Going Lucid, A YA Paranormal Page 6

  Malakha rubbed her arms, looking around for something to cover herself because she really didn’t want a repeat of what happened last time, even if it did just turn out to be a dream. She found nothing and resigned herself to having to explore without any clothes on. This time she didn’t call out. In case anyone was around, she would only bring attention to herself. She just began to walk down the cracked sidewalk.

  It was when she was about to reach the end of the street that she saw the first signs of life. A gray tabby cat came out one of the burnt houses and stopped directly in her path.

  Malakha looked at it in annoyance. “Would you move?” she asked.

  “Meow!”

  It stared at her with wide innocent eyes, and if Malakha had to peg an emotion, she’d call it confusion.

  Malakha sighed. “You’re really going to make me pet you aren’t you?” she asked.

  The cat looked at her expectantly.

  Malakha sighed again and started to reach out to touch the cat, but a voice stopped her, a voice that said, “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

  Malakha jumped, turning in the direction of the voice to see a young man standing with his hands in the pocket of his jeans. He had black hair, a very defined jaw structure, and looked like he shaved enough to keep himself from getting a beard, while still allowing a thin mask of facial hair on the bottom of his face. Stubble Malakha guessed some would call it, but it looked too neat for that. His long trench coat mostly hid his form, but Malakha could tell by the way it fell on him that he was also very muscular.

  “Nothing in this world is what it seems,” he said crossing the street to come stand next to her.

  “Well what exactly is it?” Malakha asked.

  He didn’t answer, only looked at the cat, which was now hissing at him.

  “Why is it doing that?” Malakha asked.

  He again didn’t answer, but he did kick the cat into the middle of the street. Malakha started to yell at him for the mean behavior until she saw the cat turn into a large demon type creature, similar to the wolf that attacked her when she first came here, but leaner, more humanoid, and a lot less beastly. The creature hissed at the young man again before running off.

  “What was that?” Malakha asked.

  “Something not even half as scary as the other kinds of monsters that lurk around here. By the way, unless you’re purposely trying to send the message that you want someone to ravish you, I wouldn’t walk around here like that,” he said.

  Malakha had forgotten her state of undress, and the young man before her was doing nothing to draw attention away from the fact that he was appreciating the view. Malakha tried to cover herself with her arms again and got ready to make a run for it so she could avoid a repeat of what happened the last time she was here. That other man… monster… thing… hadn’t been that hard for her to fight off until he turned all beastly and tried to kill her instead, but she doubted she would be able deal with this guy so easily.

  “Relax,” he said and took off his trench coat, handing it to her. “Here.”

  Malakha looked at the offered coat hesitantly before reaching an arm out and snatching it from him. She turned around to put it on, glaring at him over her shoulder when she heard him whistle at her. When the trench coat was secured, she turned back around, feeling like she was in a better state to try to stand her ground against him now that she was at least covered. She sized him up again, this time with only his thin white T-shirt on. She had been right about the muscular part. Normally she didn’t pay much attention to the appearance of the opposite sex, not that she got the opportunity to since the uniforms at school did little to flatter anyone’s physique, but even she wasn’t blind. He was beyond attractive.

  “Who are you?” she asked, focusing back on the more pressing task at hand.

  “Technically since you’re on my turf, I should be asking you that question. But since I’m a gentleman, Julius,” he said.

  Somehow, Malakha doubted he was a gentleman, even if he had given her his coat.

  “Malakha,” she said, hopping he didn’t expect her to offer her hand to shake or something.

  “You’re not from around here are you?” Julius asked.

  “Why else would I be wandering around here naked?” Malakha asked.

  He laughed. “Yeah. That was an indication.”

  Malakha sized him up once more and deciding that he wasn’t a threat to her asked, “Where is this place anyway?”

  “You really don’t know? Where are you from?”

  “Atlanta,” Malakha replied, “But right now I’m at boarding school as a punishment for not believing in religion or God.”

  “Atlanta?” Julius asked.

  “Yeah. You know. Georgia? The United States of America?”

  “Oh yeah. I’ve heard of that place.”

  “Of course you have. Everyone has unless they’ve been living under a rock or something for the last two hundred odd years or so.”

  “Or they’ve been living here,” Julius said dryly.

  “You still haven’t told me where here is.”

  “Simply put. This is Hell.”

  Malakha looked at him blankly, not at all amused by his joke. “Hell?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Sure,” Malakha replied. “Now be serious. Where is this?”

  “I’m not kidding. This is Hell.”

  “Hell?” Malakha asked in disbelief. “You’re serious?”

  “Do you speak another language or something?” Julius asked. “And before you ask, you’re not dead.”

  “I know that,” Malakha said rolling her eyes.

  “What makes you so sure?”

  “Because I did this before. It happened only two days ago and I was just high. I don’t know how, but I guess I’ll eventually wake up.”

  “Before?” Julius asked and then said, “That was you Deverick was chasing.”

  “Deverick? The wolf thing?”

  “It was you alright…” Julius said trailing off and then said, “You came back.”

  Malakha started to ask what he meant by that until Julius laughed and added, “Well we certainly don’t get many of you around these parts.”

  “Many of me?”

  “People who can cross the invisible divide between Heaven and Hell,” Julius said beginning to walk down the sidewalk again.

  “There’s a divide. Wait. Where’s Heaven?’

  “You live there.”

  “I live there?”

  “Well you did come from the other world, didn’t you?”

  Malakha stopped walking and then scoffed. “Trust me. That place is hardly any kind of heaven.”

  “Does it look like this for the most part?” Julius asked gesturing to their surroundings.

  Malakha looked around, and though her world had its share of dilapidation, it was nothing like this barren wasteland Julius was trying to convince her was Hell.

  “Besides, that’s hardly you all’s fault.”

  When he said “you all” Malakha guessed he meant the people on her side of this invisible divide he was talking about.

  “Then whose fault is it?”

  “Creatures like that wolf and cat. Sometimes there are cracks in the divide between our worlds, and they take advantage of them.”

  “Sorry, but there’s nothing like those things running around on Earth… My Earth anyway,” Malakha added.

  “That’s because their hosts do their dirty work.”

  Malakha looked at Julius in shock. “You mean like… like possession?”

  “Is that what they call it in your world?” Julius asked and Malakha nodded. “Don’t get it wrong, it’s not like they can physically come to your world and take someone’s body over. It’s like we can make a connection and through the connection, through the cracks, something can make a suggestion to someone to do something.”

  “Like a puppet master?” Malakha asked,

  “What’s a puppet master?”

 
Malakha shook her head. “Never mind. Just… Well do people show up here often? Like me?”

  “Not that I’ve heard. Not like this.”

  Malakha frowned. That worried her. If people didn’t show up like this often, then there was the very real possibility that she was dreaming all this up.

  “That’s it. I’ve gone crazy,” Malakha muttered to herself.

  “No you haven’t,” Julius said.

  “Yes,” Malakha assured, “I have.”

  “Then I’ll send something back with you to prove it,” Julius said and took a silver pocketknife out his pocket. He held it out to her. “You take this with you and when you wake back up in Heaven and you still have it, you’ll know this wasn’t a dream. You’ll know Hell exists.”

  Malakha huffed, but took it from him anyway. As she inspected the item, she asked, “And why should I trust you?”

  Julius looked at her like the answer was obvious and said, “Because I haven’t tried to hurt you yet?”

  Malakha smirked and raised her eyebrows at him.

  “I know that. But you’re the one who told me that nothing here is what it seems,” Malakha replied. “So what are you really?”

  “What do I appear to be?” Julius asked with a wide grin.

  “You want me to be honest?” Malakha asked.

  “Otherwise I wouldn’t have asked.”

  “Well, you seem like a really nice guy, despite the fact that you seemed pretty pleased to stare at me naked earlier,” Malakha said while tapping the palm of her hand with the knife.

  Julius smiled at her and said, “Well then there’s your answer.”

  Malakha blushed under his gaze, feeling like one of those ridiculous swooning girls she usually rolled her eyes at. Curse hormones and devilishly handsome guys like Julius. Suddenly noticing that he had gotten closer to her and was now invading her personal space, Malakha cleared her throat and began to say something to him to diffuse the awkward tension between them. Thankfully a loud cry, something that sounded like an animal was dying rang in the still air. Both Julius and Malakha turned in the direction of the cry.

  “What was that?” Malakha asked.

  Julius didn’t answer and started to follow the cry. When Malakha began to follow also, he turned around and held his hand out to stop her. She ran into him so that his palm was resting on her chest and he was physically keeping her back.

  “You need to get out of here,” he said still looking in the direction of the cry.

  “Why?”

  “Just trust me on this one alright. Go back to Heaven or your Earth, whatever you call it.”

  “There’s only one problem with that,” Malakha said firmly, not at all liking that someone, who was probably not even five years older than her, was telling her what to do. “I don’t know how.”

  “How did you do it last time?” Julius asked.

  “I don’t know! There was dust everywhere, and I just woke up.”

  “Then try going to sleep,” Julius said continuing to where the noise had come from.

  “That’s stupid. What do you think this is? A TV show or something?”

  Julius rounded on her, mouth in a fierce snarl as he closed the distance between them so much that Malakha could feel his breath on her face. Before he could say whatever it was he was going to say, the cry came again and this time something dark in the sky flew towards them from the distance; something dark and large.

  “What is that?” Malakha asked.

  “Move out the way,” Julius said pushing her and himself aside as the thing, a big ugly bird that looked like a zombie eagle, swooped down on them. Its talon grazed Julius on the arm.

  “What the hell?” Malakha asked.

  “Damn it! I told you to get out of here,” Julius said standing up before grabbing her hand and pulling her up also.

  “And I told you. I don’t know how!” Malakha snapped as she felt the wind of the bird turning around and coming back toward them.

  “Duck!” Julius said. He didn’t wait for her to decide to obey him or not and pushed her forward so that she fell on the ground.

  Then he jumped just as the bird pulled up to go back into the air. Malakha lifted her head to see where he had gone and managed to make out his form on top of the bird as it turned again to come for her.

  “Malakha, stay down!”

  Malakha tucked her head back down just in time to feel the tips of the bird’s talon’s graze across her back. When she didn’t hear the bird coming back, she got up and turned around to see where it had gone.

  The beast was valiantly trying to throw Julius off his back. Julius on the other hand wasn’t letting go and was pulling at feathers on the back of the bird’s neck. Malakha didn’t know why, but Julius yanking the feathers disrupted the bird’s flight, causing it to descend to the ground. It let out another cry, the same one from before that sounded like something was dying except it was closer and louder and hurt Malakha’s ears. She covered them as Julius continued to tug at the feathers until finally the bird fell flat on its breasts, still crying out loudly. If Malakha thought that the bird’s cries had been louder then, they only seemed to get louder when Julius tugged on a feather so hard, he plucked it out.

  With that, the beast fell unconscious and Julius jumped off its back. Malakha hesitantly approached him and the unconscious bird.

  “What did you do to it?”

  Julius didn’t answer. Instead he asked, “Are you always this hardheaded?”

  “Yes,” Malakha admitted. “But this time not necessarily on purpose.”

  Julius sighed, looking past Malakha and into the distance. Before she could follow his gaze to see what he was looking at, he looked back at her and said, “We’ve got to get you out of here.”

  Malakha rolled her eyes. “I told you—“

  “I know what you told me. And I’m going to try to help you,” Julius said. “Let’s assume that this works the same way it would work if someone from Hell made a connection through a crack in the divide. Technically, this is just a temporary form for you. Your real body is back across the divide, so somewhere in that head of yours, you should have some awareness of your world. Can you sense it?”

  Malakha pressed her lips together and tried to tune out the noises of the wasteland. There wasn’t much noise to begin with, only the soft whines of the bird. She waited for a while, to see if she could sense anything happening in her world. After a while she shook her head.

  “It’s not working.”

  “Try again. And find something to focus on and see if you hear background noise or something.”

  Malakha sighed. The only thing there was for her to focus on was Julius’ breathing. Well there was also the bird’s whining, but it annoyed her and broke her focus more than anything. As she focused on the soft barely perceptible sound of Julius inhaling and exhaling she began to hear the background noise. It reminded her a little of being in the farmer’s market back home. It was very loud, but after many visits she had learned to ignore it, made it part of the scenery and atmosphere that she could overlook because it just was. Then she heard Sabrina’s voice.

  “Malakha! Malakha! Malak, she’s not waking up. I knew we shouldn’t have let her take that stupid drug!”

  “Sabrina?” Malakha muttered trying to focus even more on the voice.

  “Who?” Julius asked.

  Malakha didn’t answer him, only focused even more on the voice until it became clearer and sounded less dreamy. In the process, Julius’ voice, which had been clear at first, began to muffle and sound surreal. Then the world began to blur again, and Malakha saw her own world beginning to appear on top of Hell until finally, her world took over completely and she was back in the van, blinking wearily at Sabrina and Malak, both of whom had been trying to shake her awake.

  Sabrina wrapped her arms around her and let out a sigh of relief.

  “Thank God you’re okay,” she said and then pulled away. “What happened?”

  Malakha blink
ed, looking at herself to find that she was back in her school uniform, and Julius’ trench coat was gone. She then looked back up at Malak and Sabrina

  “I went to Hell.”

  Malak and Sabrina both reared back like they had been slapped.

  “Say that again?” Malak asked.

  “I went to Hell,” Malakha repeated, not quite able to believe it herself.

  “Hell?” Sabrina asked slowly. “Malakha, you don’t believe there’s a Hell.”

  “No,” Malakha said. “I said I don’t believe it’s a place you go when you die. I didn’t die. I went to Hell.”

  Malakha then looked at her right hand, which was clutching something smooth and cool. She held out her fist to Malak and Sabrina and then opened it to reveal the silver pocketknife Julius had given her, the knife that hadn’t been in her hand when she first went under.

  “What’s that?” Malak asked.

  “I brought it with me from Hell,” Malakha replied.

  All three of them were silent, not knowing what to say as they stared at the only proof Malakha had that she had indeed traveled to another world and hadn’t had some strange dream.

  Finally, it was Malak who said, “Well this gives entirely new meaning to going to Hell and back.”

  Chapter Seven

  Sadist

  Malakha was really going to have to take some time out of her schedule to call her grandfather so that she could beg and plead to him to convince her parents that she didn’t need these “confessions” sessions. At this point, nothing anyone said was going to make her believe in any kind of religion or God for that matter. Couldn’t she still be a good person without all that? Regardless, she wasn’t being as difficult with the priest today, settling on short simple answers so that they would move along through the session.

  “Tell me Malakha, is there a particular reason why you feel so strongly against religion? An event in your past that may have skewed your perception?”

  Malakha rolled her eyes at that. Why couldn’t people just understand that there wasn’t a reason that she didn’t believe in any of this stuff? There was no trauma that made her a cynic or a disbeliever in the good of the world and God’s grace or whatever they wanted her to believe. She just didn’t. But they would never accept that answer. There had to be a reason.