Splintered Energy (The Colors Book 1)

by Arlene Webb

  She pointed with delight. “David.”

  “Dad! She knows my name.”

  Huge eyes turned. “Dad? Aaron?”

  He smiled at the beauty staring at him. “No worries. We’ll help you understand.”

  With a soft fluttering of her fingers, she gestured. “Names? Help?” She swung her feet to the floor, a rippling flow of grace.

  David explained objects and grinned as she mimicked him. Strands of hair flowed past her waist, the ends curling in a seductive twist against her hips, as her baby steps took her exploring.

  Her innocence seemed real, but the weapon in Aaron’s hip pocket reassured him. “She’s a computer-brained goddess,” he muttered to David. His attention locked on her, he took matches from his nightstand and lit the candle.

  “Candle, pretty,” she whispered and patted the green wax. The flickering flame drew a frightened flinch, but she moved on without sobbing in chromophobic confusion. Her glide around the bedroom grew more confident, and she absorbed English as fast as they could talk.

  * * *

  I’m so damn scared. Jaylynn felt like she walked on eggs guarded by a red dragon. Her unpredictable captor not only had inhuman strength, he possessed photographic memory. She’d answered his demands for names to everything in sight, and he’d managed ten minutes without looking like he’d break something—and that included her neck. Should she beg for compassion? She didn’t understand what he wanted, and she might not live long enough to find out.

  “I want to go home.” She hated herself for the whine. “My arm hurts. I’m thirsty and frightened. Please let me go.”

  “Teach arm hurts.” He tossed the last log on the fire.

  “I don’t want to die. You broke my arm.”

  He looked confused, and then he sighed. He rubbed his temple, tossed cracked sunglasses onto the couch, and raised his chin.

  Oh. My. God. He’s not even a human lunatic.

  Her legs unfroze—his hand muffled her scream.

  Drawn into the demonic rays that were his eyes, Jaylynn choked on the fear twisting in her throat as if she’d swallowed a python. What’s happening to me? She couldn’t move, breathe, or understand the current surging from his hand into her face.

  In the midst of her panic, she began to comprehend the energy he radiated was soothing—in a caught-by-an-electric-demon sort of way. When her scream dissolved, he dropped his fingers from her mouth. His other hand held her back from him, kept her from collapsing.

  He felt real. Solid, seductive flesh. No horns. No tail. Gates of hell didn’t open, and he appeared stricken. Blood tears welled in beautiful vermillion eyes.

  Unable to look anymore, his grip unbreakable, she stepped into unreality, and buried her face into his chest.

  He grunted at her whimper. Picked her up and carried her to the couch. She fell from his arms like an irritating, limp doll.

  When the security blanket landed on her lap, she dared to open her eyes. Sunglasses back on, he fidgeted beside her. She drew a shuddering breath. “What…are you?”

  His gentle caress dried her face while his rough voice growled, “Don’t know name. Don’t know broke arm. Want home. Jaylynn home, soon.” He drew back from her, and his hands balled into fists. “Jaylynn, no afraid. Teach thirsty.”

  That radiant light couldn’t be real. It just couldn’t. She dared to close the space between them and took off the sunglasses.

  He looked away, and then shifted glowing eyes back.

  “Your eyes shouldn’t be red.” The mangled glasses fell from her hands, and he put them back on. “You’re a demon? Is hell for real then?”

  “Don’t know hell. Don’t kill Jaylynn. Try don’t break Jaylynn.”

  He sprang up, strode to the end table, raised it over his head, and smashed it on the floor. He flung the splintered wood into the fireplace as she found her feet. “Jaylynn no afraid. Hurts…Demon’s head. Teach thirsty.”

  She inched for the doorway and managed to croak, “Thirsty is a need for water. There’s a sink in the other room.”

  Red eyes burned into her back.

  An isolated dwelling in the woods, no telephone in sight, a demon waiting—could she get more doomed? Past twilight, the kitchen’s dark shadows enhanced the eerie silence. She found a glass on the counter and filled it. She set the glass down.

  The back door opened without a creak.

  “Don’t know what Demon is,” his harsh voice called out. “Demon hears.” She choked back her sob. His voice grew angrier. “No home. Teach. Demon try not break arm—again.”

  She left the door open, gulped the water, and whispered, “Screw you. Mean, cruel, demonic delusion.” She refilled the glass. Maybe the monster was thirsty too. Maybe water would melt him back to hell. Maybe…was that him growling out there? Ohgodohgodohgod.

  He turned from the fire and sighed at her hesitant approach. She handed him the glass and cringed back. As his fingers closed around it, thin cracks radiated out. “Teach,” he barked as his nostrils flared.

  She pretended to drink.

  Brow furrowed, he brought the drink to his lips. Delight splashed across his face, and he drained every drop. One step brought him close. He thrust the glass at her. “Demon like water.” A soft smile curved his lips, and her breath froze.

  He’d never had a glass of water before? She stepped back, cradling her arm.

  His shoulders drooped, and he pivoted to stomp across the room. He yanked the door out of its broken frame, threw it down, and faced her with his hidden eyes. “Teach. Mean Cruel Demon…screw you?”

  Her heart pounded so hard it hurt.

  He snorted. He stepped aside and snapped his fingers. “Go. Home.”

  The glass shattered on the floor. She ran from the flickering fireplace into the dark. Less than ten steps later, she didn’t see or hear, but felt that electricity encircle her arm.

  “You said I could go home.” She bit down so hard inside her lip she tasted blood.

  “Demon teach.” He guided her away from the cabin toward the woods. She had no choice but to trip alongside, until he stopped and dropped his hands. He looked up and grinned. The cool night air and starless sky seemed exhilarating to him.

  He turned to her, mercurial smile gone. No time to draw a last gulp of boring air before his sweet breath hit her face. His hand covered her mouth and then released. His threat not to scream was clear.

  “Demon won’t hurt Jaylynn. Home.” He swept her into his arms, cradled her like a child, and ran without a barefoot stumble. He didn’t say a word for the mile or so. Her car waited in the ditch, both doors still open. He set her down by the driver door.

  “Thank you,” she mumbled. Unbelievably, her purse lay on the seat. “What are you going to do now?”

  No reply. Her demon had disappeared into thin air. She looked at the broken steering column, and whimpered as she reached for her cell. “Police? Ghost busters? Loony bin?”

  * * *

  What was Jaylynn’s problem? She couldn’t make the vehicle move? Demon broke it? Or maybe he broke her, damaged more than her arm, and she was lost and confused—like him. If only he knew where he belonged, he could bring her with him. Keep her safe.

  He watched from the trees. Would she shake with irrational fear if he approached to ask her? He slumped. Unfair, but she most likely would.

  When the death strap hidden under her upper-covering had become visible, he hadn’t harmed her. He’d controlled the desire to make her remove it. He didn’t have the words. To his disbelief, the white still didn’t take him, and she hid it under the black cover again. He could ignore it, like he did the death circling her eyes—focusing on the beautiful centers. He didn’t look at awful teeth but at her perfect dark hair.

  Jaylynn’s eyes kept losing water. Was she so afraid that she dissolved? She could wear death and survive, yet was so fragile she leaked because of him. She’d given him words, fire, water. Beautiful things of immense value.

  Anger twisted throug
h him. But then why did she fear him? She couldn’t control her dislike of his outer-casing she called skin, his optical units she called eyes, even his voice tones. Mean and cruel? Screw you? Jaylynn wouldn’t teach him the words, but he’d understood she wanted her home, to be unafraid, without him. He wanted to smash her leaking eyes, yelling mouth, her need to flee him, but he missed the soft curvy teacher.

  Finally, he heard and then saw the metal unit arrive. A creature opened the door for her without breaking it, and a strange feeling, sadness, gripped him as she readied to leave. At least the red lights on top of the vehicle were beautiful, despite the annoyance of the flash. He could go with her in such a pretty vehicle.

  But she doesn’t want me.

  She was gone.

  He could leave as well, but he didn’t know where to go. He leaned against the tree, absorbed with the beauty of the night sky—what was appearing? Pinpoints of yellow-light. Whenever this world showed beauty, something got ugly.

  He scowled and hopped to his feet. How was he to blend in such a strange environment? Would he always have to hide his eyes?

  He wished he wasn’t a mean-cruel-demon.

  He didn’t like this world.

  Where was Demon’s home?

  * * *

  Malcolm James didn’t sit in the correct home. Time, a serious enemy, clicked by. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame website, where the homeowner had gone, had its hours posted. Digital numbers on the lower right of the screen encouraged him to risk four minutes longer.

  His skills—Malcolm James’s skills—now surpassed anyone that spent, say, a lifetime in front of a screen. Knowledge, culture, social skills were loaded and filed in his memory.

  He’d exceeded the standard, human-limited, activation of selected brain sections. Over forty percent of his mental mass powered to the max—simultaneous firing in targeted areas. And he suspected the manipulation of this organ would increase with learned precision control. What exactly fueled Malcolm James’s neurons, he didn’t know. It wasn’t a priority, until basic survival odds were raised.

  Yet, a few stressed brain cells could be derailed to contemplate acceptance of this unknown—him, who now powered the intellect. Loss of freedom, trapped in a body, and the fact that not James, but—he—needed to accept his essence as Malcolm James seemed irrefutable.

  Existentialism led to the next conclusion and out of third person.

  I—self—me—individual.

  In this body, I now exist. Without rules, regulations, not even a simple guideline. Thrown into actuality to go with the flow—it felt more like a violent riptide, leaving him not only clueless but bereaved.

  Oh my. No time for this. I must get on with the basic survival.

  With a solid foundation of the language, he assumed he could communicate. He now understood bank records, credit cards, and exactly how much the dead Malcolm had left him. But he didn’t have a handle on safety.

  He needed the sanctuary of Malcolm’s—my home—before the man that lived here returned. He pulled up a map of Cleveland and memorized the path.

  It took two minutes to erase any trace, and two additional minutes to second-guess and recheck. Yes, he’d left the computer as he’d found it.

  The pretty flowers on the table tore a groan from him. He snapped an inch off the base of each stem, opening a fresh path to draw fluid. He added water and put the vase back where it had been.

  Along with vandalism, breaking and entering, it didn’t feel right to take without permission, but he needed the illusion of security. The black, chenille blanket was now his. One loose knot under his chin fastened it around his shoulders, and he closed the door behind him. The daylight had faded into a blue-black sky, quite beautiful, despite the glittering pockets of stars.

  Blanket billowing behind him, he navigated suburbia for twelve miles. He could distinguish human or animal breathing up to ten yards away. Dogs followed him through their territory until stopped by chain or invisible fence. Ground contact time diminished, stride frequency increased and decreased, and the earth seemed to rise to meet his feet.

  Fourteen minutes later, he slowed to a jog and entered the housing development. The blacktop driveway at 55 Edgewood Lane allowed him a grunt of relief, and he filtered the sounds of the night. Nothing human or animal breathed in the quiet shelter. Eighty seconds of systematic number punching and he opened the garage.

  The lock on the interior door broke with a sharp twist, and he found the light switch. He preferred the dark safety of the night, but he had to face what—his—home held.

  Shoulders squared, he grabbed a broom from the corner closet, and proceeded to swat paper towels, dishtowels, and a white toaster into the closet. He tossed and caught an ugly-green ceramic dish three times, as he crossed the room. He placed it on a shelf and sighed, stepped back and centered it correctly, before closing the cabinet.

  Soon, reasonable shades of grey, blue, and beige filled the kitchen. He’d ignore the refrigerator for now, with hope he wouldn’t be here long enough to care. Objects from the living room filled another closet.

  A partial smile curved his lips. The computer had been positioned near a window. He patted the monitor with affection, powered it on, and returned to his systematic rearranging until the living room and master bedroom were at least tolerable. He left the door to the second bedroom closed. The home was basically pleasing to begin with.

  Malcolm James had been okay, for a now dead human.

  He flipped the light in the blue-tiled bathroom connected to the master bedroom. For the first time since he saw the glimpse of the sky earlier that morning, he understood joy as he noted the shower.

  He placed the stolen blanket, folded neatly, on the counter. Eyes closed, he grabbed towels and shoved them in a cupboard. He turned the shower on full blast and made his clothes a tidy stack.

  The scent and sound of splattered droplets gave him courage to face the mirror. His muscular body radiated disciplined strength, without a trace of fat. He carefully pulled away and flickered a sickly yellow-white. He resurged, repeated the process of beautiful to Caucasian and established how simplistic a change of skin hue was.

  Every emotion clamped down, he stayed the wrong color, looked into his eyes and concentrated. Beautiful beams dimmed to the color of the tiled floor. His mouth, open with dismay, exposed the teeth. He resurged.

  He banged his head down on the counter, escaping the reflection—oh my, not the reflection, but his.

  I am so ugly. His sob twisted from his lips. The now familiar emotion of sorrow, akin to fear, led to despair.

  Get it together man, whatever, idiot Mr. James. He straightened. He flicked the light off, and stepped into the shower where he continued to cry. After two minutes, he quieted. He stayed immobile, water cascading over his shivering body for four hours, four minutes, four seconds.

  Shortly before dawn, he turned the shower off. Droplets glistened, reflected off his flesh and abandoned him. The blanket wrapped around his waist, he strode to the computer.

  Increments of time counted down, as he broke security codes and entered the Cleveland police system. File numbers changed, he deleted and rewrote James’s sedan as an abandoned vehicle while another section of his brain sizzled.

  How did I come to be in this body? A disabled vehicle, the timing was such James had pulled off the road. I killed him, and then my memories began. He couldn’t assess a single memory of the deceased man. He had no recall of anything prior to finding himself trapped, except absolute purity. The beauty of the past he yearned for.

  In the now, he must accept he was not only an individual, he also owned many things, including six credit cards. He, a.k.a. dead human Malcolm James, adjusted the name, address, and car license number.

  His exit without trace from the police computer grid took sixteen minutes, forty-two seconds. An email with credit card information, authorization to replace the tire, took care of the garage connected with the impound lot. He sent a final message to the man
ager at the downtown branch, Bank of America, stating he’d miss meetings for at least a week.

  He left the comforting hum of the computer for the bedroom and threw himself face down on the blue bedspread.

  Dawn of day two tapped on the windows. Malcolm James the imposter didn’t need sleep, and he seethed with anxiety. He was an individual, alone, but he didn’t feel solid. No weight against him, no one to shoulder, he had no substance.

  Malcolm James shouldn’t be alone. Where was…his…what?

  A dilemma. He didn’t yet know what he lacked.

  Chapter Five

  Aaron stood back and watched. Evening of day one since this creature lit up his world, but he remained as befuddled as sunrise had found him.

  Waves of long hair tumbled past her waist, giving the strange woman an ethereal fairy-like quality. She absorbed information like a sponge. Another reason to assume she wasn’t human, as if sparkling laser eyes weren’t enough.

  “You know my name’s Aaron.” He pointed at himself, then at her. “What’s your name?”

  She flowed to his bed and folded thin legs under her with feline agility. “Don’t know. Aaron find name?”

  Wow. Communication established. Major hurdle overcome. Did he dare explore unknown territories regarding chromophobia without the starship Enterprise? In his bedroom?

  A deep breath and he “made it so.” He removed his sunglasses, placed them on his nightstand and—yippee—she didn’t dissolve in a heap of terror. It appeared her acceptance of human eyes, specifically the white sclera, now extended to him. With an apprehensive shiver, she faced his calm smile, and dropped her timid, alien eyes.

  Unbelievable. It certainly didn’t help, considering he gawked as if she had an emerald halo and was about to sprout wings.

  “I don’t know your name or what you are.” He leaned with his elbows against the back of the chair. Maybe if he lost a few inches of height, she’d lower that trepidation a notch or so. “You don’t have to be afraid. We won’t hurt you. But until we understand you better, you shouldn’t touch David.”