"Honestly?" Lillian winced. "It feels like empty space."
"No kidding." I let her go and knocked on the surface. My knuckles struck solid metal, which made a dull sound. "So I guess you didn't hear that just now?"
She shook her head, looking apologetic. "Nothing, Stag."
"Weird." I folded an arm across my chest, propped an elbow on my wrist, and rubbed my chin. "Not only can't you see it, but you can't feel or hear it, either."
"Or...," said Lillian, "...it isn't there."
Still rubbing my chin, I walked along the side of the spire, looking for a way in. "I guess I'll have to do all the seeing, feeling, and hearing for both of us, then." I stared at the smooth metal surface, but it wasn't broken by a single seam or indentation. "Not that I'm doing much good yet. I don't see any openings or controls on this thing."
"Neither do I." She grinned when I shot her a smirk.
"There must be something." I continued working my way around the base, running my hands along its surface. On the far side of the spire, I stopped and called to Lillian. "By the way, can you see me now?"
"Plain as day," she shouted back to me. "You're just standing on the other side of the clearing."
"Weird." I went back to touching the surface of the spire, patting different spots in hope of triggering a sensor. "I guess I must look pretty funny to you right now."
"Like a mime," shouted Lillian. "Doing that 'I'm touching an invisible wall' bit."
"That's what I thought." I laughed and kept searching. Pretty soon, I was back where I'd started. "Well, that was nonproductive, wasn't it?"
"Because there's nothing there?" She shrugged. "I'm just saying."
Suddenly, I caught a flicker of movement from the corner of my eye. As I whirled toward it, I saw a pale tendril of mist flowing out of the jungle. Then another tendril close behind it.
"Lillian, look!" I pointed as they glided toward us. "Now you can't tell me you don't see those."
"Those?" She looked where I was pointing. "The ghost fish, you mean?"
I gaped at her. "You can see them?"
"Sure I can." She nodded. "They pop up from time to time around Heaven. No one knows what they are, exactly, but they've always been harmless." She held up an arm, and one of the tendrils swam around it. "It's supposed to be good luck if you see one."
"I'll be damned." I raised my own arm, and the other tendril looped around it. "You know they're intelligent, don't you?"
Lillian started to say something. Then, suddenly, the ghost fish circling her arm lunged into her chest, and she stopped.
"Lillian!" I ran to her. "Are you all right?"
For a long moment, she just stood there, staring into space with her mouth hanging open. Then, without warning, the ghost fish leaped out of her back and spun up into the air.
"Lillian!" I grabbed her by the shoulders. "I said, are you..."
With a dazed expression, she turned and looked upward. "Oh, there it is." She giggled and pointed at the spire. "I guess you're not so crazy after all."
"You can see it?"
"You were right, Stag." She nodded. "It sure is huge."
As we stood there, the two ghost fish came together overhead, twining in a misty spiral like a strand of DNA. They hung there, squirming and twisting, their long dark eyes staring down at us.
And then they shot away like a spring, launching straight for the base of the spire. They passed right through the silver surface without slowing down, and then they were gone.
"I guess we know how to get in now," I said. "If you're made of smoke, that is."
Suddenly, an oval doorway appeared in the base, open wide at ground level. I could see the ghost fish hovering inside, peering out at us.
Lillian nodded. "Like I said, they're supposed to be good luck."
I took a step forward, gazing through the doorway, but all I could see other than the ghost fish was darkness. For the first time since leaving the Bestiary, I felt a flicker of doubt.
"You don't have to go in, you know," I told Lillian.
"Yeah, right." She marched up beside me and elbowed me in the side. "You really think I'd come all this way without finding out what's inside that thing?"
"All right then." I headed for the doorway. "Let's go."
*****
As soon as we walked over the threshold, the wall sealed behind us, cutting off our exit.
Cutting off our light, too. Without the moonglow and starlight from outside, the interior of the spire was pitch black. I couldn't even see the ghost fish, wherever they were.
"Stag?" Lillian's voice rose out of the darkness beside me. "Is that you?"
"Yes it is." I reached over, found her hand, and folded it into my own. "So what do you think so far?"
"A little disappointing, actually," Lillian said nervously. "Kind of dark, don't you think?"
Just then, I felt something brush against me from the other side. I looked over fast but couldn't see anything. "What the hell?"
"What?" said Lillian. "What is it?"
"I don't know." As soon as I said it, something brushed me again. "Hello?" I flung out my arm, but whatever had been there was out of reach.
Suddenly, Lillian cried out, and her hand wrenched free of my grip.
"Lillian!" I swept my arms through the air, finding nothing. "Where are you?"
She cried out again...then fell silent.
For a moment, I stood there in the darkness, heart pounding like a boxer's fist in my chest. A wave of regret rolled through me; I should never have entered the spire.
"Hello?" My voice echoed back to me. "We're not here to hurt you. We only want to help." I knew I sounded desperate, but I didn't care. "We're good people, I swear."
"Bullshit." A man's voice hissed the word in my ear.
I spun, lashing out at him...coming up empty again.
"You lie." This time, I heard the voice in my other ear. "There's nothing good about you."
Instinctively, I started to lash out again, then caught myself in mid-swing. I froze.
Because it couldn't be him. I recognized that voice, made the connection the second time I heard it, but it couldn't be couldn't be him.
As I wobbled in place, reeling, a hand seized my arm and swung me around. Then another hand punched me in the face.
"Hi, Stag." Another punch landed, this time in my gut. "Aren't you glad to see me?" He howled with laughter. "Oh, wait! I guess you can't see me."
Suddenly, his face lit up before me. I realized, as impossible as it seemed, that he was exactly who I thought he was.
"A.E.? B-but you're..." My words were cut off by another punch in the face.
"Dead?" He hit me again and laughed some more. "Do I look dead?" Grabbing me by the front of my shirt, he hauled me down to his handsome, high-cheekboned face. "But that doesn't change what you did! That doesn't let you off the hook."
"How...?" I stared into his eyes, which were just as dark brown as I remembered. Everything was the same.
"Don't worry your pretty little head about it." He sneered and flung me away. "You've got bigger things to worry about right now."
I stumbled but stayed on my feet. "Wait, please..."
"You know how I kicked off? Well, it's time for a taste of your own medicine!" He roared with laughter, and the light that was shining on him went out.
Instantly, another beam flared to life in front of me, revealing twelve objects floating in midair. Twelve syringes, each at least a foot long from plunger to needle tip. They were all full of bubbling liquid and emblazoned with a skull and crossbones symbol.
And they were pointed right at me.
"Hey now!" said A.E. from the darkness. "Did somebody order an overdose?"
As soon as he said it, the syringes darted toward me...
*****
Chapter 11
As the twelve huge syringes jumped toward me, I scrambled back away from them--until strong hands grabbed my upper arms and held me fast.
It was A.E. "
Take your medicine, Stag!" His voice echoed through the spire. "Take it!"
The syringes stopped six inches away, their glistening tips pointing at my head and chest and arms. The black skull and crossbones symbols on the syringes' glass vials came to life, laughing gleefully as sickly green liquid bubbled away inside.
"I'll bet you never thought it would come to this, did you?" said A.E. "You never imagined you'd bite it like I did."
"Let me go." I struggled to break free of his iron grip. "Please just let me go, man."
"The hell I will!" A.E.'s voice swelled with rage. "You could've saved me, 'man.' You could've saved me, and you didn't."
"Let go." My eyes never left the foot-long syringes floating in midair in front of me. As I watched, they started to slowly rotate, turning over and over in the beam of light from above.
"You let me die!" shouted A.E. "Admit it! Be honest for once in your godforsaken life!"
Mesmerized, I kept watching the syringes as they rotated...then began to creep toward me. I fought harder than ever against A.E.'s grip, to no avail.
"Did you really think there'd never be any payback?" he said. "Did you think you could bluff your way through the afterlife the way you did with your life, and no one would ever call you on it?"
Hauling up my right knee, I plunged my leg back, hoping to land a kick--but my foot found only thin air. I pulled the leg forward and swung it back again at a different angle, and still hit nothing. A.E. was back there, holding on to me like a vise, but my kicks seemed to pass right through him.
"Well, I'm calling." A.E. squeezed my arms so hard, they hurt. "Your days of skating on this are over. Guess who the dead bitch is this time?"
He shook me forward, and the tips of the syringes nearly touched me. The skull and crossbones symbols laughed harder, and the sickly green liquid bubbled faster.
My heart raced as he shook me again. It didn't matter how he'd gotten there or why this was happening. All I could think about were the syringe needles pressing toward me.
And how I most definitely deserved to be punctured and poisoned by them.
"So is this how it's gonna be, Stag?" said A.E. "Aren't you ever gonna cop to what you did to me?"
As the syringes closed the gap, I flinched back--and he pushed me forward again. This time, the tips of the needles were touching my body.
"Well, if you won't admit it to me, maybe she'll have better luck with you." A.E. let loose a shrill whistle.
Another beam of light appeared, revealing Lillian standing ten feet away. The misty ghost fish were coiled around her from shoulders to ankles. "Stag?" She looked scared. "What's going on?"
"You're his so-called daughter, aren't you?" said A.E. "Why don't you ask Daddy what he did to me twenty-five years ago?"
Everyone was silent for a moment. Looking down at the syringes, I saw they were still turning, but not driving forward into my flesh.
"Ask him!" said A.E.
Lillian stood with unnatural stiffness. I assumed she was mostly paralyzed by the ghost fish--though she was still able to talk and move her head. "What did you do to him, Stag?" She winced as she said it. "What's he talking about?"
"Tell her," snapped A.E. "The truth will set you free."
I stared down at the syringes, then looked up at Lillian. I'd spent twenty-five years burying the truth, sometimes fooling even myself; the idea of exposing it seemed impossible.
"Tell her!" said A.E. "Tell her about the night you found me. The night of the overdose."
"Go ahead, Stag." Lillian's eyes were wide with fear, but she set her jaw and nodded firmly. "You can tell me."
Just then, the syringes all pushed forward at once. Their tips pierced my skin, and I cried out.
"I want to hear you say it, Stag," said A.E. "I want to hear you confess."
The needles were inside me, now. Once the plungers pushed in, the bubbling liquid would enter my body. They were holding steady for now, but how long would that last? How long until they injected me?
Faced with that, what difference did it make what I said? Why keep a secret for the rest of my life if my life was only going to last another few minutes?
"It was a long time ago," I said finally. "I was a different person."
"No excuses!" said A.E. "Let's hear it!"
I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "We were both cast in the same film." Even as I said the words, I couldn't believe I was doing it. "He got the lead role, which I'd auditioned for. I got a supporting role."
"A small supporting role, don't forget," said A.E. "Very small."
"He hated me," I told Lillian. "One day, he said he was going to get me fired. He was going to do it the next morning."
"Because you couldn't act," said A.E. "You were worthless. You were dragging me down."
The needles sank a little deeper, and I winced. I thought I saw a plunger press inward...but no. When I blinked and looked again, it was still no further forward.
But my voice was still shaking when I continued the story. "That night, after a late shoot, I left the lot. But then I turned around and went back to try to talk him out of it."
"Tell her what you found, Stag." A.E.'s grip tightened on my arms. "Tell her!"
I stared into the darkness, remembering the long-ago moment. "I found him. A.E." I nodded slowly. "He was passed out on the couch with a needle in his arm."
"And what did you do then, Stag?" said A.E. "Did you rush to my rescue?"
I glanced at Lillian, who had a sympathetic look on her face. "No." I turned away. "He started choking on his own vomit."
"What then?" said A.E. "Did you administer C.P.R.?"
I shook my head.
"Did you call 911? Did you at least run out on the lot and get help?"
I shook my head again. "I left."
A.E. shifted forward. "You left?" His lips brushed my ear. "You left me to die?"
I nodded. This time, when I glanced at Lillian, the sympathetic expression was gone from her face, replaced by a frown.
"Why did you do it?" said A.E. "To save your own ass from getting fired?"
I looked down, wishing the syringes would hurry up and finish me off. Wishing that somehow, I could avoid the next word I was going to say.
I hated him for making me say it, hated him more than I had ever hated him before. Because he was the only one other than me who knew the truth of what had happened, so he was the only one I couldn't lie to about it.
Even though, truth be told, I hated myself just as much as I hated him. I hated myself for doing what I'd done and knowing in my heart that I was as guilty as he said I was.
I hated myself for saying what I said next and knowing it was absolutely true. "Yes," I told him. "That's probably why I did it."
"Ha!" He shouted in my ear. "Now that's what I've been dying to hear!"
"It was a mistake," I said. "I regret doing it."
"Are you sure about that?" said A.E. "Things turned out pretty great for you from that point on, didn't they? You got my role in the film, and it was your breakout performance. You won an Oscar, didn't you? You got one sensational role after another after that!" He laughed loudly and gave me a hard shake. "My death was the turning point for your career, wouldn't you say?"
I looked at Lillian and shook my head. "That wasn't what I wanted."
"Bullshit," snarled A.E. "It was exactly what you wanted. And you made the most of it, didn't you?"
I didn't answer him. I couldn't deny it, so I said nothing at all.
"So what do you think of your proud papa now?" he asked Lillian. "What does Daddy's Little Girl think of Mr. Hotshot Superstar Celebrity now that you know how he got to be who he is?"
"I don't know," said Lillian. "I wasn't there when it happened." Her frown turned into a defiant glare. "Maybe you deserved it."
I couldn't believe it. I was so happy to see her take my side, I almost burst into a grin.
But then I noticed the syringe plungers were moving.
"Maybe you
're more like your Daddy than I gave you credit for," A.E. said to Lillian. "But no matter. It's time for the moment we've all been waiting for."
"Stop it!" My eyes were glued to the plungers as I spoke. They were all pushing in slowly but steadily. "Please stop!"
"After all you've done for me?" said A.E. "Your wish is my command."
As soon as he said it, all the plungers pushed all the way in at once. The skulls and crossbones laughed heartily as the bubbling green liquid emptied out of the syringes and into my body.
"Whoops, sorry!" A.E. howled with laughter. "My mistake!"
I wailed and twisted as a dozen burning blasts of white hot intensity blazed through my chest and arms. The liquid fire expanded instantly, searing its way down through the rest of my body--and racing up into my head.
As I thrashed mindlessly in the grip of the greatest pain I'd ever known, A.E. suddenly let go of me. I fell to the hard floor and writhed spasmodically, completely out of control.
"How do you like it, Staggerino?" said A.E. "I'm giving you the same treatment I got--times a million."
Screaming my lungs out, I rolled and kicked and clawed at the floor. I could hear Lillian calling my name, but it barely registered and meant nothing. All I cared about was the pain coursing through me.
Like wildfire, it rushed into every corner of my body, obliterating every thought and sensation. It plowed through me in a monstrous wave, doubling and tripling in ferocity with each passing moment.
Soon, I was dissolving in it, fading into that surging flow of agony. My awareness of myself and the world around me melted away, subsumed by the poison.
Then, suddenly, I was back. My awareness was keener than ever--and I instantly wished that it wasn't.
Because I wasn't in the dark heart of the spire anymore. Instead, I was strapped to a cross, gazing out over a fiery plain under blood-red skies. Everywhere I looked, I saw demons armed with jagged-looking implements, chasing naked men and women with innards hanging out.
As for me, I had my own personal demon--A.E. He hovered in midair before me, held aloft by leathery orange wings. "Good morning, buttercup." His skin was as red as a chili pepper. The bone-white horns on his forehead looked sharp enough to shred human flesh.
Heaven Bent Page 14
