by Robert Essig
“Jesus Christ! What’s wrong with me?” asked Rich. There was no one there to respond, to tell him that everything would be all right. No comfort in the In Between. In fact, there was nothing at all. Rich felt like sobbing in a pool of his own distress, but he wasn’t capable of such lament. He felt something within his shattered form that he had never felt before. It seemed to radiate from his chest where his heart should be— a strange and sunken in chest speckled with what looked like calcium deposits and gangrenous scabs. It was something stronger than anything Rich had known on Earth, stronger than the deepest love he had felt or the most ravenous lust, stronger than his most venomous hate and his most illustrious success. It was power. Pure, unadulterated power, and it radiated from him like some kind of aura.
“Rich,” came a voice from behind. It was Dagana.
Rich turned around to face the one who had brought him here. She was in her sentinel form. Rich could feel the sheer power flowing forth from her. She was dominant; that was very clear.
“Do you feel it?”
Rich nodded.
“Good. You are now beyond human. You are of the In Between. There are a few things I need to tell you and things you need to learn real quick. Where we stand now is one of a limited amount of safe areas in the In between. The tribe I used to belong to cannot and will not enter these lands. They are forbidden zones and it is believed that anything that walks in these zones will die. But that isn’t true. What you’ll need to learn is how to peer between the voids. If you can see from the In Between to Earth, you will always know where you are, which will give you the advantage in avoiding my tribe. If they find you, they won’t kill you. They’ll make you suffer. For eternity.”
16
There are people who have said they can tell when they’re being watched, as if there is some sixth sense that could detect such a thing. Austin was reluctant to subscribe to that kind of notion. He figured the other five senses were acute enough in these people to detect other clues as to someone watching them, be it the smallest sound, or even a fragment of an odor, something so minute that the very detection was picked up at an almost unnatural microscopic use of sensation.
Austin couldn’t sense anything, yet he was certain Garaam Baz was watching, and that made him nervous. The very idea that some supernatural being was constantly hovering and watching was enough to make any man ready for the room with the white padded walls.
Austin was going to try and get some sleep, but his mind was a flurry of thoughts and images all swirling about like litter in a wind tunnel. He could hardly grasp any one thought before it was swept away and replaced with a new one. What did seem to have stuck in his mind were both the murder in San Diego and the thing that came into his hotel room that called itself Garaam Baz. Those were the two most intense and bizarre incidents Austin had ever experienced in his life. He’d seen a lot over the years of wandering the Earth, but this week was a whole new ball of yarn.
It was just after midnight. Sleep was something that may have to be the result of taking a pill. Probably a Benadryl. But for now Austin decided to put down yet another shot of vodka, hold the beer chaser, and get dressed to go out for a few hours. It had been very late when he saw this Dagana woman kill the man in the alley, which meant that she was a nighttime person. If he was going to find her for Baz, he’d better start now.
Nighttime in Hollywood, California: people dressed in flashy clothes waiting in horrendous lines to enter prestigious clubs while fancy cars rolled right up front and wealthy jet setters and movie stars walked right in; bums wet with fresh urine and stinking of something gutters couldn’t achieve harassing anyone daring enough to look them in the eyes; tourists laughing and shocked as they witnessed what nightfall brings; punk kids with ripped clothes, chains, colored hair and red rimmed eyes looking for the next fix; hookers who’d given up on assured success walking streets that weren’t paved with gold as they had thought when they were young and stupid enough to leave their homes with stars in their eyes—This was Hollywood after dark. This was what Austin walked into when he stepped out of the Wheeler hotel, and it was about as sordid and maniacal as the very thoughts that powered through his mind—a fitting backdrop.
There were bars and clubs that weren’t as fancy and sought after as the ones that surrounded the Wheeler hotel. They were down on Sunset and on the streets just off the strip. The kind of places thriving with locals who lived in the slums outside of the Hollywood most of the world saw on their televisions.
Austin found himself in one such bar with a vodka tonic in hand and the feeling of strange eyes on his back. Not the eyes of someone else in the bar, but of Baz. Austin was sure he was there somewhere, critical and wondering just what the hell he was doing having a drink when he should be seeking out Dagana.
He had to come up with a plan of attack. He’d bought himself some time, but Baz would be at him for information on Dagana and he wasn’t so sure he would be able to come through. How the hell was he supposed to find her?
Feeling mildly buzzed, Austin tried to relax and took a look around to see if he knew anybody. Every bar had its regulars and he may just recognize a face or two from back when he spent some time in this bar several years ago. In many ways, the places reeked of bad memories and despair. This was the very place he had met Megan, the bitch who stole his heart nine years ago and strung him along with a series of lies. Right now, he could care less if her lying ass was in there somewhere. He wouldn’t give her the time of day—or night for that matter.
At the end of the bar were two familiar faces. Jack McCoy and Fred something or another. They were chatting away like they did just about every day for the past fifteen years. They were red in the face, not so much from living in Southern California, but from their indulgence in alcohol and from their struggling livers. You could bet your last dollar that they’d be sitting at the end of the bar every night shootin’ the shit. Austin had to chuckle at this, and he decided that he would refrain from saying hello. There was a good chance that they wouldn’t remember him anyhow. Barflies of their high order met far too many people to remember them all.
Austin turned toward the bar jingling the ice in his empty glass. He wanted another, and bad. His mind was firing off in all directions with thoughts of the past, present, and future. And he wasn’t sure about any of it, particularly his future. Right now, a she-thing named Dagana was very much his future, and he was already procrastinating, which was something that he rarely did.
One thing he would do for sure was look at the morning papers in Los Angeles and the surrounding counties. A mysterious murder or sighting could be a potential clue. There was something he could do tonight, and as clear as it should have been, Austin didn’t realize what it was until there was a tap on his shoulder.
When he turned to address whoever had tapped him on the shoulder he, a man who was very difficult to shock, found himself indeed shocked.
It was Audrey.
The last person Austin thought he would see in this bar was Audrey. He would have expected to see Megan before Audrey.
She was pissed, standing there cross-armed waiting for an explanation—hell, a goddamn apology.
In seeing her again, Austin was filled with something that scared him. Feelings. Not that he’d spent enough time with her to develop strong feeling for her, not that. Something else. There was something about Audrey that brought out what Megan had destroyed. Something he thought was lost and gone forever. In the few hours they spent together, he began falling for her and he truly desired to know her, to learn more about her and see where they could go. But she came into his life at a very strange time.
“Well?” said Audrey. “What do you have to say for yourself?”
Austin made an executive decision to go ahead and spill the beans. What would it hurt? He was in a potentially dangerous situation with this Baz freak that he couldn’t talk himself out of, and there was no way he could turn a blind eye to the guy and pursue this woman who had so stric
ken him. His only option was to tell her the whole truth, if she was willing to hear it, and see what came of it. Probably she would think he was crazy. So be it. It was better than blowing her off again.
“Well . . . ?”
Austin was in a daze. He had to speak now.
“Do want to have a drink?” She wrinkled her brow with a look that said “are you fucking kidding me?”
“I have a story to tell if you’re interested in listening. I’ll start by telling you that I really didn’t want to get involved. You know. When I dropped you off this afternoon. I haven’t wanted to become involved with a woman since . . . Well, that’s another story altogether. Maybe for another time.” Austin paused long enough to assure himself that he had her undivided attention. “How about that drink. We could get a booth.”
Slowly, reluctantly, Audrey nodded. It was clear that she could see there was indeed a story to tell, and it was also clear that she wanted to hear.
17
“Acronos,” said the thing that once was human and had been referred, in his time of living, as Rich. “I like the sound of it. What does it mean?”
“Whatever you want it to,” said Dagana. “There isn’t much meaning here in the In Between. The existence of this land is solely for demons to incubate and grow before entering Hell. There isn’t any meaning other than that here. The In Between is one giant crossroad the damned pass through. Some linger and others are kept here, but aside from the demon incubation, this is a wasteland.”
Dagana and Acronos had spent far longer in the In Between than she wanted them to. He had much to learn, but she would be double damned if she was going to allow him to get her captured by Baz and the rest of her clan. He was going to have to learn and learn fast.
“Now,” said Dagana. “You need to focus. Here we stand in one of the necropolises; on Earth we stand in the cabin where Rich lies dead with the corpses of his favorite band. If you look hard enough you can see into Earth’s realm. If you can see it, you can transfer yourself there.”
Acronos strained his brass colored eyes, his malformed brow twisting and contorting in a manner that was almost obscene. Even Dagana thought he had turned into one ugly fucker. The sentinels were all abstractions of demons and angels, but this one was a human abstraction, and a real gruesome one at that. At least he would have the intimidation factor going for him.
“I . . . I can’t see anything,” said Acronos.
“Try harder.”
Acronos grumbled. He was becoming frustrated and didn’t mind showing it. Dagana was frustrated as well, and if he didn’t get the picture soon enough she was going to have to teach him the hard way, and she didn’t want to do that. He was her first creation, her first manipulation, and she wanted him by her side on Earth. Together they could make more monstrosities like themselves and Dagana could be the ruler of her own tribe and wage a battle against Baz and her former tribe. She would like that. Life on earth in exile wasn’t her idea of fun. Ruling over the In Between, on the other hand—that was something else altogether.
Was it his distorted appearance, or was he growing ever frustrated? Dagana couldn’t tell, but there was something in the air that she didn’t like. There were things in the In Between that didn’t know the rules of the Necropolises, the ghosts and spirits who seeped through the cracks and became forms of mindless evil that would attack just about anything. It wasn’t that Dagana couldn’t protect herself from them, but that they were stealthy. One of those crazy bastards could come right up and rip your head off before you had a chance to beat the thing into a pulp.
Dagana’s eyes darted this way and that. She had had about enough of this shit. She had to get back to Earth before the hungry, evil spirits—what sentinels call thits—came out. They also had a tendency to hunt in packs; and that was something to be frightened of.
“Sometimes there’s only one way to learn something,” said Dagana. “You have immense power, Rich—er, Acronos—but you have to learn to tap into it. It is the difference between being free and suffering for an eternity. Believe me, you don’t want to suffer here. Those who are left to suffer are suspended at the crossroads for traveling sentinels and mutations to rape and abuse as they pass through. Discovering your way through the realms will save you from such a fate, but I cannot sit here and watch you fail. It’s far too dangerous.”
Acronos’ gruesome face slackened. “But—”
“No buts. You’re on your own. I’ll be waiting on the other side, and watching. Just realize,” said Dagana as her form began to fade, “that you are safe on Earth no matter what comes after you.”
And she was gone, Acronos left in her wake.
Though he felt power surge through his body like electricity in his veins, Acronos was left confused by Dagana’s disappearance. Surely nothing in the In Between could be that bad, right? They were powerful, courageous, invincible!
Or were they?
Acronos turned and stepped across the field of skulls gingerly as if he was worried about crushing them, and he decided to hell with tip toeing about like a pansy and deliberately crushed them beneath his monstrous feet. They caved in like old clay pots erupting into tiny shard riddled dust clouds as he roamed the necropolis. The trees around him were all dead, and the few structures looked like stone mausoleums, but even through his superiority, Acronos didn’t dare go into one. And it was at that moment when he realized that fear did indeed dwell deep within him, fear of what could be inside the mausoleum. Acronos shuddered. Suddenly he felt cold, alone.
He felt eyes on him as if someone was watching his every move. He didn’t like that feeling. He remembered it distinctly from his human life. People watched one another on Earth. There was always someone watching, and if that someone wasn’t human, the watcher was in the form of strategically positioned cameras à la George Orwell’s 1984.
This world was something even Orwell couldn’t fathom.
As Acronos wandered about it occurred to him that one of the distinct qualities of this land that he found so alarming was its silence. There was no wind. No rustling of leaves. No birds. No animals at all, for that matter. All was dead. Everything. Dead.
As he turned to see just how far he’d come, something shifted just out of his vision. It reminded him of when he was a kid (back in the days of Rich) and would turn and catch a glimpse of something from the corner of his eye. He was never sure of what he had glimpsed, but there were times when he swore he saw his aunt Sheryl or his dog, both of whom had passed. He had told himself back then that they were watching over him.
He hadn’t seen those figures since he was a kid.
Now no one watched over him.
Behind him was a trail of broken skulls leading back to where he’d began his becoming. That was where the cabin stood on Earth. Acronos realized that he had become so entranced by the In Between that he had forgotten to test his abilities and attempt to see through the realms. If the danger was enough to cause Dagana to flee to Earth, then he’d better learn the ropes and start traveling through the realms.
Another glimpse of something darted by, silent and taunting..
Staring back the way he came from, Acronos focused on the cabin that should be standing there on Earth, but he saw nothing more than a field of skulls dotted with dead trees and crude stone structures.
About a year ago, he was in a serious relationship with Sandra Rivers, who turned out to be a real bitch. One day she started on this health kick consisting of tofu, yoga, wheat grass, and meditation. She’d told him that meditation would help calm him down. Fuck that shit! Rich had been a mean bastard back then, verbally abusive, drinking copious amounts of beer and developing one hell of gut. His idea of meditation had been sitting on the couch with a brewski watching the fight. Rich was dead and gone and now Acronos was wondering if that filthy bitch who wasted a year of his life was onto something with her meditation nonsense. Perhaps that was what he needed to do to see through the realms.
He tried to focus—medi
tate—on the cabin but the forms began swooping and swarming him like large bothersome mosquitoes. They were getting so close that Acronos was certain they were the thits Dagana had warned him about.
Something began to take shape several yards away. Acronos thought he was beginning to see Earth, but it turned out to be Dagana. She poked her head through the ethereal curtain between Earth and the In Between.
“Acronos! You have to try harder. There are thits all around you! You have to get back to Earth before they gang together. You won’t die, but they will weaken you and cause terrible suffering.”
“How do I . . . ?” But her face was gone and the thits were becoming more furious. They were so strange, like decayed human torsos draped in threadbare honeycomb tripe. Nasty things with the ability to distract Acronos like a pesky cloud of gnats.
Meditation was bullshit on Earth, and it was bullshit here. Acronos ignored the thits and let his coral-like body go limp. He didn’t try so hard to envision the cabin where it stood, but attempted to see through what was currently his reality, as if allowing his mind to wander would somehow allow him to see through the realms. However little sense it made (according to Dagana’s method of realm travel), it worked, and the brown wooden exterior of the cabin began to take shape, however faintly, though the realms. In his excitement, he almost lost the vision, however he held fast as it coalesced.
Dagana was there, standing outside the cabin. She had been watching Acronos struggle to learn his new ways. She was so skilled in her ability to see through the realms that he felt a pang of fear when her eyes darted to his left. He turned his head to see what caught her attention, and was thrust back to the In Between where he saw the huge stone door of the mausoleum begin to open. His sense of Earth had been obliterated. From the darkness within the stone tomb emerged a fifteen-foot tall monstrosity.
