The Hollow Gods

by A. J. Vrana

  “Of course not.” She rolled her eyes, taking him by the elbow and dragging him away. “Now let’s get out of here.”

  Mason didn’t fight her as she yanked him along. He was still in a daze, confused but enthralled. He thought he’d be staring death in the eye again, but the universe was proving capable of mercy, after all.

  When they turned the corner, the fast-paced squeaks of rubber soles against the beige tiles drew their attention as someone called out to Jazlyn. It was one of the other nurses, rushing towards them with a frantic expression.

  “Jazlyn!” she cried out again when they noticed her. Her dark hair was tied back in a low ponytail, the light blue scrubs hugging her rounded hips.

  “What is it?” Jazlyn asked as they walked further down the hall, a good distance from the room with the miracle patient.

  “It’s his blood tests—John Doe’s, I mean. Something isn’t right.” Her cheeks were flushed, her hands gripping the folder until it bent.

  “What do you mean?” Mason asked in concern, momentarily forgetting himself, only to be reminded by Jazlyn’s elbow in his side.

  “Jazlyn! Amy!” It was another nurse, calling to them as she flew around the corridor from where they’d just been. “We’ve got a code yellow!”

  Jazlyn’s jaw dropped, and Mason’s face turned borderline purple as he held his breath, sweat breaking out over his hairline.

  “Seriously!” Jazlyn all but shrieked. “What is up with today? How—”

  “I just went to check on the patient!” she explained, her voice wobbling as she tapped the folder Amy had in her hands. Visibly trying to calm down, she recited her every action in a slow, measured tone. “I went into his room…thought I’d got it wrong…checked my records…double-checked the room number…but I was definitely in John Doe’s room!”

  Mason swallowed the lump in his throat as he considered if his day could possibly get any stranger. He had just been there. He had just been in John Doe’s room. The man was in a coma.

  Horror, wonder, and an undeniable sense of excitement crept up his spine. This had to be some kind of joke. Or a dream. But it most definitely couldn’t be real. Although he’d told himself not to speak—not to get involved—he couldn’t stop the words from forming on his lips, his voice sounding meek and foreign as he said aloud what everyone already knew,

  “He’s gone.”

  11

  Miya

  The Crossing

  When Miya opened her eyes, she was looking towards the sky. It was sunset—the last specs of orange and red bleeding into the horizon, leaving a luminous, ephemeral streak under the darkening blanket of night. This wasn’t the sky of the waking world.

  She stood at the foot of a mountain covered in forest. It was peaceful and intimate, her senses gifting her a sharp awareness of her surroundings. She felt more in control here than in the outside world.

  A cobblestone path up ahead led into the hilly woods, so she began to follow it. Only after travelling a fair distance did Miya realize there was something familiar about this place, something resembling a memory. She continued walking uphill, the oak trees framing the tiny road twisting as she passed them. The massive boughs curved overhead as though she had disturbed their endless slumber, watching her move through their land. Their leaves turned red, then brown, withering and succumbing to the pull of gravity. Seasons changed before Miya’s eyes, the cycles moving at a pace befitting the perception of an immortal spirit—one who had witnessed them a thousand times over. By the time she reached the end of the path, the trees were all dead.

  Where the passage ended, there was a colossal redwood towering so high it reached through the clouds and disappeared somewhere beyond. Miya could hear it breathing, pushing and pulling life in and out of the soil. A small figure stood near the base of the massive trunk, his back turned as he appeared to speak with someone. Miya could tell that he was old—very, very old. She wanted to reach out to him, unexpected longing coiling around her heart. She was about to call out, but he burst into a thousand ravens, rushing skyward with an eruption that shook the earth. The world disappeared beneath her, and she fell into the darkness.

  Miya was back at the forest’s edge, a small village behind her. Her peripheral vision was blocked by something dark and soft; she was wearing a cloak with the hood drawn over her head. Without rhyme or reason, she walked into the woods, this time finding no path to guide her. Ducking under branches and stepping over tree roots, she had no idea where she was going or why. Something was pulling her, but the call was too faint for her to grasp. She was lost, the sun still sinking towards the horizon.

  She continued to wander, weaving through the trees until she found herself in a glade encasing an eerie, old willow tree. Like the redwood from before, it seemed alive, its roots pulsating just beneath the earth. The old guardian’s branches were like a long, fluid curtain, separating her from whatever resided behind them. As the breeze parted the willow’s arms, Miya caught a glimpse of a shadow—a mass of dark fur lying under the protection of the swaying wisps. She felt the pull once more, the wind at her back pushing her forward until she passed into the darkened space.

  There, under the willow, Miya found a black wolf. He was unmoving, his eyes closed despite her presence. It dawned on her that he was dying, his thick coat matted and sticky with blood. She crouched down to examine him, though the stoop left her feeling vulnerable, apprehensive. And yet it wasn’t the wolf that frightened her.

  Something hovered behind Miya with intent she couldn’t place. She perceived curiosity, amusement, and perhaps something more insidious. She didn’t dare turn around for fear of what she might see, but the presence was distinctly female. It drew closer and closer until Miya felt breath on her ear—dark, feather-like shadows caressing the ground around her. Miya’s eyes fell on the wolf; she was paralyzed in anticipation of the apparition’s voice—her message to the intruder.

  “Don’t lose your way,” she hissed an ominous spell, “or there’ll be hell to pay.”

  Then, a horn blared in the distance, the sound bellowing as the last specs of sunlight burrowed deep into the earth. Miya’s time here was up.

  Gasping for air, Miya’s eyes shot open, wet strands of hair clinging to her face and neck as she tried to remember where she was. The windowless grey walls and the sight of her beloved red panda on the wobbly dresser dizzied her with relief as she finally recognized her own bedroom. Taking a deep breath, Miya flopped back against the pillow and exhaled, pulling her hair from her hot, irritated skin. She’d always had pretty wild dreams, but nothing like that before—and never about the fable of Black Hollow. She thought about her earlier resolution to hunt the Dreamwalker, and the shadowy woman who’d visited her bedroom with a message. The tables had turned. The Dreamwalker had come to her.

  No, she was coming for her.

  Miya’s pulse thundered in her ears, the afterimages of the place she’d returned from fresh like a wet painting. Squeezing her eyes shut, she tried to preserve the impressions, willing herself to record every minute detail. But the dream slipped away like vapour. The paint bled off the canvas, leaving her with nothing but the residue of disquiet.

  Yet the dream wasn’t the only thing that disappeared. The fable too was gone, as though it had been wiped from her psyche. But how could that be? She’d heard the legends a thousand times. Miya strained to remember the lore she’d been taught by the school librarian, the warnings her father lectured her with in high school. But it had all vanished. She only knew there was a Dreamwalker that spirited young women away. The details, however, were a fast-fading ripple in an ocean of memories.

  She checked the time on her cell phone and realized it was evening; she’d been out for over twelve hours, and yet still felt exhausted. Usually, after a long bout of insomnia, she’d collapse into a day-long coma that left her drowsy and lethargic. But this was different—like she’d gone somewhere during the night. Miya’s head rattled like a battered punching bag. Disgru
ntled, she sat up and threw the covers off, rubbing her eyes until she regained the coordination to stand.

  Something was...wrong. Her skin crawled and her eyes watered. The hairs on her neck stood on end. She kept glancing over her shoulder as though someone was following her, hugging the shadows in every corner. The compulsion to check burned the peripheries of her awareness until there was nothing but an urge to flee. Every cell in her body screamed.

  Wild, Miya grabbed her keys and ran out of the apartment. Out the door and into the darkness, she didn’t dare look back, sprinting until sound fell into a vacuum and silence enveloped her.

  She didn’t stop until she could barely see buildings flickering past her—until traffic lights grew sparse, sidewalks disappeared, and the road narrowed into a single lane of cracked pavement. She moved fast towards the black mass in the horizon—the forest. But before she reached the fields, Miya’s chest caved in, and she collapsed into a squat, heaving in an effort to catch her breath. She had nothing with her—no wallet, no jacket, no cell phone. Groping around her back pocket, she fished out a five-dollar bill.

  She wanted to go to the playground, but in her frenzy she’d taken a wrong turn and veered off the usual path. It didn’t help that she hadn’t eaten all day, but grocery stores and fast food were well out of the way. She ventured towards a lone gas station at the edge of the road and bought some beef jerky and a can of pop with the measly bill. After tax, Miya was short a few cents, but the clerk let it slide. Grateful for the pass, she thanked him with a barely audible mumble and scuttled back outside, afraid he might change his mind.

  She reached the crooked maple some fifteen minutes later. As she approached the meadow, the air grew thick and misty. It was quite something—how different the fields looked at night. Without the stalls and vendors embellishing every inch of open space during the market hours, Miya felt like she was passing through a different world. Everything felt more expansive, disorienting, and precarious. By day, it was a space of congregation and community for the people of Black Hollow. By night, it had a life of its own without the presence of humans—one that didn’t want to belong to them. It made Miya wonder if she would be accepted.

  She found her swing set despite the blinding vapour. As she settled in, the mist began to lift, allowing a few meters of visibility. Miya pulled out her snacks and popped open the can, raising it in a toast to her sanctuary.

  “Cheers,” she whispered and took an obligatory sip. Now out of the basement, she felt lighter. It was odd, but in silence, Miya was least alone. She could finally look at what she wanted to see and not worry about what others were seeing in her. Elated, she reached for the jerky and tore open the bag, the crinkling plastic alerting her to how eerily quiet her surroundings were. With the settled storm came the awareness of how chilling it was to be alone in a blanket of fog. But Miya was mesmerized, her blood rushing with new life; she was the only one here, and it made her feel powerful—the air full of lingering potential.

  Her emboldened state, however, was short-lived. She heard a rustle in the nearby bushes and froze, jolted out of her daydream.

  I must be hearing things, she thought until the snapping of twigs followed the momentary silence. Whatever was back there must’ve had some weight to it, but Miya didn’t know of any missing girls since Elle Robinson. Her heartbeat picked up as she scanned the area.

  Don’t worry, she reassured herself. Whatever it is, it’s probably more scared of you than you are of it.

  With the moon barely penetrating the haze, it was almost impossible to see, but the crackling directed her attention until a shape began to emerge from the shadows.

  A large, black wolf limped towards Miya from the cover of the forest, his dark form parting the white mist like a slow-moving bullet aimed straight at her chest. The soles of her shoes melded into the sand; she was paralyzed as her fondest memory stepped closer. Miya never thought a memory could waltz out of the past and into the present—transcend the déjà vu and become something more. But perhaps that was the point of repetition. Perhaps it was a fight to rupture the bounds of time.

  Miya considered whether her marbles had rolled away as she leapt over the canyon of logic and expected to land safely on the other side. But she did. She couldn’t fathom why else this wolf would be there in the exact same spot, why he would be as unafraid as she was unless they already knew one another.

  He reached the edge of the playground and stopped, his lustrous, jet-black fur gleaming in the moonlight. Even in the dimness of night, Miya could make out the mahogany-red in his eyes—the faintest of glints that left her haunted. The sound of his breath thundered through the open air, echoing in her ears like a heartbeat. Wonder flooded her from the ground up, her entire framework of reality giving way to something utterly foreign. She was looking at a wolf, but every fiber of her soul was asking one insane question:

  Who are you?

  A cold chill ran through her, an undeniable air of danger emanating from him and rushing down her spine.

  How do we know each other? The question relentlessly pounded through her head.

  Miya wanted to reel back and run. This was ludicrous—a wolf without fear of humans was dangerous. She knew this from years of living in a town surrounded by them. Wolves were shy animals. Without a natural avoidance of humans, a wolf might well attack.

  Or maybe he’s here to kidnap you, a tiny voice whispered in the back of her mind. Maybe it’s your turn to go missing.

  But the sight of him limping severed Miya from her questions. His head hung low as he hobbled to the left, then looked up and met her gaze. She grew distant from common sense; he was hurt, and she couldn’t just ignore that. What if he died? To leave him in this state seemed cruel, though she realized she had no means of helping him. Miya looked anxiously into his eyes. She was powerless, and if she approached, she could get mauled.

  “I—I have nothing on me to help you with,” she told him, distressed by the situation and her apparent expectation that the wolf would comprehend her. But she figured if he hadn’t lunged at her yet, talking to him wouldn’t hurt. “I don’t know what to do.”

  He appeared unfazed and, as if understanding her, eased himself carefully onto the ground. The desire to go to him welled up in her chest—a deranged notion, she was sure, but the urge was too compelling to ignore. Her fear melted away as she grappled with different possibilities in a frantic search for the best course of action.

  “I’ve got beef jerky?” she proffered, realizing how harebrained it sounded as she lifted the bag she’d been snacking out of. Animals rarely refused free food, and she hoped this one wouldn’t attack the idiotic biped offering it. “You can have it if you’d like.”

  The wolf continued to watch Miya, perhaps wondering what the strange noises coming out of her mouth were. But seeing that he wasn’t growling or trying to back away, she gathered enough courage to approach with fidgety half-steps until she was close enough to crouch down and reach out.

  His ears twitched as she rustled through the bag and withdrew a strip of jerky, hesitantly extending it to him. He leaned forward for a cautionary sniff before snatching it with his teeth, pulling his head back and out of reach as he promptly devoured the treat. Encouraged, she fished out more and offered it piece by piece until the bag was empty. With each turn, he grew bolder in accepting the food, allowing himself to linger for a moment of contact. Miya relished the feeling of his wet nose and tongue against her palm, relaxing her fingers against his soft muzzle.

  “I’m sorry, that’s all I got,” she said with a sheepish smile as he looked up at her expectantly. “You probably need ten times more than that.” The wolf canted his head as he held her gaze, inspiring her to persist in her mad rambling. “I would have gotten you a whole chicken if there was a grocery store nearby.”

  With the words out of her mouth, Miya started to worry that maybe she was losing her grip on reality. A strange sensation rose in her chest and curled around her heart as she watche
d him intently—a crushing vulnerability, conjured by the surreal appearance of this wolf. A lump lodged itself in her throat like a piece of hot coal, and she bit her bottom lip to keep from crying.

  As she fought the tears, her companion inched forward, leaning his head down and licking her hand. Miya figured it was salty from all the meat, so she lifted her palm to his nose and laughed between shaky breaths. “I guess all you really care about is food, huh?”

  He regarded her momentarily, then drew back like he’d realized he’d gotten too close, too friendly. Even if he didn’t understand words, Miya considered that maybe he still understood—a kind of empathy. His tail swooped down as he lowered his nose to the ground, then turned and silently disappeared into the forest from where he came.

  Miya sat on the edge of the playground and stared into the darkness beyond the trees. Only when her heart began to pound did she realize she’d been holding her breath, waiting in vain. She considered following him into the labyrinth, the darkness luring her in. She could hear the invitation in the wind, daring her to venture through the gate, tempting her to cross the threshold and lose herself on the other side.

  Maybe the insomnia had finally gotten to her. Maybe she’d accepted that a life of drudgery punctuated by moments of wonder was all one could hope for. Whatever the case, it took a good deal of restraint not to fall for the dare. Wandering the woods wouldn’t pay the rent, and last she checked, she preferred a mattress to the forest floor. Forcing herself back to earth, Miya pulled her wary body off the ground. Eventually, everyone had to go home.

  12

  Kai

  During his short life, Kai had grown accustomed to hunger; he’d learned as a child that food was a luxury as much as it was a necessity. He remembered seeing a kid ask their dad for a cheeseburger and poutine off a food truck on the street. But when Kai asked Alice, she told him he could have a peanut butter sandwich when they got home. She didn’t have the money for fries and gravy, let alone half a pound of beef. That was fifteen years ago. His time with Alice had been short, but it had left its mark; without her, he wouldn’t have survived among humans.