No Goodbyes

With an air of unreality a woman stepped into the small building that was adorned with earth tones and heavy with the strong scent of steamed bitter hazelnut-chocolate-caramel and the low murmur of contented voices as their lips touched cooked white porcelain through grinning ignorant mouths.

Through the sea of people she could spot her companion seated alone at a table-for-four, his hands tapping on the polished oak with clear impatience.

Somehow his eyes locked on to hers within a second, the blackened coal burning with anticipation.

The woman winced; She had wanted to stall a bit longer.

She forced her legs to carry her across the crowded room, the scattered voices and that spoke of everything and nothing and arms and clothing that brushed up against hers as she tried to fight her way through.

But the thoughts in the back of her mind still trickled to the one question as she inhaled the vanilla bean and honey scents that used to calm her but only added to her mounting migraine.

Why am I doing this?

She'd asked herself this question when she followed a cryptic message into a dark alley and met the threatening edge of a knife.

This question when she repeated the words of Oath and drew her blood as a symbol of dedication to the 'cause'.

The same question when she stared into the utter betrayal in her best friend's eyes as she pressed the knife into his skin, killing him.

And she asked herself this now as she gripped the ominously cold back of her chair and sat before her adversary.

She couldn't lift her chin to see his eyes, staring instead at her hands as they twisted and twisted until they became reddened from the abuse and the mental images of the past week pulsating in the back of her mind.

The periodic tapping of the man's charred fingers vibrated through the table, boring into her mind.

thud. thud. thud thud thud.

thud.

A small death march.

A man in apron circled his way over to their table and presented her enemy with his order; something strong and bitter and near boiling point.

The girl ordered decaf; the adrenaline in her veins and her shaking limbs didn't need any more energy than she did now.

Her racing heart started to palpitate; shuddering and tightening as though in a choke-hold and she forced herself to take in a loud, shuddering breath.

"Miss. Morres."

This was not a greeting.

This was a command.

In an attempt to mask her mounting dread she raised her head and looked into the man's dark eyes that always seemed to be burning with a kind of hell.

"Why did you choose such a public place for this?" She hissed, but the man before her saw through her mask; saw her petrified eyes for what they were, scrutinizing every shaking inch of her, every trickle of sweat beneath her eyebrow.

"Do I make you nervous, Miss Morres?" He gave a condescending, evil grin.

"No." She lied.

"You see, Evaline, the world is mixed with a selfish people, an arrogant people; too wrapped up in their own lives and their own pantomime to think anything of a low conversation happening right before their ears and eyes," he stretched his fingers "So this is the perfect place to discuss a murder,"

Evaline froze.

Her body seemed to stop functioning.

Her blood ran cold as her heart seemed to stop beating.

The employee came round and served her the chocolate drink and with an anxiety-stricken haste she sipped it, ignoring the boiling liquid scorching her tongue and leaving it rough and numb to flavor.

The man stretched back in his chair and smiled as though pleased with himself.

She could never remember his features, only his eyes that burned.

"Don't feel so bad; you knew what you were signing up for, I'm sure,"

"I didn't."

"Let's not lie to each other,"

"I didn't think you would choose me. I just wanted to see if it would work."

"We struck a deal, Miss Morres. And you and your friend - Josh, was it-?"

"- Johnathan. His name was Johnathan."

"Yes, yes. You and Johnathan-" - he said with mock concern - "-Were closer than any other pair assigned. It had to be you two, there's no doubt about that,"

"Go to Hell,"

Blood had rushed into her neck and cheeks and her shaking was not anxiety but rage, a pure, irrefutable rage.

It only ascended as the man with a furnace for eyes frowned and said, "Oh, what makes you think I'm not already here?" He motioned to the shop and the world outside the dirt-tinted window.

"Abbadon I swear-" Her hands had unconsciously found the table salt.

"-you want him back, don't you? don't. test. me." he threatened. "Let's not forget who held the dagger,"

She relaxed her grip in shame and hatred, but the faceted glass had left deep creases in her hands.

"A funny little Icarus, aren't you?" he laughed. Evaline slumped in her chair and imagined different scenarios; some, the ending meant her sipping coffee at home, the rest of the world far behind her. Others however, ended in a casket somewhere unknown buried twelve feet under.

Either way, she had to escape this.

"Now, let's discuss the process."

"You and I both know you're only going to tell me half of it."

"Half! Less than half, I assure you."

Her feet made motions to stand and leave, but Abbadon slapped her hand down on the table with a fury of strength and his black eyes blazed and she sat back down.

"You want to see your friend again, don't you? Alive and breathing and not slowly decomposing, flesh teeming with worms and blood and those dull, lifeless eyes that you -"

"Stop-Stop!" She threw her hands up so onlookers stared, and immediately they both became hushed. "I'll do it."

The turn of his blistered lips made her regret her choice, but she knew now something she should have known long ago; Never make a deal with the devil himself.

Evaline's migraine floated upwards and expanded as images of Johnathan's face, first full and flushed with life, then deteriorated into something grim and ugly.

Her left hand trembled; the hand that brought down the blow of the knife.

She remembered exactly where she did it; right beneath the collar bone, because her grip had slackened with sweat and fear and her hand slipped.

Abbadon glanced at her near-empty cup and stopped her from taking the last sip.

From his coat pocket he took out a neatly folded piece of paper, and told her, "drink it when you memorized the address,"

His stare was like a hunter's; no movement made by Evaline escaped his notice as she carefully unraveled the slip of paper.

First Storehouse; 3:01 AM: Do not eat after 8:03 PM.

-AU

Her lip trembled at the words; she knew what they meant. The abandoned storehouse where she first said her oath, where she threw her life and Johnathan's life away in two hours.

where she signed a page in her blood by candlelight, while nameless, faceless people murmured amongst themselves and whispered in approval.

She was smiling then; she was accepted then.

Until the unthinkable happened.

But joining Abbadon's Uprising wasn't a school-game; it wasn't a club, or a game at all; it was real, real with all of its terrifying consequences.

There was no turning back; she had accepted her own mortality long ago; and so she dipped the paper into her cup and downed its contents as if it were alcohol, the sodden paper like a thin strip of leather coating her tongue, slipping down her throat and into the depths of her stomach in a single second.

She was no longer shaking now; the reality had truly hit her this time and her body was past adrenaline; this was paralysis.

The world was a haze of nausea and green spots of head pain and voices that were all too loud.

And when she turned the devil had gone.

She sat there for an hour; barely moving, hardly blinking, breathing or living.

And the world outside was a hell that went on without her.

***

It was 1:38 AM and Evaline broke from a drifting sleep in a tangle of sheets and cold sweat, heart and mind racing with nightmares, tears slipping down because waking meant no relief.

She threw herself back on her pillows and stared at the gray ceiling, knowing that she would sit there stricken with anxiety for the next hour.

Her breath became a shuddering rasp and guilt overcame her for twenty minutes, grief overtook the world ten minutes after that.

But then it was 2:40, and somehow time had passed in a daze and disorientation.

She turned on her light, and a yellow glow swelled into her room.

Bile rose in her throat as she struggled with her clothes; swapping pj's for a lightweight dark jacket and black pants. It took her three tries to get her fumbling hands to do her bidding, until she decided to wear slippers instead.

It was 2:52 now, and her heartbeat became hummingbird pace.

Before she left her room, she stared at her reflection.

Her dark brown hair hung in soft waves that framed her face and amplified her clear, light gray eyes.

They were reddened and puffed and stricken with fear and apprehension.

With a deep breath that gave no relief, she left her house without turning back, climbed into her car and drove off.

The time was 2:56.

***

The hood concealing her face and her hair spilling from either side, she checked her watch hastily every second outside the rusting, forgotten building.

3:00AM

3:00AM

3:00AM

3:00AM

3:00AM

still 3:00AM...

3:01.

She couldn't move.

couldn't think.

Her veins were ice and her heart pumped thick heavy ice cubes and she still did not move.

There was a creak and her head whipped towards the sound but she never saw it; a sack was thrown over her head and she inhaled the intoxicatingly sweet perfume of a sedative.

In the panic she gasped for air and the world faded away and her heart slowed, slowed, and slowed further still and she smiled.

***

I see myself as though I am watching through a screen; I see my body laid on a table, Johnathan's body lying peacefully next to mine. Our hands are joined as one.

An long knife piercing through the palms of our hands appears to be holding us together.

I can't feel anything here: Emotions are fuzzy and the world is black glass; shreds of things real and things of dreams.

Although I know there are others surrounding our bodies, I cannot see them through the glass.

"Johnathan?" I call, and the fuzzy barrier shatters when there is no reply.

I might have lost him forever.

I can't let the thought swell and I call his name, screaming, crying, saying I'm sorry, saying I was stupid and crazy and didn't know what I was doing and I'm trying to bring him back.

There is a pause like eternity, and suddenly the boy I know and love and hate is before me as if he was there the whole time.

He looks the same.

His fluff of sandy hair and sad eyes and sad smile and crooked nose and straight teeth and he's breathing, breathing, breathing.

I run to him and we embrace.

It worked.

"They were right! they can bring people back. I don't know how, or why, but he said it was about emotional connection, something about an incantation or herbs but the point is you can come back."

Trapped in his hug I remember the promises they made to us when we were recruited.

How they told us that they can make our fallen rise one more time.

They just needed a test subject.

I hate them for it.

but my best friend is here and he's telling me it's not my fault, it's not my fault.

The relief is so overwhelming I am high off of it, but it ends quickly.

I look in his eyes and I know that there is something he wants to tell me.

He whispers in my ear.

"I've been dead for a week now. I see the dead walk by here now and then, some old men, some kids." He closes his eyes and shudders. "But you know who else I saw? Abbadon. He's dead too. Always was."

"What?"

"He comes here now and then, and I think it's when he can't fool the living much longer. He's like a poltergeist or something."

"What?" any other word is either stuck in my throat or behind a curtain of shock.

I bury my head in his chest and squeeze his arms and my body starts to shake violently.

Or whatever skin this is.

"I'm not able to come back, Evaline. I never was." His smile is not at all reassuring and I can't understand, can't understand a word he is saying.

but he holds me sternly and looks into my eyes with his horribly sad ones, and says, "He just needs a body - a shell - and a willing life. He wants to be a living being again. That's all he ever wanted. He got both from us. He used us both, probably the whole cult doesn't know. That's why he needed a connection. And you were willing to die for me."

He tries a small smile again and I just...

"The man is the devil," My voice is barely audible but my mind is screaming.

I drop to my knees at a loss of what to do, think, what to feel. Johnathan kneels to my eye level, a flame of determination in his eyes.

"But You can go back. There's still enough time."

"No. No. no, I can't -"

"Evaline! Listen to me." He practically screams but it doesn't penetrate my skull; to me he is only whispering. "When he takes my body - "

"- Stop - "

"-No - listen - when he takes my body. I need you to kill me again."

The impossible, unthinkable, inconceivable thought echoes and turns and bounces off my brain and I don't comprehend for the longest time.

He holds me by my shoulders.

"You don't want to let him get away with this, do you?"

I shake my head and my cheeks are wet again and I am reminded of when we were six years old, and I had fallen and skinned my knee. It bubbled and bled and I was crying senseless but he was there; he knew exactly what to do. And I trusted him.

But how can I leave this place without my best friend?

The world pulsates and it knocks us both backwards.

And then the once solid body that held me steady fades away and I am clutching smoke.

"I love you, and I don't blame you." His disoriented voice is sincere and I believe him. I can't hold in the cries any longer as he says, "Do him in for me."

"Promise, no goodbyes?"

"Never." He whispers, with a certainty that a breath of laughter escapes my lips. He grins at me one more time.

And then his features fade away and I am alone in the darkness.

He has left something in my hand; and I know how to use it.

************ *

The world became clear to Evaline and she recognized the filthy, dark warehouse and the light above her that amplified her headache.

Her hand wet with a thick, warm liquid, and the pain that started out dull was growing rapidly in lightening waves, she heard no life; the storehouse was completely empty.

Her hands found the cold steel table and she lifted herself up; she confirmed that was alone; save for the body sitting up next to her.

There was a knife to the side of the table.

She stared at the man to her side, who was smiling with eyes that burned like hell that made this familiar face unrecognizable.

Do him in for me.

"Johnathan!" She said in delight, and she threw her arms around the shell, who enveloped her in cold arms.

Do him in for me.

"I can't believe they were right," Bloodied hand in bloodied hand, and the eerie response of silence throbbed in her mind.

The shell hadn't said a word, and while locked in an embrace, she slowly slid the knife into her jacket pocket, which was deep enough to not make it noticeable.

"Let's go home," The shell said in Johnathan's voice.

Evaline Morres kept one hand in the shell's, and one in her pocket, clutching the cold medal made warm by her skin.

The alley was empty and the shell was never skeptical.

***

Evaline was alone on her couch Wednesday morning, watching the news, face illuminated by the white-blue electricity.

"Did you hear that, Johnathan?" She whispered, tears staining her face for the millionth time, only this time she was lifted of fear; she was calm, she was grieving, but she was safe.

The reporter had just announced a man had been found dead near an old storehouse, a wound on his palm, and one, perfectly, directly, on his heart.

She grinned sadly.

"I didn't miss this time."