Carter could feel a faint buzz in his stomach. Almost an anxiety. But it wasn't- he knew- it was something else. "You know," the magician said softly, "You never did tell me why you wanted to be my stagehand."
The flapper shook her head. "Your memory's going, Maxy. I took one look at your act- remember?- and told you we were going to make it. I wanted to make it."
"But why?" The question was stupid. He was being stupid. He shouldn't press this far. "Why do you need to make it so bad?"
"Why do you ask?" The reply came out short, a little defensive. And even through his alcohol- induced haze, Carter could tell he hit a nerve.
He paused a moment, trying to figure out what he should be saying. Then realized it didn't matter; Charlie probably just wanted the truth.
And, somehow, that was more difficult than any other option.
The magician glanced up at the ceiling because gazing at partially decayed caulking was easier than looking his companion in the eye. "I suppose...I only ask because I wonder the same thing about myself sometimes."
"Oh?"
"I mean- why do I have to be the Amazing Maxwell? Why can't I just settle down with a homestead or a real job like everyone else? What the hell do I have to prove?" Carter couldn't remember much of what he was thinking when he said that. He must've been drunk, completely blotto. Or else he never would have let her see that far in.
Or maybe...he was simply hopeful.
The air was quiet for a moment then Charlie answered- just as hesitantly as he'd asked.
"That we aren't…I don't know, broken or something."
Her lips barely moved yet the words seemed to echo throughout the barroom like an incantation. A slight rattle sounded from mountains of glassware, bottles and goblets, piled on every available space. Carter could almost feel the ground shudder like the beginnings of an earthquake.
And Charlie looked at him, face scrunched into a mask that the magician could recognize blind. After all-he wore it too.
"Listen," the flapper said, her voice so tight Carter could pluck it like a guitar string. " You want to know why I need to make it?"
"Well. If you're willing to tell me."
Charlie let out the long gust of a sigh. "There isn't much to tell. It's all in the details, I guess-a lot of crumby little things. Like, no one expects a flapper to be a screenwriter, even in this modern age. And especially a Jewish flapper. And even more especially, Winona Pearl Rosenstein's little sister."
She snorted.
"Is it weird that the last bit's the thing that gets to me the most sometimes? Like I swear, every time my Bubbie comes to visit, she's just like. 'Feh! The small one is doing what now? Stage magic? She will die alone. Why can't she be more like her sister?'"
"Feh! Feh! Feh!" The stagehand paused. "Well. I don't think she used those exact words, 'die alone.' And it's not like I even really care what she thinks anyway- I mean I know they're all wrong. I'll prove them all wrong…"
She shrugged, her eyes turning toward the magician at her side "But it grates on you after a little while, you know?"
"I think so." Carter nodded slowly, eyes fixed on some point across the barroom. Was it strange that he knew exactly what she was saying? That for once in his life he didn't feel like he had to scrounge for words? "Charlie... this might be rather out of the blue but did I ever tell you about my brother?"
"You mentioned him in passing. Jack, right?"
"Yeah-Jack." The magician rubbed the back of his neck- which had long since started aching from his position against the wall. "He crossed the Atlantic first, about five years ago. Back when there was all this hooplah about how America was the only place worth living. Anyway he lives up in Corona now-"
"What? Why didn't you tell me? We could've stopped there weeks ago- back when we were still in the area..."
Carter was quiet.
Between the booze and exhaustion, it took Charlie a couple of moments to figure it out. But figure it out she did.
"Oh... So, you two aren't exactly-"
"Nothing like that!" Carter cut in frantically. "We're fine. It's not as though we hate each other or anything. We just...have never really seen eye to eye. Mostly for the same reasons you and your sister don't."
The stagehand arched an amused eyebrow. "He's a stubborn nudnik who thinks anything without grease and spare parts isn't worth his time?"
"Substitute the machinery with cabbages and different breeds of pig and you'd be right on the money." The magician sighed, half in amusement, half frustration. "He names them all after Roman emperors too. Of all things."
"My sister's got a roll of adhesives called Ida B. Tapebell. Trust me, you aren't alone."
"Really?"
"Truly."
"What a mad, mad world we live in." Carter shook his head. "Sounds like the two of them would get along. I mean- not romantically- Jack's already got a wife-"
"And Winnie's not interested in m-I mean marriage. But if your brother needs a pair of steady hands to fix his plow…"
"And your sister is willing to accept payment in roasted red cabbage…"
"Ha! Yes!" Charlie snorted. "Positutely brilliant-we really should introduce them!"
Carter grinned weakly. "I suppose."
That was impossible of course. As far as Jack knew, he'd been dead for over a year. Killed by a train accident in Arizona just as he was beginning to see sense about that ridiculous dream of his.
And yes, the magician knew it was a crumby thing to do.
But he was certain, in the end, the choice would turn out better for both of them. Jack, after all, would no longer have to watch out for his troublesome bird of a younger brother. And as for Carter...well the Amazing Maxwell needed somebody's ashes to rise from. They might as well be his own.
If Jack ever managed to figure it out, to visit a show- or even look at the paper's entertainment section- in memory of his poor dead brother...well, Carter supposed that they both would be pleasantly surprised.
Granted Charlie knew none of this yet. It would take another month and a great deal of stubbornness before the magician finally divulged all the unsavory details of exactly what had happened between him and his brother. All the flapper saw now in the shadowy haze of the barroom was the strange expression that had suddenly taken over her companion.
She gazed at him intently, eyebrows pressed slightly together. "He's the one you want to prove something to, isn't he?"
"Jack?" Carter laughed a little, gaze fixed firmly on the ceiling. "I think I'm more likely to start the pig apocalypse than to do that. Not that you're wrong."
There was a moment of silence. In the corners of his vision, the magician thought he could see something move. Slinking. Shady.
He blinked and it was gone.
Letting a deep sigh slip from his throat, Carter returned his gaze to his companion. "I suppose I've always had a taste for impossible tasks, you feel?"
"More than you could ever know, Maxy."
The flapper's face had suddenly become unreadable in the low light. With a creeping fear, Carter looked about the barroom only to find that the hazy shadows had grown long, inching toward the two of them beneath the tapestry.
"Maxy?"
The magician swung his gaze back to Charlie, finding that he could see her expression again. Wide-eyed and daring. Somehow, she hadn't seemed to notice the shades lapping at her feet.
"Maxy? Could you promise me something?"
He nodded. "Anything."
The Fanged Basilisk's kerosene lamps flickered out.
No.
They couldn't have. Carter remembered every moment of this night and, at no point whatsoever, had the lights gone off in anyway. Not even one.
Yet the darkness paid him no heed. He could hear Their whispers at the edge of his consciousness, searching, pushing for a way in.
"Charlie?" he whispered.
That was when the magician remembered the matchbox somewhere deep within his left pocket. The peculiar gift from one of Zelda's many friends-what kind of person would hand a complete stranger matches? Well. It didn't matter now.
He fumbled for it a few moments then managed to strike one of the little wooden sticks against the side of the box. Sure enough, it sparked to life, providing a few inches of light in the hazy barroom darkness.
He said it again, louder. "Charlie?"
There was a faint rustling in the darkness and Carter swung toward it, brandishing his match like torch. He could feel a faint chill enter his bones.
"...Maxwell?"
The reply was faint but miraculously still audible. The magician leaned forward slightly, following the voice.
"I'm here," he responded. "I'm here Charlie."
His words echoed, splitting the darkness open with a loud crack- like someone's skull breaking in two. And for a moment, he could see her. Eyes wreathed in shadow. Hair turned to ebony flames, blazing like hellfire. She reached for him, a hand gnarled by nightmares grasping at his.
The magician hesitated, gaping in horror at this new version of his assistant-
Then took her fingers within his.
The skin of it- if this was still skin- was cold as ice. And Charlie's grip was hard steel. Dimly, in the back of his mind, Carter wondered if he had made a mistake, but he'd already decided that he wasn't going to pull away now. Not when his hand was the only human thing his companion had left.
"Promise me Maxy..." The rasp of this shadow-Charlie's voice cut through the fracas of his thoughts. Her eyes bored into his, twin fires burning bright enough to produce a hazy film of light between them. "...Promise me that despite everything, we're going to make it."
He could not look away. She had said the same thing that night but, now...everything was different.
"Promise that you won't give up."
"I-" The words remained stuck in the magician's throat. Her face ebbed and flowed like the tide, a moonbeam undone by night. She was fading away and every moment, Carter could feel his hold on her hand slipping.
"I promise." He choked out.
The shadow-Charlie grinned- "Copathetic."- and her smile widened, mouth open to the extent that he could see the shadow leaching into her gums, the points of each tooth elongating, down her gullet into darkness.
Carter stumbled backward but didn't pull away. Rather- he couldn't- the vise around his wrist was as tight as tempered steel.
The woman in front of him- Charlie, his nightmare, whatever- let out a rasping laugh, and leaned until she was but an inch from his face. He could see indigo shadow leaching into the whites of her eyes, turning each the color of the hands that had pulled them from the stage.
The color of Them.
"Charlie…?" he whispered.
The creature opened her mouth and lunged.
Then everything went black.
