This is Episode 3-22 of a serial urban fantasy & paranormal story.

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Part 3-22: Door

The chill in the back of my head expanded, as I continued to be dragged backwards, now in near darkness.

Thinking I may actually want to be a ghost when my body was devoured by a giant tree-crab, I tried to find my way back to my spirit self.

It was easy, because Eden was gone.

I saw it all now, back in the evergrey Clockworld. The crab had half crawled up the house, white walls now wrapped in a forest of plants. A single blue puff of smoke—my poor physical self—about five seconds away from being pulled up to the main body. Tons and tons of vines plugged into the ground; they resurfaced in a ball where the truck used to be.

The creature reared up, three legs looking like they were ready to cave in the roof. Must still be a tasty Deluxe treat alive inside.

Then it froze, and seemed to flinch.

The flinch became a shake, and it crawled off its prize. Vines began untangling, melting off the truck and the house, pulling back so the big blind bastard could stuff them down its throat. It sent vine after vine down there, after something… maybe a bothersome little remote control device that had recently keyed into a cell tower signal, maybe not.

“Yeah yeah yeah,” I said, standing. I could see the truck, and there was a blue hue from within.

Crabby shook and shook, then a white beam of light snapped on, firing out of its eatin’ hole. Solid, blessed wifi. Two tinier beams appeared on different spots of its body, then three more, then too many too count.

“Fuck you, fuck you, yes!” I cried, jumping up and down. Too happy in the moment to be concerned about my physical self, who was practically underneath a now quaking and stomping crab. The wifi sun consumed the monster, and those sparkling jets of light came bursting out again, firing off in wild directions only to slow and curve, then rocket into the giant grandfather clock tower.

The signal burned me too, as it escaped from the creature. So, I popped back into real me for good, now intent on finding Deluxe or Jimena or Dack or whoever.

Darkness again, my ears ringing from the gun blast, my face aching from missing teeth… but I could see the truck’s tail lights, so I hobbled in that direction. Behind me, a snapping, crunching noise that sounded like a tree constantly falling down. Not a shitting vine in sight.

“Jimena! Deluxe! Dack!” I yelled.

Before I could get to the truck, however, the horizon started to throb. Red and blue, red and blue. Through my wrecked hearing, I thought I could make out a siren.

I reached the bed of the truck and slapped on it, calling for my friends. The windows were cracked, and the roof was caved, but it was all intact. As three or five police cars came thundering in, surrounding me and the truck, Jimena’s face rose up from the cabin, tears streaking her eyes, pleading with me silently through the cobwebby ruin of the rear window.

“It’s over,” I said. And she blinked at me, now seeming to notice the swarm of lights and cops.

“Step away from the vehicle, now!” instructed a newcomer.

“At least for now,” I said.
 

 
Small town jails are, as it turns out, small.

And it must’ve been a slow night, minus the terrible ruckus at the Walkerby’s, because only Deluxe and I shared the drunk tank.

She’d shaken me awake; after I’d been in the relatively soft backseat of a police car for about 0.8 seconds, I pulled a classic post-ghost hunt blackout-snooze. There were a pair of charmless prison meals there for us, which I devoured—unsure if the soup was vegetarian, not caring, even when it stung the gap where my molar had been (only lost one tooth, bonus!). Also at some point, they must’ve allowed me to clean up and change into some thematically charmless prison sweatpants. I remembered about the pee and silently vowed to never remember about the pee ever again.

After a thunderous belch and some tearful embracing, I asked, “The others?”

“Didn’t see, they apprehended me fast and wouldn’t answer any inquiries,” said Deluxe.

“Rude,” I said. “Oh, Prime, we are up shit creek ain’t we?”

“We might hope that Constables Roman and Barranco will vouch for our lack of misdeeds, I suppose.”

The mention of Roman sent shivers all through me, and there must’ve been something in my eyes too, because Deluxe gripped my wrists and said, “Tell me what happened out there.”

I pursed my lips and looked around. Outside the iron bars, there was an unmanned desk, a computer, some papers. Voices echoed from further away. The glassy half circle of a security camera occupied a corner ceiling.

“I… is it…” I said.

“Broad strokes, then,” she said. “Is Persi okay? Is… is Dack okay?”

I leaned my head against hers, and murmured her up to speed the best I could, trying not to move my lips much. She was quiet throughout, holding my hand, squeezing it every so often. Her teeth clacked and she squirmed when I got to Dack’s part.

When I was done, we sat like that for a while, until she finally stood up, paced to the front of the cell and then turned back to face me.

“I’m sorry about the wifi,” she said.

“It’s okay, I didn’t think of it ‘til almost too late either.”

“At least you did.”

“Go meee,” I said, miming a weak cheer. My heart danced and galloped, even though my body told me it wanted thirty more hours of sleep.

Deluxe took a step closer.

“How many times did you hear the clock’s hands?”

I rubbed my temples. “Only once for sure. After… after…”

“Can you check?”

“Check? Oh…”

I could check. I could indeed.

But I wanted some rest first, and the hustle and bustle of the station made me nervous, so Deluxe let me snooze until she felt like the place had gone to sleep for the night. Ghost Alena broke out of jail quite easily. She poked around a little, looking for her friends, but had to leave the burning, wifi filled building before it drove her nuts.

Outside, it was past real midnight, according to the digital display clock outside the station. But up overhead, Eden’s clock told me the time was 11:58.

“Two to midnight,” I said.

Which could mean Dack and Persi were okay. Or at least not trapped in a cell, inside that terrible castle.

It also meant Eden would be back.

Returning to jail to pay down some of my sleep debt would be nice, or I could at least discuss what to do next with Deluxe. But like I’d learned before, waiting was a bad choice. Hesitation: don’t do it. So I pictured an abandoned fifth floor hallway, willed myself to be there, and poof, there I was. Fifteen steps from the devil’s door.

I blew out an airless breath, and walked.
 

 

Continued in Episode 4: All Squares are Diamonds

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