by Arlene Webb
The mercurial redhead stared through broken sunglasses at the large neon sign. He jumped out and over the hood. He growled “thank you” then pivoted toward the entrance.
The man twisted the wheel on his convertible and floored it.
* * *
Invincible. Damon loped across the lawn. Twenty feet away from the building, he came to an abrupt halt.
Large sections of glass allowed him to see inside, and he drew a deep breath. Many scents, including large amounts of the pretty fluid—blood—that had been on Jaylynn’s face. White walls, green floor, and the ugly alien that waited to confront him wore a solid white coat. Death everywhere. White couldn’t get through to him, but this seemed impossible.
For the first time, his fear rose so high he didn’t want to proceed. He fought his head that commanded him to turn and run so fast he’d finally be freed of the body. Something felt wrong inside there. Inch-by-inch, he scanned the building and filtered through hundreds of scents…there, faint, buried under layers. The first purity he’d detected in this tainted world.
He had to learn what it was, why it was hiding. Dread pounded hard in his chest, and he fled internally while he forced his feet forward. Hugged to the center inside the body, as far away from the skin as he could get, he kept his concealed demon eyes on one of the ugly creatures within. It’d help him, or he’d choke it.
He raised his hand to smash the door and the glass moved. It took tremendous willpower to wait, but the door opened by itself. The creature at the desk finally saw him.
“Damon wants psych unit.”
“Well, sure, you can go to the admitting desk on that floor. Follow the purple letters hanging from the ceiling.” Its hand pointed down the corridor with ugly images, all wrong. He didn’t understand, but desperately needed to flee its blue/white eyes.
Invincible? His strides rose and fell one escalating step after another. He lost control and surged, panic-stricken, inside his restrictive but protective skin. He ran blind, his eyes closed to block out the terrifying walls, guided by the almost nonexistent scent.
A minute later, he slowed to change course, go higher. He opened his eyes to a frightful green hall with many white doors. An exit-door with a little window showed stairs. The metal-door cooperated and pushed open to his flat hand. Three steps per stride, he ran four levels and crashed through another swinging door.
Unable to avoid the walls and ceiling, he doubled over. Pretty droplets cried from his skin. Dissolving? Would he finally die?
The creature at another desk pounded its airflow too loud, afraid of him. He couldn’t wait for the known to come to him. It’d become even more afraid if he removed its death covering and asked for help. He straightened and swallowed the nausea-water trickling from his mouth.
One sharp kick blasted another door off its hinges. Not as fragile, it bothered his foot.
A strong desire to demolish shook him. He gave in to his need and the nearest door shattered. The creature on the bed jerked, and its eyes shone terrified. He spun backward to leap over the splinters of plastic-metal that used to be a door.
The next obstruction he also pulverized and entered through the mess without stopping until he reached the bed. The tiny creature tied with white straps, on a white bed, in the white room, contained the purity.
Invincible. He’d smash this horror.
He ripped the death straps off. Unable to swallow his sob, he grasped the white covering and flung it down. Rage yelled so hard inside him, it hurt. Hot droplets escaped from his eyes to fall onto the death-sheet that’d landed by his feet. The beautiful-red fluid shimmered and died. He wiped his hands on his lower covering, and kicked the sheet into the death wall. With one sharp tug, he shredded the last, wrong-green material from its body.
Enough leaking. He stopped his eye-water from splattering onto the ugly creature, grabbed soft skin and lifted it. The bed crumbled, its foundation destroyed from his knee banging into it. Another horrible mess. He flung the collapsed, orange thing over his shoulder. The footsteps of two creatures were almost at the door he’d destroyed. He spun out of the room toward the white coats.
“Stop! Put the girl—”
He forced his blow to soften. The face of the one yelling at him crumpled under his fist, and it went off its feet into the other. Furious at the echo of the broken jaw, he shuddered. At least the fragile head had stayed on.
He jumped over bodies, the “girl” secure against him. He threw his free shoulder into the next door. It demolished, nicely, into a large open room—with more white walls.
A grunt sobbed from him at the sight of the night sky. He ran past startled creatures and kicked. Without decreasing speed, he continued his leap through the shattering glass. He landed on his shoulder. It hurt.
He pushed the shutdown creature off his other shoulder and sprawled back. He gave in to shuddering breaths, contaminated and reeling from the horror of what he’d done. He’d entered a place filled with death. Touched it, smashed fist and feet into it, and picked up something he thought was labeled a girl. Now he lay under an awful light, on repulsive grass, next to—not it, but her.
Things had to get better. He looked at her and breathed that faint purity. Yes, she was like him, only ugly. She’d shutdown, but he could hardly blame her with the straps and cover that had been on her. Her purity lay buried under confusing scents. They’d put something bad inside her to keep her quiet.
Glass fragments fell off him. He picked her up, cradled like he’d held Jaylynn, and ran. Sounds bombarded him from all angles, and he avoided irritating creatures with ease. Finally, he focused on a pretty image named Vacancy.
In the furthest, darkest end of the shelter, he heard no airflow within. He kicked the door as gently as he could, breaking, but not splintering it from the hinges.
The bed had a brown cover, a wood table next to it that was also safe shades of brown as well as a fire food source. Things were improving. But how to make fire alive was difficult. He missed Jaylynn. He dumped the girl on the bed, closed the broken door, and tossed glasses on the counter. The chair held a safe blanket.
Blanket clutched tight, he stomped for the bed. He lifted and dropped the girl out of his way, onto the floor between bed and wall. On his back, black blanket over his face, he tuned out the noise beyond sixty feet, alert to movement and sound within that field.
Were there more death shelters? Others held captive? Just how monstrous were the creatures of this world? Unable to stop his worry, he rested his body, aware of every breath from the girl on the floor.
Chapter Seven
Rochester, New York
10:15 AM
Friday, July 8th
Yellow—why would anyone wear slacks that bright? Morrison sat at his desk, pushing papers and brooding about his new help. Yesterday, when the woman had wandered into his greenhouses looking for work, he’d hesitated. Slender blonde, late twenties, she wouldn’t give references. Her nails looked sharp, not good for manual labor. Strangely blank, her brown eyes were cold, but she’d been nervous, and it’d make his wife happy if the attractive woman wasn’t friendly. He decided to give her a try. If she worked well, he’d do the paperwork and officially hire Lisa Rowan on Monday.
This morning, someone dropped her off right on time. He’d showed her how to water the geraniums and left her to it. The strangest flash of light hit his peripheral vision as he headed back to his office, and he skipped a third cup of coffee. An hour of bookwork, and he faced the fact Rowan should have long since popped back to start loading the day’s deliveries.
The geranium house door stood ajar. He sighed and closed it behind him. If he had to chase his daughter’s cat out…what…in the name of Christ! The plastic house was not only deflated, at least half a bench of primo stock-plants had been destroyed.
No one else should be on the premises except his wife and child. Had his new employee gone on a bizarre rampage?
The end of the hose lay on the sidewalk where the damage b
egan. Water ran, turning the white concrete dark. Duct tape, which sealed the pellet gun punctures in the poly from his nephew’s horseplay, had torn loose. Pressure loss from such a small opening wouldn’t have collapsed the greenhouse. A section of steel bench had been flung into the next aisle. Pots of geraniums, red flowers broken, lay stomped or booted all the way to the end of the bench.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Only plants, only money, but he couldn’t fathom such senseless destruction. Hands shaking, he turned the water off. Deep breaths didn’t help, and for her sake he hoped he didn’t find his “help” before his rage simmered down. He’d never struck anyone before. He’d hate to start with a woman.
Where the trail of murdered plants ended, a vertical slash ran through both layers of plastic covering the greenhouse. Human nails couldn’t have carved through six millimeter poly. The gaping hole in the blue wallboard, like a super villain’s foot had kicked through it, would require bone-breaking force. She must have used a sledgehammer and a knife.
The end door to the parallel house had been flung open. No sign of anyone amidst the yellow sunflowers.
She’d been dropped off, left without a vehicle, and his van hadn’t been stolen. Perhaps she’d broken into the tool shed.
No, lock intact, nothing seemed to be missing. At least Colleen wasn’t up yet to watch her father go ballistic. It took him the better part of the morning to patch the plastic, re-inflate the house, and pick up damaged plants without a crazy blonde anywhere in sight.
* * *
I won’t tolerate impurity. She lay in the damp shelter she’d dug into the ground. Beneath the soil for some time now, she no longer cared about survival in this contaminated world. If she couldn’t find her way back, she’d destroy as many of the wrong shades as possible. Impossible to deal with the domineering blue above her, but red and green had no right to be side-by-side. She crawled out from under her dark security blanket and paused.
Down the dirt pathway, an awkward creature skipped toward her on thin legs. Much smaller, yet similar to the body-mass that trapped her, its presence marred the limited beauty of the golden flowers surrounding them.
I don’t like it. Should she attempt to communicate? Despite a pleasing upper covering, its tiny feet wore deadly stripes combined with a dull, ugly red. The high-pitched humming noise it made grated. Lightless. Impure. Why bother understanding a subspecies? She lowered into a crouch.
It moved at a pathetic slow pace. When it finally focused on her, the mouth gaped revealing dead-teeth, and more annoying language screeched from it.
Tainted, noisy, ugly—she might as well quiet it. She leapt.
It screamed and turned to run. She grabbed long brown hair and wrenched the creature down. One stomp crushed a little foot. Red drops spurted out!
She stamped on the other foot and snarled. It leaked impure, filthy red droplets also. They stank. Metallic and wrong.
The cries from the creature had become piercing. Intolerable. A blow to the vocal unit, and it’d be silent. Another would mush its head—did gushes of repulsive crimson fill all of it? The splatter might touch her. Didn’t matter. The creature needed to die, after she’d faced a new threat. Something closed in, its heavy footsteps fast and frightened.
She moved aside. The little one writhing in agony wouldn’t go anywhere—not without feet. She’d deal with it, if she survived the being that loomed large in the entrance. Its dull optical-units, filled with disbelief and horror, had that ring of death.
“Police. Ambulance. Hurry.” It barked into a small safe object. “Leigh Road, Morrison’s Greenhouses. A woman’s attacked my child.”
The harsh words directed toward her as it ran. “Lisa? What-what…Get away from her!”
She could do that. She kicked the writhing thing under the bench.
“Oh my God—I’ll kill you.” It scurried past her and dropped to crawl to the little one.
She clenched her fists and watched the large beast scoop the screaming mess into its arms. Bewilderment flared all over its ugly face. “Shh, baby. Daddy has you. Shh…” Its whispers did nothing to silence the thing while it ran out of the structure.
Should she follow? Let the larger one take her—if it was capable?
No. She’d let the unknown come to her. She dropped and reburied herself. Rage over who, what, had removed her from purity overwhelmed her, and the darkness of the soil provided little comfort.
The small creature sobbed outside the structure. A third joined the large one trying to soothe it. It wasn’t long before another irritation joined the racket. The repetitive blaring of the vehicle hurt her head.
Fortunately, the siren stopped, and then the sobs of the little one ended. Perhaps they’d finished it off for her. She didn’t want to try deciphering the language the large one barked, “Go with her. No, honey, I don’t know, and it’s too weird to tell you now. After the cops get here, I’ll be there.”
The vehicle left, carrying all airflow with it, except the noise from the large one. It approached, footsteps quiet and deadly. Vibrating with violence, its anger turned to fear when she rose out of the ground. Granules of soil scattered from her as she leapt forward.
Her fist smashed into its face, and the power of her blow lifted it from its feet. It flew backward into the metal bench and lay still. She sighed. No contest. Size didn’t matter, and its fragile skin had cracked. Red dripped from its mouth and its nose. Contaminated inside and out, just like the other.
Disgust filled her and she turned away. Soon, she’d purify this nightmare. Perhaps the strange sun in the domineering blue overhead would continue to descend until the earth devoured it. She dropped to the ground again, when yet another abrasive noise stopped outside the structure. Rage shook her. She’d had enough. Refuge from the light was no longer a priority.
She stalked past the large one. If its shallow airflow continued, she’d smash all the red out of it. Assuming she survived, that is. The lightless being in the doorway was similar in size to the one she’d knocked off its feet. Would it be as breakable?
Doesn’t matter. I am all that should be.
Covered in a corrosive blue, it pointed a safe-black object at her, yelling in that bitter language. “Police. What the—stop. I’ll shoot!”
She lunged and yanked the metal from it. Deadly, yet safe-brown centered, optical-units widened with shock. Without hesitation, it pulled out another safe-black object. Thin wires propelled—
* * *
Officer Bryan Reilly couldn’t believe it when the woman with wildcat eyes of yellow fire fell forward to collapse in his arms. She barely weighed anything, insubstantial as a child, and she should have dropped, writhing in pain, not passed out cold. Her skin—for God knows what reason—had been a creamy yellow and was now a normal Caucasian.
He lowered her to the greenhouse aisle. Colorful confetti carrying his id tag littered the walkway, the aftermath of firing the taser, adding a surreal, festive tone to the crime scene. He reholstered his taser and retrieved his Glock from the ground. She’d wrenched it from him with unbelievable speed, leaving his wrist pulsating like it’d been sprained.
He kicked aside the probes and bent closer. The extraordinary woman’s hair looked duller, a normal blonde shade, and those eyes—once inhuman with yellow beams of radiant light—were now a fixed shade of amber.
Ahh, she…she—no pulse!
This can’t be happening. Police brutality. Lawsuit. But he’d only tasered her.
The garish sunlight surrounding him became tainted with shades of black, and only his training forced him to shake off the dizzying fear. Further down the aisle lay a motionless man, thrown into a bench. Christ, CPR, he had to start CPR. Of all the days to be without backup. He’d try to get a pulse on her then check out the man.
He raised her head. She tasted…she tasted damn good. Clean, fresh, intoxicating. Had her skin really been yellow?
I’m losing it. Some sort of contagious…Who cares? He pressed another burst of air in h
er mouth. Her pure flavor surged through him, a crackling blood rush… She wasn’t responding.
Oh God. I’ve never killed a woman…or whatever the fuck she is.
Chest compression, his flat hand under a perfect breast, got him nowhere. That man—he needed to call for another ambulance.
Another taste, one more breath of life, lady, please—nothing. Bryan lowered her head to the ground. Golden hair clung like electric silk to his fingers. Her skin, now the color of any pretty blonde of Anglo-Saxon descent, felt cool.
He barked into his shoulder mic requesting another ambulance as he bolted down the greenhouse aisle. The man had a pulse, a shattered face and bashed in skull. With probable neck injuries, Bryan should wait for the medics. He left him.
He pulled out his cell phone, noting the time—1:38 PM, as he raced back.
Come on, you can’t be dead. He performed CPR until 2:05 when the second ambulance arrived, and he scooped her off the greenhouse aisle and ran.
“Been resuscitating since I tasered her, but nothing,” he informed the medics. “There’s a guy down with a head injury.” Bryan settled the woman—he wasn’t sure he could call human—on the stretcher the medic thrust at him. They grabbed another stretcher off the ambulance and hurried into the greenhouse.
One glance at the woman without a pulse and they told him to load her beside the man who was breathing. CPR was performed unsuccessfully for over a half hour. No point in getting out the defibrillator. They’d let the emergency room have her, unless he wanted to wait with her and they’d send the coroner?
