AN: The title sucks, i know
I had been at Cole's the whole fuckin' night.
Hearing that voice taunting Cole and me about things that I did not know of.
I was tired. I must look tired, since I felt so tired.
I could barely see straight.
Cole looked tired too, very tired.
She was 7 am. Today, I was skipping, saying that I was sick, and everyone would believe it. Simon was there, and so was Gina. How fun could skipping be if you did it by yourself?
"I don't know what to do," Cole said.
He does, right Cole? You do know...
"He says that you know, what is it that you're not telling me? Gonna keep secrets?" I yawned.
"There isn't a way, Ben! You get that? There's no way to get him out of your head."
Liar, liar, pants on fire...
"You're lying," I tell him.
"Ben, stop listening to him. That's what he wants. You under his command. Before you know it, you'll be the voice in the back of the head."
I must have overrated him...
"Shut up," I tell the Source, the voice. "But isn't there a way to keep him where he is?"
He buries his head in his arms. "Of course. Yeah, there is. Wait here, I'll be right back," he tells me, the do something that looks like the fairy dust Tinkerbell has.
Tinkerbell?
"A Disney fairy. In Peter Pan. It's a funny movie." Disney cartoons was what we always watched at home, ages ago. Before grandma and grandpa moved in. Before mom got pregnant. When I came in first place.
Why don't you go to sleep?
"I don't think that would be wise." Maybe just shut my eyes for a while?
Yes...
"No. If you think that it's a good idea, then it isn't," I said firmly. Got to stay awake.
My eyelids drop, I put my head on the couch.
Sleep...
Fuck! Gotta stay awake. I can't go to sleep. That's bad.
Music. Phone.
I pull out my phone and start playing Dead Kennedys. Loud. Thank god I chose phone from the quality of the sound and not design. Like Gina, whose sound sucks like hell.
Music. Good. Listen to music.
Can't you just go to sleep? This won't work Ben... You know that, don't you? Go to sleep... Dream sweet dreams... Dreams are nice... Nicer than trying to stay awake listening to...
"It's Dead Kennedys, one of the best punk-bands there was, okay?" I snap. "Dreams aren't nice, they're mean. Tells you things you'd be better of not knowing."
After listening to Dead Kennedys in repeat, trying to stay awake while a voice inside your head tells you to go to sleep, Cole finally returns. He was holding a book, and a glass vial.
"Drink this." He held out the vial for me.
No, don't... Why would you drink it? Could be poison...
I don't give a fuck whether it's poison or not, I'm gonna drink.
I unplugged the vial, and drank in one gulp.
"Say this," Cole said and pointed at a passage in the book.
"Subsisto qua vos es, radix of vox in meus mens."
"OWW!" The pain was like a lightning, spreading to every part of me. Fuck, it hurt!
Owwww! No!
It all went black...
"Take it easy, Ben."
"Ughh." I groggily open my eyes. And blink several times at the bright light. Then I yawn.
"How are you feeling?" Cole ask me.
"Uh... pain."
"Where? Head?"
"Yeah." I try to sit up and everything spins. Cole's got five faces. Haha.
Uhh...
"He's still in there! He shouldn't be there, he should be gone. I... I... He shou..."
"Ben, it was just a subduing spell. He'll stay where he is, there is no known way to get him out of there, seeing as the victim usually is willing,"Cole told me.
"Why would anyone in their right mind want ?"
They want the power that I can give, Ben... That was what Cole wanted, then he started fighting back when he realized that I was about to take over... Funny, isn't it? He's a liar, Ben... Don't trust him...
"What are you going to tell your parents about this?" Cole asked.
"I'll let them come to their own conclusions. Can I sleep here for the rest of the day? Then they'll just think I was at Simon's, didn't call and then skipped."
"Are you sure about that, Ben? Are they, uh, good parents?"
His mother was very good...
The voice sounded as close to a leer as it possibly could.
"Yeah, they are, but I've got three siblings and an insane mother too, I'm relatively normal and old enough to handle myself."
Cole nodded.
"Okay, so I know that that's not considered normal behavior, but it works. I'm independent, and that's good. I've got friends, and good grades during fall and winter." He still didn't look comforted, so I went for the classic. "Fuck off."
Haha...
I went to lay down on the couch, but Cole put a hand on my shoulder and transfigured the couch into a bed.
I gratefully lay down on it.
I was in a cave of some sort.
But it felt wrong, like I was my self, but at the same time not.
It was supposed to be warm, and... blind.
Instead I could see everything, and it wasn't right.
They started chanting, the three sisters. The pale one was mean, she hated my dad. My dad was a nice guy, not at all evil.
One of them was my mother, and she liked me. I was supposed to be with her, and throw the pale one around. That was fun, but the bad music wasn't.
The last of the women was trying to help me, ha, I didn't need help. I had everything.
Now I just needed to destroy them, the woman said. Then she was going to be my new mother, and take good care of me.
I though that I had control, but I didn't. I killed myself. I didn't mean to.
All I wanted was to... What was it that I had wanted?
Elizabeth had my son. She couldn't take him, could she? He was mine as much as hers.
She shot something at me. But it couldn't be true. She couldn't be a demon like she had said. Our son was nice.
He cared about people, and he was sympathetic.
My little Coleridge was my son, and he was supposed to have a happy childhood.
Death hurts. It burns.
I was in a meadow, animals, cattle, was playing there.
Laughing, playing around, having fun, acting like people.
A lamb turned towards me. "Please don't eat us. We're just like you. Sentient beings."
A black lamb turned towards me. "You're a cannibal, if you eat us Ben. You eat yourself."
I opened my eyes, breathing hard.
You're not going to give up meat?
"No, or... I don't know. Don't ask me questions that I can't answer," I snapped.
I check the clock on my phone. 2 pm. School's out soon.
Wonder what sort of food Cole has in the kitchen, maybe some old chinese. And water. Headache. Yet again.
You often get headaches? Migraines?
Why do you care? You're the one causing them.
I take a pill from the Tylenol pack, find the kitchen and swallow the pill with a glass of water.
I was right. The fridge was almost empty, except for old chinese.
Which I eat, then writes a note to Cole saying that I'm going home.
The source think that I should have written it on the wall, with fire. I thought that was a bit too mean. I've got a soul, ha!
Having a soul is just going to annoy you in the end, Ben...
You believe that crap. I don't.
When I open the door to the house, I meet grandma.
Not mom. Why couldn't mom have met me? Then I could just push by her and not give a fuck.
"Where have you been?" she asked.
You're in trouble...
Stop sing-songing and help me here.
"School." How am I supposed to get by her? Who else cou-
Who else is there... Sense...
Right. Um, mom, grandma and no one else. This is gonna go well. Grandma, who would just fuckin' love to skin me, and mom, who don't talk. At all.
"Maybe I should be more specific. Where did you sleep?"
"Simon's. I was gonna sleep over. Didn't you know?" Grandma raises her eyebrows, never really having mastered just raising one.
Get out of here... Nothing else you can do...
You're right.
I push grandma out of the way, got to my room and close the door behind me.
Grandma knocks on the door. "Ben? Stop lying, I know you weren't there. I'm going in."
"No, you're not." I throw myself against the door, using my weight to keep her out.
Can't you lock the door?
No.
"Do you have to be such a teen?" I hear grandma's footsteps as she walk down the stairs.
I slide down the door, and put my arms around my knees. I close my eyes, and lean my head against the door.
How could this have happened?
Because things like this happen to people like you...
Stop being mysterious, you're stuck in my head. And what the fuck do you mean with 'people like you'?
So because I'm stuck in your head, I can't keep secrets?
No, you can't. And answer the question!
No...
Feeling smug? Fuck you.
Someone knocks on the door. Mom.
Great. Just great. Now I have to talk to mom. And then dad. And then grandpa. Why does grandma have to be so grandma-ish.
"Mom, I've been in school and slept over at Simon's, which you forgot since you obviously hate me, okay?" She leaves.
Have you been to the underworld yet?
No, I haven't. Stop pestering me.
What am I gonna do? Seriously.
I'm a witch-
A demon, too...
Even better. The point is that I can't tell anyone, 'cause then I'll have to wear white with long sleeves for the rest of my life.
Bad...
Glad we agree on something. I open my eyes, and at the sudden brightness of my ceiling I abruptly close them.
I'm confused. My ceiling is painted white, it should not be bright.
By the inhabitants of the underworld white is considered bright...
I ignore the voice in my head and open my eyes again. The ceiling isn't bright anymore.
I'm going crazy.
Want to learn telekinesis?
Moving things with my mind? No thanks, I've got enough as it is.
Then what are we going to do? I'd like to go to the underworld, but you'd never agree with that. Wouldn't it be fun to kill a couple of manticores?
I know what I'm going to do. I'm going to visit Aaron.
I sense for him, and then concentrates on getting there.
In the middle of the journey, I get a splitting pain through my skull and, uh, loose focus.
AN: cliffhanger! Hope you like. And this chapter has been beta'd by yours truly, but i've at leats gotten spellcheck to work so it should be okay.
And there will be an update tomorrow.