Banished To Earth Book One (29))

 “You mean monsters.” Nikki said, now sitting on the fireplace hearth.

  “My. Your ears are big. I ain’t said nuthin’ ‘bout monsters, no sucha thing.”

   The little girl looked over at Beth and Pry. Who were both looking away from Trudy’s face.

  “What?” Trudy asked. 

   “Ah nothing,” Beth replied.  

   “Can you try Chase again?”

  “Should I put my phone on speaker?”

 “Speaker?”

  “So, we can all hear,” Beth emphasised the word all.

    Pry’s features tightened. After a few moments, she nodded yes to Beth.

  “What’s goin’ on here?” Trudy demanded.

   Pry took Trudy’s hand.  “You must listen. And you must trust.” Her eyes were pleading.

     Trudy blinked and stepped back. It was as if she stepped into a spider web. She could not see it, but she could certainly feel it. Something new was clinging to her. Real and inescapable. “Make the call.” Her words were low, just above a whisper. “Go ahead. Beth.”

   Pulling her phone from her purse, her right finger poised over its screen shot of Nikki, it rang. She almost dropped it but managed to find the phone app and promptly put it on speaker.

    Chase’s voice was frantic. “The Fall. The monsters are here. I’m safe, at least for now, well out of town. My SUV is dead, pretty sure my phone will go next. Just listen. Stay away from towns. Even small ones. Everything awful is flying toward the lights, the people. There is no military response, no fighter jets, no bombs or tanks, at least none that I’ve seen or heard.

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     I can see fires in the distance. I think something must have hit the main road. Looks like I got out just in time.” He paused, “No one's behind me. The black sky turned blue, then blood red. The clouds went strange, flat like glass, then pinch points appeared everywhere. It was like some giant hand was reaching down, grabbing giant swaths of clouds and sky and crushing them together.

      Afterwards, blisters, boils, it was like the air itself was infected. They swelled high over Wilmington, grew bigger and bigger until they finally burst, spewing things that flew or leapt from the sky, with incredible speed and power. Dragons, every kind of beast and bird, lizard, all mixed in with creatures I could never imagine.

    I was too far away to make more out; my truck was going crazy, headlights flashing, my doors wouldn’t even open. Good thing my window was rolled down. The whole thing shuddered until it finally went black and still. I love you Pry? “

   “Ah, this isn’t Pry, it’s me, Beth.”

  “Where is she?”

   Beth quickly handed Pry the phone. “I’m here, with Trudy. We’re at Tom Masters’ house. Everyone is fine, and their cars still work.”

   “Must be a localized effect. But it will spread. I’m sure of it. How did you, never mind…we can talk about it later. Pry, I can’t just leave my Mother in this mess. I can shift right into her room. She can’t walk, let alone run. Her diabetes took her feet. Surely after all this she will finally believe me, and I can get her to where? Tom’s house? Well okay. That’ll work. Just so long as it’s safe, doesn’t matter where.”

   “I am going too.”

   “No. I need you with them…”

  “I am going. They are safe for now. You are not. I love you, goodbye.” She wasted not another second and didn’t bother to hide what she was about to do from Trudy. With speed, none of them had ever seen before, she spun a portal open and dove out of sight.

    Trudy could do nothing but stand and stare.

 

 

 

 

Chapter 18

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     Pry's ability to summon Chase’s memory made it quite easy for her to shift into Mable Gillette’s room. It was, for the most part, intact. There was a large gaping hole in the concrete wall behind her. But there was no power. Everything was black as axle grease. Mable could not see Pry or anything else.

   She hesitated, hid her eyes in silence and waited for Chase. Her wait was short. However, he did not shift into his mother's room but wisely chose the parking lot.

    Moments later, he pushed past a loose concrete block and joined Pry. It toppled to the floor, making a loud thump when it hit.

   “Who’s there?” Mable croaked. He took Pry’s hand and slowly led her up to Mables’ bed.

   “Demon!” She shrieked, “I see your eyes burnin’ at me. Get away. Get away!”

    Pry expected nothing more from her. She continued unfazed.

   “It is all right. I am not going to hurt you.”

   “Mom, it’s me, Chase. And this is Pry. We’re here to help you.”

   “Get that Demon away from me!” She hollered.

 “I am not a demon, Mrs. Gillette, I am his wife. Your daughter-in-law.”

  “I’d call you a liar, but what you just said makes all the sense in the world to me now. His Daddy was right. He tried to tell me, but I couldn’t bear to listen.”

  “Listen to what?” Chase asked, drawing even closer to Mable.

  “Look at those eyes, those shiny, demon eyes sparkin’and a blazin’ in my son's head. No!” She yelled, “not my son.”

  “Mama, don’t talk crazy. Just calm down. We’ve come to take you out of here.”

The bitter old woman grunted. “You move and ‘I’ll trail a strang of guts from here to the county line!” She threw back her bed sheet. “Can your demon eyes see this!”

    “Ugh,” Chase turned his face away from the horrid sight of his mother’s intestines hanging halfway out of a ragged, bloody tear in her abdomen.  

  

 

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    “A hunk of brick come flying through my room when your demon friends come tearin’ through the buildin’, caught me right in my stomach. It didn’t stop rippin’ ‘til it laid me wide open. I ain’t going nowhere. Not with you. Not with anybody!”

   “We, we can bind you. With a bed sheet.” Pry's voice was trembling. “We’re not going to let you die here!”

    “Don’t you touch me, you she devil.”

  “Mama, come on you know we’re not devils.”  

   “Don’t call me Mama, you murdering thief!”

   “Murdering thief? Where’d that come from? What is it? You run out of names to call me?”

  “I’m dying. I’ll never leave this bed alive. So I’m glad you came. I want you to hear this before I go.”

    Chase steeled himself, having no idea what was coming next. It was not going to be a loving, tearful goodbye.

    “I remember the way he felt inside my womb. And I remember clear as glass the day I stopped feeling him curled up against my heart. A door opened deep inside me. You opened that door, yanked my baby out and took his place. I never told anyone about it, not even my husband. But the day you were born, I saw the look on his face when they handed you to him. He didn’t know you, didn’t see himself in you. There was no joy, no pride. No love-just fear. And that was the only thing I ever saw in his face when he looked at you. He knew.

  All the time I carried you, I told myself I was bein’ a silly pregnant woman. But his eyes told me the truth even while my heart kept lyin’. I couldn’t bear to think my feelings were true. Not possible, how could such a thing be true?

   But here you stand, your eyes burnin’ like hellfire coals, justa floatin’ and burnin’ in the dark. They’re all the truth I need.”

   “So. I’m a changeling.” Chase said, stumbling back.

  “If that’s the word for thieving murderer, yes! That’s exactly what you are!” She reared up, groaned and collapsed. “I tried to love you.” She whimpered through her pain, “Even after Evan left me, I tried to love you. But you kept on seein’ monsters. Every time you come up with that mess, it’d remind me of what you are, what you did to my baby. And my heart would boil with hate.”

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   “If you truly believed that, why didn’t you just give me away. Let somebody else raise me.” He screamed at her. Pry clasped his arm. He pushed her away.

   Mable shook her head, peered into the darkness, seeing nothing at all. “No. I