-- Yay, I got reviews! Thanks to everyone who did so. You guys are sexy as pie! Nonetheless; I own nothing, NOTHING! Well, except for Ginny, Kris, TJ, and a couple of other characters... heh, heh...
Steamy, warm water rolling down her spine... each drop; a lightning bolt of fiery hot pain.
Ginny showered, to cleanse the blood from her back and the sweat and blood that had made her clothes stick to her, and still stuck to her skin. Wash it all away... she waited... and stayed there a long, long time.
When the water ran clear and the pain in her back seemed in steady, scorching rings around where the wings connected into her back, she finally shut off the water. She stood in the vacant, dripping shower stall for a moment, shivering with her arms wrapped around her bare body.
Quite suddenly, she wanted just to drop to her knees and sob for ever dear life. She wanted to rip every patch of flesh from her face with her bare hands, and scream until her throat blistered and bled. It took quite some self-control, but she resisted.
She stepped out the shower, and dried herself lazily with a tower. Besides where it had been hung on the wrack, a clean white camisole and pair of sweat pants hung, and flip flops rested side-by-side below. She slipped into these clothes listlessly.
Finally, she pawed a crossed the room to the one and only door. Her cold, clammy hand wrapped around the knob. She was afraid of what was on the other side... was this all just a trick? Was there going to be an endless drop to the pits of fiery Hell right outside waiting for her? And most chilling of all; if she opened it, did it mean that she was really dead?
She swallowed her fears like a bitter pill, and allowed her person to take on rather the frame of mind of a zombie. The knob turned, and the door opened, and fiery Hell was not waiting for her... instead, the door opened to a small room like a foyer, and there was a long hall lined with doors and windows covered with mini-blind on the outside of them... strange. All of this was white, as well.
She took a step outside of the door, awe-struck, and didn't even notice the man standing beside it until he cleared his throat pointedly.
He spoke very quickly, as if all of this was very routine and tiring. "Hello and how do you do? I—"
"Whoa!" she cried, interrupting him, and jumping back.
The man, the creature, the angel that stood before her... was incredible. A blindingly bright gold hoop acted as a halo above his head. Long, blonde hair the color of moonbeams trailed down to his buttocks, gently braided on either side to behind his ears to keep it out of his face. His eyes were narrow, a keen silvery blue, though kind. His skin was powdery white, with a gentle rosy tint in the cheeks. He dressed in a flowing white robe trimmed with spun gold. Most impressive of all... was his wings.
They were humongous! Tremendous! Billowing out of his back, tracing his shoulders, and tumbling to the ground like a great, white crystal waterfall. They towered in their presence, flowing down in all the feathery glory of holy Heaven.
"Who are you?" she breathed in astonishment.
"I, child, am the archangel Gabriel, here to assign you a guide through the gates of Heaven so that you may begin the quest to find your afterlife and–"
"Hey!" Ginny cried, suddenly, interrupting him once again. "You look just like Haldir!"
"Whom?" Gabriel cocked a brow.
"Haldir," Ginny repeated less enthusiastically. "You know… from the Lord of the Rings movies… played by Craig Parker… you're practically identical… you could be twins."
Gabriel – obviously, by the look on his face – did not know and was not amused.
"Yes, that's fantastic," Gabriel remarked, entirely without enthusiasm. He glanced down at his clip board, and spoke again after a moment. "Ah, Gabrielle Jenks... you know you're named after me, right? Right?"
"I always thought I was named after my grandmother," Ginny muttered, knitting her brows. The smile dropped immediately from Gabriel's face, along with his pride-induced change to good nature.
"Wonderful, really; you're a bleeding joy," Gabriel grumbled, sounding a wee bit English... hmm… Who would've thought? "Well, I've done my duty... let me see who God's going to assign to guide you."
"Oh, do I get to meet God?" Ginny asked eagerly, her eyes growing wide.
Gabriel glowered at her. "No."
She pouted. He snapped his fingers and a phone appeared. He picked up the receiver and pressed the numbers "4, 1, 1" before waiting... a moment later, he began to speak. "Ah! Hello there. It seems we have a... Gabrielle Jenks here. She needs a guide, obviously," at this point, he put his hand over the receiver and whispered to Ginny, "Couldn't very well have me wasting my time with you," then he moved back to the phone, all this very quickly. "So, um, yeah... could you send someone right over to the shower room doo—"
Gabriel paused for a moment, and his brows became very flat, like two parallel lines. His mouth slowly morphed into a scrawl. "Me, sir? What about Michael, what's he out—Holy war, oh, bother! Fine, I'll do it, I'll do it; I'll take the blooming girl..."
He hung up the receiver then, and went muttering on as he looked at his clip board. "Stupid Michael always getting to have all the fun... I mean, what's the point of being the bloody archangel if you're stuck guiding souls all day? I knew I never should have taken the position of greeting every new-comer to Heaven. Stupid, stupid... ah, bloody hell..."
"It appears I'll be guiding you today," he spat quite bitterly at Ginny. He had already found her name again on the board, and had read it over. "You're a very special case Ms. Jenks. Heaven commends you for your bravery... not for your sacrifice, because that was bloody stupid, but for your bravery nonetheless...
"So, I'll give you the quick run-through. Every soul that comes up here gets to see stuff... meet their dead relatives again, see past lives, stuff like that. It's all along that hall," he pointed to the one in front of them. "So... let's carry on, then. I want to get this over with before tea time in the Lord's chambers..."
xXx
Now, in the quite opposite regions of the afterlife, a certain son named Damien was visiting his certain parent named Satan.
He walked effortlessly quick along the dangerously thin path of rock suspended at least a hundred feet above flames and flats where the damned were being tortured the fifty-or-so yards to Satan's layer.
Satan's layer was a large island of rock that could only be reached by that one thin path. It was surrounded with a certain of black mesh that came together to be pushed aside where the path joined the island. Within, at the far end, there was a large throne where Satan sat, haloed with beautiful peacock feathers and the most realistic fake plants you were saw... probably because they were illusions, but nonetheless.
A few demons cluttered around, fanning and pampering Lucifer. Damien pushed past all of this and went up to his parents... and, would you believe it or not; and revealed that Satan was, indeed, a woman.
She rested her head on the bosom of a beautiful woman and her feet in the lap of another, making little webs of yarn between her fingers, the nails painted the color of blood to match her luscious lips. Her hair was long and silk-like, flowing smoothly down to her belly-button, and sunshine blonde in color. Her eyes were a piercing green, and her skin a delicate tan. She dressed in a red vinyl corset top, red vinyl mini-skirt, and red stiletto heels.
"Mommy," Damien drew her attention. She glanced up from her finger's entwinement.
"Yes?"
"We have a... meager problem."
She sat up straight now, dropping the original circle of string to the floor. "Is it those damn bunnies again? The fuck, how do they keep getting down here?"
"No, mom, it isn't the bunnies," Damien said, shaking his hands in the air. "It's the dream demon Freddy Krueger."
"Krueger," she echoed. "What about him? He's been racking in the kills... got his power, finally, word has it."
"That's just the thing. You know how hard it is to predict these crazy types... Krueger had one of his schizophrenic attacks and became convinced that the girl who had his powers was, like, his new daughter of something! Now that he's killed her, he's gone completely a-wall, totally backed up into the gnarled little head of his, and nothing'll make him come out!"
"Nothing?" Satan questioned, and then shook her head. "There's no such thing... everybody works for a price. Find out what we need to pull his string, and then bring it to him."
"I already know what will do it for him," Damien followed, bringing Satan's attention back to him just as it was going away again as she eased into her chair. She stopped, and sighed.
"And what is that?"
"I can't bring it to him, but—"
"Just spill!"
Damien sighed, shaking his head. "It's the girl... the nut wants her so bad, I don't know what he'll do if he doesn't have her! Fred was never one to give up, he always takes what he wants, but now... now there's no way..."
"So what's your solution proposition?" she crossed her hands over her stomach, tasting the coming engagement her son was about to lay upon her.
"Go up to Heaven, pay your brother a visit," Damien suggested, cautiously. "He owes you a favor after they accidentally sent that social worker down here, anyway... you sent her back, remember? Cash in on that!"
"You want me to try and do business with your uncle God?" she narrowed her eyes. "The bastard banished me from Heaven! I haven't talked to him in a millennia!"
"We need Krueger," Damien reminded her. "He's one of our tops demons, and the very best of his kind... as I said, Uncle God owes you a favor, anyway! You should at least try, mom... if for nothing else, then for the soul count."
"... Fine," Satan sighed and stood up from her chair. "I'll talk to God and see what I can do... but no damn promises! I might just come home with his head on a platter, son a bitching—"
With that, Satan disappeared in a momentary eruption of fire. Damien smiled, pleased with himself and optimistic with the arrangement he set off, and turned to leave; perhaps rape some damned young women in sector C... all in good taste, of course.
xXx
And back in the real word, events had taken place, as well.
The day was gray and cold as coming death. Rain fell heavily from the sky little dozens of tears from the angels above. Everyone dressed in back, marching or driving up the gravel hill to the cemetery gates... so many funerals, and now; the one they believed to be last.
Kris Carrigan walked slowly up the hill, his black Etnies soaked already from grass and falling rail, with the tiniest stones sticking to them from the gravel. His hands were buried deep in the pockets of his black jeans, the knuckles clenched so tight they turned white inside of them.
He remembered that night, as he stalked through the gates like a ghost and on to where they met around the black coffin and open grave. The people who came were few and far apart. Some came just to see the grave of the bitch who had imitated the Springwood Slasher, but Kris knew better.
His face was very pale, almost sickly yellow, like the color of sour milk. His eyes seemed tremendous in his head, staring out like two brown flash lights, though so very dead in those irises... his soul had been crushed that night.
That night, that night, always back to that night…
He'd been on the porch talking to Ginny, trying to change her mind. Her tiny body, so thin from her inability to eat given the past she'd lived through, shuttering unconsciously against the cold wind. Her eyes were so sunken, like someone had drained the very life out of them. Her hair was mess, as if she hadn't combed it in days. He face was a lot like his, disturbing in color... he'd been horrified by her appearance, but he didn't let it show.
"Destroy him," he'd pressed on – referring to Freddy – and grasping her head in his hands. "Let it be done... once he's gone; you can be real."
But she pulled away from him. She'd turned slowly, to head for the door, but stopped to touch her temples, cringing her eyes shut tight, before falling to her hands and knees.
He'd cried out, jumping to her side immediately, setting his hands on her shoulder and back.
"Ginny?" he begged her. "Ginny, are you alright? Ginny, please answer me! Ginny? Ginny?"
But never did she utter a sound, except for a string of curse words, before her forehead contacted with the floor, and then her entire body went limb. He caught her before she hit the ground, and turned her over in his arms.
"Ginny, please, no..."
But she was fading... her breaths game in short, quiet gasps one after another. Her lips moved with words that never came out, words she was speaking in another world to Freddy. TJ had heard Kris cry out. She came to the door to see what was wrong, but before she could get a word out, Kris shouted at her to call an ambulance.
He clung to Ginny, holding her tightly in his arms and rocking her back and forth. He was absolutely petrified, to a state where he could hardly think. He'd just lost his brother, Donovan... he couldn't lose Ginny, too.
He never told her, but... he was in love with her.
How could he tell her? There was never a time! Between running to get away from everyone, trying to protect her from taking the fall for Freddy's crimes, fighting Freddy, and fighting each other; it'd just never been appropriate... besides... he hadn't really realized it until he was sitting on her porch, holding her while she was dying.
The ambulance never made it in time, and it's not like there was anything they could do. Suddenly, her body tensed, and her felt her eyes cringe against his chest. He let her slip back in his eyes, eyeing her face... in the dream world, she must have screamed really loud, because in the real world, she whispered – a hoarse, ragged sound; painful to the throat and ugly to the human ear – she whispered, "Take it..."
"What the—" was all he was able to breath out, before her chest exploded.
Blood splashed out of her, onto his face and chest. Her eyes jerked open, her head lulled back, and her lips stop moving. He looked down at her, and there were four thick claw-marks straight into her heart... Freddy. Kris's mouth fell opened, because he was too shocked and horrified to scream.
It took, maybe, two minutes for her to stop breathing... as the time went on, her breaths became more labored and sounded more and more like water boiling. She even gagged a little, as it drew to the end. All the while, he held her close again, running his bloody hands through her hair and kissing her forehead.
The ambulance arrived after she'd been dead for about a minute and a half...
They took Kris back to the hospital in the ambulance with her. He watched them hook all these machines up to her corpse, and try to resuscitate her, but none of it any good. At the hospital, she was pronounced D.O.A... Dead On Arrival. At this point, Kris broke down. They sedated him, put him in a room, and called his parents...
The next morning, he awoke to see a nurse at his bedside, smiling at him like everything was okay... it wasn't okay, and he knew it instantly. The night before came back to him in a rush, and he buried his head in the pillow, biting his bottom lip so hard he made it bleed. He needed to go come and slice the piss out of his wrist, and he needed to now!
But no; the nurse left the room, brought a doctor back, who urged him out of bed and took him to the morgue to identify Ginny's body. They cleaned her up, closed her eyes, and combed her hair back, but she still didn't look like herself... she was dead, and it cut through him like a knife.
... And he knew he had Freddy Krueger entirely to thank.
Now, as the priest droned on about God and Heaven forgiving "this child" for her "sins", Kris's mind grew very dark. A deep, undeniable anger was growing heavy in his belly... he wanted revenge.
He'd take down the bastard that took down Ginny, if he had to take down the whole world in the process! An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth; he'd find a way, and he'd stop him, the Bastard Son of a Hundred Maniacs... he had every intention, and the rage to fuel it.
Kris was determined to destroy Freddy.
xXx
Back in Heaven, the tour was already underway.
Gabriel had just finished leading Ginny through all of her past lives... amazing; she'd never been used as a shell before! In one, she was a hippie who died in a car accident because the driver had been drinking... in another, she was a renegade painter who caught tuberculosis and died from that... and, in another, she was a poor child in Ireland who drowned in a stream at age eight.
Now, they were moving onto the part Ginny was most eager about, and yet – at the same time – dreaded the very most... meeting with departed relative again.
They were different rooms to separate the reunions with. One reserved especially for your parents, another for siblings (though Ginny only had one, and – as far as she knew – he was yet to pass on), another for aunts, uncles, and cousins, and then again for other relatives like grandparents and friends and such...
Ginny asked to enter the room with her parents in it last. She was scared... scared out of her mind, actually. She was scared of the relative on her mother's side, too... none of them would ever speak to her again after the crimes. On her father's side, she still heard from the family, but they'd but scared to take her in after the crimes for fear of her killing them, too... everyone had.
To the best of her knowledge, her brother was living now with her uncle Ben, her father's older brother. His wife had died of breast cancer a year ago... Ginny went to see her, first, and was greeted with hugs and kisses. She also met her cousins June, who had died tragically at age four, and Peter and Charlie, who were twins that had died at age twelve when one caught ammonia and then other couldn't live without him, in the same room.
She then met both sets of grandparents, who had died of old age and heart failure, in then next room. One of her grandmother's slapped her, and called her "Devil Child", before leaving the room and returning to Heaven. The others were loving, and held no grudge...
In another, she met with friends that had died, besides the ones that Freddy had taken. She wondered where they were, but had neither the stomach nor the courage to ask...
... And, lastly, she met with her parents.
Gabriel allowed her to open the door for herself. For a long time she waited outside of it, fearful of what would pass through her once she passed through the door. The building up of her courage was only disrupted by Gabriel impatiently tapping his foot... finally, she found it within herself, and entered the room.
She found them inside. Her mother, Lucy, was prettied up in her favorite, burgundy dress and subtle make up. Her father had chosen an orderly blue suit for the occasion. They wait, side-by-side, for her. Her mother seemed anxious, her brows knitted.
Ginny crept in, silently. She stood two feet before them, and eyes her parents up and down... they looked wonderful; better then they ever had alive! Not a word was spoken... until, finally, her mother embraced her in a hug. Her father joined only a moment after.
"My little baby," her mother sobbed, and Ginny felt tears come to her eyes.
"Ma… ma… m-ma… m-mommy?"
"Yes, Sweetie, it's me. It's alright. Everything's okay."
The hug ended several minutes later. Ginny stepped back and wiped her eyes, and both women were sniffling. "A-aren't you mad?" Ginny asked, fearfully.
Lucy shook her head, but Ginny's father answered for her. "No, honey... we know why you did it now. When the tour is over, you'll get to meet God... and he'll grant you one question, one and only one, and it can be anything, and he'll tell you the answer."
"We asked him why," Lucy picked up, pausing for a moment to find the right wording. "We asked him why you did what you did... and he told us everything. He told us all about Jeanie and Freddy Krueger. We're so sorry, baby; we didn't know!"
"It's okay," Ginny nodded, weakly. "As long as you guys don't... hate me… like I was so sure you would..."
"We could never hate you, Ginny," her father told her. "Never."
They hugged again, and this time it was even longer then the last, and stayed together chatting for many hours, and Gabriel stood tabbing his foot and checking his wrist watch impatiently outside the door, before he finally came in to get Ginny and told her that they had to go... after all; she'd have eternity to be with her parents, now!