by Mary Ramsey
“Sure, whatever you say.”
The creature laughed, coughing up blood from whatever hole she was speaking from. “You’re like a tree reaching for the clouds, convinced that all it takes is for you to want it badly enough. When in reality, you like all humans are a bonsai, a freak of nature cut off at the knees.”
“So, what are you?”
The body shrugged. “I’m not your mother; I’m much closer to what she worshiped. Although I have been known to take human form. As you can see.”
“Why? I mean, you can’t have that many opportunities to fuck with witches.”
“Witches, humans; I visit this world for the same reason a child visits the zoo.”
“To learn?”
“No way! And you call yourself a mother?” The body laughed, spurting blood like a fountain. “Children throw popcorn at the lions, pound fists on the glass enclosures, maybe even shout at the sleeping animals for daring to not entertain.”
“Not all children.” I knew for a fact Lola was not such a cruel individual.
“All human children go to the zoo to watch the outcome of their cruelty and laugh at the inherent stupidity of lower lifeforms. It’s a form of fun.”
“Is that what you believe? That humans, even at their most innocent, are vessels of unlimited malice? If so, I pity your lonely existence.”
“Big words for a little witch.” The corpse started to fall apart like a wilting flower, losing her hands, arms, then shoulders. “But there’s something to be said for being lonely.” The head was the last piece to succumb to the decay, falling to the side with a crack, before releasing one last thought. “I’ll leave you to figure that truth out on your own.”
“Yeah, you leave me the fuck alone!” I shouted at the darkness. I would prove her wrong; humans are strong and compassionate, and we can prevail. First thing’s first. I knew I needed to get to where she was keeping my family. But to do that, I needed to let go of Raven Miller.
“I pray to you, Father, for guidance, for strength. Please protect my soul.” That prayer was meant for my actual father. “In God’s name, I pray. Amen.”
Gripping my head, I blinked my eyes, trying to find the little girl I’d seen earlier. She was the key, I knew it. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Leo pulling victims from cars, playing the hero. The beautiful angel with the rainbow hair, he was speaking to a hysterical, sobbing woman. The woman was covered in so much blood I couldn’t tell her age or ethnicity. She cradled what appeared to be a dead baby in her arms. It might have been a severed limb. Either way, she was covered in blood but not ash. I needed to find the little girl covered in black ash.
“Raven!” Adam shouted.
I could see him running towards me. But I knew where I had to go. I saw a black minivan lying on its side. It was glowing with flames that were quickly spreading to nearby trees. I walked towards the fire. I heard Adam still screaming at me, but he couldn’t stop me.
He couldn’t save me. I’d found my daughter, my place, my home. The fire was so welcoming, reaching out to me with arms of bright orange flames. I felt no pain as time stood still. For a moment I could see a figure made of light. “Dad?”
The figure reached his hand out to me, his voice calming and warm. “Are you brave?” the figure asked in a digital voice. “A-alone we are brave.”
Alone we are brave? I could feel electric jolts of agonizing pain. It was like I was burning from the inside out. The fire was eating my clothes, my skin, my flesh. I closed my eyes while I still could. The scene glowed in front of my dying eyes; pink, purple, blue—the brilliant galaxy shades slowly lost their color as my world fell to darkness.
“I think he’s waking up!” It was my wife’s voice. “Bobby!”
I was back in my brother’s POV. And hopefully this time I was there to stay. My muscular arms were still pinned to the wall by ropes, but my head was held in place by something much smaller. I needed to force myself to look around.
Craning my neck, I could see where Alice and Lola were being held. Alice was handcuffed to a pipe. But it was clear she hadn’t gone down without a fight. Lola, my innocent little toddler, however, was locked in what appeared to be a dog carrier.
I could hear her whimper in fear. “Lola?” Bobby’s voice, my voice, was weak. There was something cutting deep in his throat. “Sweetie, are you ok?” With every breath, I could feel warm blood streaming down my neck to my collarbone.
Lola crawled to the front of the cage, pressing her innocent face to the metal bars. “I’m here, I’m ok!” The little girl appeared frightened at her next phrase. “If you can free your neck, I think you can escape.”
What was in my neck? I leaned forward, trying to move my head as far forward as it could go. I could see a spike, then another. But it didn’t feel like I was being stabbed; it felt like I was being choked. This thing was removable, I just needed to figure out the puzzle. I closed my eyes to breathe in an attempt to calm my mind because I already knew that the answer would require bloodshed. My only hope would be if I still had Raven’s powers while in Bobby’s form. If that was the case, I just might be able to call upon the law of equivalent exchange. “Lola, are the ropes alive?”
“Alive?” she asked with a squeak.
“Does it seem like they’re made of plants or something else?” I kept my voice tranquil and slow, hoping the calmness would be contagious.
“The things around your arms?” Lola’s voice seemed louder, with a sense of self-assurance. “They look like plants from The Little Mermaid.”
“Ok…” That didn’t tell me much, but I would still attempt what I was planning. Everything had as a spirit or a soul. There was a good chance my plan would still work.
“Are you Mommy or Uncle Bobby?” Lola asked, looking up with innocent eyes.
“Let’s find out.” I focused on my left arm, shifting my powers to my hand. I could feel the blood flowing to my fingers. My hands moved, wiggling, taunting, offering. “Guardian plants, please heed my call.” I wiggled my fingers again. Bobby’s arm was healthy, strong: a perfect vessel. “This body already holds two souls. I can easily handle another.”
The walls started to shake. I could feel the cold green leaves wrapping my fingers like bandages. And then I felt thorns. The plant was testing me, so I paid it no mind. “Take my arm, it’s yours.” I locked my eyes, keeping my mind focused. I needed to make that arm look as irresistible as a chocolate truffle wrapped in a hundred-dollar bill.
I could hear Annie stifle a scream. But I trusted she would bite off her own hand to keep our daughter safe.
Lola whimpered but quickly shifted her little body. I hoped to God she was facing the wall. No, that was Bobby’s heart talking. I knew my daughter was brave. She was mine. I had stolen Lola! I had cut her from the belly of her whore mother! She was always meant to be mine!
I flung my body forward, smacking my face against the concrete floor. I was free; my legs, my neck, my right arm… “Ow!” Then there was the matter of my left arm. My shoulder was burning, and part of me truly didn’t want to look.
I could hear voices in my head. Hundreds if not thousands of voices, like insects buzzing. “We are one.”
I stood up with confidence. Bobby’s towering body felt even stronger with the vines melding with his flesh.
My flesh. Our flesh.
The arms made of vines whipped the wall near Annie, freeing her hands. Annie stood up on shaky legs. “We need to get out of here.”
“But where exactly is ‘here’?” I asked as I turned Bobby’s arm to get Lola’s cage open. With the new arm, I was feeling confident. I was like a video game character with multiple lives, with the arm being my first line of defense.
Annie reached for Lola, scooping the little girl up in her arms. “I think this is a sewer. As for the actual location? I have no idea.”
“Are we locked in?” I asked, looking around for a ladder or a door.
“No, I-I don’t think so.” Annie’s voice was brea
king with emotion. I had never seen her so afraid. “But I can’t tell how long we’ve been down here.”
Lola looked up with her innocent eyes. “Four.”
“Four?” I asked.
She nodded, reaching into her pocket. In her hand was a pocket watch. There was no way a child so young could even tell time.
“Where did you get that?” I asked.
“Miss Becca, give to me.” Lola’s voice seemed to fade away as she spoke. She sounded like a doll. (Or a well-placed trap.)
Annie froze, nearly dropping her. “Bobby, or Raven,” she spoke frantically as she adjusted her grip on our daughter, “whoever you are, please tell me you have a plan.”
“I do.” At least I think I do. I leaned against the wall. If anyone knew how to get us out, it was the plants. Because this was Becca’s plan all along. She wanted me to solve the puzzle, using only what was in the room. And I did. I sure as fuck did. “Come on, plant arm, I know you want out of here, too.”
I could feel the plants crawling up the walls, finding cracks and corners that could be moved. I felt like one of those dolls made of silly putty. Every movement of the alien vines pulled on my actual nerves and tendons until I felt like I was about to scream out in agony. We made a map. “I know where we are.”
Annie nodded, waving her hand for me to continue. “So, where are we?”
You’re not going to like the answer. There was no entrance or exit because this was a place between worlds. “I think we’re inside a relic.”
Annie’s face froze. “Um, what?”
“Like you said, I have a plan. Or an idea, anyway.” I quickly looked around the room, focusing my eyes on every wall. There were six in total including the ceiling and floor.
This could work. I had just enough limbs to try and force my way out. I focused my spirits; Bobby’s physical strength would push the floor, my magic would push the ceiling, and our new plant friends would take the rest. On the count of three…
“One,” said Raven’s voice.
“Two,” said Bobby’s voice.
“Three.” The final voice was a demonic howl.
The walls shook. As the pain and energy rippled through my body, it felt like I (or rather, we) were making progress. I could see a crack of light from the ceiling. Was it the sky? I would never know because as soon as I saw it, I lost focus.
Gravel rained down upon me and my family as the hole quickly closed. “It can’t be broken from the inside,” said a digital voice. The sound came from everywhere, like a PA system with no visible speakers. “You were foolish to sacrifice your mortal body.”
Bobby’s voice was a roar. “Fuck you! Face me, Becca!” I shouted, screaming in all directions. “Are you too much of a coward to play fair?”
“Play fair?” Becca’s disembodied voiced laughed like a schoolgirl. “Your family is lost as they always were, always are, always will be.” The room shook as the voice started to laugh in a deep, demonic roar. “Y-you have lost.”
No, this can’t be possible. I looked around, desperate for answers. Was I really going to die in a trap?
“Oh, it is possible,” said a clear female voice. “But to be fair, this is less of a trap, more of a slaughterhouse.”
I could tell she was standing behind me. “What’s the difference?”
“A trap implies there’s a way out,” she explained. “Like solving a puzzle or chewing off your own leg.”
I turned around to see the blond woman with rainbow-streaked dreads. “You damned your family to hell. And now you belong to me.”
“To you? Why?”
She came closer, pressing her lips to my ear. “You’re back with your mommy, where you always belonged.”
“Then let them go! You have me: two of your strongest children in one body. Do what you want to me, but let my wife and daughter out of this fucking place!” I felt like crying, but if this was really my mother, she was the last person to whom I wanted to admit defeat.
“No, I think I’ll have you kill them, starting with Annie.” She walked to where Annie stood. “You went with her because you saw her as the mother you always wanted.”
“Annie!” I cried. But as I spoke, I realized I had Bobby’s voice. Raven was no more, at least not in this world.
Annie looked at me with eyes filled with pain. “I’ll say hi to your mom for you.” She quickly pulled out a blade from her sock. It was the craft knife she always carried. The same knife that she’d used to draw the map back in the hotel. “Tell Raven I truly did love her.”
Becca snickered. “You loved her only because you needed someone to love.” Her voice echoed as the two women melded into one form.
Their new body was a beautiful woman with gray dreads, youthful skin, and shimmery dark eyes—the perfect abomination. Lola kicked and screamed until she fell from the woman’s arms. She ran to me, wrapping her arms around my leg. “Uncle Bobby, help!”
“I’m going to attack the walls again.” Because I had no other ideas.
Lola shook her head in terror. “I want Mama! Where’s my mama? Mama!”
I wanted so badly to tell her everything would be ok. But that would have been a lie. We were not going to survive this. If we were inside a relic, we were someplace. We could be found. I gripped the walls, focusing all my physical strength, all my magic until I could no longer feel the breath in my lungs. My vision went white. I was beyond the point of no return. No, fuck, this is bad. My life flashed before my eyes. I saw my childhood spent caring for my dying father. Running away from home, finding my place as a nurse at the veterans’ hospital.
And finally, Nate. “Hey, kiddo.” He stood before me in a military dress uniform.
“Hey.” There were tears in my eyes. We were back in the ICU room. The wall was cracked where the hole had been. It was as if the wound had been healed. “You’re the last person I expected to see.”
“The last?” he asked with a smirk, pretending to come off as offended.
“In a uniform. That’s what I mean.”
“And I wasn’t expecting you to meld your soul with your brother, and an alien plant.”
“What do I look like right now?”
“You mean who?” Nate took my hand, lifting it to my line of sight.
It was Raven’s hand. I was in Raven’s body.
“Your brother is safe.”
“Ok,” said Raven’s voice. “That’s good at least.” Standing closer, I could feel Nate’s chest. Where I touched him, a hole started to form. It was like his body was made of water. I could see his heart beating, his lungs inflating and deflating. But it was all just an image, a reflection.
“In another life, would you have married me?” Nate’s voice was becoming a digitized echo. Was this even the real Nate?
“I would have run away with you. Even when you were sick, I had this dream of leaving with you. We would steal a car and just drive off into the desert.” It was the truth. That was all I wanted, to be happy.
Nate’s spirit started to fade. “You were always my dream girl.”
“I want to die.” I was ready to die. Everything I had done in my life had led to my current level of shit. I was going to run forever, fight forever-for what? To honor my father? To save my soul? “I don’t want any of this.”
Nate reached up to touch my face. “You may need to wait just a little longer.”
Cracks started to form as the room started to degrade. No, it’s opening. I felt like Alice in Wonderland; I was a shrunken doll inside a box. Light flooded the opening to reveal a strange sight.
I could see a battle going on between Leo and Becca. The view I had made the action look like an Imax movie. Holy crap.
Leo’s wings were on full display as he attempted to fight her in the sky. But Becca was teleporting. And every time she vanished and reappeared, she looked different. She was changing costumes. Each form was of similar height and weight, and I recognized them all. Each one was someone who I survived or defeated.
And they were kicking Leo’s ass.
Becca punched with abnormal strength. And in every form, she was able to pull out a weapon exclusive to that individual; magic wands, baseball bats, needles, guns. Some weapons were easier to dodge than others.
She was faster than Leo. But Leo had more power. He could block and put up shields.
But where was Adam? Was he protecting my brother and my daughter?
Bobby appeared in the scene, his body fully powered with the alien plant arm and what appeared to be my light magic.
The battle played out like a puppet show. I reclined on the floor of whatever container I was in to watch the show.
Leo and Bobby were attempting to keep Becca in one place.
Bobby was a tank, taking hit after hit. The best way to describe it would be the star power-up in the Super Mario games; his skin was shimmery, his body radiating with power, and he appeared to be completely invulnerable.
But where was Lola?
“Her name isn’t Lola.”
“Who said that?” I stood up, looking around the small space. The voice was soft, female.
“Her name was never Lola. She was never your baby.”
I rubbed my nose nervously. “Where are you? Show yourself, Gia!”
Why, so you can take even more from me? You act so righteous, like a perfect little angel. You walk around saving war veterans and soldiers, like you’re doing God’s work. But I can’t wait to see you burn in Hell, where you belong.
It was clear I was hearing Nate’s dead ex-wife only in my head. I always told myself I was an angel, a guardian. What I did with my powers, I did to honor my father. But my father had not been an executioner. That was all on me. I had fallen in love with a married man. He had been dying of cancer, with a disloyal wife. But I had chosen to murder her. I had chosen to punish her because he couldn’t. Even if he had survived his illness, Nate would not have wanted me to kill her. And now my soul was in purgatory. All I could do was wait.
Leo was shouting. “Where is she?”
The blond woman crossed her arms over her chest. “It’s written in the stars that our game of cat and mouse will go on until the end of time.” Wings of orange and gold flames started to emerge from her back. “So you’ll forgive me if I just flip the game board.” With a single motion, the sky filled with a massive fireball-like explosion.
