Mystery Lake
[49] Little Problems
Roxy grumbled and restrained little curses to herself that she had to relinquish the best part of her breakfast to chase after Alyssa. She sneezed with every step, little aches bouncing with her body.
Naturally, the girl wasn't to be found just sulking in some sullen corner of the store. That would be far too easy. The front door was only half shut, with a conspicuous crack of morning shimmer bleeding through. She could and she should have just texted her to check in, but she continued carefully down the stairs, to the ground floor, and to the side street. A lingering foggy haze filtered through trees both near and far.
She huffed a billowing breath, pushing forward with a clear mental picture of Alyssa's dark and shadowy colors, wavering like a bat laced sideways in ice. But there was no one around, and no indication of which direction she might have chosen. The path away from downtown was a little darker and clouded in an ominous forest. That way made sense if she didn't want to be found. She wanted to see that critter corner, but it was likely too early to be open. Not that the girl would think of that oversight before she arrived. Roxy tried to relax her thoughts and focus on some sign or old lady-level intuition that would guide her in the right direction.
That seemed absolutely silly. Not that she thought that supernatural abilities were ridiculous; the last day had clearly shown her otherwise. It was just when it came to her and whether she could wield anything like that properly. Still, a feeling pressed her towards town, despite the logical appeal of tracking into the nearest forest.
The other side also had a dense, natural green belt. Focusing on it drew all of her attention, though she wasn't quite sure why. Was the princess trying to help her out with some special ability? She didn't have anything else to go on. The center of town gazed back at her with all its tightly contained but glittering shapes and hints.
She went onward, soon realizing that she was also heading off without telling anyone where she was going. It shouldn't be far, but that still seemed like a good precaution in case something happened. She texted Jake a succinct message saying that she was at the north end of the main road looking for Alyssa. She snapped a photo without sending it and continued to hurry.
At least a path was cut through the forest, and it seemed to get a little thinner to the left. She had no idea if this was the right direction, though, until she caught a trace of that mottled blackness fluttering its way sideways through the darkened green. Now she could only hope that it wasn't a trick or an illusion to lead her to her doom. The path was rudimentary, more like combed dirt, but with some gravel to keep it from being destroyed by regular rain and snow. More like something from an athletic field.
Her back wasn't ready to be up this early, but she ignored it and pressed on until she came to a small park area, apparently for dogs, with a meager rest stop less fancy than the one the trucker had trapped her in. Alyssa flopped down on a bench with her legs stretched out and her arms covering her face. Roxy knew it would be impossible for her to cloak her arrival; her shoes scuffed, scraped, and rattled on the little stones, even though she did her best not to drag her feet. A nervous little breath escaped as she stopped nearby. Alyssa sighed.
"I'm sorry. I'm sorry; I can't keep smiling when I want to. I'm sorry for making you chase after me. I kind of figured you would, even though I didn't want you to. I just wanted to be alone, even when I didn't really want to be. I'm such a mess, and I don't know who or what I can really trust. Not with you, I mean. With inside myself. I have so much to say, and I don't know how to say it, and you're the one who should hear it most of all. Something happened to me at the lake that can't be seen from the outside."
Roxy crouched slightly and wanted to sit on the bench, but she was afraid that the girl would dash away as soon as she sat down. It would probably be better to stand.
With a sigh, Alyssa added, "You look good in my clothes, better than I do. Mira would look better in my life than I do. Why am I even here? I have failed at so many things, and then I failed at this too. I deserve to be discarded; I deserve to be forgotten. I'm so tired. I am so broken. Maybe if I just offer myself up to the creatures that hate us, that sacrifice will appease them, and they'll let you go. And I can be good for something. That'll definitely piss off my...friend but forget them." Alyssa wobbled around like she was on a ferry ship at sea, and each of the waves translated through the hull into her body, and she could just barely keep up.
Roxy's ears perked up. Friend. Did she have a friend too? She had vaguely alluded to what seemed to be going on inside her when she had been rescued from the trucker, but she hadn't really clarified what it meant. It would just worry everyone else that she was going crazy when what they really needed was her support. So many subtle suggestions and uncertain assumptions. She had to know if Alyssa was like her. She pressed her about who her friend was and what she was talking about.
Alyssa appeared so defeated and listless. She shrugged and admitted, "Someone has been talking in my ear ever since the lake. I've been trying to ignore them, but they actually… I don't know. Forget about it. I don't hear anything; it doesn't matter."
"I have it too," Roxy proclaimed boldly. Presumptuous, so presumptuous, but she was going to lose the poor girl if she didn't say something to pull her out of this. Alyssa paused from her moping and raised her head to meet Roxy's eyes. She wore sharp, scrutinizing eyebrows, and her eyes inspected the blue orbs across from her.
"You're just saying that. For me. You don't… But then. You were kind of weird, and I was kind of weird about that trucker guy. It was like I could hear you without talking. Do you really have a voice inside you that tells you stuff?"
No time for softening; whatever this represented, she nodded firmly and assured the pale girl that her situation was pretty much the same. Not unvarnished truth, but she could iron that out soon enough. "It must be that princess who the leprechaun guy named. When you splashed me, I actually got some water in my mouth; maybe she or something tried to... went inside of me. She saved me, though."
"I started hearing the voice, which I thought was an imaginary friend, before I went in the water. That's what… Well, it didn't make me do it, but it suggested that I splash you. And I was so upset. I'm so sorry… I shouldn't have listened. I just... I shouldn't exist."
Without hesitation, Roxy wrapped her arms around Alyssa and hugged her tightly. "Don't say that. It's going to be okay. You didn't do anything wrong. We just need to figure out how to change things for us so that I can go back and forth like pretty much everyone is learning to do now, and you can be stuck the way you really want to be. That sound good?"
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Alyssa took a few breaths and fussed in her grasp. Roxy pulled back to give her a chance to collect herself. The poor girl looked even paler than usual, with a subtle hint of green. She wobbled again and frantically turned to heave over her shoulder the black, destructive mass of which she had already emptied much into the Triton kitchen sink. And it just kept coming. The swirling mass twisted like an unleashed miniature tornado. As more and more freed itself from Alyssa, it was almost as if she was wasting away, melting as much as those monsters did when splattered by her toxic blackness. She didn't scream, though, and no pieces of her were damaged. It took Roxy a moment to realize what was happening. Alyssa was getting younger by the second.
Her colorless clothes were draped over her, and her black flannel pants were in danger of shooting to the ground. The jacket was huge. Roxy tried to help, but gripping the awkward sack against gravity and trying to keep the girl on her feet shot an infusion of pain right into her back. It ached so bad that it practically took her breath away. The chaos swarmed, swallowed, and twirled around them, but at least Roxy could confidently say that being so close to the expulsions didn't revert her to a Joel state.
When things finally calmed down, it was like a forest fire that had been put out, without any scent lingering in the air. Little Alyssa retained most of her shirt and part of her pants on the bench, with Roxy clinging to her, sprawled out on her back. Alyssa's hair somehow seemed even longer and darker than it had been. Her pallor brightened slightly, her lips conspicuously pink, and her face dazed with confusion. If Roxy had to guess, she looked more like seven years old than the twenty-one she should have been. Her limbs were so tiny and fragile. Roxy gently disentangled herself from the young girl and helped her to sit up.
It didn't take Alyssa long to realize that several somethings were wrong. She couldn't quite reach the ground while sitting on the bench unless she stretched her legs uncomfortably. Her phone had been ejected from her pocket but was lying safely behind her. Her mouth dropped as she looked into the camera, cradling the case tightly in her little fingers.
"I'm a kid. Oh crap, I'm a little kid—a little girl again. Why am I being tortured? You...fuck you...fucking garbage, shitty imaginary friend!" She squeezed her little stomach as hard as she could and cried with bright, hot tears. It was much easier for Roxy to put her arms around a little girl. She could even lift her up. Roxy just held her as she sobbed wetly against her shoulder. She rubbed her back in a steady, reassuring motion. Except for little Alyssa's crying, the area around them was starkly quiet—too quiet. Roxy braced her arms around the little girl, even though it didn't feel like enough protection.
The tears soon subsided, and the girl turned slightly. A sudden gasp caught in her throat as she shouted, "DOWN, GET DOWN, MOM!"
She didn't have the time to process the fact that Alyssa had literally called her 'mom' before she pushed her to sprawl on the ground again. Something swooped down from above, dragging a blast of air behind it. Roxy barely saw the impression of a wooden weapon that flashed like a plank with something glittering and nastily sharp at the end. It swept terrifyingly close, pulling and shearing off a lock of her black hair that trailed too far behind. Her head jerked slightly, and it hurt, but nothing else happened. Moments later, the top of the bench toppled over, separated from the base.
Roxy scanned ahead of them and saw a large blur swooping back. When it settled, she could make out certain details. The most prominent was a red cap on its head, which looked like it was molded to its sloping, bulbous head.
"Cut them, tear them up..." A harsh, growling voice spoke, its words not directed at them but rather as if they were burrowing through the earth to be spoken. Long, jagged yellow teeth jutted out in a menacing overbite with a sharp, awful nose. Long, pointed ears didn't fit into the cap. Muscles bulged in loose cloth armor, with heavier bracers gripping a long pole with a sharp, pointed iron head at the top and a curved blade like a scythe bent across.
The ugly, goblin-like creature thankfully wore a crude tunic to cover most of its body, with black, iron boots at its feet. It was taller than their visitor, but only by a head or two. Roxy pulled Alyssa back, trying to protect her with her body.
"The hell are you, and what do you want?!" She tried to make those words sound stronger and more confident than they felt escaping her mouth.
"Redcap. Redcap redcap. I love to slice, cut, and tear. So neither of you will be there." He stretched a disgusting, bloated tongue over his rotting teeth. She could sense his unholy breath from afar. Probably not the type to respond to coarse language, but she had to try.
"How many diarrhea assholes did you eat along the way? And do you jerk off with that thing? Why does it have to be so big? Is it because you have got a microdick?"
The creature just laughed as if she'd said the funniest thing. "I eat what I kill. You'll be my best shit in days still. I'll leave your titties to the last and then rub them all over my ass."
Alyssa had a different, altogether surprising tact. "But the Lord is faithful, and He will strengthen you...and protect you from the evil one." The little girl did her best to put as much energy and enthusiasm into her words as possible, more than Roxy had ever heard Alyssa put into anything. She didn't know that the girl was this much of a Christian. Or maybe just family. Whatever it was, she'd take it if it helped.
The creature gurgled and held up a hand to protect its face. That was a good sign until it started chuckling darkly to itself.
"Should've tried 'Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes.' I like that one. Fun. Nice try, though, but it's time to go. Is just a job. No, don't sob. It must be done." He raised his weapon as Roxy tried to retreat further. She had one last idea.
"HOLD FAST! I AM YOUR PRINCESS, ASHERAH!"
"... Did you really say 'hold fast'? We not be a ship at sea. And I know, Princess Asherah. They killed you once. I am here to make it take."
Within Roxy, that bothersome, inconsistent voice returned to ask, "May I have a moment?"
Not that Roxy had a choice in the matter; she let the princess take the reins. That glamorous, confident, annoying presence inside her continued to protect the little girl as she twisted her mouth to make a bold, sharp, high-pitched note, the same sound she summoned against the trucker. Her ears practically vibrated. The trees rustled, and the redcap creature clutched its weapon tightly. Something was coming.