“Is it too late?”
Her thoughts raced
Watching the flickering scenery rush past as she darted down the old dirt road.
The sky clouded and the stars winked away
Pitter
pat
Ratta tat
Pitter
pat
Ratta tat
New shoes tattered and scuffed with mud that dripped and caked her skin.
“It’s too late…too late...” her thoughts raced, heart catching in her chest.
Trip
Stumble
Splash
Scraped knees against the grime and gravel.
Resting in the warm comforting mud.
Frozen and waiting
For the sound of powerful hooves driving into the muck
For the shouts of men’s voices
Distant now…but soon
“Shut your eyes tight,” she choked back her panic, “wish it all away, pretend that you’re not here, pretend that your family is---“
A whisper hushes through her mental cries,
“You!”
It demands, faint but growing stronger,
“What do you think you’re doing?”
“Not answering, it’s normal to hear voices in your head when you’re distressed.”
Eyes still shut
“Wishing and pretending” it snarked, “doesn’t get you anywhere you know.”
“I know…I know that, but…”
“Are you waiting for them? Do you want them to find you here, pathetic, weak, covered in that awful smell?”
“No, no I don’t want that.”
Eyes open, and through the rain she saw them charging, a shadowed speck against the waterfall of night and grey.
“THEN RUN!”
Lifting her feet, she darted blindly forward into the night,
Still wishing
Still waiting
Her feet pounded against the ground
“Keep running…”
It hissed, her new imaginary friend,
“Don’t stop.”
While the only thing she could think was
“Why?”
That old cliché
“Why did this happen? What did I do to make God hate me so much!”
Laughter melted softly within the rain as she felt her body jerk to a halt.
Eyes fell downward
A sheer drop,
off the edge
of a cliff
where the road so conveniently stopped.
“Let me tell you something, Girl.”
The voice continued, as she looked back panic tracing her features.
Angry shouts and gunfire followed by the heavy charge of horses.
“In this world.”
She looked back towards the fall. The cool glass surface of the lake was shattered in the chaos of the storm. The wind seemed to carry her, urge her towards it.
“There’s no such thing.”
Feet slipped
Arms outstretched
“As God.”
The wind swept beneath her
As if she could fly
Body
Tossed and twisted
A rag-doll brought magically to life by the wind
Breaking the glass surface of the water below, already disturbed by the rain.
Under the surface and in the silence she watched the nighttime clouds twist and ripple through the shaking pane.
The stars blurred
And-------
The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
“What is it?”
Came the rasping hush of an unfamiliar voice
“A human, you moron, isn’t it obvious?”
“Really?”
The voices tittered and cackled with a sound that reminded of things that scuttled and hushed at night.
“I’ve never seen one up close before.”
“That’s like saying you’ve never been to Somewhere!”
There was a pause
“You mean----“
“So what! I’m not the only Nothing who hasn’t been Somewhere!”
“---- right you know, most haven’t been to a place at any time. Other than ----- and a few others….”
A soft sigh
“There just isn’t much need for Nothing in Somewhere.”
The blood began to flow through her once more as her breath caught in her lungs.
“Shhhh, it’s moving!”
“What do we do?”
“Shush!”
Her eyes flew open, darting, waiting to take in the sight of whatever----
Nothing
There was----wait
“Hello!”
She called, what she took in was----was grey sitting in silence. Her gaze continued to wander over what was before her:
A blank room
With blank walls
And she sat on…
A bed?
Not quite, it seemed to be a piece of shade that was a little higher than the rest of the flat color around it. There were a few windows inside what could only be described as a room but wasn’t.
“Hello?” She called,
She could have sworn…voices…but----
Moving through an outline of white, out onto a decimated street that was blurry and empty like a watercolor. Around her were old and tumbling buildings, remnants of a city now crashed away into nothing but a wavy outline and a vague concept of what might have been a city. It’s outline traced with smatterings of white and glass,
And beneath the buildings and casting shadows crawled the creeping black.
Drip
Drop
The only sound
Drip
Drip
Patter
Drop
The soft and unknown splash that rang throughout the echo world
Scuttle
Shudder
Those voices!
She looked around and called,
“Hello!”
Once more nothing answered, however, not without voice----
“I told you it would hear!”
The long anticipated voice rasped with frustration while another cried weakly
“Sorry…I can’t help but want to get up close!”
“You’ve already seen it! Now be quiet you---!”
“Excuse me!”
Her own voice cried, lonely, and ringing,
“But I would like for you to know I’m not an It!”
The voice didn’t answer, instead only the soft and fleeting sound of a whooshing run was all that was offered.
One familiar cackle stayed behind,
“Oh really, if you’re not an it, than what are you?”
When she fell---it was
“I’m human!”
Nothing that spoke to her,
“Laughable, people are Its, simply because they have names doesn’t make them any less an It.”
“If I’m an it!”
A childish retort
“Than what are you?”
A soft laugh, that seemed to cause the faint shadows of shape to grow,
“Nothing.”
#
In the silence she stared
down a crooked
road
that marked a path
through the vague
and broken city.
At the end of the road she saw a man. A tall Grey Man, who wore grey tatters,
a thin man with a thin face and sunken eyes.
Tap
Tap
Went the cane his pale hands clung to.
Tappity Tap
Rat
Rat
Ratta tat tat
A waiting and impatient noise that rang until she took a step upon the path.
He was waiting for her.
She heard that Nothings whisper after her, the small shades at the corner of her eyes fluttered away from the road and away from the Grey Man.
The Girl
wound her way across the
t
w
i
s
t
e
d
city where he towered before her.
When she saw his face. The one she had seen from so far away, winking at her,
was gone.
The Grey Man’s body stood rock still, patient and voiceless.
“Hello?” She rang and static answered, bouncing and tumbling off the ruins of the Nowhere city. The hypnotic tapping of the Grey Man’s cane had stopped almost as soon as she had gotten close and now was a faceless statue.
How had she seen the face before? Was she dizzy? Was she crazy?
The Girl thought, looking into the void of his expression, standing on the tips of her toes,
“What is he?”
To get a closer look at what she was sure was only a trick of her mind and not nearly anything alive when------
The blankness ripped
like flesh made water.
She gasped and jumped back as a mouth rolled into place
grinning.
“It’s not nice to stare,”
came the rasping smile when two large eyes rippled to the surface of the skin pool. They BUGGED and twisted opened wide and washed of color.
A sense of fear surged through her as she backed slowly, maybe if her steps were small enough, he wouldn’t chase her and let her slip away.
The Grey man stalked towards her and she caved, sprinting from him.
“Now little girl.” His crippled voice tutted as he reached one long and stretching arm to catch her around the scruff of her neck,
“You can’t run away from every scary thing you see.”
Arm bent so she was at eye-level with the bizarre man, lost in his too large gaze,
“The scaries always catch up,”
She shuddered at his words,
“eventually.” He soothed, before his mouth sank beneath his skin only to be replaced by a new grin, this time wide and thin.
The Girl tried to speak, but only mousy squeaks scampered from her mouth,
“W---were you---w—waiting for me?”
His eyes spun with glee,
“Of course, and do you know why?”
She shook her head, his grip loosened on her scuff,
“To send you on your most wonderful----“
He dropped her
“Journey.”
She tumbled