The Father

   Author’s note: I highly recommend reading the stories “The Death” and “The Plan” (in that order) before reading this story because you won’t have a clue about what’s going on. This is told in Lightia Madison’s perspective.

   I didn’t want to accept it. I didn’t want to. No way. No. Just no. 

   A part of me protested,

   “But Emoni--”

   No.   

   She’s not dead. It was all a dream. She’s still alive.

   Voices kept whispering.

   “She’s dead. She’s dead. She’s dead. She’s dead.”

    I believed them.

   Emoni Chase is dead.

   My sobs were piercing and heartbroken. They echoed through the darkness. I hated how I sounded right now. So weak and helpless. A pathetic little girl. I sobbed anyway. They turned desperate and broken. 

   Crying so much hurt. After that stupid pill, the last thing I wanted was more pain. But I couldn’t stop.

   Crying is an interesting thing. It was much like pain. You think you’ve reached your limits, but there’s just another horrible layer beyond that. 

   But pain always stops one day. No matter what you’ve been through. That calmed me. The tears stopped flowing. 

   Even though my tears were gone, I still felt hollow. Empty. like my life had been snatched from under me. 

   How ironic. 

   I mulled over what had happened to me in the past ten days. Emoni Chase, the love of my life, The one person who always cared for me, is dead. That thought was almost enough to bring me into tears again.

   But I fought them back. I had to move on eventually. I can’t dwell on the past. I can’t mourn for Emoni forever. Ten days seemed like a good amount of time.  

   I had to move on. That’s what Emoni would want. 

   What happened next?

   Right. I took out an illegal pill out of my vast collection (wait. Forget you read that. I do not have a collection of illegal pills. And they definitely aren’t in the secret hatch in my basement. Moving on!) and took it. It was a special pill that gives you an immense amount of pain and allows you to see a painful memory of yours. Then it kills you in ten days. Fun. 

   I time travelled into the moment when I met Emoni, and I figured out that I could control the vision and change time. I decided to warn Emoni after a few months, but that’s when my ten days were up (time flows differently with that pill) and I died.

   Now, I was in some sort of dark place that was huge, based on the echoing of my cries.

   I was somehow still existing, but also dead. Was I a ghost? What type of afterlife was I even in? I wanted answers.

   Ignoring the dead body (my body) on the ground, I tried to walk. 

   I couldn’t move. 

   Panic swelled in me. I didn’t want to be stuck in this dark place forever, with only my grief and my dead body (thank God I can’t smell anything). 

   I gritted my teeth. Why can’t I walk like a normal human being? Why can’t I just move left so I can see if there’s any doors to this place? 

   I floated left. Hm.

   I thought, 

   Right.

   I floated right. 

   A wind whistled through the darkness behind me. I could hear the room, or whatever it was, started to shake like it was having a laughing fit. Then I heard the whispering, like the one I heard earlier. One that seemed oddly familiar. I shook my head. There’s no voice. I’m imagining it. 

   “I see you’ve gotten the hang of being dead.”

   I couldn’t help it. I screamed. 

   “Relax,” The voice assured me. It was male and deep, and something about it made me shiver down to the bone. “I am a friend.”

   The more the voice spoke, the more I knew. I’m in danger. It’s the enemy. Every ounce of my body screamed that I should float away from this voice and this room as fast as I could. I knew that this voice was only appearing to harm me. Could the dead get killed?

   “Yes, the dead can get killed, in a way.” I got the strange sensation that whoever was talking was smiling as it said this.

   I shuddered. That was creepy. Mind reading. 

   But it also made me depressed. Emoni could always figure out what I was thinking. I could feel my body go numb at the thought of her.

   The voice continued, 

   “If you do not cooperate, I can sever your soul from your body and scatter the pieces of your life across the planets of the Essence. From the planets Pax to Vehemnti. You will cease to exist.”

   Now, I’ve heard plenty of threats before. But this one had the ounce of truth. Despite all of his talk about planets and the Essence and the Latin. And that’s what frightened me. 

   “But like I said,” the voice murmured. “I am a friend.”

   I could suddenly see everything. I was in a cavern made of obsidian and black onyx. It was so huge I couldn’t even see the end of it. The cavern was now even darker, if possible, probably because I no longer glowed like a ghost. 

   But I could still see everything perfectly. 

   Once I noticed the figure, however, I wished I couldn’t see at all. 

   It was a twenty-foot-tall skeleton, with parts of skin and blood hanging off the bones. I could see pieces of something stuck to the bones on the inside of its rib cage. It’s heart? Lungs? Kidney? I didn’t want to think about it. An eyeball peeked at me from one of its eye sockets.

   It was easily the most disgusting thing I’ve ever seen. Then, the figure shifted. 

   It suddenly possessed the faces of anything and everything, all at once. A blob fish. My high school biology teacher. Kuato from Total Recall. A tarantula. My childhood crushes. Nico, the black cat I used to have when I was twelve. Voldemort. 

   I kept a straight face. Something told me I shouldn’t show weakness by showing my emotions. 

   Then, the figure had the face of Emoni. Its body shifted until it looked exactly like her, right down to the T. The laughter lines on her face from all of the times I told her corny jokes. The happiness in her white-blue eyes when we were on dates. The rosy flush she got on her cheeks whenever we let go from a kiss. 

   Looking at her appearance, one that was so accurate and, well, her, was like twisting a poisonous knife dipped in fire into my heart. I couldn’t take it anymore. My straight face made like the city of Pompeii in 79 A.D. and crumbled. Tears streamed from my face. 

   I glared at the figure. 

   “Well,” I sighed, trying to look bored, although my glare, tear-filled eyes, and my shaky voice kind of ruined the look. “You got to me.” I gestured at my face. “Aren’t you going to do something?”

  The Figure laughed. It’s laugh sounded so much like Emoni, it hurt. 

  It morphed into a ten-foot-tall man in his fifties, with skin as black as charcoal. He was wearing a sleeveless black t-shirt and shorts, but he somehow still looked serious. His eyes were a milky white, with specks of black in his eyes, like cookies and cream ice cream, just a lot more savage than sweet. He didn’t have a hair on his body, which I found slightly strange. The strangest thing, however, was the white tattoos encircling his body. 

   Ever heard of the phrase, “Go big or go home”? That seemed to be this man’s motto when it came to tattoos. I saw more ink than skin. 

   All of the tattoos were scenes of death. I noticed a tattoo that showed an entire room of sick patients. Another one had a teen in a car accident. Both were so life-like, like the man had tattooed photos on his body. One particular tattoo caught my eye. 

    It was on his bicep. The tattoo depicted a woman in a dress, with three guns aimed at her chest. I stared at the tattoo, fascinated by how intricate it was. 

   The tattoo started to move, like the man had inked a movie on his arm. 

   I blinked, and I was suddenly in a dark alley. The same woman from the tattoo I had seen on that man’s arm was staring down three men who had guns aimed at her. I recognized the woman. Militza Rowe, author of the book, “Peace Will Prevail”. She was one of the most popular YA authors right now.

   I tried to run and get help, but I couldn’t move. I couldn’t snap out of the vision. I could only watch, and I had the sinking feeling that this scene was happening in real life, and right now. 

   I saw Militza raise her hands, like she was surrendering. The men let down their guard.

   That was a mistake.

   Beams of pure blue light shot out of Militza’s palms. The guns in the mens’ hands disintegrated into dust. She used that moment to try to escape, while the men were in shock. 

   try. 

   The mens’ guns reformed like snowmen unmelting. Militza stared at them in shock, like that wasn’t supposed to happen. She thrust her hands towards the guns again, but no blue lights came out. 

   While she was distracted, the men shot her.

   I stared at the scene in horror, unable to pull my eyes away.

   The bullets sank into Militza’s stomach. 

   Usually, it takes longer than a second for a person to die after they have been shot.

   But that’s exactly what happened. As blood started to pour from her stomach, I could feel the bullets carrying these tiny poisonous cells that travel through your entire body in a second. The poison will destroy you.

   Although your death would last a second, it would easily be the most painful and terrifying second you've ever experienced. I still preferred it to a death pill that lasted ten days, though.  

   How the hell did I know that?? 

   Militza passed.

   My brain chanted,

   “May you pass and elude the Black Barbarian, Militza Rowe, Master of Peace, member of the Essence.”

   I had no idea what those words even meant. It just felt right. The still sane part of my brain shouted,

   “What do you think you’re doing?!”

   Unfortunately, that sane part of me was very small.

   I blinked, and I was back in the cavern with that man. The man was silent and still, like nothing had happened. Like I didn’t witness the death of one of my favorite authors. 

   You might be thinking, 

   “You seriously think that Militza actually died? You think that actually happened? You were hallucinating! Or witnessing the future! Or dreaming!”

   Yeah. . . . no. it was just like when I heard Emoni was dead in Trenton. Well, not exactly heard. More like felt. I didn’t live in Trenton, or anywhere near it. I didn’t check the news reports, or actually visit Emoni’s home to make sure she was okay. 

   I just knew she was dead. 

   And I know Militza Rowe is dead, too. 

   The man smiled, and I knew on instinct that he was going to say something I wasn’t going to like.

   “You’ve only scratched the surface of your powers.”

   I scowled at him. 

   “What do you mean, powers? How am I even supposed to believe you? I don’t even know who you are!”

   The man faked sympathy.

   “Such a shame. You don’t even know yourself. Emoni never told you about your true power. Your part in the prophecy. Your parentage.”

   I gritted my teeth.

   “Don’t bring my dead girlfriend into this.”

   “I’ll answer all of your questions. I know you have a lot of them. Come with me. We can reconnect. I can train you. I know I haven’t been there for you your entire life, but I’m on your side. Just do as I ask and pledge yourself to me, and you will be able to fulfill the prophecy you were born to fulfill.”

    That’s a lie. 

   “Get away from me.”

   “I forgot how stubborn you are. Perhaps this would help.”

   He stretched out his hand.

   My instincts took over. I grabbed his wrist, and black light immediately engulfed the man. I closed my eyes and concentrated. I tapped into the man’s life force and sucked it out like I had done it a thousand times. 

   I opened my eyes. 

   The man was gone.

   I had killed the man. I know I had. I felt his life ending, like how I had felt Emoni and Militza’s lives ending. 

   I had killed someone.

   That fact would probably make me collapse or get burdened by guilt if I had killed someone else. But I knew. Somehow, I knew. 

   This man was pure evil. I did the right thing by destroying him.

   But something wasn’t right.  

   a hand closed around my throat. 

   “You’ll have to do better than that, Lightia Madison.” It was the man. He had escaped from my grip. “You’re powerless against someone like me. The force of death itself. The Black Barbarian. Nigrum Barbara. The father you thought you didn’t have.”