Liquid Death (The Edinön Trilogy Book 1)

by C, Mitzi

  The man is at least a foot taller than me. He has curly black hair, milk-white skin, and facial features that could cut steel. The robe is multilayered (silver on the inseam) and reaches his ankles. His lips are leaden and his eyes are completely black. Instinctually I know he is not human. His stance is that of a supreme overlord overlooking his vast, interplanetary kingdom.

  I have no use of my vocal chords when I look at him. I have never felt so puny and insignificant in my life.

  “Half-breed.” I think he is looking at me, but it’s hard to tell when his eyeballs are motionless. His bass voice is subtle and shudder-inducing. Goosebumps prickle on my skin.

  I try and fail to swallow.

  “I am Time.”

  Obviously. Heh. I want to pinch myself, but I am too afraid to move.

  “I have come to take you home.”

  ***

  CHAPTER 20 – Juan/Kandi/Leyla

  The Plan

  July 20, 2017 (JUAN)

  “Where is home?” I inquire, coughing blood into my fist.

  Time points upward and the evening turns to night, the sky lighting up with billions of stars. “Not on Earth.”

  “What... happened?” I gesture to the totaled Ford behind me.

  Time tilts his head. “I am Time. I can bend reality as I please.”

  “So, is...” I scratch my head and wince when I touch a warm, sticky, red substance seeping from my scalp. “Is this real?”

  “All that is is real, Half-breed.”

  Okay, I guess that makes... sense. “Where is the ship?”

  “What ship?”

  “The ship that, um...” I think my brain is broken. “Got you from home to here?”

  “The rescue vessel shall not arrive for 6,360 Earth hours. I recently inherited my Father’s position as Time and decided to come ahead of schedule.”

  “Without a ship?”

  He looks at me like he must explain everything to a toddler. “I am Time. I can shorten the Time required to traverse Space, and therefore shorten Space. For such concepts are congruent, Time and Space; one would not exist without the other.”

  While I am busy cognizing his response, Time continues, “Before I take you home, Half-breed, I must locate the Daughter of Death. Her essence is hidden from me. Mayhap you could be of some assistance in this regard.”

  The Daughter of Death... “Kandi? I don’t know where she is.”

  “You do. Your minds are connected.”

  “Our minds are... what? What does that mean?”

  “You spent many hours inside her head, leaving a mark, which you are subconsciously driven to pursue. You may also communicate with her from any distance, with my help. For Space and I are one.”

  I widen my eyes and whistle. I’m light-headed. “Sure, but I think I might have bumped my head.” I touch the back of my scalp again and sigh. “Everything’s a little fuzzy.”

  Suddenly, the sun rises, and a tumbleweed blows across the landscape. “It is yesterday,” Time says. “Your traveling companions are alive, and you are unencumbered by injury.”

  Clarity snaps in my system like a whip. I can actually see now. “Wow. But couldn’t you just go back to when I was with Kandi?”

  “When dealing with a fellow immortal, I am afraid it is not so simple.” Time nods his head. “Attempt to establish contact.”

  I grope inside my own mind for a minute, not having a clue how to even begin. “How?”

  “Imagine her visage and commence communication.”

  I raise my brows and inhale. “Okay.” I close my eyes and picture her faint smile and sunny hair. I formulate a greeting and direct it toward this imaginary Kandi. To my astonishment, she immediately responds.

  “Juan, I told you not to look for me.”

  A lump forms in my throat. “Sorry. I’ve met Time.”

  “Time, the Edinön?”

  “Edi-what? Time, the deity, immortal, god-whatever. He is looking for you.”

  ***

  July 19, 2017 (KANDI)

  I am bound to a chair under a spotlight, listening to my father pray in Gídnei to Denboïrn, the Adam to the Death Bloodline.

  Before Juan found me, I had convinced myself we would have been unstoppable together. That was before I developed a certain affection toward him and realized my father had killed everyone for whom I’d felt similar. So when Death finally showed up to take us to his secret lair, I chose last-second to leave Juan behind. I could not watch him – or anyone – die again. I must battle my father alone.

  “... your Line rich and pure, unvanquished eternally, my Father...”

  I roll my neck and shoulders. I am famished and sick with fear. I flex my fingers and toes and test my restraints for the fifteenth time. “Can you wrap it up, please?” I beg. “Don’t you think Denboïrn would have ceased listening to your prayers already, considering you are on a planet light years away from Home, and you are beyond redemption?”

  Dad concludes his supplication and looks at me shrewdly. “He is not a Judge, he is a Father. A Father’s love is unconditional.”

  “So you are aware of your depravity?”

  “I am aware that I’m saving the human race. If that is wrong...” He moves to his rack of tools along the left side of the room.

  I roll my eyes. “Try again.”

  “Very well.” Death grabs a sword off the rack and twirls it about. “I am doing this for us. I couldn’t care less about humans.” He stops twirling and steps toward me, sword tip against my neck. “Honesty is quite refreshing, I must admit.”

  I swallow, and the blade grazes my skin. “If you love me so unconditionally, why keep me here?”

  “For my own protection.”

  Ah, of course. He knows I plan to kill him. “Are you going to cut me?”

  Dad sheaths his weapon and smiles pleasantly. “Only if I am so compelled.”

  Growing up, my father taught me humans were an inferior race, that I was immortal, and therefore “better.” This contradicted with the recurrent underground experiments and daily physical/verbal abuse I received from my peers. As much as he tried to cram my greatness down my throat, I could never feel like I was worth more than the dust. I grew up terrified of physical contact because the tiniest touch of an individual transferred their pain to me. I was afraid to confess to my own mother and sister that every time they touched me, I felt deathly ill. My mother thought I was merely a sick child that needed constant monitoring and nurturing. She knew I wasn’t normal. She never knew I wasn’t human until two days before she died.

  It was a rainy day in April when I pulled out my first tooth. I bounded up to my mom to show her my accomplishment, excited and proud.

  “Look, Mom! My tooth fell out!” I grinned and held it up for her to see. She was on the computer writing an essay for an online class. “Mom!”

  “Just a second,” she said, still typing. Her lips were tucked under her teeth in concentration. When she finally finished whatever she was typing, she turned to look at me. “Okay, what is it?”

  “My tooth fell out. See?” I handed it to her.

  Mom smiled. “I’m so proud of you, sweetie. Let me see the gap.” She leaned forward to look into my mouth. I bared my teeth so she could see the gap between my lower canine and central incisor.

  Suddenly, blood squirted from the hole in my gums and continued to squirt onto my mom’s face until I covered my mouth with my hand. I screamed. It wouldn’t stop. My mouth was filling up with blood. I gagged and ran to the bathroom to spit in the sink. Blood dumped out of my mouth and wouldn’t cease flowing.

  Mom frantically grabbed a towel and crammed it into my mouth. The towel soaked in less than a minute. I swallowed more blood than my stomach could hold, and soon it added vomit to the mix. I upchucked more blood than the average person donates at a blood drive.

  When blood began trickling out of my eyes, my mom called my dad and told him to meet us at the hospital. She handed me a plastic bucket and a couple of large
towels and hustled me to the car. She drove me to the emergency room. I never stopped screaming.

  “Dad! Where’s Dad!” I’d yell between spitting.

  “He’s coming, Kanidie.”

  “He’s the only one who knows what…” I threw up. “He knows how to fix it!”

  “What? Has this happened before?”

  I nodded and threw up in the bucket again.

  “When?”

  I shrugged and shivered. “Mom, I’m getting sleepy…”

  “Hang in there, Kanidie. We’re almost to the hospital. Hang in…”

  “You know, Kandi, you ask many questions,” Dad drones on as he paces the bunker. “You have always been a curious child, and a clever one, seeing how you pieced my plan together in such a short time. But you neglect to ask the most important question of all.”

  My fists turn white. I am dying to hear this one.

  “Did you ever think to ask why we were on the ship in the first place?”

  Wrathful tarantulas parade in my stomach. I can hardly contain my energy; I feel it ramping up inside, just under my ribcage and in my wrists. Sweat beads on my brow. I shut my eyes to cope. Why were you on the ship?

  “You think I am ‘destroying the human race,’ when I am actually preparing them.”

  For what, pray tell? Dark energy collects in my palms.

  Startlingly, before my father can proceed with more lies, I see Juan’s face and hear his voice. My heart trembles with relief and trepidation. “Juan, I told you not to look for me.”

  “Sorry. I’ve met Time.”

  “Time, the Edinön?”

  “Edi-what? Time, the deity, immortal, god-whatever. He is looking for you.”

  “Looking for me?”

  “Kandi, where are you?”

  “Juan, I don’t know where I am.”

  “But you-“

  “Look, after I teleported my father and me out of Utah, he took me somewhere off the radar. We could be anywhere: on an island in the Pacific, in Mongolia, heck, even on the moon. I can’t help you.”

  “But are... Are you okay?”

  Tears brim my eyes at the anguished tone of his voice. It’s like he actually cares. “I’ll be fine. I can’t die, remember?”

  Hesitation. “Right, I know. I’m just... I’m not going to stop looking for you.”

  “You will be looking for a long time.”

  “Well, I’ve got Time on my side – literally – so...” he laughs.

  I smile. My resolve to kill Death grows stronger by the nanosecond. “Be careful.”

  Another pause. I can almost hear his characteristically heavy breathing. “Don’t worry.”

  His face vanishes from my thoughts, along with his comforting presence. I open my eyes as they flood with undesired moisture. I look at my father and allow black energy to engulf my arms and back, the tendrils of heat arousing an incredible sensation on my skin. “Dad, why were you on that ship?”

  ***

  July 19, 2017 (LEYLA)

  Leyla sits in her office awaiting further reports, perusing through a recently deceased Patient’s file: Jazmine Hanten, Patient 41. She accidentally drowned another Patient with a simple touch. Leyla removes her glasses and rubs the area around her eyes, unready for the call she will have to make to Jazmine’s single father. “We are sorry the treatment failed to cure your daughter, Mr. Hanten.”

  A knock on her door offers a welcome escape from the drudgery. “Come in.”

  Doctor A steps in, her red hair undone and frizzy. Like all the Doctors of late, she looks fatigued and frazzled. The adjustments they have been forced to make following the Blue Skys explosion haven’t been easy. The government has threatened to cease funding the project if they aren’t able to hold up on their own and show more progress. If they can find a way to cure the Coma Contagion, all will be forgiven. Unfortunately, such a task requires fresh blood from an uncontainable, unrestrainable Patient. What blood they had left at Blue Skys was obliterated. Jeremy would have been a valuable asset, but clearly he didn’t have their best interests in mind since he invited her to preside over his project.

  “Yes, Ashley?”

  She smiles insincerely and struts across the room to set a file on her desk. “We have located the boy. He was last seen in Wisconsin.”

  Leyla’s eyebrows rise and knit together. “Wisconsin?” She opens the file and bites her thumbnail. The photographs within the file show Juan walking with a Slenderman-esque figure on a deserted sidewalk. “Who took these photos?”

  “Traffic cams.”

  “Has he been detained?”

  “No. They have found it difficult to approach him due to the man he is with. They have yet to capture his face on camera.”

  Leyla nods as she skims through the report. She then closes the file and returns it to Ashley’s slender hands. “Tell them to continue their pursuit. They may lead us to Kandi.”

  ***

  July 19, 2017 (KANDI)

  “Intimate relations between Immortals are forbidden. I have told you this before. I was a strict conformer to the rules until I met Hope.”

  “Let me guess,” I say, clenching my jaw. I already know all of this. I can pick and choose which of my thoughts Dad can hear, so for now I’ll play along. “You were caught. The Edinön threatened to remove your powers and banish you.”

  Dad grins. “Correct. Of course, if I lost my powers, my younger brother would inherit them. Hope and I agreed it would be in everyone’s best interests if we prevented him from becoming Death, so we fled.”

  “You fled into outer space.” I curl my fingers over the arms of the chair. “You were caught in a wormhole, you came out the other side and floated in space for several decades before you found Earth.”

  “Yes, at which point, Hope... my Hope... died.” Death hunches over and faces the wall. “All I had was you to remind me of her.”

  I am the spawn of Death and Hope. What does that make me?

  “There is a reason immortal Edinön are not allowed to procreate,” he says. “Their offspring are unpredictable and capable of destroying the Bloodlines. I knew the Edinön would do all in their power to find and eliminate Hope and me before we inflicted more damage upon our people. I had to be prepared.” Dad straightens. “Fortunately, I have the perfect weapon.” A serrated knife materializes in his hand, and he slices me across the cheek. My head remains completely still. I barely blink. He switches to Gídnei, his tone dropping an octave, “With your blood, I can transform an entire planet into an army, which I can use to battle against the Edinön seeking my life. The perfect plan.”

  “Would Hope have approved of this plan?”

  “Hope would have done anything to protect her only child.” He slices my other cheek. “You see, I am not their only target. They will combine their most powerful forces to fight you, sweetheart, because you are the only being in the universe besides our Fathers who can kill them.”

  “And you think an army of human mutants can stop them?” I’m growing dizzy with power.

  “An army of human mutants armed with your powers is invincible to all but me, Kandi.”

  I believe that is all the stalling I need. “And me.” I offer a side grin before releasing a psychic pulse so powerful it knocks Death into the opposite wall, down which he slides and sags, unconscious. I incinerate my metal restraints and the weapon rack to my right with a single sweep of my eyes.

  My sole dying wish is that you will awaken your full potential to stop your father’s plan from succeeding.

  I step outside the bunker and crawl across wet sand before planting myself under the shade of a palm tree and sobbing in a fetal position. My emotions are so out-of-whack that I can’t pinpoint the cause of these tears.

  Finish him off. Death will awaken any moment. Kill him before he kills Juan.

  I sense Juan nearing. This is your last chance. Finish him off. I glance at the open bunker as a wave crashes over the shoreline. I swipe tears from my face. I am done wi
th crying. I am done with feeling.

  I summon black flame to my right hand and shape it into a blade the moment Death’s head emerges from the hole in the sand. Once he has stood and brushed sand from his suit, I face him head-on, ignoring the erratic behavior of my heart and the fire in my neck and ears.

  Dad eyes the fiery blade in my hand and resigns himself to his fate. “You are smarter than I considered.” He opens his arms and ignites in malachite flame. “Proceed.”

  ***

  July 19, 2017 (JUAN)

  Time zaps me to Brazil in the middle of a busy marketplace next to a fruit stand. The air smells citrusy and smoky with a hint of exotic spices and manure. It is stiflingly hot, humid, and sticky. I look down at my feet, then at a man peddling his bicycle in my direction. All seems fine and dandy until my ears detect a scream across the road next to an open bar. A woman collapsed off her stool, and her friends/family frantically call for help as they perform CPR. Others around the bar begin to sway and grapple for something to hold onto before they follow the woman to the ground, seemingly dead.

  “Zidivin has struck this city,” Time says.

  I nod guiltily. Why do I feel like this is my fault? Anyway, without further ado, I reach out with my Kandi-detecting senses until a location pops in my head.

  My “connection” with Kandi has led me all over the planet, from Wisconsin to Romania to Sri Lanka to Brazil, and finally to a deserted island in the South Pacific.

  Time transports me to this location. Upon arrival, I expect to receive another vision which will clue me in to our next destination.

  When does what I expect ever happen, anyway?

  “Kandi!” I gasp quite unintentionally the moment she raises a stunning blade composed of onyx fire. Her father stands calmly in the path of the unearthly sword, surrounded in green flame, his eyes brilliant as lightning.

  My idiotic vocalization distracts her from completing the fateful swing. Her head swings my direction, and her mouth opens in shock. Her eyes are unrecognizable orbs of white electricity.