by N. P. Martin
Time would tell, as it always does.
In the meantime, the arrow on the Soul Finder began to move gently around, before settling down as it pointed in a northerly direction while glowing light blue. "I guess we go this way," I said as I began to walk in the direction the arrow was pointing.
As I walked across the desolate earth, a strange feeling stirred in my belly that had nothing to do with Max being inside me, and everything to do with the fact that I was finally on my way to see my beloved family.
I walked for hours through the gray mist as the Soul Finder pointed the way. Despite the device, more than once I wondered if I was heading in the right direction, because in all that time, I came across absolutely nothing in the way of life—no people, no organic lifeforms, unless you included a few dead trees, and certainly no buildings or dwellings of any kind. The place was dead as dead can be. "I know this is the Realm of the Dead," I muttered. "But this is ridiculous. There’s fucking nothing here."
"Patience, Creed," Max said annoyingly. "I think you forget how big this realm is. There are vast stretches of desert here that are vast beyond comprehension. It leaves room for expansion, I suppose. Humans keep dying, after all."
"Like your recent victims, Max. Maybe you’ll—"
I stopped suddenly as I noticed something rising out of the mist not too far ahead. From this distance, it appeared to be a huge block of shadow, but as I started walking again, drawing closer to the change in scenery, I saw that it was in fact a building up ahead. Finally, I thought as I quickened my pace.
The building itself was huge, and constructed from gray stone blocks. It also wasn’t the only building. There were more, each one uniform in its dimensions, being rectangular and stretching high into the sky, like the skyscrapers back on Earth. I could also hear sounds for the first time, which cut through the heavy silence I had grown used to. The sounds of people.
Excitement and apprehension grew in me in equal measure as I walked quickly towards the buildings up ahead.
"Looks like we’ve arrived at the Gray City," Max said, sounding intrigued. "It seems very…gray."
"Is that supposed to be a joke?" I said.
"Not really. Just alluding to the fact that everything is so very…gray here."
"I’m sure your domain in the Underworld is a fucking rainbow delight."
"Not exactly, though it isn’t…gray. There’s lots of red where I come from."
"Sounds awesome."
"Better than this faded memory of a place."
The Soul Finder was still pointing north as I made my way into the Gray City, which didn’t appear to have any set boundaries, and seemed like it was in a constant state of expansion as it spread into the desert. I even saw the first signs of people as I stepped onto a road that seemed to grow out of the desert itself. People were coming and going in and out of the buildings nearest to me, some of them rushing off deeper into the city. Anyone who noticed me gave me a strange look, and it didn’t take me long to figure out why. So far, every person I had seen looked the same, in that they were gray in appearance, as if all the color in them had faded over time, or as if they had stepped out of an old black and white photograph. I, on the other hand, had retained my normal colors, and while not exactly vibrant, I still stood out against the grayness of everything else.
"So much for keeping a low profile," I said as I caught the stares of more people.
"Not being truly dead has afforded you a bit of color," Max said. "You’ll be like a beacon walking around here."
I sighed. "Fuck it. What’s the worst that can happen? I mean—"
That’s as far as I got before I got jumped and thrown to the ground.
20
Shades Of Gray
Whoever jumped me was now wrestling me onto my back after shoving a few unwelcome knuckle sandwiches into my face. Before I knew it, my assailant was straddling me, their considerable weight on my chest making it hard for me to breathe. When I finally got the chance to look up and see my attacker, I saw the gray figure of a middle-aged man dressed in a blood stained suit. His eyes were intensely focused on me, almost like he was looking right through me.
"What is this?" I asked with hardly enough air to finish the sentence. "What…are you doing?"
"Silence!" the man growled, more than a hint of excitement in his wild eyes for some reason. "I can’t believe I’ve found one…after all this time…"
"What are—" A slap to the face shut me up.
"You’re a living soul! I can use you to get back!"
My suited assailant planted one hand on my forehead, as he seemed to recite some sort of spell. Whatever magic he was using, I felt it invade my body, creating a highly unpleasant sensation that was reminiscent of the time when Max first possessed me.
And then it hit me what my assailant was doing.
The fucker was trying to possess me so he could use my body—my body in this realm anyway—as his ticket back to Earth. He was no doubt intent on stealing my actual physical body when he got there.
The whole thing was happening so fast, and my magic was so slow to respond, that he may just have succeeded in his bid to use me as his way out of the Gray Lands.
Except he wasn’t counting on one thing.
Max.
"Sorry," Max said to my assailant as the man’s gray form began to push its way inside me. "But you are trying to fuck with forces your puny brain could never hope to understand, and indeed you will feel those very forces as they fuck you up in just a moment. But in the meantime…fuck off!"
With a burst of sudden energy that blasted its way out of my body, Max used his power to throw the man off me. It was like my assailant (more like fucking rapist!) had just received a massive electric shock that propelled him several feet into the mist, before he landed with a heavy thump on the ground.
Immediately, I sat up and rubbed at my chest. "Glad to see someone’s power is working fine," I said.
"It seems to be," Max said before I felt him take over my body and jump to his feet. "And I know one gray bastard that is about be on the wrong end of it."
Max used my body to stomp to where my assailant now lay moaning on the hard earth. The bloodstains on the man’s suit looked fresh, or at least I thought so. It was hard to tell when everything was so damn gray. "Please don’t," the man said looking up, probably seeing the hatred and anger Max had written all over his—my—face. "I just wanted to go home…"
"You want to go home?" Max chided. "I can certainly help you out with that."
The man frowned. "You can?"
"Of course! Now hold still, won’t you?"
"What are you going to do?"
"Just this."
Max brought his boot down on the man’s head, stamping his skull into the ground.
"For fuck’s sake, Max!" I protested powerlessly. "Stop!"
One of the man’s eye sockets was now crushed, and dark blood was oozing from it. Aside from the lack of color, the blood was as real as any back on Earth. If I didn’t feel so disgusted, I may have wondered why the man was bleeding at all, or why he was afraid of dying when he was already dead. As it happened, the dude answered at least one of those queries. "Please," he spluttered. "If you…kill me…I’ll have to start all over again…"
Even Max was intrigued now. "Start what all over again?" he asked.
The man shook his head like we didn’t understand. "This…"
Max frowned for a second, then shook his own head. "Sorry, I don’t know what you mean. Come to think of it, I don’t care either…"
Max’s boot came down on the man’s head once more. Then again. And again. And again. Soon he was stamping nothing but bloody mush.
"Stop!" I shouted. "Fucking stop!"
Max stopped after one final stamp. "There," he said. "He won’t be jumping any more unwary strangers, will he?" He took a deep breath and smiled. "That sure felt good. I was getting pent up in there. Now I feel better."
"Was there any fucking need for tha
t?" I demanded to know.
"Of course there was. The man was a parasite. He needed stamping out." He laughed then. "Stamping out…you get it, Creed?"
"Fucking hilarious, Max. Now give me back my body so I can do what I came here to do."
"Fine." He gave me back control then. "I’ll be here to save you again when you need me to, don’t worry."
"I won’t," I said as I wiped my boot along the ground to try and remove the clumps of skull and brains stuck there.
"We’ll see, won’t we?" Max said smugly.
As I started walking again, I realized I didn’t have the Soul Finder. "Shit," I said. The device must have fallen once I got jumped. I looked around for the next few minutes, peering through the mist as I scanned the ground for the device, finally finding it safe and sound. But when I went to pick it up, a voice made me stop dead.
"You won’t last another hour here," the female voice said in an English accent.
I slowly straightened up and put the Soul Finder in my coat pocket for safe keeping, before turning my attention to the newcomer. "Who are you?" I asked her.
The woman was as gray as everything else. Her dark hair spilled down over the long cloak she was wearing. I saw no obvious signs of injury, so I couldn’t say how she died and ended up here. "Someone who can help."
I hadn’t been in the place for long, but long enough to know that I should be suspicious of everyone. "Why would you help me? I suppose you’re after my body as well?"
She shook her head. "You have a choice. Stay out here on your own so someone else can jump you, or come with me now before more Soul Jackers arrive."
"Soul Jackers?"
"You just met one…before you crushed his skull."
I looked away for a second. "That wasn’t me…" I muttered.
"It sure looked like you."
"It’s complicated."
Through the mist, distant voices carried, heading our way. "You coming or not?" the woman asked.
"I don’t trust her," Max said.
"You don’t trust anybody, Max," I said telepathically before addressing the woman again. "What’s your name?"
The woman hesitated a second before answering. "Moira."
I walked toward her. So far, the woman seemed genuine. She also had a point about me hanging around in full technicolor for all to see. It was clear that I would have to cover myself up somehow if I was going to survive this place. It also occurred to me that Moira had probably been a Gray Land’s resident for a while now, and that she may be able to help me navigate the place. The realm was obviously more perilous than I first thought. "The name’s Creed. Lead the way."
Moira nodded, her face pretty even rendered in gray tones. "Follow me."
She proceeded to lead me further into the city through a series of back alleys, before going inside one of the gray stone buildings. To be on the safe side, I took out my gun, Moira raising her eyebrows at me when I did. "Just being cautious," I told her.
She nodded. "That’s a good policy in this place."
The inside of the building was like any other you would expect to find on the Earthly Plane, though it appeared abandoned, and eerily quiet. "What is this place?"
"Just a derelict building," Moira said. "A good place to hide out."
"From what?"
She glanced at me over her shoulder as she led me down into the basement. "Lots of things."
I shook my head. The Gray Lands were seeming more perilous by the minute.
"Shoot her if she tries anything," Max said. "Or I’ll rip her apart myself."
"I don’t think it will come to that, Max," I said.
"This might be trap."
"Maybe, or it might be a much needed safe haven for me to get my bearings."
On the way down to the basement, Moira unhooked an oil lamp from the wall and lit it with a match. Using the dimmed light to find her way, she led me further into the basement, before stopping in a large opening, a place she obviously called home judging by the mattress on the floor and the canned food scattered around.
"You live here?" I asked her.
"It’s safer than up there."
"Safer? What kind of realm is this place?"
"Probably not what you think," Moira said as she sat down on an old wooden crate and removed her cloak. I was surprised to see two short swords criss-crossed on her back, and a small crossbow clipped to her belt.
"You run into trouble often here?" I asked her as I looked around the room, wondering why she would be living in a disused basement.
"A bit, yeah." She narrowed her eyes at me then. "What are you doing here? Are you another traveler? Travelers don’t last long here."
"I’m here on business, actually."
She frowned and shook her head as if that didn’t compute. "What business could you possibly have in the Gray Lands?"
"You ask a lot of questions," I said, grabbing a crate and sitting opposite her.
"I just like to know who I’m dealing with."
I nodded. "Fair enough."
"Tell her nothing," Max said. "The bitch will likely betray you."
"She seems okay," I said to him. "At least she’s helping me."
"Bringing you to a darkened basement, probably so her compatriots can come along and jack your soul."
"You have serious trust issues," I told him. "I’ll be on my guard though, if it makes you happy."
"Just don’t blame me when things go tits up."
"Things have already gone tits up. We’re here, aren’t we?"
"So why would you risk your soul to come here?" Moira pressed.
"My family members are trapped here. I think anyway."
"And you’ve come to save them?"
"That’s the plan."
Moira snorted and shook her head. "You have no idea of the kind of place you just walked into."
"I’m hoping you’ll tell me. Is it even possible for souls to get trapped here?"
"Of course. Some don’t seem to move on, like me. Others…"
"Others what?"
"Others get held prisoner." She looked away then, as if she knew someone in that very predicament.
I frowned. "Held prisoner? By whom?"
"Someone you don’t want to mess with if you value your soul."
"This person sounds dangerous."
"He is."
"He?"
Moira sighed. "You ask a lot of questions yourself."
"It’s in my nature," I said smiling.
A slight smile appeared on her face as well for the first time. "Mine too. I was a detective before…I died, and ended up here."
"Were you any good?" I knew she would have been. She looked the dogged and determined type, and as gray as her eyes were, I could see the experience in them.
"I was," she said.
"What happened?"
"How did I die, you mean?"
I nodded.
"Heart attack. You believe that? Thirty-eight years old, and I die of a fucking heart attack. Stress of the job, I guess."
"I’m sorry."
"So am I. I’ve been stuck in this miserable realm ever since."
"How long?"
"How long have I been here?" She shook her head as if she didn’t know exactly. "At this point, it feels like years. There’s no time here, so it’s hard to keep track."
"Any idea why you’re being kept on hold?"
"No idea. Maybe there’s no room left in Hell."
"I suspect you’ll go in the opposite direction."
She threw me a look. "How would you know? You don’t know what I’ve done."
I shrugged. "Maybe not. We’ve all done things, though."
"Yeah. Maybe I would’ve been more careful if I’d known this afterlife shit was real. I mean, you’d think we would’ve been informed of the afterlife’s existence on Earth. It would have made things easier."
"I doubt it," I said. "We are who we are. Some things are destined."
"Like you?"
"I d
on’t follow."
"Well, you’ve landed here, in my lap, so to speak."
"And?"
"Maybe you can help me."
"Help you do what? I can’t exactly speed up your processing."
"I don’t mean that."
"What then?"
"Here it comes, Creed," Max said. "She’s going to ask you to risk your soul to save hers. I can see it written all over her miserable ashen face."
Moira tilted her head forward slightly to stare intently at me. "If I help you with your business here—and you will need my help—you give me a lift back to Earth."
"Told you!" Max said. "Fuck her…fuck you bitch!"
"Jesus, calm down, Max. She does have a point. I need her knowledge of this place."
"She’ll screw you, Creed," Max said. "She will do it!"
"Sounds like you’re the one with the problem, Max. Pipe down in there, will you?"
"Fine. Don’t come running when she jack’s your soul."
"How can I give you a lift back to Earth?" I said to Moira. "I don’t think that’s possible."
Her gray eyes lit up for a second. "It is with magic."
"Magic? You’re an adept?"
She shook her head. "You can get whatever magic you need here…for the right price."
"So if that’s the case, why don’t people here use magic to escape?"
"Because it can’t be done apparently. The only way out of here is in the body of a still living soul."
"Of which I am one."
"Yes. That makes you as valuable as anything here."
"Tell her this seat is already occupied," Max said. "There’s no room at the inn…no seats on the bus…no—"
"Yes, all right!" I said. "I get it, Max."
"Are you all right?" Moira asked. "You seem…tense."
I smiled at her. "I’m interested in taking your deal, but there’s something you should know first."
"What’s that?"
"Me, bitch!" Max shouted, nearly fucking deafening me from within, to the point that I flinched. "That’s what!"
I wanted to scream out loud for Max to shut the fuck up, but I managed to keep my cool as I said to Moira, "I’m eh…possessed…by a demon."