by Beth Goobie
“Could you ... ,” Nellie hesitated, her heart pounding so hard she could barely breathe. “Well, d’you think you could go up the ladder if I carried you inside me?”
Deller’s mouth dropped and he stared at her.
“I just thought,” Nellie said quickly, her face growing flushed. “Well, the Gods taught me how to take one of Them inside me — as vibrations, y’know? So I thought maybe I could do it with you too. I could take you inside me as vibrations and carry you up the ladder, and when we got into the cathedral you could come back out and walk around there like you do down here.”
For another long moment Deller simply stared, then muttered, “I’ve never heard of anything like that.”
Nellie shrugged nervously. “Me neither.”
“Well ... ,” Deller paused. “You sure about this? Like I’m dead, and you’re —”
“C’mon,” said Nellie, fighting off a wave of fidgets. “Let’s just do it.”
A look of incredulity crossed Deller’s face. “You’ve got guts,” he said slowly. “I’ll say that much for you, Nellie-The-Other-One.”
They stood looking at each other, and then Deller stepped awkwardly toward her. At the last second a surge of fear swept Nellie, closing her eyes, and she missed seeing the actual moment the spirit passed into her body. But she felt it — a coldness like a low sigh sifting into her flesh. A trembling ran through her and a deep heaviness, as if the weight of her body had suddenly grown too great to bear. Then, without warning, she felt something smash into her throat and tear it open, followed by the brief sensation of fluid pouring out. Instinctively she pressed her hands to the hole, trying to catch what was leaving and push it back in, but it was gone, all of it — every color she’d seen, every taste and scent, the sound of every bird chirp and laugh, the touch of someone’s hand.
She was dead. Not released — dead, completely dead. Standing in the tunnel beneath the Goddess’s Redemption Cathedral, Nellie stared dully about herself and wondered where she was and what she was doing there. She couldn’t remember, couldn’t remember ... ever ... doing ... being anyone ...
“Nellie?” The word came from above, a single girl’s voice traveling down through the gloom toward her. Slowly Nellie turned toward it.
“Nellie, are you there?” the voice called again.
A grunt came out of Nellie’s mouth, barely audible.
“NELLIE!” Feet began to descend the ladder and then someone was beside her, groping for her in the dark. “Here you are,” said the girl. “What’s the matter with you? Why did you come back down here? Did you see Deller? Deller,” the girl called softly, then gave a long sigh. “I guess Fen’s right,” she muttered. “He’s gone.”
“Did you find her?” called another voice from above, a boy’s voice.
“Yeah,” said the girl. “But she won’t say anything. She’s a zombie.”
“Get her to climb up,” said the boy.
“I’ll try,” said the girl. Taking Nellie’s hands, she placed them on the ladder, then lifted her right foot onto the bottom rung. “Climb,” she ordered, and when Nellie didn’t respond, placed her shoulder under Nellie’s butt and heaved upward. A tiny spark shot through Nellie and she lifted her foot to the next rung. “That’s right,” panted the girl, again shoving Nellie’s butt with her shoulder, and slowly Nellie’s foot lifted and settled on the next rung. “Great,” grunted the girl, and Nellie’s foot lifted once more. Slowly they progressed up the ladder, the girl shoving Nellie’s butt repeatedly with her shoulder as Nellie lifted the immense weight of one foot, then the other, climbing toward the faint square of light above her. Finally her head passed through the trapdoor and hands reached toward her, pulling her upward.
“Your hands are freezing!” hissed a boy with slanted green eyes. “So is your arm.” Warm hands touched her cheek. “Even your face is cold.”
“What’s the matter with her?” asked a small girl standing nearby. Coming closer, she took one of Nellie’s ice-cold hands and peered up at her. “Don’t go away,” she said, her eyes steady and unblinking. “You can’t go away. I like you. You have to stay here with us.”
A shudder ran through Nellie, and a slight flickering of warmth, and then the inner heaviness began to shift. Abruptly she was filled with an intense desire to belch and fart, as if she needed to eject something from her body. Grunting low in her throat, she gave herself a long rumbling shake. An inner presence seemed to be coming awake and uncurling itself. She grunted again, hurrying it along, and then with a quiet popping sensation the presence stepped free of her, out into the space in front of her body.
“Deller,” gasped a voice. A long trembling lifted through Nellie, and she remembered who and where she was.
“Is he here?” she asked, blinking rapidly. “Did I get him out of the tunnel?”
“Yeah, you did. You got me up here,” said an oddly muffled voice, and Nellie’s eyes focused on the pale transparent figure that stood beside her, grinning exuberantly. Her knees went weak and she staggered slightly.
“Oh, good,” she whispered. “That’s good, that’s just so good.” Tears swarmed her eyes and she brushed at them impatiently, then realized she was still holding the stun gun. Skipping her gaze past her twin, who was standing with her eyes riveted to Deller’s face, she turned to the girl in the gold dress. “So what’s next?” she asked hoarsely.
Nell’s double gave her a fierce grin and pointed to the right. “There’s a door here. It’s the only way out, except down, of course. And there’s the other skins, but they’re fixed, so we should just stay in this one.”
“Okay,” said Nellie. “It’s this door.” Leaning against it, she pressed her ear to the door’s surface. Beyond it the chanting had stopped, and the congregation was singing a familiar hymn. Their voices sounded very close. Sending her mind through the door, Nellie scanned the immediate area. It was difficult to focus — exhaustion was buzzing her brain and her stomach felt like an empty pit, but she was able to get a general sense of hundreds of people seated in pews.
Then her mind honed in on the backs of several young boys standing nearby. Altar boys, she thought. Carefully she scanned again. From what she could hear, it sounded as if the priest had begun his sermon, which meant the altar boys would be at the rear of the church, waiting for the last part of the service when they would be called to the altar. That should make it easy to slip out of the back of the sanctuary while everyone was focused on the priest at the front.
Eagerly Nellie turned to the others. “We’re at the back of the sanctuary,” she hissed. “I’ll check it out first, and then we can get out of here.”
“Wait,” said the girl in the gold dress, stepping forward. “You need to lis —”
But Nellie was already easing open the door and stepping through it. Immediately she was hit with the dense scent of incense, and then she became aware of a great open space before her. Eyes widening, she focused on an altar draped with white cloth, the back of a blue-robed priest, and the vast sea of faces in the pews beyond him. Shock slammed her, then horror, as she realized her mistake. They weren’t at the rear of the sanctuary as she’d thought, but at the front — the very front, behind the altar. Whirling around to warn the others, Nellie’s eyes landed on a pair of enormous plaster feet, then shot upward along a long stretch of red, past a pair of upraised pleading hands, to a pale oval face with long blond hair and tightly slanted gray eyes.
It was a floor-to-ceiling statue of the Goddess, in Her second manifestation. And She was wearing the face of Nellie Joanne Kinnan.
Twenty-Two
A FACE POKED cautiously through the doorway at the base of the statue, and Phillip glanced out. A second later Nell appeared beside him, her eyes bugging as she caught sight of the scene before her. Frantically Nellie gestured at them to get back inside the statue, but already one of the four children was peeking around her twin’s hip. Then someone in the congregation gave a startled cry and a man shouted, “The Goddess. It’
s the Goddess in Her Second Coming.”
With a sinking feeling Nellie turned toward the congregation, then froze as the blue-robed priest whirled around in his pulpit. As he caught sight of her, the man’s eyes widened and darted to the statue. Riveted, Nellie watched incredulity flash across his face. Something about the priest was tugging at her mind, whispering for her to notice as he threw down the book he was holding and started toward her.
Fear reared through Nellie, temporarily lifting the interference field from her brain, and to her horror she saw two overlapped figures approaching — the priest in his blue robe, and, clear as anything, the white radiant figure of a jaw-jutting, slanted-eyed God. Then, as she stared, openmouthed, the doubled figure threw back its head and a surge of energy left it, headed straight for her.
Instinctively Nellie snapped back her own head, and a ball of light exploded from the top of her skull. Traveling toward the God’s fireball, her own ball of light met that of the God’s midair, and the collision sent both ricocheting up and back so they slammed into the statue’s chest. A tremor rocked the idol, followed by a massive splintering sound, and a crack appeared, angling toward the statue’s face.
“Get out!” Nellie screamed at her twin. “Everyone out now!”
The doorway erupted with children, pushing and shoving to get through. Quickly Nellie grabbed the hand of the small girl and started forward. But as she did, the doubled priest once again threw back his head.
“Oh no, you don’t,” said a voice behind her, and suddenly Phillip grabbed the stun gun from her hand and fired it at the priest. Without a sound, the man collapsed to the floor.
“Thanks,” gasped Nellie, staring at the motionless priest. “I forgot I had that.”
Another dull splintering noise exploded behind them, and she whirled to see cracks angling across the statue in every direction. “C’mon,” she yelled, and together the children stampeded past the priest and down a short set of stairs into the sanctuary’s center aisle. Behind them a loud rumble sounded as a large portion of plaster broke free of the statue. Then, with a great roar, the rest of the statue’s plaster facade slid free of its frame and crashed to the floor.
A huge dust cloud wafted upward, catching beams of colored light from the cathedral’s stained glass windows. As the children tore down the aisle, most of the congregation continued to sit staring at the destruction in stunned silence. But in the back pews, individuals were leaping to their feet and crowding into the aisle where they stood, ominously quiet. Sliding to a halt, Phillip raised the stun gun.
“Wait,” Nellie hissed, grabbing his arm. “This isn’t the maze. We’ve got to at least try something else first.”
Thoughts racing, she stared at the angry faces before her. Judgement was written all over them — the Goddess, blasphemy, sacrilege. But the crowd was keeping a careful distance, wary of Phillip’s gun and the fireball they’d seen exploding from the top of her head.
“Please,” said Nellie, stepping forward. “I’m not the Goddess. You don’t understand, it’s the priests—”
“Goddess!” snapped a woman, cutting her off. “Demon, more like. You’re some kind of fiend taking the shape of the Goddess’s Second Coming to fool us.”
“No,” Nellie protested, her eyes raking the hostile faces. What could she possibly tell these people? They had never seen a God or a false heaven. They would never believe her.
“It’s the priests,” she blurted desperately. “They’re the ones who’ve been fooling you. There never was any real Second Coming. It’s a lie they cooked up to make you believe in them. See, ever since I was eight, Detta’s been training me to someday be the Goddess in Her Second Coming. And they’ve been teaching me a pack of lies and nonsense so that when I did become the Goddess, I’d do whatever they told me. And most of that would be telling you what to do, so you would obey them. That’s why they painted the Goddess’s statue with my face, because I was supposed to become Her.”
Absolutely silent, the crowd’s eyes shifted between Nellie’s face and the destroyed statue. “She does look like the Goddess’s new face,” a woman said dubiously.
“So what?” snapped a man. “Detta’s job is security, not creating new goddesses. Especially not false goddesses,” he added meaningfully.
“False goddess is right,” said another man. “Demon is what she is. Demon twin that can shoot fire from the top of her head and try to stop the Second Coming.”
Something brushed against Nellie’s shoulder and Nell stepped up beside her, jutting her chin out angrily. “Yeah, she’s a twin,” she snapped. “My twin. But she’s no demon, and we didn’t come here to wreck the Goddess. I love the Goddess, more than anyone — more than you, or you. Or you,” she added, pointing to the last man who’d spoken. “But I’ve done some learning lately, and now I know the Goddess isn’t that.” Turning, she pointed at the statue’s sagging wire frame. “And She’s not this cathedral, or a star chart on a wall. She’s love, the love that’s in everything and everyone. You’ve just got to listen to hear Her.”
A glance passed between Nell and her double, and then Nellie heard her twin’s voice inside her head. D’you think we can do it? she asked nervously. This place is pretty big, and everything’s so full of hatred here.
We won’t go into another skin, replied the girl in the gold dress, just show them this one. It’s not size that counts, Nell — it’s the kind of vibes you put out. C’mon, let’s try.
Reaching out, she took hold of Nell’s hand. An intense expression crossed both girls’ faces, as if they were listening carefully. Then, without glancing at Nellie, Nell took hold of her hand. Immediately a surge of vibrations entered Nellie’s body, a tiny buzz that sank into her molecules and began to spread. But though she braced for it, no grayish screaming blur kicked in. Instead, the scene around her began to dissolve into the familiar multicolored field of energy she saw on the days she was really tuned.
Excited, she grabbed the hand of the small girl beside her, and felt the buzz travel from her own hand into the other girl’s. “Oh!” said the child, and then, as if it was the natural thing to do, she reached out and took the hand of a woman sitting at the end of the closest pew.
With a gasp the woman said, “Sweet Goddess, what is this?”
The scene before Nellie was hovering between two realities — a vast leaping shift of colors that overlapped solid reality. “Just take hold of someone else’s hand,” she told the woman eagerly, “and they’ll see too.”
The woman hesitated, then reached for the hand of the man next to her. “What?” he whispered as the delicate buzzing sensation entered his body.
“Can you see it?” said the woman. “It’s all the hidden loveliness just stepping out to greet you.”
Staring about himself, the man nodded. “Take Barin’s hand,” urged the woman, and the man reached for the boy beside him. Then, as Nellie focused, she felt it — the sweet humming sensation passing from the man into the boy, and into the elderly man beside the boy, and the child beside the elderly man. And so it continued along the pew, each person taking the hand of the one beside her and when it reached the end of the row, the woman there reached forward and took the hand of the child in front of her. On and on it spread through the congregation, people stepping into the aisles to reach across them, and from everywhere there came murmurs of astonishment and wonder.
Suddenly Nellie felt another surge of vibrations from her twin, and the buzz in her body deepened. Next, her view of solid reality vanished completely and there was only energy without definition, leaping around and through her like a multicolored fire. With a start, Nellie realized she could hear what seemed to be thousands of voices, each singing a different note. The singing sounded as if it was coming from everywhere and at the same time from inside the molecules of her own body, as if her body was everywhere — one vast aching beauty of color and sound.
But where’s the screaming? she wondered, bewildered. K Block had it, and so did the tun
nels under this place.
That was because we were out of sync, said a voice inside her head, and she realized it was coming from the girl in the gold dress. When you’re between skins, that’s when you hear the dead. Right now we’re in your home skin, watching its love — the Goddess’s love. Now if we could just get some flux in here, things would really start happening.
Not everyone’s watching the Goddess’s love, Nell interrupted grimly. This bunch standing in front of us can’t see it.
Yeah, agreed her double. Too much hatred. But they can tell they’re missing out on something, and that’s making them even madder. I think we’re going to have to go out of sync to get out of here. It’ll be tricky with so many people and I don’t know this place, but ...
There was a pause, and then Nellie felt the vibrations coming from her twin’s hand cut off. As the vivid shifting energy field around her began to solidify, moans of disappointment sounded across the sanctuary.
“Okay, we’re going out of sync,” said the girl in the gold dress. “Let go of anyone’s hand that isn’t with us, and brace yourself for some screaming.”
Immediately the sanctuary faded out, and the children found themselves standing alone in a grayish screaming blur. Okay, just keep focused, Nellie could hear the girl in the gold dress thinking to herself. This shouldn’t be too hard. The back of the room is about twenty feet away. Just pace it out real slow, and you won’t end up materializing inside a pillar or something.
Sweet Goddess! Nellie thought incredulously. She’s just winging it. She doesn’t know what’s she’s doing any more than I do.
Okay, everyone start walking, ordered Nell’s double and Nellie started forward, counting carefully as she walked.
One, she thought, imagining the entire line of children materializing inside a wall and trapped there for eternity. Two, two and a half, no three-quarters, three and a half ...
