Above, the Ovessa lunged and swelled, growing slicker with its dew. It was a whole world made cognizant, a god made matter. It believed in its right because it was all it had ever known, except for those heretics it had watched through the barrier. Who was there to tell it otherwise?
The Ovessa neeeeeds! Needs to be more, needs to be pure. Doesn’t Audrey need? Doesn’t Audrey need to let go of fear and pain, of sadness and anger? Embrace and begin the truth, begin the future. Begin being better.
Being better…
Inanis touched her shoulder and snapped her out of it.
“It’s scared of you, knows what you are,” he said.
“It tried to get in my head,” said Audrey, gripping her skull.
“Tried that with everyone.”
She shook Binici, the old woman had passed out beside her. “C’mon, please don’t be dead.”
“What, what happened?”
“Are you okay?”
She reached down and gingerly touched the piece of tentacle still in her abdomen. It wasn’t twitching anymore but her fingers still came away bloody. Binici smiled up at Audrey as best she could. Despite everything, Audrey had grown fond of the professor and didn’t want to see anything else happen to her.
The Ovessa began to seize and twitch high above them, the glistening light growing brighter.
Inanis turned to her. “Audrey, I need you to flow as the Crimsonata, here in the room, right now.”
CHAPTER 41
“Where the fuck did Audrey go?” screamed Elliot.
One minute they were all standing there, the next minute her, Binici, and Inanis were gone. He didn’t like that at all. Not only was it creepy, he didn’t like her disappearing on him. Not that he could do much to protect her from all of this. He didn’t even have a weapon.
The Invocated still stood around them in a silent circle, but the thing called the Sanctified was still approaching and nothing Roma and Hayden shot at him seemed to be slowing him down. He really wished he had a weapon, a gun or a baseball bat. He’d take a steak knife at this point.
“The Crimsonata has fled,” said the Spittle.
“Their folly,” said the Sigh. “Pitiful human conjurings in an attempt to hide within the building. Either our brethren will find them or the Ovessa will see to them in its own glory.”
Roma had ditched her handguns in exchange for her shotgun. That did more damage, knocking the beast backwards. Elliot swooped in and picked up a discarded gun, yelling for some ammo. In one fluid motion, she dropped a clip to the ground, while continuing to fire the shotgun. He fumbled to load the gun, having no idea what he was doing.
Taking a cue from Roma, Hayden switched to his shotgun as well. The blasts knocked the Sanctified back, Hayden growing bold. Roma yelled at him to move, but he ignored her.
“Filth will always be put down!” Hayden roared, eyes wide. “Down to the ground!”
The Sanctified reached up, taking a blast full the chest in the process, and reached past the shotgun. It gripped Hayden’s right arm and snapped it in half.
Hayden screamed in agony, breaking free of the creature. His shotgun slid back to Elliot who picked it up. Hayden staggered, his bone ripping out of his skin. The Sanctified regained his footing and came forward. Instead of a massive blow, it grabbed Hayden by the shoulders with both hands and held him in place.
“Burn, burn them all!” bellowed Hayden. “Suffer not a...”
The Sanctified lowered its swirling, jittering mess of a head onto Hayden’s head, silencing him, engulfing him. When the creature raised back up, the Promethean Wall member’s head was gone, a bloody stump all that remained.
To his left, he heard Roma whisper, “Goodbye Alec, I hope you find peace.”
The Sanctified seemed to forget about them for the moment as it busied itself with devouring the rest Hayden’s body, starting on the broken arm. Elliot watched in horror as the arm passed into the glitching, tumbling mass. He wondered if that was to be his own fate.
“Tell me I’ve loaded this gun right,” he said to Roma.
She looked it over. “You did it right.”
“I’m sorry about Hayden.”
Roma shrugged. “I had a feeling his end was coming anyway.”
Elliot looked up to the two on the porch. “Why are you doing this anyhow?”
The female looked down at him and gave him something like a smile.
“Why does anything grow and evolve? Because that is the way of things. Even you, here and now, serve a purpose. You test our Sanctified, prove its worth. See if its properties are functioning as they should be.”
“Properties? To maim and kill? Yeah, I think you’ve got a winner.”
“The Sanctified does not consume to nourish itself. We are all part of a greater whole. That which it takes into itself is matter transmuted unto the horde, meat repurposed in honor of the Ovessa.”
“Wait,” said Roma. “His body is used to build monsters?”
The Sigh and the Spittle both smiled wide.
Roma began laughing, far too hard for the given situation, as far as Elliot was concerned.
“What the hell?” he asked.
“Ah Hayden, you prick,” she said, slinging her gun over her back as she watched the Sanctified start in on his legs. “You’d be so pissed.”
CHAPTER 42
“You want me to do what?”
Inanis turned and threw out his hand, a stray Invocated that had wandered into the room burst into flame. Back to Audrey, he frowned. For a moment, she thought he was going to yell at her, but instead he took a deep, measured breath.
“You need to take off your clothes, right here, right now. Walk beneath the Ovessa, and flow. Do what you were always meant to do.”
But, but,” stammered Audrey. “I have no idea how to! And why here?”
“The Outer Gods have always fed upon the Crimsonata because they didn’t have anything else tastier. But if they get a whiff of the Ovessa while dining on you? Let’s just say I’m willing to bet their palates will evolve.”
Another Invocated rushed into the room and exploded into smoldering ash at the gesture of the man in the suit. Audrey stared up at the oozing god world and wondered at the plan. Could it be as simple as that?
“Try, dear,” came Binici’s weak voice from the floor beside her.
“I don’t know how,” she whispered back.
“Yes you do, you’ve always known how,” said Inanis. “Don’t worry about the clothes, just go!”
Audrey walked farther out into the room, farther beneath the Ovessa. The slick sheen of pus along its skin gleamed, muscles taunt and expectant. The hole that revealed that portion of the Ovessa in this realm was crumbling, reality breaking apart between this world and its own. Eventually all of the Ovessa would be here, a world made of flesh and able to remake the earth as it saw fit. It undulated in pleasure, flexing its might.
Literally, this was what Audrey Darrow was born to do. To keep things like this at bay. To protect this world from monsters. Not to feed gods, but this. She took hold of that thought and concentrated on that.
She thought about her mother, frazzled and lost, following pieces of a doctrine she didn’t fully understand. She thought about all those women throughout history who had flowed to protect the earth from this moment. She thought about herself standing here now, facing off against a petty god that wanted to enslave her planet.
These thoughts coalesced, and Audrey thought about her last dream.
High above, the Ovessa began to buck and thrust.
The orb of black ichor. The blood of divinity made eons ago and stored on a plane elsewhere. A supply that would never run out, its contents purified once ran through the body of the Crimsonata. Through her magic. More than just food, so much more. Celestial essence, distilled down, marking the bodies of those who wielded it as something more. But it had always been more than just food.
Audrey had begun to float and she hadn’t even realized it.
From that greater realm, that was not really a desert, the essence came to her. Flew to her. It had been called by the Crimsonata. She did not bleed her own blood, but the blood forged for her by cosmic juggernauts, primordial beings who had engineered the universe. The blood poured into her from the far, unseen realm, and she understood.
The Crimsonata had survived for millennia because they were a weapon, too.
The black blood began to seep out of every pore of Audrey’s body as she floated in the air, diffusing through her skin. It soaked into her clothing, but that didn’t matter. She had control. Above her, the Ovessa let out a high-pitched noise, something like a psychic squeal that shook the room. It tried to push itself through the hole, squeezing its bulk further into the earth realm. Reality splintered around the aperture as quickly as the roof itself. Audrey continued floating and bleeding, appraising the god.
Images flashed in her mind of all those women in the desert. All those women who had been the Crimsonata before her. A part of them all now resides within the essence, guarding it for all eternity. They look at her as one. As one, they gave her their love, their support, their strength. Audrey saw her mother. She saw her pride.
With that, Audrey hurled the blood from her body up at the Ovessa, firing it like liquid projectiles. When it hit, it didn’t just splatter, but pierced the diseased skin. The world god howled again, thrashing. She threw more blood, a bigger discharge that she balled up in her hands like a baseball. It blew a hole deep into the Ovessa’s hide. As she did this, droplets of blood were drifting from her body and floating up above her, vaporizing into atoms. She failed to notice most of these until one drop lifted from the end of her nose. She paused, watching it slowly soar away, and was almost cut in half by a blast of light from the Ovessa.
Audrey tumbled to the floor. While the ichor was still coating her clothing, it was almost entirely gone from her body. Had she used it all up? From the sensations she had received during the dream experience, the source was endless. The Ovessa creased its skin and shot out another bolt of light across the room, its aim off by a good five feet. She’d become the Crimsonata, but she’d accomplished nothing.
Suddenly, the entire ceiling above them grew dark, as if it no longer existed. A galactic vista overtook the space above them, one vast and dark, yet filled with movement. The presence in that deeper black weighed down on Audrey, filled her with a terrible dread, and forced her to look away. These were entities far beyond the Ovessa, beings that had both created the Crimsonata, and also created other universes. She felt their concentration bear down upon her, examining her.
They turned their attention toward the Ovessa.
Another psychic shriek as the Outer Gods drew closer. It tried to pull away from its hole in the roof, but a new feast had been found. An Invocated staggered in but fell and began to liquefy before Inanis could even set it on fire.
“Well, this has worked out much like I expected,” he said.
CHAPTER 43
As Inanis spoke, the Spittle and the Sigh rushed into the room.
“Most Holy, no!” screamed the Sigh.
“What have you done?” bellowed the Spittle.
“Work of the Outer Gods,” replied Inanis, pointing up.
The hole was starting to close, reality starting to repair itself. The Ovessa was being dragged back to its own world from where the deeper black could feed on it forever. Its voices must have seen this and ran for their disappearing god.
“We’re coming, Most Holy We will never abandon you!”
A last beam of light enveloped them before the hole closed. For a moment, the greater, vast darkness lay above them, and Audrey feared what was to become of her. Would they still want her to be the Crimsonata? Was she just to walk away or were they simply going to kill her now that they no longer had a use for her? Now that their gaze was turning back to her, she could barely stand it. It felt like gravity had increased, but in her psyche as well as her body. She was powerless against their whims and she knew it. Such a lack of control was utterly terrifying.
Their attention shifted.
“Yeah, I’ve got this,” said Inanis.
And the ceiling went back to normal.
Audrey gawked at Inanis. “What the fuck was that?”
“Right now, you’d better see to Emily.”
Audrey glanced over and saw the old woman bleeding out. The tentacle was gone.
“What happened?” Audrey asked, scrambling over.
“When the Ovessa was transported back to its realm, all of its creations went with it.”
Audrey cradled Binici’s head in her lap. “It’ll be okay, we’ll…”
“I got to see you flow,” whispered the professor. “You were glorious.”
“I was the Crimsonata,” said Audrey, surprised at her tears. “I saw the line of my lineage, millions of women, and the never-ending source of the blood. It was created by the Outer Gods themselves and we were the conduits. But it wasn’t just food, never just food.”
“Audrey,” said Inanis.
“The blood was always meant to be more, whatever the Crimsonata needed to it be. To kill, to heal, to protect, to lead. We made the blood into that. We found our own divinity in the blood.”
“Audrey,” Inanis said a little more forcefully.
She looked down. Binici was dead. Audrey sighed.
“Hold on, I’m just going to teleport us.”
“Why didn’t you…”
They were outside next to Roma and Elliot.
“… do that earlier?”
“Couldn’t show my hand,” said Inanis with a shrug.
“You’re alive!” exclaimed Elliot, coming over to give his sister a hug. “What happened?”
“I became the Crimsonata, beat up the bad guy, and sorta saved the day. You?”
“Roma mostly saved my ass until everything disappeared. Oh, and Hayden died.”
Audrey shrugged. She wasn’t heartbroken over that news. “Binici died.”
“Sorry.”
“Yeah.”
Roma sat down on the steps to the hotel and rubbed her temples. “I’m honestly surprised any of us survived this. I’m surprised this whole thing worked!”
Inanis waved his hand. “Nah, I knew it would work. We haven’t been satisfied with the Crimsonata in centuries, but nobody wanted to be bothered to change the status quo. I simply took some initiative.”
Audrey slowly backed away from Inanis. “What are you saying?”
“I’m one of the Outer Gods. What, you thought my name was actually “Inanis?” Inanis is just your Latin word for empty. I thought that was funny considering the circumstances.”
“But the barriers,” stammered Audrey. “The blood that keeps you back!”
“Audrey, we can do whatever we want, whenever we want. That was just the myth to keep you all flowing. A bit of propaganda. Granted, it was true the barriers would break down, but that has nothing to do with us. Well, it did. That was our fault for making the Crimsonata in the first place.”
“What?” asked Roma.
“Audrey gets it. She draws her blood from a higher plane. And that blood has to be constantly drawn now to keep a wall there. An unforeseen side effect. We really weren’t paying much attention when we threw this project together.”
“Are you serious?” asked Audrey, floored.
“Hey, I saw all the flaws in the plan. So I saw that a need would arise, something that would force the others to go along with change. No Crimsonata for twenty years. I waited until there was only one Crimsonata left on the planet with a young daughter who didn’t know any better. And then I saw to it that your mother died in car crash. I’ve orchestrated this whole thing since you were seven years old.”
Audrey reared back and punched him in the face.
Inanis just laughed.
“I think this whole thing has worked out splendidly for everyone.”
“Thousands of people are dead!” Roma yelled.
&
nbsp; “Well, we are gods after all,” Inanis replied with a smile.
And he vanished.
“Motherfucker,” said Elliot, staring at the spot where he had been standing.
“So are you still the Crimsonata?” asked Roma.
“I don’t know,” said Audrey. “The Outer Gods don’t need me anymore, so I don’t have to flow. The way Inanis talked, the connection would be severed. Chances are, I was the last.”
“Jesus,” said Elliot. “I guess we just go home.”
Home. What was home now? Sitting alone in a small apartment, hiding behind the internet. She had seen behind the curtain, looked at the hidden face of the universe. How could she go back to that life after facing down gods and monsters? She might not be the Crimsonata anymore, but she remembered the sensation. She knew what her lineage was. The blood had flowed through her, albeit only once, but it had been enough.
“I need to talk to Roma first,” said Audrey. “I have some decisions to make.”
CHAPTER 44
FOURTEEN MONTHS LATER
This summer had been just as humid as the previous one, but it was at last winding down. It was the tail end of August and Audrey was sitting in a car sipping coffee with Roma. Twilight was settling on the state park whose name she couldn’t remember. She was lucky that she could recall they were in Utah.
The scenery was beautiful. The trees were lush with greenery and the rocks large and ancient. The sun cut ribbons of colors across the sky as it dipped below the horizon. Too bad they weren’t here for the sights.
“Hey, it’s about nine o’clock,” said Roma.
“I know,” said Audrey.
Roma wasn’t overbearing, she just knew they were on a timetable. Audrey could appreciate that. She placed her coffee in the cup holder and fished through the satchel at her feet. Two different pill bottles, one for little whites, one for little reds. They helped combat her depression and anxiety, made her a better Audrey, the her she was supposed to be. She slipped the pills into her mouth and swallowed them down with coffee.
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