Indigo: Abraham, Emotion Vol. 3: Bridges, Chapter Twelve: "Bridges, Bringing Down the Bone Grinder"

 

Chapter Twelve: Bridges, Bringing Down the

                                           O

                                        GriNder

                                              E

 

            The city disappeared into a vast, icy wasteland.  Cold winds cut deep, and they dropped their heads against them as the snow piled up around them.  Isaac gave his jacket to Ellen like a gentleman, and she hugged it tight to her torso as she kept one arm up and did her best to ignore the frosty bite of the cold.

            Isaac grew pale but didn’t seem to mind.  Periodically he stopped to breathe into his cupped palms, but the rigidity with which he moved showed Ellen who futile it all was.  These breaks never lasted long, and he wouldn’t allow her to stop, either.

            Ellen tripped and feel knee deep into the snow, and he was at her side to help her to standing.  She shouted into the wind as it tossed her hair about, “Isaac, I don’t know how much longer I can go on!”

            “Don’t think about it.  Just focus on moving.  As long as you do that, you’ll be able to move forward.”  His words were puffs of blue-white steam, but his smile after was the sun.  She didn’t believe him, but she trusted him enough to keep going anyway.

            As they moved forward, they stepped together for warmth.  He held her at the back, pushing her forward, and each step was synchronized.  Both kept their heads down, and whenever she felt too weak to keep going, he held her up.

            The blizzard died and the sun appeared beyond the clouds.  When they looked back the storm was gone altogether, and the snow glittered in the sunlight.  The air was cool and still, and it hurt to breathe, but it was better than the lashing winds.  They kept together still, requiring the shared warmth, and then parted as they kept moving.

            Ellen smiled at him.  It was all strange, too strange for her, but Isaac made her feel safe.  He was strong and clever, and he always seemed to put her first.  Looking at him, she sometimes believed they would make it home.

            They crested a hill that looked out on endless mountains and canyons.  Everything was snow-caped and dark blue beneath.  The air was cleaner here than any she had ever breathed before.  Ellen shook the frost from her hair.  “How long until the storm starts again, you think?”

            “I’m not sure.  It could be that we’re in the eye of the storm, but—It’s impossible to know anything about this damn place. If my father were here, I could ask him, but...He wouldn’t tell me.  He never tells me anything.”

            “Your father?”  Ellen swept her hair back and watched him.  He had gone rigid again, colder than the mountains.  Isaac was like that sometimes.  He was the sun and then, within a breath, he was a winter night.  At those times, she worried.  “Isaac?”

            She had blinked, and he was gone.  The mountains were gone, too, and the snow and the cold.  She was inside of a tomb made of golden stone stacked high on slanted walls.  She stood on a bridge, with another bridge above her and another below.  Shadows filled the spaces below and above her.  Dust dulled what light cast by lanterns bolted to the walls.

            She turned, as she always did, and hugged Isaac jacket tight.  It smelled like him, which was a comfort, but wasn’t enough to keep her safe.  There were entrances on either side of the bridge she stood on.  The air was musty and harsh on her lungs.  She looked over the railing and sighed.

            “Okay,” she said to the emptiness.  “Well,” she looked back where the mountains and been, or at least where she imagined them to have been, “I’m not going that way, so...”  She turned again.  “Maybe ahead?  Or maybe I should wait.”  She thought of Carolyne and started walking.  “At the very least I should find somewhere I can hide if I need to.”

 

: Bridges :

 

            Alex and Shana walked hand-in-hand and ever forward.  They left the island behind them, venturing out onto a thin arm of dirt that stretched infinitely into the sea.  The sun was high and warm, but a breeze teased their hair and kept them cool.  The air smelled wet and salty.  Shana tired first, but Alex kept her head up and never stopped moving.

            The world shifted in an instant.  One minute they were enjoying the fresh sea air.  The next they choked in a musty temple.  The walls were wide but old, fashioned from a porous yellow stone and cut with ancient sigils of times long forgotten.  There was no breeze, hardly any air to breath at all, and the air was stagnant and flat.

            Their footsteps echoed.  The way before them a long, flat bridge, unevenly tiled and thick with dirt.  Everything was faded in color and somewhat dehydrated.  There was a darkened tunnel before them, a squared mouth opened to swallow them.  Behind them was a slanted wall.  Below them were bottomless shadows.  Alex leaned over the railing to stare and felt it shift slightly.  Part of the bannister crumbled in her hand.

            The bridge was sturdy enough they found.  They kept walking and eyed the draconic statues that lined the walls and the maidens between them, hands folded into cups and outstretched in offering.  They passed through one archway and into another room, another bridge, this one forking partway.

            Shana watched Alex as they moved.  She was different, changed by her experience.  On the surface, she was very much the same, except she wore her hair back.  When they spoke, she met Shana’s eyes now, and her shoulders were back and head up.  She looked ready to meet the world for the first time since Shana knew her.  It was strange to see, good, but a change, and Shana wondered where she would fit in the new Alex’s life.

            However she worried, Shana smiled.  Since childhood this was the Alex she had wanted to see, the one she had wanted to meet.  It was a good thing, different though it might be, Shana was sure of that.  Everyone changed as they entered adulthood, and Shana was still determined to love Alex and support her whatever happened.

            An uneven tile caught Shana’s foot and tripped her forward, and Alex was there to catch her.  They shared a smile.  “Sorry about that.”

            “It’s fine.  You okay?”

            “Yeah.” Shana kicked at the tile.  “Don’t worry, just clumsy.”

            Alex laughed.  “Sometimes.”  They stood straight and started walking again.  “Looks like we still have a long way to go.”

            “Yeah, but we’re together now, and that’s what’s important.”

            They walked until they reached the crossroads.  Another bridge stretched off, in a T formation, toward a nearer entrance.  They could see light and smell fresh air from there.  Standing in the entry way, chest bare and scarred, and stinking, always, of sweat, was Goliath.  He smiled when they saw him and flexed his hand.  A heavy golden rod appeared in the air and fell into his hands.  It was nearly twice the height of Alex.  “There you are.”

            Alex pulled Shana behind her and stepped forward.  A flash of light appeared around her right forearm and hardened into her bracer, which took the shape of her blade.  She glared.

            “And, as I expected, you’re still determined to fight me.”

            “I told Abraham that I would protect her, so I will protect her.  End of discussion.”

            A frown creased his face.  He looked older than she remembered and angrier, too.  “You can’t protect anyone if you’re dead.”

“You’re going to kill me either way, right?  So, I may as well fight.”

            Goliath took a deep breath and then shrugged.  He twisted his hands around his staff and fell into a wide stance.  To Alex, he appeared to a crouching beast of mythic origins.  His body was tight but fluid.  He rested the staff on his enormous shoulders.

            Alex looked back a Shana.  “You wait here while I take care of this guy.”

            “No,” Shana said, stepping forward.  Her Voice appeared in her hands forming, seemingly, from the air and from sound itself.  She mimicked Goliath’s stance as best she could.  It didn’t leave her looking so imposing, but she felt solid.

            “Shana!”

            “Alex, I’m here with you.  After everything we’ve been through, I’m finally here with you.  So, please, let me protect you.”

            Alex stared at Alex, in her eyes, and she laughed.  “Fine,” she said, shaking her head and looking at Goliath, and she was still smiling.  “We’re both idiots, huh?”

            “Maybe a little.”  Shana sized up Goliath.  She remembered him being taller than she and Alex standing on each other’s shoulders.  Looking at him face-to-face, she wasn’t sure that was wrong.   Alex took Shana’s hand and gave it a squeeze. Shana squeezed back.  “All for one?”

            “You protect me; I’ll protect you.”

            Alex led the charge.  With her blade ready she sprinted forward.  She knew, deep down, that it would end poorly but knew no other way to go.  Goliath was violence incarnate, and no matter what she did, he would win.  So, the only choice she had was the most obvious one: swing blindly and hope for the best.

            She lunged at his chest, blade straight and shining, but he knocked her aside with a flourish of his staff.  Using the momentum, Alex spun around on her heel and brought her blade around toward his neck.  He held firm in response, driving his staff vertically into the bridgework beneath him and stopped her.

            Withdrawing his staff, he stepped in and jabbed her in the stomach with the end of his staff.  The blow knocked the wind from her and sent her reeling.  She tumbled into the guard rail and fell into a fit of coughs, holding her stomach and doubled over.  He stopped beside her, staff up, and brought it down, only to be interrupted by Shana.

            Leaping through the air and wailing, Shana brought her hammer down on where Goliath was.  He heard he, though, and stepped away.  The tiles where he stood shattered into a hundred shards and scattered.  As she recovered, Goliath stepped back in, took her by the neck, and tossed her aside.

            Shana flew off the bridge, over the rail.  Before falling she grabbed hold of one of the bannisters, but her fingers were loosened by the inertia.  She slipped, slowly, and stared down into the waiting darkness.

            Alex sucked in a breath and pushed away.  She ducked under Goliath’s next swing and thrust at his ribs. He side-stepped again, took her by the arm, and held her in place while driving his bulky knee forward into her sternum.  Her chest exploded with pain and her knees turned to jelly.  Adrenaline was all that kept her moving.

            She staggered away, where she hoped to be out of reach, but was caught by the end of his staff.  Her right solar plexus throbbed as she swayed.  Another blow caught her in the left side and left her breathless again.  The world spun as she gasped.

            Another step, another strike, this one meant to force his staff through her chest and finish her.  Alex saw the movement in fine detail, his muscles flexing, the sweat beading across his flash.  She saw the fury in his eyes, and the reluctance, and she saw Shana slowly slipping away.  She was desperate, and she was overwhelmed, and she lifted her Voice to block him and felt it shift.

            The red and blue jewels on the front shifted place, the former pulling back toward her elbow, the latter moving into the fore.  The blade receded and fanned, forming into a shield with a maiden’s face and hands and a blue jewel sparkling at its center, which stopped the staff.

            Alex went tumbling and landed on her back.  She felt heavy, lungs burning, bones aching, and the battle had only just started.  Then there was Shana to consider.

            She sat up and watched Goliath’s approach.  He was sauntering now, a scowl on his face, and it gave her time to gather her breath and bring herself to standing.

            “A shield?”  He growled the world.

            “I have things to protect.”

            He grunted and leapt, and his strong legs carried him high and far.  At apex, Goliath had his staff overhead, and he brought it down on top of her.  Alex planted her feet and brought her new shield up to meet it, angling it slightly to the left.  Sparks flew as the staff slid away, imbedding itself in the floor while Alex winced from the impact.

            She didn’t have time to recover before Goliath attacked again.  He was graceless, lifting the staff one more time and bringing it down harder.  Again, Alex held her ground and let the staff slide off of her shield, but the blow was hard enough to leave her arms numb.  On his third attack, she rolled to the side, stopping on her shield face and kicking off of the railing so that she could slide across the bridge.

            The tile flooring before him turned to dust, Goliath turned.  He followed her, approaching as she stood and hit her hard in the gut with the end of his staff.  She was forced back into the railing, which she held to for dear life while the world spun around her.  The wind left her and brought up bile with it.  She vomited down her blouse as she fell to one knee.

            A horizontal swing meant for her head came in, wind whistling around it, and Alex ducked under.  She pushed back just as Goliath brought his staff back at her, and she had just enough time to heft up her shield before being hit hard.  Contact sounded like a gunshot and vibrated through her arm.  She flew back and tumbled nearly ten feet before coming to a stop on her back, lying limp and struggling for breath.

            Shana fell over the railing, onto her face.  She pulled herself back up in time to find Goliath stalking toward Alex and charged.  Leaping, like he did before her, she brought her Voice with her.  It spoke to her whispers from her soul, and she echoed them aloud.  Light poured from her hammer head and the air hummed.

            Thus He spoke, ‘The weight of the world shall crush you!’

            Heart Song grew heavy in her hands and hardened, too.  She could feel it change and put all of herself into the blow, swinging with thunderous force at Goliath’s skull.  He remembered her just in time to stop the blow, blocking with his staff, which folded on impact.  Shana landed, heavily in front of him and stumbled to a stop.  She admired her work before a tickle ran up her spine.

            Ignore my title, she said, the words warping reality around her, Dismiss my image; hear only my song!  Her Voice grew lighter now but remained hardened, the outer surface of it glossy and catching reflecting the light.  Spinning on her heel, brought it around toward his ribs.

            Goliath stepped and watched her hammer glide by.  He hooked the crown with his bent staff about her waist and turned his back on her, using the leverage to uproot her and toss her overhead.  She landed hard and came to a stop beside Alex momentarily breathless.

            When she stood, she found Goliath regarding his staff with a grimace.  He looked at her, tossed the weapon aside, and produced a whip from the air.  With one swift movement it unraveled, and with a twist of his wrist the tiles at his feet were sundered.

            He pulled back, the whip receding, and then snapped.  The whip lunged like a snake, slithering forward and slicing a stray hair inches from her face as she dodged to the side.  It fell slowly as it unraveled, not even touching the ground before he made another strike that narrowly missed.

            Shana sidestepped and watched a shadow beside her explode into a cloud of dust.  She staggered as the railing was cleaved apart.  Her legs felt weak and her body sluggish.  Years of academics had not readied her for a fight for her life.  Another snap and the whip looked like a tide of woven leather.  It slowed, and she watched the wrinkles form and stretch as it surged toward her.

            Blood splashed across the tile and a scream echoed in the void.

            Alex opened her eyes and pushed through the pain.  Goliath had caught Shana on the left leg, tearing her pants and her flesh in one move.  She was left kneeling and holding her wound as he flicked his wrist.  The whip retreated and returned, and she watched its approach with fatalistic fascination.  This one would catch her across the face, possibly even part her head in two.

            Never stray from your path.  Never lose hope.

            Alex blocked Shana, her shield gleaming.  The whip made contact and came apart.  Light washed over them both as Alex turned to Shana and touched her shoulder, and warmth spread through them.  Their wounds mended and, as Shana stood, Alex smiled.

            The whip frayed, tearing at the center and lashing back at Goliath.  A shallow gash formed across Goliath’s arm, leaving a trail of blood across his hairy forearms and dribbling from his knuckles.  Before him, Alex stood, worn and fierce, Shana at her side.  From how it looked to him, Alex was not only resolved to finish the battle, but she seemed resolved to win it.

            Goliath roared, stomping a foot in his rage as he tossed the whip aside.  His eyes bulged; his face grew red.  He screamed, “Why? Every time I knock you down, you get back up again.  Why do you insist on fighting so damn hard?”

            “Because I have promises to keep.”

            Alex charged now, leading with her shield.  He bled, and that made him human, but it didn’t make him weak.  If she wanted to win, then she would have to close distance fast and land a killing blow before he could respond.  She got within his reach but couldn’t strike before being struck.  He brought his fist down from above, knocking her shield aside with his first blow and then striking her across the face with his other palm.

            She folded, collapsing under his brutal force.  Blood splattered across the floor and across her torso.  He positioned himself above her, punching again, and this time knock her into the tile.  She swayed, wheezing, as he kicked her in the side.  She rolled into the nearby railing, which fractured on impact.  There, he pinned her in place with his foot.

            “Damn you!  You’re too weak even to fight.  Too weak to keep these empty promises you are going on about!”

            Appearing from his side, Shana stepped in and took a blind swing at Goliath’s head.  He caught her hammer just under the weighted head and used it to lift her in the air and flipped her, slamming her down hard against the tilework of the bridge.  Contact knocked the air from her lungs, and his big foot came stomping down to keep the air out of her.  He applied pressure to hold her there, and she clawed weakly at his ankle while she wheezed.

            “Look here, Alexandra!  This is what happens when you’re weak!”  Goliath ground his foot into Shana’s chest as he shouted.  “She tried to save you, and she couldn’t.  She fought as hard as she could and achieved nothing but being stopped.  Look at what happens when weak little things try so hard to keep their promises, when the strongest thing about them are the promises themselves.

            “You have nothing, and you can protect nothing.  You can’t help anyone because you can’t even help yourself.  Your promises are soft in the face of solid opposition.”  Goliath forced a whine from Shana’s throat as her arms went limp against him.  For a moment, he regarded her with pity, and then he bared his teeth in a violent grimace.  “This was a mistake.  It was all a mistake.  You never should have come here.”

            Alex was up.  Driven by Shana’s cries, she lunged forward, her broken body by carried by little more than adrenaline.  The air was charged around her, whistling in her ear.  Goliath caught her with his foot and sent her flying back with a harsh step.  The railing caught her, but only just barely, cracking under her weight.  There she slouched, and Goliath stepped over Shana’s body to reach her.

            Again, Alex met him with a thrust.  Her movements were sluggish and wide.  He let the attack slide past him and met her with a knee to the stomach.  Alex stumbled back, giving a wide, clumsy swing, which he stopped with one hand.  Catching her by the forearm, he grabbed her by the back of the head with his free hand and spun her about, bringing her face-first through the railing.  She hung over the edge, blood oozing out of her mouth and gathering in her hair.

            The world blurred.  Staring over the edge of the bridge, Alex watched droplets of her own blood fall into the infinite abyss below.  To her, it looked like the jaws of death waiting, gaping and hungry.  It didn’t matter.  None of it mattered.  Life was meaningless, born dying from the start, it was just another broken promise she was never meant to keep.

            Goliath flipped her with his foot and stared down into her bloodshot, empty eyes.  She was bloody and bruised, her hair matted to her forehead, her skin bruised and broken.  Blood and saliva oozed from her open mouth and every strained breath made her shudder.  He lifted his foot and hovered it just above her head, poised to crush her skull, and then he dropped it to the ground somberly beside her. 

He kneeled. “Do your promises mean this much to you?  Are they worth dying for?  Worth suffering and fighting for, even in the face of inevitable and crushing defeat?”

            Alex wheezed.  With one last burst of energy she lunged at him.  Goliath deflected easily, slapping her hand away without even breaking eye contact.  He hit her in the chest in the same movement and knocked her back down.  She slid backward, to the edge of the broken railing, and felt the stonework give slightly before she coughed up more blood onto her shirt.

            His eyes narrowed.  “Just answer me before I kill you.”

            “Yes,” Alex said.  Words were hard for her to find and even harder to form, but she struggled through each one.  “Yes.  My promises mean that much to me.  They mean the world.  They’re all I’ve got left.”  She coughed again, a deep wet cough that left her chin red, and then she forced herself up onto her elbows.  Her arms were like lead, heavy and dull, but she was driven by a dire resolve.  “They’re why I keep getting up.  They’re why I’ll always get up.  Power is nothing but a tool, and if you don’t have a reason to use it, then what’s the point?  Sometimes, a promise is all you need.”

            Goliath eyed her in quiet reverie.  The air was still, silent save for the labored breaths of both Alex and Shana.  His expression had softened to stoic interest.  “And so even if you did somehow, by some miracle, kill me and went on to Abel, a man many times my superior, you would still fight?  You would die?”

            Alex winced.  She supported her weight with one arm while using the other to nurse her tender side.  “Yes,” she said, “I would.  I would fight harder and harder, harder than I am fighting now, harder than you could ever know.  I would fight and fight, and I would die, but as long as I am breathing, then I will keep moving.  I may not know where I am going, and I definitely don’t know how I am going to get there, but I am not ready to quit yet.  I won’t.

            “Now, it’s my turn for a question.  Is power all that really matters to you?  Is that why you really follow him, because he is stronger than you?  You don’t value him, his goals, his ambitions? You just want his power?”

            “I don’t want his power.”  Goliath’s heavy brow knitted.  “He is stronger than me.  He defeated me and so I followed him.  The weak follow the strong, and the strong dictate the weak.  That is the way of the world.  That is nature.”

            “That’s what you say, but you’re stronger than me, and I don’t follow you.”  Alex looked past Goliath, to Shana at rest on her back.  “I may not be strong, but I have people around me, people who need me, and they keep me going.”

            Goliath shook his head.  “Ridiculous,” he said, but he watched Alex struggle to her feet.  She used the railing for balance but fell when it gave out.  Half of her body tumbled over the side.  She caught herself with one hand and slowly worked her way to her knees.  Then, grunting, brought herself up to one foot.  “You are ridiculous.”

            “Call me whatever you want,” Alex said, and she stared him in the eyes.  It was hard to see her eyes through the curtain of dark hair swept over her face, but it was easy to see her resolve.  She shifted her weight to crouch and then stood with a grunt.  “But you can’t keep me down.”

            He frowned, watching her, as she raised her hand.  Her Voice had lost substance, seemed nearly transparent, but as she drew a deep breath it solidified.  Like an illusion made real, he blinked, and it was there, tangible and solid.  “It’s strange,” he said, standing now, towering over her.  “I could kill you.  I could crush your head with a single flex of my fingers, but I stay my hand.”

            Alex stared back at him in sullen silence.  She had her Voice in front of her but held her side still.  She wasn’t steady on her feet.

            Goliath laughed.  “It is impossible to think, but maybe you are right.  Maybe there is more to life than the pursuit of power or submission to those who already have it.”  His smile faded.  He looked solemn as he scratched his beard thoughtfully.  “Rather, maybe there is more to strength than power.  Maybe there is something to be said about fighting, even when you’re weak.”

            “What are you saying?  Are we done then?”

            Goliath opened his mouth to speak but couldn’t find the words.  Long, infinite seconds passed as he contemplated.  When he spoke, he did so with great care.  “I don’t know where I come from or why I am here.  When I woke up, I was lost in the Emotion.  Time isn’t right here—I don’t know how long I’ve been here or how long I waited—I forgot myself.  When I met Abel, all I knew how to do was be strong, and when he proved himself stronger…

            “You woke something inside of me, something I had lost before I had ever met that man.  I need to think on that.  I need to remember.”

            “And what about your mission to kill me?”

            Goliath shrugged.  “When I’m done thinking, if I’ve reached the same conclusion, then I will hunt you down and kill you, and hopefully that will be enough to see me forgiven.  But, I can’t in good consciousness kill you now with all of these doubts eating at me.”

            “What if he doesn’t forgive you?”

            “Then I will die for my mistakes.”  Goliath smirked and then laughed again.  “I thought you were so stubborn, you know, but you were right to a degree.  The fact that you fought me even when I overpowered you, that I couldn’t keep you down despite all of my strength.”  He sighed.  “Life and the meaning of it.  I haven’t thought about that for…It feels like a lifetime.  This place, it steals things away from you, cuts and cuts at you until you’re nothing but the one thing, and then you fixate on that, afraid that it will go away, too.  It becomes you, and when I met him, I was blind to everything else.  You’ve opened my eyes.”  He smiled down at her again.  “Good luck, Alex.  I sincerely hope that we never meet again.”

            Alex nodded and held her breath.  Slowly, she released it, breathing through the pain.  Her head felt light.  She saw brief spots before him as she gathered herself.  Eying his big back retreating, she called to him, and he turned back to her.  “I have one more question before you go: you said you don’t remember how you got here, but do you have any idea how to get home?”

            Goliath scratched the back of his head.  He opened his mouth to answer but the words never came.  A figure dropped from the shadows behind him, and then a thin blade appeared from his chest, accompanied by a flat fan of blood.  Goliath looked down in shock and when the blade retreated fell to his knees.  He swayed, gurgled, and fell forward, revealing Carolyne behind him.

            A monstrous smile was painted on her boyish face.  Her eyes were wide and teeth bared like a wild animal.  Pinching her fingers along the flat of the blade, she gathered the blood and shook it off as she crooned in her madness.  “Finally,” she said, her aura hard and sharp.  She looked an incarnate of the hungry abyss below as she lifted her blade and angled the fine tip at Alex’s heart.  A single droplet of blood leapt from the tip as Carolyne rested one foot atop Goliath’s massive, lifeless frame.  “Your turn.”

Indigo: Abraham, Emotion Vol. 3: Bridges, Chapter Eleven: "The Island, part three"

 

Volume Three: Bridges

 

Oh, we burned those bridges,

Oh, and we forgot their names

 

Chapter Eleven: The Island, part three

 

            Shana sat in the dark, holding Alex and watching her sob.  After all of this time spent fighting, after every struggle and lesson learned, Shana felt useless.  For the past ten years she has done everything she could to drag Alex along after her, but in the moment when Alex needed her most, the best she could do was hold her and watch.

            It hurt, and it scalded, and worst still, Alex’s Voice watched, too.  As Shana understood it, a person’s Voice was a part of them, it was their soul, maybe a small fraction of them, but still one so vital.  She began glaring at Alex’s Voice, from time-to-time, mostly as something to do to pass the time.

            Her own Voice had helped her when lost, Shana remembered.  It guided her to Alex, helped her to help a friend, but Shana thought it was fitting that Alex wouldn’t be able to help herself, or at least wouldn’t want to.  Alex lived only for other people.  It could have been admirable, if it weren’t so sad.

            I want to help her, Alex’s Voice said suddenly, its tone shifting like the shadows.  But I can’t.  It isn’t my place.  This is something she must overcome herself before we can speak again.  She is at a distance from herself, fragmented and separated inside.  When the whole isn’t united, neither am I, and until she can achieve balance, she will be unable to access my true potential.

            Shana sighed.  She didn’t like it, but she figured the Voice was right.  Alex was strong, stronger than she realized, but Shana still worried.  A Voice, the projection of a person’s will, is intention made real.  It is difficult to harness that power when someone has no intentions of their own, when their own will has withered away.  The Voice, Shana realized, is no more capable of helping Alex than she is.  Both were impotent.

            So, she hugged Alex tighter and waited.  It was comforting to think that she could at least be there for her, and she hoped that somewhere in her nightmares, Alex could feel her warmth and know that even when she is alone, she’s never actually alone.

 

: Bridges :

 

            Alex stared at the ghostly image of her past, dark eyes wide with shock, small mouth parted as she begged for an explanation.  Her parents stood there, ineffectual shades staring at the body that was their eldest child.  Beyond rest Alicia, or what was Alicia, skin pale, tawny hair fanned about her.

            She was sitting up, back to the door, holding herself and sobbing still.  Blood ran where she bit her lips, but she hardly felt it.  Periodically, she wiped her tears away, but she couldn’t stop staring.  It had taken everything she had in her to look again, and it would take more to look away.

            “What’s going to happen to her now,” Alex asked, now a little girl, sobbing at her parent’s feet.  “What’s going to happen to me?”  She came near, staggering away from her parent’s statue-like stillness and toward her future self.  They looked very much the same, eyes bloodshot, bodies shaking.  They were the same, because they knew the truth but refused to accept it.

            Alex hugged herself tight and pretended like Shana was there.  She pretended that she felt the other woman’s warmth in the darkness and, when she blinked, she told herself Shana was there, just outside the door, waiting for her.  It was impossible, and she knew that, but it still gave her comfort.

            “Please,” the younger her asked, staggering by that point, fatigued by her sorrow.  “Please, tell me.  What is going on?  Why won’t you tell me?”

            “Leave me alone,” Alex whispered, hiding herself behind her hair.

            “What happened to my sister?”  The younger Alex grabbed the older Alex’s arm.  Her hands were small and weak, her fingers pale.  She tugged feebly, whined.  “Bring her back.  Bring her back to me!”

            “I said leave me alone!”  Alex pushed her away and turned her back now.  She closed her eyes and hid herself in her arms, and she took herself into the darkness by pushing everything out.  White walls, childish wails, cold bodies, she pushed it all away and embraced instead the void.  It was impossible to feel the pain, she told herself, if she didn’t feel anything at all.

            But she did feel.  She felt it all, and she couldn’t ignore it anymore.  Nothing stays buried, and she felt the tiny fists beating on her back, dull and slow, weak as a newborn, but there.  It cried in her ear and against her back, where she had carried it for so long, and it refused to be ignored anymore.

            In a fit of anger, Alex turned, and she shoved the little girl away.  “Shut! Up!  Just shut up!  Crying won’t help!  Crying won’t change anything at all!  She’s dead.  Dead!  And she’s not coming back!  You can beg, you can cry, you can kill yourself to follow after, and none of it matters.  She’s DEAD!”

 

: Bridges :

 

            Shana jerked awake.  At some point, she had fallen asleep around Alex, and she wasn’t sure when.  She felt tired and sore, eyes still half-lidded as she regarded the darkness around her. A shout had pulled her from sleep, from a dream of Voices and Emotions, from a world where nothing and everything was real, and when she found herself in shadows she realized it wasn’t a dream at all.

            Alex flailed beside her, cursing in the darkness in her slumber.  She swung at the air, swung at herself, and it took Shana to hold her and catches the blows.  Shana pinned Alex to the ground, wincing as a wild swing caught her in the face, and she ignored it and hugged her close.

            “It’s alright,” she whispered, gritting as she was struck again.  “It’s alright, Alex.  It’s okay.  I’m here.  I’m here with you.  So, it’s alright.”

            The Voices watched from the side, unmoving, impartial, as Alex sobbed and writhed.  As Alex eased, so did Shana, and she held her still and rubbed her back, and she let her cry.

            Three Gods approached, silent and critical.  I’ve always wandered, and I have to know, it said in a voice that married thunder and rain, Why are you always there for her?  Why do you help her so much?

            Shana smiled and wiped away the sweat from Alex’s forehead.  Alex eased in her grasp and settled more, her breathing growing regular.  “Because she’s my best friend,” she said after some time, “And because I love her.”

 

: Bridges :

 

            Alex stared at the wall, silent.  She had turned her back on her little world again.  There was no point in looking.  She knew how the story ended, played it on repeat in her head and in her heart for the past ten years.  Whenever the tears came, she would just loop that moment over and over again until they stopped, and they had stopped.  There was now nothing left in her to cry out.  She was hollow.

            Little Alex joined her, squatted beside her and stared with the same glassy-eyed emptiness.  “Soon, I’ll be just like you,” she said after a long silence.  In that time no one cried.  For a moment, Alex felt not good but at least not bad, either.  When her younger self spoke, though, there was a pricking in the back of her head.  “I’ll be empty.”

            Alex scowled but didn’t look at her.  She stared, fixedly, at those damn white walls.  “I’m not empty,” she said, and when there was no response, she kept speaking.  “You don’t know what you’re talking about.  And you can’t just say things like that, things that aren’t true.”  When she turned to look, she found her younger self staring back at their parents.

            Their parents, or the specters of them, were fixed in place, frozen in a perpetual state of sorrow.  They wept crystal tears that didn’t fall, stood linked at the arms, slouched and ineffective.  Little Alex spoke, “It wasn’t that they didn’t understand, or that they didn’t love her like you did.  You lost a sister, but they lost a daughter, and they just didn’t know how to help.  At first, you were so wild, nothing but unbridled emotions while they were trying to mourn.  By the time they were recovered enough to help you along, though, you were emotionless.  It was too late for them help you along, because you were rooted in place.  You buried it all inside of you and kept it guarded by tantrums, tears, and quiet.”

            “Shut. Up.”

            “And you’re doing it again.”  Little Alex looked at her, straight ahead, glassy-eyed, empty, a perfect reflection.  “It’s the same thing over and over, you know.  Eternal.  Some people never change, and you never did, because you never wanted to.”

            “And who the hell do you think you are?  Sitting on your little throne, looking down on me like you aren’t a part of me!  But here you are!  And if you’re so damn perfect, if you have all the answers, then go ahead and take over! Change me!”  Alex fell into her knees, sobbing hard again.  “You don’t know anything.  You don’t know how hard life is.”

            “You’re right, I don’t.  I never will, because I’ll never be given a chance.  I’ll stay here, beaten down, stunted, swallowed and swallowed until all I am is a whisper in your ear, too faint to even be heard.”  Little Alex stood.  “Do you remember how to laugh, Alex?”

            Alex scowled at the floor.

            “Or do you remember how it feels to smile?  Or to love?  Do even know how to it feels to be sad anymore?”

            “Of course I do.  It’s all I know.”

            “No, Alex, you aren’t sad.  You cry.  Anyone can cry.  It’s just your body, though.  Tears don’t signify sadness.  They just signify tears, which can mean anything.  People cry for joy and, yes, sometimes in sorrow, but not you.  You cry from frustration or emptiness or because you’ve forgotten how to do anything else.”

            “I said shut up!”

            Alex turned, knocking the girl over again, and this time she pinned her down.  She swung, wildly, using her fists to hammer her tiny head into the ground.  “You! Think! You! Know! Me!”  Blood smeared her hands, smeared the floor, splattered across her face, but she kept swinging.  “But! You’re! All! Talk! No! Actions!”

            When she stopped and fell backward. The girl’s skull was broken bone and red blood.  Alex could hardly look at it and turned away to catch her breath.  She could smell the iron on the air.  The body watched her with one good eye, the other ruptured.  The bruises were already setting in.

            “Look at you,” it said, voice wet and raspy.  “You’ve almost done it, almost finished the job.  It’s taken you years, but you’ve nearly killed me off entirely.”

            Alex broke down into tears again, hugging herself more closely and trying to forget the smell of the blood in the air.  “Shut up!”

            “Does it hurt to see the real you?”

            “The real me?”  Alex sat back against the wall, staring at the dead body on the ground, at the dead body in the bed, at the dead bodies standing and crying forever.  “What was it Carolyne said?  I’m a zombie, dead but moving.”  She wiped her tears, smearing blood across her cheeks as she did.  “Is that what I am? Just a body.”

            Little Alex lied still, her head pooling across the floor.  She was small and broken, and Alex memorized every horrible detail.  At this point, she was collecting ghosts, but this one wouldn’t haunt only her.  It would break Shana’s heart and follow her to the grave.

            “I won’t let it happen,” she said, and she sniffed.  “I deserve whatever I get, but Shana deserves better.”  A deep breath, and Alex stood, jaw out, hands balled into bony fists.  “You can’t die,” she said, “Shana needs you.”

            “Is that all that matters to you?  Shana?  Is that all you live for?”

            “Isn’t it enough for now?”  Alex laughed ruefully.  “You said it yourself.  I’m empty, devoid of anything, but Shana...”  Alex stepped forward, scooped up the tiny broken thing and cradled it to her chest.  “No, it’s not fair.  I’ve been empty for so long, leeching life off of those around me, living through them, selfish to the core.  I’ve clung to Shana and used her to keep me going, pretending I was doing it for her and for Alicia but really, I was nothing but a burden to them.”

            “So?”

            “So, I don’t want to be empty anymore.”  She set the girl down on her feet and helped to keep her standing.  “Dying won’t help anyone, and it won’t solve the problem.  It just hurts the people I love.  Hurt Shana.  Maybe even leave her like me, and that won’t help, either.”

            Little Alex swayed unsteadily, held her older self to keep her steady.  “Then, what do you want?”

            “I want to live.  On my own, for me and myself, and for Shana, too, because of all she’s done for me. I owe her that much.”

            Little Alex smiled, and despite the damage done to her, it was a handsome smile. “That’s good to hear,” she said, her voice small but growing clear.  “It won’t be easy, though.  It will take more than resolve to do this, and once you start, you can’t stop.  If you make this decision, you’ll have to follow through.”

            Alex smirked self-consciously.  Isn’t that what life is about?  Besides, if I’m good at anything, it’s moving forward, even if I don’t have a destination in mind.  I just need a direction, and I’ll make it.  I’m sure.”

            “Then go toward the truth,” Little Alex said, pointing to the curtain and the specters.  “Own up to your past.”

            Alex looked ahead and halted.  She held her breath.  “Easy.  I’ve already done this one.”  She swallowed.  “This is just a repeat performance.”

            Another deep breath followed, and she hesitated.  Another deep breath, and doubts surfaced like flotsam after a storm.  It became a repeated pattern, swallowing doubts until they were buried so deep that they couldn’t stop her.  Then, she approached the curtain and put her hand against it.

            She looked at her parents, frozen in time, suspended by her own sorrow.  She looked at little Alex, battered, bruised, and half-dead but still standing in spite of it all.  She looked at herself, somehow, and saw who she was in the past, who she was in the present, and who she may become.  She breathed.  “I can do this.”

            The curtain rattled as she tugged it aside, and she found Alicia on the other side.  Years ago, Alicia was her sun, her moon, and all the stars in her sky.  She was everything Alex could ever want, everything Alex could ever hope to be, and time had changed her.  Alex was almost as tall as Alicia now, stockier in the shoulders.

            Even in death, Alicia was the most beautiful woman Alex ever met.  Her lips were plush, well-formed, her chin slightly pointed.  She was the princess Alex imagined in stories as a child, slumbering with tawny locks spread beneath her.  Her skin was pale as snow, and Alex stood, choked, holding the curtain tight for balance.

            “See,” she breathed after some time, “Not so hard.”  Tears rolled down her cheeks, and she wondered briefly if they were from frustration and decided it probably wasn’t a good sign that she didn’t know.  Time stood still, suspended, always suspended, and she didn’t feel any different.  The moment wasn’t at all like she hoped it would be.  Just an old memory.

            “This is stupid.” She started to turn but couldn’t release the curtain.  It had taken so much effort to get there.  “No, you’re just running.  Eyes open, move ahead.”  She stared at Alicia’s body, released the curtain to take her sister’s hand.  Alicia’s fingers were stiff and cold.

            Time passed and the room was still.  Alex held Alicia’s hand and stood by the bed, and she felt self-conscious.  Her parents were watching.  She was watching.  There were more tears, and she wiped them away.  By this point, the blood on her hands was dried.  She felt like she should say something but couldn’t think of the right words.  When she did, she finally said it all in a whisper.

            “I love you.”  It wasn’t the first time she had said it over the years, but it might have been the first time she meant it as a good thing, and from there the words poured out.  “I’m sure the whole world knows that already, but you know, sometimes it’s hard to admit.  Sometimes, I think that if I talk about you, you’ll be taken away from me again.”  Tears fell from her chin, landed on her hand.  She had to take a slow breath to keep from shaking.  “I think maybe that’s why I held it in for so long.  I wasn’t afraid of being hurt but, afraid that if I ever stopped hurting, I’d lose you over and over again.  Mom and dad, they would say—they told me that you were always alive inside of me, that you were in my memories, but what did that mean to a kid?  I was nine, and I was so young, and so sad, and I thought that meant I couldn’t stop being sad.

            “But that’s no excuse.  I never grew up because I never really knew how to.  After so many years of being sad, it became something like my natural state.  It became a part of me like my singing or...”  She smiled, slightly, and touched Alicia’s hair.  It was as soft as she remembered.  “The memories only made it hurt more, though, and deep down I knew it wasn’t right.  It’s an insult to your life to let your death be the only thing I hold onto.  I was just afraid to admit that because, every year, your laughter becomes harder to remember, and your voice...”  She closed her eyes.  “I don’t even remember what you sound like.”

            Silence fell like the night, and for the first time in ten years, Alex held nothing back.  She cried, and she cried, and it didn’t hurt.  She let it all wash over her, overwhelmed her, and she hugged Alicia tight to her, and she cried.  “I love you, Alicia.  I really do.  I love you, and I miss you.”

            “I miss you, too.”

            Alex went quiet.  She opened her eyes and found that the room was gone.  Now, she was at the graveyard.  There was a funeral in the distance, a crowd of people all in black, and a nine-year-old Alex among them with an eight-year-old Shana at her side, holding her hand, crying with her.  The people left one by one, and the two little girls stayed, staring at the freshly dug grave.  They wouldn’t stop crying until they fell asleep in the back of Alex’s parent’s car.

            Alicia was there with Alex, sitting beside her on the gravestone.  Her flesh had color to it, her cheeks a natural rose blush.  Her eyes were unclouded and her tawny hair fell about her shoulders like a curtain.  They were still holding hands, but her fingers were soft and warm now, and she smiled at Alex.  Looking into her eyes, Alex could almost see her sister standing in a field, wheat waist high, the sun setting behind her.

            “Alicia?  Are you—Are you real?”

            “Yes and no.  I’m a memory,” she said.  “That’s all that’s left of me now, but you already knew that.”

            “Yeah, I do.”  Alex wiped her eyes, but she didn’t let go of her sister’s hand.  “I guess hope springs eternal, huh?”

            “Right.”  Alicia gave a half-smirk.  “You’re looking good.  Tall.  A lot taller than I remember you being.  How long has it been again?”

            “About ten years, but if you’re just a memory, then shouldn’t you know what I know?”

            “You’re thinking too small, Alex.”  Alica’s memory nodded toward the funeral.  “You’re not the only person who ever new me.  People remember, and the world remembers, too.  We all existed together, connected by invisible threads.  When a person dies, their body goes back to the dirt, right?”

            Alex nodded.

            “Memories are the same way.  Everything has a place to go, and everything is eternal.”  She turned her smile back on Alex and lifted one leg to hug it to her chest.  “So, even if you forget, I’m never really forgotten.  Others will remember me and, when they die, the world will remember for them.  History will remember.  I existed, you know, and nothing can take that away from me.  Nothing in the cosmos has that sort of power, not even God.  Do you understand now?”

            “I think so.”  Alex sat beside the memory of her sister and found it smelled like lilacs, like her sister always did.  The voice was familiar, a touch high, and a bit like a bell.  It seemed so real, and as Alex dug her feet into the dirt, she smiled.  “Still, I don’t want to forget you.  I don’t want to go on without you.  And it’s not that I’m not strong enough.  I just really don’t want to lose you anymore than I have.”

            “That’s normal.”  Alicia’s memory reclined back, stretching her legs out, taking her hand away long enough to stretch her arms.  She let out a breath.  “But that’s what I’m getting at.  I’m not gone, and you’re never without me.  I was here, and that is never going to change.  The world will always remember me.”  She took Alex’s hands.  “And so will you.”

            “Even when I forget you’re always with me?”

            “Exactly,” Alicia’s memory said.  “And not like a ghost or anything like that, but in your blood, if you want to be literal.  We’re sisters, after all, and you’ve been crying a bit of me with you for the last ten years.  The rest?  We’ll leave that in your heart.”

            Alex rubbed her own arm self-consciously.  She felt warm now, and soft, like Alicia’s hand.  She allowed another smile.  “Thanks, Alicia, for the help.”

            “No problem.”  Alicia’s memory jumped from the gravestone.  “Now, listen, because here’s where it gets a bit heavy.  Everything else you’ve been doing, all the holding back, all the hurt, that’s got to stop.  You know it’s not the right way, and you know it’s not really living.”  She looked Alex in the eyes.  “You’re not the one who died, so why are you playing the part?”

            “I don’t know.”  Alex shrugged, stared at the ground.  “It just didn’t seem like there were any options left to me.  After you were gone, I didn’t know what to do with myself.”  She met the memory’s gaze again and found that its eyes were just like she remembered.  “I wanted to be you when I was younger, you know.  So, when you died, I didn’t have anyone to grow into.  I guess I just followed your example.”

            “No.  When you lose your way, you cut your own path.  Got that?”

            “Yeah.  I got it.”

            Alicia’s memory put a hand on her hip and tilted her head on one side.  “Then tell me that you’ll live your own life and make your own decisions.”

            “I will.  I’ll live my own life.  I’ll make my decisions.”

            “Good.”  Then, in perfect mimicry of the real Alicia, the memory took Alex’s face between her hands and stared her in the eyes.  “Now, mean it.”

            “I do.  I mean it.  I’ll carry on without you, and I’ll add more memories to the world.  I’ll finish the path you weren’t able to finish, I think.”

            “That’s a good answer, there.”  The memory smiled, and they watched the funeral end and the shades disperse.  “You’ve gotten taller, you know, but I think you’re grown in other ways.”

            “I don’t feel like I’ve grown at all.

            “You have. You’ve got a long way to go, but I think you’re on the right track.”  The memory looked up at the sky.  It was pale and the clouds were thin.  It was a sad day then, but the sun was coming.  “It’s been a long night, hasn’t it?”

            “Too long.”

            “But the dawn is soon.  I think it’s about time you get going.  There are people waiting for you.”

            “Wait.”  Alex took the memory’s hand.  “Can’t I say here with you for a little longer?”

            Alicia’s memory turned to look at her over the shoulder.  “Really, Alex, haven’t you learned anything yet?”

            “I have, but, just think of it as a good bye.  Just a little longer, please.  Even if you’re just a memory, you’re still my sister.”

            “No,” the memory said, sighing, and she embraced Alex.  It was warm and familiar and safe.  “I’m not.  I’m just a memory.”

 

: Bridges :

 

            Alex woke in a field of flowers.  The sky above was clear and, in the distance, she could hear the shifting of the waves as they danced along the shoreline.  The flowers were in full bloom, bright, vibrant petals so beautiful and vivid that they seemed to glow.  The brightest among them, she noted, were the yellows and oranges.

            Shana was with her, holding her close and caressing her hair.  She had one hand under Alex’s head, cradling her.  When Alex opened her eyes Shana smiled, and they made eye contact.

            “Shana?”

            “You’re finally awake.”  Her tone was motherly and serene.  She helped Alex to sitting.  “Are you feeling okay?  It seemed like you were having a nightmare.”

            Alex hugged Shana and felt the familiar warmth.  It was the sunlight that surrounded her, the smell of flowers in spring.  It was everything good Alex knew, and it was there now.  They stood together, and Alex rubbed her eyes.  “I was,” she said, “But I think it’s over now.”

            “Good.”  Shana looked around them, at the field of the flowers, at the trees green with leaves, and the blue sky.  “What do we do now?”

            Alex shrugged, and she took Shana’s head and lead her back toward the forest.  “I guess we go look for Ellen and Abraham and we get out of here.”  They reached the beach and found a long, thin strip of land had appeared in the water.  It extended into the distant horizon, flanked on both sides by the shifting waters.  The girls made eye contact again.  “You ready?”

            “Am I ready?”  Shana released Alex’s grip and sprinted forward, setting foot on the land-bridge out of there before she turned to blow a raspberry.  “Just try and keep up.”

 

: Bridges :

 

            He stumbled out of the darkness, leaving his memories behind him.  Each foot fall stirred the dust where he appeared.  The walls were ancient brick, yellow in color and smoothed by time.  Enormous pillars rose around him, into the shadows above.  Statues of figures unknown to man lined the walls, bearing images of creatures the likes of which he had never seen nor could ever imagine.

            The air was dry and warm and hurt his chest to breath.  The bloody wound upon his chest burned, his chest hair matted against his flesh.  It was scarring already, aided by the energy of the Emotion itself.  It was shallow to begin with looked far worse than it felt.

            The shadows hadn’t done much but slowed him.  They gripped at him and held him, and they whispered doubts into his ears, but he would not fail again.  This was the second time Alex was allowed to live.  A third time could not come to pass.

            He growled and started toward the far wall, where a staircase led up.  From the air he produced a weapon, which was still forming as he began his ascent.

            This time, Goliath would not hold back.