again. Its pale, puppet-like face was inches from mine.
“Ugh.” I coughed and turned from its breath. “The hell did you eat for breakfast—garbage?”
Ignoring my insult, Gus continued talking me to death. “A monster is something that gives false hope to someone. Let's them believe in something better, and pulls a wool of lies over their eyes. A monster hides them from the terrible truth. It lets them think they will come out okay.”
The pressure inside my head increased. The worms roiled my brain.
“Look at them.” Gus pointed to Ortiz and Lizzie.
I spat on the creepy Muppet's face.
“Look!” he ordered. My neck felt like a rusted motor as it was forced to turn by the phage. Ortiz sat there, eyes looking right at me—through me—still shaking. “A monster brings people like that into danger with no way out. It's been an hour since we departed to the Neravene and back. What do you think is left of her, of young Elizabeth? Anything at all? Who involved them in this?”
You, you twisted freak.
“I probed every recess of their thoughts. You don't think I know who's responsible for their predicament? It's certainly not me. I am doing what I've always done—surviving. If you hadn't come along—who knows—I might not have harmed these two at all. There's no end to the people I could have chosen. It's possible these two would've left the asylum before I had a chance. And if I did feed on them, it would've been quick.”