Volume 1: Proscenium

Issue 7: Good Fortunes

Florian Reyes Honeywell

By Roach

“Before we get started, it’s only proper that we pay our respects,” Camilo said.

“Pay our respects?” I echoed.

After our meeting in the greenhouse, we had agreed to reconvene at 7 pm by the ginkgo tree west of the school. We had decided to wait until the evening so there wouldn’t be any other students around. At the same time, we didn’t want to wait until the weekend, in case the creature had a chance to strike again. This seemed like the best time.

Now, as if in response to my question, Camilo pointed to the tree. When he realized it didn’t answer anything, he explained, “It’s a theater tradition to visit this tree in preparation for any show.”

“What’s so special about it?” I asked.

“We always pluck a leaf for good luck. Gabriel says it’s because it’s… like, one of those living fossils, you know?” Based on his comment, I guessed that Gabriel—from our English class—was also in theater. The leaves of the gingko had barely budded, but nevertheless, Camilo walked up to it and stripped a leaf off one of the lower branches. He put the immature leaf in his pocket. For a moment, he placed his palm on the trunk. Then he looked at me. “Your turn.”

“I’m not relying on luck,” I said.

“Well… Maybe that’s the smart thing to do. But I guess, it’s…” He paused. A brief smile crossed his lips. “Stranger things have happened, right?”

His voice faltered. It was the first sign of nervousness I had seen from him. During lunch, when we planned everything, he had been the image of confidence. Was that also an illusion? The closer we got to executing our plan, the more surreal the situation seemed. I felt my own unease reflected in the swarm’s restless movements, crawling throughout my insides.

I snatched a leaf off the nearest branch. “Is that all?”

“If you want.”

I looked the tree over. Its mostly naked branches fanned out above us. I thought about something to say, but it all sounded silly. May this leaf protect me? From misfortune? The claws of a bloodthirsty monster? Death?

While I held the fan-shaped leaf, a hum spread from bee to bee. I tried to understand what they were saying, but after a few moments, I realized they weren’t articulating anything concrete. They were singing, each hum leading into a new note. I got the feeling that they were honoring… something. Although I wasn’t sure exactly what it was, I sensed warmth in their song. As if prompted by their hymn, I muttered, “Thanks, ginkgo.” I pocketed the leaf.

“Are you ready?” Camilo asked.

“Did you get the key?”

He held up his hand. With the snap of his fingers, a key materialized in his grip. I couldn’t tell where the illusion began or ended—whether the key had always been in his hand but invisible, or if the key was an illusion in itself. Either way, his triumphant smirk told me that we weren’t going to have any problems getting inside.

“Let’s do it.” If he were looking to give me a way out or trying to test my determination, I wasn’t about to back down. The swarm’s churning persisted throughout my organs, but somewhere in my worry, a strange sense of excitement had started to take shape. Rather than being at odds with one another, the two feelings fed into each other; a snake eating its own tail. My awareness heightened, picking up everything from a distant car honking to the slightest rustle of the gingko’s leaves.

Camilo walked up to the school, approaching the theater’s loading dock. At lunch, he had informed me that the theater had a separate entrance for props that were too big for the main door. While the school had security cameras stationed around some of the more important areas and entrances, there were none by the loading dock. It had a garage-like door, which he unlocked. It rolled up. Right now, it was empty inside. We entered. Then, the door slammed shut behind us, engulfing us in darkness. I followed the sound of his steps until we reached the light of a hallway. It led us to one of the locker rooms.

The room was a mess; makeup, colorful dresses, and masks cluttered chairs or hung from mirrors. I navigated my way through the scattered props.

“Hang on,” Camilo said. He began to sift through the various costumes. Then he threw a mask to me. “You should wear this, in case someone happens to come by. There isn’t anything scheduled for tonight, so we should be in the clear… but you never know.”

I caught the mask. Its wooden face portrayed a donkey, with colors and shapes like a modernist painting. “What is this, Pinocchio or something?”

“You really don’t pay attention in class, do you?”

“What?”

“Bottom turns into a donkey in A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”

I rolled my eyes. “Why don’t you wear it?”

“I’m not going to need it.” As he said it, his face faded away into something indiscernible. When I looked at him, I had the same feeling as trying to remember a stranger’s face from a dream. “If anyone comes by, I can just disappear.” His voice was clear, but somehow, it was hard to pin down how he was speaking. When I tried to look at his mouth, his brown eyes caught me instead… Or were they green, now? Had they always been like that? And when I tried to look away, a trace of a smile surfaced. Then, his face returned, and I pushed away my growing sense of foreboding.

“Fine,” I sighed and strapped the mask around my head. It sat uncomfortably on my nose, while the long ears felt heavy. I noted that if we ever did something like this again, I would have to bring my own disguise. A costume. Like a real…

“Looks good,” Camilo teased, interrupting my train of thoughts.

“Shut up.”

He walked over to another door. “This will take us backstage,” he said. “I’ll follow you up to the catwalk from there. Then we’ll start this for real. Do you have your bee ready?”

I summoned a single bee. She crawled out of my ear. Sit on Camilo’s shoulder, I ordered. Like I asked, she flew over to him and perched on his shoulder. “You’re sure it’s okay if she stings you?” We had agreed in advance that if I needed to quietly alert him, I would order one of the bees to sting him. If he needed to do the same, he would show me an illusion only I could see.

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“If we’re going to handle a monster, the very least I can do is handle a bee. Ready? For realsies?”

I nodded slightly.

“Without further ado…” He flicked the lightswitch, then opened the door. We entered backstage. Knowing how much closer we were to the monster’s nest, neither of us spoke. I couldn’t hear Camilo’s steps at all. I was unsure if he used an illusion to suppress them, or if his familiarity with the space let him be quieter. I tried to move as quietly as possible as I followed him up the stairs of the catwalk. There was an occasional creak beneath my steps.

The stairs bridged the backstage and theater rooms. Like his illusion showed me earlier, three separate catwalks crossed the stage horizontally. They connected with one another at the edges of the stage. Once we reached the top, I realized we were a lot higher up than what it appeared like from below. As I looked around, I began to wonder if we really should be up here. Like Camilo had promised, a giant glass moon dangled by a rope from the middle platform. Although the lamp wasn’t illuminated at the moment, I could see the intricate painted details, down to each crater. It hung directly above the trapdoor.

I saw the theater in its entirety. The space was colossal, with around 1,000 velvet seats for the audience. Multiple chandeliers hung from the gilded ceiling above. No wonder the bees thought of it as a sky of gold, as the soft light glistened against the surface. But more importantly, I had an overview of the stage forty feet under me. Aside from a few artificial trees—which I assumed to be part of A Midsummer Night’s Dream—it was mostly empty. I tried not to think about what the bees had found below. Instead, I focused on Camilo in front of me.

When I looked at him, letters appeared in the air between us. I’m going down. Wait here, he wrote in a font reminiscent of a typewriter.

I gave him a thumbs up, and the illusion disappeared—alongside him. He had turned invisible.

While refining our plan at the end of lunch, we agreed that he would be the one to move the trapdoor. It made the most sense, since he could do it unseen. Afterwards, he would return to the catwalk and plant the bait. Meanwhile, I kept watch.

I tried imagining him heading downstairs and towards the trapdoor. I directed my attention there. Each second dragged out. The bees shifted around inside of me. It seemed like an eternity passed by, and for a moment, I wondered if he had abandoned me. Where are you? I asked the bee watching over his shoulder. Her pheromonal transmission responded to me a few steps away from the trapdoor. I watched as an invisible force pushed the hatch aside. Knowing that Camilo had completed the task, I smiled uncertainly under my mask.

While I waited for him to return, I kept my gaze moving around the theater. It was eerily quiet. I had never seen the theater without an audience in it, which made it seem larger than I remembered. But most importantly, there was no sign of the creature.

My classmate reappeared next to me. A new sentence formed in the air between us. Now, for my next trick… His words faded, and he looked down to the open trapdoor. A chunk of raw meat appeared in front of it. The level of detail was more elaborate than anything else I had seen him do so far. Even from our vantage point above, it smelled like a slaughterhouse. I couldn’t have asked for a more irresistible bait. Based on what Camilo had told me, I assumed that the effort it took to combine multiple senses limited his ability to do much else. His knuckles paled as he tightened his grip around the railing of the catwalk.

Crouching next to him, I peered down at the trapdoor. Shadows shrouded the opening. I scanned the stage for any hint of the creature, never letting my gaze linger in one place for too long. As I surveyed my surroundings, I glimpsed movement in my peripheral vision. For a moment, I stood still. Then, with a sinking feeling, I turned my head slowly.

At the end of the catwalk, a silhouette emerged from the dark. I froze. As the thing came into view, an icy feeling rushed through me. My former sense of anticipation turned to dread. The swarm grew heavy like stone inside of me.

With its cobalt blue fur, the creature was unlike anything I had seen before. At a glance, it was similar to a tiger. But upon closer inspection, its face was narrower and its ears were tufted, more like a lynx. More prominently, sharp spines ran from its back to its tail, like porcupine quills. The creature lowered its body, wriggling its haunches slightly, ready to pounce. It held itself in the same way I had seen street cats do while stalking birds—except it wasn’t looking at any birds. It looked towards us. Not to mention, it was much larger than any housecat I had ever seen. Larger than a lion, even—although it was crouching, its form still reached roughly to my waist. Meanwhile, Camilo remained focused on the trapdoor.

Even if I had wanted to, the shock left me silent. Instead, I sent a command to the bee on my classmate’s shoulder. Sting. She followed my order, her stinger piercing the skin of his neck.

Camilo whipped around. Mid-motion, he turned invisible. The reeking stench of the meat disappeared instantaneously. The creature froze for a moment, then narrowed its glowing, frost blue eyes. It locked its gaze onto me. Growling, it stepped forward.

I bolted in the opposite direction. With my pheromones, I searched for Camilo’s bee again. Here, she replied. Her signal came from behind the creature, meaning he had somehow been able to sneak past it. Knowing he wouldn’t be standing in my way, I sped up.

The chimeric figure leaped after me with unsheathed claws. Its growl turned into a deafening roar, louder than any lion. It had an inhuman screeching quality to it. Bees surged throughout my body, their thrum like a pulse inside of me. In my attempt to move faster, I stumbled. I reached for the railing to steady myself. As I stepped aside, its feline claws whizzed past my shoulders. When its body shot past mine, it shoved its flank into me. Without enough room on the platform for the two of us, my body flipped over the railing.

As I tumbled through the air, I grasped for something, anything, to hold onto. The drop would surely kill me. But in a brief moment of freefall, one realization dawned on me. At least I would avoid Mr. Howells’ fate. If it weren’t so damn stupid, maybe I could have found some twisted sense of humor in that. Then, as I reached out, three of my fingers clung onto the lowest bar on the railing. The rest of me dangled forty or so feet above the stage.

But any sign of hope evaporated. The entire platform shook as the creature forced itself to a halt. My ring finger slipped, followed by my middle finger. My index finger alone wasn’t enough to keep me up. At last, I lost my grip.

Something firm clasped around my forearm. Like an invisible hand. Which, I realized, was exactly what it was. Camilo pulled at me. I felt my body raise about an inch, then falling down two more. Although I still couldn’t see him, I heard him curse under his breath. A demonic snarl sounded off to his right. The swarm sizzled in response to the deep sound. Camilo continued to struggle in a standstill between himself and gravity. I locked my own hand around his arm.

I stole a glance towards the creature. The catwalk was narrow enough that turning around slowed it down, but now, it oriented itself towards us again. Its claws drummed against the platform, and it huffed with every breath.

“Faster,” I pleaded.

“I’m trying!”

I reached up with my other hand, but as I moved, Camilo lost another inch on me. His grip was on my wrist now.

“Fuck!”

The Queen addressed me. Hive, you must let go.

“What the hell are you talking about?” In the midst of my panic, I forgot to answer internally instead of out loud. As Camilo remained invisible, I couldn’t tell how he reacted. I only got a read on the creature. It let out another growl—if I could attribute an emotion to it, it would have been amused, almost a purr. It was toying with us.

The Queen continued, Don’t underestimate the architecture of the Empire. Now, let go.

I didn’t let go. Instead, I reached for the platform with my other hand again. This time, I was able to make contact. My fingertips gripped onto the edge. But it still wasn’t enough to pull myself back up. The catwalk trembled as the monster took another step towards us. Its tongue flicked over its lips.

Unless you want to kill all of us, do as I say. As her insistent pheromones enclosed me, I felt a strange calm. In the span of a split second, I was reminded that the Queen, at the end of the day, was a parasite. As her host, it was in her best interest to keep me alive. It didn’t matter how much we despised one another. In this situation, we shared one common goal: survival.

The creature flashed its fangs. Then it bounded forward. We were out of time.

I stopped struggling. I let go of the railing. I let go of Camilo. As I did the complete opposite of what my instincts told me, a second wave of terror replaced my calm. Expecting to fall, I braced myself for the incoming pain. Instead, nothing happened. I remained suspended midair as Camilo clung onto my wrist. His other hand wrapped around mine. But instead of going up, my body lowered. I began to slip.

“Dammit, no!” he exclaimed.

I continued slipping, little by little, until I no longer felt his grip.

I fell.