Be Holden

Chapter 14: Change

Drip! Drop! Drip! Drip! Boom! Boom! Light breaths stroke your neck. Your breaths are light as well in the dark space you are in. You press your hand against the roof of the coffin like pod's lid. It does not move until you push it open with a greater amount of force than your initial contact with it. The lid slowly falls back onto the mud still attached to its hinges. The rainfall slaps your skin and every heavy drop that hits you makes you colder. You look to the side to see the minion shivering and light blue showing through its partially open lids. You get out of the pod and kneel to pick the minion up into your arms. It shakes against you. You stomp through the mud in long strides near the trees. The minion mumbles against your shoulder and you ignore it. You are lost and the rain storm persists with lightning and thunder sounding off in the distance. You find a tree with a cavity at the base of its trunk. The huge cavity is enough for you and the minion to fit in comfortably. Temporarily, you cannot remember the events prior to this point but you hope that it is because that would mean you are close to the manor. Your vision begins to blur and you hear whimpering. You look at the minion who is lying with its eyes closed while leaning on an inner root of the tree. A dizzy spell hits your mind in a constant rhythm. You hear heavy breaths and more whimpering. You are in a daze. The Sun has not left the cover of the storm clouds all this time and now the crickets are chirping. The rain is stopping and the moon is trying to compete with the Sun's veiled image.How long have I been staring at the sky? Your vision blurs again and your knees buckle onto the ground outside of the tree's cavity. A shiver crawls up your spine and you hear heavy footsteps. Your forgotten memories flood your mind.The footsteps approach you but you cannot seem to stop staring at the sky. You force yourself to tilt your head to the left which is the direction of the footsteps. White strands of hair dance as a gust of wind comes from opaque wings, etched with white veins swirling into intricate patterns, stop flapping. "So, you are no longer living but you are not dead. You just exist but you have the choice to stand alone and exist or be my side." Ether says. You look at him and you do not think this matter is as important as the mental healing you need, which is staring at the sky until you get over the fact that your high school sweetheart was surely possessed by something reporting to the overseer of evil and killed you. You know there is no way you could have changed their mind, but you wonder if there is a hint of truth in what your ex-sweetheart told you before the murder and suicide incident.Did I commit adultery unknowingly? Maybe I was possessed at one point just like my old sweetheart.Ether looks down at you waiting for your answer. You have already forgotten his proposition. Your body shakes as you settle with not being able to do anything about what happened to you. Anger gurgles to the surface. "The evil overseer must pay for what he has done to me and someone I cared about!" You exclaim. You did care about your old flame, but you did not ever think the feeling was intense enough to admit vocally until now.

Ether looks at you with a grin creeping across his face. "So, are you going to attempt to take him down alone or will you join me?" Ether asks you. "If I join you, I would be weaker than any being that exists, right? I will not be able to have ample amount of time and energy to improve, right? You are an overseer just like him. There is always a limit to your underlings' ability because you cannot allow them to surpass you in strength or intelligence. You get tired of your underlings and they are disposable to beings like you, right?"

"I am nothing like him. You think you are the only one he has attacked? He broke my skull in that world and took her away from me again! I have had to deal with him far longer than you have. I am just as angry. No, I am angrier than you are. I am irate and fuming. Frostbite is the what I want to give him. I will defeat him and get her back with or without you."

"Why should I trust you when he has already left a bitter taste in my mouth? Even if I help you... won't you just throw me away after you are done with me?"

"I don't see why we can't go our separate ways after we are done. This is a 'no strings attached' deal. I don't want to control you or have you under my thumb. You can exist and fight as my ally instead of an underling."

"Do you even have underlings?"

"Yes, I do but I do not call the beings of the land I watch over underlings. That name does not fit them. They are strong and wise beings. I rather not disclose any more information about them."

"I will not agree to fight beside you unless you tell me something about your followers that would push me to give you a chance."

"Okay...They eat the souls of weaklings that oppose me or get in my way, whenever it is necessary, on their own. Souls give them sustenance."

"Are they here, right now?"

He looks at you. You realize he will not answer your question and decide not to ask him anything else. "I will not join you." You say. His face loses its grin and his eyebrows furrow a little. "The minion is in the cavity of that tree over there. Take good care of it or return it to its master. I don't know...just be nice to it." You say and walk away from Ether.

You find the manor but it looks much different from what you remember. Living flesh covers the main house and flies buzz around its open wounds. There are other homes on the land that have dust and ash blowing off of them. They are charred and trees have cracked their walls with roots that weave through the structures. Vines cover the entrance of each door. You pull the vines off of the main house's entrance door and open it. You see fleshy walls with fresh scars inside. The walls are convulsing at irregular intervals. The inside of this place is different. It does not have stairwells. There are two diverging paths before you and you choose the left one. The dirt on the scratched, old wooden floor shifts as you walk along. You try not to touch the fleshy walls as you descend on the sloping floor. It bends downward and leads to a blood soaked, wooden door that is partially open. You push it open further with your index finger. You wipe the blood smudge on your finger onto your green shirt. You walk in a room visually opposing the outside of it. It looks like a clean, empty warehouse excluding the cardboard boxes scattered here and there. You see the silver haired guy that appeared in your life when the overseer of evil merged with Vincent.

He looks anxiously at the stack of cardboard boxes that come up to his waist. He leans on it for support as his long, hooded black robe slightly shifts on him. He shakes his head and takes long strides to another room. You follow him. It is a bedroom. He feels the air with his greyish-blue hands as if someone is before him. Then his hands collide with each other, and he realizes that he was seeing an illusion. He paces on the floor until he abruptly sits to observe another illusion that is invisible to you. He continues to approach the illusions and gets disappointed after touching nothing repeatedly. Panic is in his normal silver eyes. His anxiety grows with every illusion. You smile. I guess consequences found you before I did. You start to walk away and he grabs your arm. You try to pull it away and he drags you into the bedroom through the hallowed closet to an opened pod. Ishin floats above the pod and a few ghost candles are surrounding her in the air.

He walks past you and subtly moves his arm. The candles disappear and her body floats down into his waiting arms. You shake as a wave passes through you. You cannot define this sensation. You feel a wet, slick fluid drool down your back. He passes you and goes to the bed. He begins to put her on it and you notice a tree root snake itself around her legs. You walk toward the bed with dry lips that slightly quiver. Branches and roots weave her into a wooden orb. "Hold her...but I cannot let her be alone. If you want her, you have to hold me to." He says. "No, I don't want you." You say through gritted teeth.

"Don't make me crush you!"

"You are spiritually too heavy to hold on to."

"Then you won't have her."

"Actually, I already do. She will make me stronger. Thanks for giving her to me."

You chuckle with a new raspy voice and make your way to the front yard to find the overseer with the youthful voice and old body. He looks displeased at your current state. He pulls an animated stone embedded cord out of his pants pocket. It wraps around your neck and chokes you to sleep.