SO LIKE… CHARLIE

Our arrival in Hope’s Cradle was rather uneventful. We simply landed at the port, and then took a taxi to my other aunt’s manor. When we arrived, Aunt Ashley spoke to the guards and got us passage through the gate, afterwards, I was sent to a room that would be my new bedroom while my Aunt went off to meet with her sister and that was it, I was now alone in a room I had never been in with furnishing I’d never seen before. Aunt Ashley had sent one of the staff out to buy me some essentials but aside from that, everything in the room was now mine. The room was spacious and had its own bathroom and walk-in closet, but despite that it felt… wrong. It looked nothing like my room. It had none of my things, like that teddy bear I got when I was a kid. I don’t even know why I held onto it for this long, but knowing how it was likely destroyed in the fire… it made me feel a little sad. I heard two quick knocks on my door followed by a voice. “Young miss, I have returned with the essential belongings your Aunt has requested me to retrieve, may I enter?” “Y-yes,” I said with one body. The other was currently floating in a high corner of the room, allowing me to see the space in its entirety all at once. The man entered; arms filled with bags from several stores. Behind him came several other members of the staff, all carrying bags. It was a little odd for me to hear them speaking so freely in comparison to the staff at my previous home. I watched as they put stuff away, they asked me how I wanted it organized, but I didn’t really have much of a preference. I figured if I wanted to move anything I could do it myself. When they were finished, they excused themselves and left. I looked around. The closet had gotten several outfits, and they said I now had an appointment with a tailor so that I could get some that fit better. I had a desk with a laptop, several notebooks, pens, pencils. They even set up the laptop. I lay down in the bed with both bodies.

I ate dinner in the dining hall, although there was no one else there. I hadn’t seen either of my aunts since I arrived. Just the staff, they were friendly enough, but there was always this line. They weren’t really friendly because they wanted to be, they were friendly because it was their job to be. Even so, I couldn’t feel upset about it. It’s not like it was in their job description to befriend me. I woke up the next morning feeling sick in one body. I flew over to the bathroom and immediately vomited in the toilet. While I was doing that, I found it odd. Apparently one body could get sick while the other was fine. Although I guessed it made sense, It’s not like germs respected the fact that I only had one mind. It was weird having my bodies feel different, one was fine, while the other felt miserable. The disconnect was really messing with me. I decided that this was the best way to be sick. One body was sick and miserable, but I could have the other one take care of it by changing the towel or bringing soup. It was super convenient. Although most of my time was spent watching movies on the computer while trying to ignore how I was half-sick. I’d been here for five days and still hadn’t seen anyone but the staff. I was starting to wonder if something was wrong.

I’d just finished eating lunch and now my sick body was taking a shower. I had left to return the used bowl to the kitchen and was just returning to my room. The staff said I didn’t have to return the dishes, but it wasn’t like I had anything else to do around here. I entered the shower and immediately turned the water as high as I could handle. My other body arrived, and I immediately began taking off my clothes. When I was finished, I entered the shower. While I was showering, I noticed a weird bump in my stomach. It was subtle but noticeable. I poked at it. It was a little squishy but didn’t feel like fat. Was it a tumor? When I got out of the shower, I immediately called my Aunt. She answered just before the phone went to voicemail. “Charlie,” she said, it wasn’t really a greeting. The sound of her voice gave me pause, but I was too concerned to let it stop me. I took a slow breath and spoke. “Uh, I just got out of the shower, but when I was in there, I noticed there was a bump on one of my stomachs, and I thought it might be a tumor or something, that body has been feeling sick for the past couple of days.” “I see, so you’ve already noticed. It’s happening faster than I thought it would,” she said, sounding mostly disinterested. “What’s happening?” “You’re pregnant,” she said simply. My mind was immediately sent reeling. I guess the signs were there, but also how? I-I’d never had sex before. How could I be pregnant? Did she inseminate me in my sleep? But why? “Why?” I said voice faint. “Where did you think your third body would come from? A package in the mail? Now if that’s all, you should give birth in about twenty or so days. Look up what to do and what not to do as a pregnant woman online.” The line went dead. I… she…. How? I set my phone down and flopped backwards into the air, spinning freely towards the ceiling. I gently bumped against it, and I pressed myself to it, looking down at myself, my pregnant body was lying in the bed. I opened my eyes and looked up at myself. Even now I could almost feel a feint connection to another body. I smiled. I was going to get my third body back. I would be whole again. My smile broadened as I felt giddy little giggles run though me…. Just before I had to quickly fly to the bathroom to throw up again.

I entered the dining room, once again seeking food. My other body had seemingly gotten over the morning sickness. Usually it lasts for months, but seeing as this wasn’t a normal pregnancy, and was roughly a tenth the length, some strangeness was to be expected. After making my request with the cooking staff, I returned to the table to wait. As I walked over, however, I noticed there was a person seated there. She was tall, had golden blonde hair and sparking emerald eyes. She glanced up at me as I entered. “Hello there. Charlie, I presume?” “Y-yes miss,” I said, reflexively showing deference to her regal aura. I suppose this is my other Aunt though it’s at this point I realize I don’t know her name. “I haven’t seen you since you were a baby. My, how you’ve grown,” she said, looking me over. She gestured for me to spin, and I obliged. “Thank you for letting me stay in your home miss,” I said. “You can call me Aelora, and there is no need to thank me, she said.” Her voice suddenly going a little… flat. She looked into her wine glass, gently swirling it. I quickly checked my phone, it was barely past noon, a little early for alcohol. She sighed. “Oh, has my Aunt Ashley thanked you already?” I asked. She looked back up at me. “No, but she’s doing me a favor.” “I see.” She sighed. “Honestly, it’s why I’m drinking so early in the day.” I quirked an eyebrow. “What do you mean?” She let out a little huff from her nose. “What do you think of Ma… of Ashley,” she said. Pointedly using the name Ashley. Was that her real name? It started with Ma. What names started with Ma? Mallory, Maddison…. I can’t think of a third. Maybe it’s something odd like Manta or Manatee. Even so I had a question to answer. “I don’t know, she’s nice,” I said. The woman in front of me burst out laughing. “Girl, my sister is many things but nice, certainly isn’t one of them. Now, tell me. What do you really think of her?” Was this some kind of test? I swallowed… and spoke. “I think… I think she’s selfish, and cruel, and calculating and manipulative and….” I paused trying to come up with another word. Aelora smiled. “Dangerous?” she said. “No, not that… she’s…” Aelora cut me off. “Then you just haven’t seen that side of her yet.”

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

A group of men stood in front of the locked and barred doors of a large manor. One of them was holding a heavy sledgehammer. He raised it over his head and brought it down against the door. It shook and cracked at the blessing-enhanced force behind the implement.

“W-what do you mean?” I asked, a hint of foreboding in my voice. Aelora sighed, then waved a hand at the serving staff in the room. At the gesture they all made themselves scarce. “When… Ashley was in school, she was the quiet type, she didn’t get particularly good or bad grades, didn’t have any friends, mostly kept to herself. Maybe that was what made her a target for bullying.”

The door fell off its hinges with a final splintering crunch as the group of men stormed the building. Immediately met with gunfire from the guards inside the building. One of the men was ready however, and had a spell already cast. It conjured up a barrier that defected even the bullets enchanted to pierce such defenses.

“Mind you, this isn’t the sort of bullying you see in movies. The sort of sadistic, often illegal, sort of action no, this was real bullying. Some jokes at her expense, teasing, that sort of thing, the sort of thing you could probably just ignore. The thing is, I think the girl responsible for it all actually wanted to be friends with Ashley, and just didn’t know how to express it. This was middle school after all.”

As the guards lay bleeding, dying and dead in the foyer, the men progressed further into the home, weapons drawn. They grabbed up any members of the family they could find.

“My sister was very consistent. After school she would go to the job she had at the time and then mind her own business and be back home by dinner. But everything changed when she came home right after work. I didn’t think much of it at the time but when I went to school the next day, I noticed the girl who was bullying her wasn’t there.”

The men dragged a woman, kicking and screaming into her own living room, where they grabbed and held her still, forcing her to watch as a boy, her son, was thrown to the carpet before her. He was screaming for her help; she was screaming at the men.

“I asked my sister about it a few years later, and she explained to me… exactly what she had done to that girl. There was apparently a local gang in our city, they weren’t really anything dangerous, just some kids thinking they were cool because they sold drugs to sophomores. My sister had spent months, indirectly whispering into their ears. Planting seeds of ideas in their heads, all without showing them her face. All culminating in them breaking into a house, thinking they could rob a family blind. They didn’t know anyone was home, because the family’s car had suddenly experienced some problems and was in the shop that day. When they were in there, they panicked and shot the wife, husband and son eight times. They were dead before the paramedics could arrive.”

A man pinned the boy to the ground as his and his mother’s screams became desperate. The man holding her back gripping her head tightly, forcing her to watch as a man raised the same sledgehammer used to break down the doors over his head. The woman’s screams and struggles became all the more frantic with desperation. As the man swung the sledgehammer down at the boy’s head.

“My sister didn’t kill her like a common psychopath, she orphaned her. Orphaned her so that she had to leave to go live with relatives. It would have been easier to just kill the girl, but instead, that woman manipulated the very world around her to make it a place where that girl’s family would be shot and killed in their own home.”

The woman sobbed, spatters of blood and bits bone on her face. She hung limply in the man’s arms. As the men all cackled around her.

“And do you want to know what she told me when I asked her why she did it? She told me that it was because she wanted to see if she could. A few weeks after the incident she stopped attending classes altogether. Yet she still managed to bring home the same mediocre report cards as always. That girl’s life is in ruins because of my sister’s trial run. And… and I have just set that monster loose on some of my… political rivals,” Aelora said, taking a long drink of her wine. “My sister is the most horrific type of spider. She doesn’t see fit to make a web and wait for a fly to come to it. She worms her threads into the very world around you and makes your very home her web. She plays with people like pieces on a chess board. Training them into the sort of person she wants, and then placing them in a position where the most logical course of action is exactly what she wants to happen. My sister is the most dangerous monster you will ever face,” Aelora said with a grim conviction in her voice.

A woman with shoulder length brown hair and green eyes sat idly on a park bench, sipping her coffee. Watching from the corner of her eye as a man approached. As he was passing, steps hurried as he was late to work, she tossed her lukewarm coffee at the trashcan. The cup impacted him. Staining his well-tailored suit. “Watch where you’re going,” she said imperiously. Before striding off, leaving the spluttering man. He didn’t have time to deal with her. He would just have to deal with his frustration somehow. The woman smirked, knowing exactly what, or rather, who he would take it out on.

“Why. Why would you invite someone like that into your home?” I asked. She just smiled sadly. “As much as I would like to say it’s because you never leave family out on the streets, I can’t. The answer is because a person like that doesn’t really ask for anything. They threaten, no matter what situation, no matter how polite they seem. Any favor they ask of you is to be taken as an implicit threat. I wish I’d learned that lesson sooner,” she said. Wistfully, as she lowered the hem of her shirt. On the skin of her right breast were six scars, long thin lines evenly spaced and perfectly save for one diagonal scar crossing off a group of four. Tally marks. “Every time I disobey her, I get a mark. She takes a branding iron and burns the consequences of my disobedience into my flesh,” She said, raising her shirt. “Why are you telling me all this?” Aelora leaned back in her chair. “A warning. It’s probably best that you know what sort of thing you’re dealing with. I had to learn it the hard way, that doesn’t mean you have to as well. All that said it’s best to just blindly follow along with whatever she tells you, and under no circumstances try to escape. Your mother only wishes she didn’t…” she cut herself off. “Look at me, rambling on like a drunk,” she said. “Wait, what about my mother?” I asked. Aelora raised her hand. “It’s probably best that you don’t mention her, especially around Ashley.” Aelora stood from the table, and walked off, leaving me with a foreboding feeling, and a dozen questions.