Taken
There is only so much a person should have to give before they stop. Unfortunately none of us know where that line stands. How do you stop when every day you are told that giving is so good, kind, heroic. What you are willing to give up, the world will take and continue to carve out more. Until one day, without knowing it, you realise that you are a shell of the person you once were.
It will take your love, soul, even your pride.
When do we stop? When we return to nothing but the dirt and the dust that we are formed from?
Please God.
When do I stop?
...
The very fabric of reality itself tore open before them. A portal, shrieking and sucking the air out of the world around it like the vacuum of space, ripping up chunks of land to swallow into itself with a ravenous appetite that would never be sated.
Through it, the beyond. He saw planets, other realms and what seemed like stars splitting apart through cataclysmic devastation.
Kurt grabbed onto her, terrified at the hole in reality that he couldn't comprehend. His mind fixed onto things that were real. The bitter wind nipping with cold, blinding him with his own hair. The grass of the old school yard slowly lifting up and sinking beneath them like the ground was sobbing. The warmth of her hand. They were in this together. For all the times she had left him in the past, now was what mattered. He loved her.
'KURT!' She flailed, trying to reach back desperately.
Then she was gone. Slipped right through his fingers no matter his struggle.
'You chose to leave Heaven… That has consequences.'
He pressed against the barrier, shoving all his strength into reaching for her. He pushed, it bent. He pushed, it caved. 'Whatever it takes,' he pushed, it split, his arm lancing with pain. He reached for her ghost, even as his body was broken and split by the beyond. Digested. Consumed.
'You chose to leave Heaven.'
Lord, please don't do this to me!
'If you truly want to save me, prove yourself a hero.'
'AMANDA!"
A choked gasp shuddered through him as Kurt bolted upright in bed, slick with sweat. His lungs heaved in air like he'd just remembered how to breathe. His tail thrashed about, thumping the bed as it weaselled him out of the tangled sheets.
Breathe.
Once he was free, and his heart had stopped trying to escape his chest, relief began to sink in. The sulfuric smell, as well as the strong deodorant, gave it away. His room.
One of the Bamfs, tired blue imp-like creatures, staggered out of sleep and fell off the end of the bed, squeaking in alarm. The others snapped awake, turning their blazing yellow eyes to him owlishly in the dark.
His hand twitched before running over his face, out of tiredness or shame he couldn't really tell anymore. Moving his limbs felt like a monumental task once the adrenaline left. His tail curled into his lap sluggishly. 'I'm fine,' Kurt muttered, 'I'm fine.'
His gaze raked across the room once more, trying to get his bearings. Counting and cataloguing the things. His attention snagged on the rosary on his bedside table. A volatile chill seized his panicked heart.
He picked up the rosary, examining the cross before gently pressing it to his forehead in shame.
'Forgive me Amanda. I-' Frustration rose and he felt his fangs grind together. In the silence, staring off into space, he fought to admit the truth. But something choked him. He couldn't say it.
He swallowed a sobbed and counted the beads as they passed through his fingers.
He took one last look at the cross, sending an insignificant prayer to God. Though ashamed to ask, he needed help. A sign. Because right now, he didn't know what to do or if he had the strength to be... anything.
...
Victoria's heart burned as she sprinted through the forest. Bare footfalls thudded so hard on the dirt that her ankles felt close to giving out. She spun, eyes searching desperately for something remotely recognisable in the area apart from towering trees and this damned fog!
'Oh god- Oh God!' It was the first chance she had alone to recognise the sticky substance smeared on her body, dripping off her hands and filling her nose with a smothering metallic stench that made her gag. The mixture of disgust and closing dread rolled her stomach but she couldn't stay still. They were coming for her!
It echoed around in her skull, bouncing off her brain to the point where she clutched her head in pain.
'HELP!' She shrieked as her knees buckled.
What do you do when you feel your life boiling down to one moment? When your weak, desperate and not enough anymore, who do you look to? Family were too far away and to self-serving to care about spawn. Friends? Victoria's left her to save their own skins… or did she leave them? Details are such grey little things. Like worms.
A gentle hand brushed against her back as she cried. Victoria bucked wildly away with a demented screech, her limbs kicked and punched towards whoever had caught her. The mystery-person snatched her wrists and pinned her against the closest tree with ease, another hand pressing her mouth shut.
A twig snapped behind the tree and they both froze in place. The thick fog around them parted in smoking swirls as they slipped through the terrain with liquid fluidity. These hooded figures glided through the forest in an almost unearthly manner, pacing in calm, methodical strides.
Victoria somehow heaved her gaze to the stranger. A woman, tall and slender with striking blonde hair and such piercing green eyes that she was glad that the woman was glaring at the hooded figures as slowly stalked past. If looks could kill took a whole new meaning.
A moment passed.
Then two.
Only when the chanting had dulled down into faint, indecipherable gibberish did the woman step back. 'I will take my hand off your mouth. You will remain silent. Understand?' She spoke softly, but with a faint accent that certainly wasn't American.
Victoria nodded.
The woman peeled back her hand, her tense expression eased when Victoria kept to her word and remained quiet. They took the time to regard each-other quickly. The woman wore a pristine white dress that seemed ripped out of a fantasy and in the right light her hair almost glistened with small jewels woven into it.
'Who are you?' She breathed, unable to maintain eye-contact with the stranger for long before checking over her shoulder for the hooded figures to re-appear.
'I'm here to help. You called for me Victoria.' She brushed a ratty piece of blood clotted hair out of Victoria's face and gently cupped her cheek. 'I am The Guardian of Tir na Nog. Protector of lonely and heartbroken souls. My name is Niamh, child.'
She twitched away from the touch, but such an entrancing expression sucked her further into her sway. Fresh tears welled in her eyes. They streaked down her face in fat drops that cut through the caked grime. 'I wanted to explore my spiritual side not get hauled off by the cool-aid cult!'
She hushed sympathetically, 'I won't let them hurt you anymore.'
A hysterical scoff escaped, doubt tinged Victoria's tone.
'I've been trapped here for a long time. The fog was once a way to protect souls in Tir na Nog. Now, the gods use it as a cage.' Niamh stalked through the trees, ducking back behind them at the slightest swirl of the fog. 'But you have the chance to make this right.'
'H-how?'
Suddenly, a bright flash of light struck between them.
Victoria screeched, scrabbling in the dirt until she managed to climb to a stand. Everything swirled in a sickening motion. Gravity spiralled. She staggered and hit the ground. The hooded creature was all she could untangle from the dizzied visions and she choked on her thundering heart. 'NIAMH!'
Thunder echoed so powerful the ground itself quaked. Out of nothing the woman in white summoned a long sceptre of bleached wood, a strange circular piece of glass was fixed into the twined top. The glass changed colour as it swooped past the trees. Niamh slammed the staff into the ground. The world itself bent to her will. Thunder growled. The trees contorted, snapped, splintered as if it had bones to break. The twisting branches snatched the hooded ones. Snapping, stabbing until crushing them in the canopy.
Niamh grinned. A fire lit in her eyes.
'H-how?' Victoria propped herself up against the tree but flinched away in fear of being its next victim.
'All gods are given power through belief child. Yours allowed me to claim my sceptre and protect you.' She pointed to the mangled bodies. 'Let us escape this place. Where did you come from?'
Victoria looked around, taking a shuddered breath before nodding. She pointed to two trees that bowed and knitted together like folded gnarled hands. 'I went through those. It should lead to a tunnel that goes into the Sea caves. Those crazies doused me in blood and some creepy glowing shit happened before I escaped. I don't know what will happen when we get there.'
Niamh just smiled, her hand gliding over the hilt of her sceptre. 'Don't dwell on such worry.'
A small smile twitched her mouth. For the first time in her ordeal Victoria felt… safe. No one could touch her with Niamh by her side. She beckoned and began to trace back her steps through the fog.
After a small amount of time they found the mouth of the tunnel, a yawning hole that inclined into the mountainside. Two pillars blocked the path with runes carved into the stone that radiated a dominating ancient magic. The pressure was enough to make both women rub their temples gently.
'Can your magic get through this?' Victoria swallowed nervously.
'No. This spell was cast by a god much stronger than I…' Niamh found it difficult to approach the pillars, pain evident in her expression. 'However, we can trick it. The living ones may pass back into your realm. We just need it to believe we are you.' Niamh glided back to Victoria, 'Let me have your body.'
'What?!' Victoria's eyes went wide.
'All you'll need to do is agree. I'll travel to the living world, dispose of the scum who did this to you and then come back to break down the barrier from the other side.'
Shaky strides had Victoria pacing away. Frustration built as she couldn't focus with that energy messing with her head. She cried out.
'Do you trust me?' Niamh's whispered words broke through the compressed fury that deafened her.
'Yes!'
'Then believe in me.' Niamh took Victoria's blood crusted hands and entwined them in her pale slender fingers.
Victoria looked up at the beauty in front of her. A vision who was willing to save someone as dirty and desperate as her. A small pang of adoration sparked in her chest and, somehow, Niamh responded, growing brighter like an angel.
'Say it.'
'I- I…'
Niamh smiled and let go of Victoria's hands, she held up the sceptre and through the glass, watched her lovingly.
'I believe in you.'
By the time Victoria had the chance to look anywhere else the sceptre was taken away. In Niamh's place stood… Victoria. Deep brown straight hair replaced blonde, her dress changed into a business suit, the only thing that didn't change were her stunning eyes.
Slowly Niamh stepped back. Through the pillars with staff in hand. A spark of green momentarily froze her, but It didn't hurt any more as she passed through. She looked back at Victoria a triumphant grin on her face.
'You'll come back for me, right?'
Niamh responded nodding gently. 'There will be more Victoria… lost in the fog. Should you find them make sure they believe in me too. I'll be able to protect you better if more souls believed in me.'
'Yes.'
With that, Niamh disappeared into the tunnel.
In the silent fog, Victoria realised she couldn't feel the cold. The wind that rattled the trees didn't tousle her hair or brush her skin.
Numb. She was numb.
Slowly, through the licking fog she saw them, the wind had stopped yet the rustled noises churned into the heart stabbing chanting. The hooded creatures relentlessly closed in on her and all Victoria could do was turn to the gateway.
'Niamh!' She cried, checking over her shoulder as the horrors slithered closer. She pressed forward but the pillars blazed with furious green energy, throwing her back from the escape. 'NIAMH!'
Her wretched screams echoed through the tunnel, but Niamh had other priorities. She could smell the sea, hear the waves she ached to listen to again. The cold prickling against her skin made her heart rise with unadulterated joy and she laughed. Oh, how she laughed as she marched through the sea tunnel, her eyes casting on every witch that sat chanting for her return!
'My lady. The world has changed since your last visit.' One of her followers shimmied forward on her knees in the wet sand.
Niamh brushed back her hair, examining those who prayed to her with a piercing scrutiny. 'You need me.'
The disciple shifted uncomfortably, her hand fiddling with severe burn marks on her forearms. 'New creatures have surfaced. Mutants. They poison the land and hurt so many.'
'And this is what you ask of me in repayment.'
The witches nodded.
'Very well. But Tir na Nog is fading. The gods are not as strong as they once were. I wish to restore it to the paradise it once was before the void swallows it.' Her eyes landed on the surf, the shallow waves that went back and forth in bubbling delight. She fought the melancholy that washed over her, only allowing steady steps as she made it to the mouth of the cave. Was this even the same sea that he has shown her long ago?
'You need more to believe?'
'No,' she smiled softly her hand resting on the head of her frightened disciple. 'I need utter devotion.'
...
Layla kept a keen watch around the rickety bus as it wound down the pot-hole ridden country lane. A small smile slapped on her face and a secure grip pinned a paper bag full of groceries. Evening had just about turned, yet barely a soul was on the transport. No one ever went this far out into the country except her, some teens hoping to get drunk and her Nana.
When they passed over a small bridge she pressed the bell to get off. The group of teens grew silent, waiting, at the back of the bus when she rose from her seat. The sudden stop lurched her forward. If her arm hadn't hooked onto a rail just as the driver halted she would've been sent sprawling. Having one hand, not practical in the slightest. But at least it gave her a strong capacity for dealing with bullshit, like the quiet sniggering or whispers from the back of the bus.
'Thank you, Tom.'
Tom frowned.
Layla glanced back, feeling the stares bore into the back of her head and spotting the teens quickly looking back down at their phones or muttering quietly to each other. She used to teach those kids. She couldn't let that sadness creep back up on her again.
As the bus peeled around the corner her expression dropped into a tired scowl. She blew a lock of ginger hair out of her eyes and turned to take the steep trail home. To the crooked house on the hill.
Using her elbow, she pushed against the rusted steel gate, white peeled paint disintegrated on her arm the more she moved. It let out a protesting groan and fell off its hinges with a dramatic THUNK.
Layla gazed down sympathetically. Sometimes she just wanted to lie face down on the floor and ignore everything too.
'Nana?' she called, hoping the old woman was outside tending to the flowers.
Silence gave way to the whispering chill of the wind. Nothing but the empty valley for a good five miles all around. As she looked up at the evening sky, burning orange as the sun slowly sank, Layla wondered if one day she would end up just another part of this place. Forgotten, falling apart… alone.
With a sigh, she trekked through the vegetable garden and banished those useless thoughts; tucking her nose into her scarf. She juggled the bag, transferring it from one arm to the other as she rooted around her pocket for the keys. Only to find it clacking open and shut gently with the wind. Unlocked.
'Nana?' she shouted when entering the old dark, musty kitchen, 'How many times have I told you to lock the door when I'm out?!' She plopped down the bag on the small wooden table taken up with herbs, spices and pebbles.
'In here dear! I can't hear you.' A sweet little croak called from the living room. Oddly cheerful.
'Don't act senile with me! You have radar ears up until the moment you're in trouble.' It wasn't that difficult! You wrestle the handle, slotted the key, turn it back a tad before slamming it round until a you heard a click. As she let go it began to groan but a quick punch to the side of the mechanism tamed it.
She stormed through the kitchen and down the hall, towards the living room. 'How am I supposed to leave you alone if anyone can just waltz… in…'
Across from her Nana was a stunning woman. It wouldn't have been difficult to mistake her for a queen with her regal posture and controlled expression as she nursed a cat mug. A shock of white hair and stormy eyes. She seemed amused at her passing comments.
'Dr Cormac I presume?' She smiled wryly.
Layla coughed in embarrassment, shifting the groceries in her arms awkwardly and swore never to yell from another room ever again. 'Yes. Yes! That's me!'
'Good,' The woman nodded and gracefully put her teacup on a knitted coaster, 'Because my institute was very interested in your job application.'
Thank you for reading! I know this is quite a niche area of the internet that I'm posting in but hey, write what you'd like to read. Not going to lie, I'm slightly nervous about this so any feedback would be much loved! :D
- BronzeLion