by Mark Tufo
“Michael?” she asked. There was genuine concern in her voice. “Are you in trouble already? You have been gone less than five minutes.”
I heard Mathieu in the background like we were talking over a phone. “Well, if anyone could get into trouble that fast it would be him.”
Sebastian seemed bemused as I nearly glided right past him. “Can we go now?” he asked.
“Just checking in,” I told Azile. “Is this how I get a hold of you when I need you?”
“It is, Michael, and Gabriel and I can bring you back easily enough when you are on this side of the gate. Once you cross over it cannot be done.”
“Like, at all?”
“At all.” This from Gabriel.
“Is Sebastian helping?” Azile asked.
I wasn’t sure how to answer that. “Did you know what he looks like down here?” I asked quietly.
“Of course. Are you two getting along?”
“Along? I wouldn’t go that far.”
“Pay attention Michael; listen to him. Do not let your old biases hinder your ability to let him help.”
“You realize that he hates me, right? That he would rather see me dead than succeed, and that he could easily eat me.”
“That’s just him warming up to you.”
“You two certainly have a way of sticking together.”
“We must leave now, Azile. Bledgrum comes,” Sebastian said.
“Go, Michael. Leave now!” There was a panicked dread in Azile’s voice that easily and quickly transferred over to me.
“How bad can this Bed-gum be? And I thought this was your territory?” Yeah, I had asked the questions with a sort of bravado but we were already on the move and I was doing all I could to stay up with the cat-monster.
“Most of my power, our power, is concentrated at the gate. Out in the open, even I would be no match for what comes.”
We started hearing noise behind us, sounded like a live, six-point caribou being force fed through a meat grinder. Now in honesty, I have no idea what this would sound like, but it would be horrifyingly disgusting and terrible and loud. Sebastian’s face wasn’t overly expressive, but I could easily detect the mask of good old-fashioned fear covering his mug. His eyes were open wide and his teeth were exposed in a grimace.
“We’re going to have to hide,” he said as he lowered himself down into a thicket of thorns. I don’t think he so much as parted his fur with the barbs. I, however, could have supplied the Red Cross with a couple of pints of blood and had some slopping off the table as well when he reached up, grabbed my ankle, and yanked me through.
I was about to rail on him for purposefully trying to eviscerate me by brier. I would have, too, if he hadn’t stuck a paw with fully extended claws straight into my maw. Look at that! Damn near a Dr. Seuss verse, albeit with a darker slant. He had effectively sewed my mouth shut with four razor-sharp talons. If I dared to speak he would rip deep gouging wounds through my lips and gums. I could not pull back for fear of shoving a spike through my spine. Involuntary tears rolled from the corners of my eyes. He pulled his grapnels back, leaving his paw there. By now I was well aware that speaking wasn’t a great idea. The ground I was kneeling on was thrumming as if it had been electrified. At first, it was a low-level current, and then the intensity built up, along with the thrumming hum. The ground shook so hard we were now bucking like a heart attack patient getting defibrillated. Whatever it was had to be huge, so naturally I had to see it. I find it funny that they say “curiosity killed the cat” because Sebastian, if anything, was sinking lower to the ground while I was slowly rising up.
I went far enough to just peek my eyes over the curtain of brambles we were enshrouded by. I had a fascination with Godzilla in my youth, and by youth, I mean all the way until the z-poc started, when suddenly we had more immediate threats to deal with. But there was something about that two hundred or so foot-high monster that intrigued and terrified me to no end. Kind of funny; I had watched Godzilla before we started learning about dinosaurs in school. I remember being wholly unimpressed with a forty-foot tall tyrannosaurus-rex once we finally got to the natural history museum. The “terrible lizards” were nothing compared to the king of all reptiles; it didn’t matter that they had actually terrorized the earth. Then I got my first glimpse of Bledgrum, four hundred feet…five hundred, maybe? It, (I’m sticking to It, otherwise I have to assume there are two of these beasts and they somehow copulate and there’s only so far I can carry this bad dream) looked like one of the pyramids of Giza had fallen through some quicksand, been deposited in this hellish landscape, come to life, and was now bent on harassing the locals. A lot like Godzilla, when you think about it.
I wouldn’t doubt if the ancient Egyptians had somehow witnessed this monstrosity and constructed their monuments with it in mind. Size and shape notwithstanding, that was about it for the similarities. Instead of a sandstone shade, it was more the drab gray of a subway tunnel. Its skin, if that’s what it was, had a coating of thick slime that reminded me of a garden slug. I thought it might have had some sort of facial features but its…head, I guess…was so high up and the light was suspect; it was impossible to tell. Tentacles by the dozens protruded from every side in random order and lengths. They flailed about as if independent from each other, a handful of blind snakes escaping through giant, gray, slimy fingers. Sometimes they seemed to be randomly flogging the creature for merely having the audacity to exist, often times they would whip down, grip great swaths of thorny vines, rip them free of their mooring, then toss the heavy vegetation high and far so that it came down much like a missile would. Explosions of plant life, dirt, and dust plumed from every strike point like a full-scale nuclear war was being waged upon the battlefield.
Hundreds of legs supported the base of the beast, each as thick as an elephant’s. Again, much like the tentacles, they all seemed to be operated by their own driver who had not a clue what the rest of the others were up to. A chill swept down my spine as I watched dozens of legs snap in half as they tried to go against the majority, they would flop around and be dragged on the ground; following this hideous slapstick routine would be this awful grinding sound as bones reset and the legs were once again able to be used, though they never seemed to learn the dance and would once again be broken, dragged, reset; as It would stumble on.
“What the…?” I asked aloud and too loudly apparently before Sebastian knocked me flat on my ass.
“Quietly or he will hear you,” the cat hissed.
The thing was maybe a mile away and over five hundred feet tall; I was having a hard time believing it would be able to do that, unless it had ears the size of ship sails, and I saw no such organs. But I believed the cat, completely.
“He knows we are here,” Sebastian said.
Again, I trusted him; nothing can fake that kind of terror. I could have started with the “Hows and Whys” but what was the point? It wouldn’t change the facts.
“It’s your soul, it’s as out of place here as you are in Azile’s home.”
“Fuck, Sebastian, even when we’re about to die you dig in an extra one.”
“The truth may be spoken in all places and times.”
“Wait, what about your soul? It could just as easily be tracking you.”
“Impossible; I do not possess one. I volunteered its release so I could guard the gate.”
“Do all cats do this?”
“Do all humans join the military? Only the bravest and fiercest are allowed to become Gate Keepers.”
“But why the cost of your soul?”
“So that we cannot be tempted over the threshold. We lost many great warriors in the first few millennia of our war. Either they would follow an enemy too far in the hopes of finishing the demon off, or else they would be seduced to pass over, believing in so doing they would obtain powers beyond imagining.”
I had so many questions regarding where these souls went. Was there, like, a Souls Storage Warehouse? And did this mean th
at demons also possessed souls? Probably, but I didn’t know for sure. Not sure if that helped or not, but the thought was there now and I could chew on it later. The great beast was still lumbering along, sort of, but not mostly, in our direction. As it searched, the monster made a fearful racket—a great cracking sound as if giant sequoias were being uprooted and snapped in half by a raging tsunami. At first, I assumed that this was just a normal sound caused by the movement of one so big and unwieldy, but Sebastian said otherwise.
“It grows angry. Azile is giving him false leads.” This time the cat’s smile was more smirk. “Its roar is meant to drive us from our hiding hole.”
“It’s working on me; how about you?”
“I, too, would very much like to leave this place.”
“Look at that! Only takes the threat of being smashed into atomic particles to make us bond.”
“We are not bonding. I merely do not wish to die.”
“Fair enough, I didn’t think we were bonding either, but we are definitely seeing eye to eye.”
Sebastian shook his head. “I believe Tomas and his sister are doomed, and now we are not far behind them.”
“It’s turning.” I had poked my head up. That it was turning meant absolutely nothing; its four sides were indistinguishable from each other. “It’s coming this way.” My heart was beating faster and working harder to push blood that was beginning to thicken from the cold. Even if it never saw us we would surely be trampled to death as if we were Mufasa and Bledgrum was the wildebeest. I thought back to a moment ago; I hadn’t caught it then. “Sebastian, if he is looking for me, couldn’t you escape?”
He regarded me, without saying anything.
“There is no sense in the both of us dying. I could die knowing I had at least attempted to save Tommy. I would feel better if I did not add you to the scales.”
“It is not an easy death Bledgrum offers you. Those tentacles have needle-like barbs on them; he will suck your soul from you, leaving the dead husk of your body behind.”
“I mean, yeah, sure, that sounds pretty bad but…”
“You do not understand; you cannot. Your soul will reside inside of that beast for thousands of years as he slowly digests it. You would remain completely aware and in unbearable pain the entire time, conscious, unable to pass.”
I was feeling slightly faint; okay, more than slightly.
“What remains of you, your id, will be sent back to purgatory where the thousands of years of torment that your soul endured within the beast will be nothing but a footnote in the novel of the eons you will sustain there.”
“Yeah, but we can outrun that thing, Sebastian. Can’t we?”
“No, that time has passed. He is in search mode. If we were to run, we would simply become prey; we would stand no chance.”
“I’m listening.”
“We wait for Azile to come up with something.”
“That’s it? That’s your plan? I could have come up with that and I’m the master of disastrous plans. What if we pull the plug? Can’t we just pop out and pop back in somewhere he isn’t?”
“Yes, but if we leave it may be months, or even years, before you are capable of returning.”
“You didn’t say anything about that before.”
Sebastian shrugged.
Whatever was going on with Tommy, I was sure he did not have that kind of time. I concentrated on Azile. I could make her out on the couch; she had heavy beads of perspiration on her forehead.
“Hey, Azile,” I said, through gritted teeth.
“I am busy my love,” she forced out.
“We may need an extraction.”
“How close?” The effort to say anything was clearly visible.
“Quarter mile and closing.”
“I must do what I can to keep you there; I will give you the ability to talk directly to Gabriel.”
“This is fucking great. My life is literally in the hands of a gigantic cat and a six-year-old.”
“He can hear you,” Gabriel replied.
“Sorry kid. Wasn’t expecting this.”
“I have not told Azile because she has too much going on right now, but someone has tampered with our connection.”
Dread, which was free-flowing through me, was beginning to lessen as panic began to rise. “What’s that mean, Gabriel?”
“I can’t get you back.”
“This isn’t a really good time for games, Gabe.” I was looking at the squirming, limb-snapping, slow-digesting, gray beast coming our way. The ground was now hopping up to meet us from Its footfalls.
“This has never happened,” he explained, apologetically. “Something or somebody has cut the link, and I do not know how.”
“We’re in trouble Sebastian.” I looked over to him.
“You don’t say? Perhaps Azile believes she can somehow improve you through her influence,” he said after a moment of reflection.
“If you weren’t the size of a mountain lion right now, I’d shove your head in some kitty litter. My connection to the upper world has been terminated. Gabriel does not know how. But you should be able to get back, right?”
“That is without a doubt. This is my domain; I have spent far more lifetimes here than I have in your world. I can’t help but respect your decision to die alone. Most would be much more selfish in their desire to be in the company of others in their greatest time of need; in their final moments, in your case. I will not soon forget this.”
“Don’t get too choked up, it’s not like we’re life-long friends. Maybe a moment of peace and quiet before I am no more would be more comforting. Well, I mean until my parts are separated and forced to suffer forever.” I was watching Sebastian; he was not moving, his eyelids furrowed down as his iris expanded from a small slit to completely open. Didn’t take a lot of figuring to realize he was stuck as well, he just didn’t want to let on.
“I felt it would be nobler of me if I were to, that is, witness your devastation. To give Azile that final measure of closure so that she could move on and find someone better.”
“Mighty magnanimous of you.”
A clod of earth the size of a dump truck was ripped up no more than a hundred feet from where we hid. It landed another hundred feet past us. The thing had thrown tons of material nearly the length of a football field and that was with only one of its tentacles; it was chewing up the landscape faster than a herd of goats with tapeworms. Soon we would be in a barren, pockmarked field. There was little chance for escape and no place to hide.
“I have an idea,” I said to Sebastian.
He was looking to the opposite side from where our pursuer was coming. His body was tense and his tail moved slowly back and forth; suddenly I thought he was gearing up to make a run for it and see how that worked out. Now I had to ponder whether he had known that this thing would hone in on me all along and had me hide here in the briar patch on purpose so it wouldn’t take as long and he could go back to Azile, all sad and sympathetic. If he knew he could “pop out” whenever he chose, what was the risk to him? He did not turn when I spoke.
“You told me running would not work.”
“Not likely when he is this close,” he answered. “Perhaps if I had gone sooner…” he seemed to lament.
“What if I had gone sooner?” I asked. He did not answer; I think maybe he realized his mishap.
“What is your idea?” He turned to face me.
“The legs.”
“You wish to be trampled by his legs before he can skewer you with his barbs? That is a pretty good thought for one like you. The chance that he can get a hold of your soul is greatly diminished that way.”
“Only greatly diminished? Not completely out of the question?”
“The quicker you die the better. Your soul will be confused for a moment as you make the transition; the quicker you regain your wits, the better off you will be. As you try to grasp the concept that you do not still physically exist you will be the most vulnerable.”
/> “Got this all figured out, don’t ya?”
“I believe it bears repeating. There are not many aspects of you I admire, maybe none at all, actually.” He tilted his head to think on this.
“Should have known a cat would be my undoing. Some sort of cosmic karmic fuck up the old ass.”
“I told you not to call me that again.”
“Screw you, cat. I’m out of here.” I made the best version of a beeline that I could to get to Bledgrum. In some spots, the thorns were too thick; in some, I had to go down one side of a huge divot and back up the other. In a couple of areas, I actually had clear sailing, and not more than a whisker away was Sebastian, who I think was attempting to gut me, or at least fantasizing about it. The monster spun our way faster than should have been possible for something so mammoth and uncoordinated. When you think huge, you think lumbering, slow, and maybe deliberate in its steps. An economy of movement because of the energy required to ambulate something so vast. Well, if I needed any convincing that this world was vastly different from my own, here it was. A tentacle lashed out; I dodged to the right.
Not more than an inch of that slimy appendage touched me, I mean just the tip, but it had enough force to send me sprawling and it stung like hell. I was rocked sideways, my left shoulder made contact with the packed ground first. Some of the impact was absorbed as a lot of the momentum was expended as I slid. I immediately felt the piercing of my skin. I was wondering what it would feel like to have your soul sucked through the world’s largest silly straw. Took me a second to realize I was on the move again, this time in the mouth of Sebastian. It wasn’t tentacle barbs but rather large feline teeth that were making me bleed my own blood.
“Can you stand?” he asked with his mouth full as we got closer to the beast.
“Yes,” I managed to answer as tentacles rained down all around us. The ground was being beaten into submission by the strikes. Sebastian shifted his body and swung his massive head, giving me some momentum as I tumbled from his mouth. I hit the ground, spun once, and was up and running before I could get hit again.
There was sort of an “eye of the storm” type of feeling about five feet from Bledgrum. He could not see, nor could his tentacles reach me, though he tried valiantly. As of yet, I was not a direct obstacle to the hundreds of feet and legs thrusting about in their broken puppet type of way. I think it was me staying in that sweet spot that ultimately saved Sebastian and I’d let him know when I got the chance. Bledgrum knew his deficiencies and was prepared to take steps to correct them, and by steps, I mean he started running toward me in an effort to crush my ass. This was when I helped Sebastian up before he could become ground chum. Now we were both making a run for it, and Bledgrum was having none of it. He changed direction faster than an NFL running back. A tentacle swept dangerously close; my hair moved from the wind it pushed.