The Realms of the Dead (3 page)

Breathe, can't breathe, oh God, oh dear God, I'm choking, dying, choking, breathe, damn it, BREATHE!

Floating just beneath her panicked thoughts, another hint of memory: This is what had happened to Granddaddy, down by the creek with the blocks of wood by his side, close enough to see the light of the cabin but unable to cry out as pain jolting through his left arm and his chest tightened. And it was her fault he was dead, all her fault. He'd mentioned the snipe hunt and she begged him to take her, bouncing from foot to foot as she tugged on his trousers and repeated
please
in the sweetest voice she could, forcing him to relent with a laugh.

Without warning, Lydia huffed in mouthfuls of air, her stinging lungs grateful for its cool reprieve. Laying her cheek against the floor, Lydia pulled her knees to her chin and wrapped her arms around her legs as she cried. Partly for Granddaddy, partly for herself, partly because she still wasn't even sure if it was a true memory or not. Tears of frustration, guilt, and fear pooled under her cheek and her shoulders hitched with each new sob.

What was the point of getting back up? Why even bother running? The creature would get her in the end. She'd tire or trip again, the creature would pounce, and then she'd die, never knowing who she truly was.

There was no other possible way the scenario could play out. She was certain of this. So why prolong it? There was no shame in giving up. If she were to die, then at least it would be on her own terms.

So she laid on the floor with grit sticking to snot and tears. She braced herself for the inevitable and tried to manifest an image of Granddaddy in her imagination. Was he tall? Burly? Did he have spectacles and facial hair or was he bald? A hundred different combinations flipped through her mind, features and
characteristics
from one bleeding into the next. Anyone could have been her grandfather. Or none of them. Her memory was as dark as the corridor surrounding her, and no matter how thoroughly she probed it, details would not emerge.

She forced the ambiguous remembrance from her mind and simply listened to the sound of impending death, hoping it would be quick and painless, but doubtful.

Stop.

Sniff.

Scurry.

Repeat.

The sky was a deep shade of lavender with puffy white clouds drifting lazily across its expanse; to the south, a lemon yellow sun blazed, its rays streaking the atmosphere around it, and a soft breeze carried the scent of lilacs as it rustled grass in a field that seemed to stretch into eternity. This grass was dotted with daisies of every color imaginable: pink, blue, and yellow petals mingling side by side with reds, aquas, and variegated pastels not normally found in nature. The foliage grew less dense as it approached a tree whose brown bark was as smooth as paper; the trunk was as wide as a large car and thick branches jutted out from either side, rising into a canopy of leaves so bright and vibrant that it almost seemed as though they'd been airbrushed. A rope was tied to one of these branches and it descended to a rubber tire that was suspended a foot or so above a patch of hard-packed earth.

The little girl sitting within the tire swing looked to be around seven or eight years old and her blond pigtails brushed against her shoulders as she swung back and forth. She was wearing a floral sundress and blue eyes looked out from behind thick glasses, watching the man approach with an expression that could only be described as neutral. Only her mouth betrayed hints of nervousness; she chewed on her bottom lip as she studied the newcomer, rubbing bucked teeth over the chapped flesh as if she could scrape the flakes of skin away.

Squatting beside the girl, Chuck Grainger smiled, making sure to keep his palms flat against his thighs. He didn't want to come across as threatening, but he also had to ensure he wasn't closing himself off. Something as simple as crossing his arms over his chest or balling his hands into fists could dictate the entire course of the interview; experience had taught him it was best to maintain a distance close enough that he could be heard while talking softly but not so close that the girl felt as though her personal space was being infringed upon. This was true for all souls, but with children body language became even more important.

“Hi, sweetheart.” His voice was low and soothing, as though he'd just tucked her in and was reading the opening lines of a bedtime story. “My name's Chuck. What's yours?”

The girl leaned backward slightly and eyed him in silence as she allowed the swing to slow. He could sense the uncertainty in her, the tension of encountering a stranger who may or may not be dangerous fighting against the loneliness that had undoubtedly plagued her in this place.

“Sure is a nice swing you've got there.” He continued once it became apparent she wasn't ready to talk yet. “My uncle built me one like this when I was a kid. I only had it for around a week, though. We ended up getting these really bad storms, you know? Thunder and rain for days. Anyhow, lightning struck the tree my swing was on and burnt it so badly that the branch split right away from the trunk. I don't figure you have to worry about that, though. I suspect it doesn't ever rain here, does it? That the sky is always bright and sunny, even when you know it should be night.”

The little girl shifted in the swing, but Chuck noticed that she'd stopped chewing on her lip.

“You ever think about having birds in the tree? There was a nest in the tree my swing was on. I remember sitting there and listening to them sing. It sounded pretty, but between you and me I was a little scared that one of them might poop on my head.”

The girl giggled as she covered her mouth with a hand and Chuck's smile widened, knowing he'd made a bit of headway. At the same time, a rustling of wings came from overhead and he glanced up to see a robin perched atop the coil of rope that attached the swing to the branch. The bird's red breast swelled as it chirped and warbled, its song sounding light and cheerful in the otherwise stillness of the eternal afternoon.

“Hey, I guess you thought a bird wasn't such a bad idea, huh? But I tell you what…you better not let that thing poop on me.” The little girl giggled again, and Chuck took this as his cue to duckwalk a few steps closer to her. “You ever notice how that happens, sweetheart? How you think about something you want and
poof
…there it is. Maybe it's a different dress. Or a ribbon for that pretty hair of yours. Or even a bird.”

The girl gasped as she nodded, her startled eyes seeming all that much more wide through the magnification of her lenses.

“I…I wanted watermelon real bad. And then I had it. Right here in my lap.” The girl's whisper was so soft that Chuck had to cock his head to the side to hear the words. “And I thought it would be funny if there were puppies everywhere, but there was so many that I got scared when they all started runnin' at me. So I closed my eyes real tight and when I opened them again all the puppies were gone. I think I…I think maybe I…
killed
them.”

The girl's eyes shimmered behind a well of tears and she seemed to pull into herself, as though shrinking away from the memory. Her lip quivered, and Chuck wanted nothing more than to pull the girl into his arms and hold her tightly, to stroke her hair and tell her that everything was going to be okay; but he knew he had to keep those emotions in check. There was a fine line between letting enough out to actually interact with the little girl and allowing himself to get carried away. So he forced another smile instead as he shook his head slowly.

“You didn't kill them, princess. They just went back to the same place they were before they came here. Do you remember where you were before you were here?”

“I think I was in a car. I remember hearin' Mommy and Daddy's talkin' and the radio, too, but they sounded real far away. I was sleepy and I was tryin' to watch the moon out my window and then…and then…I dunno. I was just here.”

“Do you know where your Mommy and Daddy are now?” The little girl shook her head as her eyes welled with tears again. Her grip on the tire tightened to the point that the rubber creaked beneath her grip and her nostrils flared as she drew a quick breath through her nose. “Well, I do, sweetie. And I can help you get to them. Would you like that? To be with your Mommy and Daddy again?”

The girl nodded so rapidly that Chuck was reminded of the bobble-headed figurines some of the cubicle workers kept on their desks.

“Okay, then. I can help you, honey. But you're going to have to trust me, okay? And part of trusting me is to tell me your name. Can you do that for me?”

The girl pulled herself from a slumped position to her full height, throwing her shoulders back as if mustering the courage to answer Chuck's question.

“Abigail. Abigail Louise Peterson. But all my friends call me Bug 'cause they say I bug them all the time and also 'cause my glasses make me look like one.”

“Well, I'm your friend…but I'm just going to call you Abigail because a little girl as pretty as you deserves a pretty name. Anyhow, Abigail, I'm going to tell you a secret. And you're going to have to listen very closely to what I'm about to say. But—more than anything else—you're going to have to believe me. Okay?”

Something flickered in Chuck's peripheral vision and his eyes darted away, instinctively seeking the change in a world that was, for the most part, static. He knew it was a mistake, that the action could potentially be interpreted as a sign of deceit…but he was nonetheless powerless to stop it.

Whatever he'd seen had been dark, like a wave of blackness that had rolled across this false reality; but in the short amount of time it had taken for him to look away, it had disappeared. Still, something
felt
different. Almost as though the sun wasn't shining quite as brightly as it had moments earlier. And the colors in the plants and sky seemed a little more muted, as if a bit of vibrancy had been leeched from them.

But that was silly. He'd probably just imagined whatever it was that he thought he saw and was now looking for something,
anything
, to be different. That was the most logical explanation, the one that made the most sense; but at the same time, nervousness rippled through his stomach. His silver cord stretched out behind him, nebulous and ethereal in this seemingly solid world, and he traced it with his eyes, seeking its reassurance.

Luckily, he was able to get his emotions under control before they escalated to the point intervention would be required. Not that intervention was necessarily a bad thing, but it would be notated in the trip log…and logs with fewer incidences of intervention were the ones that helped further careers.

Returning his attention to the girl, he smiled again.

“Okay, I'm going to tell you a series of facts, Abigail. And you have to really and truly believe that each thing I tell you is true. You have to
trust
me. And if you do, you'll be with your parents, okay?”

Darkness shimmered on the edges of his field of vision again, squeezing his gut in a cold grip; this time, however, he managed to keep his gaze steady as he took a slow breath through his nose. Whatever was happening wasn't important. All that mattered was freeing this little girl and helping her move on to whatever lay on the other side of The Divide.

“Fact one: None of this is real. The grass and flowers, the tree and this swing, all of it is just…”

The air surrounding the field crackled and sparked as dark clouds devoured the sky, spreading so rapidly that within seconds the sun was nothing more than a hazy disk hidden behind their murky veil.
Simultaneously,
wind howled across the field, the gusts shredding daisies in its wake and scattering them in swirling vortexes of current. The multicolored petals burst into flames as they brushed against the flashes of electricity, disintegrating into ash as fine as dust but somehow releasing the stench of singed flesh.

“Are you doing this?” Chuck cupped his hands and shouted over the sound of the wind, but he didn't have to hear Abigail's reply to know the answer. All color had drained from the girl's face and her wide eyes were glazed with panic as shivers wracked her small body. Beads of sweat trickled from the child's forehead and she ducked behind the tire swing as though it was a shield that could protect her from whatever force had invaded her realm.

A shiver tingled Chuck's spine and thoughts scrambled for dominance as he tried to make sense of what was happening. Things like this simply weren't supposed to occur. Not on a routine assignment. This mission was so simple even a Level III Whisk should've been able to complete it. Children were easy. They were predisposed to believe in fantasy and magic, to accept the impossible as probable, to consider the possibility that things sometimes were more extraordinary than they first appeared…and yet this little girl's world was dying around him, the grass shriveling into blades so brittle that they were reduced to powder with the slightest rustle.

And through it all the wind continued howling, the sound like the roar of some dark and malevolent beast as it awakened from eons of slumber. Arcs of electricity jumped and sizzled and the tree the tire swing hung from contorted into a gnarled hand, the bark becoming strands of mummified muscle and the branches clawed fingers that raked at the sky.

Abigail's face glistened with tears and snot bubbled from her small nose as she covered her ears with her palms. Her eyes were clenched tightly shut, squeezing out even more tears, and her back and shoulders hitched with sobs.

“Control, we have a problem here.” Chuck's voice cracked with panic and he leapt to his feet as the ground rumbled with subterranean forces. “We have a
major
fucking problem!”

In this distance, something erupted from the earth in a cloud of dust and debris, setting off a chain reaction that rapidly spread across the once fertile field.

“Control, do you copy, damn it?”

Chuck gagged on the smell of burning flesh, the stink so thick that he could taste it, greasy and sickeningly sweet, like a maggot-riddle steak that had been charred on a grill.

At that moment, a scream filled his head, the coarse voice straining with agony so forcefully that it felt like a sudden burst of pressure exploding within his skull. The scream quivered his eardrums and drove him to his knees, his head splitting with its intensity as he pressed his hands against his temples, crying, yelling, wordlessly begging for release.

The entire world disappeared into darkness, everything flashing out of existence in a single instant.

The tree that had turned into a hand: gone.

The field: gone.

Abigail: gone.

There was only the darkness and the never-ending scream that had become his world. And Chuck knew with every fiber of his being that within seconds he, too, would share the little girl's fate.

He wouldn't follow his silver cord back to his physical body.

There would be no returning home.

No office or apartment.

There would be nothing.

Chuck Grainger.

Gone.