That Which is Unexpected

by A. L. Bridges

I instinctively know that my eyes are silver as I open them. Everything feels different: I feel Euphoric. Vibrant. Powerful. I sprint towards the cliff faster than ever, possibly even faster than Tia. I reach the slope, knowing that I still have a little ways to go so I tone it back a bit to make sure that I don’t accidentally run into a trap. I reach the top and see Cheza lying against a large rock on the ground next to a mesquite tree. I can feel her steady heartbeat, indicating that she is unconscious, and I can see her silver outline with her frosty blue central aura. The sight of her gives me strength and makes me feel somehow complete. I make eye contact with Illapa and notice that he is holding a macana, an Incan club/staff with a stone star at the top used for crushing bones.

  “HA HA HA I HOPED YOU WOULD COME!” Illapa exclaims in amusement, his voice sounding like thunder itself.

  “BEFORE WE GET STARTED I WOULD LIKE TO SAY SIX WORDS. EIN NYET, ZWEI NYET, DREI NYET!” Illapa booms and then waits while seeing that nothing is happening.

  “WELL, WELL, WELL. ISN’T THIS INTERESTING! A SHORN ONE WITH AN IMMUNITY TO OVERRIDE COMMANDS!” Illapa says curiously, but with a twinge of uncertainty.

  “LET’S SEE HOW YOU HANDLE THIS!” Illapa exclaims as I smell ozone and my skin starts to tingle. Seeing that nothing is happening, Illapa is more than a little surprised. I don’t feel any pain like with the incident on the bridge. Does my Drive state offer some sort of immunity to this type of attack?

  “Are you done with the parlor tricks? Because I would like to get to the part where I kill you,” I say, noticing that my voice sounds slightly like its doubled and overlapping on itself.

  I don’t wait for his reply and launch my attack. I start by firing five rounds only to find that Illapa dodges all of them. He is much faster than Tia, meaning that he is also much faster than me. I continue firing as he gets in closer. Ten rounds later, I spring towards him with a downward slash of the Sic blade while firing five more rounds. Illapa moves quickly around to my side as I pass by him. I anticipate this and point my gun behind me and fire five more times as the slide locks back. I only hit him with grazing shots, but it is enough to stagger him thanks to the wider impact of the hollow points. After quickly spinning around, I launch myself forward. I slice downward, but Illapa is able to block with his macana. My Sic blade hits the macana’s wooden staff and slices it in two.

  Illapa recovers quickly and I barely have time to block both the macana’s mace-like top and wooden butt that are in each of Illapa’s hands—I think I might’ve just made things worse. I’m out of bullets and Illapa isn’t going to give me any time to reload. I block the next flurry of attacks, not having enough time to counterattack. Illapa finally gains the upper hand when he’s able to knock my pistol out of my hand. In my surprise at being disarmed, he spins and smashes the macana star into the top of my left bicep, shattering my humerus. I howl in pain as I jump back twice to put some distance between us. I really wish I would have remembered my jacket right about now.

  Illapa doesn’t allow me any time to recover. He presses forward and I block the macana star in his right hand with my Sic blade only to take the stick to my face. Illapa follows up with another spin hit. I’m able to get an upward cross slash into his back, right before he bashes my chest in with the star, breaking my newly healed sternum and possibly a rib. Reinforcing my muscles does nothing against blunt force trauma of this magnitude.

  “COLE!” I hear Cheza scream and look over to see that she’s awake.

  As it turns out, that wasn’t such a good idea. Illapa disarms my Sic blade with the stick and follows through with another crushing blow to my ribcage, which lands me on the ground a few feet back.

  (Damage report: Sternum: Broken, 2 ribs on left side: Broken, 6 ribs on right side: Broken, Right lung: Punctured.)

  Ah, so that’s why I am having so much trouble breathing. My blood tries to repair the damage, but it’s unable to dislodge the rib that is sticking out of my popped lung.

  “I THINK IT IS TIME TO END THIS, DON’T YOU BOY?” Illapa thunders as he stands with his hands pointing skyward. Aw man! Don’t tell me it’s a Spirit Bomb! 7

  About twenty feet away Cheza screams my name again. The sky booms as a lightning bolt flies straight toward Illapa. Oh, I see. Illapa has to take the lightning into his body and then redirects it at his target. However, instead of hitting Illapa, the lightning hits the mesquite tree that is only about fifteen feet from him. The lightning bolt gets redirected, splits, and shoots out wildly towards my body, along with several other directions. Pain surges through me as the bolt hits my chest. I feel my heart almost flat-line, but it continues beating after a moment.

  Something is wrong. I feel empty… hollow… doll-like.

  I can no longer feel Cheza’s heartbeat.

  I feel my face and eyes go blank as I rise to my feet. I know that something is broken, I know that Illapa is the one who broke it, and I know that this bastard is going to suffer for it.

  “OH! SO YOU HAVE SOME FIGHT LEft in y…” Illapa says, his voice trailing off as horror inflicts itself upon his face.

  Out of my peripheral vision, I see several silver tendrils are wafting out of the gashes in my arms and legs. The tendrils surge forward and spear through Illapa’s hands, shoulders, thighs and feet before they raise him up off the ground (3.8 Liters).

  Blood drips down my right arm and forms a cylinder in my hand. I watch as a silver light, which I realize is my aura, extends outward from the bar in string-like wisps while blood gushes from my hand. It floats out three feet away before it connects in a curved, wasp-waist, shape that reminds me of a gladius sword (2.0 Liters). I understand now what it is now: pure silicon carbide molecules connected in a string formation. I think I just made a molecular cutter or nanocutter/ µ-cutter/ Mu-cutter. I walk over to where Illapa is still floating in the air, speared by my tendrils.

  “What are you!? WHAT IN THE HELL ARE YOU!? AUGH!” Illapa screams as I bring the Mu-cutter effortlessly through his left arm.

  The arm falls to the ground as the tendril in his hand retracts. The severed arm breaks apart into little gold flakes as the flakes start floating skyward.

  “YOU FUCKING MONSTER! THEY’RE GOING TO HUNT YOU D—AUGH!” Illapa screams as I cut his pelvis in half diagonally, his right leg falling off with it. It does the same gold flaking thing as his arm.

  “AHHH! YOU SON OF A BITCH! THEY’RE GOING TO KILL THAT LITTLE BITCH OF YOURS SLO—AAAAAAAAUUGHH!” Illapa screams as I stab the Mu-cutter into his torso and slowly twist it, grinding a hole through him and enjoying every decibel of his scream.

  “She’s dead because of you,” I whisper to him, my voice once again sounding doubled and overlapped.

  Illapa’s entire body starts to slowly disintegrate and float towards the sky, no doubt as a result of having that hole drilled into him. I quickly slice off his right arm, left leg, and finally his head as I retract the tendrils and walk over to where Cheza lies.

  I can still save her. Her heart has only been stopped for a short while. If I can restart it…

  (Your body no longer contains enough blood for you to execute your plan and survive)

  “I don’t care. I’m not letting Cheza die,” I say aloud.

  I move to her right side and hug her to my chest. I take out my knife and slice open my jugular on the left side and I make a small cut into her neck. I let some of her blood drain out, and then I hold her close to me and will my blood to go inside her. (1.7 Liters)

  I send it down into her heart. (1.4 Liters, Mortality Warning)

  I make my blood fill her heart. (1.2 Liters)

  I will my blood to pump her heart like an internal form of CPR. (1.0 Liters)

  I feel her heart start to beat again. I give one last order to my blood to seal her jugular and heal her. I watch her jugular vein close as my eyes shut.

  …

  “Cole? Cole!? Wake up! Cole…?”

  My eyes flutter open. I see Cheza looking down from above me, my head lying in her l
ap as her tears fall onto my face.

  ‘Cheza, it’s alright. Please don’t cry.’ I want to say, but no words will come.

  I try to raise my left hand to wipe her tears away, but the most I manage is to bend it at the elbow. Cheza grabs my hand and grips it firmly with both hands.

  Dammit! I want to do something for her, anything to reassure her that I’m fine with the way things played out—that I’m happy she’s alive.

  (Ring. Right pocket. Now or never)

  That’s right, the ring I made her. It’s in the seed pocket.

  I reach an unsteady hand into the pocket and pull out the ring. I hold it up. Cheza cries more, takes the ring, and slips it onto her left ring finger.

  “Yes Cole, of course I will!” Cheza exclaims while choking up.

  Wait… What?

  (Mazel tov)

  More tears fall from her eyes as my eyes slowly close for the last time.

  “Cole…? COLE!” Cheza sobs as her voice trails into nothing.

  ****

  Chapter 25: Wait… What?

  I’m floating in the dark space again and see that the silver doors are wide open.

  “Hello?” I ask as I float over to the doors.

  “We are the same being now, Cole,” I hear myself say as my voice sounds doubled and overlapped. “This is goodbye. Your being won out and gained control. You are now We.”

  “Wait!” I say with my voice back to normal.

  The silver door shatters as the darkness around me cracks. The darkness begins to fall in large panes like glass, light streaming from the holes as it reminds me of an egg hatching. When the last pane of darkness falls away, I feel myself rush forward.

  ****

  I suddenly find myself standing in a night club. The bass is pounding around me as I lean with my back against the blue and pink neon lighted, frosted glass bar. Laser lights bounce around on the walls and the dance floor that is over the railing to my right. It appears that I’m either on the second floor, or this club has a basement dance floor. I look over at the bartender who is smoking a cigarillo and mixing a drink in a shaker that he is holding over his shoulder. The place is pretty crowded, but it is still breathable. A large black man walks over to me wearing sunglasses and a black t-shirt that has BOUNCER stenciled across the chest. The shirt appears to be about two sizes too small. He looks familiar in some way.

  “THE YOUNG MASTER REQUESTS YOUR PRESENCE,” the man booms over the music and motions for me to follow him.

  Why do I get the feeling that this guy has a pet mouse? I follow the man over to the back wall, away from the bar, and then towards a flight of stairs on the right. The stairs lead up to a small walkway that borders length of the dance floor, which is now over the railing on my right and about thirty feet down. Some of the people dancing look sort of familiar…

  “WATCH YOUR STEP,” the bouncer says before I stumble on a step, catching myself with the railing.

  For some reason, this man has a kind of ‘kingpin’ feel to him. We walk into the hallway at the end of the walkway and the music starts to fade slightly so that it’s only loud and not deafening. I suddenly get this flash of a memory that has the bouncer’s voice saying, “Ricky Bobby, You are not paralyzed!” …Holy Shit! It’s Michael Clarke Duncan! 8

  Before I can become star struck, I become dumbstruck instead as Michael Clarke Duncan directs me to a circular booth where I see Jason with his tongue down a blonde’s throat while his arm is around a brunette on his opposite side. As I slowly walk closer, I see that his arms are around Audrey Hepburn and… Marilyn Monroe! Umm, yes… please excuse me while I pick my brain up off the floor.

  “CT! It’s been a while! Do you want a drink? I can’t believe this is what it takes for me to talk to you. I’ve been trying to contact you for months, but that blonde-haired bitch kept blocking me out!” Jason says after extracting his tongue from Ms. Monroe. I just stare at him stupefied. “Ladies, can you please excuse us for a while? CT here is a little shy and I think he is star struck.”

  Audrey and Marilyn scoot out from the booth. Audrey just walks past me, but Marilyn stops, puts her hand on my shoulder, and whispers into my ear.

  “Don’t sweat it, sweetie. We’re used to it,” Marilyn says and then walks away. Now I’m officially star struck… dead star struck…

  “What in the hell is going on!?” I ask Jason.

  “You’re dead!” Jason replies, a little too enthusiastically. Recent events flood my mind and I sit down to avoid falling over.

  “I think I could use that drink now,” I tell Jason. He snaps his fingers and a drink suddenly appears on the table: spiced rum and coke, cold with no ice. Jason knows me well!

  “How’d you do that?” I ask as I grab the glass and take a drink.

  “I can do lots of things now that you don’t know about,” Jason cheerfully answers.

  I recall that the reason I don’t know is because I killed him five months ago.

  “Don’t feel bad, CT. If I hadn’t died then, I wouldn’t have learned who I am!” Jason exclaims.

  “And who are you?” I ask.

  “I’m Hel’s son,” Jason says. I stare at him incredulously.

  “Hel? The Norse goddess of the underworld?” I ask.

  “One and the same!” Jason replies. “It’s been great! I’m like royalty here!”

  “So what have you been doing for the past five months?” I ask while finishing my drink. Jason snaps his fingers and the glass refills. This time it’s a 7 and 7. That is such an awesome trick.

  “I’ve been partying like twenty-four seven. Let me tell you, there is no time like trying out tons of drugs other than when you’re kinda dead. I’ve been shooting up with Kurt Cobain, and doing speedballs with John Belushi. I’ve been getting super drunk going shot for shot with Ryan Dunn, and I mean super drunk, like even worse than that time I got us eighty-sixed from that bar after I started a fight with myself for pissing on my shoes… or did we get thrown out because I was taking a piss in the middle of the bar?” Jason asks while trailing off in thought. About a minute passes before he recovers and continues.

  “I even had the chef start making candy and baked goods with drugs in them, which are awesome! Just stay away from the crystal meth cupcakes…” Jason says and stares blankly like he’s stuck in a memory that is slightly unpleasant. He shivers when he snaps out of it.

  “I even started my own harem! Marilyn and Audrey are in it, along with Jayne Mansfield, and a few other actresses like Katharine Hepburn. I always thought that Katharine was Audrey’s sister so I thought it might get a little weird, but as it turns out, they aren’t even related! Another great thing is you don’t have to wear condoms down here! You don’t have to worry about pregnancies at all! I think I might’ve caught a wicked case of the ghost clap though…” Jason says.

  I think Jason may be trying to screw his way through JFK’s ‘little black book.’

  “Do you cure that with ghost penicillin?” I ask and Jason laughs.

  “Aw man, I’ve missed you, CT. I got a little worried for a while when you went all agro and started ripping guys’ hearts out or tearing their heads off and throwing them at walls… funny thing about that wall, I bet if Andy Warhol could take credit for it as abstract expressionism and came up for some bullshit reason about existentialism to explain the dead guys, it would sell for a couple mil’ …and then there were those awesome spike thingies coming out of your arms and legs! Ooh, and then you drilled a hole in that asshole Illapa! I couldn’t see how you did it, but it was awesome!” Jason exclaims, completely missing the fact that his speech went from something of an ethics lecture to ‘Bro, that was sweet!’

  “Wait, how could you even see that?” I ask.

  “Oh, I always keep my TV on the CT channel, bro!” Jason says as if that explains everything.

  Jason’s eyes glaze over for a second and then he snaps back a moment later.

  “Shit! It looks like we’re out of time, CT. I have to send
you back now, but listen. I need you to go to that place. Rei knows the location. And make sure you finally admit that you love her!” Jason exclaims.

  I open my mouth to ask him what he’s talking about, but Jason doesn’t give me the chance.

  “I mean, she is your fiancée now,” Jason says while trying not to laugh.

  “MY WHAT!?” I shout as Jason explodes with laughter.

  Then the club and Jason fade away.

  [End of Book 1]

  References

  Have you come across something in this book and thought ‘I know I’ve heard that before, but I can’t remember where it’s from’? Well that’s what this section is for! I have marked down every reference in this book that wasn’t self-explanatory so that you don’t have to wake up at 3am and shout “Got it!” when you finally remember.

  1: Alien vs. Predator.

  2: The Beggin’ strips dog.

  3: Hugh Hefner/ Playboy Mansion.

  4: It’s done with baby powder in the movie How High, but supposedly actual pimps use a menthol powder because it stings more on the cuts that the bitches get from the pimp’s rings when he slaps them.

  5: Misery by Stephen King.

  6: Ryu’s special attack from Street Fighter.

  7: Dragon Ball Z.

  8: The Michael Clark Duncan movies referenced are The Green Mile, Daredevil, and Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby.

  Acknowledgments

  I started writing this book as a distraction from the chronic pain I’ve been living with for the past three years. This book started off as being based on a dream where I was riding on the roof of a flying trans-Siberian express with a blue dragon flying alongside it. As you all can tell, I deviated from that plan a little bit. It took me just over a month to write the first and second books, but it has taken much longer for editing, cover art, formatting, and beta readers.

  I’d like to thank my friends and family for reading the book and catching little things that I didn’t in the stupidly vast amounts of editing I did. I’d also like to thank them for supporting my insane writing binges that kept me up until 5am and caused me to sleep until noon.