Dead Man Walking

by Zach Adams

  He tried to ask what the hell was going on but couldn’t quite find the best way to phrase the question in this unique situation. The ghost that looked like him understood. They traded thoughts as they continued in a new direction.

  I’m what’s left of your other timeline, Ghost-Isaac explained. On Earth, imprints like me are just shadows, no consciousness. But things work differently in places like this.

  Isaac recalled how everyone he saw had a gray blur beside them, usually doing the same thing they were but mirrored, what he assumed were the results of his poor vision. Several had been behaving independently, and Isaac wondered what role the people those ghosts belonged to had played in Ghost-Isaac’s timeline as well. He also wondered where this place was.

  Part of the None, I think. That’s where the gate was supposed to lead. As far as I can tell, it arranges itself based on your memories, as if you’re dreaming. You see the school too?

  Isaac, the living one, nodded.

  They descended a staircase going at a ninety-degree angle from the hallway, yet somehow their feet held to the surface without succumbing to trivial things like gravity. After three steps they began to appear as though they were leading up, contradictions blending into one another like an MC Escher piece.

  Isaac asked where the ghost was leading him.

  After a lot of trial and error, I figured out the way through this labyrinth and into the Lost World. Some of the memories are still intact, so I should be able to take you as far as our diverging point. And this living/ghost stuff isn’t entirely correct, either. I’m more like a self-aware GIF, with some of the data scrambled. But now you’re here, which helps fill in the blanks.

  The real Isaac, as he felt comfortable thinking of himself until it crossed his mind that the ghost must have existed first, asked what the “diverging point” was, but received no answer. They reached the top, bottom, whatever it was of the staircase and came out in the lobby of the school. A wide sigil of overlapping hexagons, triangles, and jagged characters Isaac was unfamiliar with had been burned into the floor, spanning the room from the various staircases and corridors to the wide-windowed entryway and the vacant office of Mrs. Darc -

  Don’t say any of her names! Ghost-Isaac hissed. In a place like this, it’ll bring her right to us.

  They stopped at a pair of black plastic chairs next to the principal’s office door. Isaac took a seat and pointed for his ghost to follow.

  We can’t exactly afford to waste time.

  The most recent version of the Isaac OS told himself that if he was going to survive, he needed to catch his breath. He assumed the shadow could relate. Ghost-Isaac took the remaining seat.

  Impulses like breathing and resting are only old habits to me at this point. Fringe benefit of being incorporeal.

  The one with a solid body looked through the wide windows of the entrance doors and saw in the infinite nothingness a pair of what looked like burning scarlet eyes. It was like they were in a hidden face right in front of him, peering into and through him, but at the same time they looked to be the size of small planets, gazing down on the pair. They seemed to burn with hatred and anguish.

  Look away, damn you! Are you trying to destroy reality? Ghost-Isaac yelled as he tried to smack Isaac on the head. His hand passed straight through, giving him a chill.

  I don’t remember being this dumb, but I guess we both read the Book.

  Isaac asked what happened to him in the other timeline. His duplicate, or rather the one he was a duplicate of, shifted uncomfortably.

  Telling you won’t make a difference. If you manage to survive it will all be erased. Let’s just keep going.

  Isaac crossed his arms and refused to budge. The shadow growled under his breath, and the wounds covering his face and hands seemed to become more visible.

  You really don’t want to know, Ghost-Isaac said. Living-Isaac assured him that he did, and they weren’t going a step further until he told him. The pair thought in unison that they were irritatingly stubborn.

  I spent two years looking for Pages on my own, right after I got the library job. Experimented with the phrases I learned, after that copy of ‘War of the Worlds’ disappeared. I got caught trying to cover it up, got fired. Without me there, Donny only lasted about a week. It was the first time I had seen Beige happy.

  They shared a theory that this was because Beige was not truly capable of human happiness.

  Yeah, one of Donny’s many theories about that dick. Anyways… She, the vampire, sent everything she had after me… I thought I was doing pretty well. Pulled off an inventory space trick I put together, on my backpack, I like to call it a TARDIS charm. Started leaving clues for her next target so they could survive if my number came up, although I didn’t think the next target would still be me.

  Living-Isaac put a hand on his backpack, still slung over his shoulder. He hadn’t really thought about it, but since the first hollow attack the bag never seemed to run out of space. He went on to point out that while the ghost’s quest took him two years, in his own memory he wasted the same two years behind the checkout desk. His past week certainly felt like two years, though.

  Things only went downhill from there, of course…

  Silver tears began to fall down his translucent face. Isaac felt the base of his skull get warm and his pulse pick up as his hands went cold. Part of him felt overwhelmed with grief and shame as the other was inexplicably livid. He demanded his former self finish explaining.

  That fucking cat-lizard thing and a few zombies followed me to the apartment, while Chloe and Donny were there waiting for me. I was late, but they held them off well. The ghost swelled with pride for a moment, until he continued the story. An impulsive thought passed between them correcting the term from ‘zombies’ to ‘hollows’.

  M-my spell went wrong. The building went up in flames. Tobias showed up, tried to put it out, and one of the monsters paralyzed him. I got out. But Chloe and Donny, the cats…

  Isaac stood up. He tried to punch and strangle his failed self. The version of him that started all of this. The Isaac who couldn’t resist reading the Book and playing the hero.

  The same one who couldn’t resist doing it a second time, Isaac thought bitterly as his hands passed through and hit the wall. He slowed his momentum just enough to avoid smashing his knuckles on the bricks. The ghost rose to his feet and entered the front office.

  You’re going to erase all of it at the diverging point.

  Isaac asked him once again what the diverging point was, and why they were going there.

  Where I end, and you begin.

  Isaac felt that this sounded ominous. Further explanation please, we already have a headache.

  That’s a feedback loop, from both of us being here. We reinforce each other’s consciousness, but it’s in overdrive. Eventually it’ll burn us both out like a big battery, because by continuing to be at all, and especially by setting foot outside of our reality in the first place, we are a universal paradox. We really must get moving, so I’ll try to keep it short. Back in the old days, just making it to the forest was enough. I thought it would still work, but I guess standards have been raised in the past thousand millenia. I’d be willing to bet that reuniting the timelines that are breaking reality will get someone’s attention, though.

  If the elves’ goddess lets us in, that ought to fix the paradox, both of Isaac thought in harmony.

  Isaac followed himself into the office. The old wolf statue, bane of all troublesome students, was still on the desk. Isaac felt even more certain than he had as a teenager that the thing was about to go for his neck. The ghost started to grab the statue, indicating for Isaac to do the same. He had one more question before they went on; Was L’æon really working with Li - Mrs. D - her? The shadow blinked and raised one eyebrow.

  Who?

  Isaac let the subject drop as they grabbed the wolf. The school melted into oblivion around them.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight: The Lost World
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  The Isaacs opened their eyes to find that doing so was of meager help to them wherever they had ended up. Ghost-Isaac gave off a slight glow, not quite as strong as L’æon’s had been, but enough to give them about a foot of light. Living-Isaac could see trees surrounding them, the color of charcoal where they weren’t covered in off-white ropes. Directly above, a waxy moon hung in the sky, but it didn’t touch the ground here.

  I’m having a tough time remembering this place, so stick close and watch your step.

  The pair stepped over roots and what Isaac sincerely hoped weren’t bones sticking out of the dirt. There didn’t seem to be any clear path to follow, but the shadow seemed to have a vague idea of which direction to go. Muscle memory, perhaps.

  I find that term to be slightly insensitive, under the circumstances.

  Isaac touched a tree to keep his balance and was rewarded with regret. The ropes dangling from the branches, whose bark appeared to actually be charcoal upon closer examination, was sticky and unpleasant to touch.

  “Ugh!” Isaac managed to say out loud, though the sound only lasted a moment longer than it had in the None.

  “Webs just like in my dream. I guess that häzün charm wore off,”

  The ghost stopped walking and turned to face him. He was waving his hands in silent warning, but the message was lost.

  “Wait, webs, like in the dream…” Isaac said again. “That means… Oh, shit.”

  Quiet! Something might hear you.

  The shared thought was interrupted, and the pair dove to the mossy ground on panicked instinct. Isaac had been to concerts which didn’t pack as much of a punch on his ear drums.

  The ground erupted into violent, almost trampoline-like quakes. Burnt trees were uprooted and sent flying. Isaac flung like a ragdoll around the dark woods, coming to a halt against the base of a tree which had held its ground. Both Isaacs wobbled for longer than they could afford. The air around them cracked with the thunderous roar of something(s) gargantuan and unhappy.

  One such something came into view from the darkness, just barely despite Ghost-Isaac’s glow. First the Isaacs saw padded paws and felt a simultaneous “Pet the kitty!” instinct. Until, that is, the fact settled in that the paws were twice as wide across as his torso and came up to his knees. The vile, snarling breath from its owner misted the forest, turning Ghost-Isaac almost into a rainbow. Isaac looked up.

  Staring at them, hissing breathlessly, was the grotesquely twisted face of a human, frozen in an expression of terror but with hungry feline eyes. The rest of its body looked a lot like the moura, but pale, and with a writhing cobra for a tail instead of a scorpion’s stinger. Rather than being the size of a jungle cat, as the moura was, this one was about the size of a Winnebago. Neither of Isaac needed to see any more - they fled.

  As Isaac ran, not nearly as fast as the monster but small enough to dodge its attacks, he saw his other self run face-first into a dead tree and hit the ground. He collected his wits for a moment before standing back up.

  Then, the scream.

  It came from the previously frozen face of the giant moura. It had no words. It was obscenely high-pitched, anguished, and explosive in a way that gave the impression it had intentionally been weaponized and aimed for Isaac’s ears. The shriek vibrated his entire body, taking time to shake hands with every cell individually from his hair to his toenails. He barely managed to not projectile vomit.

  A final interruption stopped the beast from having raw Isaac for breakfast. When this voice arrived, the moura scurried back into the darkness like a knowingly misbehaving pet when the humans came home. It made Isaac think of Nikola, as Gamora never cared what the humans thought.

  “æ’géminë!”

  A burst of fire as thick around as an oil pipeline streaked across the tops of the trees, Isaac could feel the heat on the back of his neck.

  The terrain settled just long enough for the Isaacs to lift their heads up. As before, the flames lit up a much larger portion of the blackened forest. The ghost took off running without hesitating to see what came through the blazes, and Isaac followed suit.

  Don’t fall, and don’t get stuck!

  Isaac put everything he had into his legs. Whatever fraction of his attention span remained was spent keeping his eyes glued to the ground ahead of him. Smoke burned his eyes and lungs.

  “I can’t -!” Isaac gasped. He choked on the rest of the sentence.

  Save your breath!

  The ghost leapt over roots and fallen trunks, apparently having regained his memory of an escape route. Isaac tried to keep up. His chest began to seize and refuse to allow any smoky air in, and everything in his sight started to look like his blurry ghost.

  We’re almost out, keep going!

  The invasive thought distracted Isaac. He looked up mid-step to make sure he knew where the other him was.

  For that second that his eyes weren’t on his feet, a root the size of his arm appeared in his path. His foot caught underneath, sending Isaac face-first into a mess of moss and monster-web. His body met the sticky substances with enough force that he couldn’t pry himself back out of them.

  Agh, crap! Isaacs thought with a pained groan. The harder he tried to pry his bruised self from the trap, the harder it held to him like a demented version of a finger puzzle.

  Ghost-Isaac doubled around and tried to help himself back up, forgetting in their mutual terror that he was insubstantial. They both looked up to the burning forest around them as the source of the chaos came into view. Isaac remembered the image vividly.

  …A long snout coated in red scales, mouth open and full of interlocked fangs. Smoke swirled from a pair of flared nostrils, and when that vanished it revealed a pair of furious eyes, the same shade as the scales. Underneath was a long neck lined with razor spines, capped with a pair of leathery wings the size of a commercial airplane. Isaac had never seen a dragon outside of storybooks, of course - but he was certain that their lower half did not consist of a black widow spider the size of a tank, the visually privileged face and venom-spitting mouth living on the dragon’s upper chest. Six hairy limbs flailed about in twitchy chaos as the whole beastly mess was held aloft by its wings…

  The monster descended, crushing more trees on its way. The spider and dragon faces prepared to let loose an unholy storm of venom and fire. Isaac still couldn’t get himself from the ground.

  Isaac thrust a hand into the pockets of his backpack for something, anything that could be of use here. The creature’s lungs were nearly full.

  His fingers found a stiff but brittle stick covered in rows of delicate hairs. He pulled it loose. The monster began to exhale, vicious gusts of superheated wind slapping both of Isaac before the real show could begin. Sweat poured down his head and back in buckets.

  A piercing whistle rang across the sky, diverting the arachniwyrm’s attention for mere fractions of a second. Isaac looked at his hand – he was holding the white-and-gold feather he had taken from Tobias. It was warm to the touch.

  Following the whistle, a trail of lightning ripped through the flames. At the end was a mass of light like a speeding meteorite. It slammed with the force of one into the several-eyed arachnid face of the monster’s chest. The whirlwind of lightning and flame brought the colossus to the ground with another brutal rumble. The force was just sufficient to knock Isaac out of the sticky mess covering the ground. He saw his ghost bolt in the opposite direction.

  For one extra moment he paused to look back and saw, clawing at the significantly larger beast with golden talons, the biggest bird he had ever seen, covered in the same color feathers as the one in his fingers. Electricity crackled around the ends of its angelic wings and eagle beak.

  Move!

  Isaac followed his ghost out of the forest. As they ran, the webs and roots became less and less as the scorched ground gave way to ash. From horizon to horizon was gray nothing, save for a lopsided structure in the distance. Their savior’s path of light
ning came from beyond it, stretching past what he could see. A winning factor of this expanse of emptiness was the lack of arachniwyrm or uber-moura monstrosities. Ghost-Isaac went for the structure, betting they could hide there for a minute or two. They could only hope nothing else was waiting in the shadows.

  Good thinking, having a phoenix feather on hand. What are the odds that’d be the thing that would save us?

  “Uh… Yeah. Good thinking, right,” Isaac stammered.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine: The Diverging Point

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  Isaac slowed his pace as they crossed over endless ash. He was light-headed from the smoke and nearly fell to his knees every few steps as the phoenix and arachniwyrm battled behind them.

  We can’t stop!

  “No shit, we just don’t have much choice,” Isaac groaned. A sudden clap of thunder sent his head spinning. Isaac stopped moving altogether as he tried to reduce the number of copies of himself in his vision.

  You can breathe on the other side of that wall!

  The dueling creatures returned to the sky. Without the burning forest to block their view, the sky seemed to slide away as Isaac looked up. It gave the dizzying impression of having flipped upside-down. This did nothing to ease his light-headedness.

  The phoenix rose first, the edges of its wings smoking. It flew around in a half circle until it faced the arachniwyrm again. The bird opened its beak wide and crackling, blinding light began to gather within.

  Isaac’s living nightmare followed. The spider-dragon’s gigantic leathery wings beat the ash around them into a tornado. It was about this time that Isaac thought he had some energy left to run after all. As he forced his legs to act enthusiastic about their job, the force of the wind yanked him side to side.

  Globs of spider venom rained down in their path. The fumes from the acid and smoke combined to form the most potent substance Isaac had ever inhaled. For a moment he felt content and relaxed, bordering on anesthetized until the effect made him think of times with Donny, and he was pulled abruptly back to near sobriety. He ran on.