There was silence on the plane between life and death. It was a sea of darkness, dotted here and there with pockets of light about the size of a man's head. The lights were scattered in every direction, with nowhere to turn that was free of their calming glow. In this place there was no cold, no fear, no hatred or hunger, nor was there warmth, love, or joy. The plane was a constant. It stretched to the dawn of time and back again. It was the bottom of the hourglass, the end of every road. Every single soul, every life that was ever lived, passed through here onto their final destination. And in all this space, all this vast gulf of nothing, all these paths to infinity, there was only one place to be concerned about.
A small outcrop of stone, floating just before one of the lights. The top of it was flat, topped with cobblestones, as though a hunk of causeway had been ripped straight from the ground and now drifted freely through space and time. On this island there stood a doorway of arched rock, with a shimmering field of blue at its center, and through this doorway came the ghost of Marilyn Singh.
She was twenty eight when she died. Drowned at the bottom of a lake. She stayed there, body and soul, for nearly half the years she'd been alive, her spirit causing general unrest for the small town nearby. Her mind was shattered. Her life, her death, all swept away in the trauma of her final moments. She was trapped there, able only to wander back and forth across the lake, becoming the subject of tall tales told over firelight.
Until the medium came, to put things right.
Rosangela Blackwell fell through the doorway after her. She rose and dusted herself off. Not that dust existed there, but, even where death didn't exist, old habits died hard.
"Where are we?" Marilyn said. Her head turned to take in the infinity, her tangled and knotted hair hanging limply over her shoulders.
"If I knew, I'd tell you." Rosa said. She had tried before to come up with an impressive name for the place, something like "The Fade" or "The Shadows," but it always sounded trite when she said it out loud. Now she just tried to get past that part of the conversation as soon as possible.
"This, is where you get to move on." She said. She figured that was cool enough.
"Oh... you mean heaven?" Marilyn stared into the nearest light, hovering just over the cobblestone. "It's in there? Looks a little... small."
"I don't know. I've never been on the other side."
Marilyn turned to Rosa, one eyebrow arching.
"You don't know?" She smiled. "Aren't you supposed to be guiding me?"
Rosa threw her hands up defensively and laughed.
"Hey! I got you here didn't I?"
"Wherever here is." Marylin said. Suddenly, her face fell and her voice grew quiet. "What about Kyle? Did you ever find any proof?"
This sank Rosa's smile. "No... all we have is your word. I'm afraid that's not enough to go on. I'm sorry."
"It's okay. I'm just glad to be out of there. I hate getting wet."
They stood there a moment. Rosa did, anyway. The light in the distance twinkled, like the flash of a camera frozen in time.
"So I suppose I better get going." Marilyn said, drawing out the "so," anxiety creeping into her voice. "Unless there's anything else I need to know?" she looked to Rosa hopefully.
"Not that I can think of. Just float forward and... whatever is over there will take care of the rest." Rosa said.
"Oh. Okay." Marilyn took a deep breath. "This is what it's all been about, isn't it? Better just get it over with." She floated up towards the light. Just as she reached the precipice, she turned to Rosa one last time.
"Thanks for everything! I hope I see you again soon!" As soon as the words came out, she realized what she'd said. Her eyes widened and she clapped her hands over her mouth. "Oh! I didn't mean it like that! I mean- I hope you live for a long long time and then-"
"Marylin! Just go!" Rosa laughed.
Marylin rapidly nodded, closed her eyes, and flew forward into the light. There was a crack and a flash.
Gone.
Rosa let her shoulders relax. She stood for a moment, appreciating the stillness that surrounded her, spoiled only by the rhythmic rising and falling of the platform below her. Joey could wait, she had earned a little break.
She watched the glowing sphere before her. The spirits always said that it felt good... felt warm. Rosa couldn't feel anything. She thought of where Marylin was now, travelling through eternity on her way to literally God knows where. Rosa had to stay here, going from dead body to dead body, hearing tragedy after tragedy, putting back together broken lives, her "power" threatening to drive her insane at any moment, like her aunt and grandmother before her.
It wasn't fair.
She'd inherited a life full of suffering. Where was her reward? Then she thought of Marylin, her fearful excitement as she went to a better world. She thought of all the others she had freed from an eternity of wandering. That warmed her, a bit.
Then the stillness shattered.
Rosa toppled sideways as the floor beneath her shook. The dull hum of the light was drowned out by a deep churning, a primal growl. Rosa rose to one knee and looked for the noise, and found that it came from all around her. Bright lines were being etched into the darkness, spanning for what could be thousands of miles. Then they grew, expanding outward, like tears in a fabric. The tears widened rapidly, their insides a broiling green energy that crackled and shot outwards, massive tendrils that whipped across the infinity.
Rosa spun towards the door and ran, stumbling as the platform shook again. The growling filled her ears, blotting out every thought except for mad flight. She closed her eyes and flung herself through the portal. She landed on wood, and heard the chatter of crickets.
Rosa propped herself up on one arm and looked around. She was on a dock, off the shore of Wikwemikong lake. Surrounding her was a crown of trees shivering in a crisp wind. The water lazily shifted in its sleep, while the night sky above her was smattered with stars. Joey floated beside her, a bemused grin pushing up his cheeks.
"Joey! Something's wrong in my head!"
"You're telling me, sister."
Rosa smacked her other hand down on the wood in frustration.
"You need to see this!" She grabbed his tie, and in a burst of light he was pulled into her.
For the third time tonight, Rosa fell to the ground. This time she was up in a flash, looking around her. Joey stood before her, mouth agape.
The crackling had died down in her absence. Now only a few still shot outwards from the tears, a fraction of their former length.
"What... what did you do!?" Joey shouted in exasperation. "Five minutes! Five minutes you were in here!"
"I didn't do anything!" Rosa shouted back. "We talked, she did her ghost thing, I did my medium thing, she went into the light. Then all..." Rosa waved her arms in small circles above her head. "this!"
"I gotta tell you kid, I've seen some wild stuff in my time as a spook but this blows all of 'em away." Joey said, pushing the brim of his fedora up with his thumb. "They look like... holes."
"Holes to where?"
"Wish I knew kid." Joey asked, rotating slowly, not unlike Marilyn had been doing just minutes before. "Did you feel anything? Before it started?"
Rosa instinctively rubbed her temple, there was still a dull pain. "It hurt right here, it came out of nowhere."
Joey's eyebrows jumped. "Like when your powers first kicked in?"
"No... I don't think so. It was different, it felt like my head was being torn apart."
Joey looked back up at one of the cracks, green energy pulsating out from it in waves, like a sickly tide.
"Well, it looks like it's settled down at least. I don't think we can do anything from here. Not right now anyway. You're sure you're alright?" Joey asked.
"I'm fine. A little woozy." Rosa said.
"You just get some sleep. We'll figure out how to stitch this place back together in the morning."
Rosa nodded and followed him out of the portal, taking one last look at the immense tears that crisscrossed the plane.
She left the dock and started the walk back to her hotel. In the morning she would call the head of the tourism board for the town and tell him she'd sorted out their problem. It would take a week or so for him to confirm it, but she'd at least earned a few months rent. Unless they were like the last people who hired Rosa and just paid her in a commemorative T-shirt.
The bus ride back to Manhattan was not as celebratory as they'd expected. She thought about how she'd managed to help another soul, but it was small comfort. She stared out at the rising New York skyline and tried to count the buildings.