Ethan.
The name seemed to echo around inside his head. Ethan, that was right. Ethan...
"Land." Penny choked out the word and clutched at her chest, wheezing heavily. "Land's End. Ethan Land's End. Christ, Ethan, what did you do?"
...But no. It wasn't right. He wasn't Ethan Land. He could not be Ethan Land. That thought rose up in his head with the strength of an abjuration. Something fundamental inside him rebelled against the thought. He was not Ethan.
"It's Hell," he heard the sprawling woman mumble. "We're in Hell. But it's your Hell. That's why they kept having me killed, because you were - were obsessed. With me. Because it hurts you. They don't even care about m-me."
He couldn't frown. The grin carved into what passed for his face didn't allow it. Instead, he shook his head. "No," he said, slowly. "That's not right."
He turned and shoved his wooden hands into the pocket of his battered coat. Outside, the noises were dimming away. Some part of him realized that the light was going with it. The moon was dimming. But, in here, he could see. Somehow. The shack seemed full of some sort of diffuse light, just enough to see in a grainy black-and-white, to make out shapes without seeing details.
"That's not right," he said again, more firmly. He took a few lurching steps inside. They were in a hallway, a cramped stretch of corridor between the two halves of the shack. On one side, a living room with a lumpy recliner and a broken television joined with a kitchen that lacked a stove. On the other, a bedroom that contained nothing but a sagging cot with torn sheets and a small cabinet that hung open to reveal stained clothes on wire hangers.
And the fourth door, shut.
There was some sort of dark stain on the floor underneath it. He crouched down to peer at it. Behind him, he heard Penny breathing laboriously, back in the five-two-five rhythm.
He slipped one hand out of a pocket and prodded the stained wood with one overlong finger. It squelched, wetly.
"What is that?"
He turned his head. Penny was getting to her feet, wearing the sharp expression she used when she was looking for something external to focus her mind on, to keep the panic at bay. He shrugged. "Don't know," he said. His voice sounded disturbingly similar to the sound his finger made as he dragged it across the wooden flooring.
He straightened up. "It's gone dark outside," he said, glancing at the door they had left hanging open. "We're moving again."
She shook her head. "There isn't anything we can do about that." Her voice was as sharp as her expression.
"Then let's do something else." He turned away again, pivoting on the longer, right leg, and strode off into the house. "I'm not Ethan Land," he added flatly, over his shoulder. Some part of him wondered which of the two of them he was trying to convince. "But this place seems to be built... around him. Tell me about him."
He ducked under one sagging doorway and into the living room. The recliner and the television were the only things there. The recliner was old, stained, and ripped open in several places. The television was older still, and the buttons had broken off. Both of them looked as if they should have been thrown out years ago.
"This was his place," he heard Penny say. She was leaning against the doorway, arms folded over her chest. But she wasn't looking around. She was staring at him so intensely that he felt as though she were attempting to drill into his head with her eyes. "But it's not, really. It's like my house, but the other way."
He looked away again and moved over towards the television. Dust kicked up from the worn carpeting under his boots and filled the air with the smell of mold. "Explain," he said.
There was a magazine on top of the television. Playboy. Ancient.
"My - the house at the top of the hill was too perfect," she said. He could feel her gaze on the back of his neck. "I never kept the place that clean. And his was never this rotten."
"Rotten to the core," he mused idly. Then he wondered why he said it.
There was a faint rustle of cloth against wood as she shrugged. "Yeah," she said. "This place is disgusting. His was bad, but never... never like this. He worked hard to make sure it stayed at least presentable."
"How did you know him?" He didn't turn to face her. Instead, he pivoted again and lurched over to the recliner. There was a sharply-defined depression in the middle, a dip where someone's body had beaten its shape into the stuffing.
She sighed, and when he finally did turn to look at her, she had tilted her head back and pulled the hat down over her eyes. "He was a vet," she muttered. "Iraq. Two tours. Came back with his left leg crippled and some of the worst PTSD we'd ever seen."
"We?" He leaned down to look at the handle to trigger the chair's reclining function. It had broken off and never been replaced.
"The hospital," she said flatly. He straightened up slightly and peered at her over the arm of the chair.
"I'm a nurse. He got brought in after a car wreck off the highway. He was the only injury. Only car. He went off the side at ninety and didn't brake. Scarred him pretty badly, physically. On the... on the face." She lifted one hand and drew a finger sharply across her mouth.
"Suicide attempt," he said flatly.
She nodded, and opened one eye to peer at him from under the brim of her hat. "I was one of the nurses assigned to him after the surgery," she said. "He... he got scary. Kept showing up at my house after he was released. Stalked me for weeks. I had to have a restraining order put out."
"And he sent you flowers," he said, standing up again. "And you threw them out."
She shrugged, then closed her eye again and nodded.
He straightened up and stared at her for almost a full minute. Then, abruptly, he said, "I'm not him."
She lowered her head again and opened her eyes. One eyebrow was slightly raised, expectantly.
"I'm not," he repeated. His hands opened and closed on their own, fingers scraping across the palms as if he were trying to gouge the wood. "I don't know who I am, but I'm not Ethan Land. Even if the name sounds so damn familiar. But I'm going to find out where he is, and how he got us here, and who I really am, and then I'm going to get us out."
The eyebrow stayed raised for several long moments. Then, very quietly, Penny said, "He used to do that as well. With the hands."
Then she unfolded her arms, turned, and walked back into the hallway.
Tuesday, September 17, 2013
Monday, September 16, 2013
Ten
The streets were alive.
There were sounds on all sides: cars, doors, footsteps, shouts. Other, less distinct ones. The distant wailing of police sirens.
Only... it wasn't distant, really. It didn't have a location. It was so far away and yet... and yet it was right there, inside her head, closer than it should have been possible.
The vertigo welled up inside her again. This time she couldn't fight it. She couldn't fight anything, not even the grip on her wrist. The scarecrow-thing had locked its fingers around her flesh in the exact same spot as before. The gashes felt like liquid fire.
But even that wasn't real. It seemed, like the sirens, to be very close and very far away at the same time.
Mister Sticks had killed the kid...
She blinked once, twice, owlishly. She had fallen to one knee. When had that happened? There was the sound of something crackling wetly, a yelp. A gunshot. Even that didn't seem real, despite the sudden deafness in her right ear and the ringing noise joining the rest of the cacophony.
She wanted to stand and run, to get as far away from everything as possible. To get away from Mister Sticks.
It had done it so casually...
The memory rose up in her mind, replayed itself over her eyes. The kid, moving like a puppet, not wanting to do what he was doing, a victim as much as anyone. The scarecrow, with that jagged grin like the edge of a rusty saw. The blood.
The vision vanished as she felt all the wind knocked from her lungs. She was up again, moving, but not under her own power. She felt something clamped around her waist, felt the arrhythmic lurching, and realized that Mister Sticks had her slung over one shoulder, as if she weighed nothing at all.
The moonlight illuminated the house they had just left. Some part of her recognized that she was looking at the back door, that the scarecrow was taking her down the hill where there were fewer houses and they might be able to avoid notice.
Most of her was too busy trying to get a grip on her whirling thoughts to think anything coherent.
The shack at the bottom of the hill. She had recognized it. Not when she had first seen it, but now, now that she wasn't thinking so lucidly. It was Ethan's. The location was all wrong and the place was even more of a stinking pit than she remembered, but it was Ethan's. It was too close to the hill and too broken-down and it couldn't be but it was, she knew it.
It was his shack. The shack he hated so much with all of its peeling paint and shattered windows and all the little errors that no one saw but-
- but himself, and Penny Columbine, whom he loved so much but who lived so far away, up at the top of the hill in a house worth more money than he'd make in the entirety of his miserable existence.
Penny Columbine, who had thrown out the flowers he had sent her.
She felt her stomach lurch sickeningly, but her body was too battered and oxygen-starved to even get up the energy to vomit.
There was the sound of a door being forced open, and the moonlight vanished, replaced with the musty, rank smell of the shack. A moment later, she felt herself being lowered onto the rotten wood of the floor.
She gasped, choking for air, for almost a full minute. She couldn't see anything but the tips of the mud-stained boots the scarecrow wore.
She recognized them, now. They were familiar boots, but... viewed through different eyes. Ethan had worn those boots. They were fourth-hand and battered, but they had never been this disgusting to look at.
Neither had the coat, or the pants, or the undershirt. But perhaps he had always thought of them this way.
Slowly, she sat up, propping herself upright on her arms, and looked up at the jack-o'-lantern face.
It seemed to be waiting for something.
She swallowed hard. "I know," she rasped, her voice no stronger than a whisper, "where we are now, Ethan."
There were sounds on all sides: cars, doors, footsteps, shouts. Other, less distinct ones. The distant wailing of police sirens.
Only... it wasn't distant, really. It didn't have a location. It was so far away and yet... and yet it was right there, inside her head, closer than it should have been possible.
The vertigo welled up inside her again. This time she couldn't fight it. She couldn't fight anything, not even the grip on her wrist. The scarecrow-thing had locked its fingers around her flesh in the exact same spot as before. The gashes felt like liquid fire.
But even that wasn't real. It seemed, like the sirens, to be very close and very far away at the same time.
Mister Sticks had killed the kid...
She blinked once, twice, owlishly. She had fallen to one knee. When had that happened? There was the sound of something crackling wetly, a yelp. A gunshot. Even that didn't seem real, despite the sudden deafness in her right ear and the ringing noise joining the rest of the cacophony.
She wanted to stand and run, to get as far away from everything as possible. To get away from Mister Sticks.
It had done it so casually...
The memory rose up in her mind, replayed itself over her eyes. The kid, moving like a puppet, not wanting to do what he was doing, a victim as much as anyone. The scarecrow, with that jagged grin like the edge of a rusty saw. The blood.
The vision vanished as she felt all the wind knocked from her lungs. She was up again, moving, but not under her own power. She felt something clamped around her waist, felt the arrhythmic lurching, and realized that Mister Sticks had her slung over one shoulder, as if she weighed nothing at all.
The moonlight illuminated the house they had just left. Some part of her recognized that she was looking at the back door, that the scarecrow was taking her down the hill where there were fewer houses and they might be able to avoid notice.
Most of her was too busy trying to get a grip on her whirling thoughts to think anything coherent.
The shack at the bottom of the hill. She had recognized it. Not when she had first seen it, but now, now that she wasn't thinking so lucidly. It was Ethan's. The location was all wrong and the place was even more of a stinking pit than she remembered, but it was Ethan's. It was too close to the hill and too broken-down and it couldn't be but it was, she knew it.
It was his shack. The shack he hated so much with all of its peeling paint and shattered windows and all the little errors that no one saw but-
- but himself, and Penny Columbine, whom he loved so much but who lived so far away, up at the top of the hill in a house worth more money than he'd make in the entirety of his miserable existence.
Penny Columbine, who had thrown out the flowers he had sent her.
She felt her stomach lurch sickeningly, but her body was too battered and oxygen-starved to even get up the energy to vomit.
There was the sound of a door being forced open, and the moonlight vanished, replaced with the musty, rank smell of the shack. A moment later, she felt herself being lowered onto the rotten wood of the floor.
She gasped, choking for air, for almost a full minute. She couldn't see anything but the tips of the mud-stained boots the scarecrow wore.
She recognized them, now. They were familiar boots, but... viewed through different eyes. Ethan had worn those boots. They were fourth-hand and battered, but they had never been this disgusting to look at.
Neither had the coat, or the pants, or the undershirt. But perhaps he had always thought of them this way.
Slowly, she sat up, propping herself upright on her arms, and looked up at the jack-o'-lantern face.
It seemed to be waiting for something.
She swallowed hard. "I know," she rasped, her voice no stronger than a whisper, "where we are now, Ethan."
Tuesday, June 25, 2013
Nine
"In fact, our only story tonight, 'cause you know we only report the news worth hearing, folks..."
It was the ringmaster, even though he was in a different role now. No one else had a face like that. It was all gleaming teeth and bright, flashing eyes. The thing called Mister Sticks stared blankly at the television screen with hollow eyes. Behind him, Penny glared.
"...it's the Columbine kidnapping, of course. We've got a positive I.D. on the culprit now, too: Edward Hyde. Yes, that's right, folks, you heard me. Old Mister Hyde is back in town, and he's got his claws on our very own Penny Columbine."
The voice was smooth and casual, more like a talk show host playing the crowd than a reporter. It seemed to flow over the mind like syrup, sweet and slow, turning your thoughts to mush.
"Of course, here at Land's End, we've dealt with this sort of thing before, haven't we?" The man gave a deep, full-chested laugh and grinned a little more broadly. The click of perfect white teeth was almost audible. "We've just let him get a little bit ahead of us this time. We can take care of it, even if we do have to try and round up the big one as well."
The man leaned forward over the desk and folded his hands. "And since I know you can hear me, Miss Columbine, I've got a message for you, all the way from the top: 'don't worry. We'll get things back on track very, very soon."
The movement wasn't conscious. He just found himself gripping Penny's shoulder.
"And to my old pal Ed." For the first time, the man's grin faded, becoming a slight scowl, and he extended two perfectly-manicured fingers to point at the camera. But the voice remained as hypnotic and easygoing as ever. "You just let her go, and we'll make it quick for you. Believe me, you don't want it to be slow. There are a lot of really creative ways to excise something like you, and believe me, you deserve the worst of the worst. Such a degenerate, filthy, disgusting thing... I mean, really. We'd be justified in ripping you apart mote by mote. But the boss is prepared to give you an easy one if you just give her back."
The winning smile was back, as quickly as it had gone. "Think about it, won't you? And, to everyone else listening to this broadcast: they're at her house. The cops are on the way, but why should we let them have all the fun?"
A bright, happy little laugh. "And that, ladies and germs, is the news. Good night, and God bless."
And the screen snapped off.
For a few seconds, there was silence. Then, gradually, Mister Sticks became aware of the sound of labored breathing. He turned his head.
Penny was breathing heavily, in sharp, heaving gasps. The rhythm was there, as if she was fighting a panic attack, but she didn't look frightened. She looked angry. Her face was twisted in rage.
"That bastard," she hissed between clenched teeth. "He wants me to go back? And talks about it like that's a good thing?"
She wrenched her shoulder out of his grip, stood, and snatched the alarm clock from the bedside table. A moment later, there was a resounding crash as it flew through the television screen.
"Fuck that."
She turned back to stare upward at his face, still glaring. "I'm not going back to them," she snarled. "So if you're thinking about handing me over-"
"I wasn't." He said it without any hesitation. The thought hadn't even crossed his mind; in listening to all of the man's threats, the idea that he might actually give Penny away had never even seemed like an option to him.
She glared at him for another moment, then shook her head and shuffled around him. "Then we've got to get out of here," she said flatly. "The cops are on their way, and I'm pretty sure he just sicced all the people who were watching that on us. Given how damn weird this place is, I'm pretty sure we're about to get an angry mob. Where can we go?"
The answer came to him in a flash of memory. Without really thinking, he rasped, "The shack. Bottom of the hill. There won't be anyone home."
She stopped at the door to the bedroom and gave him a suspicious look over her shoulder. He shrugged. "I don't know," he said.
She sighed and started walking again. He lurched after her.
"Better than nothing, I suppose," she said. Her hair was still wet from the shower, and hadn't been put up into its formal bun. She rammed the battered derby onto her head anyway and started down the stairs. "Come on. And try to be qui-"
She stopped abruptly, frozen, at the base of the stairs.
There was a man in the broken doorway - no, a teenager. Mister Sticks staggered haphazardly down the stairs, clutching the banister with a grip like iron, and stared at him. The kid was wearing an expression of utter terror on his pale, sallow face, but he was holding a kitchen knife in one hand, and it was pointed squarely at Penny.
"Y-you've..." The kid's voice was a squeak. He swallowed, and tried again. "You've got to come with me, miss. Away from..." He glanced up at Mister Sticks. "From him. You-" he swung the knife around to point at the scarecrow "-you stay back. Stay away from us!"
One of the scarecrow's boots thudded on the floor at the base of the stairs. He put one malformed hand on Penny's shoulder and pushed her aside, gently. Then he said, in his creaking, sharp voice, "No."
The kid swallowed again. "Then I'm gonna have to kill you," he said. His eyes flashed from side to side, as if looking for an escape. He looked as though he wanted to run more than anything in the world.
"Are you." Mister Sticks put both hands into the pockets of his jacket and straightened up as best he could. He towered over the other two; he must have had at least a foot over each of them. He felt as though he should be worried, intimidated, slightly wary of the glinting blade in the teen's hands. He wasn't. Everything was calm and simple.
The young man shook his head frantically, but said, "Yes. Yeah." There was a moment of strangled, terrified silence, and then a quiet, "I'm sorry."
He stepped forward, lurching almost as crazily as Mister Sticks when he walked. He seemed to be fighting with himself over whether to attack or retreat.
It was so easy. One step forward, bring the right arm up to deflect the blade, left hand comes around to grip the wrist, twist until you hear the snap, catch the knife in your still-moving right, spin it in uneven fingers, and push.
The flesh offered hardly any resistance at all.
The kid let out a soft sound, like a cross between a groan and a sigh, and slumped to the floor. Mister Sticks let him fall, then straightened up again and turned his head to look at Penny.
She gave a soft squeak and pressed herself further back into the wall. Her eyes were wide and fearful, locked firmly on the body at his feet. He nudged it with the tip of one boot.
"It's okay," he rasped. "He's dead."
"Y-you..." She gasped. "You killed him."
"It was that or have him take you away." He shrugged. It all seemed so simple. "We don't have time to waste with him. There'll be more."
She stared wildly at him. He could see her thinking, but he couldn't imagine what it was that she was wrestling with. He had done what he had to do. He had protected her.
There was a dull, rising sound from outside. After a second, he identified it as the sound of a police siren.
There was no more time. In one motion, he stepped forward and seized her arm again. "Come on," he said. "There are more coming." And he turned to pull her along behind him, out into the streets.
It was the ringmaster, even though he was in a different role now. No one else had a face like that. It was all gleaming teeth and bright, flashing eyes. The thing called Mister Sticks stared blankly at the television screen with hollow eyes. Behind him, Penny glared.
"...it's the Columbine kidnapping, of course. We've got a positive I.D. on the culprit now, too: Edward Hyde. Yes, that's right, folks, you heard me. Old Mister Hyde is back in town, and he's got his claws on our very own Penny Columbine."
The voice was smooth and casual, more like a talk show host playing the crowd than a reporter. It seemed to flow over the mind like syrup, sweet and slow, turning your thoughts to mush.
"Of course, here at Land's End, we've dealt with this sort of thing before, haven't we?" The man gave a deep, full-chested laugh and grinned a little more broadly. The click of perfect white teeth was almost audible. "We've just let him get a little bit ahead of us this time. We can take care of it, even if we do have to try and round up the big one as well."
The man leaned forward over the desk and folded his hands. "And since I know you can hear me, Miss Columbine, I've got a message for you, all the way from the top: 'don't worry. We'll get things back on track very, very soon."
The movement wasn't conscious. He just found himself gripping Penny's shoulder.
"And to my old pal Ed." For the first time, the man's grin faded, becoming a slight scowl, and he extended two perfectly-manicured fingers to point at the camera. But the voice remained as hypnotic and easygoing as ever. "You just let her go, and we'll make it quick for you. Believe me, you don't want it to be slow. There are a lot of really creative ways to excise something like you, and believe me, you deserve the worst of the worst. Such a degenerate, filthy, disgusting thing... I mean, really. We'd be justified in ripping you apart mote by mote. But the boss is prepared to give you an easy one if you just give her back."
The winning smile was back, as quickly as it had gone. "Think about it, won't you? And, to everyone else listening to this broadcast: they're at her house. The cops are on the way, but why should we let them have all the fun?"
A bright, happy little laugh. "And that, ladies and germs, is the news. Good night, and God bless."
And the screen snapped off.
For a few seconds, there was silence. Then, gradually, Mister Sticks became aware of the sound of labored breathing. He turned his head.
Penny was breathing heavily, in sharp, heaving gasps. The rhythm was there, as if she was fighting a panic attack, but she didn't look frightened. She looked angry. Her face was twisted in rage.
"That bastard," she hissed between clenched teeth. "He wants me to go back? And talks about it like that's a good thing?"
She wrenched her shoulder out of his grip, stood, and snatched the alarm clock from the bedside table. A moment later, there was a resounding crash as it flew through the television screen.
"Fuck that."
She turned back to stare upward at his face, still glaring. "I'm not going back to them," she snarled. "So if you're thinking about handing me over-"
"I wasn't." He said it without any hesitation. The thought hadn't even crossed his mind; in listening to all of the man's threats, the idea that he might actually give Penny away had never even seemed like an option to him.
She glared at him for another moment, then shook her head and shuffled around him. "Then we've got to get out of here," she said flatly. "The cops are on their way, and I'm pretty sure he just sicced all the people who were watching that on us. Given how damn weird this place is, I'm pretty sure we're about to get an angry mob. Where can we go?"
The answer came to him in a flash of memory. Without really thinking, he rasped, "The shack. Bottom of the hill. There won't be anyone home."
She stopped at the door to the bedroom and gave him a suspicious look over her shoulder. He shrugged. "I don't know," he said.
She sighed and started walking again. He lurched after her.
"Better than nothing, I suppose," she said. Her hair was still wet from the shower, and hadn't been put up into its formal bun. She rammed the battered derby onto her head anyway and started down the stairs. "Come on. And try to be qui-"
She stopped abruptly, frozen, at the base of the stairs.
There was a man in the broken doorway - no, a teenager. Mister Sticks staggered haphazardly down the stairs, clutching the banister with a grip like iron, and stared at him. The kid was wearing an expression of utter terror on his pale, sallow face, but he was holding a kitchen knife in one hand, and it was pointed squarely at Penny.
"Y-you've..." The kid's voice was a squeak. He swallowed, and tried again. "You've got to come with me, miss. Away from..." He glanced up at Mister Sticks. "From him. You-" he swung the knife around to point at the scarecrow "-you stay back. Stay away from us!"
One of the scarecrow's boots thudded on the floor at the base of the stairs. He put one malformed hand on Penny's shoulder and pushed her aside, gently. Then he said, in his creaking, sharp voice, "No."
The kid swallowed again. "Then I'm gonna have to kill you," he said. His eyes flashed from side to side, as if looking for an escape. He looked as though he wanted to run more than anything in the world.
"Are you." Mister Sticks put both hands into the pockets of his jacket and straightened up as best he could. He towered over the other two; he must have had at least a foot over each of them. He felt as though he should be worried, intimidated, slightly wary of the glinting blade in the teen's hands. He wasn't. Everything was calm and simple.
The young man shook his head frantically, but said, "Yes. Yeah." There was a moment of strangled, terrified silence, and then a quiet, "I'm sorry."
He stepped forward, lurching almost as crazily as Mister Sticks when he walked. He seemed to be fighting with himself over whether to attack or retreat.
It was so easy. One step forward, bring the right arm up to deflect the blade, left hand comes around to grip the wrist, twist until you hear the snap, catch the knife in your still-moving right, spin it in uneven fingers, and push.
The flesh offered hardly any resistance at all.
The kid let out a soft sound, like a cross between a groan and a sigh, and slumped to the floor. Mister Sticks let him fall, then straightened up again and turned his head to look at Penny.
She gave a soft squeak and pressed herself further back into the wall. Her eyes were wide and fearful, locked firmly on the body at his feet. He nudged it with the tip of one boot.
"It's okay," he rasped. "He's dead."
"Y-you..." She gasped. "You killed him."
"It was that or have him take you away." He shrugged. It all seemed so simple. "We don't have time to waste with him. There'll be more."
She stared wildly at him. He could see her thinking, but he couldn't imagine what it was that she was wrestling with. He had done what he had to do. He had protected her.
There was a dull, rising sound from outside. After a second, he identified it as the sound of a police siren.
There was no more time. In one motion, he stepped forward and seized her arm again. "Come on," he said. "There are more coming." And he turned to pull her along behind him, out into the streets.
Wednesday, June 19, 2013
Eight
The entire house was almost as she remembered it.
Even as she fought the feeling of sickening vertigo in her head, Penny Columbine could see the slight differences. The remnants of her earlier panic attack couldn't conceal them from her, even when she stopped at the top of the staircase to lean against the wall and cover her face with her hands for a few seconds just to get a breather.
The whole place was... nicer than it should be, she knew. Her house had been slightly worn down and lonely-looking, not precisely unkempt but definitely showing signs of age. This one was clean and neat and, aside from the door that Mister Sticks had kicked in, unblemished.
Well, almost unblemished. She lowered her face from her hands and looked into the bedroom. It wasn't her bedroom. Hers was never without a few discarded clothes scattered about. And this one had a bouquet on the nightstand.
It wasn't a real bouquet. Each of the flowers was crafted out of some sort of brass, like the kitschy little handmade things she saw at garage sales. And, despite their metallic composition, each of them managed to look wilted and dessicated.
There was a small note taped to the side of the vase. She hesitated a moment, then stepped forward. She wasn't surprised to see the familiar writing there.
To My Penny
- Ethan
There was a tiny smiling face drawn to the side of it.
Vertigo welled up inside her head again, and she sat back on the bed to cover her eyes. She wasn't going to cry. Or throw up. The two of them were fighting inside her gut, trying to force her into some sort of reaction, but she was in control.
Five. Two. Five. Two. Five...
She had thrown the flowers out. And they hadn't been brass. But that was the note that had been on them, right down to the happy smiling face, the little face that had seemed to be as mocking as it was sincere. Disgust and confusion clenched her stomach like a fist.
With her eyes still covered, and still breathing in slow, measured time, she reached out and pushed the vase off of the nightstand.
It didn't break. The fall wasn't far enough for that. The only sound was a small, unsatisfying clunk.
Trembling, she stood up and shuffled into the bathroom. She didn't bother to grab a change of clothes. She didn't want to wear anything from this place. It wasn't her house, however much it wanted to be. Even the suit was better than that.
The shower worked, at least. It was so hot that it stung her skin, but she didn't care. She even liked it, a little. The minor discomfort gave her something tangible and manageable to focus on while she scrubbed.
The greasepaint took longer to remove than she had expected, but the rest went quickly. She scrubbed the dirt and sweat from her skin, taking special care around the scratches that the scarecrow had left on her wrist. Her fingers were slightly bloody as well, from when she had struck out at it during her panic attack, but they weren't in too bad of a shape, considering.
Then she heard the scraping.
It was high and thin and keening, like a knife being drawn across metal. And it was coming from the mirror just beside the stall.
Something was scratching on the back side of the mirror.
The side of the stall was glass. She stared through its misted surface, too petrified to move, as a phrase etched itself on the glass.
NEVER
FAR
She wanted to scream, but the panic was back, seizing her throat in an iron grip and stifling her voice. She couldn't even look away from the mirror. It was here. It was going to kill her again, and this time she wouldn't wake up, she had broken the cycle and she would die horribly-
There was a loud thudding sound from the staircase, followed by another and another, a series of them in rapid ascension. A moment later, she heard the bedroom door burst open, and then a strike like a hammer blow on the bathroom door.
"Penny? Penny!"
The scarecrow's voice. A little voice in the back of her head breathed a sigh of relief, but the rest of her still couldn't bring itself to speak.
Then the door exploded inward as the wooden man's boot crashed through it. Mister Sticks forced his way through the remnants.
The jack-o'-lantern head swiveled grotesquely, the black pits of its eyes scanning the room, while the rest of the disfigured form hunched like an animal. Its hands were like claws, long and thin and pointed, and the jagged grin had a desperate, predatory edge.
She screamed.
Even as she fought the feeling of sickening vertigo in her head, Penny Columbine could see the slight differences. The remnants of her earlier panic attack couldn't conceal them from her, even when she stopped at the top of the staircase to lean against the wall and cover her face with her hands for a few seconds just to get a breather.
The whole place was... nicer than it should be, she knew. Her house had been slightly worn down and lonely-looking, not precisely unkempt but definitely showing signs of age. This one was clean and neat and, aside from the door that Mister Sticks had kicked in, unblemished.
Well, almost unblemished. She lowered her face from her hands and looked into the bedroom. It wasn't her bedroom. Hers was never without a few discarded clothes scattered about. And this one had a bouquet on the nightstand.
It wasn't a real bouquet. Each of the flowers was crafted out of some sort of brass, like the kitschy little handmade things she saw at garage sales. And, despite their metallic composition, each of them managed to look wilted and dessicated.
There was a small note taped to the side of the vase. She hesitated a moment, then stepped forward. She wasn't surprised to see the familiar writing there.
To My Penny
- Ethan
There was a tiny smiling face drawn to the side of it.
Vertigo welled up inside her head again, and she sat back on the bed to cover her eyes. She wasn't going to cry. Or throw up. The two of them were fighting inside her gut, trying to force her into some sort of reaction, but she was in control.
Five. Two. Five. Two. Five...
She had thrown the flowers out. And they hadn't been brass. But that was the note that had been on them, right down to the happy smiling face, the little face that had seemed to be as mocking as it was sincere. Disgust and confusion clenched her stomach like a fist.
With her eyes still covered, and still breathing in slow, measured time, she reached out and pushed the vase off of the nightstand.
It didn't break. The fall wasn't far enough for that. The only sound was a small, unsatisfying clunk.
Trembling, she stood up and shuffled into the bathroom. She didn't bother to grab a change of clothes. She didn't want to wear anything from this place. It wasn't her house, however much it wanted to be. Even the suit was better than that.
The shower worked, at least. It was so hot that it stung her skin, but she didn't care. She even liked it, a little. The minor discomfort gave her something tangible and manageable to focus on while she scrubbed.
The greasepaint took longer to remove than she had expected, but the rest went quickly. She scrubbed the dirt and sweat from her skin, taking special care around the scratches that the scarecrow had left on her wrist. Her fingers were slightly bloody as well, from when she had struck out at it during her panic attack, but they weren't in too bad of a shape, considering.
Then she heard the scraping.
It was high and thin and keening, like a knife being drawn across metal. And it was coming from the mirror just beside the stall.
Something was scratching on the back side of the mirror.
The side of the stall was glass. She stared through its misted surface, too petrified to move, as a phrase etched itself on the glass.
NEVER
FAR
She wanted to scream, but the panic was back, seizing her throat in an iron grip and stifling her voice. She couldn't even look away from the mirror. It was here. It was going to kill her again, and this time she wouldn't wake up, she had broken the cycle and she would die horribly-
There was a loud thudding sound from the staircase, followed by another and another, a series of them in rapid ascension. A moment later, she heard the bedroom door burst open, and then a strike like a hammer blow on the bathroom door.
"Penny? Penny!"
The scarecrow's voice. A little voice in the back of her head breathed a sigh of relief, but the rest of her still couldn't bring itself to speak.
Then the door exploded inward as the wooden man's boot crashed through it. Mister Sticks forced his way through the remnants.
The jack-o'-lantern head swiveled grotesquely, the black pits of its eyes scanning the room, while the rest of the disfigured form hunched like an animal. Its hands were like claws, long and thin and pointed, and the jagged grin had a desperate, predatory edge.
She screamed.
------
Now she was seated on the edge of the bed, dressed again, with her face buried in her hands as she struggled to control her breathing. She could hear the uneven footsteps of the scarecrow pacing the room around her.
"Five, two, five," it kept repeating. "Five, two, five..."
"I know," she managed, "the rhythm. I know." She took another breath, held it, and then released. She couldn't stop the shuddering, but the screaming had stopped. It was progress.
There was a soft sound, and the scarecrow's pacing stopped. She heard another slight noise, and then it said: "You threw the flowers away."
She opened her left eye and peered up through a slit between her fingers. "What?"
Mister Sticks was standing there, holding the tiny note that had been taped to the side of the vase. He was turning it over and over in his fingers, as if he'd never seen anything like it before.
"You threw them away," he said. "I don't think... I don't think you should have done that."
She groaned and shut her eye again. "I just knocked them over."
"The real ones, I mean."
Her eye shot open again. Now Mister Sticks was looking at her, the note held unregarded between two claw-like fingers. "You threw them away," he repeated. "And the note. I remember that. Why did you throw them away?"
She blinked once, and the rhythm slipped. She took a few seconds to force herself back into it, then shook her head. "It's not important," she said. Her voice was small and quiet.
"But the flowers are here," said Mister Sticks. "I think-"
"Because I didn't want them," she said, her voice sharp and cutting. "They weren't from anyone I wanted flowers from, okay? I didn't want them, so I threw them out, and now these ones are here with the same damn note. I don't know why, and I don't care. This place is messing with my head and I don't want to think about Ethan right now, okay? Just let it go."
At the end, her voice broke, and she shut her eye again.
She heard the floor creak as Mister Sticks shifted from side to side on his uneven legs. "I think you're going to need to think about him," he began, after a minute. He didn't say anything else, though, because he was interrupted by another sound.
There was a small television on the dresser.
It had just turned on by itself.
"Our top story tonight..."
Penny opened her eyes - both of them, this time - and lowered her hands. She knew that voice.
There, on the screen, was a man wearing a neatly-pressed suit. A man that seemed to be all bright eyes and gleaming grin.
The ringmaster.
Monday, June 17, 2013
Seven
The thing called Mister Sticks felt Penny bend slightly to feel around for whatever it was that she had just stepped onto. She gave a soft grunt of surprise, then muttered, "It's a grate. Set into... concrete? Covered in grime, too. Ech. Disgusting."
She straightened up, and he heard the soft rustling of her wiping her hand on the jacket of her suit. "We're not in the forest any more," she said flatly. "Feel around. I think we're in an alley or something, but fuck me if I know how."
He lifted the one of his overlong arms that wasn't busy keeping him anchored to the clown and took a few shuffling steps around. His wooden fingers came into contact with something that, while indeed covered in dirt and grit, was undoubtedly a brick wall. A moment later, there was a loud bang as one of his knees impacted the side of a rusted dumpster.
"Well, this is weird," he rasped.
"This entire place is weird," said Penny sharply. Her voice was still slightly strained, as if she were fighting to keep control of herself but simultaneously trying to hide that fact from him. "Walking into a city without seeing it is hardly weirder than anything else. Hold on, I think I see something."
He saw it too, just a second after her. There was a distant, faint light in front of them, outlining the mouth of the alley. Wordlessly, the two of them crept forward until the dimness became clear enough for them to tell what it was: the glow from a nearby house's window.
It was a city, or at least a suburb. The street they had just walked onto stretched away to the left and right, curving slightly until it intersected with another, larger one some distance away on their left and disappeared over a hill on the right. There were no cars, but there were lights on in some of the houses.
And, at regular intervals along the side of the road, tall lampposts with large brass flowers as lights.
"The forest is gone," said Penny's voice. He looked down. She had turned around and was staring back into the alley from whence they had arrived. "It's a dead end."
He turned as well. It was, indeed, a dead end; the alley just behind the grating was blocked by a decidedly solid-looking brick wall.
"It's making a new one," he said. "Wherever we are. You said it would change every time you woke up. And now it's changed anyway, even though you didn't-"
He stopped. The thick makeup on Penny's face was smeared heavily, and had run in large tracks down her cheeks. She had been crying - was still crying, he saw. A large tear was running down her face, and she was blinking rapidly. Her right hand was clenched tightly around a set of scratches on her left wrist, squeezing sporadically. She won't be okay for hours.
"Come on," he said. "Let's find somewhere to hide out. Maybe we can get into one of these houses."
She snorted. "Yeah, right," she muttered. "Like anyone will let us in."
But she fell into step beside him as he started off down the street, towards the hill. It was high ground, the highest that he could see, and might let them catch a glimpse of an easier path towards their destination. And there were houses up there, so if nothing else panned out they could at least find somewhere to rest.
He became aware, gradually, that Penny was staring around wildly at every house they passed.
"What is it?"
"I know these houses," she said. Her hand clenched tightly around her wrist again. "But they're all in the wrong places. And the streets are all labeled wrong, or missing. The signs say this is Cockbill Street, but the houses are from Everton, and Ash is supposed to come before Oak, and West Main is missing entirely." Her voice became more rapid and edged with frantic urgency with each word.
He looked around at the houses. There was a faint twinge of familiarity in the back of his brain, but that feeling had been triggered by almost everything that he had seen since waking up in the forest. "What is this place supposed to be, then?"
"My hometown," said Penny. Her voice was high and quiet, more a squeak than anything. "And my house should be up on the hill."
He nodded. There didn't seem to be anything else to say, so the two of them walked in silence for a few minutes. Then they reached the bottom of the hill, and he spotted the other house.
It was tiny, hardly more than a shack, with a glass door that had been cracked heavily at some point in the past and then never repaired. The windows were all dark and covered in grime, the shingles on the roof were falling off, and the aluminum siding was overgrown with Virginia creeper vines. The car sitting in the driveway was an ancient-looking Oldsmobile, covered in rust and with half the tires obviously deflated.
He glanced around. All of the other houses in the area were, while not exactly opulent, at least well cared for, and larger.
"I don't like this place," Penny muttered. He looked down. She had wrapped both arms tightly around herself, and had both eyes squeezed shut. "It's wrong. It's all broken. It's not my home. It's a mock-up. It's creepy."
The shack pulled his gaze back to it. He wanted to go inside, to see why it was so different - but there was Penny, obviously just a few moments away from panicking again. She was fighting, but...
"Come on," he said, taking her shoulder again. "Even if it's a mock-up, we can get in your house and rest for a while."
She nodded slightly, and started walking again.
Eventually, they reached the top of the hill, and Penny wordlessly pulled him towards the third house on the right. It wasn't particularly large, but it was well-kept, like the rest. It was a two-story affair, as well, though it wasn't very broad.
There were no lights on inside.
Penny walked up to the door, then stopped, frowning. "I don't have my damn keys," she said. "How are we supposed to get in?"
He staggered up beside her, leaned back for a moment, lifted one awkward leg, and kicked the door so hard that the frame flew into splinters as it swung open.
"Like that," he said flatly.
She stared up at him for a moment, her expression entirely blank, then shook her head and walked in, picking her way carefully over the fragments of wood. "I feel like I should care," she said, "but honestly, I just want to curl up on my couch with some ice cream."
He had to stoop to make his way through the remains of the door frame. Inside, Penny flicked on a few lights, bathing the hallway they were in with warm yellow light.
"At least this is normal," he heard her mutter to herself, just before disappearing into a side room.
It wasn't a particularly lavish house. There was a living room with a television and a leather sofa, a kitchen with a refrigerator and island counter, a sitting room with a few small bookshelves, and a dining room with a table barely large enough for two and a mirror on one wall.
There was also a staircase leading up to the second story. Penny was stomping her way up, taking off the outer layer of her clothing as she went. The shoes, jacket, and hat she had worn were already discarded carelessly by the banister.
"I," she called, without looking back at him, "am going to take a shower. Eat whatever you want, I don't care. Just leave me some ice cream." Then she disappeared.
He thought about following her, or at least exploring the second story, but something in his head told him that she'd rather be alone at the moment. So he lurched into the kitchen instead.
To his own surprise, he wasn't hungry. Come to it, he wasn't sure that he could be hungry given his current circumstances, but whatever the answer to that, he wasn't at the moment. He checked the contents of the refrigerator anyway. Normal.
He wandered out again, into the room with the television. It worked as well - at least, so far as turning it on. A commercial for Dawn dish soap was playing. When he pushed one of the buttons marked CHANNEL, however, nothing happened. He tried the remote as well, with similar results. After three minutes of consecutive uninteresting commercials, he gave up and stalked into the sitting room instead.
The bookshelves were all about waist-height, and packed to bursting with everything from cookbooks to high fantasy. He selected one of the latter at random - the title proclaimed it to be The Sword of Shanarra - and flipped it open.
I sat in the sun on a bench; the animal within me licking the chops of memory; the spiritual side a little drowsed, promising subsequent penitence, but not yet moved to begin.
He stopped.
That was all that was legible on the page. The rest seemed... foggy, as if the words were just out of sight even when he looked directly at them.
He turned the page.
You must suffer me to go my own dark way.
Another.
I had learned to dwell with pleasure, as a beloved daydream, on the thought of the separation of these elements. If each, I told myself, could be housed in separate identities, life would be relieved of all that was unbearable; the unjust might go his way, delivered from the aspirations and remorse of his more upright twin; and the just could walk steadfastly and securely on his upward path, doing the good things in which he found his pleasure, and no longer exposed to disgrace and penitence by the hands of this extraneous evil. It was the curse of mankind that these incongruous faggots were thus bound together--that in the agonised womb of consciousness, these polar twins should be continuously struggling. How, then were they dissociated?
Every word was familiar to him, every phrase another sparkle in the shattered glass of his memory. He knew these words.
He turned another page. There were two legible snippets on this one.
There comes an end to all things; the most capacious measure is filled at last; and this brief condescension to evil finally destroyed the balance of my soul.
Here then, as I lay down the pen and proceed to seal up my confession, I bring the life of that unhappy Henry Jekyll to an end.
There was a loud, wailing shriek from the dining room. It wasn't Penny's voice, or any voice at all, but the sound of metal scraping on metal, like a power saw through a wrought-iron fence. He dropped the book and rushed in.
The noise stopped just as he spotted the mirror. There, etched into the glass as if scratched onto the back side of the mirror, were the words:
SHE'S
MINE
She straightened up, and he heard the soft rustling of her wiping her hand on the jacket of her suit. "We're not in the forest any more," she said flatly. "Feel around. I think we're in an alley or something, but fuck me if I know how."
He lifted the one of his overlong arms that wasn't busy keeping him anchored to the clown and took a few shuffling steps around. His wooden fingers came into contact with something that, while indeed covered in dirt and grit, was undoubtedly a brick wall. A moment later, there was a loud bang as one of his knees impacted the side of a rusted dumpster.
"Well, this is weird," he rasped.
"This entire place is weird," said Penny sharply. Her voice was still slightly strained, as if she were fighting to keep control of herself but simultaneously trying to hide that fact from him. "Walking into a city without seeing it is hardly weirder than anything else. Hold on, I think I see something."
He saw it too, just a second after her. There was a distant, faint light in front of them, outlining the mouth of the alley. Wordlessly, the two of them crept forward until the dimness became clear enough for them to tell what it was: the glow from a nearby house's window.
It was a city, or at least a suburb. The street they had just walked onto stretched away to the left and right, curving slightly until it intersected with another, larger one some distance away on their left and disappeared over a hill on the right. There were no cars, but there were lights on in some of the houses.
And, at regular intervals along the side of the road, tall lampposts with large brass flowers as lights.
"The forest is gone," said Penny's voice. He looked down. She had turned around and was staring back into the alley from whence they had arrived. "It's a dead end."
He turned as well. It was, indeed, a dead end; the alley just behind the grating was blocked by a decidedly solid-looking brick wall.
"It's making a new one," he said. "Wherever we are. You said it would change every time you woke up. And now it's changed anyway, even though you didn't-"
He stopped. The thick makeup on Penny's face was smeared heavily, and had run in large tracks down her cheeks. She had been crying - was still crying, he saw. A large tear was running down her face, and she was blinking rapidly. Her right hand was clenched tightly around a set of scratches on her left wrist, squeezing sporadically. She won't be okay for hours.
"Come on," he said. "Let's find somewhere to hide out. Maybe we can get into one of these houses."
She snorted. "Yeah, right," she muttered. "Like anyone will let us in."
But she fell into step beside him as he started off down the street, towards the hill. It was high ground, the highest that he could see, and might let them catch a glimpse of an easier path towards their destination. And there were houses up there, so if nothing else panned out they could at least find somewhere to rest.
He became aware, gradually, that Penny was staring around wildly at every house they passed.
"What is it?"
"I know these houses," she said. Her hand clenched tightly around her wrist again. "But they're all in the wrong places. And the streets are all labeled wrong, or missing. The signs say this is Cockbill Street, but the houses are from Everton, and Ash is supposed to come before Oak, and West Main is missing entirely." Her voice became more rapid and edged with frantic urgency with each word.
He looked around at the houses. There was a faint twinge of familiarity in the back of his brain, but that feeling had been triggered by almost everything that he had seen since waking up in the forest. "What is this place supposed to be, then?"
"My hometown," said Penny. Her voice was high and quiet, more a squeak than anything. "And my house should be up on the hill."
He nodded. There didn't seem to be anything else to say, so the two of them walked in silence for a few minutes. Then they reached the bottom of the hill, and he spotted the other house.
It was tiny, hardly more than a shack, with a glass door that had been cracked heavily at some point in the past and then never repaired. The windows were all dark and covered in grime, the shingles on the roof were falling off, and the aluminum siding was overgrown with Virginia creeper vines. The car sitting in the driveway was an ancient-looking Oldsmobile, covered in rust and with half the tires obviously deflated.
He glanced around. All of the other houses in the area were, while not exactly opulent, at least well cared for, and larger.
"I don't like this place," Penny muttered. He looked down. She had wrapped both arms tightly around herself, and had both eyes squeezed shut. "It's wrong. It's all broken. It's not my home. It's a mock-up. It's creepy."
The shack pulled his gaze back to it. He wanted to go inside, to see why it was so different - but there was Penny, obviously just a few moments away from panicking again. She was fighting, but...
"Come on," he said, taking her shoulder again. "Even if it's a mock-up, we can get in your house and rest for a while."
She nodded slightly, and started walking again.
Eventually, they reached the top of the hill, and Penny wordlessly pulled him towards the third house on the right. It wasn't particularly large, but it was well-kept, like the rest. It was a two-story affair, as well, though it wasn't very broad.
There were no lights on inside.
Penny walked up to the door, then stopped, frowning. "I don't have my damn keys," she said. "How are we supposed to get in?"
He staggered up beside her, leaned back for a moment, lifted one awkward leg, and kicked the door so hard that the frame flew into splinters as it swung open.
"Like that," he said flatly.
She stared up at him for a moment, her expression entirely blank, then shook her head and walked in, picking her way carefully over the fragments of wood. "I feel like I should care," she said, "but honestly, I just want to curl up on my couch with some ice cream."
He had to stoop to make his way through the remains of the door frame. Inside, Penny flicked on a few lights, bathing the hallway they were in with warm yellow light.
"At least this is normal," he heard her mutter to herself, just before disappearing into a side room.
It wasn't a particularly lavish house. There was a living room with a television and a leather sofa, a kitchen with a refrigerator and island counter, a sitting room with a few small bookshelves, and a dining room with a table barely large enough for two and a mirror on one wall.
There was also a staircase leading up to the second story. Penny was stomping her way up, taking off the outer layer of her clothing as she went. The shoes, jacket, and hat she had worn were already discarded carelessly by the banister.
"I," she called, without looking back at him, "am going to take a shower. Eat whatever you want, I don't care. Just leave me some ice cream." Then she disappeared.
He thought about following her, or at least exploring the second story, but something in his head told him that she'd rather be alone at the moment. So he lurched into the kitchen instead.
To his own surprise, he wasn't hungry. Come to it, he wasn't sure that he could be hungry given his current circumstances, but whatever the answer to that, he wasn't at the moment. He checked the contents of the refrigerator anyway. Normal.
He wandered out again, into the room with the television. It worked as well - at least, so far as turning it on. A commercial for Dawn dish soap was playing. When he pushed one of the buttons marked CHANNEL, however, nothing happened. He tried the remote as well, with similar results. After three minutes of consecutive uninteresting commercials, he gave up and stalked into the sitting room instead.
The bookshelves were all about waist-height, and packed to bursting with everything from cookbooks to high fantasy. He selected one of the latter at random - the title proclaimed it to be The Sword of Shanarra - and flipped it open.
I sat in the sun on a bench; the animal within me licking the chops of memory; the spiritual side a little drowsed, promising subsequent penitence, but not yet moved to begin.
He stopped.
That was all that was legible on the page. The rest seemed... foggy, as if the words were just out of sight even when he looked directly at them.
He turned the page.
You must suffer me to go my own dark way.
Another.
I had learned to dwell with pleasure, as a beloved daydream, on the thought of the separation of these elements. If each, I told myself, could be housed in separate identities, life would be relieved of all that was unbearable; the unjust might go his way, delivered from the aspirations and remorse of his more upright twin; and the just could walk steadfastly and securely on his upward path, doing the good things in which he found his pleasure, and no longer exposed to disgrace and penitence by the hands of this extraneous evil. It was the curse of mankind that these incongruous faggots were thus bound together--that in the agonised womb of consciousness, these polar twins should be continuously struggling. How, then were they dissociated?
Every word was familiar to him, every phrase another sparkle in the shattered glass of his memory. He knew these words.
He turned another page. There were two legible snippets on this one.
There comes an end to all things; the most capacious measure is filled at last; and this brief condescension to evil finally destroyed the balance of my soul.
Here then, as I lay down the pen and proceed to seal up my confession, I bring the life of that unhappy Henry Jekyll to an end.
There was a loud, wailing shriek from the dining room. It wasn't Penny's voice, or any voice at all, but the sound of metal scraping on metal, like a power saw through a wrought-iron fence. He dropped the book and rushed in.
The noise stopped just as he spotted the mirror. There, etched into the glass as if scratched onto the back side of the mirror, were the words:
SHE'S
MINE
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
Six
He had to take on an even more juddering, uneven gait than usual in order to walk alongside the woman named Penny Columbine. Her legs were shorter than his, and despite her apparent determination to stay slightly ahead of him, she didn't move very quickly.
There were still a few brass flowers scattered through the branches, even this far from the circus. In the dim light, he took the opportunity to study her.
No one would have called Penny Columbine beautiful, even if she hadn't been wearing a deliberately unflattering outfit and grotesque makeup. Her skin was pale and sallow-looking in the places where the whiteface didn't reach, and her face itself was slightly round and clownish, even under the red nose and white greasepaint. But she carried herself well, and the severity of her dress, contrasted with the vivid red of her hair, gave her a striking appearance.
Everything about her seemed familiar, but he couldn't remember why.
Her sharp, icy blue eyes snapped around towards him, and she scowled. "The hell are you staring at?"
"You," he answered flatly.
"What, you've never seen a girl before?" She gave a derisive snort and looked forward again, still trudging through the undergrowth. "Well, don't try anything, mister. I may be small, but-"
"I've seen you before." The sound of his voice still caught him somewhat off-guard. It sounded hollow, like a recording rather than someone speaking. And his mouth - what counted as his mouth - didn't move. "I remember your name. Bits of your appearance. But I don't know where from."
"Yeah, well, I've never seen you before in my life." She shoved a low-hanging branch roughly aside and forced her way past. A few brass flowers dropped to the forest floor, dangling from a small green wire. "And I'd remember meeting a Wizard of Oz character, so I've got no idea where you think you know me from."
He shrugged, and kicked aside a small stone. "That's why I wanted to talk to you," he said. "I don't remember anything. I want to know how I got here. And you seem to be in the center of all this." Another low-hanging branch forced him to duck awkwardly to pass. "Maybe if you tell me what you know, I'll start remembering things."
Penny didn't answer at first. Anyone watching less intently might have missed the slight shudder, like a full-body flinch, but he didn't. Eventually, she said, "I already told you. I woke up here, with the same damn stars over head, and then I got killed by that thing. Over and over."
"The Rake," he said, without thinking.
"Whatever it's called." She stomped ahead with vicious force, crushing twigs and branches underfoot. He sped up slightly.
"But that doesn't explain anything," he said. "You said things were different every time. How?"
Again, there was silence for a few seconds. Penny continued to thrash her way through the undergrowth without looking at him. Then she said, "You saw the circus."
"Yes."
"The first time, it was a museum," she said. "I was a teacher taking her class on a field trip. And Mister Face was the curator. It was one of the exhibits."
She fell into silence again.
Out here, the brass flowers were becoming more and more sparse, and the trees were becoming thicker. There was almost no light to navigate by. The two of them pressed on regardless.
"Mister Face?" he asked.
"Ringmaster," grunted Penny, as she ducked under another branch. "He's always there, or something like him. Somebody who's all grin and flash. Fancy outfits, big words, position of authority. He never died before, either, if that's what you're going to ask."
It was almost perfectly black now. He took a few rapid steps, then dropped a hand onto Penny's shoulder. She didn't jump. She just kept walking.
"So you," he said, "The Rake, and the ringmaster."
"Yeah." Their progress had slowed to a crawl in the darkness. He could feel Penny's body sway as she groped blindly ahead, and hear the shuffling of her careful walk forward.
"And you never tried to talk to them?"
"What, stop and try to reason with the thing that's ripping my throat out?" she snapped. "Or with the crazy guy who sets it on me every-"
She stopped. He pulled to a halt behind her, just an inch away, his hand still gripping her shoulder tightly.
There was no light any more, no light at all.
"Hey," she whispered.
"I'm here," he answered.
"There's no more grass."
He shifted slightly. There wasn't. There was ground under his foot, but it felt perfectly flat and smooth. And the air was becoming chillier.
He heard Penny's breathing become quicker and more ragged. Her shoulder shook slightly under his hand. He squeezed it, gently.
"Stay calm." Silently, he cursed his voice. It was too high and cold and raspy to be comforting. But he felt her nod anyway.
"I'm calm," she said. Her voice had a slightly strangled quality to it. "I just... don't like this. I feel like we did something wrong. Very wrong." There was another pause, and then, almost too quietly to be heard, she breathed, "I don't think you were supposed to save me."
He took one awkward step forward, around her, and lowered his hand to find hers. He gripped it tightly in his wooden fingers, then began to shuffle forward again. "But I did," he said flatly. Despite the darkness, his voice was firm. "I saved you, and now I'm going to keep you safe. I need you right now. You're my only clue."
"Oh, is that what I am?" Her voice was suddenly sharp and brittle as she began to stumble along behind him. The knife edge of panic bled into every syllable. "A clue? Great, yeah, I feel really safe now, I'm stuck in the dark in a crazy place that keeps murdering me being hunted by the boogeyman and the only person who will help me is just doing it because I'm useful!"
Panic attack. The words flashed across his mind. She has panic attacks. Breathing exercises-
He felt her hand pulling away from his, felt her trying to flee. He gripped tighter and stopped walking, then tugged on her arm and pulled her closer.
"Get off of me!" Her voice was a shriek now. He answered by releasing her hand, but, before she could run, putting both hands on her shoulders.
"Penny," he said. His voice was calm and even. Something about this felt familiar. "Penny, listen to me."
He felt one of her hands strike his torso. She was flailing desperately at him, but his wooden body barely felt it. "Penny," he said, more insistently. "Stop. I'm not going to hurt you. Just breathe. Remember your breathing exercises? Five, two, five. Breathe."
The next punch stopped on his chest and stayed there. He heard her breathing raggedly, but there was the hint of a rhythm there. The snatches of memory flashed across his mind again: she knows the count, she knows the problem, she fights it.
"That's good," he said, after a few seconds. "You're winning. Five-two-five. Concentrate."
"H-how-" She inhaled sharply. "How do you know-"
"Just breathe," he said firmly. "I don't know how I know. But we'll find out. Breathe."
For almost five full minutes, he stood there, stock-still, gripping Penny's shoulders and listening to her fight for control. After a while, he heard her mutter, "I think I'm okay."
Not for hours. Another flash of memory across his mind. But she'll say she is anyway.
He didn't say it. Instead, he said, "Good."
There was silence again, for another few moments. Then he heard her mumble, "Thanks."
"I told you I'd keep you safe," he said. "You okay to keep walking?"
"Yeah." One of her hands came up and gripped his wrist again, and she turned to shuffle forward again.
"We're gonna have to come up with a name for you," she said, after a few minutes' movement.
He shrugged in the blackness and said, "You called me Mister Sticks before."
"It was a joke. That's a stupid name."
"It's the only one I've got, right now."
She gave an exasperated sigh. Something in his mind registered that she was trying to distract herself with unimportant things, deflecting the anxiety by focusing on his name.
"Fine," she said eventually. "Mister Sticks. So tell me, Mister Sticks, can you see where the hell we're going?"
"No."
"That's great."
Almost at the same moment she said it, there was a soft clang: the sound of someone stepping onto metal.
There were still a few brass flowers scattered through the branches, even this far from the circus. In the dim light, he took the opportunity to study her.
No one would have called Penny Columbine beautiful, even if she hadn't been wearing a deliberately unflattering outfit and grotesque makeup. Her skin was pale and sallow-looking in the places where the whiteface didn't reach, and her face itself was slightly round and clownish, even under the red nose and white greasepaint. But she carried herself well, and the severity of her dress, contrasted with the vivid red of her hair, gave her a striking appearance.
Everything about her seemed familiar, but he couldn't remember why.
Her sharp, icy blue eyes snapped around towards him, and she scowled. "The hell are you staring at?"
"You," he answered flatly.
"What, you've never seen a girl before?" She gave a derisive snort and looked forward again, still trudging through the undergrowth. "Well, don't try anything, mister. I may be small, but-"
"I've seen you before." The sound of his voice still caught him somewhat off-guard. It sounded hollow, like a recording rather than someone speaking. And his mouth - what counted as his mouth - didn't move. "I remember your name. Bits of your appearance. But I don't know where from."
"Yeah, well, I've never seen you before in my life." She shoved a low-hanging branch roughly aside and forced her way past. A few brass flowers dropped to the forest floor, dangling from a small green wire. "And I'd remember meeting a Wizard of Oz character, so I've got no idea where you think you know me from."
He shrugged, and kicked aside a small stone. "That's why I wanted to talk to you," he said. "I don't remember anything. I want to know how I got here. And you seem to be in the center of all this." Another low-hanging branch forced him to duck awkwardly to pass. "Maybe if you tell me what you know, I'll start remembering things."
Penny didn't answer at first. Anyone watching less intently might have missed the slight shudder, like a full-body flinch, but he didn't. Eventually, she said, "I already told you. I woke up here, with the same damn stars over head, and then I got killed by that thing. Over and over."
"The Rake," he said, without thinking.
"Whatever it's called." She stomped ahead with vicious force, crushing twigs and branches underfoot. He sped up slightly.
"But that doesn't explain anything," he said. "You said things were different every time. How?"
Again, there was silence for a few seconds. Penny continued to thrash her way through the undergrowth without looking at him. Then she said, "You saw the circus."
"Yes."
"The first time, it was a museum," she said. "I was a teacher taking her class on a field trip. And Mister Face was the curator. It was one of the exhibits."
She fell into silence again.
Out here, the brass flowers were becoming more and more sparse, and the trees were becoming thicker. There was almost no light to navigate by. The two of them pressed on regardless.
"Mister Face?" he asked.
"Ringmaster," grunted Penny, as she ducked under another branch. "He's always there, or something like him. Somebody who's all grin and flash. Fancy outfits, big words, position of authority. He never died before, either, if that's what you're going to ask."
It was almost perfectly black now. He took a few rapid steps, then dropped a hand onto Penny's shoulder. She didn't jump. She just kept walking.
"So you," he said, "The Rake, and the ringmaster."
"Yeah." Their progress had slowed to a crawl in the darkness. He could feel Penny's body sway as she groped blindly ahead, and hear the shuffling of her careful walk forward.
"And you never tried to talk to them?"
"What, stop and try to reason with the thing that's ripping my throat out?" she snapped. "Or with the crazy guy who sets it on me every-"
She stopped. He pulled to a halt behind her, just an inch away, his hand still gripping her shoulder tightly.
There was no light any more, no light at all.
"Hey," she whispered.
"I'm here," he answered.
"There's no more grass."
He shifted slightly. There wasn't. There was ground under his foot, but it felt perfectly flat and smooth. And the air was becoming chillier.
He heard Penny's breathing become quicker and more ragged. Her shoulder shook slightly under his hand. He squeezed it, gently.
"Stay calm." Silently, he cursed his voice. It was too high and cold and raspy to be comforting. But he felt her nod anyway.
"I'm calm," she said. Her voice had a slightly strangled quality to it. "I just... don't like this. I feel like we did something wrong. Very wrong." There was another pause, and then, almost too quietly to be heard, she breathed, "I don't think you were supposed to save me."
He took one awkward step forward, around her, and lowered his hand to find hers. He gripped it tightly in his wooden fingers, then began to shuffle forward again. "But I did," he said flatly. Despite the darkness, his voice was firm. "I saved you, and now I'm going to keep you safe. I need you right now. You're my only clue."
"Oh, is that what I am?" Her voice was suddenly sharp and brittle as she began to stumble along behind him. The knife edge of panic bled into every syllable. "A clue? Great, yeah, I feel really safe now, I'm stuck in the dark in a crazy place that keeps murdering me being hunted by the boogeyman and the only person who will help me is just doing it because I'm useful!"
Panic attack. The words flashed across his mind. She has panic attacks. Breathing exercises-
He felt her hand pulling away from his, felt her trying to flee. He gripped tighter and stopped walking, then tugged on her arm and pulled her closer.
"Get off of me!" Her voice was a shriek now. He answered by releasing her hand, but, before she could run, putting both hands on her shoulders.
"Penny," he said. His voice was calm and even. Something about this felt familiar. "Penny, listen to me."
He felt one of her hands strike his torso. She was flailing desperately at him, but his wooden body barely felt it. "Penny," he said, more insistently. "Stop. I'm not going to hurt you. Just breathe. Remember your breathing exercises? Five, two, five. Breathe."
The next punch stopped on his chest and stayed there. He heard her breathing raggedly, but there was the hint of a rhythm there. The snatches of memory flashed across his mind again: she knows the count, she knows the problem, she fights it.
"That's good," he said, after a few seconds. "You're winning. Five-two-five. Concentrate."
"H-how-" She inhaled sharply. "How do you know-"
"Just breathe," he said firmly. "I don't know how I know. But we'll find out. Breathe."
For almost five full minutes, he stood there, stock-still, gripping Penny's shoulders and listening to her fight for control. After a while, he heard her mutter, "I think I'm okay."
Not for hours. Another flash of memory across his mind. But she'll say she is anyway.
He didn't say it. Instead, he said, "Good."
There was silence again, for another few moments. Then he heard her mumble, "Thanks."
"I told you I'd keep you safe," he said. "You okay to keep walking?"
"Yeah." One of her hands came up and gripped his wrist again, and she turned to shuffle forward again.
"We're gonna have to come up with a name for you," she said, after a few minutes' movement.
He shrugged in the blackness and said, "You called me Mister Sticks before."
"It was a joke. That's a stupid name."
"It's the only one I've got, right now."
She gave an exasperated sigh. Something in his mind registered that she was trying to distract herself with unimportant things, deflecting the anxiety by focusing on his name.
"Fine," she said eventually. "Mister Sticks. So tell me, Mister Sticks, can you see where the hell we're going?"
"No."
"That's great."
Almost at the same moment she said it, there was a soft clang: the sound of someone stepping onto metal.
Tuesday, June 11, 2013
Five
There was the sensation of broken glass.
The iron certainty that had filled Penny Whiteface's head until a moment ago was splintering apart, falling to pieces inside her head. This wasn't how it went.
Her shoulder screamed at her, louder even than the dull, icy pain in her wrist from the scarecrow-thing's grip. It was holding on hard, its grip tighter and more painful than a vise, and paying no attention to her discomfort. Its legs were long and uneven. She was nowhere near as tall. All she could do was stumble along in its wake and try not to let it rip her arm off.
It had simply brute-forced its way through the mob at the theater doors. Now it was dragging her back towards the carts, through the panicking crowds. She had dropped the whip somewhere back in the press of bodies. She had no weapon.
But... it hadn't tried to kill her. It appeared to be trying to save her.
It had saved her.
She could hear screams and the splintering of wood as the booths were broken and trampled in the mad rush, but those noises were fading now. There weren't as many people running through the carts. They were headed for the exits, into the forest.
The scarecrow-thing staggered to a halt in front of her cart and roughly hauled her around so that she was standing in front of it. When it took its hand off of her wrist, she saw a livid bruise already beginning to rise around the deep scratches that its claw-like fingers had left.
She stood perfectly still, staring up into the hollow jack-o'-lantern eyes, her expression carefully blank. It was the same expression she had worn during the show: stony impassiveness, with the slightest hint of disdain.
Confusion and fear fought for control of her features. She stifled them. She refused to break down now.
Instead she said, in a voice like a scalpel, "Who are you?"
The thing in front of her shifted slightly, rocking on its uneven legs. The leering, predatory grin on its carved face didn't change, but she thought she detected a hint of uncertainty there.
After a moment, the thing lifted its hands and slipped them into the pockets of its overlarge coat. Then it shrugged. It was a surprisingly expressive gesture on its deformed frame.
"I don't know." The carved mouth didn't move when it spoke. Its voice was high-pitched and cold, like a file being drawn across a rusted hinge or the creaking of old wood. Again, it appeared to hesitate, as if it was surprised at the sound.
She stared at it, waiting for something else, but it didn't speak again. It seemed to be waiting for her to react. Eventually, she gave in. "Then what do you want?"
"To talk to you." Its head swung from side to side slowly, as if looking around, but without eyes, it was difficult to tell. "I want to know who I am and how I got here. I remember some things, but not much." Another pause, but this time it spoke before she felt the urge to fill in the silence. "I remember your name."
She laughed, once. There was no humor in the sound. "Yeah?" She rubbed ruefully at the bruises and cuts on her wrist. "Well, that's weird, because it's not my name. It's a stage name. Penny Wise? Come on."
The thing just continued to watch her, swaying. It had the most emphatic silences she had ever heard.
"Penny Columbine," she said eventually. She opened her mouth to continue, but there was another scream from the crowd, longer, and with the sharp edge that indicated pain rather than fear. Her head snapped around towards the noise.
The scarecrow looked around as well. "It's still out there," it rasped. "We need to keep moving."
We, she noticed. Well, it was strong, and apparently wanted to keep her alive. And was either brave or suicidal. Good enough.
"Fine," she said sharply. "Where are we going?"
Something in her mind told her that she should have the answer to that question, but it was lost in the splintering sensation. Her brain felt as though someone has poured ice water into it. Her mind was crumbling.
"Into the woods." The thing slipped its hands out of its pockets and lurched off towards the trees. "Away from here." In the dim light, the jeering grin on its face seemed to mock her.
"Any better ideas than getting hopelessly lost?" she snapped, as she fell into step just behind it. Her wrist throbbed dully, and she grimaced angrily.
"You're the one who doesn't have amnesia," answered the thing flatly. "Tell me what you know about this place and we can figure out where we're going."
"Who says I don't have amnesia?" she said, frowning at the back of its head. "I've got no clue how I got here either."
The thing paused for a moment to glance at her over its shoulder. "But you were in the show," it said simply, as if that meant something. "And you know your name."
She snorted, and stomped ahead of it to lead the way into the trees. Behind them, more screams broke out amongst the crowd. "I know my name, but I've got no idea where we are, what's going on, or how I got here," she said, without looking back. She heard the crunch of twigs and leaves underfoot as the scarecrow started forward again, following her. "I only know I keep waking up in crazy fucking situations, and the same thing happens every time."
"What happens?" The scarecrow had caught up to her. It wasn't really surprising; the thing had almost two feet in height over her, and with legs that long, it moved fast, even if it was clumsy.
She stopped in her tracks and turned to face it again. "I die," she snarled, jabbing a finger towards its chest. She felt the wood under the shirt. "Everything acts normal, even if the place is weird, until all of a sudden that thing shows up and it kills me. And then I wake up again. I've lost count of the number of times I've had to go through that."
The jack-o'-lantern kept up its mocking grin, but the voice that came from it held no edge of malice. "But you didn't die this time," it said simply.
"Yeah, because you showed up," she said. She knew that she should feel grateful, or relieved, or anything other than angry - but her blood was rushing in her ears, her head was throbbing, and the confusion in her mind was so overwhelming that she could almost feel herself starting to go insane. "Whoever the hell you are. You weren't supposed to - I've got no idea what to do now!"
Despite herself, her voice cracked, becoming a wail. She grimaced again and dropped her gaze down to her suit. A tiny fleck of dust on the lapel caught her eye, and she brushed it off with a hiss.
"You come with me," said the voice of the scarecrow. She looked up.
"You come with me, and we find out where we are, how we got here, and who I am," it continued flatly. Then it stopped, and swayed on the spot again. "I don't want to watch you die," it added, after a moment.
She snorted. "Yeah, well, I'm not too fond of it either, but at least I knew how it worked," she said. She realized how stupid it sounded almost as soon as the words had left her lips, and scowled again. Then she turned away and stomped a few steps off into the forest. "So where the hell are we going?"
"That way."
She waited for some indication of direction, but none came. After a moment, she turned back. There was the scarecrow, standing in the middle of a small clearing and pointing almost directly upward.
At the moon.
"What, can you fly?" Despite herself, she smirked slightly.
It shook its head. "No. But that's the only landmark we've got. The moon." It lowered its overlong arm and slipped its hands into its pockets again. "It's the center," it said, still looking upward. "Everything spins around it. It's like the Pole Star. I remember the Pole Star. There isn't one here, but there is the moon." A pause. "It looks bigger than it should, too. Like it's closer. I want to find out what's under it. In the center of all this."
It lowered its head and fixed her with its empty grin again. "Or we could go back and see what happens when you die this time."
She sighed heavily and started walking again. "Point taken, Mister Sticks. It's better than dying. Let's go."
Again, she heard the crunching sound of the scarecrow walking behind her. Together, they set off through the forest.
The iron certainty that had filled Penny Whiteface's head until a moment ago was splintering apart, falling to pieces inside her head. This wasn't how it went.
Her shoulder screamed at her, louder even than the dull, icy pain in her wrist from the scarecrow-thing's grip. It was holding on hard, its grip tighter and more painful than a vise, and paying no attention to her discomfort. Its legs were long and uneven. She was nowhere near as tall. All she could do was stumble along in its wake and try not to let it rip her arm off.
It had simply brute-forced its way through the mob at the theater doors. Now it was dragging her back towards the carts, through the panicking crowds. She had dropped the whip somewhere back in the press of bodies. She had no weapon.
But... it hadn't tried to kill her. It appeared to be trying to save her.
It had saved her.
She could hear screams and the splintering of wood as the booths were broken and trampled in the mad rush, but those noises were fading now. There weren't as many people running through the carts. They were headed for the exits, into the forest.
The scarecrow-thing staggered to a halt in front of her cart and roughly hauled her around so that she was standing in front of it. When it took its hand off of her wrist, she saw a livid bruise already beginning to rise around the deep scratches that its claw-like fingers had left.
She stood perfectly still, staring up into the hollow jack-o'-lantern eyes, her expression carefully blank. It was the same expression she had worn during the show: stony impassiveness, with the slightest hint of disdain.
Confusion and fear fought for control of her features. She stifled them. She refused to break down now.
Instead she said, in a voice like a scalpel, "Who are you?"
The thing in front of her shifted slightly, rocking on its uneven legs. The leering, predatory grin on its carved face didn't change, but she thought she detected a hint of uncertainty there.
After a moment, the thing lifted its hands and slipped them into the pockets of its overlarge coat. Then it shrugged. It was a surprisingly expressive gesture on its deformed frame.
"I don't know." The carved mouth didn't move when it spoke. Its voice was high-pitched and cold, like a file being drawn across a rusted hinge or the creaking of old wood. Again, it appeared to hesitate, as if it was surprised at the sound.
She stared at it, waiting for something else, but it didn't speak again. It seemed to be waiting for her to react. Eventually, she gave in. "Then what do you want?"
"To talk to you." Its head swung from side to side slowly, as if looking around, but without eyes, it was difficult to tell. "I want to know who I am and how I got here. I remember some things, but not much." Another pause, but this time it spoke before she felt the urge to fill in the silence. "I remember your name."
She laughed, once. There was no humor in the sound. "Yeah?" She rubbed ruefully at the bruises and cuts on her wrist. "Well, that's weird, because it's not my name. It's a stage name. Penny Wise? Come on."
The thing just continued to watch her, swaying. It had the most emphatic silences she had ever heard.
"Penny Columbine," she said eventually. She opened her mouth to continue, but there was another scream from the crowd, longer, and with the sharp edge that indicated pain rather than fear. Her head snapped around towards the noise.
The scarecrow looked around as well. "It's still out there," it rasped. "We need to keep moving."
We, she noticed. Well, it was strong, and apparently wanted to keep her alive. And was either brave or suicidal. Good enough.
"Fine," she said sharply. "Where are we going?"
Something in her mind told her that she should have the answer to that question, but it was lost in the splintering sensation. Her brain felt as though someone has poured ice water into it. Her mind was crumbling.
"Into the woods." The thing slipped its hands out of its pockets and lurched off towards the trees. "Away from here." In the dim light, the jeering grin on its face seemed to mock her.
"Any better ideas than getting hopelessly lost?" she snapped, as she fell into step just behind it. Her wrist throbbed dully, and she grimaced angrily.
"You're the one who doesn't have amnesia," answered the thing flatly. "Tell me what you know about this place and we can figure out where we're going."
"Who says I don't have amnesia?" she said, frowning at the back of its head. "I've got no clue how I got here either."
The thing paused for a moment to glance at her over its shoulder. "But you were in the show," it said simply, as if that meant something. "And you know your name."
She snorted, and stomped ahead of it to lead the way into the trees. Behind them, more screams broke out amongst the crowd. "I know my name, but I've got no idea where we are, what's going on, or how I got here," she said, without looking back. She heard the crunch of twigs and leaves underfoot as the scarecrow started forward again, following her. "I only know I keep waking up in crazy fucking situations, and the same thing happens every time."
"What happens?" The scarecrow had caught up to her. It wasn't really surprising; the thing had almost two feet in height over her, and with legs that long, it moved fast, even if it was clumsy.
She stopped in her tracks and turned to face it again. "I die," she snarled, jabbing a finger towards its chest. She felt the wood under the shirt. "Everything acts normal, even if the place is weird, until all of a sudden that thing shows up and it kills me. And then I wake up again. I've lost count of the number of times I've had to go through that."
The jack-o'-lantern kept up its mocking grin, but the voice that came from it held no edge of malice. "But you didn't die this time," it said simply.
"Yeah, because you showed up," she said. She knew that she should feel grateful, or relieved, or anything other than angry - but her blood was rushing in her ears, her head was throbbing, and the confusion in her mind was so overwhelming that she could almost feel herself starting to go insane. "Whoever the hell you are. You weren't supposed to - I've got no idea what to do now!"
Despite herself, her voice cracked, becoming a wail. She grimaced again and dropped her gaze down to her suit. A tiny fleck of dust on the lapel caught her eye, and she brushed it off with a hiss.
"You come with me," said the voice of the scarecrow. She looked up.
"You come with me, and we find out where we are, how we got here, and who I am," it continued flatly. Then it stopped, and swayed on the spot again. "I don't want to watch you die," it added, after a moment.
She snorted. "Yeah, well, I'm not too fond of it either, but at least I knew how it worked," she said. She realized how stupid it sounded almost as soon as the words had left her lips, and scowled again. Then she turned away and stomped a few steps off into the forest. "So where the hell are we going?"
"That way."
She waited for some indication of direction, but none came. After a moment, she turned back. There was the scarecrow, standing in the middle of a small clearing and pointing almost directly upward.
At the moon.
"What, can you fly?" Despite herself, she smirked slightly.
It shook its head. "No. But that's the only landmark we've got. The moon." It lowered its overlong arm and slipped its hands into its pockets again. "It's the center," it said, still looking upward. "Everything spins around it. It's like the Pole Star. I remember the Pole Star. There isn't one here, but there is the moon." A pause. "It looks bigger than it should, too. Like it's closer. I want to find out what's under it. In the center of all this."
It lowered its head and fixed her with its empty grin again. "Or we could go back and see what happens when you die this time."
She sighed heavily and started walking again. "Point taken, Mister Sticks. It's better than dying. Let's go."
Again, she heard the crunching sound of the scarecrow walking behind her. Together, they set off through the forest.
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